CHAPTER TWO

"You feeling better?" asked a sheepish Spike as he scooted closer to Buffy on the black iron bench.

"Not really, no." Buffy sat primly and stared down at her folded hands.

"Didn't mean to upset you."

"I'm not upset," she protested for the fifth time in as many minutes. "I just..." She glanced across at him. "I'm trying to wrap my mind around the fact that they tortured and executed people here five hundred years ago--"

"Three hundred, pet."

"Whatever. They hurt and killed people here, and now tourists want to hear really detailed stories about it from you, and moms and dads bring picnics for their kids and eat right over there by...by that block where they beheaded people. It's sick!"

"Well yeah. It's a tourist attraction. People have died at Disneyland too."

"Nobody's been tortured at Disneyland."

"Never been through 'It's a Small World' have you? Dru and me--"

"Not now, Spike."

He slouched on the bench and scowled at the family seated on benches across the green and eating the sandwiches that had inspired part of Buffy's outburst. One of the Tower ravens sidled closer to the family's children, hoping for a handout.

"I get it," Spike said. "You need a few minutes to get back your appetite."

"Among other things. I need to be alone for a few minutes, please?"

"Sure. You stare at the grass and glower at me for having some fun with the tourists at the expense of people who are three centuries dead."

"Don't--"

"Don't what, Slayer? You're upset, I get that for all that you're saying you're not. What I don't get is how I can entertain a sodding group of strangers with a bit of history, but I can't be allowed to help fix whatever it is that's wrecked your good mood. You were happy enough looking at the...the diamonds and stuff, so it's obviously something I did with the torture."

"Yes, it is," she admitted. "But I don't know why yet. Okay?"

"Fine." Spike gritted his teeth so tightly, Buffy could hear them grinding together. "Let me know when you want me, yeah?"

Pushing off of the bench so hard that it vibrated beneath Buffy, Spike stomped across the grass and startled a raven into flapping frantically to get out of the way. Joining one of its fellows on a nearby rock, the bird ruffled its feathers and cawed after the vampire.

"Sod off!"

Why do I feel like this? Buffy pondered. Why do I feel so... unnerved... about what happened in there? It's not like Spike tortured those poor people all those centuries ago. And it's not as though I don't know what he did do. I thought I'd come to terms with that while we were still in Sunnydale. I mean, he went and got his soul to ensure he'd know good from evil and be able to choose accordingly. His conscience and his soul are every bit 'there' as my own are. So why am I sitting here freaking over him when I know I love him and this is our first day back together? Why am I wrecking this?

"Excuse me?" A tall, well-built woman hurried in Spike's direction. She practically broke into a run before the vampire stopped and stared at her.

"You yelling at me?"

"Yes. I'm sorry, I know it's terribly rude of me, but I'm an informal student of the Inquisition. Might I have a moment of your time?"

"Yeah. Sure."

"Your lecture was better than a horror movie, Mr.--"

"Spike."

"Mr. Spike."

"No. Just Spike." Turning, the vampire sighed and gave her his full attention. "What can I do for you?"

"You've already done it." The woman beamed. "You made me think because you made Alison come alive for me in there. Your story and its horrible details? They resonated with me."

"Yeah?"

"Through your words, I felt what it was like to be confined to the torturer in a way I never have while merely reading about the instruments themselves. You have a gift, Spike. What sources did you pull from?"

He scuffed the toe of his boot in the grass. "Umm, it's been awhile since I was at the books, but I think you can find the details in the Annals of Scotland, Reign of James the Sixth, 1591 through 1603, Part C."

Spike is an historical scholar of torture? Buffy barely refrained from rolling her eyes. Why does this not surprise me? Then again, so's the very mortal woman he's talking to, right? I wonder if she'd be into it if she knew how many demons would be glad to give her an up-close, personal look at being tortured. Once upon a time, Spike was among them.

"For the other stuff," Spike was saying, "try Guiley's book from 1989 and Sidky. Can't remember the date for his work."

"You do know that torture occurred over a relatively short period of time of the Tower's history?" the woman ventured.

"Right." Spike eyed the sky for a moment where the sun was trying to break through the clouds. Strolling casually back toward Buffy, he regained the shadows and safety. His fan followed him. "During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries."

"Yes, exactly. Of the prisoners passing through the tower, only a tiny fraction were ever tortured."

"A fraction more were executed." Spike dropped the fact casually, but the woman flinched. "Ever think about that?"

"Do you know why they stopped torturing people? Was there an outcry against it?"

"A few contemporary critics claimed torture was cruel and ineffective because a man on the rack would say anything to be released. Those critics were right with a few notable exceptions, like Alison."

"Have you other sources you might share with me?" the woman pursued.

"Have you pen and paper?"

Spike scribbled in the notebook the woman pulled from her purse, and Buffy grew bored with the conversation that resumed after he'd finished scribbling. The woman took her leave eventually, and Spike glanced warily toward Buffy. Offering a silent smile by way of apology, she patted the bench beside her and tried to look harmless. Relatively, anyway.

Spike returned to sprawl on the bench and scowl with his legs stretched before him. "Know you were watching, Slayer. Can't tell what you're thinking, but I stuck to the facts. It's all in the history books."

Buffy sighed. "Do you want to hear what I'm thinking, or do you just want to assume bad things?"

"Always willing to listen. Never sure you want to let me in."

He'd shoved his hands into his duster pockets, much too far away for Buffy's liking. Slipping her hand inside, she wrapped her fingers around his.

"I'm not deliberately shutting you out," she protested. "I'm trying to figure out what I feel about what you did with the tourists."

"Yeah?"

She chewed her lip. "In Sunnydale, you always had words while I was still stuck feeling things. Words take a long time with me.

"You're using them great at the moment," Spike observed.

"But this is as far as I've gotten. All I'm doing is thinking out loud. Will you help me work through this to the end?"

Spike stopped scowling and his eyes softened. His fingers tightened around hers inside the duster pocket. "Do anything for you, pet. You know that."

Buffy squeezed his hand. "How weird is it that I'm at the Tower of London with a vampire in broad daylight...cloud light, anyway...and you're making friends with the tourists rather than eating them?"

"More interesting to talk to them," Spike muttered. Sitting up straighter on the bench, he laid their still-entwined hands on Buffy's knee and turned to offer her the same focused attention he'd given the scholar-tourist. "How strange is it that a vampire loves the Slayer and that she's written him all sorts of letters when before she always shut him out?"

She played with his fingers. "I thought I had to do everything alone."

"You still feel that way?"

"No. But the intense way you stare at me makes the Slayer in me twitchy. I feel like prey."

"Sorry." Spike looked away. "That better?"

Laying her hand against his cheek, Buffy gently turned his face back to her. "Don't stop doing it. It's my problem, not yours, and I'll get used to it. Your eyes have always been so expressive whether you were hating or loving me."

Her fingers traced the scar in his eyebrow. "It's kind of scary talking like this without any barrier. Not even pen and paper. I've never let anybody so close."

"Not Willow or Rupert or Peaches?"

"No. I couldn't be the independent Slayer and vulnerable, open Buffy at the same time. You made sense of the silent stuff then, so maybe you can help me make sense of the talky stuff now." Groaning, Buffy fell back against the bench. "I'm babbling, aren't I? Where am I going?"

"I don't know, but keep going."

She laid her arm over her eyes. "I can't. I'm stuck. I told you talking and me are non-mixy."

"How about you think back to when we were inside the torture exhibit. What were you feeling then?"

"You...You said you were going to give everybody the shivers. That's what they were there for. You looked predatory, the way you did when we met inside Sunnydale High. All, 'I'm gonna have lots of fun with you.' I thought you were enjoying it way too much."

"Enjoying what?"

"Making the tourists shiver."

"I see." Spike considered that for a moment. "I used to tell Dawn stories that made her shiver. Like the one about the little girl in the coal bin."

"You were chipped and unsouled then."

"I may be unchipped and souled now, but you know I'm still a vampire. Still dangerous." He gave a shrug. "What's the difference if I'm telling stories?"

Buffy sighed. "I don't know. That's something I'm trying to work out in my mind."

Spike gave her a minute before asking, "Do you think I wanted to hurt those tourists?"

She didn't hesitate. "No."

"Are you sure, Slayer?"

"Oh, yeah. You're a hundred percent more gleeful when you want to hurt someone," she said petulantly, flapping her hand at him.

He tugged on her arm. "Pet, it's difficult to talk when you're languishing like Camille. Could you sit up and look at me?"

"Who's Camille?"

"The heroine dying of consumption in 'La Traviata'."

She sat up and shifted on the bench so that she was facing him. "I haven't coughed or tried to sing to you once."

"Right." Sliding his arm around her, Spike drew her in. "Feels better if we touch while we talk, yeah?"

"Definitely."

"Buffy, have you noticed that from the moment I got this shiny soul of mine, there's been no time for either one of us to learn what it means. We were busy battling the First for a year, and then I burned up. You and the Nibblet went off to Rome to rebuild your lives, while I tried to fight the good fight in Los Angeles. I'm coming to terms with being a vampire with a soul, while you're coming to terms with maybe wanting to have me around. It's never going to be all sunshine and kittens between us."

She looked at him for a long moment. "We'd both be bored if it were sunny kittens all of the time."

"Well, yeah."

She sat up. "You know something else? I'm a dope."

Spike shook his head. "You called me that once. Never forgot it."

"It's me who's wrong. More twitchy than wrong really, about nothing. You didn't do anything bad to those tourists. You didn't even want to. You...you've just got this weird, outrageous sense of humor. Remember just before we fought for the first time when you told me that you liked weapons, they made you feel all manly? You, Mr. 'I've Already Got My Weapon'-vamp?"

He arched an eyebrow. "You were the slayer who wanted to throw yours away. I was just making some pre-fight conversation."

"You were posing. Strutting, even. You wanted me to stare at your crotch."

"Well, yeah. Distract you, then leap on you and tear out your throat. It's what I do. Did."

"I remember those worn button-fly jeans you wore. It was impossible to ignore your crotch or its attachments. Anyway...." She gave herself a little shake. "That was then, this is now. Where was I?"

Spike smirked, his blue eyes danced. "You were staring at my crotch."

"See? That just proves my point, that you have this perverse way of looking at things. I don't mean it's wrong, it's just weird. And you have this...this mind that hoards trivia like black velvet collects lint. You've always been outré--"

"Do you even know what that word means, Slayer? French is not your friend, you were fracturing it the first night I saw you."

"Outré means highly unconventional and eccentric. You used it one night and I looked it up after I got home."

"Well. Think of that."

"Don't get all conceited, it happened only once. The point I'm trying to make is that I've never realized before how outré you've always been without losing your humanity."

The vampire frowned at her. "What's my humanity got to do with my sense of humor?"

"Everything's tied together. Your sense of fair play and not wanting to kill me unless we'd had a fair fight. Your not killing Mom because...why didn't you kill my mom?"

"I like mums."

"See? That's not vampish, it's human. You didn't want Angel destroying the world because you liked the English equivalent of moms and apple pie."

Spike snorted. "I hadn't even met your mum then."

She nudged him. "You know what I mean. Later on, you went all chivalrous. You wanted to open doors for me and kept Mom and Dawn safe for me."

"Wasn't always stalking you when I spent all those nights smoking in your front yard," Spike said quietly.

That earned him the softest of kisses. "You really were my knight in black leather, weren't you?"

"When you let me, yeah. But I still don't get what you're saying about my sense of humor."

"When you're funny, it's a lot more subtle than when Angel or Xander were funny. You're faster, more deadly. You come up with wise things in a smart-assed way. Like telling Angel and me that maybe you're love's bitch, but you're man enough to admit it. I mean, where did that come from at the end of that speech about love being blood not brains?"

"Just say what I feel, Slayer."

"Well, what you say can be lethal. I know I'm explaining this badly. But I didn't get it until just now."

Spike grimaced. "I think maybe you've been watching The Three Stooges all of your life, Slayer. Maybe you've grown up enough to recognize satire when you hear it." He shrugged. "Or at least Monty Python."

"Are you laughing at me?"

"Really not. You've just paid me a very nice compliment. Have to admit I don't see what it has to do with my terrorizing the tourists."

"You were playing with the tourists, not terrorizing them," Buffy proclaimed. "Just like you were playing with my sister when you told her stories in your crypt. You weren't being malevolent, you wanted Dawn's attention. To make her shiver. You weren't reliving the crunch with her anymore than you were reliving the crunch with Alison."

Spike regarded her solemnly but didn't say anything, so Buffy went on.

"What freaked me out today is that you made it real. I wasn't ready for that. But you only used words to do it. Soul or no soul, you could have locked those tourists inside and demonstrated what those torture thingies can do in a much more intimate way. You chose to tell a ghost story instead."

He was still staring at her.

Buffy squirmed. "I told you I'd be thinking out loud. Am I wrong?"

"No, pet. But I've got something important to say, and I want you to think about it."

She braced herself for the worst. "What?"

"Alison and her family weren't ripped to pieces by vampires or other demons. Her own kind put her through it. Men who had the blessings of their god and their government. Men who were dead inside."

Buffy blinked. "Oh, Spike. I didn't think of that."

"If I could make you and the others feel for Alison and her own, it's because Angelus did things like that to me in the early years. I learned to kill at his side, but I did it clean. I've been a monster, Buffy. I still am. I captured children for Dru when she wanted to feed, but I never tortured them. I'm not into the pre-show, never have been and never will be."

She rubbed his thigh, soothing. "I know you're not like that."

Taking her by the shoulders, Spike dug in his fingers hard enough to bruise.

"Will you listen to yourself!" He shook her a little. "Don't do this, Buffy, don't discount it. Don't forget there are still monsters out there, and don't whitewash what I've done. Don't ever make that mistake."

"I don't." Her hands came up to clasp his arms. "But you shouldn't forget that I train new slayers every day and kill some of those demons every week. But you changed, Spike. And then you died and I missed you so badly, it hurt to keep breathing. Even though you've been evil, you've showed me over and over that you're a good man. That's what I remember first."

"No matter how much I change, it undo what I've done. All I can do is stop hurting people and go forward. Make a difference now. Make the right choices today and tomorrow and tomorrow. Anything you see that's good in me, you put it there. But I'm still a monster. Still a vampire. I may not have hurt Alison, but there were others I hurt. I made a lot of people scream and there was so much blood--"

"You'd never hurt them now, and that's what matters."

"That won't bring back Alison or her family."

Buffy shook her head. "You're not responsible for them, but you were responsible for Dawn the summer I was gone. You loved her and took care of her, you bought her ice cream and made her smile. Before I died and after I came back, you were careful and tender and you made my life a lot easier on the hellmouth. Your training helped us survive the First."

"Doesn't matter," he growled and pushed her hands away, made to rise from the bench.

"It does matter." She yanked him back, and while the vampire didn't pull away again, he didn't sit back down either. "Just this week, I've been using your lessons to train the new slayers. You're still helping to keep people alive, help the slayers battle the demons."

She struggled to get the words out past the lump in her throat. "I know you've been an evil vampire, I was there for some of it. You've also saved the world three times that I know of, and I was there for two of those."

Dropping back his head, Spike bunched his fingers into fists. "You're crying again, I can smell the tears. Not worth a Slayer's tears."

"You want to make a date with Vi and Rona and watch them kick your ass for saying that? They cried when you didn't make it out of the hellmouth. You matter to a hell of a lot more people than you realize, and they're still missing you. So stop being broody hair-gel guy number two and sit down." She swiped the wetness from her cheek with one hand and yanked on his duster with the other. "Don't make me rip this."

Spike sat down. "You know I'm going to be bad and rude again in the future. Can't help it. It's what I do."

"So?" Buffy scrambled for a tissue and blew her nose. "I've called you a pig and will again. Maybe you never knew my favorite toy from childhood was a pig."

"So all those times I thought you were insulting me, you really weren't?"

"I was too. Just not as badly as you thought." Sniffing delicately, she drew a deep breath. "Look, I know you're never going to be the civilized-Giles type. I don't want or need you to be. Just be yourself while I try to get some perspective and stop freaking every time you tell a ghost story. It's my problem, not yours. I need to deal with it."

"We'll deal together," Spike insisted, checking that Buffy's fingers were dry before capturing her hand and holding tight. "My turn to talk now since you made me sit back down. You up for that?"

Buffy nodded. "Whatever you want."