A/N: Thanks to our wonderful beta, Immortal_Beloved :)


Eventually, Spike’s battered, weary, malnourished body ran out of tears.
 
His shattered heart, however, was still filled with them, bottled up inside, crying out to be poured forth with his pain, his despair, onto the grass where he knelt beside the lake.
 
But what was the use of his tears?
 
He rose slowly to his knees, his arms crossed over his chest as he stared blankly out over the crystalline water sparkling in the moonlight. Now that the initial shock had passed, his mind was trying to work it out -- to make sense of it somehow -- how he had come to be here, a slave again, when only hours ago his freedom had been restored to him.
 
Questions swirled around in his mind, seeking elusive answers that refused to fully form. How could this be happening to him? Hadn’t Giles meant to *help* him? Was the Watcher responsible for this? Did he even know Spike was here at all?
 
Every time his thoughts neared the truth, Spike’s mind seemed to shut down, refusing to know it, refusing to acknowledge that he was really here, really enslaved once more -- perhaps in a worse position than he had held even in Siron’s possession -- and most likely at the command of a man he had trusted to help him.
 
He couldn’t think about it; it hurt too much. The questions flooding his mind overwhelmed him, exhausted him, until finally he stopped trying to figure out how things had come to this and allowed his thoughts to shut down until his mind was filled with a numb, grey fog.
 
By the time he both smelled and sensed a recently familiar human slowly, calmly approaching, only one question still filled Spike’s mind. He looked up at the man through dull, despairing eyes, lacking the energy even to rise to his feet, as that single question escaped his lips in a low, rasping whisper.
 
“*Why*?”
 
Ethan Rayne just stood there for a long moment, regarding the broken vampire pensively. Then a slight smile rose to his lips as he replied quietly, “Because you were getting in the way, Spike.”
 
Spike shook his head in confusion, staring up at the sorcerer through wide, incredulous eyes. “In the way of *what*?” he asked, his voice hoarse from screaming and crying, breaking slightly over the words. “I’m a bloody wreck! What in the bleedin’ hell was I getting in the way of?”
 
Ethan gave him a little sideways half-nod, acknowledging the apparent accuracy of his words, before answering the question with a frank honesty that Spike would not have expected from this man who had already so thoroughly, pitilessly deceived him.
 
“Ripper’s plans for his Slayer.”
 
At the mention of Buffy, Spike felt his throat close up and tears prick at the backs of his eyes, but he fought them back, unwilling to allow Ethan to see him break down again. Still, there was a suspicious sheen in his blue eyes as he glared up at the man in frustrated confusion.
 
“What plans?” he demanded as a dark, frightening thought occurred to him. “What plans does he have for Buffy?”
 
If Giles was capable of such deception…was it possible that he might even be willing to betray the girl who had been like a daughter to him for so many years?
 
“Plans for a normal, happy life,” Ethan stated, emphasizing the words with a patient smile, a knowing look of sympathy in his eyes as he added, “A life that does not happen to include love-struck vampires to muck it all up and ruin her chances at little things like *marriage*…*family*.”
 
Spike flinched at the words that had filled his own mind on more than one occasion, his head bowed as he swallowed back a sob that rose in his throat.
 
“I want that for her, too,” he whispered in a low, desolate voice. “I don’t even *want* to see Buffy. The Watcher *knew* that!”
 
“You don’t want her to see *you*,” Ethan corrected, the words striking home with vicious accuracy. “Isn’t that what you mean, Spike?”
 
The vampire could not bring himself to respond.
 
“But eventually…you would have changed your mind,” Ethan went on casually. “Ripper knew that. That’s why he wanted to be sure that you were out of the way. That’s what I do for him, you know…the reason why I’m still in business, despite the fact that the bloody do-gooder organization he runs knows all about me. I do him a favor every now and then…and he turns a blind eye to my…well, less-than-reputable activities.”
 
Spike looked up at him, frowning with confusion. His head still felt fuzzy and numb, his thoughts slow to connect. As the sorcerer began to explain, Spike found his gaze drifting out over the water again as he struggled to focus on what Ethan was saying.
 
“If he has a problem that he needs to…well, to disappear…he sends it my way, and I see that it’s never heard from again…except by paying customers,” Ethan smirked, and the cold, predatory look in his eyes started a sick sensation deep in Spike’s stomach. Rayne’s tone was darker, subtlety menacing, as he added, “You’re one of those problems, Spike. Or rather -- you were. You’re no one’s problem anymore. You’re no one’s…but mine. You may not like the way things have turned out, Spike. In fact, I‘d be rather more worried if you did…but you belong to me now, and you will do as I tell you.”
 
Spike’s gaze found its way back to Ethan’s, the traces of his little remaining defiance glittering in his eyes as his jaw clenched with repressed anger.
 
“And if I refuse?”
 
Spike felt a perverse sense of satisfaction, however slight, at the anger he saw rising up in the sorcerer’s eyes. It gave him a vague, nearly insignificant feeling of control to be able to break through that terrible calm, that utter self-possession Rayne had, which was more frightening in many ways than the violent, raving rants in which his former master had indulged so often.
 
“If you refuse,” Ethan answered quietly, his voice still carefully controlled, a cold smile pasted onto his face despite the fury in his eyes, “you will swiftly learn that it is in your best interest not to do so. That bracelet you’re wearing -- just like those worn by every slave in my possession -- is covered in magicks, Spike. Not only will it prevent your leaving my property, but it will also inflict severe punishment for any disobedience.”
 
Spike stared down at the metal ring on his wrist, his raw, bloodied fingertips picking at it again, though this time the action was idle as he no longer expected to be able to remove it himself.
 
“It will not come off either,” Rayne confirmed the conclusion he had already reached. “Not unless I decide to take it off.”
 
“Which I don’t suppose you’d ever be inclined to do.”
 
Ethan smiled indulgently, shrugging his shoulders. “You’ll find it’s really not so bad here, Spike,” he said in a soothing, reassuring voice that was as false as the smile on his face. “You’ll be well fed and well rested, and you won’t spend your nights in chains…well, unless you’re working and the customer desires it. And I’ll be certain that your previous wounds have healed and you’re physically able before I’ll be putting you to work. My customers are not allowed to inflict any permanent damage either…”
 
Spike looked up at him sharply, disgust in his eyes. “Yeah…tell that to those soddin’ humans who were cuttin’ up that poor bugger upstairs.”
 
Ethan’s smile took on a dark, evil glint of amusement as he pointed out, “He’s a vampire, Spike. They didn’t take his heart -- so he’ll recover. And that sort of thing…that’s not the ordinary way of things, not at all. I reserve the fulfillment of those sorts of requests only for the slaves who are most rebellious and disobedient…those I wish to punish.”
 
Although Spike did not want to let the man see it, his words had their desired effect. His previous slavery had him thinking not of escape, but of ways to ensure that he pleased his new master enough to avoid such vicious, sadistic punishment as he had seen inflicted on the vampire being sacrificed upstairs.
 
All at once, he realized the nature of his thoughts and what that said about his own mindset…and a deep anger began to boil up inside him, a dark resentment for those who had brought him to this place of slavery and submission.
 
“So the magicks…all linked to you then, are they?” Spike guessed after a moment, not looking up, his gaze focused carefully on the bracelet. In the same low, almost casual tone, he added, “S’pose something were to happen to *you*…what would happen to the bracelets?”
 
The man moved more quickly than Spike would have thought possible and, in an instant, had gripped his hair, yanking his head back at an awkward angle, exposing his throat in a move designed to make a vampire feel most vulnerable. The conditioning of Spike’s former slavery made him react by freezing, not daring to move, rather than by fighting as he once would have done.
 
“You’ll never get the chance to find out the answer to that, Spike,” Ethan informed him in a deadly soft voice, crouching beside him and gripping the wrist that bore the magic bracelet as he explained.
 
“A built in factor of the spell is that, if a slave should ever attempt to harm me or any of my customers in any way, the bracelet will administer a severe punishment...painful enough to incapacitate the slave for…well, a full day at least. And that’s not to mention the secondary punishment I would personally choose to inflict in recompense for the loss of that day.”
 
Spike tensed as the sorcerer moved in close, and he could feel his breath against his ear as he added, softer still, “I hate to lose money, Spike…and I can assure you that a lost day of *your* time due to your being incapacitated in such a way would be quite a loss indeed. I should be quite displeased with you if that were to happen.”
 
As he spoke, Ethan’s grip on Spike’s wrist tightened, and the vampire gasped as a deep, fiery pain shot from his wrist up his arm. He tried to pull free, but the sorcerer whispered a Latin word, still near his ear, and suddenly he could not move. Just when Spike was sure that he was going to be overcome with pain and panic, Ethan released him suddenly, standing up straight, and Spike’s body was his own again. The pain vanished as well, as suddenly as it had come, leaving the shaken vampire trembling with shock.
 
“You will find that I am not a man you will wish to cross, Spike.”
 
Subdued by the pain and fear of the last few moments, the vampire did not respond, his eyes downcast, gasping for breath as he struggled to recover.
 
“Take as much time as you need to allow your mind to adjust to the idea,” Ethan went on mildly, glancing up at the dark sky. “However, if you’re not in by half an hour before daybreak, my men will come out and bring you in. And if I think that you had an attempt at suicide in mind, Spike…I will not be pleased. And in addition to the punishment you’ll receive, I’ll reset your bracelet to prevent you from leaving the building.”
 
Spike’s heart sank with those words as they stole away the one remaining option he had held in hope.
 
Even the ability to end his own suffering by ending his existence had been stolen from him.

*************************************

“Okay. Is this the result of getting directions from Andrew, or is this lake *supposed* to be here?”

Melinda laughed at the senior Slayer’s words and the skeptical expression on her face as she nodded toward an area several yards away from where they stood along the boundary of the lake they had just reached.

“It’s supposed to be here. We have to go the rest of the way by boat,” she explained. “Hope you’re not too tired from the walk because now we’re gonna have to row.”

****************************************

When Ethan Rayne had been gone for a few minutes, Spike finally found the strength of mind and energy to rise to his feet again. He had no doubt that the invisible boundary tied in to the bracelet on his wrist went around the entirety of the sorcerer’s property, but some part of him -- well-buried under the weight of his recent suffering, but still present - was clinging to a last shred of hope that there simply had to be *some* way out of this place!

He walked along the edge of the lake, wondering how far out into it the boundary lay, until he had passed the water. Then, he continued walking slowly along, testing the perimeter of Ethan Rayne’s property, gauging just exactly how much area there was in which he was free to move about.

It took him a little less than an hour to reach the spot where he had started out.

He glanced in the direction of the building he had fled earlier that night, a listless expression on his face, his eyes aching and scratchy from the torrents of tears he had shed. He no longer felt like exploring the grounds -- not that he ever had felt like it to begin with -- but he had even less interest in returning to the dark, frightening place where others, slaves like him, were being tortured and used by Ethan’s human “customers”.

With nothing else to do and a couple of hours yet before dawn, Spike sank back down on the bank beside the lake, his knees drawn up in front of him, his head pillowed in his arms across them.

And he found that his body had managed to replenish its supply of tears.

**************************************

In less than an hour, the five Slayers in the two boats were nearing the far edge of the lake.

Buffy found herself strangely pensive, and all of the girls had fallen silent, aware that they were drawing nearer to a place that held great danger for them, if they were not cautious.

It was perhaps this silence that allowed Buffy to hear the faint sound that touched her ears…the sound of…was someone crying?

“Do you hear that?” she asked in a low voice, barely over a whisper.

“Hear what?” Melinda frowned, squinting as she peered at the far bank shrouded in the darkness of the pre-dawn hours as well as the fog that was rising over the lake in the cool night air. “I didn’t hear anything…”

“Shhh!” Buffy hissed, frowning, her oar going still in the water as she listened for the sound she had just heard again.

************************************

Spike raised his head and cast a morose glance out over the lake, mostly concealed now by the short-lived fog that the coming morning would consume. He wished in that moment, more than ever, that he would just be allowed to stay out here until the impending sunlight reduced him and his suffering to ash.

But he knew that was far too much mercy to expect.

Suddenly, he went very still as he heard a faint sound out on the water. A soft, rhythmic splashing sound. It could be a fish or a water bird of some kind -- except for the steady timing of the splashes. He rose to his feet and edged closer to the water, staring out into the cloudy blackness that even his night vision could not fully penetrate; and the longer he looked, the more certain he was that he could see movement out on the water.

Someone was on the lake.

*************************************

Buffy’s attention was focused on listening for the crying sounds she had heard which seemed to have faded away. At any rate, that was why she was taken by surprise when Melinda hissed behind her.

“There’s something over there,” she whispered, her voice low and intent. “Do you see that? On the shore?”

Buffy looked…and she did see a brief flash of movement through the mist, a shadowy figure moving nearer to the edge of the lake. Then, for just a moment, the mists shifted and she got just a moment’s clear view of a head of bright blond hair above a black-clad form.

Her heart briefly stopped.

*It can’t be…he’s dead…I just…I just *want* it to be…so much…*

But as the boat drifted closer to the shore, the figure only became *more* defined instead of receding into her desperate memories as she had expected.

“Ready,” Melinda whispered, drawing her attention.

Buffy noticed with alarm that the girls had all drawn their weapons and were preparing to fire. Panic seized her as she glanced back toward the male form, apparently staring out across the water as if searching for something, and realized that the girls were preparing to shoot him.

“No!” she said in a sharp whisper. “Hold your fire!”

“Buffy?” Melinda frowned, clearly uncertain.

“I said *hold your fire*,” Buffy snapped, her voice still low, her eyes fastened on the decreasingly distant form, and she now imagined that she could see the glint of dark blue eyes in the moonlight…though at this distance, it was impossible.

But as the boat drew nearer to the shore, her heart began to race with the knowledge that somehow the impossible had come to be. As much as she knew that he could not be there…there he was, standing on the shore, staring back at her, apparently unaffected by her presence…or perhaps too stunned by it to venture a reaction at all.

*He’s dead. He’s dead…it can’t be…can’t be. Buffy, don’t do this to yourself, it just *can’t be*!*

But it was.

It was Spike.