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Angels and Demons by TalesofSpike
 
Chapter 7.12
 
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Note: Thanks to my beta t_geyer for her unending patience, perseverance and support.

SECTION 7 - LAKE OF FIRE

People cry, people moan.
Look for a dry place to call their home.
Try to find some place to rest their bones.
While the Angels and the Devils try to make THEM their own.

(Nirvana, Album - MTV Unplugged with thanks to Zanthinegirl for the suggestion)




Chapter 7.12
Wednesday, July 17th, 2002


"So what's this aunt of yours like?" Spike asked as he tugged slightly on where his hand was joined with Buffy's to draw her off to the left of their previous path.

Buffy shrugged. "Okay, I guess."

"So, if worst comes to worst, she'll cope with all the drama?"

"If you mean will she wig if Caleb turns up at the church with a bunch of his hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil monkies, you bet she will... She's not from Sunnydale. She doesn't know that you're meant to ignore these things."

"But she's your mum's sister, right? She'll swing an axe and take care of herself if push comes to shove?" His gaze travelled to the gleaming weapon that Buffy clasped in her other hand.

"I guess... But she's not going to have to... Right? 'Cause we're going to get this all sorted out before she gets here."

"Course we are, kitten," Spike answered as he pushed open a wrought iron gate swathed in dead vines at the graveyard's boundary. "You didn't see any bad guys muckin' things up when we were dancin' in that first vision we had, did you? And now they're pointin' us where we have to go to get everythin' all tied up in a nice pretty bow before your family get here. Can't go wrong when we're gettin' hints like that, can we?" He nodded toward the small pyramid that stood before them. "Told you I'd seen it before."

Buffy paused to look at the Egyptian-style engraving that had been gouged into the lintel above the blackened iron door. A reddish brown disc was centred in a pair of outstretched wings.

"The Winged Sun Disc," Spike's soft tones informed her, as if he had heard her unanswered question.

Buffy twisted to face him and raised an eyebrow. "A hint as to what it means might be more useful."

Spike shrugged. "Take your pick. Some reckon it's to do with rebirth an' the way Isis and Nephthys brought Osiris back to life. Some say it's a sign for Horus, the sun god... that he commanded Thoth, the god of knowledge, that it should be brought into every sanctuary to all the gods to drive out evil. Others reckon it symbolises air and it's used when you want to invoke the protection of the sylphs. The Masons used it as a sign for Jesus.

'For behold the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.

But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as calves of the stall.

And ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your feet in the day that I shall do this, saith the Lord of hosts.'

The Rosicrucians used it as a symbol of 'The Golden Age'. Same as the Egyptian myth, with the Gods coming back to rule over the earth in person and everythin' being all rosy an' bright, but the Christian version. Then some clever Dick decided that the sun god and Satan were the same thing an' some of these lots gave up on usin' it. Had it removed from all their stuff. Like I say, take your pick."

"Are you sure you weren't a watcher before you were turned?" Buffy asked and Spike released her hand, whether from disgust at her suggestion, or to allow her to approach the door would have been anyone's guess, if not for the fact that their bond told her his offence was as false as the attempted scowl on his face.

"Just because you couldn't make ten minutes to check out what it had to say on the internet. Some of us would as soon not walk into a situation blind when we don't have to... though I reckon in this case I'm not much further forward.

Gave the place the once over when I was lookin' for the Gem of Amarra. Door wouldn't..." The vampire's jaw dropped as Buffy took one step back before kicking in the hefty metal door so hard that it flew off its hinges and went skidding down the steps behind it. "Budge an inch," Spike finished in an awed whisper, as he began to follow his mate down the staircase she had revealed.






 

Buffy stepped warily into the chamber of finished stone that they found at the bottom of the long stairway. Both her hands gripped the axe she carried, ready to put it to use at an instant's notice. A flaming torch was mounted on the wall at either side of the doorway where they entered and flames flickered in a shallow brazier at the other side of the room. Unless there was some magic at work, and Buffy conceded that there probably was, the torches would have burned out long ago without someone to attend them. She heard the change in Spike's step behind her as he moved from the stairway to the level surface of the room's floor and the scraping noise he made as he lifted one of the torches from its holder.

Buffy peered into the corners of the mostly bare room as Spike held the torch high. Jars and baskets were clustered in groups in each one as if banished as far out of the way as possible. The light fell upon a curtain of filmy gauze that screened off a corridor leading from the room, but before Buffy could reach it, the insubstantial barrier was pushed to either side and an old woman stepped into the room.

The woman's face was lined with the marks of great age and her skin had the transparent glow that Spike had once associated with the later stages of tuberculosis. Her hair was drawn away from her face, but then spilled past her shoulders in waves of palest grey, but her back was straight and her voice surprisingly strong as she greeted them. "I'd forgotten. I'd forgotten how young she would be. Comes from the waiting. The mind plays tricks." She nodded toward the axe that Buffy still held in both hands. "I see you've found our weapon."

"Well, technically, Faith found it, but close enough," Buffy answered. "Who are you?"

"One of many," the old woman replied before she seemed to reconsider. "Well. time was. Now I'm alone in the world."

Spike moved up to stand at the slayer's side. "I think she was looking for something a bit closer to plain English, pet."

Buffy gave the vampire a grateful smile. "So you're some kind of ghost?" she asked, her eyes travelling over the robes that the woman wore, pretty certain that no one with the woman's pale complexion had worn that style of clothing since before Columbus had sailed the ocean blue.

The woman gave a smile that came close to being a laugh. "No, I'm as real as you are. Just. well, let me put it this way... I look good for my age. I've been waiting." She held out both her hands, palms upward and without any further cue Buffy laid the weapon on them, earning a look of relief from the vampire when the woman's fingers were solid enough to prevent the blade from falling to the ground. "You pulled it out of the rock-."

"Agai-. Ow!" Buffy protested as Spike stood none too gently on her toe.

The woman seemed to wait for the pair to return their attention to her. "You pulled it out of the rock. I was one of those who put it in there."

Spike rolled his eyes. "Was a time when if someone took as long to tell me what I wanted to know as you are, I'd have been pullin' their fingernails out with pliers by now."

This time it was Buffy's turn to kick the vampire in the shins. "Rude much, Spike. Ignore the King of Instant Gratification, here... not that time isn't at a premium.

What is it?" she asked.

Again the woman smiled as if haste was something that had become little more than a vague memory. "A weapon. A scythe. Forged in secrecy for one like you who- I'm sorry. What's your name?"

"Buffy."

"No, really."

Spike smirked, earning himself a sidelong glare, but when Buffy shrugged the woman continued.

"We forged it in secrecy and kept it hidden from the Shadow Men who-."

"The who?" Buffy interrupted.

"Those who bound a demon into The First Slayer and bound her to the earth, forcing her to fight the creatures of darkness for them. Those who decreed that when she died the curse would fall upon another and when she died upon another and another. And they became the Watchers and the Watchers watched the Slayers. but we were watching them."

Spike's nose twitched slightly. "So you're like the Internal Affairs of the demon world?" He reached out and roughly grabbed the woman's arm, pulling her away from the curtain and propelling her halfway across the room. He grabbed the axe with his newly free hand in the instant he let the old woman go, tossing it back to Buffy and backing off until he was close enough to take the woman by the hand again. It all happened in just a fraction of a second but Buffy was ready and waiting for Caleb when he ripped down the semi-transparent curtain.

"You went and ruined my dramatic entrance. It was a real heartstopper," he accused Spike.

"This thing?" Buffy asked, her question aimed at the ancient, though she never took her gaze from the man before her. "This is what we needed to hurt this guy, right? That's why he wants it so bad. Because it can stop him?"

Caleb made a grab for the axe, but Buffy refused to relinquish her grip, gritting her teeth with the effort as he lifted her from the ground.

Her foot lashed out, a wickedly pointed boot catching him on the kneecap and Buffy found herself standing on solid ground once more. She swung out and hit her opponent on the side of the head with the stake-like end of the axe, drove the tip of the blade into his gut as if it were an old fashioned can opener and then she drew the weapon back, slashing across his body with the width of the lethally sharp blade.

"It's the only thing that can truly hurt him." The woman gasped as Spike jerked her sideways and stepped around her, just in time to drive a knee into Caleb's gut as the cleric grasped at the wall for support, the ferocity of his lunge for the old woman having driven his fist through a foot thick stone pillar and bringing the column crashing down in a cloud of dust.

Spike darted backward before The First's priest could make a grab for him, but Buffy brought the axe blade smashing down into Caleb's lower back as he moved to straighten up.

She gave a smug grin as he slumped to the ground, his spine obviously severed and a huge gash exposed as his fall ripped the blade from his flesh. The smile faded as the man's bones began to knit together before their eyes. Buffy was so mesmerised by the rapidly healing damage that she failed to see the hand that shifted to grab her foot and yank it out from under her until Spike gave a belated warning.

"You must separate his head from his body or cleave his heart in two," the grey-haired woman called out.

"And you couldn't tell me this earlier?" Buffy asked before she rolled to her feet, taking a brief second to rub her bruised pride as Caleb also picked himself up off the floor.

"Can't you see, girl?" The preacher's drawl was as patronising as ever. "You can't stop me. I can just keep going back for more. It's like being reborn."

Buffy lashed out with the axe aiming for Caleb's neck, but this time he seemed to be playing things slightly more warily.

He ducked under the blow, avoiding contact, but Buffy continued on the offensive, swinging, slicing and thrusting. Caleb seemed to effortlessly evade every attack and Spike had his hands full just keeping the old woman out of the way of both combatants.

When their circling finally brought the vampire back to the stairway, he pushed the old woman toward the steps. "Get out. Hide. I'll track you when we finish with Pat Robertson, here."

"I can't..."

Spike barely registered the old woman's words as he watched the former clergyman draw Buffy into what his instincts screamed was a trap.

All Caleb's weaving and dodging had ceased. He smiled and stood upright presenting himself as a perfect target. Too perfect.

Buffy swung the axe in what would have been a beheading blow.

Without even a sideways glance, Caleb's hand darted out and grabbed the axe-shaft in mid-swing, stopping it cold. In that instant his other fist crashed into Buffy's jaw so hard that she flew backward into the opposite wall, the impact raising a cloud of dust and numbing Buffy's arm from the elbow down, so that the axe tumbled from her fingers.

Spike stepped forward and swung the torch he carried like a club. The blow was hard enough that the torch broke in two, its flame doused as the top half rolled on the dusty floor.

Caleb gave a howl of pain and frustration as Buffy reached the axe, grabbed it and flipped back to her feet.

Spike threw down the splintered wood in his hand and grabbed the other torch from the wall. "What the hell do you mean you can't?" he yelled, rounding on the old woman who had climbed no more than half a dozen steps, as Buffy and the preacher battled on.

"I can't leave the pyramid. My life has been extended by years beyond number but if I leave the shelter of Isis's sanctuary then time will have its due."

"All you had to say was you'll die if you leave," Spike growled, seemingly allowing his impatience with the old woman's long-winded speeches to distract him from the fight. However, when Caleb found the vampire's turned back to be too tempting a target, Spike's back kick demonstrated that appearances could be deceptive, connecting crunchily with the preacher's kneecap before he was close enough to land a punch. Even with his back turned, Spike could see every move through Buffy's eyes. He had deliberately offered himself up to allow Buffy a breathing space from Caleb's relentless assault.

"Just keep her safe, Spike. This is my deal." Buffy sounded tired, but there was a determination in her voice that he was familiar with.

He gave a curt nod. He knew that sometimes there were things you just had to do on your own. He took a few steps back into the stairwell. "He's all yours, starshine."

 

 

 

With thanks to C and her daughter Q for identifying the inscription on the pyramid. And also to Google and http://www.seanet.com/~raines/disc.html.
 
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