Chapter 11 - Bad and Badder


The Watcher’s Journal of Sir Arthur Gosnard-Tisklin.

Brontley, January 3, 1901, continued. I was nearly gone when the deadly leech was ripped away from my neck.

Dazed and weakened, I watched as the Slayer fought the vampire that had nearly drained me of life, indeed nearly drained me of my very soul. The hell fiend was dark haired, large and heavily muscled. Perhaps he had been a farm lad in life. Even in the unlit village, his evil eyes glowed like nasty yellow plates of fire. His movements were clumsy, but his blows were powerful and hard.

At first, the Slayer danced around the creature, punching at him lightly, drawing him out, tiring him and confusing him. Then, too soon, she engaged him in earnest, landing blow after blow to his neck and face and chest. To no avail, I realized. His strength was far superior to her own – he had every advantage – height, weight and the reach of his long, powerful arms. He beat her brutally, pummeling her lovely face as she continued to fight gamely. One blow to her torso sent her sailing through the air to land in front of the church.

She staggered to her feet and disappeared into the church, where the demon would dared not follow, leaving me to the mercy of a soulless monster. ≈§ ≈ § ≈


***


Spike rolled out of bed and went looking for his mate.

Buffy sprawled on the couch, surrounded by a stack of books. She was chewing on a pencil and wearing one of his black tee shirts and nothing else. The shirt came to the bottom of her cheeks, which peeked out when she jiggled her leg. She was only pretending to study in order to brass him off. He did not appreciate being ignored by his mate.

His mate looked particularly fine this afternoon. Her skin was smooth and tanned from the sun, her softly glowing nails tipped in pink polish and her golden silky pelt of hair, streaked with white and tawny brown, tumbled around her shoulders. She was tiny, but perfectly formed. He could have done much worse picking out a mate for himself. If he wasn’t already in love with his Dark Rose, he might find himself seriously tempted by this girl.

As it was, Buffy was getting too close to becoming a necessary part of his life. He enjoyed these quiet moments, as well as their fights, entirely too much for a man who was supposed to be in love with Drusilla. He needed to remind her of her subservient role as his mate and remind himself that he’d only mated Buffy in order to wreak violence on the denizens of Sunnydale with impunity.

Her tender lips turned up into the tiniest of smiles.

Couldn’t let that continue. He sat down next to her and knotted his fingers through Buffy’s hair and tilted her face up to his.

“Enough studying. Your Master wants you.”

She yawned and pushed his hand away. “Busy. Got a test.”

He guided her hand to his cock, which was hard and throbbing for her. “No more books. Master is hungry and horny.”

“Mmmm,” she said and scrambled onto his lap. “Horny.”

He locked his hands around her neck and stroked her neck with his fangs. He daintily sliced her skin and licked up the faint line of blood.

She started. “What time is it? Ohmigod, it’s noon-thirty. Why’d you let me stay so long? I’ve got to get out of here. I’ve got class. I’ve got homework.”

“Not so fast, ma petit crème brulee. I didn’t give you permission to go. You’re staying right here to keep me from getting bored.”

Buffy shoved his chest and broke free. Before he could grab her again, she leaped up and jerked on her leopard spotted pants, which required some jumping around to get her legs in since her pants were skin tight. She didn’t bother to look for her panties which had a habit of mysteriously disappearing when Spike was around. “Drop deader, Spike.”

“Bugger! I’m the master here. You’re supposed to fetch and carry, give me supper and keep me from being sexually frustrated and not be running off whenever you please.”

Buffy snorted. “As if, Spike. I may be your mate, but in no way, shape or alternate dimension are you my Master.” She pulled her wrinkled top on over her head. Ewww. This impromptu sleeping over at Spike’s lair had to stop. She looked like a skank. She ran into the bathroom, combed her hair and brushed her teeth with Spike’s toothbrush. That definitely had to stop. “Also, the mate thingy is strictly temporary, too,” she called out.

Spike followed her into the bedroom. Had Buffy found out that the claim would expire with the next full moon? That would spoil everything. He’d claimed her and she wasn’t going to slip through his fangs. It was up to him when the claim expired and he wasn’t ready for it to expire. “Claim’s permanent,” he blustered.

“Have a nice nap, Spike. I’ll find you later. You’re coming shopping with me tonight so I can keep an eye on you. Don’t want any extracurricular biting on my watch.” She kissed him on the cheek and flounced out of the bedroom.

“I’ve half a mind to call up your Watcher,” he shouted after her. He stalked into the main room to continue the argument, but she ran outside into the burning afternoon sunlight and banged the front door behind her.

“Bloody hell! Buffy’s my mate. I bit her. I claimed her, and the teasing little bint won’t even stay around in the afternoon to help me out with my post-nap hard-on. She wouldn’t mind me even after I’d yelled. This whole mate thing is not turning out at all the way it’s supposed to. She’s supposed to be at my never-ending beck and call, hustle up my smokes and booze, give me a drink when I get thirsty and put out anytime I feel like getting laid.”

He checked the living room bottle of booze – empty. He tossed it into the fireplace and returned to the bedroom and took a swig of Jack from his bedroom bottle.

“Comes and goes just as she pleases, except when she’s pissed on warlock juice, nags me about cleaning up the house, bitches because I don’t keep a clean towel for her. Said I wasn’t half the vampire that wanker Angel was and threatened to send me straight to Vampire Hell as soon as she got the chance. It’s not right. Not a bit of it. Mates are supposed to be respectful, loving, cowering and insatiable.”

He smirked. “She is insatiable.”

On that happy thought, he decided to get dressed and go out. It was too early to go outside, but he could make his rounds in the sewers, get his work squared away so he’d have more time to spend with his mate. He went into the bathroom, rubbing his cheek. Little bit of beard springing up. Should he shave or give her a razor burn tonight on those sweet, inner thighs?

“Wifey’s attitude’s not the worst of it. I’ve gotten used to her hanging about, enjoying her company when she isn’t on her high horse about something.”

It was a bit of all right to talk shop with her - how to kill a Kertzsmek demon when you didn’t have a weapon handy, or how to avoid crossing into an alternate dimension by accident or how to fight off a six-pack of fledglings, although she claimed she was killing them as her Slayer Duty and he killed fledges to keep them from horning in on his feeding ground. When he’d gotten drunk last night and cried about losing Drusilla, she’d stroked his hair and cried with him and even said she liked him. Course, she’d been wonked out of her mind on Cave Cola at the time. She’d probably forgotten all about his breakdown, which was good.

He’d give her a break and shave.

“My own doing, it is. Been lurking around on my own too long. Solitude’s making me soft, vulnerable to the Slayer’s prattle and wittering about. Been at loose ends since Dru left, no one to hunt with, no one to take care of or talk to, and most of all no one to shag. So, the first girl that comes along, I grab her for my mate, no matter how badly intentioned and grounded in menacing evil that grabbing was, and now, well, I’m feeling friendly.”

He cut himself shaving, cursed, licked his own blood off his fingers, splashed his face with water and threw the plastic razor on the floor. Never get used to these poncy razors. Needed a good straight edge like the old days. Good straight razor was useful for shaving or slitting throats. You could cut a head, vampire or human, clean off with one good stroke with one of those.

“Doesn’t matter what she does.” As soon he got the minions well in hand and his position as Master of Sunnydale solidified, he’d let the claim expire and send her packing. No, he’d kill her. “Yeah, that’s just what I’ll do.”

Damn it. Bint’s been using my toothbrush.

He returned to the bedroom and pulled on his jeans which were lying in a crumpled heap on the floor next to the bed. He drained his bedroom bottle of whiskey and tossed the bottle against the far wall, tucked his fags into his coat pocket and planned his night.

“First, check up on the minions and send them out to hunt, while I keep the Slayer otherwise occupied in a completely different part of town. Got to remember to make the minions pick up a couple of girls for me to drink.”

He wasn’t that hungry, since Buffy had been so accommodating last night, but he’d insist that his minions bring him home a fresh victim or two, so they’d remember their place.

“Oh yeah, look up Rosamund and dust her for killing Bob’s brother-in-law. Shame to dust such a lovely slut, but Bob’s probably good for some merry cash in return for promptly executed vengeance.”

Maybe Buffy would like to take in the dog races over in Isla Vista while his vampires were hunting? If he asked her for a date, would she go out with him? After he got through with the minions, he’d stop by that little flower shop down the street from the mansion and pinch her some daisies and ask her out. Yeah. Show her that her Master could be a good sort if she cooperated.

***

Back at her dorm room, Buffy took a shower and crammed her stuff in an overnight bag – tops, pants, pink-strappy sandals, thongs, lace teddies, perfume, handcuffs, batteries, toothbrush and her best bath towel - then headed for the University library to find Willow.

Buffy found Willow sitting at one of the big tables, surrounded by stacks of books, copying her class notes in various colors of inks, sorted by importance and alphabet, with a liberal sprinkling of asterisks, footnotes, highlighting and underlines.

Buffy plopped her overnight bag on the table and sat down gingerly. She really had to talk to Spike about the wild sexiness and the importance of pacing one’s activities and not overindulging in Slayer blood. She adjusted a pink chiffon scarf around her neck.

“What’s with the overnight bag, Buff? Another Slayer Vision Quest in the desert with the Big Rasta Mama? Does Giles really do the Hokey Pokey?”

“No. Yes. Will, have you got anything on the claim yet? How to break it?”

Willow glanced down at the mathematical calculations printed on Page 294 of Maxwell’s Demon and Twisting Time to Suit Yourself and avoided looking in Buffy’s eyes. She hadn’t researched anything about the claim since her conversation with Giles, and Giles hadn’t informed her of any developments. “Not yet. I sort of had to write a paper about Seventh Century Aitutaki Tribal Drum Rituals.”

Buffy nodded, and to Willow’s surprise, didn’t exactly look disappointed.

“I’ve got to do something about Spike. I can’t fight him as long as the claim is active, so I’m going to have to stay with him all the time so I can keep him from feeding. I think he ate that Jack guy from the pub.” While I was out cold from the potion Jack gave me. Serves him right if Spike did eat him.

“Jack sorta deserved to get eaten after turning half the campus into Cave Persons. Are you sure you have to stay with Spike all the time? He sleeps during the day, doesn’t he?”

“Not as much as I thought. He gets up and roams all over town in the sewers, spreading cheery darkness wherever he goes. He put together a pack of minions that I had to dust. Hence, the overnight bag. I’m moving into the mansion so I can watch him.” And, so I can max out on Spike sex before Willow figures out how to break the claim.

“Oh, Buffy. This is horrible. Spending all that time with Spike. At least, you’re not drinking any more beer and having sex with him.”

Buffy blushed. “Right. No more Foamy.”

“Good. Well, I’ll keep looking for a way to break the claim. Say, when Spike claimed you, what exactly happened? Maybe there’s some detail we’re overlooking.”

More Fiery Red Buffy Face. “Like what? I don’t remember exactly.” She remembered exactly. Spike – tongue – orgasm – biting - another orgasm. She picked up one of Willow’s note pads and fanned herself.

“Like what he said and what you said and what he did and what you did after what he said.”

“Well, he … with his tongue … and, then, he bit me … and then, I … I was sort of confused, you know from the potion … and he said ‘Mine’ and I said ‘Yours.’”

Willow transcribed the essential points of Buffy’s conversation in blue Flair pen in her red notebook. “Tongue, bite, confusion, mine, yours. Okay. That’ll help us.”

“Us?” Had Willow been talking to somebody about the claim? Somebody like Giles?

“Us! As in -- Buffy you, and Willow me -- us.” Whoa, almost tripped up. Buffy would be furious if she knew that Giles knew that Buffy told her and then she told Giles and Giles told her not to tell Buffy that he knew because she told him. She sighed with relief when Buffy left a few minutes later to track down Spike.