thismaz | Bewitched, Chapter 8

I got some lovely news this morning. Ice-cream won at the Running with Scissors Awards, in the Undead American category - best vamped Scoobie. And that makes me wonder, how would you spell that, "Scooby" or "Scoobie"?

Anyway, there are some really good winners there. You should go and have a look.

And it's a long weekend. Somehow I got all the way to leaving work on Friday, before I knew that.
Work colleague, walking out of the door: "See you, Tuesday. Have a good weekend."
Me: "Uh, yeah, sure, see you."
Colleague, looking back over her shoulder: "You do know it's a bank holiday on Monday, don't you?"
Me: "Duh!"

Meanwhile, back in a version of season 2...

Title: Bewitched, Chapter 8
Pairing: S/X
Rating: This chapter - PG-13
Summary: When Valentine's Day arrives, Dru dips her finger in the brew and gives it a stir.
Word Count: 2,640
Betaed by

sparrow2000 and DJ, with many thanks. Thanks also to Sparrow for her help with conflabbing on plot twists and forms.
Comments: Are greatly appreciated, loved and cherished.
Disclaimer: here.

Prologue here, with a link to the other chapters, or you can find the whole thing, in reverse order, in tags.

Chapter 8

Giles frowned. "What you did was extremely foolish and dangerous."

Xander hung his head. "I know."

It hadn't been a painful lecture, by the standards by which Xander judged such things, but it certainly hadn't been pleasant. When he first entered the library, Giles was busy tidying up the checkout counter. He looked up as Xander came through the door and for a split-second Xander thought he was going to smile. He didn't. He simply put down the date stamp he was holding and turned away. Xander hesitated, unsure of what to do, whether to leave and hope that Giles had calmed down after another night's sleep, or whether to stay.

The idea that Giles didn't want to talk to him, made Xander's stomach clench. As a result, when he walked around the edge of the counter and came out into the main part of the room, Xander felt himself sag with relief.

"Xander," Giles said. He sounded stern, but not as angry as he had the day before. "How are you?"

That was Giles, always polite, even before ripping you a new one. Giles raised an eyebrow in interrogation and Xander realised that he hadn't been asking a rhetorical question. "Um..." Steeling himself, Xander took one more step forward and stopped, clasping his hands together in front of himself. Giles simply waited. Xander realised that his hands were twisting together so he forced them apart, shoving them into his pockets and rocking back on his heels. "Um... Look... Er, Giles. I, I'm sorry. I know you're really mad at me at the moment, and I understand that I'm in trouble..." He paused to take another breath. "And whatever you decide, I'll not argue. Because I know I screwed up. And, and, I'm sorry..." he trailed off and lifted his head to look Giles in the eye, being a man, like his dad said he should.

And that was where it got really unpleasant. Giles didn't shout. He remained calm. He didn't even appear to be annoyed. But by the time he was finished, Xander was left with an overwhelming appreciation of just how disappointed Giles was, which was worse than any display of anger. If Giles had yelled at him, Xander could have got mad in return.

Eventually Giles paused, his lips pursed thoughtfully as he studied Xander. "Why do I get the feeling that you'd be happier if I said you were grounded for life?" he asked.

A number of replies flitted through Xander's mind and he felt a giggle threaten, but the situation was still too uncertain for joking so he fought the urge back. "Like you were my dad?" he asked instead. "Er, I think you might be a bit too young for that."

Giles' eyes widened, and yes, that was definitely a softening of his frown. With a huff, he clapped a hand on Xander's shoulder and Xander ducked his head as his stomach twisted again, with pleasure this time and hope that maybe the worst was over.

"I am hardly in a position to condemn you," Giles continued. "I was angry because I never wanted to see you," he made a vague sweeping gesture with his other arm which Xander interpreted to mean he was referring to all of them, not just to him, "making the same mistakes I made." That made Xander look up and stare, and Giles' lips twitched. "I know you think of me as an old man," he said, ignoring Xander's earlier statement, "but it might surprise you to learn that I was young once. And I too made foolish and dangerous mistakes."

He became serious again and the sudden shift in tone reinforced for Xander the importance of what he said. "It's because of that that I worry about you all. I do know how seductive magic can be." He paused, his eyes leaving Xander's and focussing on some point beyond, then he sighed and seemed to pull himself back from a private memory. When he spoke again, he was his usual firm, no nonsense self. "However, I also believe you are too sensible to allow that to happen. Let this act as a warning to you. Learn from it and I have every faith that you will be okay."

During the course of the lecture they had somehow edged across the room to the table. Xander pulled out a chair and sank into it, determined to live up to Giles' assessment of him. "I know I messed up," he said. He looked up at Giles. "I know you broke the spell. You probably saved my life."

Giles pulled out the chair next to Xander's and sat sideways on it, his right arm resting along the back. "Magic always has consequences," he explained. "In most cases, breaking the spell is enough. On other occasions there is a backlash. And some spells have layers. Breaking the obvious enchantment doesn't reverse the whole. It leaves the rest of the spell untouched." With a sigh he leant sideways against the back of his chair, looking tired. The lines on his face, the ones that gave him such character, were more deeply etched than usual.

"What kind was this?" Xander asked tentatively.

Pulling himself together, Giles sat up straight and twisted in his seat so he was facing the table. He reached across its width, pulled over an open book from the far side and turned it around so he could read it. He pointed at some hand-written notes in the margins of the page. "I don't know," he said. "Amy took a basic love spell, but she added to it, mixed in some new elements and I'm not sure what they were for." He stopped speaking and Xander found himself watching Giles' hand lying on the page, fingers tapping as he thought.

He was just beginning to consider how to frame his next question when Giles spoke. "I think if you told me about it, it might help," he said. "Can you describe everything that happened?"

"Everything?" Xander gulped.

"Everything you remember about the spell and everything that happened as a result of it. I saw the mark on the floor; I could still read it, even though someone," he gave Xander a look over the top of his glasses, "did their best to wash the evidence away."

Xander shrugged ruefully. He'd known that they hadn't managed to clean the strange circle away completely, but he'd been sure that no one would notice the faint outline that was left, unless they were looking for it. Giles obviously had been.

"It was a composite of the masculine and the feminine," Giles said. "That's, uh, odd for a love spell. As a male supplicant to Diana, the sign should normally have been the feminine alone. As I said, I don't understand these additions. I need you to tell me everything you remember."

Xander slouched down in his chair with his head back, looking up at the ceiling, his hands resting on his thighs, and tried to remember every detail of the spell. He started hesitantly, describing the jars of herbs and powders, the beaker on the Bunsen burner and the marks Amy had drawn on his chest. As he spoke he found that the memories became clearer. He described how the lights had swirled around the room and how they seemed to suck him into a vortex where he could almost see and touch someone else, but never quite did. Finally, he described how the marks on his body had disappeared, once the spell was finished.

Looking over at Giles, he asked, "Is that what you wanted?"

"Yes, it's certainly a good start," Giles agreed. "There are some strange elements there. I'll have to do some more research. Am I right in thinking that the effects were not immediate?"

"Yeah, Amy said it would start working when the moon set. So I helped clear up the mess and went home. But it didn't work. At least it did, but not the way it was supposed to."

Taking a deep breath, he told Giles about what had happened the next day, how every girl, except Cordelia, wanted him and how, when it turned nasty, he'd had to run and hide. Looking at Giles, he sat forward and rested his forearms on the table. "Could it have made me to do something I didn’t want to do?" he asked, once he'd described how he'd rescued Cordy, their run to Buffy's house and how they pushed their way inside. He hoped that a question might divert Giles, while he considered how much more he was going to tell and how he was going to tell it. Giles was being very understanding, but he needed to ease himself gently towards any thoughts about the rest of the evening, let alone speak about it aloud. He would prefer to avoid it altogether, but he didn't know which bits might be important.

"Why, what did you do?" Giles asked, looking suddenly nervous.

"Nothing!" Xander's fingers curled and dug into his palms. "I just wondered... I felt... I mean... I did it for Cordy... but..." He paused to take a breath, like he was always advising Willow to do when she stumbled over her own thoughts. The difference was that Willow tripped over her words because she had so many thoughts. Xander felt like his had all gone on vacation. Possibly to Canada. "I, I suppose I must have loved her," he said.

Giles obviously heard the question in Xander's voice, because he smiled reassuringly. "Maybe not 'loved'," he said cautiously. "But you must certainly have fancied her. And from my observations, I would hazard a fair degree of lust."

Xander felt himself blush. 'Fancied', he thought. It was an odd word. "You make her sound like a chocolate cookie, or a bar of candy," he said. Pulling himself back to the original subject, he continued, "But that's the point. I don't. I mean... I can't remember why I did."

Giles' gaze suddenly sharpened and he pulled the spell book nearer again, running one finger down the handwritten notes in the margins of the page. "Do you remember feeling attracted?" he asked.

"Yeah, sorta. I mean... she's beautiful and I remember... but I don't feel it now."

Giles gave him a searching look, but didn't press for more. "From what I've understood of this spell," he said, "Amy tried experimenting. She claims that she doesn’t know what her additions would do, or what they were for." His expression made it clear that he didn't believe that assertion.

After a moment's silence, during which he continued to read, he smiled and, although it looked forced, his voice was reassuring. "I do know that it didn’t change you," he said. "That, at least, is clear. You are still the same Xander you were before. The basic structure of the spell is unchanged from the original. It didn’t attempt, and couldn't have succeeded, in making you do anything against your nature, or your will." He paused, perhaps noticing Xander's dismay and Xander did his best to look reassured, rather than alarmed. Giles continued more cautiously, "It might have encouraged certain natural desires," Was that a question in his voice? "exaggerated them, as it were. But there was no element of direct compulsion involved."

Xander threw his hands up and leant forward to lay his forehead on the table. "Shit!" he exclaimed, only belatedly realising that by doing so he had pretty much given the game away.

He sat back up and looked at Giles who had a slight smile on his face, as if Xander had just done something amusing. "Angelus caught me last night," he said and there was some satisfaction in the way the smile immediately disappeared, to be replaced by an expression of shock.

"Are you alright?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. Sort of. Drusilla grabbed me from him, before he had a chance to do anything permanent. She was definitely under the influence of the spell. But then, then Spike arrived and Spike was..." He took a deep breath. "Spike was like Drusilla and all the other women," he said. "And so was I. With him. And it had to be the spell, because last time I saw him he was trying to kill us and there was no love there. But this time... It was like we never questioned it, um, well, until after."

"So that's what you meant by me saving your life?" Giles still looked concerned.

Xander nodded. "Yeah. I felt the spell break. And it was like I'd been in a dream and I suddenly woke up." He stared down at his hands. "I ran." Looking up at Giles again, he added, "And he can't, so, so I got away. I, I don't think I stopped running until I was back in my room with the door locked."

He tried for a smile and Giles smiled back. "I'm very glad you're safe," Giles said. "Thank you for trusting me enough to tell me this."

Ducking his head, feeling suddenly shy, Xander mumbled, "I thought you'd guessed, anyway."

"I think it would be more accurate to say that I had suspicions and was concerned, but I didn't realise how close a call it was. I thought you'd possibly met with Larry and..." He stopped speaking and plucked his glasses off, rubbing his eyes with both hands. "Thank goodness I was able to talk Amy into co-operating," he said, his voice muffled. Dropping his hands from his face, he placed his glasses carefully on the table. "I dread to think what would have happened if Spike had got close enough to bite. I'm fairly certain that under the influence of the spell, he would have turned you."

*****

Across town, in a warehouse long abandoned by the packaging company that built it...

Spike looked up when Angelus threw his cards down on the table between them and stood up. "You're no fun like this, Willie," he said. "You're pining. Stupid boy, just because you're stuck in that chair, doesn't mean you have to go without." A crafty smile twisted his lips. "Tell you what," he suggested, "how about I go fetch him for you? Won't take you long to break him." Adding casually, "His name's Xander."

Spike growled. Trust Angelus to drop that little gem into the conversation, as if he didn't know how Spike had been fretting. "Sod off!" he snarled. "You leave him alone. I don't want you anywhere near him."

In spite of that assertion, he considered Angelus's proposal. He imagined having the boy, Xander, delivered to his bed. He remembered Xander laughing in the hotel and tried to put that laugh on the face of the boy in the bed. He tried to make the boy smile shyly up at him.

It didn't work. He didn't want Angelus to force Xander to come to him. He wanted Xander to come on his own. Snorting silently, he thought, "Romantic fool," with disgust for his own weakness. Not that it mattered; if he ever agreed to Angelus's suggestion, Angelus would take great delight in twisting his promise. Reason enough to refuse. The boy, Xander, would probably be delivered dead or already turned, Spike's grandsire's childe. Stupid bastard wouldn't be able to resist the temptation. "I'll fetch him myself, as soon as I'm out of this blasted chair," he said. "You keep your mitts off, okay!"

Laughing, Angelus raised his hands in a gesture of surrender, taking a few rolling steps backwards. "Easy, tiger," he said. "Alright, he's yours. No big deal. It's not as if I want him. I told you, I'm more interested in women, or girls in this case. You fetch him whenever you like." Turning on his heel, he sauntered out of the room.

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