~ Revelations ~
by Hellmouthguy
e-mail: hellmouthadmin@thehellmouthrevisited.com
My story archive can be found at: www.thehellmouthrevisited.com

Disclaimer/Summery: See Part 1

Warren burned.

His flesh was melting away; what remained of it hung from his body in charred, bloody strips. Blood dripped from his eyes as well, and his nose, and his mouth, bubbling and boiling as it collected in pools on his coal-black, scabrous skin, and the flames consumed it. Warren's clothes had burned down to a few smoking rags, adhering grotesquely to his body in places like tattoos, and the hair on his head had burned off, leaving only a few stiff, wiry, smoking tufts clumped here and there in patches like the smoldering remains of a forest blasted down to a desert. His body had begun curling in on itself as it hung suspended in the air like some scarecrow made of kindling wood, his muscles involuntarily contracting as the fire scorched them. He smelled like cooking meat.

The fire consumed him greedily, eating his flesh away with an almost deliberate fervor, as if some intelligence guided it. Warren's bones cracked and split, the sounds echoing perversely through the dark room, as that demoniacal, inexhaustible fire, not satisfied with his flesh alone, bit into him ever deeper, like some feasting wolf, hunting for new flavors and textures to add to its meal. Smoke rose from Warren ceaselessly, black mingled with red, as his blood, super-heated, actually turned to steam in places, and to the cracking of his bones the sound of his flesh sizzling and popping like bloody meat on a skillet was added.

And he screamed: he screamed endlessly, only stopping at intervals to catch his breath. The screams had started as hideous, ear-splitting shrieks, but had almost immediately resolved themselves into a series of plaintive, mewling, whimpering noises, much as some captured animal might make, as he soon lost the strength to scream.

Thor stood in front of him, watching. Thor's hand was on the hilt of the hunting knife he kept in a scabbard on his belt.

At the other end of the cold, shadowy basement room, Willow sat on the floor, holding Faith in her arms, and she caressed Faith's cheek, and looked down into her eyes. She had gently entered Faith's mind, like walking into a warm, familiar house she had visited many times before, and taken her pain away, and calmed her down. Faith looked up into Willow's eyes now, and didn't look away, as Willow gently held her gaze, and concentrated it in herself.

"I love you," Willow whispered. "I love you, Faith. I love you. I love you."

Faith looked up into Willow's eyes, and held on to her, as tight as she could. Faith wasn't crying anymore, or shaking. She felt tired...like she wanted to sleep.

"Go to sleep now," Willow whispered, as she caressed Faith's cheek, and touched her mind in a certain place, and gently put her to sleep. "Go to sleep, and Auntie will make it all better. In the morning it will be all better."

As Faith looked up into Willow's eyes, she felt her own eyes beginning to flutter closed, and she began to yawn.

"That's it, baby," Willow whispered. "That's it."

Faith curled up against Willow's breasts, and went to sleep.

Willow didn't move. She held Faith in her arms, and caressed her cheek.

But part of Willow was with Warren.

Not a very large part; only a tiny portion of her attention. The lion's share of herself went to Faith--to making sure Faith felt safe, and warm, and loved. But Willow remained aware of Warren: she carefully noted every moment of his suffering, and every kind of degradation his body endured as the flames began the infinitely slow process of his unraveling, his utter destruction. The flames would consume him, lash him with pain, but they wouldn't destroy him. They would burn him away, eating his flesh, cracking his bones, but they would keep his mind intact, so he could understand what was happening to him and feel every second of it, and every bit of its intensity. His eyes would burn but his retinas would remain undamaged, so he could see the smoke rising from his body, and the flames as they licked at him, running up and down his flesh like rivulets of lava down the side of a volcano; his nose would bleed ceaselessly but he would still be able to smell his own burning flesh; his lips would blacken and shrivel and crack like two strips of bacon and his throat would burn hoarse, but he would still be able to whimper; his nerve endings would be charred but not destroyed, so he could feel the pain, and it wouldn't be numbed in the slightest.

He had been burning for less than five minutes. The flames wouldn't stop for ten hours.

The flames were only the first circle. There were six more after that.

Willow had killed him with Seven Hells, and she intended for him to feel every second of it. She wouldn't allow anyone to prevent it...

"Thor," she said.

Thor turned to her. His hand remained on the hilt of his knife.

"I know you're thinking about killing him, to end his suffering," Willow said, without looking up at him. She was still concentrating on Faith: she was going in now, exploring all her places, ascertaining the extent of the damage. It would take time to heal her.

Willow looked up at Thor.

"Don't," she said. "I'm warning you. Don't."

"This is...unseemly, Willow," Thor said. "It is beneath you. In torturing him, you debase yourself. I would not see you debase yourself so."

"He's mine," Willow snarled, her face contorting as she said the words; becoming ugly. "I killed him with Seven Hells and every fucking second of his suffering belongs to me. If you try to spare him I'll never forgive you. I'm drawing a line. If you cross it, you and I are finished."

Thor looked stricken, when she said that; his face blanched, and his eyes grew moist. But just as much as her words, it was Willow's tone that struck him, that hit him like a closed fist: she sounded harsh, cold.

He still hadn't taken his hand from the hilt of his knife.

"Decide what matters more to you," Willow said. "Your code of honor, or me. You, or me. I put myself, my morality, above my friends when I took that oath not to kill again and here's what it fucking got me. I wanted to make it easier to live with myself, I wanted to be able to not have to think about hard stuff like life and death. So I came up with a nice, easy rule so I could congratulate myself on suddenly being this wonderful person. I was full of shit. When you're in a war you have to make hard decisions and I was tired of having to make hard decisions. So I came up with a nice, pretty-sounding cop-out. No killing. Except I have killed: I killed all my friends when I let that piece of dogshit over there live. I had chances to kill him a dozen fucking times and I didn't. He had exactly one chance to kill all my friends and he didn't hesitate. In 2009 the people I love are dead because of him. If I manage to get us all out of this? There's gonna be changes. No one ever fucks with us again. Now, you have a decision to make. What's more important? Your code of honor? Or having me in your life? Because you might think killing him will save me, and maybe you're even right, but you'll lose me. You'll lose me forever if you try to deny this to me."

Willow prayed Thor wouldn't try to kill Warren...because she didn't want to lose him...and she knew she would, if he tried to take Warren away from her. She knew she would cut Thor out of her life, irrevocably, forever, if he tried to take Warren away. She felt a cold, black thing inside her gaining power and she knew that thing would never give an inch; it had decided it wanted every single second of Warren's suffering and it had laid out its terms to Thor and if he tried to gainsay it, the black thing would forget Thor, deny him...forever. The black thing was cold and alone, and it was used to being alone...

Thor took his hand off the hilt of his knife, and turned his back on Warren, and walked away.

He walked back to Willow, and looked down at her. Suddenly, Willow didn't feel like she could meet his eyes.

"You ashamed of me now?" she said, softly.

He knelt beside her, and raised her chin, so he could look at her.

"No," he said. "But I'm worried for you."

"I need...I need a place for Faith," Willow said. "She's gonna need a lot of healing and I can't do it all here, it'll take too long. For one thing she lost a bunch of teeth, and growing teeth back in an adult takes hours. If Tara were here she could do it all quicker, but she's not here. Plus she's got some broken bones and her wounds are getting infected. I'll need the whole night, at least. We need a place."

"We can take her back to my halls."

"No, she's freaked out enough, what do I say to her when she wakes up in Asgard? Plus she's scared of Loki and you know how he likes to bother me. I'm thinking like a hotel maybe. Grab that jacket over there? Warren always carries a big wallet stuffed with cash. I didn't notice it in his pants pockets."

Thor looked around, found Warren's parka, and brought it back to Willow. She fished through the pockets, and found Warren's wallet, his glasses with the red lenses, his cerebral dampener, and his wand.

She crushed the cerebral dampener in her fist; it exploded in yellow sparks and fell from her fingers in a stream of glittering dust. She tossed the glasses away, and put the wand in her coat pocket. Warren could time travel; if some other version of him from some other point in the time stream ever attacked her she wanted something of his, so she would always be able to locate him. She opened the wallet. It contained a substantial wad of cash, and a driver's license and a credit card, both in Warren's name. He was a wanted felon in 2009 but not in 1997, so he could use plastic here with impunity. Willow assumed he had manufactured both the card and the credit line and that there would be quite a lot of money on the card. She thought she might like to buy something nice for Faith, before she left her...before she had to send her back out into the cold, without a home. She thought about giving Faith all the money in the wallet.

But Willow knew she couldn't...she couldn't risk damaging the timeline. Faith was supposed to have nothing...so Willow couldn't let herself give her anything...no matter how desperately she wanted to. She felt something in her stomach: a spasm, a twinge of cold, when she thought of what she would have to do after she healed Faith; when she thought of sending her away, back out on to the street, alone. When Willow let herself think about it, she felt like crying. She stopped thinking about it.

"We're in business," Willow said. "Okay, help me get her to the chariot, and then I gotta get to a drug store, and then I gotta find a phone book somewhere so I can start calling hotels."

Thor nodded, and lifted Faith in his arms, wrapped in his cape, and silently carried her up the stairs, and back to his chariot. As they climbed the stairs Willow put a glamour around Warren; it would disguise him as part of his surroundings, essentially camouflaging him. He would look, sound, smell and feel like part of the room to anyone who happened by. It was even better than invisibility. No one would hear his screams, no one would ever know he was there, even if they were standing right in front of him, even if they bumped right into him. Willow smiled, as she watched him disappear. It was like she had put him in a drawer. She would leave him there until she was ready to take him out and use him again.

After that Willow put the Viggo Mortensen glamour back in effect around Thor, made Faith look like a sleeping kitten, made the chariot a Ford Mustang again, and also put a glamour around herself to disguise the smell of piss, and they were off to the nearest drug store, an old-fashioned place on the corner of Huntington Avenue down by the colleges that still served milkshakes and root beer floats from a soda fountain behind a long, art deco counter, and stayed open late because of the college kids. Willow bought rubbing alcohol to disinfect Faith's wounds, and she found a phone book and a payphone in the drugstore too, and spent the next ten minutes making phone calls while Thor looked after Faith in the chariot.

It was a Thursday night and most of the hotels in Boston were booked up. Willow wanted to get Faith cleaned up and start healing her as soon as possible so she couldn't be picky about the accommodations; when the Westin Hotel in Copley Square had a room available due to a last minute cancellation she took it even though it was a single. Money certainly wasn't an object; Willow had counted more than four-thousand dollars in Warren's wallet and she knew the credit card would be loaded too.

"Okay, handsome, let's go," Willow said, as she came out of the store with the rubbing alcohol. A few college girls from the art school down the street had wandered near the chariot, and they were standing on the corner, staring at Thor like a bunch of hungry crocodiles eyeing a scrumptious little frog while whispering and giggling to each other. He was Viggo Mortensen at the moment, which Willow thought was maybe about sixty-percent as good-looking as Thor usually was on his own, but sixty-percent as good-looking as Thor was still plenty good-looking and the girls just stood there gawking at him.

Willow noticed Thor looking back at the girls curiously. In Asgard girls didn't giggle and stare. In Asgard a girl would simply march up to you and inform you that she wanted you, and then perhaps recite poetry at you, or challenge you to a contest of some sort, or maybe just immediately kiss you. In Asgard, girls didn't beat around the bush.

"Well met," Thor said to the girls, as Willow approached the chariot.

"Hey," one of the girls, a tall, thin girl with blonde hair streaked with blue, said. Then the girl blushed, started giggling hysterically, and her three friends all hustled her away into the drug store.

"Will you stop torturing those poor girls?" Willow said, as she got into the chariot, and gently lifted Faith's head so she could sleep in her lap. "I swear, I can't take you anywhere."

"You still speak strangely," Thor said, with a small smile.

As Willow entered the room and turned on the light, hastily dispelling the glamour that disguised her as Warren--she needed to look like Warren when she used his credit card so she would match the picture on his driver's license, but that didn't mean she had to like it--she was pleasantly surprised: the room was much better than she had expected. It was a single, but it was a suite with two rooms, one of which was a pretty nice little living room with a leather couch, a couple of leather chairs, a recliner and a big television set with a VCR hookup. The bedroom contained a little antique writing desk, a king-sized bed, another leather chair, and sliding glass doors that led to a little balcony that Willow thought was maybe just big enough to dance on while drinking a bottle of wine with her lover.

She walked out to the balcony, and leaned on the railing, and looked down at the street, from sixteen floors up. Snow was starting to fall. Boston had been expecting a snowstorm the next day but Thor's presence had hastened its approach. The air was cold, and the city was quiet and still; the snow was a blanket slowly drawing itself down over the world.

Willow had danced on a balcony with Tara, once: they had gone to New Orleans together to dispatch a particularly unpleasant voodoo sorceress and had decided to stay to celebrate New Year's Eve, 2006. They brought a portable CD player out on the balcony with them, and danced to slow songs, and drank wine, as the fireworks lit up the sky all around. It was a beautiful night, warm even for New Orleans; the temperature reached seventy degrees at midnight, and Willow and Tara danced naked on the balcony together, and drank the whole bottle of wine...

Willow realized she was crying. Tara was dead now. They all were.

Willow wiped her tears away, and put the memory out of her mind.

Willow could see all of Copley Square from that balcony, slowly becoming lost in swirling clouds of snow, and she could also see one particular patch of snow ascending upwards through the air instead of falling from the clouds: Thor's chariot, disguised by a glamour. The patch of snow reached her after a few seconds, and a column of snow jumped on to the balcony. Willow dispelled the glamour, and Thor stood before her on the balcony, with Faith in his arms, wrapped in his cape. The chariot and the goats remained where they were, still covered by the glamour and hovering by the balcony, as if someone had shaken up a snow globe and left it floating in the sky.

"Okay, let's bring her into the bathroom," Willow said. "I need to get her cleaned up."

Thor followed Willow into the bathroom. It was just as impressive as the rest of the suite: spotless, with gleaming green tile, and most importantly it had a bathtub instead of just a shower. Willow didn't want to have to stand Faith up; she wasn't even sure Faith could stand.

"Sit her on the toilet," Willow said. Thor gently sat Faith down on top of the toilet bowl and knelt beside her, keeping his arm around her to make sure she stayed steady. Willow ran the bath water, carefully monitoring the temperature. She wanted it warm, not hot. She stood up, found a facecloth and a towel and soap, then knelt down by the bath, waiting for the water to finish filling the tub.

The bathwater ran. Willow knelt by the bathtub, running her hand through the water, making minute adjustments, making sure the water didn't get too hot. Thor knelt by Faith, propping her up on the toilet, wrapped in his cape.

The bathwater ran. No one talked.

It was awkward: Willow had never felt awkward around Thor before. She didn't like it.

"Yeah, so...I'm sorry I blew up at you," Willow said.

"There is nothing to be sorry for," Thor said.

"There is. I don't like the tone I took with you. But, Warren...he brings it out in me. But...look, I was, okay, a bitch? But I'm not changing my mind. For what he did to her, I want Warren to suffer."

Thor nodded once, curtly. And didn't respond.

There was an argument there if Willow wanted to pursue it--an argument about why he could kill, and it was glorious and noble and honorable and just, but when she did it she was debasing herself. But she didn't feel like arguing.

They were quiet. They didn't look at each other. The water filled the tub.

"Okay, um, I gotta get her undressed and wash her, so..." Willow said.

"Aye," Thor said, and stood up.

"It's gonna take me the rest of the night to heal her up, and I have no idea what I'm gonna do in the morning. No idea what to tell her and no idea what to do about the future...I mean, we stopped Warren. So did we win? That's what it should mean, right? 2009 should be there now? The future should be saved?"

"I do not know; the meanderings of time are an uncertain thing. The future cannot be guessed at with confidence. I will talk to my father. He will be waiting to hear news of our quest anyway. And mayhap Loki will have our answers. Nothing in the past or the future is hidden from him when he looks into his cauldron. If our Midgard stands or remains fallen, Loki should be able to tell us."

"Okay. I'll be here. Come by whenever, let me know."

"Aye."

He looked down at her for a moment.

"I'm...look, I really am sorry, okay?" she said. "I'm sorry...I just unloaded on you like that. You didn't deserve that."

He nodded.

"We always disappoint you, don't we?" she said. "You're always like, perfect and awesome? And the rest of us just...just screw up all the time. We don't deserve you. I don't deserve you."

"You speak nonsense," he said. "I will see you soon."

He walked away.

Willow gave Faith a bath, got her cleaned up and dried off, went back over all her wounds with the rubbing alcohol, and then carried her to the bed. There was a time she wouldn't have been able to carry Faith, but ten years in the weight room with Rebecca had paid off. She wouldn't want to have to carry Faith down to the end of the block, but she could manage to get her back to the bed without any real exertion.

Faith was naked, and when Willow laid her out on the bed she could see the extent of her injuries for the first time. She had touched Faith's mind, so she knew what the injuries were--broken ribs, fractured skull, missing teeth, deep lacerations, some minor internal bleeding, and a growing infection--but knowing what the injuries were and actually seeing them were two different things. Willow burst into tears when she saw Faith lying there, covered in wounds and lashes and deep bruises, missing four teeth. But then she stopped herself.

She got to work.

It took five hours. For five hours Willow sat by Faith's bedside, giving her every ounce of her strength.

She destroyed the infection, prodding Faith's immune system into action and augmenting its strength with her own until every vestige of the infection was gone; she knitted up her broken bones, and healed every one of her wounds, including the brand; she stimulated Faith's bone marrow to create new blood to replace the blood she had lost from the whipping. She re-grew the teeth Faith had lost, fooling Faith's body into thinking they were baby teeth that needed to be replaced; that alone took three hours.

When Willow had finished, she stood up, trudged into the bathroom, and took a long, hot shower to wash Warren's piss off. Her sweater and her jeans had some of it on them too. She washed them in the shower, put them on hangers to dry, and came back out into the bedroom in her underwear.

She pulled some clothes from Faith's backpack, and dressed her. She got Faith under the covers, and tucked her in, and kissed her cheek.

Then she took one of the blankets off the bed, went to the leather chair in the corner, and sat down, and closed her eyes...

Faith woke up in a strange room.

She'd had a bad dream. She couldn't really remember it, but it scared her.

She looked around. The room was rather gloomy, but she could see daylight through glass doors leading to a balcony. The room looked lavish, but small, like a hotel room, though Faith had never actually been in a hotel before. She'd seen them in movies though, and this definitely looked like a hotel room, and a pretty nice one.

The bed was nice too. It was big, and the sheets were clean, and soft.

There was a woman asleep under a blanket in the leather chair in the corner. Faith jumped when she saw her; she hadn't noticed her in the gloom. The woman was curled up in the chair with her long, dark hair hanging in her eyes.

"Where the fuck am I?" Faith whispered.

She got out of bed. She was wearing jeans and a tee-shirt, with no socks or shoes. Her jeans were unbuttoned. She had no idea how she'd gotten there. She had no idea who the woman with the long, dark hair was.

She buttoned her jeans, moved quietly toward the adjoining room, and peeked in.

It was a living room. There were no guys there. No drunk people lying on the floor. No drugs or booze or cigarettes anywhere at all, in fact; no sign of a party. Faith had woken up in strange places without knowing how she'd gotten there before. But this was the strangest place, because there were no guys...no party.

There were always parties...Faith was a party girl. It was the only way she ever got to spend time with people. People only liked her when they were drunk and they thought she might put out.

If she wasn't at a party, she was alone; it's the way things had been ever since she ran away from home.

But now she wasn't at a party, or the aftermath of one, and she wasn't alone. It was strange...

Faith moved to the glass doors leading to the balcony. She could feel the cold coming through them, so she didn't open them, but she took in the view, to get a sense of where she was. She recognized it, even through all the snow whipping around--Copley Square. She could see all of Copley Square out there: the park with its well-tended garden in rows, and its pool with the fountain that all the kids played in during the summer; the massive Public Library with its carved stone lions flanking the steps; the sleek, slender, gleaming Hancock Building, standing tall and elegant above the square as it reflected the hard, gray morning sky, graceful, shimmering, beautiful as a silver swan; and the massive, gothic-looking Trinity Church seeming terribly out of place with its giant arches surrounded on all sides by beautifully carved figures of saints, its vivid colors, and its intricate ornamentation. And dwarfing all of it, the singularly uninspired Prudential Building: fifty-two stories tall, yet still managing to somehow seem squat compared to the soaring Hancock Building; drab and cheerless compared to the lavish, palatial Trinity Church; the Prudential Building had stood there for more than thirty years, yet it still seemed like an intruder in the venerable old square. If Copley Square was Old Money, the Prudential Building was a yuppie.

When Faith looked out at the Prudential Building, she felt a chill go through her...she didn't know why.

She turned away from it, and looked around the room for her boots and her socks. She didn't see them, but she saw her backpack in the corner. She had no idea how the backpack had gotten there; she had left it at the YWCA a couple of days before. When she opened it up she found her spare underwear inside, and pulled out a pair of socks. But her other pair of jeans was gone, and one of her tee-shirts was missing too. She realized she was wearing them. She didn't know where the clothes she'd had on yesterday were.

Her alarm went off.

She realized someone must have taken her clothes off of her.

It was what she had always been afraid of, and she felt herself starting to panic as she considered it. She went to a lot of parties, and she drank because it made things easier, but she always tried to keep her wits about her, to make sure she didn't get so wasted that someone could take advantage...

But someone had undressed her; she knew it. Brought her to this hotel, and undressed her. Maybe they brought the woman there too? Or maybe the woman had been the one who undressed her...lots of women had shown an interest in Faith before. When Faith went to bars, there were nights she got hit on by more women than men.

She had to get out of there. She sat on the bed again, pulled on her socks, and looked around for her boots and her leather coat. She didn't see them in the bedroom. She ran into the little living room. It was nice. Big leather couch, nice chairs, TV with a VCR, expensive looking rug. The hotel room would have been a nice place to stay in for awhile. Better than the street. But someone had done something to her there, she was sure of it...she had to get out of there, now. She had survived this long on the street by knowing when to run.

She noticed the bathroom, and looked inside. The bathroom was strange. There was a pair of jeans and a sweater on hangers over the shower rod, but they weren't hers. There was an empty bottle of rubbing alcohol on the sink, and lots of blood-stained tissues in the little wastebasket. There were little blood stains here and there: on the toilet seat, in the tub.

Faith's alarm was getting louder. Something was definitely wrong...

She'd learned pretty quickly on the street that curiosity really didn't have an upside. If you saw something shady you moved on; it was just the best policy. She needed her boots and her leather coat. Once she had them she could get the hell out of there, and try to figure it all out later...

"Ow," someone said.

Faith came out of the bathroom, and saw the woman in the chair rubbing her neck.

"Hey, sweetie, you sleep okay?" the woman in the chair said, when she saw her. Then she closed her eyes, and frowned. "Had to be better than this chair. And again, ow."

"Who the fuck are you?" Faith hissed.

The woman wasn't setting off her alarm. Something about her made Faith feel like she wasn't dangerous. But she was still part of this...

"Um, long story?" Willow said, and stretched, and yawned. She felt barely conscious; she was so exhausted she felt drunk. "But listen sweetie, you're perfectly safe here, okay? No one's gonna hurt you, no one's gonna touch you, I promise. How about we talk about it over breakfast. With lots and lots of coffee. You hungry?"

But then Willow woke right up, when Faith lunged at her and grabbed her by the throat.

"Asked you a fucking question," Faith said.

Faith knew she had to get out of there. She knew this was the wrong play. If she hung around too long, and whoever had taken her clothes off suddenly came back...but maybe this woman was the one who had done it. Maybe she had done things to her while she was asleep...touched her.

The shadow of a memory was scratching at Faith...she thought it was that bad dream she'd had. But there was something else...

She didn't want to remember it. Whenever she touched the memory, she felt herself becoming more afraid.

Willow kept herself calm. Willow knew Faith was feeling cornered right now, and Faith was always dangerous when she felt cornered. Willow would have to be careful here. But she knew Faith: she knew her by heart. And she knew how she had to play this.

She had to be honest with her.

Willow pointed at Faith's hand around her neck, and raised her eyebrows. Faith loosened her grip a little.

"I'm Willow," Willow said. "Willow Rosenberg. And my neck already hurts? You're not making it better. So how's this? You let go of me and I tell you what happened yesterday, and how you got here. Deal?"

Willow spoke in calm, measured tones, without a hint of anxiety or anger or fear. She needed to defuse this situation, needed to calm Faith down.

"Did you touch me?" Faith said. "You the one who took my clothes off? You a fucking dyke?"

Willow knew she had to be honest. Lying to Faith was the easiest way to scare her out of your life.

"You were hurt," Willow said. "Bleeding, all over. I needed to tend to your wounds. I got you out of your clothes and gave you a bath. You saw the bathroom, right? The tissues? That was from me cleaning your wounds."

Faith tightened her grip on Willow's neck again. Willow didn't move, didn't try to remove Faith's hand. She knew Faith needed to feel like she was in control now.

"You touched me, didn't you?" Faith whispered. "You...you raped me. You got me drunk or something and..."

Faith started to cry. She let go of Willow's neck.

"I didn't," Willow whispered, and felt her own eyes welling up with tears. "I didn't sweetie, I didn't."

Faith turned away from her.

"Did I show you a good time at least?" Faith said. "You have a good time with the drunk skank?"

Willow stood up. As she was standing she realized she was still in her underwear and she quickly draped the blanket around herself.

"You're not a skank," Willow said. "And I didn't hurt you last night. I would never hurt you."

"Not blamin' ya," Faith said. "It's my fault. Probably let you get me wasted and then I put out for you. I put out for people, y'know? I put out for food and a place to sleep. Maybe I oughta start chargin' for it. Stand on a corner somewhere."

"Don't...don't talk like that, Faith," Willow whispered, as her tears began running down her cheeks. "Please? Please don't?"

Faith turned, and looked at her.

"Why the hell are you crying?" Faith said.

"Because...because...I care about you," Willow whispered.

"How do you know my name? How...do you...?"

Faith remembered. Her face turned white as chalk.

All girls are whores, Faith, she remembered a man saying...he had followed her in a red BMW...

How the fuck do you know my name? Faith had said to him...

Faith stood there, frozen, looking back at Willow, but not seeing her anymore...

So hey, here's how our big date's gonna go. You listening?

Faith started shaking.

So first, I'm gonna beat the shit out of you, and you're gonna stand there and let me. Then after you've been softened up, the fun starts. I'm gonna strip you naked and torture you. Whipping for sure, I already bought the whip? Plus I'm gonna brand you too, y'know, like they do with cattle?

The man had beaten her...burned his name into her...whipped her...he had...

Then after I've tortured you for a good long time, I'm gonna piss on you, and hang you. Maybe somewhere in there we'll have like, a horse carriage ride or I'll buy you flowers? But don't hold your breath...

"Sweetie, it's...it's okay," Willow said, moving toward her, haltingly, the way someone might try to calm a skittish horse, as Faith's shaking got worse. "No one's gonna hurt you, I promise, I promise."

Faith collapsed. She fell to the floor, screaming, but no sounds were coming out of her mouth...she looked straight ahead, at the wall, and cried, and trembled, and hugged herself, as her mouth gaped open in a ghastly, frozen shriek, but there were no sounds...

"Faith, Faith!" Willow shouted, and ran to her, and knelt beside her. "Sweetie, he's gone. He's gone. No one's gonna hurt you now. No one's gonna hurt you. I promise sweetie, I promise I'll protect you, I'll..."

Faith shrieked again, and this time the sound filled the room. Faith pushed Willow away, and sprinted for the door in her socks. Willow got up and sprinted after her, and just managed to grab her before she could get the door open. Faith flailed around, throwing wild punches; she caught Willow in the face with one. Luckily Faith wasn't a Slayer yet and she also didn't know how to fight yet either, or Willow knew that one punch would have laid her out unconscious and flat on the floor. Even so, the punch still hurt enough, and she felt her lip bleeding. Willow managed to grab Faith's wrists.

"Sweetie, stop!" Willow shouted. "Stop it! Just listen to me! You're safe, you're safe! Please! Please just listen!"

Faith was still screaming; Willow knew it would be a problem soon, if it brought hotel security. She could force Faith to calm down, force herself into Faith's mind, but she didn't want to do that...she didn't want to impose her will on Faith now, didn't want to violate her. The blanket was on the floor, and Willow realized again that she was in her underwear; she cursed herself for not waking up earlier and putting her clothes back on after they had dried. She knew how this whole situation must have looked to Faith...it would confirm her worst fear.

Faith was spinning around, trying to wrench herself free from Willow's grip, but Willow held on, as they whirled around the room together like they were dancing; finally Faith managed to whirl them both off-balance and they landed on the bed. Faith became even more scared, when they were on the bed, and Willow was on top of her, holding her down; she kept screaming, and she started trying to scratch at Willow's face.

"Faith! I'm not gonna hurt you sweetie!" Willow shouted, crying now. "I swear, sweetie, I would never hurt you! Never! Just listen to me! The man from yesterday! The man who hurt you! I saved you! I saved you from him! I'M THE ONE WHO SAVED YOU!"

Faith stopped screaming. Her breathing came in fast ragged gasps, and she was still shaking, and tears were still running down her cheeks. But she wasn't screaming, and she stopped struggling against Willow's grip.

"Sweetie, sweetie, do you remember?" Willow said. "Do you remember me taking your pain away yesterday? I just wanna protect you, baby. I just wanna protect you."

"He...he..." Faith whispered, and started crying harder. "He..."

"I know," Willow whispered, and let go of Faith's wrists. "I know what he did to you. But I stopped him, and he's gone now. He's gone, sweetie. He'll never hurt you again, okay? Never again."

"You...stopped him?"

"Yeah," Willow said, and got up off of Faith, and sat on the edge of the bed.

"He's gone?"

"Yeah."

"You're...you don't have clothes on. And...someone...someone took my clothes off."

"Look...he beat you up pretty bad and I had to clean you up so I could heal you. And he...he...peed on you. It got on me too, so I washed my clothes. They're in the bathroom on hangers. Sweetie, I know how bad all this looks. I know. I wish I had been, like, less of a dummy about how I handled all this? I know this is like, awkward and weird and um, well...sort of actually like the first few minutes of a bad women in prison movie right this particular second? And I know it's asking a lot, but you just have to trust me. I won't hurt you, I'll never hurt you. Let me prove it, okay? Gimme a chance to prove it. Let's just talk, and I'll answer all your questions. But, um, first let me go put some clothes on? Because I really, really want to put some clothes on."

"What do you mean...healed me?"

"He hurt you. I healed you...made you better. It's a long story? But I promise I'll explain everything."

"Your lip. Your lip's bleeding."

Willow smiled. "That's okay, sweetie. You have a hell of a right cross by the way."

Willow rubbed her neck again. It was still aching. She decided that if she managed to save the world the very first thing she was going to do when she got back to 2009 was grab Tara and go to Bermuda for a month.

"You were there," Faith said. "I remember now. He was hurting me and then...you were there, and he wasn't hurting me anymore."

"Yeah," Willow said. "Sweetie, look. Last night a lot of crazy stuff happened? Stuff you might have--okay, you definitely will have--a hard time believing. But I won't lie to you. I'll never lie to you, Faith."

"How do you know my name?"

"Yet another chapter in the long story? So how's this. While I'm telling you the long story let's have some breakfast. I'm starving and you must be hungry too so I'll order up some room service, and I'll answer all your questions while we eat and I drink about a gallon of coffee. Deal?"

Faith was looking at her. Willow knew what the look meant.

"You don't know me," Willow said. "You don't trust me. I'm like this crazy girl talking at you in her underwear right now. I understand that. But the thing about trust is, it takes time and it happens in small steps. So, step one. I said I'd answer your questions over breakfast, so let me prove it. Okay?"

Faith was looking at her.

"Okay," Faith said.

Willow got her clothes back on, called down to room service, ordered bacon, scrambled eggs, sausages, pancakes, toast, French toast, hash browns, a quart of milk, a pitcher of orange juice and a pot of coffee. It was enough for six people but Willow didn't care. She was ravenous, and she knew Faith hardly ever got a decent meal in her. She wanted Faith to have a decent meal.

They ate in the living room. Faith sat on the couch. Willow sat on one of the chairs. She didn't want Faith to feel crowded.

Faith only ate if Willow told her she could. She waited for Willow to ask her if she wanted some pancakes, or bacon, or hash browns, or juice, before she had any of it.

"Faith, it's your breakfast too," Willow said. "Just eat what you want, okay?"

"Your money," Faith said. "Your room."

"Actually, not my money," Willow said, as she finished her second cup of coffee and poured a third, black, and then cleaned the leftover eggs off her plate with a slice of toast. "I used his credit card to get this room. I needed a place to clean you up and heal you and I don't live around here." She looked at the window. The storm was here; it was a blizzard outside. There was no way she would send Faith back out into that. There was no choice: she'd have to keep Faith with her in the room until the storm passed.

"His card?"

"Yeah."

"How'd you use his credit card? Wouldn't they want a picture ID?"

"Yeah." Willow wanted to tell her...to tell her everything. The trick was to find a way to do it that wouldn't make Faith bolt. "Okay, there's an explanation for how I did that, and for how I healed you too. You were beat up pretty bad yesterday, Faith. I don't know how much of it you remember right now, but you had broken ribs and lashes all over your back and you lost four teeth. But you're healed now. Your teeth are all grown back in too."

Faith suddenly got up, ran into the bathroom, and closed the door.

She was in there for a long time.

When she finally came out, she said, "How...how'd you do that? Did you...take me to a hospital? You like a doctor or something? But...I don't even got any scars."

"I'm gonna be honest with you sweetie, okay?" Willow said. "I won't ever lie to you. But the explanation...you won't believe it unless I prove it. Actually you're gonna have a tough time believing it even after I prove it."

Willow knew she was letting it get out of control. The smart thing to do was erase Faith's memory, send her back out there and let her be on her way...but Willow couldn't do that to her. She couldn't send her out into that blizzard...she couldn't send her back into that cold...and she couldn't lie to her.

She found herself sifting back through her memories again...Faith's memories, that were a part of her now. She realized she had been wrong, before. She thought Faith had no memory of anything before March or April of this year...but Willow got the sense now that it was much later than that. Faith's first memories in 1997 didn't happen until summer at the earliest now...maybe even as late as September. But Willow could've sworn it had been March or April before...

She had changed the memories, she realized. She was changing them, right now, just by being here. She was changing Faith's past...and therefore the memories of Faith's past that she had in her own mind...

But that first memory from 1997 was still the same...sitting on a park bench on a warm, sunny day, in Copley Square, near the fountain, and not knowing how exactly she had gotten there. And then the dark-haired woman, walking away...or was it running away? And the woman was crying...

Willow knew she should send Faith away, before the damage to the timeline became too great. Send her back out into the cold...

She couldn't.

"So here's the deal," Willow said. "When I tell you how I healed you, how I saved you, how I was able to use that credit card without a picture ID, how I'm even here in the first place, you're gonna freak. It's not like, bad? It's not scary or anything. It's just really weird and you're gonna think I'm crazy at first. So I'm gonna prove it to you."

"Uh-huh," Faith said, which Willow knew was always what she said when she wasn't buying whatever it was you were selling.

"See that spoon?" Willow said, and pointed at a teaspoon by Faith's coffee cup.

"Yeah?"

"I'm gonna levitate it."

"You're gonna what?"

"Levitate it," Willow said, and sent the spoon floating straight up into the air over Faith's head.

Faith jumped up off the couch, and looked from the spoon to Willow, and back again.

"What...what the fuck? That's...a trick. It's a trick."

"No," Willow said. "It's magic. I'm a witch. Magic is how I healed you. Now watch this."

Willow held up her hand, and the spoon floated down to her, and she plucked it out of the air. Then she waved her hand, and a silver, undulating hole appeared in the air...it was about a foot in diameter and it looked like a puddle of crystal clear water standing on its side. Its surface rippled, and Faith could see her reflection in it.

"What the hell is that?" Faith said.

Willow tossed the spoon into it. The spoon disappeared, and the hole disappeared with it.

"Wait...what happened to the spoon?" Faith said.

"I'll tell you in two minutes," Willow said. "Now watch this. See the cut here on my lip that you gave me?" She pointed to her lip.

"Yeah?"

The cut healed. In front of Faith's eyes, the ugly red bruise disappeared, and Willow's lower lip, which had been puffy and swollen, suddenly returned to normal.

"I just healed myself," Willow said. "With magic. Magic is how I healed you. It's how I stopped Warren when he was hurting you. It's even how Warren hurt you in the first place. He's got this crystal ball thing..."

"Warren," Faith said. "That the guy? That's his name?"

"Yeah. Warren Mears. Do you remember a light? Like, he was talking to you, and then a light flashed?"

"Yeah."

"It's a gadget he uses, it looks like a little crystal ball. He calls it a cerebral dampener. He invented it. It's mostly technology but it's got a little bit of magic bound up in it too. It hypnotized you, took your will away. Made it so you couldn't fight him."

Faith looked down at the floor.

"Yeah," she said.

Willow got up, went into the bedroom, and came back with a strange, glowing blue necklace. She put it down on the coffee table.

"He had you wearing this," she said. "You remember?"

Faith thought back...

"Yeah," she said.

"He used it to hide you from me. I can locate people with magic but this thing blocked me. That's why it took me so long to find you. I'm sorry, sweetie. I'm sorry...I'm sorry he was able to do all that to you before I got there. I'm sorry I..." Willow's face crumpled up, and tears came streaming down her cheeks. "I'm...I'm sorry," she whispered.

Faith took Willow's hand, and sat her down on the couch.

They sat there together, holding hands.

A moment later a hole appeared in mid-air, a few feet away from them. It looked like water, standing on its side.

"What the hell?" Faith said.

A spoon fell out of the hole, and landed on the rug. Then the hole disappeared, as if it had never been there.

Faith let go of Willow's hand, walked over to the spoon, crouched down beside it, and picked it up.

"You wanna maybe explain what the hell just happened?" Faith said, as she looked carefully at the spoon.

"That hole was a time portal," Willow said. Two minutes ago I created a portal that could send something two minutes into the future, and I threw the spoon into it. Now, here we are two minutes later. Hello, spoon."

Faith looked up at Willow, and searched her eyes.

"You're shitting me," she said.

"Want me to do it again?" Willow said.

Faith watched her. She watched Willow, and didn't say a word.

"You're not lying, are you?" Faith finally said. "Jesus Christ. What's... what's going on? What's up with this? What is this shit?"

Willow got up, and walked to the window, and looked out at the storm.

"I'm here from the future," she said. "The guy who hurt you came back in time to kill all my friends and I came back to protect you." Willow thought she could have said it better, found some way to make it sound more believable, but she was tired. "That's how I know you, how I know your name. You're...you're... someone special. Someone I care about."

Willow didn't look at her. She was afraid to look at her, to look at Faith's eyes, and see that she didn't believe her...

"Uh-huh," Faith said.

Faith thought about things.

Faith remembered the night before...she remembered Willow holding her, in the cold basement the man had taken her to, and telling her she would make it better...and then the pain was gone.

She remembered Willow holding her in her arms, even though she was covered with urine.

"Look...I gotta take off," Faith said.

"You don't believe me," Willow said.

"Not sure what I believe. A lot of crazy stuff's happened. Where's my coat and my boots?"

"Closet in the bedroom. But, Faith--"

Faith got up and walked into the bedroom. Willow followed her.

"It's...it's really bad outside, sweetie. Can't you maybe...maybe stay here, just until the storm passes?" Willow said.

Faith sat on the bed, and put on her boots, and her coat.

"Nah," Faith said. "I'm good. Thanks for breakfast."

"But...I just...don't want you out in the cold," Willow said. "It's cold."

"You gonna stop me?"

"What? Stop you?"

"All this crazy stuff you've been saying. My wounds. The thing with the spoon. Yeah, there's definitely something freaky going on? But here's what I know for sure. You stripped me, got me naked. You say you had to clean me up, okay. But you're a little stronger than me too. Maybe you can take me in a fight. And when I tried to leave before, you stopped me. So, right now? I'm wondering whether or not I can leave. Or if maybe you'll always stop me. Yeah, it's cold out there. Nice and warm when you got a naked chick to play with though, huh?"

Willow's face turned beet-red.

"That's not...you think...you think I would...do that?" Willow whispered.

"I don't know what to think," Faith said, and got up, and picked up her backpack. "One way to find out though."

Willow was standing in front of her, barring her path to the door.

"Can I leave?" Faith said. "Or are you gonna throw me down on the bed again?"

"I would never...Faith, I would never do that, sweetie," Willow said, her eyes filling up with tears.

"That guy had me last night, now you have me. You're using his card to pay for the room. Maybe you and him are pals? Maybe he gets a turn with me, then you do? You like girls, don't you? A lot of gay gals dig me, I guess I got like a vibe or somethin'? But you definitely got a vibe, Will. You like me, don't you? You kinda think I'm hot."

Tears streamed down Willow's cheeks.

"Can I leave?" Faith said.

Willow walked to the writing desk, took Warren's wallet out of the top drawer, took out all the cash, came back, and put the cash in Faith's backpack.

"What's this?" Faith said.

"All his money," Willow said. "I don't want you to be hungry out there. There's more than four-thousand dollars there. Take it."

Faith looked at her. The tears were still streaming down Willow's cheeks.

"Thanks," Faith said.

Willow nodded, and stepped aside...giving Faith a clear path to the door.

Faith went to the door, opened it, and stood in the hallway. She looked back at Willow. Willow was looking down at the floor.

"Thanks again for the breakfast," Faith said.

Willow nodded, without looking at her.

Faith closed the door, noted Willow's room number, and walked away, down the long, quiet, carpeted hallway.

She waited for the elevator.

She took the elevator down to the lobby.

She walked out of the hotel, into Copley Square. It was about thirty degrees outside and the sidewalk was icy and treacherous and she could see maybe about five feet in front of her. The wind hit her like a frozen mallet.

It would have been easier to just wait in the lobby for awhile, but she knew Willow could see her from her window if she was watching. She had to make this look real. She needed to know for sure Willow wouldn't chase her.

Faith walked across the square, to the park. It kept her in view of Willow's window. If Willow was watching, she would know Faith had left. Faith crossed Boylston street, to a Store 24, and went in and looked at the magazines.

According to People, Uma Thurman had a new movie coming out. Faith liked Uma Thurman. She thought she was pretty. She read the article. She looked out the window, into the storm. No one was chasing her. According to Sports Illustrated, the Lakers were poised to give the Celtics a run. She read that article too. She looked out the window again. There was still no one chasing her.

She looked at the comics rack. Batman was fighting the Joker again and acting all mopey and grim about it. But Batman was always fighting the Joker and acting mopey and grim about it. Faith thought Batman needed to get over himself. She picked up Spider-Man instead. She liked Spidey; he always had shit luck. She could relate to him. She read the story.

Spidey's boss at the newspaper was trying to get away with paying him less than half what his exclusive crime photos were worth, his Aunt May was in the hospital again, he was juggling two girlfriends at once and they had both just found out about each other, Doctor Octopus was trying to blow up New York, and the replastering job Spidey had done himself on the bathroom in his crummy apartment because he couldn't afford to hire someone to do it completely collapsed when he tried to take a shower. Faith smiled.

"Hang in there, Spidey," she said.

She looked out the window again. Still no one coming. It had been more than half an hour.

She walked back to the hotel.

She walked into the lobby, took the elevator back up to the sixteenth floor, walked back up the carpeted hallway, and knocked on Willow's door.

"I'm sorry," Faith said, when Willow answered the door. Willow's eyes were red from crying.

"Wh-what...?" Willow stuttered.

"Can I come in?"

"Yeah." Willow opened the door and stepped aside.

Faith walked into the room, her hair white with snow. "Offer still good to stay here awhile?"

"Yeah," Willow said, and smiled.

Faith took off her backpack and her coat. She hung her coat in the closet. She ran her hand through her hair and shook out the snow. She opened up her backpack, and pulled out the money Willow had given her.

"This is yours," Faith said, and held it out to her.

"It's...no, sweetie, I gave it to you," Willow said.

"Take it. It's a deal breaker. Keeping this money makes me feel like you're paying me to be here, you understand? I know that's not how you mean it but it's how it makes me feel. I don't wanna feel that way. Take it back or I walk."

Willow took the money.

"I'm sorry about what I said before, Willow," Faith said. "I was kinda playin' you a little. I know you weren't in it with that guy. I know you don't wanna hurt me. I know you saved me last night. But I needed to know for sure that I could leave. I don't like feelin' boxed in."

"Okay," Willow said. "I'm sorry too...sorry I freaked you out."

"Magic and crap, hard to avoid freaking people out. You wanna, uh, go sit on the couch? Figure we got some stuff to talk out."

"Yeah."

They walked into the living room, and sat on the couch together.

"You're gonna be a hundred percent honest with me?" Faith said. "Gonna answer all my questions? 'Cuz that's a deal breaker too. You lie to me even once and I'm gone."

"I'd never lie to you," Willow said.

Faith nodded.

"You like girls," Faith said. "You like me."

"It's...okay, I like girls, and yeah, I think you're really pretty? But...with me and you it's not like that, sweetie, I promise."

"You say you're from the future or whatever."

"Yeah, I came back to save you."

"Like Terminator 2."

Willow smiled. It was the kind of thing Faith would say. She knew Faith had always watched a lot of movies. At this age, sixteen, she hadn't even been out of Boston yet. She had no friends. Movies were how she experienced the world. Rebecca would change all that, but she wasn't here yet.

"Yeah, except I don't show up naked and I'm not an Arnold Schwarzenegger-shaped robot guy," Willow said.

"Hey, no one's perfect," Faith said, and smiled back.

"Okay, like, gross? Now you've got me thinking about naked Arnold Schwarzenegger. And, hello? Robert Patrick? If I have to think of a naked robot guy I'll take him. Not to mention whatshername from the third one. Now if I was gonna be an evil robot, looking like her might be pretty cool. But wait, what am I saying? Claire Danes. I'd wanna look like Claire Danes. See, now you got me thinking about Claire Danes and I'm like, totally losing my concentration."

"There's a third one?"

"Yeah, it comes out like five or six years from now."

"Is it good?"

"I really liked it? Especially how they had the nuclear war actually happen and the good guys couldn't prevent it? I thought that was a cool way to go with the story, y'know, like they've been trying to prevent this evil future for years but it was just always meant to happen because the future can't be changed. So I really liked it, but a lot of people were just kinda like, whatever about it."

"Did they have the cute kid with the hair? You know, John Connor?"

"No, they replaced him with this totally un-cute guy."

"Lame."

"But hey, Claire Danes."

"So you can like, time travel. You can time travel."

"Yeah, sweetie. I can time travel."

"But you get how it's hard for me to believe, right? How I'm still kinda on the fence about it? I mean, I saw the spoon thing but still...it's hard to get my head around it."

Another portal appeared in the air between them, and the glowing blue necklace suddenly popped out of it, and fell to the floor.

"Um..." Willow said. "Okay...that was...unexpected."

Faith looked at the blue necklace on the floor, and then back at the one on the coffee table. "Uh...there are two now. You do this?"

"I must've, that was one of my portals."

"When did you do it? Did you do it after I left?"

"I haven't done it yet. I must do it in the future. I must've sent the necklace back to us from the future."

"Why?"

"Um...I don't know? Probably because you still only half believe me about all this stuff."

"It's not that I think you're lyin', Will," Faith said. "I mean, I'm all healed up with no hospital, not even a trace of a scar. And I got my teeth back good as new, and you did that spoon thing. But...about every ten seconds I stop believing you because it's all just so fucked up? And then I gotta remind myself to believe you again."

"Can't blame you. When I think about my life even I don't believe it sometimes. I haven't even told you the really crazy stuff yet."

"It's pretty damn crazy already," Faith said. "That guy...Warren. He...he... peed on me."

"Yeah," Willow said.

"I remember you holding on to me...I was wrapped in a blanket or something and you were there. You held on tight to me even though I was covered in piss. You got his piss all over you, because you held on to me."

"Yeah," Willow said.

Faith took her hand.

"Gonna ask you a question," Faith said. "Don't take it the wrong way, okay?"

"Okay."

"Assuming I believe this stuff...the future, magic, all of it. Assuming I believe it...were we...in the future, were you and me...were we...a couple?"

Willow smiled. "We came close. We were both tempted. But we ended up as really close friends."

"Do I...do I...have someone? In the future?" Faith looked nervous, when she asked the question.

Willow squeezed her hand.

"Sweetie, you're gonna have a whole boatload of people who love you, including me," Willow said. "Plus there's gonna be one really special person who's gonna commit to you...who's gonna build her whole life around you. Because you're really special too. Because you're her special girl."

"Her, huh?" Faith said, and smiled.

"Um...yeah. Actually, maybe I shouldn't have revealed that little surprise. Sorry."

"The gay gals sure do dig me."

"Yeah, they do," Willow said, and smiled again. "Believe me."

"Never thought I'd go that way? I mean...I don't know, I think some girls are pretty but...I like driving stick. Gotta admit though, guys can be fucking assholes. They never...guys never...treated me too good, y'know?"

"I know. I know, sweetie. But you held on. You held on, because you're strong."

"Yeah? You...think I'm strong?"

"Yeah. Stronger than me."

"No shit? But like...you do crazy magic shit. Assuming I believe you."

"But you survived out there," Willow said, and looked back out at the storm.

"Not sure I'd call it surviving. So...what now?"

"Will you stay here until the blizzard's over at least? I've got Warren's credit card, we can keep the room as long as we need to. Yeah, it's a single, but I can take the couch."

"That reminds me, you never told me how you used the credit card. And I only like half believe the time travel stuff by the way."

Willow picked up the blue necklace from the floor.

"I think that's my cue," she said, and created a portal, and sent it back into the past.

"You just sent that one back to the past? Back to a couple minutes ago?"

"Yeah."

"So wait, what would've happened if you didn't just send it back?"

"Impossible. It appeared in the past. That means I did send it back."

"But you could've decided not to send it back just now. You could've like, never sent it back."

"But it appeared in the past, sweetie. So I did send it back. No way around that."

"So...what? You had to do it? You had to do it because that's just the way things are supposed to go?"

"Yeah. I know, weird and confusing? Believe me, I get headaches just thinking about this stuff. So let's get off time travel and talk about some other stuff. Like, the credit card. You wanted to know how I could use it without a picture ID, right?"

"Yeah."

"Okay, there's these spells called 'glamours'. Basically a glamour is when you disguise something as something else. Like...okay. See the blue necklace?"

"Yeah?"

Willow waved her hand. The necklace became a chessboard.

"Uh..." Faith said.

"Okay, the thing is? I didn't turn the necklace into a chessboard. It's still a necklace. But the glamour is making us think it's a chessboard. A glamour doesn't affect the thing you cast it on, it affects people. Everyone who ever sees the necklace will think it's a chessboard now, until I remove the glamour. But it's still a necklace. Get it?"

"Yeah. But what's this got to do with the credit card?"

"I can put a glamour on myself, to make me look like whoever I want," Willow said. "I'm like, still me? But everyone in the world will think I'm someone else, right down to the way I talk, the way I smell even. When I used the card I disguised myself as Warren."

"You...you can do that?"

"Yeah."

"Show me."

"Sweetie...I don't wanna freak you out."

"I'm a big girl, I can take it. I wanna see."

"Promise you won't freak? Promise you'll remember that I'm still me?"

"Yeah."

"I don't wanna scare you, Faith. So you gotta promise you'll be okay with it. Promise me, or I won't do it. Deal breaker."

"I promise," Faith said, and smiled.

Willow waved her hand in front of herself...and became Warren.

"Jesus Christ," Faith whispered.

"Sweetie," Willow said, in Warren's voice. "It's still me, okay? I'm gonna change back now."

Willow waved her hand again, and Warren was gone.

"You okay?" Willow said.

Faith was watching her.

"So like, how long do these glamour things last?" Faith said. "Could one last forever?"

"They last for as long as the caster can keep up the spell, it's a power drain. Not much of a power drain though. I know if I put all my energy into a glamour and nothing else, I could keep it going for years before I got tired."

Faith nodded. She got up, and walked away from the couch, and leaned against the wall, with her arms folded across her chest, and watched Willow.

"So how do I know you're not that Warren guy casting a glamour to make him look like Willow?" Faith said.

Willow paused. She really didn't have an answer for that.

Willow knew people underestimated Faith sometimes. Faith could talk crudely, especially at this age, and she could swear a lot, at least until Rebecca told her not to. She had lived on the streets for a couple of years and she could act like it. But she was perceptive, and smart, and she picked things up quickly, and she had an innately tactical mind. The insight she had just come up with was brilliant, especially considering she hadn't even heard of magic until today.

"You...well...um...I guess you don't," Willow said, as Faith watched her, her eyes locked on her, steady and unwavering. "If Warren wanted to, if he had access to a powerful enough glamour spell, he could disguise himself as me for a good long time. He had tech stuff to make his own time portals too. He could've done the spoon trick. Levitation, he probably built a gadget that can do that for his sixth grade science project."

Faith nodded, and came back to the couch. "It's cool, she said. "You ain't him. You're Willow."

"Glad you believe that, since things would've been really annoying for both of us if you didn't."

"You gave me the right answer. You didn't lie to try to get me to believe you were you. You were straight with me even though it coulda made me suspicious. I trust you."

Willow smiled.

"So this place got cable?" Faith said.

They spent the rest of the day watching movies on cable and ordering food from room service. They laughed together, and they talked easily. Willow had always found that interesting, from the day she had first met Faith; they always got along so effortlessly, even though they were such different people, from such different backgrounds. After Willow had received Faith's memories their bond had strengthened, but even before that she and Faith could always hang out and talk. Faith could be prickly and withdrawn in the early days, and Willow had been relentless in her attempts to draw her out into the light. And Faith seemed to appreciate that. She liked that Willow never gave up on her. Once Faith finally felt like she was part of the group, she and Willow had been inseparable as sisters and had never looked back.

Maybe it was astrological, Willow thought. Faith was a Scorpio, and she was a Pisces, and the exact dates of their birthdays formed nearly a perfect square. Astrologically, Willow and Faith were a perfect match, every bit as good a match as Willow was with Tara...

Or maybe it was the one thing they both did have in common: neither of them had parents who loved them. Both of them would eventually have Rebecca.

Willow remembered it was Faith who had set her up with her first boyfriend after Xander, because she had been too shy to ask him out...it was Faith who insisted that Willow come and live at her mansion in Sunnydale, because she didn't want her to be alone. Faith was the one who taught her how to dance.

The room service food was good and Faith ate a lot of it. Willow knew Faith always loaded up on food when she got good opportunities, and now that she was reasonably comfortable with Willow, she practically gorged herself. Willow was happy about that, and she encouraged her, pretending to be hungry herself to make excuses to order more food. Because even though she intended to keep Faith with her until after the blizzard passed, she knew she would have to let her go eventually...she'd have to send her back into the cold...

Thinking about it that night, Willow realized she had almost made a potentially disastrous mistake. If Faith had left with that four-thousand dollars Willow gave her it would have changed things...for all Willow knew, Faith might have left Boston. Four-thousand dollars was enough money to go anywhere in the country and start over...and even if she didn't leave Boston, having that much money would still have certainly changed things for Faith. Willow had already changed things just by being there and she knew she had to be more careful.

Willow knew the future was fragile...tenuous. All their lives, all their loves, were hanging by a thread...

As she tossed and turned on the couch trying to find a single comfortable position--there had been a big argument about that, as Faith kept insisting on taking the couch, until finally Willow suggested they flip a coin, and Willow won, and made Faith take the bed--Willow thought of the future...and wondered if it was even there. She wondered if Warren had taken it all away from her...taken Tara away, forever.

She thought of Warren, burning...suffering.

She realized she wanted to see that again. But she didn't want to leave Faith.

She closed her eyes, and tried to sleep...

She awoke less than an hour later to a fly buzzing around her head.

Her back ached. And she needed a hell of a lot more sleep and she seriously doubted she'd be getting any. Her back felt like she'd been lying on a church pew. It took a moment for her to fully return to herself...to regain her faculties. She'd slept about three hours the night before after healing Faith and she'd slept maybe one so far tonight. Willow felt like she was in a fog...

And that damned fly kept buzzing...

It was hovering now, directly in front of her.

"Hello, my dove," the fly whispered.

Willow jumped off the couch.

"What the fuck are you doing here, Loki?" she whispered. "How did you even get here? Thor says you can't travel through time anymore."

"Aye, well met!" the fly buzzed. It might have been laughing, if flies laughed. "My brother and I traveled here together, to bring you tidings. He awaits on the terrace. He did not wish to disturb the child's slumber. But we must speak, witch."

"Fucking wait out there, I'll be there in a minute."

The fly meandered away, toward the balcony. As Willow tip-toed through the bedroom, she noticed one of the glass doors leading to the balcony was slightly ajar, and she saw Thor standing out there. She made her way to the closet. She had worn winter clothes; she kept plenty of outfits in Asgard because she visited there so much, and when she found out she would be time-traveling to Boston in January she had dressed accordingly. Unfortunately she hadn't thought to bring extras; all she had were the clothes on her back. Sleeping in jeans and a sweater made the couch even worse. Willow pulled her coat and her boots out of the closet and hurriedly threw them on. Then she gingerly slid the glass doors open, stepped on to the balcony, and shut them behind her. The blizzard was still going strong but the wind had died down to nothing, and Boston was quiet and still. The snow, so thick that it formed almost a curtain over the city, fell straight down from the sky.

"Keep your voices down, she's sleeping," Willow said.

"Oh, cease your womanly prattling, witch," the fly said. "You worry over trifles when all of Midgard hangs by a thread."

"Loki," Thor growled.

"Very well, very well! Don't you become a woman too, brother," the fly said, as Willow felt the air around her warping. "There, I've created a masking barrier around us. As three hunted foxes we shall be, hidden and silent. Yonder sleeping beauty shall not be disturbed."

"Great," Willow said. "So there's news?"

"Ill news, Willow," Thor said.

"Don't...don't tell me it's...still gone? The world's still gone?"

"For long hours we gazed into my cauldron, by which I see all the paths the world walks down," the fly said. "In our world, in our time, Midgard remains as it was: overrun by armies of demons, with humanity swept away like dead leaves after a winter storm."

"That's...that's impossible," Willow said. She turned to Thor. "Loki! Loki must be tricking us somehow!"

"Such cheek! Why, I believe I'm insulted," the fly said.

"Nay," Thor said. My father was there with us, seeing for himself. Nothing escapes Odin's eye, and Loki could not fool him even if he dared. We three spent the better part of a day peering into that cursed cauldron, watching events unfold first one way, then the next, like an infinite skein slowly untangling itself as some paths are tried and then abandoned, while others are trod to their end. But all the paths lead to the same place: in our time, Midgard is gone. We cannot fathom it; this Warren was the one who caused the changes, that much the cauldron confirms, and now that he has been stopped my father agrees Midgard should have returned, unblemished."

"Warren couldn't have escaped," Willow said. "It's impossible to escape that spell."

"For you, perhaps," the fly said. "But nay, the villain is still there, we checked on him whilst journeying here. He is undergoing the third circle at the moment, if you're interested. Quartering was such a dull, uninspired form of execution. Pulling off of limbs: a child could devise better! Now the goblin clans of Fenrarch, in the Northern Wastes: they know how to execute people."

"Third circle doesn't just quarter him once," Willow said, with a little smile. "It does it sixty times."

"Yes, I suppose you do have a point," the fly said. "But, tread carefully, Willow! My brother's pristine ears are unused to such rough talk as passes between rogues like us. Torture and execution indeed! Thor is too noble to hear tell of such things. Two scoundrels are we! Why, we sully him, just being in his presence! He is well above our company, eh, witch?"

Willow's face turned red.

Thor put his arm around her. But the embrace was awkward...stiff...cold. Willow knew he was doing it because his sense of honor told him he should...not because he wanted to.

"So...so if Warren's the cause and he's definitely out of commission, what's the problem?" Willow said. She felt cold. She wanted to be back in the room. She felt embarrassed, standing there with Thor's arm around her now...she felt embarrassed for him. She was shaming him. "We fixed the changes he tried to make...we saved Rebecca."

"Mayhap he could still escape?" Thor said. He didn't look at her.

"Nay, the fool hasn't the wit," the fly said. "He's a fly in amber. But there are strange portents in the cauldron, which I have not yet deciphered to my satisfaction. Certain parts of the cauldron are obscured to my sight, and that has never happened before. It may well be that while the villain yet lives, the future cannot resolve itself; cannot settle on a path. If that's the case we have but to wait two more days, until the spell finally kills him. In the meantime Thor and I shall consult the Norns. They weave the mighty webs that govern all our fates, from the highest to the lowest; if any can see the way before us clearly, it is they...if there is a way before us. If there is any hope for Midgard."

"There is always hope," Thor said.

"If not, there is vengeance," the fly said. "If humanity is truly dead, those demons at least will be denied Midgard too."

"Why would you even give a shit?" Willow said. "No more people around for you to screw with?"

"Have a care, witch," the fly said. "Remember whom thou art addressing. But I would miss the mortals, if they were gone. I too love them, after my own fashion. Aye, you doubt me, I see it in your eyes. It's the curse of the liar: when we finally tell the truth, we are never believed. But I find mortals interesting, and there are those that even gave their love and their worship to me. If they have been slaughtered Loki shall make his displeasure known."

"So you guys will be back in two days?" Willow said.

"Aye," the fly said. "When the villain dies, the cauldron should run clear. It's too bad I can't stay. I'd enjoy seeing the spell's last circle. Seeing his heart explode from fright over and over again might prove an interesting diversion."

"We will return in two days," Thor said, and took his arm away from Willow, and walked to the balcony's railing. "Come, Loki. The Norns do not welcome visitors gladly."

"Aye, the ridiculous hags will have some wretched errand for us to perform before they give us our answers, more like as not," the fly said, as Thor's chariot ascended through the air, and the goats drew it up level with the balcony.

"I'll...I'll...see you guys in a couple of days then," Willow said, as Thor jumped into the chariot, and the fly buzzed in after him.

Thor finally looked at her. He nodded once, and then looked away.

And then the chariot leapt up into the clouds, and he was gone...

Willow eventually managed to fall asleep on the couch.

She had a dream...in the dream she was in her house in London, the one she shared with Tara. She and Tara were in their bedroom, looking in a mirror together.

"Is this you?" Tara said.

When Willow looked at their reflections, Tara was beautiful, but she seemed sad...and when Willow saw herself in the mirror, she had black eyes...

Tara began to burn. She didn't scream, but smoke rose from her, and her skin became charred and black, and her hair burned away, and her eyes, and her nose, and her mouth all dripped blood...

Tara was wearing the necklace Willow had given her. It burst into flames, and the crystal pendant hanging from it exploded. Then the necklace melted away, to nothing.

"Is this us?" Tara said, as she burned...

"Hey," Faith said.

Willow woke up with a gasp and a shudder. She sat straight up on the couch and grabbed Faith by the arm with a shaking hand.

"You okay?" Faith said. "You were kinda tossin' around, like maybe you were havin' a bad dream."

"Faith?" Willow whispered. Her hand was still shaking.

"Yeah," Faith said. She took Willow's hand off her arm, and held it in both of hers, and caressed it. "You okay honey?"

"Just tired," Willow said, and held her head in her hand, and looked down at the floor. "How about you? You okay, sweetie? You need anything?"

"Yeah. I need you to get some sleep. You can't sleep for shit on this couch. Come on. You're sleepin' in the bed."

"Sweetie, that's...thanks, but that's okay," Willow said. She looked around the room. It was still dark. The snow was still coming down, and the sun hadn't risen yet.

"Deal breaker. I can't stay here if it means you can't sleep."

"But...I want you to get a good night's sleep too. I don't want you to have to use the couch. Yeah, okay, the couch sucks? That's an even better reason why I don't want you using it."

"It's a big bed," Faith said, and dragged Willow off the couch, and walked with her back to the bedroom.

Faith hopped into the bed, and scooted across to the right side. She slept in her jeans and a tee-shirt. Willow was wearing jeans and a sweater. Faith pulled the covers down for her. "Don't like get any pervo ideas just because I'm so hot by the way," Faith said.

Willow smiled.

"Well if you're gonna be that way about it," Willow said, and got into the bed with her. "Guess you're just gonna miss out."

It really was a big bed. This really shouldn't be a problem at all, Willow thought, as she sank into it and felt her back thanking her profusely.

Faith was looking at her.

"Comfy?" Faith said. "You better not try to steal all the blankets."

"Yeah," Willow said. "This thing's like sleeping on a cloud. I bet you're gonna steal all the blankets. I bet you're like a total blanket hog."

"Better not snore either," Faith said, and turned over on her side, and went to sleep.

Willow woke up to the smell of bacon and maple syrup. She yawned, and stretched. She had actually slept, and her back didn't even hurt. She looked toward the balcony. The snow was still coming down strong. When Boston did a blizzard it didn't fool around. It was definitely daytime, but there wasn't enough light out there for Willow to be able to tell what time it was.

Faith peeked her head out of the living room. Then she came into the bedroom, sat on the edge of the bed, and took Willow's hand.

"Hey fairy godmother," she said. "You get a good night's sleep?"

"Yeah," Willow said. "What time is it?"

"Past eleven. I saved some breakfast for ya. Whole mess a' bacon, plus eggs, pancakes, French toast. Woulda had 'em send up coffee but I figured you'd want it fresh. I'll call down for a pot now. You kept stealing the blankets last night by the way."

"Did I really?" Willow said.

Faith smiled, and kissed her cheek.

"Total blanket hog," Faith said.

The city was still snowed under so they couldn't go out, which was a problem because Willow really would have liked to buy some clean underwear. She was probably only going to be staying one more day but she had been wearing the same underwear and socks since she'd gotten there. Finally Willow decided to just wash them while she took a shower, and Faith let her borrow some of hers, along with her spare blouse so Willow didn't have to wear the sweater anymore. Which Willow thought was great, because the sweater was itchy.

They couldn't go out anywhere, but it was Saturday and MTV had a Beavis and Butthead marathon. So they sat on the couch together and ate all day after they showered--they had decided to try out the hotel's pastries today, and they both decided the chocolate cake was top-shelf--and watched Beavis and Butthead, because they both liked obnoxious cartoons, and at some point Willow suddenly woke up with her head in Faith's lap.

"Rise and shine, fairy godmother," Faith said. She was running her fingers through Willow's hair. The Beavis and Butthead marathon wasn't on; Faith was watching a Clint Eastwood movie now.

"Um...what happened?" Willow said, and raised her head from Faith's lap, and looked around. It had gotten dark.

"You needed more sleep, honey," Faith said. "You kinda zoned out during the one where they go to the poetry slam and Beavis drinks a shitload of coffee and goes nuts. Too bad, 'cuz that was a good one."

"I...um...I'm sorry," Willow said.

"Sorry?" Faith said, and looked down at her. "Sorry about what?"

Faith was still stroking Willow's hair. Willow liked the way it felt; in fact she liked it a little too much. It made her want to go to sleep in Faith's lap again.

Willow sat up.

"Um...just...sorry about bein' all, y'know, using you for a pillow."

"It's cool," Faith said. "I didn't mind."

For some reason, even though there was nothing to do but watch television, eat and talk, they never seemed to get bored. They giggled a lot, and talked about everything...except the future. Willow wasn't sure why Faith hadn't asked about it, but she was glad, because she wasn't sure how much she should tell her. Actually she was sure how much she should tell her: zero. But she didn't like keeping things from her.

Willow thought Faith might have been afraid to ask about the future. She knew Faith didn't like feeling boxed in...

That night they slept together in the bed again. It didn't feel awkward at all this time.

"I'm keepin' an eye on the blankets," Faith said, as she curled up on her side and went to sleep. "Plus stop checkin' out my fabulous bod."

"You wish," Willow said.

They both still slept in their jeans. Faith didn't own pajamas, or a nightgown, and Willow hadn't brought any.

Faith was asleep within fifteen minutes. But Willow felt restless...

She wondered what would happen to her, if it turned out they hadn't saved the world...if Thor and Loki came back the next night, and told her it was still gone, in 2009. What would she do? Where would she go?

She remembered the dream...of her eyes turning black...of Tara, burning...

What if Tara was gone? What if her whole life was gone, and she was trapped here, in the past? What would she do?

It was Warren's fault; she knew that. Loki, Thor, even Odin all agreed that Warren had caused the changes...caused the end of the world. Once Warren died, that should fix things...

But what if it didn't? What if her life, Willow's whole life, was gone?

Willow remembered Tara, burning...

She remembered Warren, burning.

He would probably be in the fifth circle by now--having all his skin flayed off, a little piece at a time, and then being forced to eat it. The fifth circle would be fun to watch.

Willow wanted to watch. She wanted to watch him suffer.

She got up. Faith was asleep in the bed, on her side. Willow knew she always slept on her side.

Willow sat back down on the bed beside her, and watched her sleep for a moment.

She had no idea how she would be able to send her away, even after the blizzard ended.

She kissed Faith's forehead.

"I love you," she whispered.

She got up again, and moved quietly to the closet. She took off the blouse, hung it up, and put on her sweater. She took out her coat and her shoes, and put them on.

She erected an energy shield around the room, blocking all the exits. She didn't think Faith would try to sneak out--she had no reason to--but with all the craziness that had been happening lately, and then almost losing Faith, Willow couldn't leave her alone even for a little while without knowing a shield was there protecting her. It was Willow's strongest shield, and she put as much power into it as it could contain. Even Thor would take awhile to break it down.

Then Willow went out...to see Warren.

"That looks really painful," Willow said.

Warren was being flayed alive.

Warren's body wasn't black and burned anymore; it restored itself for every new circle. His skin was being cut from his body by invisible knives, in tiny, bloody chunks. He was screaming, at the top of his lungs, in those moments when he wasn't being forced to eat his own skin. But no one would hear him...it was the weekend, and past two in the morning, and there was a blizzard. And when Willow had gotten her fill, she would put the glamour around him again, and put him back in his drawer.

She sat on a crate, in the cold basement room, and watched him die. The skin was cut randomly, so the victim didn't know where the pain would come from next, and couldn't brace themselves for it. Warren's body looked like a checkerboard. So much blood was flowing down from every part of him that he almost looked like he was melting. He was standing naked, in a pool of his own blood, and chunks of his flesh quivered in it grotesquely. It looked sort of like chicken cacciatore, Willow thought. About every ten seconds, Warren's mouth suddenly filled up, and he cried, and chewed another loathsome chunk of the flesh that had been cut away, and swallowed it.

"I don't know why you didn't just give up," Willow said. "All those times we fought, all those chances I gave you. You should've just given up. You should've stopped fighting me. You should've...should've stopped trying to hurt my friends. This is your fault. Not mine. Yours. You did this. You did this to me."

Warren screamed. His eyes were squeezed shut, and drool was dribbling down his chin. But then he was forced to start chewing again.

"Kinda like paper cuts, huh?" Willow said, as she watched the invisible knives go about their work. "Except, y'know, like ten-thousand of 'em."

Willow wasn't sure he even knew she was there. Seven Hells almost always drove its victims insane, and very quickly. It was the only way the mind could cope with that level of pain. It retreated into fantasy.

"So like, with your time travel technology, how come you never saw this coming?" Willow said. "How come you never saw your future? Or did you see it, and think you could change it?"

It was fun--in a gross sort of way--watching Warren suffer, but she wished he could respond to her. The only other person she had inflicted this spell upon had talked to her while it was happening; they'd had a very interesting conversation. But he was stronger than Warren. And Willow cared about him... she had loved him, once. So she terminated the spell before it reached the final circle, and put him out of his misery.

She knew she still loved him. And she knew he was alive out there...she was in the past, so he was alive. She could see him, if she wanted to. She filed the thought away. Right now, she wanted to concentrate on Warren.

She didn't love Warren. She didn't care about him. She didn't even consider him a human being. She had no intention of terminating the spell.

"Maybe it can't be changed, Warren," Willow said. "Maybe some things are just meant to be. Maybe you and I were always meant to be right here. Kinda sucks, huh?"

Willow watched him for two hours.

Then she put him back in his drawer, and walked out of the cold room, and headed back to the hotel.

When she got there, Faith was awake, and waiting for her.

Willow crept into the dark bedroom, having turned the key in the lock as quietly as possible, trying not to make any noise. But Faith was sitting right there in front of her, in the leather chair, in the dark, waiting.

"Um...hi," Willow said.

"Where you been?" Faith said.

"I had...an errand."

"Uh-huh."

Faith got up, and turned on the light. She was wearing a tee-shirt and panties, and nothing else.

Faith laid herself down on the bed, and stretched her legs out.

"Um...thought you slept in your jeans," Willow said.

Faith was beautiful. Her legs were gorgeous, perfectly smooth. Willow knew they weren't as muscular now as they would eventually be once she met Rebecca, and she started working out. And Faith's legs were a little skinny, because she was underweight from not eating enough. But Faith was still beautiful and her body was still delectable, and Faith knew it. Willow forced herself not to stare, as Faith stretched out on the bed like a cat. She knew why Faith was in her underwear now...she knew what Faith was trying to do. And Willow knew it was her own fault, for leaving. But she also knew this had been bound to happen eventually...and it would make things harder.

"Got a little stuffy," Faith said. "I like bein' cool when I sleep. C'mere honey. Come talk to me. What kind of errand you got at three in the morning in a blizzard?"

Willow hung her coat up in the closet, and sat down on the edge of the bed. "Had to check on something."

Faith turned over, on to her stomach. She stuck her butt up in the air a little. "So did you go out? You leave the hotel? You're all dry."

Willow noticed Faith staring at her...staring at her body.

"I can like, do these energy shields?" Willow said. "I put one around me to ward off the snow and stuff. I'm sorry I left without telling you, sweetie. I just had to see to that errand, that's all. And you were asleep and I didn't wanna wake you. I'd never just take off on you."

Faith nodded, got off the bed, and knelt down in front of Willow.

"Yeah, kinda thought you were maybe leavin' me or somethin'," Faith said. "Got a little worried. But remember what I said about lyin'? Remember how I said you lie to me and I'm out the door? You're not tellin' me the whole truth, honey. So try again."

Faith looked at Willow's breasts. She looked at her legs. She wasn't obnoxious about it, but she lingered long enough for Willow to notice she was staring. Then she looked up at Willow's eyes...straight into them.

"We're gonna be friends, Will?" Faith said. "We gotta be honest, right?"

"I was checking on Warren," Willow said, and quickly raised her hand before Faith could interrupt. "And before you maybe freak out? You don't have to worry about him. He's dead. When I said he was gone I meant it. I cast a spell on him that's killing him, but slowly. It's torturing him first."

"Torturing him how?" Faith said. She said it as if Willow had just made a remark about the weather.

"Seven stages, called circles, each lasting ten hours or so. The spell takes three days to kill you. And don't worry, it's not possible for him to break free of it unless I decided to cancel it."

"What are the circles? What happens in each one?"

"Um, really painful gross stuff? Probably better that you don't know. It starts with burning alive and goes downhill from there."

Faith knelt in front of Willow like an attentive cat, waiting on her owner's whim...waiting to be petted.

"Pretty hardcore," Faith said. "How do you survive the burning to get to the other stuff?"

Faith was resting her hands on Willow's knees now, and looking straight up into her eyes.

"Um...the magic keeps you alive but makes sure you feel all the pain. After three days, when you've gone through all seven circles, it finally kills you."

"How come you're torturing him? I mean, instead of just killing him?"

"He hurt you."

Faith nodded.

"You...really did that for me?" Faith said. "You're torturing him because he hurt me?"

"Yeah. You're important to me, sweetie, I care about you," Willow said. "He hurt you, so I'm hurting him back."

Willow knew Faith; she knew her better than anyone in the world. She knew part of the reason Faith was doing this was because she wanted to be able to stay in the room for as many days as possible. It wasn't easy being homeless in winter, especially in Boston. And Faith had unlimited meals in the hotel room, too. Willow knew Faith wanted this to last as long as possible.

But Willow knew the other reason Faith was doing it was that she didn't want to be alone.

Faith had never had a friend...never had anyone who cared about her in the slightest. She would, when Rebecca found her, and then she met Evan after that, but that was still almost a year away.

This was the only way Faith knew to keep people interested in her. It was the only thing she thought she had to offer. Willow knew Faith trusted her now, so she was offering it.

Faith had never been with a woman before at this point in her life, but Willow knew more about Faith's sexuality at this age than Faith herself did. She knew Faith was attracted to women. And she knew being with a woman was different in Faith's mind than being with a man; it was safer. Women didn't try to get inside. Willow knew that if she were a man Faith would offer her, at most, a blowjob. It would be weeks before she offered full-blown sex. But Willow was a woman, and the fact that she was a woman made her less threatening.

"It's kinda stuffy in here, hon," Faith said, and started unlacing Willow's boots. "You must be gettin' hot, bein' all bundled up like this."

Faith pulled off Willow's boots. Her hands moved gently over Willow's feet as she did it, caressing them.

"You must be dyin' in that sweater, Will," Faith said, and massaged Willow's feet over her socks. Willow resisted the urge to moan; it felt good. "Can't sleep in that sweater, you'll get like, heat stroke. The blouse is probably hot too." Faith got up. "Take that off, wear one of my tee-shirts. Got one more in my backpack."

Willow nodded. Faith went into the closet, dug around in her backpack, and came back with a pink Hello Kitty tee-shirt.

"I'm a kitty," Faith said, and flashed Willow a wicked smile.

"Um...okay," Willow said, and smiled back. The problem with Faith trying to seduce her was, Faith was really good at it. She might have been blatant but she made up for it by being beautiful...and also by being someone Willow loved. Willow knew she needed to be careful here. She didn't want to take advantage of Faith. But at the same time, she couldn't hurt her feelings when she refused her advances. If she hurt Faith's feelings, if she made Faith feel cheap, she would withdraw...she might even run away. Telling Faith she didn't want to use her was also a way of telling Faith that she was offering herself up to be used. Willow knew Faith would rather walk back out into that blizzard than be made to feel like a prostitute.

Willow thought the key was not to let Faith control this.

Willow took the tee-shirt. She pulled off her sweater, and put on the tee-shirt. Then she flashed her own wicked smile.

"How do I look?" Willow said. "Bet I'm not rockin' it as hard as you."

"Bite your tongue, girlfriend," Faith said. "You got killer boobs. Puttin' mine to shame over here."

"So you're a kitty, huh?"

"Definitely. You gonna sleep in your jeans? Kind of uncomfortable."

"Yeah, good point," Willow said, and started pulling her jeans down. They were tight and she had to wriggle around a little. "You wanna help me get these off, kitty?"

Faith nodded, and knelt down in front of her again, and helped her pull her jeans off. She pulled off Willow's socks too, and started massaging her feet again.

And then Willow sat there in her panties and a tee-shirt, and Faith knelt in front of her, massaging her feet, and looking up at her and smiling.

"Sexy," Faith said, and did the wicked smile again, as she looked Willow over, her eyes settling on Willow's panties. "You tryin' to get me all hot and bothered?"

Willow closed her eyes, and let out a small, soft moan, as Faith massaged her feet, her strong fingers playing her like an instrument.

"You like this, honey?" Faith whispered. "You like when I do this?"

"Yeah," Willow whispered.

Willow knew what she had to do. She had been expecting this, and she had come up with a plan. It was time to set the rules...and Willow knew she had to do it now, before this got out of control. Willow had always been attracted to Faith...she couldn't let this go any further. If she let it go any further, Willow knew she might be swept away...

And it would be wrong...

Willow just hoped her plan wouldn't backfire. Faith was fragile, especially at this age. One wrong word could wreck everything.

"Come...come up here, kitty," Willow gasped, and patted the bed next to her. She didn't smile when she did it. It was time to set the rules...to take control.

Faith sat on the bed next to her. Willow thought she looked a little nervous. Partly because she had never been with a woman...and partly because, as many times as Faith had done this, she had never really wanted to. And Willow knew she didn't really want to now.

Willow caressed Faith's hair, and looked into her eyes.

"So what kind of a kitty are you?" Willow said.

"I'm a kitty who likes to be petted," Faith said, and rested her head in Willow's lap, and stretched her legs out behind her.

Willow kept stroking her hair.

"Meow," Faith whispered.

"You're a pretty kitty," Willow said. "But you're a young kitty too. I'm an old cat."

"You're not old. How old are you anyway? What are you like, twenty-three, twenty-four?"

"Twenty-eight, sweetie."

"Damn. Well you sure don't look it."

"Might not look it, but I still am." Willow needed a reason to reject Faith's advances, a reason that Faith would believe...and at the same time, she didn't want to lie to her. She wanted Faith to understand that she cared about her...that she didn't want to use her...that Faith had more to offer than just her body.

"I'm not jailbait or nothin'. Sixteen's legal."

"You know the laws about that? Seriously?"

"Been to enough parties with college guys. They're always quotin' the laws at me."

Faith was shaking a little, as Willow caressed her hair.

"You know what I'd love right now, sweetie?" Willow whispered, and slipped her hand under Faith's tee-shirt, and started rubbing her belly. Faith moaned.

"What?" Faith murmured.

"I'd love to have a sexy little kitty I could pet all over," Willow said.

"You do," Faith whispered. Willow noticed Faith was relaxing, as she rubbed her belly. "I'm your kitty. You can...can do whatever you want to me."

Willow leaned down, and kissed Faith's forehead.

"Sweetie," Willow whispered. "I don't want a kitty who's just gonna lie there and let me do stuff. I want a kitty who wants to pet me too. And you don't."

"I do, Willow," Faith whispered. "I wanna...I wanna be with you."

Willow shook her head.

"Lying's a deal breaker, Faith," Willow said.

Faith blushed.

"I love being with you," Willow said. "Not just because you're beautiful. Not just because I wanna boink you. Because I love just hanging with you. I love how you make me laugh."

"You think...I'm beautiful?"

Willow smiled.

"Yeah, sweetie," she said. "I do. I always did."

"I'm your kitty," Faith said. "I'll pet you so good, Willow. Just...just gimme a chance. Just let me show you."

"I think you're a bad kitty," Willow said, and gave Faith a little smile. "And kitties need to remember that cats are the ones in charge. And the cat says, it's time for you to go back to sleep."

"I'm a good kitty," Faith said, and shook her head, and giggled.

Willow giggled too. "I think you better get to bed and stop bein' all perverted at me before that little butt gets a spanking."

"On second thought, maybe I'm a bad kitty."

"You definitely are," Willow said, and pointed toward the pillows. "Time for bed."

"Ruinin' all my fun, fairy godmother," Faith said, and crawled over to her side of the bed. She wiggled her butt at Willow as she did it.

Willow gave Faith's ass a single, gentle spank...more like a pat. Faith giggled again.

"Bad kitty," Willow said, and got up and turned off the light. Then she got into the bed on the other side, and tried to forget how horny she was...it was going to take some effort...

The bed was like laying on a puff of cotton but Willow still couldn't sleep. She watched Faith sleep instead. And she spent the rest of the night thinking about her...

She thought she had established the rules pretty effectively: she was in charge. Faith seemed to have accepted her authority. Faith's whole demeanor had changed, once Willow had used their age difference to justify the rules. She had begun acting like a little girl. Willow knew Faith would still try to have a sexual relationship with her, but at least she would do it on what she thought were Willow's terms now. And when Willow rejected her, she thought the age difference excuse had a good chance of working.

But Faith's whole reason for doing this was to be able to stay with Willow as long as possible. Willow knew Faith was seriously considering her as a long-term relationship now...a girlfriend...a lover. Faith tried that with boys sometimes...she'd had a few boyfriends. But they never lasted...they always used her, and discarded her. Willow knew Faith was hoping she would be different... that she would be the person who would take care of her.

Willow knew she had made a serious error, telling Faith about the future... specifically, about the fact that she was going to end up with a girl...with Buffy. Now Faith figured that if she was going to be a with a girl anyway, she might as well practice.

Willow knew she would have to send Faith away, soon...once the blizzard had passed, and once Thor brought news that the future had been restored...Faith would have to go back out into the cold.

Willow didn't know if she could do it.

But if she didn't, everything changed...not just for Faith but for all of them. If Faith didn't arrive in Sunnydale the way she was meant to, exactly when she was meant to, Willow herself could die. Or she might never meet Tara...

There was just no choice. Faith had to go back out into the cold...

The next day was Sunday and Willow turned on the news shows after she got out of the shower, and watched This Week With David Brinkley, Meet the Press and The McLaughlin Group over breakfast. Faith watched with her, and sat very close to her on the couch as she did.

They both sat in their underwear. They had gotten tired of wearing the same pairs of jeans. Willow didn't feel awkward. In fact it felt perfectly normal, sitting with Faith like that. And Faith was on her best behavior; she was following the rules and not trying to get physical at all. She sat close to Willow, but that was all she did.

Willow knew Faith was bored by the news shows. But Faith watched every minute of them with her, and asked questions about them, and tried to understand them, and to understand why Willow liked them.

"Hey," Faith eventually said, as George Will was telling Sam Donaldson that Gingrich was going to have a tough time getting anything done with a hostile Congress. "So you know who the President is in the future, right? You know who all the Presidents are?"

"Sure, sweetie," Willow said. "Let's see, all the way through 2008... Gingrich is a one-termer, then McCain beats Gore in 2000 and he beats Edwards in 2004...then it's Hillary Clinton in 2008. I'm from 2009."

"And you're twenty-eight years old. That means...so like you were born in 1981?"

"March eleventh, 1981. I'm actually four months younger than you."

"Seriously? That's...wow. Wait a minute...hold up. I just realized something. There's another you out there, right? I mean...the you from this time?"

"Yeah, she's in California, probably sitting at home in her pajamas right now watching the same shows we are. She's fifteen. You know, I've been thinking about it too? I mean...I could call her up. I could call my house and talk to myself."

"Time travel's fucked up."

"Well, there aren't any evil robots from the future at least."

"So what would you say? If you talked to her, I mean. What kind of advice would you give her?"

Willow was quiet for a moment, as she remembered all the people she had lost...Xander, Giles, Riley, Evan...Cordy, Wesley, Lorne, Lindsey...Angel.

"I'd tell her never to put herself before her friends," Willow said.

She looked out at the balcony. The snow was tapering off, and the sky seemed brighter. The weather forecast had said the snow would be ending today.

Tomorrow, Willow knew she would have to send Faith into the cold...

And she knew she couldn't do it.

They ate room service and watched movies in their underwear the rest of the day, and they were never bored. Faith stayed on her best behavior...and then it was nine o'clock.

Willow knew Warren would be dying, very soon.

She wanted to see.

"So, um...I gotta do another little errand?" Willow said, and got up from the couch. They had been watching The Simpsons; it was a repeat of one of those old Halloween episodes where they did a few weird stories that weren't part of the regular show. One of the stories had been about time-travel: Homer was trying to fix his toaster and he ended up turning it into a time machine by mistake and traveling to the past, where he promptly killed half the dinosaurs by sneezing on them and inadvertently destroyed the future. He kept going back in time and trying to fix things...but he never managed to. Finally he settled for a world that was close to what he remembered...a world that was good enough.

"Same errand as before?" Faith said.

"Yeah. I'll just be gone a couple hours."

Faith nodded, and stood up, with her hands folded across her chest.

"You say you're checkin' on him," Faith said. "But you told me the spell always works, that there's no way he can get out of it. So why you gotta check?"

"Um...it's just...to make sure that..."

"You're watchin' him, aren't you? Watchin' him bein' tortured."

They stood in the living room, facing each other. Faith looked straight at Willow. Willow could never outstare her.

"Yeah," Willow said.

"He hurt you. Hurt you bad. Not just what he did to me."

"He kept attacking us. He...hurt other people too, people you'll meet someday. But what he did to you was the last straw. For what he did to you..."

"You're torturing him."

"Yeah."

"You love me, don't you?"

"Yeah."

Faith nodded.

"You said it before, guess it kinda went over my head with all the crazy stuff we talked about. But we're not a couple in the future. You said we were tempted but it never happened. You love me like...maybe a sister."

"You've always been...like a big sister to me, sweetie. You always protected me, looked out for me."

Faith nodded.

"Gonna start now," Faith said. "I don't want you to see him."

"Why not?'

"Because it's not you. Because you're hurting yourself, seeing him. Watching a guy get tortured to death...yeah, I'm not losin' any sleep over him dyin' because he did a real number on me? But you're letting him get to you. Letting him hurt you, with you going there and watching. You're better than that, Willow. Watching a guy die, gettin' off on it, that's not for you. I want you to stay here with me and promise you won't sneak out to see him anymore."

Willow hesitated.

"Deal breaker," Faith said. "And yeah, we've been throwing that phrase around? But I'm not kidding. You see him again and I walk. Choose. Him or me."

Willow felt tears filling up her eyes.

"You," she whispered.

Faith held out her arms.

"C'mere, honey," she said.

Willow walked into Faith's arms, crying.

Faith held her.

"Let go of him," Faith whispered. "Okay, honey? I want you to let him go now. Hold on to me instead."

Willow nodded, and held on to her, as tight as she could, and cried.

"Just hold on to me, Willow," Faith whispered. "Hold on to me."

Willow slept in Faith's arms that night.

And she had a dream...

She was in the bedroom in the London house, with Tara. Tara had her arms around her. They were looking in the mirror again.

"I have to go," Tara said. "I'm sorry, sweetie. I'm sorry...I couldn't hold on to you. I tried. I tried."

Willow saw in the mirror that Tara was beautiful again...she wasn't burning like in the other dream, and her necklace was back. The crystal glowed with a warm white light. But Tara was crying...and slowly slipping away...

"I love you, Willow," Tara said. "You're the love of my life."

"Don't...don't go?" Willow whispered "Please?"

"It's pulling me away," Tara said, as her hands slipped from Willow's waist.

"Hold on to me baby! Please!" Willow screamed. "Hold on to me! I don't wanna be alone...I don't wanna be..."

"You'll never be alone," Tara whispered, and turned Willow around, and kissed her...a kiss goodbye...

...And let her go.

"NO!" Willow screamed. "NO! Tara?! Baby?! Hold on to me! Hold on to me! HOLD ON TO ME!"

Willow tried to grab Tara's hands, but they were immaterial now, a ghost's hands...

"TARA!" Willow shrieked, desperately clawing at her, trying to touch her... but she couldn't... "TARA! TARAAAAAAAAAAA!!"

And Tara faded away to nothing...

When Willow saw herself in the mirror, her eyes were black.

Willow woke up gasping, with tears running down her cheeks.

She looked around. It was morning; the sun was shining in. The blizzard had finally ended.

There was a fly buzzing around her...

When she looked up, she saw Thor waiting on the terrace.

Willow wiped her eyes.

"Perhaps you should put some clothes on," the fly said.

Willow stood on the terrace, with Thor and Loki. Loki remained as a fly. He liked changing his shape. Once again he created a masking barrier around them, so Faith couldn't see or hear, in case she woke up.

"You're really annoying as a fly," Willow said.

"Willow," Thor said. "There has been no change. Midgard is gone. Humanity is gone."

Willow felt her stomach fill with ice.

"That's...but...but there's gotta be some kind of mistake," Willow said. "Warren started all this...and we stopped him."

"It's a conundrum to be certain," the fly said. "And unlike Thor, I'm actually a rather intelligent sort of fellow."

"Wait...Warren," Willow said. "Could he have--?"

"He's dead," the fly said. "We saw him on the way here. Excellent handiwork, by the way. Why, you remind me of myself, when I was a lad."

Willow's face turned red. She noticed Thor wasn't looking at her.

"But then...but then...I don't understand," Willow said, softly, and started to tremble.

"Neither do I, and believe me, I am unused to the feeling," the fly said. "Odin is at a loss too. Even the Norns are at a loss. But they did at least have some counsel for us, mostly the usual cryptic twaddle, but better than nothing."

It was a lifeline; Willow grabbed it and held on as hard as she could. "What did they say?"

"Two things," the fly said. "First, you must send the sleeping beauty back to her life; cold and hard and wearisome her road was meant to be, that is the fate the Norns wove for her, but she tarries here because of you. Second, that thou wouldst do well to return to Asgard, though they did not know why. Perhaps because there is no Midgard for you to return to."

"That's it?!" Willow said. "Send Faith back on to the street and then hang out in Asgard doing nothing?! Do you people even have a plan?!"

"Nay," Thor said. "We are at a loss as to how Midgard might be saved; all that is left now is to plan our vengeance. Odin has called a great war council, and the host prepares to march, to destroy every last one of those foul demons that doth infest Midgard now like insects."

"Now I'm insulted," the fly said.

"SHUT UP!" Willow screamed. "SHUT THE FUCK UP, BOTH OF YOU!"

Thor was quiet, and he kept his reserve; only his eyes told Willow that she had hurt him. Loki, for his part, seemed amused at her outburst. But he was quiet.

"They're all dead!" Willow shouted. "The whole human race is dead and you're talking about...fucking honor and...vengeance and...stupid BULLSHIT! You and Odin and the fucking Norns all sit in your frigging castles in the sky all day long and decide how our lives are gonna go?! And now there aren't anymore lives! They're all dead! Everyone I love is dead and you guys are gonna go have a battle and then you're gonna go back to your fucking castles and drink mead and congratulate yourselves on how fucking noble you all are! Fuck that! If you guys aren't gonna lift a finger to save the world then I WILL!"

"If you had a plan, you could have told us without all the carrying on, woman," the fly said.

"The plan is I'm staying," Willow said. "I'm staying here in 1997. All the battles that are coming? All the people we're gonna lose? I'm gonna change all that. I'm gonna fix the world for the better, starting today, and when we all finally get to 2009, it's gonna be there."

"You're talking about changing fate," the fly said. "That's breaking the rules, witch. There will be consequences."

"Fuck you and fuck your rules," Willow said. "Fuck the Norns too. Faith's not going back on the street. She's staying with me."

Willow walked back into the hotel room.

Then she turned back to them.

"We're done," she said. "Go back to fucking Asgard, both of you. Go have a nice life being all honorable while you sit around watching people die. I'll be down here doing something about it."

"Willow," Thor said, softly. "I would not...have us part this way."

"Maybe it's fate, huh?" Willow said.

Then she shut the glass doors, and drew the curtain in front of them.

Willow stood in the bedroom. She stood very still.

She heard Thor's chariot leaving. There was a rush of air, as the goats leapt into the sky, and they were gone.

Faith was still asleep. She slept curled up on her side, the way she always did.

Tara was dead.

Willow could hear the little clock on the end table in the living room ticking...time was moving on. But she knew it stopped, now, in 1998.

Rebecca was dead. Buffy was dead. Dawn was dead. Fred...Connor...

Faith...

Faith was dead.

Faith was asleep, a few feet away from her.

Willow wasn't crying. She didn't understand why she wasn't crying. It seemed like the time to cry.

Tara was dead. Willow thought of her. But no memories came to mind. The concept of Tara was there...her name, the fact of her existence. The fact that Willow had loved her. But no memories came. Her smile, her touch, her warmth, the way she laughed...these things didn't come to Willow. Willow thought maybe they were gone now...that maybe Tara had taken them with her, into whatever nothingness had claimed her. Being erased from existence wasn't quite the same as dying...it was worse than dying. Tara, and everyone else Willow loved, had been erased retroactively: they stopped existing in November, 1998, when, somehow, they lost a battle they were supposed to have won...

The clock ticked. It seemed loud, in that silence.

Not only was Willow's relationship with Tara over now, but it had never even happened in the first place, she realized. It was erased.

Willow wondered if she'd forget it soon. She wondered if the changes in time would catch up to her, and change her...she wondered if that's why no memories of Tara came...if that's why she couldn't cry.

Willow felt tired. And she felt numb...like she had lost something, forever. Not something outside of her...not the loss of her friends. Something inside... something that was precious, priceless beyond compare...something she couldn't function without. She felt hollowed out. Like a mannequin...a wax figure. A representation of Willow.

The clock ticked, even louder. Willow felt it, thumping against her head like a hammer. The room was dark; shutting the curtains in front of the doors leading to the balcony had plunged the bedroom into shadow. She noticed it, and everything else, but as facts only. Information. Nothing outside of her had any effect on her now. It was all just information...

Except for the clock. It was ticking louder and louder...not even ticking now, but throbbing, pounding, blasting. It was like firecrackers, like gunshots, like cannons.

This was what it felt like to lose, Willow realized. Not to lose a game, or even a battle; to lose everything. To know that you had been given one chance to make things right, and you had failed...and now it was over. Your life, as you had known it, was over. You had lost...you were lost.

Willow stood in the middle of the bedroom, and she heard the clock booming every second, and she watched Faith sleep...

Faith was dead. But she was alive...she was alive, right here in front of her. Tara was dead, but she was alive too...she was a sixteen year old girl living in Milwaukee now.

Willow stood there, and didn't know what to do. She didn't move. She felt tired...but not like she wanted to sleep. She simply had no energy, no life. She felt like a device that had been unplugged. She knew, intellectually, that she would have to do something at some point. Move. Eat. Go to the bathroom. But she simply didn't see a reason to bother. She stood there, and didn't move, because there didn't seem to be any reason to. She had lost...lost every single thing. What was the point of going on?

She could kill herself, but she didn't want to, because it would take effort. She'd have to plan out how to do it and then go through with it and all she wanted to do was stand there. She was at the end of everything. There was no reason to do anything, no reason to live, no reason even to die. She simply existed, a woman out of time...a woman without a purpose, or a place...

Eventually, she became tired of standing up. She thought she had been standing there a long time. She didn't know how long at first, until she remembered the clock. She had been keeping track of the ticking...the pounding.

It had ticked one-thousand, nine-hundred and thirty-six times since she had come back in from the balcony and stood in the bedroom. She realized she had been counting.

The chair would have been comfortable, but she would have had to walk over to it and she didn't want to do things. She was dead, she didn't want to move. She wanted to be still, forever. So she dropped to her knees on the floor.

She tried not to think, as she knelt there on the floor, because there was no point to thinking and everyone was dead now anyway, but thoughts came to her nevertheless. She still didn't understand why stopping Warren hadn't fixed things. She still didn't understand...

She knelt on the floor, in the dark. A few shafts of sunlight squeezed through the small gap in the curtains, and settled on Willow's hair, and her cheek. It was annoying. Willow didn't want to be in the sun. She was a dead thing now, dead like all her friends, and she wanted to be in the dark.

She thought of Tara again, just to see if she could. She assumed the memory of Tara would be taken away from her soon. Willow knew, logically, that since her relationship with Tara had never happened now, that she herself was an inconsistency, a paradox, a loose thread that the universe had overlooked. But Willow knew the universe was a relentlessly logical and ordered place, and it would find her eventually...and then she'd be gone. At least, she hoped so.

The damned clock in the living room kept ticking...

Willow found herself getting up. She had a purpose now. A small one. After she had seen it through she'd go back to being dead, but right now she wanted to see to this one thing.

Willow felt like a zombie, as she walked into the living room. She had fought zombies before. She knew zombies needed an animating force, a will to compel them to do things. She was alive for a little while, to do this one thing. Then she'd be dead again.

She walked into the living room, picked up the clock from the end table, and smashed it into the wall, over and over again, until it burst into pieces.

There was no more ticking...no more pounding. The wall had a crack in it.

Willow went back to being dead. Whatever had animated her, given her purpose, was gone. The ticking was gone too.

Willow stood in the living room, with the shattered remains of the clock in her hand. She was bleeding; the face of the clock was glass and it had cut her when she destroyed it. She didn't care. The pain was a sensation that living people had. Willow stood there, with her hand dripping blood.

And then Faith was talking to her...Willow realized Faith had been standing there since she had destroyed the clock. She realized she didn't know how long ago that was, now. Without the ticking she had lost track.

She looked at her hand. It was bandaged. Willow had no idea where Faith had found bandages but then when she looked closely at her hand she saw that Faith had ripped a couple of strips from the bedsheet and used one to tie the other tight around her hand. Willow had no idea when that had happened.

Faith was still talking; she was talking louder now. Willow wasn't looking at her. She was looking at the floor, at nothing in particular, although her eyes were aimed where the remains of the clock were scattered on the rug.

Faith was caressing her hair now.

Willow looked at the floor. She had destroyed the clock, and now there was nothing else to do. So she stood there.

"Please?" she heard Faith pleading. "Please talk to me, honey? Please?" Faith's voice was shaky.

Willow turned, and looked at her.

Faith was crying.

Willow threw her arms around her. She didn't think about doing it. It just happened. One second she was standing there; the next second her arms were around Faith.

Willow realized she had a new animating force now...a new will controlling her...a new thing she was compelled to do. But unlike the clock, this thing would take a long time...maybe the rest of her life.

She was going to take care of Faith. She was going to love her, and protect her, because somehow, she was compelled to. She didn't decide to. She simply knew she was going to. Zombies didn't have choices. They didn't make decisions. They simply did what they were compelled to do.

Willow was dead. But Faith was alive...

Faith was alive.

The thought barreled into Willow's mind like someone battering down the door to some shadowy old crypt and letting in the sunlight. It raced around in there, knocking things over, kicking up dust, wrecking the ordered, embalmed regularity of the place. It had been a place for dead things to rest in the dark, but now it was thrown open to the light...

"I love you," Willow heard herself whispering, as she kissed Faith's cheek. "I'm gonna take care of you, Faith. I'm gonna take care of you."

Faith had brought her back to the bed. Willow had gone with her; Willow still wasn't really thinking about things. Suddenly, she'd find herself doing something. Right now, she was doing the things Faith wanted her to do.

They were lying on the bed together, looking into each other's eyes. Willow wasn't sure how long it had been, but she thought it might have been hours. Faith was holding Willow in her arms, and saying things, and caressing her hair, and kissing her cheek sometimes. Sometimes Willow noticed the things Faith said, and sometimes she didn't. She didn't respond to anything she said. She looked back into her eyes, and waited for things to happen...waited for herself to do something, or say something. Willow never thought of doing things or saying things now, they just happened...she would find herself moving...she would hear words coming out of her.

"If you wanna talk to me about it, honey?" Faith whispered. "Anytime you wanna talk, we can talk, okay?"

Willow felt Faith's fingers in her hair...felt her lips touch her cheek sometimes. She felt the warmth of her, all around her, encompassing her, as Faith held her.

Willow was barefoot now, in her jeans and a sweater. Faith must have gotten her out of her coat and her boots at some point, though Willow didn't remember when it happened. The clock wasn't ticking. Willow wondered where the ticking went. Then she remembered she had destroyed the clock.

Instead of the clock, Willow heard Faith's heart beating, against her cheek.

Willow found herself getting ready to talk...organizing her thoughts. She was realizing that she would have to say things...explain things. She would need to talk to Faith. She knew Faith was fragile, and if she ignored her too long Faith would be hurt. Willow felt herself gathering force...gathering energy...getting ready to pretend to be a living thing. This would be harder than the clock, because she would have to do it for a long time, without a break. Hours...

Willow found herself turning over, so she was on top of Faith, and looking down into her eyes.

"I love you," Willow heard herself say. "Do you understand that? Do you understand that I'm not lying when I say that?"

Faith nodded, and kissed her. Gently...a chaste kiss, on the lips. Willow allowed it. It felt good. It made her heart beat faster, made her feel, for a second, like a living thing. But then Faith kissed her again, wanting more...parting Willow's lips with her tongue.

Willow knew this was another way she would have to take care of Faith... she couldn't let Faith get the wrong idea about this.

Willow took Faith's hand.

"I'm gonna take care of you from now on," Willow said. "Okay?'

Faith nodded.

"That means I want you to stay with me," Willow said. She looked down into Faith's eyes. She felt Faith, opening her legs beneath her. Faith was still in her underwear. "Will you stay with me, Faith? Will you let me take care of you?"

"Yeah," Faith said, and tears rolled down her cheeks.

Willow found herself kissing them away, one by one.

Faith put her arms around Willow, and ran her fingers down Willow's back. She moved her hands under Willow's sweater, and caressed her.

"Take...take this off," Faith whispered, and kissed Willow's neck, and opened her legs wider underneath her. She moved her hands around underneath Willow's sweater, and caressed her breasts, over her bra.

Willow shook her head, and gently moved Faith's hands away.

"No," Willow said. "That's not what you and I are about, sweetie. I'm gonna take care of you. But...that's not what we're about, okay? I don't want you to feel hurt by that, or rejected. Because, you're beautiful? You're a beautiful girl, Faith. And I'd love to be with you like that? It would feel so good? But that isn't what you need. You need to understand about love...what it is. You don't understand, because no one ever showed you. I'm gonna show you. Okay? Will you let me show you?"

Faith nodded. "Will you still...can we still...?"

Faith blushed.

"Can you...still sleep with me at night?" Faith said. "I liked...I liked last night. I liked being with you."

Willow rolled off of her, and pulled her into her arms. She kissed her cheek.

"Yeah," Willow said.

She moved her hand under Faith's tee-shirt, and started rubbing her belly, as she looked down into her eyes. Faith moaned, a soft whisper of a moan, her breath warm as it fluttered against Willow's neck. Faith's eyes were beautiful, Willow realized...she had never really noticed how big they were before. Big and brown, and filled with golden light.

"You like this, sweetie?" Willow whispered.

Faith nodded, and curled up against Willow's breasts.

"You want me to do this at night when we go to sleep?"

Faith nodded.

"Love is doing what's best for someone, even when it's hard. What's best for you right now is to understand that I like being with you, that I care about you, and it has nothing to do with wanting sex with you. You're beautiful and I'd love to have sex with you, but that's not what you need. It's not what's best for you right now. Okay?"

"Okay," Faith whispered.

"We need to talk now," Willow said, and stopped rubbing Faith's belly, and sat up. "I need to tell you...everything."

"About what?" Faith said, and sat up with her. She missed Willow's hand on her stomach...it felt warm. She wished Willow hadn't stopped caressing her there. She hoped Willow would do it again that night.

"The future," Willow said.

They sat on the couch together in the living room and ate breakfast. Willow didn't know what time it was, because the clock was smashed. But it felt like it was past noon.

Willow didn't eat. She drank coffee, and watched Faith eat. The coffee was comforting, for some reason. It reminded her of when she was alive...when she used to drink coffee while pulling all-nighters studying for exams...or when she was sitting around Giles' house with Buffy and Xander in the old days, making plans to go fight monsters, treating it all like a game...they'd stay up all night and make plans, and Willow would treat it like an equation, like a problem to be worked out... something that might be difficult, but that couldn't really hurt them...it was just a matter of applying the right formula. Then Xander died.

He was the first soldier down...and that's when they knew they were in a war...

And then they lost.

Willow knew that history never happened now...it was erased. It was time to write a new history.

But before she did, Willow would tell Faith the old one. Willow was the only person in the world who remembered it now, and she wanted Faith to know it, before she let it go...before she let it fade into oblivion...

Before Willow let Tara go, she was going to make sure someone knew who she was.

"I'm sorry, Willow," Faith said, two hours later. "I'm sorry about Tara. She sounds like she was really awesome, y'know? She sounds like...one of the really good ones."

"Yeah," Willow said. She felt cold...empty. She didn't like talking about Tara now. Tara had been warm...talking about Tara reminded her that she was dead now. Willow tried to change the subject. "So anyway...um..."

"You okay, honey?" Faith said, and took her hand. "It's okay, not being okay. You've been through some hard stuff...the hardest stuff. It's gonna take you awhile. But I'll be here to help whenever you need me."

"Thanks," Willow heard herself say.

Faith was looking at her. Willow felt her eyes on her. She didn't look back. She didn't want Faith to see her eyes...to see that there was nothing inside her. That she was hollowed out.

The breakfast was cold. Willow hadn't eaten any of it, and Faith hadn't touched it after Willow started telling her the story.

"So, show of hands," Willow said. "After the story I just told you, who thinks I'm all like, this weird babbling insane woman?"

Willow heard herself saying the words. The words sounded like her...like the way she used to speak, when she was alive. But when she said them she felt like the words were a tape recording. They just...came out of her. Sometimes Willow didn't bother listening to them.

Faith looked at her, sometimes...searched her eyes. Willow never looked back. Willow noticed Faith was still holding her hand. Caressing it.

"I don't think you're insane," Faith said. "I know you wouldn't lie to me. But...Jesus Christ. This is just...I mean...I'm a superhero?"

"Well, no cape, no secret identity? But yeah, basically."

"And what the hell kind of name is 'Buffy'?"

Willow smiled. But Willow knew it was a mechanical thing; a reflex. Sometimes bodies in morgues moved too, hours after they died. "Yeah, you got a point? But trust me, I'm not making it up."

"And 'Xander'?" Faith said. "What kinda guy calls himself 'Xander'?"

"It's California, sweetie. Just roll with it."

Faith stood up, and started pacing around.

"Okay so, let's see if I got this straight," Faith said. "I'm a potential Slayer, one of like a couple thousand girls who could become the next Slayer when the current one dies. A Slayer's like, this magic chick who's all fast and strong and a great fighter and she kills vampires and demons and monsters and shit. And, oh yeah, vampires and demons and monsters? They're real."

"Yeah. Always a bummer when you find that out for the first time? I was depressed for a whole week. I just spent that whole week at Buffy's place, pigging out on ice cream."

"So anyway, Buffy, the current Slayer, dies this year, around summer, when a big bad ass vampire dude named the Master is gonna kill her. But she's only gonna be dead for like maybe thirty seconds and then she's revived. But that activates the next girl, Jamaican chick named Kendra. Kendra dies in May, 1998 when Angelus--a vamp who used to be Buffy's boyfriend, and believe me, we're gonna be talking a lot more about that--gets a gang of bad guys together and one of them kills her. Cut to the next girl, me. I get powered up, and I'm all bad ass. But before that this cool English lady named Rebecca Greer finds me, on my birthday, this year. She's my Watcher, like how that Giles guy is Buffy's Watcher. She takes me in, trains me up..."

"Yeah, and that's the thing. There are things that are happening, stuff that's in motion. Some of it we can change, some of it we can't. Some of it we're gonna want to change, some of it we're gonna want to leave alone. We need to come up with a plan."

Willow realized she had no idea what she had just said to Faith, or what Faith had said to her. She didn't remember any of it. She hadn't been listening.

"You mean like, to keep history going the way it went before?" Faith said.

But it didn't seem to matter. Willow felt like part of her was on autopilot... part of her was seeing to this, while the rest of her was...somewhere else. Maybe nowhere.

Willow heard herself talking...

"Yeah. Except...no," Willow said. "We need a new and improved version of history. Okay, there's stuff that has to happen? But there's a whole bunch of other stuff that just, like, really sucked. Stuff I can head off. The thing is, Willow is out there now...the other me, the one who's fifteen right now. She hasn't met Buffy yet, but she will in a couple months, and she'll start helping, and so will Xander. But right now she doesn't even know anything about magic. Even when she does start getting into magic, next year, I'm still gonna be a hundred times more powerful than she is. Buffy, Willow and Xander are getting out of stuff by the skin of their teeth, but once I show up I can make it easier."

"You can take out that Master guy, right? You said you can do fireballs, and fire kills vamps."

"Yeah. I could walk into the Hellmouth and dust the Master and every one of his redshirts without breaking a sweat."

"And Becca. What about her? Do we like, just wait here for her? You said when she found me she saved me from getting killed by four vamps..."

"Yeah, but it's not gonna happen that way this time. This time you're gonna be with me, and no one's ever gonna hurt you, sweetie. And we've got Warren's credit card and his cash, we have plenty of money to stay here until Becca arrives. She'll be in Boston by October at the latest, looking for you. She'll buy a really awesome house downtown, and we'll be moving in with her."

"You sure about all this? She'll be cool with taking us in?"

"Sweetie, she's rich. She bought that house so you would have a place to live. Plus she already knows me, she'll have no problem with me being there. I told you how I saved her in 1972, remember? And she's your Watcher. Of course she's gonna take care of you."

"But...I mean she sounds nice and all but..."

Faith looked uncomfortable. Usually Willow could read Faith like a book, but not this time.

"I mean...it's not gonna...gonna make you and me different, right?" Faith said. "She sounds like a nice lady but...I wanna be with you. Will she...have a problem with us sleepin' in the same bed?"

Willow thought about it. She knew the answer, but she'd just have to cross that bridge when she came to it. Faith was supposed to be with Buffy anyway... Willow would have to find a way to separate herself from Faith eventually. Rebecca could help with that.

"Um...it'll be fine, we'll figure it out," Willow said. "So anyway, the plan is you and I lay low here, wait for Becca, she shows up around the end of the year and takes us in and you start your training. You become the Slayer after that, and then when Kakistos shows up I make him my fucking ashtray."

Willow felt something. She felt something when she thought about killing Kakistos...stopping him from hurting Rebecca. It felt like a current of electricity sparking through her system and it felt good. It made her feel alive for a second. But then the feeling was gone.

"You said he'll have a bunch of guys with him, right? Like, a bunch more vamps?"

"Eighteen, plus his pal Trick. Doesn't matter. He can bring eighteen-hundred if he wants. More fuel for the fire."

"The last time...Rebecca was...I mean he...raped her. Killed her. Kicked me out a window too."

"Not this time. Sweetie, you understand that, right? You get that I'm not just bragging here? When I say you don't have to worry about Kakistos, that he won't hurt you or Becca, I mean it. It'll take me three seconds to burn him and whoever he brings with him down to dust. Yeah, I'm not all super strong or anything like a Slayer? But he won't even be able to touch me with my energy shields. He's gonna burn. He has no chance against me. Zero, none. Okay?"

Faith nodded. Then she blushed.

"You got my memories," Faith said.

"Yeah."

"I'm sorry. Sorry you...gotta carry all that. All that stuff I did. How I was all...all...doin' stuff with guys. How I was...a skank."

"Come over here," Willow heard herself saying.

It was another automatic response...another thing Willow just did without thinking about it. Part of her was committed to taking care of Faith, and that part was paying attention to Faith, and it knew what Faith needed. It always knew; Willow knew Faith as well as she knew herself.

But the rest of Willow...Willow didn't feel the rest of herself. She wasn't sure the rest of her was even there.

Faith walked back to the couch, and stood in front of her. Willow watched herself, and heard herself.

She took Faith's hand, and sat Faith down next to her.

"Don't ever say that again," Willow said, and looked Faith in the eyes. "You understand? You're not a skank. I don't want you to ever call yourself that again. Ever."

This was something Rebecca could do better, Willow knew. Faith had immediately respected Rebecca, from the moment they first met. Faith was afraid to disappoint Rebecca and afraid of the tone Rebecca's voice got when she was angry, and she could never bear Rebecca's eyes for more than a few seconds, and she always did exactly what Rebecca told her, to the letter, without hesitation.

But Willow knew Faith could always outstare her, even now, when she was twelve years younger. She knew Faith wasn't intimidated by her in the slightest, even with her magic powers. She knew Faith respected her, but not as a mother figure, the way she had respected Rebecca. With Willow it was all tangled up...Willow could feel it all, tangling up in Faith's head, in her heart. Faith wanted Willow to take care of her, but not as a mother; as a lover.

Willow realized now that it might not be the same between Faith and Rebecca as it was before...that her presence might change it...

Faith was looking at her. Willow knew she had embarrassed her, a little. And she knew her own voice didn't carry the authority Rebecca's did...

Willow knew she hadn't handled it right. Hadn't handled it like Rebecca would. Willow knew Faith could smell bullshit a mile away. Faith could tell she was faking this...doing an impression of Rebecca. Faith didn't know Rebecca yet, but Willow could tell Faith knew she was making it up as she went along.

Faith looked at her, looked right through her, and nodded.

Willow knew the key to Faith was, never lie to her.

"Sweetie...look," Willow said. "You did stuff, okay. But...you did it because you were alone...you were scared, and sad, and trying to survive out there. That doesn't make you a skank. If you were a skank, you wouldn't feel guilty about doing that stuff. What you are is a strong girl who was in over her head with stuff and did the best she could, and yeah, made some mistakes? You let some people take advantage of you? But you tried as hard as you could. Plus? You're a girl I love. Okay?"

When she said all that, Willow felt, for a moment, as if she was actually saying it...as if she, Willow, had said it...as if there still was a Willow, somewhere inside her...but then the feeling was gone.

Faith smiled.

"Okay, fairy godmother," Faith said.

They both agreed after three hours of talking about it that the future was giving them a headache, so they decided to forget it for awhile. They had been cooped up in the room for nearly four straight days and Willow owned a single pair of jeans and her underwear and socks were feeling gross again.

They both needed clothes, in fact they both needed complete wardrobes. Willow had a wallet with four-thousand dollars in it and a credit card with a two-hundred thousand dollar line of super-scientifically untraceable stolen credit and she wanted some damned underwear, and a sweater that wasn't itchy.

So they got out of the room and went shopping. Willow knew Boston better than Faith: at this age Faith hadn't really seen the city, but Willow had lived in Boston for awhile, a few years back. She had taught a course on comparative religion at Harvard for a semester after her book on Norse mythology had made a minor splash in academic circles in 2005. Willow decided they needed clothes, and fabulous ones, to make up for only having approximately one-point-five outfits each, and they were in Boston's Back Bay, a hop skip and a jump from all the cute little clothes shops on Newbury Street and the Neiman Marcus at the Copley Place Mall. Willow intended to start at Copley Place, since it was half a block away, but she was compiling a mental list of the most fabulous Newbury Street shops in her head, and then trying to figure out which ones existed in 1997.

The snow had ended but the temperature had dropped. Boston felt like the inside of a freezer as they came out of the hotel and the ground was icy and piled high with hard, tight-packed snow drifts. Their boots made crunching sounds as they walked. The city was coming back to life; it was Monday morning and people were back at work, rushing here and there, heads bowed, trying to get out of the cold. A lot of them didn't wear gloves or hats or scarves even though the temperature had to be in the single digits. Willow always thought Bostonians were strange that way.

The city was quiet. The cold had a way of doing that, muffling all the sounds. It wasn't just that people weren't talking as they headed to wherever they were going. The cold was like a blanket. It made everything softer, somehow, at the same time as it felt harsh on your skin. In winter, Boston always made Willow feel like she was inside a snow globe. Everything was hushed, and slow.

"Hold up," Faith said, before they had walked more than twenty paces. "I wanna go to that church over there for a minute."

Faith was pointing to the Trinity Church, across the square.

Inside, the old church was magnificent, done all in warm, red and gold hues, with a lofty dome ceiling, beautiful murals covering every wall and giant, centuries-old stained glass windows adorning the central chamber in every direction. And it was huge, too; there weren't many people there at that time of day on a Monday but the church could have seated thousands. But Willow felt dwarfed in that cavernous, dark room...she felt small. Oppressed. Her voice echoed, her footsteps echoed. She felt the weight of that old place. She thought it was beautiful, but she felt its weight...the weight of all those souls...with all their expectations...their endless demands...their endless questions: Why is life so hard? Why does evil exist? Why do we suffer? Why would any God make a world as bleak as this one?

God didn't make this world, Willow would have answered. Humanity did.

She felt the weight of them...she felt them all. Souls coming together here, across centuries, joined together in prayer, their eyes raised up, hoping to catch a glimpse of Heaven up there. Hoping there was a reason for all this, a reason for the monotony of their lives, for the chaos of the world, for the suffering they saw all around them, every day, and thought, There but for the grace of God...

Willow felt them all, millions of them over the years, raising their eyes toward the heavens, and hoping they weren't deluding themselves when they thought there had to be a reason somewhere up there...

Help us. Save us. Give us answers. Bring us hope. Show us the way...lead us out of the dark...

Love us...

Love us, even though we butcher each other. Even though we kidnap girls, and whip them and brand them and piss on them.

Willow wanted to get out of there. It wasn't a peaceful place at all, it wasn't a quiet place. It was a noisy place...all those souls were still there...still suffering...still pleading...still desperately hoping...hammering away at her... clawing at her...trying to rip off pieces of her.

Willow knew it was her fault the world was gone...her fault humanity had been snuffed out.

She looked across the room, at the altar...at Jesus Christ, hanging on the cross above it. She had never understood Christians: never understood why they commemorated an act of butchery. It was an obscenity, Willow thought, having a statue of that tortured man there. He didn't die for their sins, she thought. He died because they were sinners. Because they butchered him. His death didn't wash their sins away. It revealed their sins. It revealed their depravity.

Willow Rosenberg Antichrist, Willow thought. The name came back to her, a spectre whispering from the shadows.

Maybe those fanatics had been right about her after all, she thought, when they had captured her six years before. She had fulfilled every aspect of the prophecy except one: born on the right day, at the exact right moment, when the planets aligned...born in the right place, along the 40th parallel. Born a Jew. Possessing power to control the elements. Only six people in the world had been born at the exact right moment, but Willow was the only one born in the right place, and the only Jew, and the only witch. The Antichrist had to be her, the fanatics reasoned, if fanatics could reason. The Antichrist could be no one else.

But there was one aspect of the prophecy Willow didn't satisfy: she wasn't born with the mark.

This puzzled the fanatics, an order of pale, sickly, unwashed, inbred monks living like rats with their families amongst the sprawling ruins of an ancient Druidic temple buried in the darkness and the filth of the lowest levels of the sewers beneath the Vatican in Rome, and forgotten for millennia. They had captured Willow and brought her there, and they examined her for days, using wizards in their employ to maintain powerful binding spells around her, to prevent her using her magic to escape. She fulfilled the prophecy, perfectly, in every other detail; why didn't she have the mark? They shaved her head and examined every inch of her flesh. The mark just wasn't there.

But then one of the fanatics had an epiphany, as fanatics are wont to do: their prophecies didn't say the Antichrist had to be born with the mark. They only said the Antichrist would have the mark.

So they gave it to her.

They burned numbers into her skull...marked her, forever...branded her.

When they had finished, when Willow had been mutilated into the thing they needed her to be, the monks closed their eyes, clasped their hands in prayer. "Praise the Lord," they whispered. "Hallelujah".

And then Willow woke up...

And the monks found, to their horror, that though they had indeed released a monster when they mutilated Willow, it wasn't the monster they had anticipated...it was a monster they couldn't fight...a monster no one and nothing could stand against...

Willow destroyed them, when she saw what they had done to her, and the darkness she held inside her, like a glass of water filled to the top that always required perfect balance to maintain, finally overflowed. She killed every single one of those diseased monks, burned them to cinders, and destroyed their temple with fire so hot the old stone actually melted. Then she killed their families too, with the sole exceptions of their young children. When those children looked into her black eyes, they were afraid, and though Willow had enjoyed that look of terror and submission when she saw it in the monks' eyes, she didn't like seeing it in their children. She didn't like how they had been forced to live down there in the sewers all their lives, like vermin, denied the sun. So she spared them.

But she didn't spare the city: when she ascended back into the light Willow rose up into the sky above the Vatican, riding the wind like some terrible, beautiful, black-eyed goddess, and she destroyed that seat of power, and then all of Rome with it, creating volcanoes where there were none before to fill the streets with running fire, and calling thousands of meteors down from the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter to flatten the city, to utterly crush its pride, its hubris. And when that was done, and the splendid city was reduced to a devastated, burning desert, Willow caused the Tyrrhenian Sea, part of the Mediterranean off Rome's west coast, to rage with tidal waves that drowned anyone who had escaped. In the end, not one building was left standing anywhere in the city. Not one tree or flower or shrub or patch of grass escaped Willow's wrath. When Willow had finished with it, Rome resembled, more than anything else, the surface of the moon.

Willow killed more than four million people that day. After that, she nearly killed the rest of the world too.

When it was over, and Willow had managed to contain her darkness again, the world marveled at the destruction of the great city, not least of all because, miraculously, not a single child had been killed. Every person who was at least sixteen years old had died in the fires and the floods and the meteor impacts. But all the children, every last one, had been spared, somehow. No one understood how it was possible.

The world's wonder didn't last long. Rebecca paid a witch she knew named Clea Crow twenty-million dollars to create a spell that would alter the memories of every person on Earth outside of their circle, as well as altering all visual records of the disaster. The day after the spell went into effect, the world still mourned Rome, and the millions who had died, but no one remembered the woman who had killed them, and her terrible black eyes. No one remembered that every single child had miraculously been spared. The destruction was seen as a staggeringly rare confluence of natural disasters, a one-in-a-trillion sequence of events that would never happen again. Religious people wondered if the Second Coming was at hand, and there was a mass exodus from the Catholic Church, as Christians worldwide took the destruction of Rome and the papacy as a sign from God. Scientists tried for years to explain the disaster, proposing hypotheses as bizarre as the passing of a small black hole through the vicinity, or even the influence of extraterrestrials. But eventually, the world turned its attentions to the survivors, rather than the cause of their suffering, and as disaster relief operations began in earnest, life returned to a semblance of normality.

But the mark those monks had given Willow had never gone away.

Willow could heal every other part of herself, but those three sixes they had burned into her skull never did heal, no matter how many times Willow tried, no matter how many times Tara tried...until finally, they gave up.

Willow realized now, standing in that beautiful old church, that maybe it didn't matter how she had gotten the mark. She had it, that was all that mattered. She had the number 666 burned into her skull, and now the world was gone... because of her.

Willow wanted to get out of there...escape them...escape all the souls.

Willow Rosenberg Antichrist, she heard them whispering.

Willow wanted to get out of there...

But Faith took her hand, and led her across the giant room, to a massive display of candles at a side altar in an alcove beneath a stained glass window depicting Mary Magdalene. Mary, a beautiful, fair-skinned woman with red hair and green eyes, was penitent, kneeling in the dirt, her eyes downcast, with tears falling down her cheeks.

A strange feeling came over Willow, when she looked up at her...a feeling she couldn't describe. She had never felt anything like it. But then it was gone.

"What are we doing here?" Willow said. Her voice echoed.

"I wanna light some candles," Faith said, softly. "You're supposed to like, give a buck for every candle, like a donation to the church? At least that's how it was at Saint Augustine's in Southie. Then you light a candle for people you've lost." She took a crumpled-up twenty dollar bill out of her jeans pocket and put it in the little wooden donation box next to the altar. "Got some money here, I found this twenty on the floor at an arcade on Huntington Avenue last week. I don't wanna use Warren's money for this."

"I didn't know you were religious," Willow said. She didn't lower her voice. It still echoed in the dark, hushed room. "Considering I'm from like twelve years in the future plus I have your memories too, you'd think I'd know something like that."

"I'm not, really," Faith said, softly, as she picked up one of the long, thin wooden lighting sticks. "Seen too much badness out there to really be religious. But I've been to this church before, they always took me in when I had nowhere else to go. Always figured if I was ever gonna run into God? Maybe it would be here. It's nice here, y'know? Real pretty, but not like, all showin' off about it either with like a ton of gold and silver or whatever. It's just kinda pretty...and it feels warm, with all the red and gold. I think God might like it here. You religious? You believe in God?"

"No," Willow said.

"Never? I mean, all the crazy stuff you told me, vamps and all that, I can see how that might kinda make you think no one's watchin' things up there. But how about before? Before you knew about vamps and stuff?"

"I wasn't really religious when I was a kid. My parents weren't, they never bothered. They were Jewish but they never went to temple. I actually found religion after I learned about vampires and demons and stuff. Once I got into magic I worshipped the Goddess."

"Goddess," Faith said. "That like God but just a chick version? Or something else?"

"Female version of God I guess. She's the Creator...She created everything, and She's supposed to love us."

"Thought you said you don't believe? Wait, that's right, you said you don't believe in God. So you believe in the Goddess instead? Okay, cool. Girl power, I can dig it."

"No," Willow said. "I don't believe in the Goddess anymore either."

"Because...because of what happened? Losing everyone?"

"There's no God, Faith," Willow said. Her voice carried. "No Goddess, no God, no one up there. No one gives a shit about us. No one ever did. And if there is someone up there? Then that's even worse. Because it means whoever created all this is so fucking heartless that they can just sit back and watch everyone we love die and not lift a finger to help."

People were staring. Willow's voice bounced around the room, found every corner, every ear. It was cold, echoing across those warm, red and gold walls. In that reverent silence, it was harsh, discordant.

"Sshhh," Faith said, and kissed Willow, softly, on the lips. She held the kiss, gently, held her lips against Willow's.

"Sorry," Willow said, and kept her voice down this time.

"It's okay, hon." Faith picked up another of the wooden lighting sticks, and handed it to Willow. "Light these candles with me?"

"Why? Doesn't matter."

"This isn't about the Goddess. It's about you. These are all the people you loved. I don't know any of them? But I know you. I care about you. I wanna light these candles for them...because I care about you. Okay?"

Faith touched her stick to one of the candles, and gathered a flame. She looked at all the unlit candles. They were small, white candles in glass holders. Faith touched the lighting stick to one of them.

"Buffy," Faith whispered, as the flame grew.

She looked at Willow.

Willow touched her lighting stick to the candle Faith had just lit, and gathered some of its flame, and lit another candle with it.

"Tara," Willow whispered.

They lit a candle for everyone Willow had lost. Willow tried to remember them all as they said their names...tried to remember something good about each of them. Xander's' goofy laugh, the way Rebecca raised her eyebrow, the way Giles sighed when Buffy said something he didn't understand. Angel's unflappable serenity, Dawn's exuberance, the way Fred's nose wrinkled up whenever she concentrated. Evan's beautiful smile. Riley's nobility. Connor's restless curiosity. Buffy's warm hands...Tara's beautiful eyes...

When they were done, Willow thought she should cry, but she didn't.

They went clothes shopping after that. Willow noticed Faith was looking at her a lot. Faith held her hand everywhere they went, and made little jokes, trying to get her to smile. But Willow didn't smile. She was careful not to ignore Faith, because it would hurt her. And Willow tried to make herself smile, for Faith's sake. But she couldn't.

They started in Copley Place, and after a few minutes Faith decided to "kick things up a notch": since Willow had mentioned that she thought Faith should consider getting a couple of dresses, Faith said she would do it if she could pick out some clothes for Willow, and then she decided it would be fun if they went all the way and picked out all of each other's clothes. And they did. Willow bought almost all of Faith's stuff at Neiman Marcus, lots of elegant dresses and sexy skirts and expensive shoes, and some nice earrings. But Faith didn't see much of anything she liked for Willow there, so she waited until they hit the shops on Newbury Street to pick out Willow's clothes: sexy, swaggering, colorful stuff with an ample helping of tight jeans and leather thrown in, lots of hand-made silk scarves in bright colors because Faith thought Willow looked pretty in them, a gold necklace, a gold ankle bracelet, and three different funky hats.

"I look like a Powerpuff Girl," Willow said, and found herself smiling, as she looked at herself in the mirror in a cramped little used clothing place called Second Time Around.

"A what?" Faith said.

"I'm all like, funky." Willow was wearing ultra-tight faded vintage Levis jeans, a thick, black, vintage 1960's wool sweater with an embroidered pink floral design on the front, a black, red, green and yellow Rasta-style beret, and a pair of pink Converse Chuck Taylor sneakers. "And I think I've got every color in the visible spectrum going on here."

"You look hot, fairy godmother," Faith whispered in her ear. "Those jeans are steerin' around your curves just right. Gettin' me all hot and bothered. I'm thinkin' we should've extended the deal to underwear too. I woulda bought you some awesome underwear, honey. Black G-string, garter belt? Yummy."

"Remember about the spanking?" Willow said.

"I'm a bad kitty," Faith whispered, and giggled in her ear.

They got back to the hotel room much later that night, loaded down with fourteen shopping bags. The first thing Willow did was call down to the front desk and book the room for the next nine months. The second thing she did was take her boots off and plop down on the couch; they had crisscrossed Newbury Street about a hundred times and her feet were killing her. Faith had picked out three pairs of knee-high boots for her, one pair of Docs, two pairs of open-toed high-heeled shoes, and the pink Chuck Taylors. Willow hoped some of it was comfortable.

"What's wrong, honey?" Faith said, and sat next to her on the couch.

"These old boots suck," Willow said. "Walking in them for a long time always does a number on me. Here's hoping the ones you bought me are better."

Faith moved down to the end of the couch, took Willow's feet in her lap, and pulled off her socks.

"What are you doing?" Willow said.

Faith started massaging Willow's feet. A little shudder of pleasure went through Willow, a tingle that flowed up from her feet to her ankles, all the way up her thighs and into her stomach...and between her legs.

"How's this feel honey?" Faith said. "Feel good?"

Willow laid back on the couch, stretched her legs out, and closed her eyes. "Yeah...yeah, it's...it's awesome," she murmured.

"Cool," Faith said. "I always take care of my fairy godmother."

Faith took her time massaging Willow's feet, and when she was done all the throbbing was gone and Willow felt like she had clouds attached to her ankles. The massage also made Willow extremely horny, but she didn't tell Faith that. They were both quiet, as Faith massaged her feet in the dark. They didn't say a word until it was over. The room was silent; only Willow's soft moans broke the silence. Willow moaned, as Faith touched her feet in just the right way, and worked all the stress out of her.

"All better," Faith whispered, when she was done. Then she fished the ankle bracelet out of one of the bags, and put it around Willow's left ankle.

After that, they tried on their outfits for each other, not bothering to go into the bathroom to change. They had a fashion show. Willow felt a little more alive, now. The foot massage, trying on their outfits...Willow began to feel like she was actually taking part in these things, instead of just watching them happen. Faith put the necklace on her, and Willow kept it on, along with the ankle bracelet. They had bought nightgowns too. They put them on last, and went to bed, well past midnight.

Willow took Faith in her arms as they laid down together, and kissed her cheek. She slipped her hand beneath Faith's nightgown, and rubbed her belly.

"My sweetie gets a massage too," Willow whispered.

Faith nodded, and curled up against Willow's breasts, and rubbed her feet against Willow's under the covers.

Three minutes later, Faith was asleep.

The rest of that month was cold and gloomy and there was another big snowstorm. Willow took Faith out when the weather permitted, because she wanted Faith to see Boston. But Willow never smiled, and most of the time, she felt like she was watching herself...hearing herself...doing an impression of herself. She felt like she wasn't there. But she never indulged those feelings too deeply, never let them take complete hold of her, because she knew Faith was fragile, and it would hurt her...

Willow did the best she could. She took Faith to the Museum of Fine Arts, and she knew Faith hated it, but Faith pretended to be interested, for Willow's sake. Willow knew Faith had liked the museum more when Rebecca took her. They ate at nice restaurants because Willow knew Faith had never eaten in a nice restaurant before. The closest she had come was a steak house in South Boston. They went to the movies a lot, almost every night, because Faith loved movies. They were never bored, because they could always get along, always talk; it was just the way they had always been together. But Faith watched Willow, all the time. Willow always felt Faith's eyes on her.

Sometimes, Faith would bring up Tara...she would try to get Willow to talk about her. Willow always found ways to change the subject. And Willow found it curious that Faith never brought up Buffy--not even once. Faith kept talking about Tara, but not Buffy.

At night they slept together. Willow rubbed Faith's belly, and it helped Faith sleep. But after awhile Faith started holding Willow in her arms when they slept, instead of the other way around. Willow didn't mind. When Faith held her, Willow felt like she was really there, really part of the world. Eventually Willow looked forward to going to bed more than any other part of the day.

January passed into February, and the weather got even worse: bleak gray skies and hail and freezing rain and an icy wind that numbed your hands through your gloves and got into your bones and stayed there. Willow didn't really notice it; things didn't really affect her anymore. But Faith didn't like being out in that cold, so they spent most of their time in the hotel room as the weather got worse, renting movies, or just hanging out and talking. Faith held Willow in her arms, almost all the time now. They laid down together on the couch when they watched television, and Faith held Willow in her arms, and caressed her hair. Faith brought up Tara sometimes. Whenever she did, Willow changed the subject. Though they didn't go out as much, Willow did manage to get tickets to a Celtics game on February fifth--lousy tickets. They were too high above the court to even recognize individual players. They rooted for the green and white jerseys to beat the blue jerseys, and ate hot dogs, and made the best of it. Willow knew Rebecca could have gotten them seats at center court. But Faith didn't complain.

When they got home after the game that night and went to bed, and Faith took Willow in her arms the way she always did, Willow kissed her.

Willow trembled a little, as her tongue touched Faith's...as she tasted Faith's lips, and felt Faith's breath, warm, mingling with her own. She didn't know why she kissed Faith. But it made her feel alive.

They didn't do anything else. When Willow tried to kiss Faith again, Faith smiled, and shook her head, and kissed Willow on the nose. "Time for bed, fairy godmother," Faith whispered, and held Willow close, and ran her fingers through her hair...and they went to sleep.

The next day, it happened.

The day had started out fine. The sun had finally peeked out from behind the clouds and the temperature was actually back up in the thirties again. When Willow woke up Faith started tickling her, because she said she was tired of never seeing Willow smile. They'd had a tickle fight after that, more like a tickle war in fact, which Faith finally won, pinning Willow down eventually and not letting her up until she promised to smile at least once a day.

"I'll try, sweetie," Willow said.

They went out, and hit the shops on Newbury Street, and had lunch at a place called Stephanie's that boasted an outside patio, but it was still too cold for that. But the food was good, and as they ate Faith started tickling Willow under the table because Willow hadn't given her a smile yet since the tickle fight. Willow did her best to come up with one.

Willow noticed Faith watching her, as they headed back to the hotel that afternoon, holding hands in the bright sun. But Faith always watched her. Willow wished she could smile. But she knew she was still dead inside...still a zombie, doing the thing she was compelled to do. She would protect Faith, and care for her. But she couldn't do anything else...couldn't feel anything else...because all her friends were dead...

Because she had failed...

She would never be with Tara again.

Tara's smile came to Willow, then, as she walked with Faith through the park in Copley Square, in the sunlight. The way Tara's eyes crinkled up when she laughed...the way her hair smelled.

As they crossed the park, Willow suddenly stopped, and burst into tears. Then Willow fell to her knees in the dirt, as suddenly as if she had been felled by an arrow from the heavens.

And she knelt there, in the dirt, with her eyes downcast, and her tears falling down her cheeks...

Faith knelt down beside her, and put her arms around her.

"Let it out, Willow," Faith whispered. "It's gotta come out now."

"Tara..." Willow whispered, as she looked down at the dirt. "She...she's..."

Faith was crying now, too.

"She's dead," Willow whispered.

Willow screamed: it was an awful wailing sound, and it tore through the park, through the whole square, echoing across the length and breadth of it like some terrible black bird that had been released from its cage. Faith held Willow tight against her, and Willow cried, and screamed into her bosom, as people all across the square stopped and stared.

"She's DEAD!" Willow shrieked. "They're all dead! Everyone I love! Everyone! EVERYONE!"

Willow trembled. Her teeth chattered. She felt the cold moving through her, the wind tearing into her. She hadn't really felt the cold before. Even as the weather had steadily worsened, it hadn't really affected Willow particularly. But she felt the cold now...

"TARA!" Willow shrieked, and looked up at the sky, straight into the sun. "BABY! I'm sorry, I'm sorry! I'm sorry, baby! I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry... I'm sorry I let you die..."

Faith kissed her cheek, and held her as tight as she could, and tried to block the wind, to keep the cold away. But Willow still shivered.

Willow lowered her head, and held herself against Faith's bosom, her eyes downcast again now, looking down at the dirt. Her tears fell down her cheeks. They felt cold on her skin.

"I'm sorry, Tara," Willow whispered, as Faith held her, and she cried. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry..."

An hour later, back in the hotel room, Willow sat curled up on the couch, under a pile of blankets.

She felt cold. But she felt alive, she realized. She felt cold because she was alive...because she could feel things now. She didn't feel like a zombie anymore.

Willow felt like there was a hole in her...like something had torn off a piece of her and left an open wound. But she was alive.

She had no idea what to do now. No idea how to live.

"Coffee," Faith said, as she shut the door and took the tray in from room service. She wheeled the tray into the living room, and poured Willow a cup of coffee, black, the way she liked it. She made herself a cup with cream and sugar.

She sat next to Willow on the couch, got under the blankets with her, and handed her the coffee cup.

"Drink, honey," Faith said. "I wanna get you warmed up, okay?"

"Thanks," Willow whispered, and took the coffee, and sipped it. Faith held her hand.

They were quiet for awhile.

"I'm sorry about Tara," Faith said, eventually.

"It's just..." Willow started to say. Tears came to her eyes. "It's just..."

The tears ran down Willow's cheeks. Faith hugged her, and wiped them away. Willow put the coffee down, and curled up against Faith under the blankets.

"It's just...I can't even mourn for her," Willow said. "I mean...she's not really dead. She's alive, right now. She's a sixteen-year old girl in Milwaukee. My Tara's gone, in the future she's dead, my relationship with her never happened now, we...we never happened. We never happened."

"You happened," Faith said. "You guys loved each other. Don't let yourself forget it, okay? Even if you're the only one who remembers? Don't let yourself forget."

They were quiet. Willow curled up against Faith under the blankets. Faith held her.

"But...Tara's alive," Willow said. "My Tara died but...Tara's still alive now. She's a sixteen-year old girl now. I don't even know...know how I'm supposed to feel."

"Sad," Faith said. "Sad, honey."

Willow nodded.

"I can never have her again," Willow said. "Even if things go sort of the way they went before? She'll end up with the other Willow, not me. The Willow who's in Sunnydale right now, not even aware that any of this crazy stuff is coming her way. Buffy's gonna be there next month and then Willow's off to the damn races. Then it's the Master, and Spike and Dru, and Angelus..."

"You sure about all that?" Faith said. "I mean, maybe things will go different this time."

"That's up to us. Like I said before, we know what's coming, now we gotta figure out what stuff we want to try to change. The battle I told you about, a couple years from now? The one against the Horsemen, and the First? We won that battle originally...but somehow Warren changed things around so we lost in the new history."

"How'd you win before?"

"That's the thing? I don't really know. I was inside this old fort in L.A., in a little chapel, praying...and everyone outside was fighting to protect me. The First had an army of vampires and demons there to try to kill me, and all my friends and a bunch of army guys were protecting me. You were there, Buffy, Tara, Angel, Riley...you were all protecting me while I did this like, ceremonial prayer thing. But there were only like a couple hundred of us, and I think there were thousands and thousands of bad guys...I don't know what happened. Before the bad guys could get to me I was sent back...sent back to before it all happened, before those priests got their hands on the Key in the first place. And I think we...did something with the Key? Maybe? The thing is, I can't really remember. I think...there was like...a goddess, maybe? I remember a woman with black hair. And I think she sent me back...but I don't really remember how we fixed things after that. I just...know that we did. But then Warren changed it. That's why my world is gone in 2009. Because now, everyone died at the end of 1998. This time around we gotta stop that from happening."

Faith thought about it.

"Strange, how only a couple hundred of you guys held out against all those vamps and demons. Maybe the army guys had some weapons? But still. It's strange. But you were inside, right? You didn't see the fight. Maybe your friends had some help you didn't know about."

"Maybe, but if they did then whoever helped showed up after the fight started. And I can't even think of who could have helped anyway, unless more military people showed up."

"And your friends don't know about any of this?"

"No, when I got sent back, to before it happened? I was the only one in the world who remembered any of it."

"Well, plan's simple now at least. Grab that Key thing before the bad guys get their hands on it. No other choice."

"Yeah. No idea what we do with it when we get it, since it can't be destroyed and the bad guys are just gonna keep hunting for it, but I guess we cross that bridge when we come to it. But there's plenty of craziness coming before that. The first thing is the Master. He's in Sunnydale now, getting ready to escape the Hellmouth. Buffy's gonna fight him, and he's gonna kill her in June, and then she'll be revived."

"Unless we go there and stop him from killing her."

"Can't."

"Why? I mean yeah, I know she gets brought back to life anyway but... might be nice to spare her havin' to go through that."

"There's this book, the Pergamum Codex? It's a book full of prophecies about the Slayer line. The copy Angel gave us was the last known copy in the world, and we lost it eventually, but before we did, Giles was able to translate a passage in it that said the Master was gonna kill Buffy. The thing about that book is, everything in it always comes true. Always, a hundred percent of the time, no exceptions. It's never been wrong, not once in thousands of years. So if I tried to save Buffy? I think the Master would still kill her, but it would just happen differently. And it might happen in a way she couldn't recover from."

"So...we gotta lay low here."

"Yeah, we can't go to Sunnydale for awhile. We'll wait here for Becca. But don't worry, we'll be going there eventually. You're gonna love Buffy, sweetie. When you two get together? I promise, you're gonna be so happy."

Faith nodded. She was quiet.

"Hey," Willow said, after a moment. "You okay, sweetie? What is it?"

"So...Buffy," Faith said. "I was with her, right? I mean...she was my girl, the way things went before."

"Yeah. Once we go to Sunnydale, you'll meet her, and you guys are gonna be great together. It'll be a little different this time I guess? But y'know, once you guys get a couple of dates under your belt..."

"Think that's gonna happen this time? Me and her I mean? What if it doesn't?"

"Um...it will. I'm...I'm...sure it will. Faith, you two are meant to be together, sweetie, trust me. You'll be together."

Faith looked at her. Willow blinked.

"I don't get a choice in that?" Faith said. "What if I don't wanna be with her?"

"Sweetie, you will," Willow said. "Trust me, you'll--"

Faith stood up. She paced around the room for a few seconds.

Then she turned, and looked straight at Willow.

"I'm not a necklace, Willow," Faith said.

"Um...what?" Willow said.

"Necklace trick, remember? When you were explaining to me about magic and time travel and shit? That shiny blue necklace suddenly popped out of a hole from like the future? So a few minutes later, you sent it back to the past, because you were supposed to. Because it had already showed up in the past before, so that meant you had no choice. Or at least that's what you thought. But I'm not a necklace. I decide my life. Yeah, okay, me and Buffy were together before. But I'm not gonna...gonna just...date some girl because that's how it went once."

Willow stood up, walked over to her, and took both of Faith's hands in hers. "Sweetie, I know it must seem to you like...like you have no options here? Like you're not being given a choice? But...if you could know what I know? If you could just know how happy you were with Buffy? If...you could just--"

"Maybe other people can make me happy too," Faith said, and looked into Willow's eyes, and caressed her hair.

Willow blushed.

"Look...how about...how about we talk about this some other time," Faith said. "This time travel craziness kinda gives me a headache, and we still got a pile of movies to get to before we gotta return 'em. Deal?"

Willow nodded.

But neither of them moved. Faith caressed Willow's hair, and looked into her eyes.

Willow could never outstare her. She looked away.

"I'm sorry," Willow said. "I've like, dumped all this stuff on you? And...I know it's hard. I'm sorry."

"Nothing to be sorry about," Faith said. "You saved my life. You take care of me. I...I love you. I love you, Willow. I love you."

"I love you too," Willow said...and she realized she meant it in a different way now...a different way than when she said it to Faith all those times before.

They both stood there.

Eventually, Faith smiled.

"Guess Clint's not gonna watch himself, huh?" she said.

"Guess not," Willow said, and smiled back.

Faith took Willow's hand, and led her back to the couch.

"C'mon fairy godmother," Faith said, as she got under the covers, and laid herself down, and held out her arms. Willow laid herself down beside her, and curled up in her arms, as she had done every night for almost a month now, and Faith pulled the blankets over them. "If you're good maybe I'll do my Clint impression."

"Please don't?" Willow said, and giggled.

Faith looked down into Willow's eyes, and squinted at her. "You a bounty hunter, boy?" she whispered, and began tickling her. Willow squirmed around, trying to escape, shrieking with laughter.

"You're such a bad kitty!" Willow screamed, as Faith tickled her. "The worst kitty ever!"

After a couple of minutes, Faith relented. By that point they were both red-faced, and out of breath.

"You are so gettin' a spanking," Willow said, as they laid back down together. Faith put her arms back around Willow, picked up the remote from the coffee table, and started the movie.

"Bring it, Sunnydale," Faith whispered in her ear.

February stayed cold. Willow and Faith stayed in the hotel.

Willow felt better. The way she had felt before...like she was watching herself, like she wasn't really there, like there was a wall separating her from the world...had passed. She felt things now. A lot of them were bad things...they hurt. But at least she could feel again. She cried for awhile every day, because she knew she would never have Tara...because she never did have Tara...what they had was erased. That was the worst part. But Willow always waited until Faith was asleep before she let herself cry, because she didn't want Faith to worry.

At night Willow cried, but during the days things were better. They went out to rent movies and buy food the hotel didn't have on the menu--mostly double chocolate fudge brownie ice cream, which Willow agreed with Faith was awesome year-round, even in winter. During the days they watched movies and talked... sometimes about the future. Sometimes about magic. Willow explained to Faith about gods and goddesses, and how they governed the use of magic, since magic spells were really only invocations to the thousands of various deities and demons that granted certain spell effects. She also explained to Faith how the various gods and goddesses of the different pantheons had actually been created by humanity, out of human belief: if enough people believed in a deity long enough, it gained life. Faith asked if this meant Santa Claus was real.

"Well, maybe in about five-hundred more years or so, he might become real?" Willow replied. "If enough people keep believing. Then you'd have a big fat guy in a red suit riding around the world in a sleigh, somehow being able to deliver presents to every house on Earth in one night. Plus how does he fit all the presents on the sleigh anyway? It's gonna have to be the size of like, Minneapolis and travel faster than the speed of light. But Thor drank half the Atlantic Ocean once, so I guess anything's possible."

Thor and Loki took a lot of explaining. Especially when Willow mentioned that she'd had sex with both of them. "But, hey! Not at the same time!" Willow had added, hastily. "Because, y'know...that would just be weird."

After a few more conversations like that one, Faith added gods and goddesses to her list of Things Willow Kept Bringing Up That Either Freaked Her Out Or Gave Her A Headache, which currently included everything Willow had ever brought up that had anything to do with magic, time travel, apocalypses, monsters of any sort, global warming, Goth culture, or the Lakers beating the Celtics. So they went back to watching movies and talking about little things that had nothing to do with destiny or saving the world. And they enjoyed each other.

February passed. March arrived, and got even colder, somehow. "Boston," Willow sighed, on the first day of March, as she stared out the window into the murky gloom of yet another blizzard. The window shook, the wind made a whistling noise, and Willow seriously considered the idea that maybe Boston had a secret cabal of frost giants hiding somewhere.

They stayed in. They rented movies. During the day, they talked... sometimes about magic. Sometimes about the future...

At night, they slept together, and Faith held Willow in her arms.

But Willow knew Faith was supposed to be with Buffy.

Sometimes Willow woke up at night, and felt the weight of that...felt the weight of the future.

She had already destroyed the world. She wondered now if she was destroying her two best friends as well.

The next morning, they were talking about the future. They needed a plan.

Outside, the unrelentingly gray sky was sending down sheets of icy rain now, and the wind was howling. The windows shook. Things looked grim out there...Willow wondered if it was an omen. If the future would be grim too. If there was any way to really change it...maybe, no matter what they did, they would still lose in 1998. Maybe, no matter what they did, they would always be fighting a retreat...

They needed a plan. They couldn't just let things happen to them, like they had before. Couldn't just let themselves be attacked, over and over again, always trusting to their luck, until one day, their luck turned against them...

They sat in the living room in their nightgowns, holding hands on the couch and drinking coffee, and they talked about the future, and tried to come up with a plan...but it was complicated. Willow still hadn't told Faith half the things that were coming down, not because she wanted to keep them from her, but just because there was a limit to how much craziness Faith could listen to in a sitting before she got up and decided they needed to relax and eat ice cream and watch movies for awhile.

"This is like, complicated," Faith said. "Time travel's cooler in the movies."

"Well let's break it down," Willow said. "Here's what we definitely know. First, we need history to go the way it's supposed to go in Sunnydale until you become the Slayer. That's May, 1998. We can't go to Sunnydale until after that."

"Why? I mean...look, Will. Okay, Buffy's gotta die because that book says so. But then what about Kendra?"

"Um..." Willow said. "Well...that's..." Faith was looking at her. Willow could never outstare her. She looked away.

"Look at me," Faith said.

Willow looked at her. Faith's eyes didn't waver, didn't blink. She looked right through Willow...the way she had always been able to, from the night they first met. It was like looking at Rebecca's eyes, Willow thought...Faith's eyes always had the same power, even now.

"You're really gonna let some innocent girl die?" Faith said. "Yeah, fine, Buffy gets revived. But Kendra doesn't. You told me her life was pretty rough--parents gave her away when she was little, she spent her life training with her Watcher, and for what? Less than a year after she becomes the Slayer, she dies? Never went on a date, never had a friend, never even had a toy to play with when she was a kid? And then she dies? And you know how it happens, you can stop it, but you won't lift a finger? That what you're telling me?"

"But...you have to become the Slayer. And...for you to become the Slayer, Kendra...she...I mean...she has to..."

"Has to die?"

Willow looked down at the floor. "Yeah. It's just...you have to be the Slayer, Faith."

Faith let go of Willow's hand, put down her coffee cup, and stood up. She paced around the room for a few seconds. Then she looked at Willow, with her hands folded across her chest.

"Why?" Faith said.

"Why...what? You mean why do you have to be the Slayer?"

"Yeah."

"It's...just...just the way things are meant to be."

"Uh-huh."

They were quiet, as they looked at each other. Willow felt Faith's eyes, like searchlights, boring into her.

"You like me," Faith said. "You like hanging with me. The way it went before, you liked me being part of the gang. You all did. Buffy was my girl, you and Tara were my sisters. Giles was our Watcher, then after Becca got brought back she was our Watcher. And then we were all a happy family. Dawn showed up, gang added a few new members, Riley, Fred, we had the kid, even better. Everybody liked everybody."

"Yeah," Willow said. "It was...it was perfect, for awhile."

"But you didn't like Kendra so much, did you?"

"What? No...no we...y'know...we thought she was fine."

"Fine. Just not like, a friend. Not sayin' you guys were all hatin' on her or anything. Just that she was never part of it. You, Buffy, Xander...you were tight back in the day. But Kendra was never part of what you had."

Willow's face turned red.

"Not sayin' you like shunned her or anything," Faith said. Her eyes still pinned Willow down...held her. "She was just real different, right? Jamaican chick. Funny accent. Didn't know how to act around guys. Real kinda rigid, always about the job. No fun to hang with. So you guys didn't pal around much. Then she dies, I show up, and you guys all like me. I gotta be the Slayer? Maybe the only reason I gotta be the Slayer is you just like it that way better. More fun bein' with me than her."

"But it's...it's...the way things are supposed to go," Willow said, softly.

Faith sat next to her again. She took Willow's hand, and kissed her cheek.

"That world's gone, Willow," Faith said. "The way it all went? Me and Buffy, all that stuff? It's gone. Yeah, I know, that's tough to hear. But like it or not, you can change things...you are changing things, just by being here. Like it or not, the way things go this time is up to you, honey. You decide to try to make changes, or you decide not to? Either way it's on you. If Kendra dies this time it'll be because you decided not to save her. Either way, this time around, it's all on your shoulders. The way the world goes is all on your shoulders."

Willow nodded, and looked down at the floor.

Faith lifted her chin, and looked at her.

"Maybe we can make it better," Faith said.

It was March eleventh. Willow's birthday. The Willow living in Sunnydale would be sixteen when she woke up in the morning. The Willow sitting on the edge of the bed in the hotel in Boston, her eyes red from crying, didn't even know how old she was anymore. Was she still twenty-eight? Or was she turning twenty-nine?

It was just past midnight; March eleventh had just begun. Faith was asleep. Willow had waited for her to sleep, before she cried.

She still cried every night. She always waited until Faith was asleep, before she did it.

But now she didn't just cry for Tara. Now she always cried for Buffy too...

Because she was certain Buffy and Faith would never be together now.

Willow saw the way Faith looked at her. She knew what Faith wanted. She knew Faith was in love with her. She knew she was in love with Faith too.

It had happened so quickly. But Willow knew that was because part of her had always loved Faith...from the night they first met, and Faith had saved her life, and then held her in her arms when she got scared afterwards, and cried with her, Willow had loved her.

Sleeping in Faith's arms every night now felt perfectly natural...it felt right. Willow looked forward to it...savored the memory of it...thought about it all the time.

Sometimes, at night, when she cried, Willow thought she should run away. Leave Faith, erase her memory and let the world go on as it had before. She knew how to erase Faith's memory; she had been in Faith's mind often enough that she knew just how to do it, if she had to.

Willow could hide somewhere, find some little town to disappear in. Warren's credit card would get her started, and she could go on from there. She could keep herself away from them all, stay away from Faith and Rebecca, never go to Sunnydale...she could stay far away from all the people she loved, so she couldn't contaminate them...couldn't change them...couldn't twist and distort and destroy their lives, just by being a part of them.

But Willow knew she couldn't even do that. Without her, they would all die in 1998, when they lost the battle with the Four Horsemen and the First.

Willow knew she had changed things. Willow knew Buffy and Faith would never be together now.

She sat on the edge of the bed that night, as Faith slept. And she looked down at the floor...and she felt the world turning beneath her...turning on to a new course. For better or worse, she had changed it.

It could never go back.

Willow knew this was the last night she was going to cry. She couldn't remain separate from this new world anymore. Couldn't keep insisting it took the same path as the old one. Faith needed her. And all her friends would need her too. For better or worse, this was the world now...the world she had made.

"I love you, Tara," Willow whispered...and knew she was saying it for the last time...

When Willow woke up that morning she felt better. She felt lighter...like she had put something down.

Faith was holding her, and looking down into her eyes.

The sun was shining into the room; Faith's eyes always reflected golden in the sun.

"Happy birthday, beautiful," Faith whispered.

Willow smiled, and curled up closer against her.

"Birthday girls get a kiss, okay? Is that okay, honey?" Faith whispered.

"Yeah," Willow said, and closed her eyes, and let Faith kiss her...

Willow had never really kissed Faith before. Not like this...not the way lovers kissed...not abandoning herself to it, the way lovers did. Once, in 1998, before the old history was changed, Faith had kissed her; they had been lying down together because the First had appeared to Faith as Rebecca and said terrible things to her, and made her feel worthless, and made her cry. They had been desperately trying to find a way to save the world, after the Horsemen had been released and everything started falling apart, and they were all camped out at Angel's mansion, because it was defensible and made of stone so it couldn't burn. Buffy and Angel and Tara were out on an important errand, and the First appeared to Faith as Rebecca when she was alone...

But Faith wasn't alone: Willow was there to protect her. After the First left, Willow consoled Faith, and calmed her down, and told her she loved her, and that everything the First said was a lie. Faith hadn't really slept in days and she was exhausted, so they laid down together, and Willow held Faith in her arms.

And then, sometime later, Willow had awoken to find Faith looking down into her eyes, and growling at her. Faith kissed her, savagely, jamming her tongue into Willow's mouth and holding her by the hair as she did it. She ran her fingers beneath Willow's nightgown, and caressed her breasts, and then moved her fingers between Willow's legs, caressing her there, too...taking her...snarling the whole time...looking down into Willow's eyes the whole time...

"You're mine," Faith had whispered. "You belong to me." But it wasn't Faith's voice. It was the Slayer...

The Slayer's voice wasn't a human voice. It was a predatory animal's voice, a lion's voice, if lions could whisper. It sounded like fire crackling. It sounded like stealthy footfalls in the tall grass. Faith's golden eyes held Willow, pinned her, and made her wet...as Faith took her.

Eventually, Willow had managed to stop things before they went too far. But Willow never understood what brought it on...what brought the Slayer in Faith out that night...what made the Slayer say Willow belonged to her...

But that was the old history, Willow thought now, as she kissed Faith in the hotel room in Boston in 1997, in the bed they always shared, and melted into her arms, and felt herself becoming wet. They were going to make a new history...

Maybe in this one, she would belong to Faith after all.

"You're so lucky you have me," Willow said, as they laid together on the couch later that day, watching a Clint Eastwood movie Faith had rented. "Buffy totally hated watching all these Clint movies you were always renting. She always fell asleep halfway through. Especially during the cowboy ones."

"You kidding me?" Faith said, as she held Willow in her arms, and caressed her hair. "Cowboy ones are his best ones."

There were a dozen red roses in a vase on the coffee table now; Faith's birthday present to Willow. Faith could have used some of Warren's cash to buy something for Willow, but she didn't want to use his cash. But Faith didn't have any money of her own left after spending her last twenty dollars on the prayer candles in January. So she had pawned her Doc Marten boots and her leather coat the day before.

When Faith had given Willow the roses earlier that day, tears filled Willow's eyes, and Willow told Faith she loved her.

"Buffy can kinda tolerate the Dirty Harry type stuff a little, I think mostly because she likes making fun of everyone's hair?" Willow said. "But the cowboy ones put her to sleep. I mean that literally by the way. I don't think she ever managed to stay awake for more than half of one."

"Even The Outlaw Josey Wales?"

"Yeah," Willow said, and giggled, as Faith started gently tickling her stomach. "Even Unforgiven".

"So not dating her."

"Maybe I'll tie you guys up and make you date each other."

Faith flipped herself around, and got on top of Willow. She leaned down very close to her, so their noses were touching, and smiled.

"You better not fall asleep during the movie," Faith said.

"I'm definitely falling asleep," Willow said. "I'm gonna fall asleep during the opening credits. I'm gonna fall asleep before Clint can even squint at anyone."

"You better not."

"I'm completely gonna. Watch me."

Faith was holding her body against Willow's. Willow found herself adjusting to her...moving her hips...opening her legs.

They had been smiling. Now they weren't smiling anymore. They had been playing...now they knew it wasn't a game anymore.

Faith looked down at her. Their noses were still touching. Her lips brushed against Willow's. Not a kiss...just a caress. Willow moved her hand along Faith's back. She looked up into Faith's eyes, and saw a golden light there...saw the Slayer, still hidden for now, but peeking out at her...

"I'll never hurt you," Faith said, softly. "I love you too much."

Willow nodded.

"This would hurt you, today," Faith said. "It would hurt you, honey. After Tara, this would hurt you, and I can't ever do that. I gave you the birthday kiss, because you're beautiful and I love you. But...whatever this is, whatever this thing right now might be? If maybe we're playin' around, or maybe it's something more serious? It can't happen today."

Willow nodded, and hugged her.

"One thing that won't change from before?" Faith said, and kissed her cheek. "I'll always look out for you. I'll always be your big sis, no matter what else I am to you. I'll never hurt you. Okay?"

"Yeah," Willow said. "I love you too. I love you too, Faith."

Faith smiled, and rolled off of her. "Let's watch the movie. And, fair warning? You fall asleep and you're gettin' tickled."

Willow curled up in Faith's arms again. "Definitely falling asleep now."

Faith grabbed the remote from the coffee table, and the movie started. "See, and here I thought I was the bad kitty? But I think you're the bad kitty. I think you're gonna get spanked one of these nights."

"Bring it, Boston," Willow whispered in her ear.

March was a strange month. It stayed cold--March in Boston had a tendency to be cold, and so Willow and Faith spent most of their time in the hotel room as they had the month before, renting movies and hanging out and talking. But Willow felt there was something different between them...a different energy. It was like they were circling each other. Like they were each waiting for the other one to make a move.

Faith dropped little hints. She found excuses to let Willow see her in nothing but her bra and panties, and sometimes they were thong panties. When she came out of the shower, she took her time putting on a towel, and sometimes she sat around in just the towel for awhile.

Willow thought Faith was beautiful. But knowing she could have Faith scared her. She kept thinking about Buffy.

When they did go out--to restaurants when they got tired of room service, to movies when they got tired of renting videos, to the great pizza place on Boylston Street, to the great ice cream place on Newbury Street--Faith always wore a skirt and panty hose and high heels, because she could sense that Willow liked seeing her that way. She gave Willow foot massages, almost every day now. Willow would lie there in the dark and moan, usually in her underwear, because Faith liked to wait until they were getting ready for bed before she did it. Faith would never ask, or announce her intentions. She would simply sit down, and take Willow's legs in her hands, and lay Willow's feet across her lap, and start caressing them. And Willow would lean her head back, and moan...and let Faith have her that way...

But Faith wouldn't go any further than that. She didn't kiss Willow again, not like she had the morning of her birthday. Faith dropped little hints, and she waited...she circled...

Willow knew it was up to her.

But she kept thinking about Buffy...

The weather stayed cold in March. The sky was usually cloudy and it snowed a lot, and when the weather had gotten just a microscopic little bit warmer toward the end of the month, it rained a lot instead. The world seemed like a gloomy, monotonous place, whenever Willow looked out the window. The first day of Spring passed and still the temperature was in the high thirties and the sky was gray.

Spring refused to show itself. Boston was imprisoned in a gray cell.

Spring seemed to be waiting, Willow thought; day after day, it waited, biding its time, as the world circled the sun...

April continued the pattern. Sometimes there was some sun, and they seemed to have finally left the snow behind for the season. But the temperature barely cracked forty degrees all month and it kept raining...Willow and Faith went out sometimes for the hell of it, even though it was raw and miserable outside more often that not; but going out was an act of defiance for them. They wanted to coax Spring out of hiding.

Finally, one cold, windy night toward the end of April, as they walked across the Boston Common toward the Public Gardens on their way back from an Italian restaurant in Boston's North End, huddled against each other because the black sky was spitting rain, Willow stopped, put her hands on her hips, glared up at the sky and said, "Okay, can you cut the shit please? It's frigging April! It's not even the beginning of April! It's April twenty-first! We're two-thirds of the way done with April! Hello? It's been spring for a month! What is your problem?!" She pointed at the sky, and started giggling, as she heard Faith laughing beside her. "Yeah, that's right! I'm talkin' to you!"

Willow's voice echoed through the park. No one else was there but them; it was late on a Monday night and that part of Boston's downtown was deserted.

Faith kept laughing. "You tell 'em girlfriend. We'll show the sky it can't screw with us. We'll kick the sky's ass."

The branches of the willow trees all around them waved in the wind. The leaves--the thin, meager covering that had managed to grow back so far--rustled. Their voices, their laughter, bounced around in the dark for awhile, and faded away. The park was utterly empty, and so quiet they could hear the electric buzz of the streetlamps.

There was just them. The world was just for them.

Willow looked at Faith, in the dark. Faith's nose was red, and she was shivering a little bit from the cold, but she was still giggling. She was a good, healthy weight now; she had been underweight when Willow found her in January. Her cheekbones had stuck out then, and Willow could see her ribs. Now Faith's cheeks were rosy and her body was strong and supple. Faith stood there in the dark, her hair matted down from the rain, wearing the huge white scarf and the beautiful angora coat Willow had bought her, and her eyes reflected the lights from the streetlamps...reflecting golden. Faith was wearing one of the dresses Willow had picked out for her...red. She was wearing red lipstick, too.

Willow kissed her. Faith's lips tasted like cherries.

Willow kissed her the way a lover would...and felt her heart race.

"Let's go dancing tomorrow night," Willow said. "No matter what the stupid weather is. We've never danced together. I wanna dance with you, baby."

Willow took Faith's hands, and put them around her shoulders, and slow danced with her in the park, and they laughed together.

"Will you dance with me tomorrow night?" Willow said, as she swayed with Faith, without music.

"Yeah, Willow," Faith said, and tears ran down her cheeks. "I'd...I'd love to dance with you."

Willow held her in her arms, and swayed with her...

"I love you," Willow whispered in her ear. "After we dance tomorrow night, I'm gonna show you how much, okay?"

Faith nodded her head, and smiled, and cried.

And they swayed together, in the silence...

And the rain stopped.

They looked up, straight into a bright moon, nearly full.

The clouds were parting...the stars were coming out.

The next morning dawned bright and blue and beautiful and it hit sixty degrees before noon.

Willow woke up in Faith's arms, like she always did. When Faith opened her eyes and saw the sun, she smiled, and said, "Looks like the sky's afraid of you, girlfriend."

Willow kissed her. She lingered on the kiss. Faith's lips still kept some of the lipstick from the night before...she still tasted like cherry.

"Cherry," Willow whispered, and smiled.

"We're gonna dance tonight, honey?" Faith whispered, and kissed Willow's neck. "Tonight's the night we dance?"

"Tonight," Willow whispered, and kissed her again...tasted Faith's cherry again. "I'm gonna show you how much I love you tonight."

They hadn't made love the night before. Willow knew Faith wanted to, but Willow wanted to wait one more day...she wanted to take Faith out first. She wanted to go on a date with her first...she wanted to make it special...perfect. She wanted to dance with her. She wanted to watch Faith moving to music.

"I'm sorry I made you wait so long, baby," Willow said.

"Sweeter that way, beautiful," Faith said, and got out of the bed.

Faith walked to the balcony doors, and threw them open. Spring flooded in; light flooded in.

The air smelled sweet. The light was dazzling, and warm on Willow's skin. All the shadows in the room fled before it; all the gloom, all the weight the room had accumulated during those months in the dark, simply melted away, as if someone had snapped their fingers.

Faith stood there, silhouetted in the sun, in her tee-shirt and her panties. Willow watched, as Faith sniffed the air...not the Slayer yet, but soon...

"You're beautiful, Faith," Willow said.

Faith smiled, and ran back to Willow, and leaped on top of her like a lion taking down a gazelle. She giggled, as she laid on top of Willow, and moved her face close to her, so their noses were touching.

"You're my fairy godmother," Faith said, and took Willow's hands in hers, and held her down.

"That's right Cinderella," Willow said. "I'm gonna turn a pumpkin into a carriage, and make you a pair of glass slippers, and kick ass on any evil stepsisters you want. But no way am I letting some prince marry you."

"Could you really turn a pumpkin into a carriage?"

"I can do anything for you, baby. When I'm with you I can do anything."

"You better not ever fall asleep when we watch movies together," Faith said, and started bouncing on top of Willow like a restless kitten, and giggling in her ear.

"I'll try not to."

"If you do I'll bite your nose," Faith said, and kissed Willow's nose.

"Such a bad kitty," Willow murmured, and kissed her again.

The hotel room didn't feel heavy to Willow anymore...it wasn't weighted down with that pressure they had both felt for months now, like a balloon steadily growing larger, until it was nearly ready to burst. The pressure was gone...

Because Willow had finally decided. Tonight, she belonged to Faith...

Tonight, and every night after.

Willow made preparations before they went out dancing. Everything had to be perfect. She bought something special, that afternoon, going out alone to pick it up and not letting Faith see what it was when she brought it back.

There was a strange feeling between them that day. Faith was a little nervous. Willow forgot sometimes that Faith was twelve years younger than her...and that she had never been with a woman before. She still thought of Faith as the woman she had known...the Slayer...

Sometimes she forgot this Faith was different.

And Faith was nervous now, as they sat on the couch together, and Willow kissed her, little kisses, little pecks, picking out spots on Faith's lips and focusing on them, one by one.

"Faith," Willow said. "C'mere, baby. I wanna talk to you."

Willow took Faith in her arms, and laid back on the couch. She slipped her hand beneath Faith's tee-shirt, and started rubbing her belly.

Faith moaned, and closed her eyes, and immediately began to relax. Willow could see it in Faith's shoulders, in her neck...the tension was going away.

"I love you," Willow said. "I'm gonna show you tonight, and I know you're like, kinda nervous? But that's okay. It's okay to be a little nervous."

"It's not that I don't wanna?" Faith said. "I do wanna, it's all that's been in my head for a long time but...I'm just worried that I'll...that I'll do it wrong. I've never been with a girl and...I don't really know...how to do stuff."

Willow smiled, and kissed her.

"I'm gonna teach you, baby," Willow said.

The Roxy looked just the way Willow remembered it: it didn't look like much. It was a big old creaky room sitting at the bottom of a flight of creaky stairs, and clomping down those stairs always reminded Willow of walking down into a cellar. The place looked like a cellar. The bar looked like the bar in Xander's Uncle Rory's apartment. The lighting was so bad in certain spots around the room that people just seemed to suddenly appear at you from out of the shadows. The tables looked like they had been through a war and most of the stools at the bar were wobbly. It was too damned hot because there was no ventilation and there were always about two-hundred people dancing and their body heat made the place feel like a sauna.

But they got the dance floor right.

It was strange, being there: Willow remembered being there, scores of times. But she had never been there before, not even once. Her memories of the Roxy were Faith's memories.

"You sure about this place?" Faith said, as they stood at the bottom of the stairs and got the lay of the land. It was still a little early and the dance floor wasn't seeing much action, but Willow knew that would change: it was Tuesday night, and Willow knew the DJ on Tuesdays was something special...

And then she saw him.

She saw Evan, heading for the DJ booth.

"Um...trust me? You'll love it," Willow said. "Look, how about...how about, you grab us a couple seats at the bar and, and I'll...I'll be right back."

Faith was looking at her.

"You okay, girlfriend?" Faith said.

"Sure, sweetie!" Willow said, and made herself smile, and kissed her cheek. "I'll be, be right back, okay? Just gotta freshen up. I got this really hot girlfriend? I need to look perfect for her."

"Okay," Faith said, and giggled. "This girlfriend of yours is a lucky chick, whoever she is."

"Be right back," Willow said, and got away from her as fast as she could...

It was dark in there. Faith hadn't noticed the tears in Willow's eyes.

Willow ran across the room, nearly knocked over two girls heading for Evan's booth, and made a beeline for the ladies room.

The ladies room looked like they had airlifted it from a Turkish prison. Every wall was covered with graffiti, and it wasn't even interesting graffiti. The mirror was caked with ancient dirt, Jurassic dirt. The doors on all three stalls didn't lock and kept swinging open. Finding a roll of toilet paper was like stumbling upon buried treasure. But there was no one in there.

Willow leaned over the sink, and cried.

She hadn't realized seeing him would hit her this way.

She cried...

Five minutes later, she had it together again. This was her night with Faith and she wasn't going to let anything ruin it. And as she washed her face and quickly re-did her makeup, she managed to smile.

Because she knew she was going to save Evan. What happened to him before wasn't going to happen this time. She knew now that she had made the right decision, staying behind in the past with Faith. She could do so much good here, rectify so many mistakes...save so many people...

She was going to save Evan. It wasn't a decision, or a promise. It was a fact. It was the way things were going to go this time. Nothing in the world was going to stop her.

Evan was getting ready to start his first set by the time Willow joined Faith at the bar. Right now a dance music tape was playing through the speakers, and not many people were dancing; the regulars all knew to wait for Evan's set. Willow noticed Faith was getting a lot of attention, from men and women. Willow couldn't blame them. Faith was wearing a short black skirt, and her legs, which had been a little skinny in January, were perfect now. Faith sat with her legs crossed, and her skirt had hiked up a little. Willow wanted to lick her legs. And she knew she was going to later. The thought sent a tingle through her, like a sugar rush.

Faith was drinking a coke. Faith hadn't had any alcohol since Willow had been with her. She was underage for one thing: the drinking age in Boston was eighteen. But Willow knew Faith associated alcohol with bad memories... memories of doing things with strangers, of waking up in unfamiliar places with no idea of how she'd gotten there. Willow was going to change all that.

"So whaddaya think?" Willow said. "I know, kinda like, dumpy looking? But trust me, this place has like, hidden charm. Its all about the dance floor."

"Don't matter where I am, beautiful," Faith said, and took Willow's hand. "Long as I'm with my girl."

"I'm your girl," Willow whispered in her ear, and kissed her.

"Okay kids," Evan said into his microphone. "How about we get this show on the road. And no, green-haired girl back there in the booth, I will not be playing any Marilyn Manson. This is a Marilyn Manson-free zone. Also? No Rhinestone Cowboy..."

There was a smattering of boos, and a bunch of people started laughing. Willow smiled.

"It was only that one time!" Evan said. "And it wasn't even my hat! Will you people never let me live that down?"

"NO!" at least half the room screamed, as the laughter spread.

Willow watched Faith, as she looked at Evan. She knew Faith was attracted to him. But then she was meant to be...Willow knew some people were just meant to be a part of each other's lives.

"You're my fairy godmother!" Faith suddenly said, and giggled. She turned back to Willow, and took her hands, and put her nose against hers. "I love my fairy godmother. I'm gonna be a good kitty for her later."

"Okay, so I just want you all to know that I hate you all forever now?" Evan was saying, as he got the music started, and people started running for the dance floor. Faith wasn't looking at him anymore. She was looking into Willow's eyes, and smiling. "Um...except you, you, you, you, you, and you," Evan added, pointing at various people across the dark room. "And you guys in that booth? And you guys over there, even though you completely can't hold your booze. And the green-haired girl, she's absolutely my favorite. But I hate the rest of you!"

"DJ's cute huh?" Willow said, as Faith stared into her eyes.

Faith blushed.

"It's okay to notice cute guys, sweetie," Willow said. "I'm not jealous."

Willow kissed her, and gently sucked on her tongue for a few seconds, as Faith moaned. Faith was wearing the red lipstick again...her lips tasted like cherry.

"Especially since I get to kiss your cherry, baby," Willow whispered in her ear, and ran her fingers over her knee.

"Kinda...kinda wanna get outta here," Faith murmured, and touched Willow's neck with her lips. "Kinda wanna go back to the room right now."

"You don't wanna dance with me first, sweetie?" Willow said, and giggled, and moved her fingers further up Faith's leg, under her skirt now. "We don't even get to go on a date first? What kinda girl do you think I am?"

"You're my girl," Faith said, and smiled.

"Oh, and you two girls over there," Evan said. "I don't hate you two either."

Willow looked up. Evan was pointing at her and Faith. Faith giggled, and covered her face.

Some things were just meant to be, Willow knew...

"Might love you both just a little bit more if you hit the dance floor though," Evan said, and smiled. "Beautiful women? Must be on the dance floor."

Willow stood up. "That's our cue, sweetie," she said, and took Faith's hand.

They had danced for most of Evan's first set, and for once, Willow was actually able to keep up. All the other times she had danced with Faith, or at least in her general vicinity, Faith had been the Slayer and had accelerated from zero to approximately Mach eight in seconds, swirling around with Buffy like they were two Tasmanian Devils. It was nice now, being able to keep up with Faith on the dance floor.

Willow smiled, as she remembered how she used to dance, in the old days, with Xander at the Bronze...until she met Faith, and Faith taught her how to dance. Willow couldn't take her eyes off Faith as they danced now. She was so graceful, so beautiful. She wasn't the Slayer yet but she had perfect balance, perfect coordination, a dancer's poise. Willow could have just sat at the bar and watched her dance, all night long. But dancing with her was even better...

After an hour the heat was starting to affect them, and the line between slightly winded and "beginning to get all sticky and gross" was in danger of being crossed soon. They found a booth, and had a few drinks, and cooled off. Dan brought the drinks to their table, something he didn't usually do with customers, but he seemed to like Faith. He was a big guy with blue hair, a nose piercing, and a tattoo of a Hula Girl on his arm. And Willow knew he had a girlfriend he was devoted to, so he wasn't trying to pick Faith up. Dan had always liked Faith. Some things didn't change.

Faith had another Coke--Dan brought her a refill free--and Willow had a margarita, lots of salt. The Roxy didn't have a huge selection of drinks, and since Faith had never actually had alcohol there, Faith's old memories couldn't tell Willow what to expect. But Willow thought Dan always seemed to know what he was doing when he did the drinks at Evan's parties, and it turned out Dan did a great margarita.

"You're right, this place is actually pretty cool," Faith said. They held hands across the booth. "Dance floor's awesome."

"DJ?" Willow said, and smiled.

"He's okay," Faith said.

"Faith, he's got the best butt in like, the entire United States. You can notice if you want."

"The entire United States? You sayin' there isn't like maybe one guy in like Chicago or someplace with a better butt?"

"Nope," Willow said, and studied Evan closely. He was sort of dancing around to the music behind his booth, because he could be a goof. But Willow wasn't complaining because she liked the view.

"Okay, well...maybe you got a point," Faith said, as she watched him with her. "Kind of a little bit of a goofball though."

"Yeah. A big, gorgeous goofball. But, okay, he's got the awesome butt? But I've got something awesome too."

"Yeah? You gonna show me tonight?"

"Here's a little taste," Willow whispered, and leaned across the booth, and kissed Faith...a special kiss. She slowly flicked her tongue back and forth against the roof of Faith's mouth as she kissed her. Faith gasped, and a shudder went through her, as Willow played all the sensitive nerve endings there like a violin.

"I've never...never...been kissed like that," Faith said, and blushed, when Willow had finished.

"I've got a lot to teach you tonight, sweetie," Willow said, and giggled... and then her eyes grew wide, as she recognized someone walking past their booth.

"What is it?" Faith said, and turned, and followed Willow's eyes. She saw a blonde-haired guy walking away from them, carrying a drink. He looked cute from the back, but Faith couldn't see much in the gloom.

"Be right back," Willow said.

Willow found Brendan two minutes later, sitting alone at a table with a good view of the dance floor, checking out the girls. He had a drink in his hand and there were two empty glasses on the table.

"Hi," Willow said, and stood in front of him.

"You're blocking my view," Brendan said, without looking at her.

Willow smiled.

"Is that rum and coke you're drinking?" she said.

"Uh, like, can I have everyone's attention please?" Brendan said, as he walked right into Evan's booth and grabbed the microphone and spoke into it. Everyone in the room looked up at him. Willow went back to her booth, and sat across from Faith again.

"What's that blonde guy doing?" Faith said.

"Something he should've done a long time ago," Willow said.

"Dude!" Evan said. "What the hell?"

Brendan covered the microphone, and turned to Evan.

"I'm sorry," Brendan said, softly. "It's just that I'm a big stupid asshole jerk? And I do big stupid asshole jerk stuff sometimes. It's because I'm a big stupid asshole jerk. Wait, did I already say that?"

"Uh...what?" Evan said. "Okay, Dan put you up to this. Dan totally put you up to this. Dan!" Evan looked over at the bar. "What do you have this idiot doing? Is he one of your stupid frat pledges? Is this like that time with the guys wearing diapers?"

"Dude, don't look at me," Dan said, and shrugged his shoulders. "Guy probably can't hold his booze."

"I have to tell everyone that I'm a big stupid asshole jerk now," Brendan said, and uncovered the microphone again.

"What?" Evan said.

"Okay, so, uh, attention everyone?" Brendan said into the microphone. The room quieted down. "My name is Brendan, and I'm a big stupid asshole jerk. I just wanted everyone to know that like, I keep acting like an asshole to girls? And it's completely wrong, and I'm sorry."

There were a few gasps, and some laughter. A bunch of girls cheered. Evan just leaned back in his booth and watched. It was the most entertaining thing he had seen there in at least two weeks.

"Yeah, so, I just want to apologize again to all the girls I've been an asshole to," Brendan said. "I just did all that stuff because I have a fear of intimacy. I think what I've really always wanted is just to be held. Or I might be gay? I'm not sure, but it's a definite possibility, because I think Evan over here has the best butt in the entire United States."

"Oh, holy fuck," Evan said, and buried his face in his hands, as all the girls in the room started cheering, and Dan cracked up laughing.

"Anyway, I'm gonna go become a monk now," Brendan said. "Thanks for listening." And he walked off the stage, crossed the room without looking at anyone, walked up the stairs and out the door.

"Okay," Evan said, after Brendan left. "I just want to say that it's just completely obvious to me that Dan did that? And also that you guys all really need to forget the Rhinestone Cowboy thing now. Because this thing is like, officially the new thing now. It's the new thing we're all gonna remember forever. And now we dance."

Evan went back to spinning tunes. Faith looked at Willow.

"Tell me you didn't do that to that guy," Faith said. "Say, 'Faith, I didn't do that to that guy.'"

"Faith, I didn't do that to that guy," Willow said.

"But you did, didn't you?"

Willow smiled. "Abso-fricking-lutely."

"Met him before? He a jerk to you?"

"He was a jerk to you, sweetie."

"Wait...you did that for me?"

"Yeah," Willow said, and took Faith's hand.

"He gonna like, go be a monk now?"

"Nah. Spell wears off in a couple hours. He'll be fine. You wanna hit the dance floor again?"

"Yeah. Engine's all revved up again, and this DJ guy knows his tunes."

"You get your pretty little butt out there, I'll meet you in a minute. Got something I gotta do real quick."

"You off to do some other crazy magic thing?"

"Just one more," Willow said.

"Do you really have the best butt in the entire United States?" Willow said, as she stood in front of Evan's booth, jockeying for space with three other girls who were all looking up at Evan like he was all four Beatles in 1963. "Because that sounds like an awesome responsibility."

"Oh, God," Evan said, and laughed. "This place? It gets crazy sometimes."

"So how about it?" one of the girls said. She was a pretty Asian girl with beautiful long black hair that hung down her back nearly to her waist. But she wore too much makeup and a skirt that barely made it to her thighs. "Gonna be a great party. I can hook you up."

"Uh, sorry hon, I'm working that night," Evan said, and smiled without making eye contact with her.

"Those were awesome songs you were playing," one of the other girls said, jumping in the second she saw an opportunity. She was a blonde, with long, straight, honey-colored hair like Buffy's. She had a body like Buffy's too, petite, small hips, lean and not curvy. But what curves she had she drew attention to with the tightest pair of leather pants Willow had ever seen on a woman. They were black leather, but they didn't have a single wrinkle. They were so tight they looked more like latex than leather. They were Michelle Pfeiffer Catwoman tight. They were practically mesmerizing. But Evan wasn't impressed. "Yeah?" he said. "Which ones did you really like?"

Willow looked back out at Faith, on the dance floor. People kept trying to dance with her, men and women, but she kept spinning away from them. When Willow watched Faith dance, radiant in the dark, she saw the moon, putting all the other stars to flight.

"Uh...y'know...like all of 'em?" the blonde girl said. "They were awesome. You're an awesome DJ."

"Hey, thanks," Evan said, and did the smile again. Willow knew it wasn't his real smile. Evan was only half there right now.

"The party's gonna be like an all-night thing, if you--" the first girl started to say, when the third girl, an overly-eager little redhead who kept on bobbing up and down, interrupted her. "So where do you go to school?" the girl said. Evan sighed, smiled politely, and said, "Northeastern".

Willow knew that was a lie; she knew he went to Tufts. But Evan was so gorgeous he really did get stalkers sometimes. Life must be strange for someone like Evan, Willow thought.

He stood there behind his booth like a peacock in a zoo cage. He could get away between sets, but he was at the beginning of his second set now and he couldn't leave the booth. Willow knew he was stuck, and that it annoyed him: having to come up with polite small talk, the same dreary routine, endlessly repeated. Girls loved how he looked and they never saw any further than that. Evan could have any girl he wanted, but his available choices never thrilled him. He wasn't looking to get laid and move on. He was looking for someone special...

Willow hoped Evan found that special girl someday, and she intended to make sure he had a good long life to do it in. But his special girl wouldn't be Faith...because Faith was hers.

One of the girls, the hyperactive redhead, was babbling something about Gavin Rossdale, and how he had such a beautiful voice, and why didn't Evan play any Bush? Willow decided to end Evan's suffering.

"Because they're like, grungey?" Willow said. "Not the best stuff for a dance club, sweetie. Plus, I mean, I'm not really big on grunge? But if I was I'd listen to Soundgarden instead. And actually, now that we're on the subject I kinda wanna lodge a formal complaint about the song selection tonight."

Evan looked at her. She had his attention. The three girls looked at her too, but not as kindly. "Seriously?" Evan said, and smiled as if he wasn't sure if he was being kidded. "Now, see, I could've sworn you were having fun out there on the dance floor."

"Definitely was," Willow said. "But the song selection sorta lacked variety. Lots of like, booty-shakin'? But no slow songs. I mean, yeah, okay, dance club? It's all about the booty shakin'? But I wanna dance with my sweetie to a slow song. Oh yeah, and that Chili Peppers song? Kinda played out."

"Oh, it's totally played out, thank you!" Evan said, and laughed, and focused in on Willow, completely ignoring the other three girls now. "Finally someone with taste. Thing is, every time I try to drop that song I get a couple people asking me where it went. And I'm a benevolent dictator."

Willow laughed. The three girls didn't.

"Then hook me up, Big Brother," Willow said. "Just gimme one slow song for me an' my sweetie and I'll like, totally withdraw my complaint."

"Got anything particular in mind?" Evan said, smiling...his real smile. The one Faith always got...

"You got any Jeff Buckley?" Willow said.

Evan's eyes widened, and his smile got even bigger. "Get out! You're into Jeff Buckley too? He's awesome! I keep lending my CD out. I never even see the thing anymore, all my friends keep passing it around to all their friends. Seriously? I think it's in London now. But I have my vinyl here."

The three girls had wandered away.

"That girl out there," Evan said, and nodded toward Faith. "She's your sweetie."

"Yeah," Willow said.

"All the good ones are taken. If you weren't with her I'd be seriously hitting on you. Not kidding."

"You keep saying stuff like that and all the teenyboppers in this place are gonna cry."

Evan shook his head. "They're a pain in my ass. I gotta be nice? But they look at me, they see a piece of meat. Those girls? Girls like that? They come up here and talk, but we don't have conversations. This, now? Me and you? It's a conversation. It's cool. Hey, what's your name, anyway?"

"Willow."

"I'm Evan. Benevolent Dictator Evan."

"I'm just Willow. I was Evil Willow for awhile."

"Were you benevolently evil?"

"Um...well...no? Just sort of...regular old evil."

Evan laughed. "Hard to believe. I'm really depressed now, by the way. I'm like, crying on the inside. You're the funniest, coolest girl I've ever met here and you're totally taken. The good ones are all taken."

"The good ones aren't all taken, Ev," Willow said. "You're still single. And there's someone out there for you. Just...just...keep being you."

Evan nodded, and smiled...the most beautiful smile Willow had ever seen, in all her years.

"So what song you wanna hear?" Evan said. "Uncle Ev will hook you up."

The music suddenly stopped. Faith looked around.

Willow was crossing the dance floor, walking toward her, and smiling.

"We're gonna slow it down a little here, kids," Evan said, into the microphone. "Everybody take a breath, stop and appreciate that special person you're with. Think about how lucky you are. This song is for a special girl out there...and I think she's a really lucky girl too. This song is for Faith."

Willow smiled, and took Faith's hands in hers, as the song started...as a young man with a voice like an angel serenaded them.

He would be gone soon, Willow knew...in another month, he would drown. Things were beautiful because we could lose them.

The man serenaded them.

I heard there was a secret chord

That David played and it pleased the Lord

But you don't really care for music, do you...

They danced.

"You...you did this for me?" Faith said. "This song is for me?"

"Everything's for you," Willow said.

Hallelujah...

They swayed together, looking into each other's eyes...the world closed in, reduced itself, to just the two of them. There were a hundred people on that dance floor, but Willow and Faith were alone...

Well your faith was strong but you needed proof

You saw her bathing on the roof

Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew you...

"No one's ever...ever...done anything like this for me before," Faith said.

"I always will, baby," Willow said.

Hallelujah...

Baby I've been here before

I've seen this room and I've walked this floor

I used to live alone before I knew you...

Tears came into Faith's eyes, as she stared into Willow's. Then they overflowed, and ran down her cheeks.

Willow kissed them away.

Hallelujah...

But remember when I moved in you

And the holy dove was moving too

And every breath we drew was hallelujah...

"I love you. I love you, Willow," Faith said.

"I love you too," Willow said, and kissed her.

Well, maybe there's a God above...

"Can we...can we go home after this?" Faith whispered. "I wanna...I wanna be with you."

"Yeah," Willow said, and smiled.

Faith was nervous again when they got back from the Roxy, but Willow had expected that. She knew Faith; she'd planned the night accordingly.

When they walked into the hotel room, Faith automatically reached for the light switch. But Willow smiled, and shook her head, and stopped her. She took Faith's hand in hers.

"The dark is better, sweetie," Willow whispered. "Light can hide things, but dark lays us bare. The dark is sacred."

They stood in the dark together, in the bedroom, holding hands. The moon, full now, crept in through the balcony doors, splashing the room with silver. Faith's hand was shaking, a little. Willow kissed it.

Willow kissed Faith's lips, gently; caressing them.

"You're beautiful," Willow murmured, and ran her lips up Faith's neck, to the spot just below her ear. She gave her another soft kiss there, while her hands played across Faith's blouse, tracing the curve of her breasts.

Faith moaned, but she trembled a little.

"You a little nervous, baby?" Willow whispered in her ear.

"I'm...I'm sorry," Faith whispered back.

Willow smiled, and kissed Faith's hand again, and ran her fingers through her thick brown hair, smoothing it down, arranging it over Faith's shoulders. "No more saying that tonight. This isn't about, like, performing. We aren't guys. All this is about? Is making each other happy. Okay?"

"Okay."

Faith stood there in the dark, and watched Willow, and didn't move. She didn't know what to do. She didn't know if Willow wanted her to do something, or if she wanted her to stand still and wait...Faith wanted to be whatever Willow wanted her to be, but she wasn't sure what that was...

Faith knelt in front of Willow, and touched her ankles. She ran her fingers up Willow's ankles, up under the hem of the black satin vintage flapper-style cocktail dress she had picked out for her, caressing her legs, as she looked up into Willow's eyes. But Faith's hands were still shaking a little as she did it.

Willow knelt down next to her.

"I'm...I'm doing it wrong," Faith said.

"There's no wrong, baby," Willow said, and smiled, and kissed her. "There's just you and me." She took Faith's hand, and stood her up.

"I just...don't know if...I should do stuff or...hang back. If you like, want me to do stuff, or, or...wait for you."

Willow kissed Faith's neck again, and then kissed her ear, and sucked on her earlobe. Faith moaned.

"Well, before we do anything, sweetie?" Willow whispered in her ear. "After all that dancing, I kinda wanna take a shower."

Willow slipped out of her shoes, a new pair of high-heeled shoes Faith had picked out for her the week before, to go with the dress. They still picked out each other's clothes. It made clothes shopping an adventure. The end result was that Faith wore mostly skirts and dresses with high heels and sexy stockings, and Willow wore lots of arty vintage stuff in flamboyant colors, with funky hats and scarves, skin-tight jeans, lots of boots and the occasional pair of leather pants. But they liked dressing up for each other.

"Shoes fit okay?" Faith said. "Tonight's the first night you wore those. Were they comfortable?"

"Comfortable as any shoes can be when you're dancing," Willow said. "My feet are a little tired. I'm not sixteen anymore. I'm not Sabrina the Teenage Witch anymore. Now I'm Samantha from Bewitched. Samantha's light-years cooler anyway."

Willow turned her back to Faith, and slipped the straps of her dress off her shoulders, and let it slide to the floor. She stepped out of it.

"Will you wash my back?" Willow whispered, and undid her bra in back, and let it fall to the floor, while she looked at Faith over her shoulder, standing with her back turned to her, in her panties.

"Yeah," Faith said, in a husky voice, as if she was having trouble talking.

Willow turned around, and showed herself to Faith, silhouetted in the moonlight.

"I'm for you tonight, Faith," Willow said. "Every night."

"You're...so beautiful," Faith said. "I never knew how beautiful you are."

Willow smiled. Her skin was creamy white. Her long, dark hair cascaded around her shoulders in soft waves. Her green eyes caught the moonlight, and shone in the dark room like emeralds.

Willow's breasts were larger than Faith had thought; they were two perfect, pale globes. Faith noticed Willow's nipples were large too, and they were hard now. Faith wanted to curl up against Willow's breasts, and suck on them.

Willow walked around behind her, and hugged her.

"I know what you want, baby," Willow whispered in her ear. "I know what you want to do. After we shower, we'll do that, okay?"

Faith nodded. Willow caressed her breasts over her blouse, and kissed the back of her neck.

"Do I get a show too?" Willow whispered.

Faith smiled. "Yeah."

Willow unbuttoned Faith's blouse, and went on kissing the back of her neck. She unzipped Faith's skirt. The sound of the zipper cut through the silence of the room, changed the tone of it. Everything had been gentle, slow caresses, while they both stood draped in the moon's cool silver. But now Faith felt like things were speeding up...getting hot.

Willow unhooked Faith's bra, and caressed her breasts again, kneading her nipples between her fingers. They had been hard but they became even harder under Willow's expert coaxing. Willow licked Faith's neck, and one of her hands suddenly darted down under Faith's skirt, to her panties, like some silent, stealthy predator, and caressed her over them. Faith gasped and began trembling again. Willow held her still, and went on caressing her there.

"I'm gonna eat this lil' cherry," Willow whispered in Faith's ear.

No one had ever touched Faith there before. Even though Willow hadn't gone under Faith's panties yet, her fingers felt electric. Faith began pushing back against her, moving her hips, as Willow caressed her, in slow circles.

"You want me to fuck you tonight, baby?" Willow whispered. She licked Faith's neck again, on the other side, and felt Faith's panties soaking through.

"Yeah...yeah," Faith whispered back. She could feel her pussy starting to overflow now; she felt a drop run down her legs.

Willow stopped stroking her. Faith gasped again; the shock of Willow stopping was almost as great as the shock she'd felt when Willow started. Faith felt like a car stuck in neutral while someone kept revving on the gas.

Willow took off Faith's blouse and her bra, and dropped them to the floor. Then she turned Faith around, and knelt in front of her. She pulled Faith's skirt down, and slipped her shoes off.

Faith was wearing sheer lace thigh-high stockings, in a pale flesh tone. Willow had picked them out and she thought Faith looked scrumptious in them.

Willow slowly pulled Faith's panties down, looking up into Faith's eyes the whole time. Faith blushed, standing there in nothing but her stockings now, and held her legs tight together.

Willow moved her lips to Faith's pussy. Not touching it yet. Just taking in her scent. Faith's pubic hair wasn't shaved or shaped in any way. It was cut, haphazardly, as if Faith did it herself with scissors. Faith's pussy was drenched; Willow could see drops of moisture glistening on Faith's pubic hair in the moonlight, like dewdrops on the grass. Willow knew Buffy would have gotten a peach scent from Faith now. Willow didn't; she wasn't a Slayer, she didn't have the nose for it. But she liked Faith's scent. It was slightly musky, and stronger than it might have been because they had been dancing for a good long time.

Willow gave Faith a kiss, on her dark, wet patch of pubic hair, an inch above her pussy lips. Faith was hiding her pussy right now, her legs were still clamped together. Willow knew she was still scared. But Willow wasn't worried. They had plenty of time...the whole night, and all the nights after.

Faith moaned, as Willow kissed her. She moved her legs a little; they weren't held so tightly together now. But even though Willow thought Faith would let her lick her pussy now, it wasn't time yet.

"I'm not teasing you, baby," Willow said, and kissed Faith's knees over her stockings. She brushed her lips against the sleek material, reveled in its silky feel against her. Then she looked up at Faith, and smiled. "But anticipation is part of it, sweetie...part of the fun of making love. Men go too fast, they don't give themselves time to appreciate it. I'm gonna teach you about making love tonight... about going slow...appreciating it."

Willow brushed her lips, and her nose, against Faith's pubic hair. She took in Faith's musky scent, and felt a sudden wave of energy rushing through her, felt her blood spiking with it. She nearly tore into Faith's pussy and started licking it right then; she had to stop herself, calm herself down. It was as if Faith's pussy scent flipped a switch in her brain.

Suddenly, Willow understood how Buffy always felt around Faith. Being a Slayer meant that heady, intoxicating rush of pheromones Willow had just experienced would have been a constant thing for Buffy; with her sense of smell, Buffy would experience this feeling all the time when she was around Faith... every single second. And Faith would experience the same feeling around Buffy...

She had no idea how they could have managed it. Feeling like this all the time...could someone feel ecstasy every second, and not go crazy?

Willow stopped thinking about it. Tonight was her night...not Buffy's. If she was going to be part of this new world, she knew she had to commit to it...and forget the old one.

"Like you said this morning, it's sweeter when you gotta wait, baby," Willow whispered, murmuring the words between Faith's legs, her lips caressing her there, as Faith opened her legs wider for her. Faith was showing Willow her pussy now. Willow smiled up at her.

"You want me to kiss you here, baby?" Willow whispered.

Faith looked nervous. But she nodded.

"Soon," Willow said, murmuring the word, like an incantation, between Faith's legs, as Faith's scent filled her nostrils, and Faith's hair was soft and warm and damp against her face. She stood up, and took Faith in her arms, and kissed her. She sucked on Faith's tongue, and then flicked her own tongue against the roof of Faith's mouth, the way she had kissed her at the Roxy. Faith immediately began to moan, and shudder, and back away a little; she had never felt anything quite like it before, when Willow kissed her that way. It was almost too good, almost too much; she felt like she might actually explode with pleasure. But Willow gently held her still, and kept flicking her tongue across the roof of her mouth, playing her, making her whole body sing; Faith felt like her whole body was vibrating...humming...sparking. She had never come before, but she thought this must be what coming felt like...

Faith wasn't sure how much longer she could take it...she whimpered, and swooned in Willow's arms. Willow gently lowered her to the floor, and kept kissing her, lying on top of her now, as Faith moaned and whimpered and squealed beneath her, wrapping her legs around Willow and moving her hips beneath her. Willow fucked Faith on the floor, gently at first, as she kissed her, exploring Faith's mouth with her tongue and bringing her closer and closer to an orgasm. But Willow started grinding against Faith faster and faster, thrilling to the feel of Faith's soaked pussy against her own, and Faith matched her speed, and as they fucked Willow felt like she was being carried away on a wave, like she couldn't control herself anymore. She heard herself squealing now, too, almost shrieking in Faith's ear, as she held on tight to her, holding her in place as she fucked her, as she jammed her pussy into Faith's. She flashed back to Faith's old memories--to the night Buffy penetrated Faith for the first time...the night the Slayer came out, and took her...

What...what are you gonna do? Faith had said, when she felt Buffy moving against her, and she slowly opened her legs for her.

I'm gonna fuck your brains out, baby, Buffy whispered in her ear, and plunged into her...

Willow stopped herself. She didn't want to do this the way Buffy would have done it. She didn't want it to be that way. She stopped grinding her pussy against Faith's, and she stopped kissing her that way...the special way Tara had taught her how to kiss. She tried to catch her breath. They were sweating, and their pussies were dripping, and Willow's heart was beating like a jackhammer. She felt Faith's heart beating against hers, just as hard, and she saw that Faith had tears in her eyes; Faith had been seconds from an orgasm when Willow stopped. Faith's legs were still trembling around her, and she looked scared. Willow looked down into her eyes, and smiled.

"Baby, it's okay," Willow whispered. "It's okay. I love you, Faith, okay? Always remember that. I love you. I love you." Faith nodded, and wiped the tears from her eyes. Willow kissed her again, but gently; she didn't penetrate her with her tongue, didn't play the nerve endings at the roof of Faith's mouth. She just kissed her, softly, and looked down into her eyes, and caressed her cheek.

They kissed for awhile, on the floor in the dark. Faith kept her legs wrapped around Willow, and rubbed her feet against the backs of Willow's thighs, as Willow looked down into her eyes, and kissed her. They didn't talk. Willow kissed Faith, and caressed her cheek, until Faith was relaxed again.

They both knew they had been through a storm, and it had passed. Now the ocean was calm again.

"I...I need you, Willow," Faith whispered. She felt like a dam about to burst...she felt a river beating against her insides. It had nearly overflowed, when Willow fucked her on the floor; it has been about to burst out of her, when Willow suddenly stopped. "I need you so much. I need you, I need you right now. Please? Please?"

"I'm yours, baby," Willow said. Then she smiled. "But first you gotta wash my back. Okay?"

"Okay," Faith said, and grinned.

They showered together, and Faith felt like it was different in there, because the bathroom light was on and everything was more real. In the bedroom, in the dark, when Willow kissed her, and fucked her, Faith had felt like she was in a dream. In the shower, caressing Willow's breasts, and running her hands along Willow's body with the soap, as Willow did the same to her, Faith knew she was back in the world...but it was a changed world. Everything had changed now.

The shower was hot and the steam felt good. Faith felt like the water was opening her up, exposing her to the world again. She had felt like she was going under, somehow, when Willow caressed her between the legs in the bedroom, and fucked her, and kissed her in that special way she had, setting off fireworks inside her; she had felt like she was being hypnotized. Like she was succumbing to something...falling into a dream. In the bedroom everything had been soft and dark and silent and sacred, but not quite real. You couldn't really touch it...it was a spirit place...a place you might meet a goddess. But here, in the shower, the water was real: it brought Faith back to the world, as it cascaded against her skin, a steady, hot pressure; as it sluiced down her body, dripping from her hair to her toes. It brought her back to the world of light and pressure and heat and wetness, of things that were hard, not soft; loud, not quiet. They were giggling together as they touched each other and kissed, and their sounds--the sound of their giggling, echoing a little in the bathroom, and of their occasional moans, and the steady hissing of the water behind everything else--filled Faith's ears. The bathroom light filled Faith's vision. After the bedroom it was almost dazzling. They'd gone from the moon to the sun.

Faith realized she had been scared, in the bedroom. She loved being with Willow now, this way, in the shower, giggling and caressing each other's bodies, but she was afraid to go back to the bedroom.

She didn't let herself think about it. She lathered up Willow's big, beautiful breasts, and thought of kissing them, as Willow held her in her arms.

Willow knelt down, and washed Faith's feet.

"Were you afraid, baby?" Willow whispered, as she caressed Faith's feet with her soapy hands, taking her time. "Were you a little afraid back there?"

"I don't know," Faith said, and blushed. It felt strange, standing there while Willow knelt in front of her, washing her feet. Faith wanted to do that for Willow, but she didn't think Willow should be doing that for her. She didn't know why anyone would do that for her. She didn't know why anyone would want to touch her that way.

Willow smiled up at her, as the water poured down on her head, plastering her long, dark hair down over her shoulders. The contrast was striking: Willow's hair, jet-black when it was wet, made her skin look pale as ivory. Willow was absolute black and absolute white. Only her green eyes fell between the two extremes.

Faith touched Willow's hair. Willow slid her hands up Faith's ankles, to her thighs, and caressed her ass. She moved her lips close to Faith's pussy.

"You don't seem too afraid now," Willow said, and smiled.

"Feelin' kinda mellow now," Faith said.

Willow gently opened Faith's legs, and gave her a single, soft kiss, right on her pussy lips.

Faith threw her head back, and shuddered.

"You still gotta wash my back, baby," Willow murmured, and giggled, her lips caressing Faith's pussy as she spoke.

Then she got up, still giggling, and turned around. Faith began washing her back, and cupping her breasts as she did it.

"I love you," Faith whispered in Willow's ear, as she ran her hands down Willow's back, from her shoulders down to her ass and all the way up again, feeling the hard planes of muscle moving beneath her fingers as she traced their outlines, like a sculptor working a pottery wheel.

"I love you too," Willow whispered.

"You're all like...in really great shape. In clothes you look like you might be kinda soft but...you're all lean and hard."

"Ten years working out with Becca. Am I lean and hard in a good way?"

"In a great way," Faith said, and knelt down, and kissed Willow's ass, once for each cheek. "Especially this butt." Willow giggled.

"I always told Becca, y'know, like, muscles are okay, being strong is okay, but I didn't wanna look all gross, like one of those female bodybuilders? I like havin', y'know, boobs and stuff."

"You're perfect," Faith said, and went on kissing Willow's ass as she washed her back. "Hard in all the right spots. Soft in all the right spots. That Evan guy? He's got the second-best ass. Yours is the best. I could just kiss it all night."

Willow turned around and lifted Faith up.

"Got a whole bunch of places for you to kiss. Did you like the little kiss I gave you here, sweetie?" Willow touched Faith's pussy lips, and gently stroked them. Faith didn't close her legs this time, and she seemed more at ease with Willow touching her there now.

"Yeah," Faith said, and closed her eyes.

Willow stopped stroking her, and hugged her.

"You've never come before," Willow said.

Faith shook her head.

"I'm gonna show you how to come tonight, okay sweetie?"

"I didn't...didn't think I could," Faith said. "Never did with guys. Never even did when I tried to...y'know...handle it myself."

"You can, baby," Willow said, and kissed her. "Tonight, you will. And every night from now on. Okay?"

Faith nodded, and held Willow's breasts in her hands, and kissed her neck. She felt the weight of Willow's breasts, squeezed them, caressed them. They felt perfect in her hands. She wanted to kiss them. "But...it's just...no one ever...no one ever did nothin' to me before...I mean, down there. Always thought...no one would ever want to."

"You're beautiful there, Faith," Willow said, and looked into her big, beautiful brown eyes as she said it. "You're so beautiful, baby. You're a goddess. I'm gonna worship you tonight. I'm gonna kiss you there so you can come, okay? And I'm gonna kiss you everywhere else too. I'm gonna kiss you in all your beautiful places."

Faith nodded again, and smiled. The water cascaded down around them, but Willow could see tears in Faith's eyes.

Faith was a little nervous again when they came back into the living room, holding hands, naked together. The living room was dark, but the moon provided all the light they needed to see by. Willow brought Faith to the couch, and sat her down, and held her hand, and kissed her, soft little kisses, picking out spots on Faith's lips, and focusing on them.

"Be right back," Willow whispered, after a moment.

She went to the bedroom, and dug around in the closet. She came back to the couch with a bottle of champagne and two fluted wine glasses.

"Had this in a little cooler in the closet, to keep it just right," Willow said. "Champagne's awesome? But it's a complete pain in the butt to get it the right temperature."

"You bought champagne?" Faith said. "That's the secret stuff you bought today?"

"We're celebrating," Willow whispered, and kissed her.

Faith nodded, and watched Willow pour the champagne. She focused on Willow's breasts. It was difficult for Faith to take her eyes off them for long. Willow's nipples were still hard. They were light pink, with very big, very pale pink areolae around them. They would be perfect to kiss.

"I know you've never had champagne before," Willow said. "But I know you're gonna like it too."

"'Cuz you got my memories?"

"Yup. Makes you real easy to buy stuff for."

The champagne was Cristal. Willow knew Faith liked Krug Clos du Mesnil even better, but that was the champagne Rebecca had poured for her, the night she became the Slayer...it was Rebecca's moment with Faith. Willow didn't want to take that away from them.

She gave Faith a glass, and kissed her. "Time for a toast."

Faith nodded, holding up her glass. She felt, suddenly, like she didn't belong there. Like she wasn't worthy of this. She wasn't classy, like Willow was. She didn't know about champagne, and nice restaurants, and what big words meant. She felt embarrassed, suddenly, sitting there--embarrassed for Willow.

"To the goddess," Willow said, and touched her glass to Faith's. "To the goddess sitting right in front of me."

"I'm not...I'm not any goddess," Faith said. "You're the goddess."

Willow giggled. "Okay, before we have one of our Monty Python kinda back and forth arguments about this? Let's just say we're both goddesses. Drink."

They drank their champagne. Faith liked it. And it was strong stuff too; Faith felt it going to her head a little. Not making her drunk, or even buzzed, yet; just relaxing her. Making her feel warm...languid.

They looked into each other's eyes the whole time.

"I love you, Faith," Willow whispered. Faith saw tears in Willow's eyes.

"Hey...hey, honey, what's wrong?" Faith said. "How come...how come you're cryin'?"

"'Cuz I'm happy, baby," Willow said, and smiled as she cried, as the tears ran down her cheeks now. "'Cuz...I've loved you since the night we first met, that night you saved me in the alley. I loved you and...and I could never tell you because you were with Buffy, and I was with Xander, and I was Buffy's friend, and I couldn't do that to her....but now I finally get to tell you. I finally get to show you. I finally get to be with you."

Faith kissed her tears away.

"I want you to be with me forever," Faith whispered. "You're my goddess."

"Remember how I told you I had feelings for Buffy? How me and her had been friends for a long time but then I found out she'd always had a thing for me, and then I started feeling that way about her?"

"Yeah. You said it was because of having my memories...like, you were gettin' confused, havin' feelings for her like I did."

"Yeah. And I mean, hello, straight girl? At least, I was straight before I got your memories. You like, completely gayed me up."

They laughed.

"Good," Faith said. "'Cuz if you were all like, 'sorry hon, I just drive stick' I'd be all sad. I'd cry."

They finished their champagne. Willow poured them each another glass. They clinked their glasses together, and kissed. They tasted the champagne on each other's lips. Willow wanted to pour champagne all over Faith's body, and lick it off her.

"But the thing is, yeah, sure, I got those feelings from like, havin' your memories?" Willow said. "But the feelings were still real, they were still there...still part of me. And me and Buffy got together eventually...because of you. It didn't last? It was...I mean those were like, special circumstances..."

"The thing with the Mayor, right?"

"Yeah. But even though it was a weird situation, and you and Buffy got back together eventually, my feelings for her were real. I loved her...I loved her because of you. And I don't regret it. It was tough on all of us afterwards? But I still don't regret the time I was with her. And then...there was Tara. I loved her because of you too."

"You said I introduced you guys to her, right? I sort of brought her into the group?"

"Yeah." Willow hadn't told Faith the whole story...about the lighthouse... and why Faith had gone there.

"How'd I meet her anyway?"

"Um...well, you and Buffy were having one of your fights? And you just sorta ran into Tara and you guys really hit it off. You were in that crappy motel, and you wouldn't stay with Buffy, but you stayed at Tara's place for like that whole week. And somewhere along the way, even though you and Tara didn't get together then, you started having feelings for her."

"You said...me and Tara...we got together eventually, right?"

"Yeah. During the Mayor thing. That was a rough time for all four of us. We'd just lost Xander, we'd just found out about Giles, and now the Mayor's got like, cameras in our houses. The plan was the right plan? I mean, we had to do it? The Mayor was killing babies. Selling runaway kids into slavery. Destroying souls. He had to be stopped and our plan was the best way to do it and we all signed off on the plan. But it still hurt us...hurt all of us. You and Buffy took awhile to get past it. And then there was me and Buffy...and you and Tara...we're lucky we got Becca back when we did. Without Becca I honestly don't think we would have come through all that. But the thing is...not just Buffy but Tara too...I loved Tara because of you. Yeah, I fell for her on my own once I started dating her? But that was years later. And my original feelings for her, the reason I wanted to date her in the first place, all came from you."

"All my love?" Willow said, and knelt down in front of Faith, and looked up into her eyes. "It all comes from you. You're my Faith. Through all my loves, all the different people I was with, I always kept you in my heart..."

Willow gently opened Faith's legs, and began kissing her between them. She had planned on taking Faith back to the bedroom first, but she needed her... she needed her right now. She needed to taste her...drink her. Faith moaned, and her legs began to tremble. Willow moaned too...Faith's scent, her taste, was intoxicating.

"I always kept Faith in my heart," Willow whispered, as she licked Faith between her legs...

It took Faith less than a minute to come, her legs trembling as she did; she let out a short, stifled scream, which immediately turned to sobbing. Willow got back up on the couch again, and took Faith in her arms, and they laid down together.

"It's okay, baby," Willow whispered, as she kissed Faith's tears, and began rubbing her belly. "It's okay. It's okay."

After a few minutes, Faith calmed down. Willow looked down into her eyes, and rubbed her belly, and kissed her.

"That's...that's how it feels to come?" Faith whispered, eventually. She was curled up against Willow's breasts, and giving them little kisses.

"Yeah," Willow said. "Did you like it?"

Faith nodded. "Will I always cry? Do you cry?"

"I don't cry. Some girls do, it's like just this physical thing that happens. It'll get easier for you...eventually you won't cry anymore."

Faith nodded, and began sucking on Willow's nipple.

They stayed that way for awhile; Willow knew Faith had been waiting to do this. And Willow liked Faith doing it. So she held her in her arms, and kissed her, and whispered to her that she loved her, and let Faith have her that way...

Later, Faith started kissing her way down Willow's stomach, toward her pussy.

"Will you...will you show me how?" Faith whispered, when she had kissed her way down to the top of Willow's pubic hair.

Willow nodded, and took Faith's hand, and led her to the bedroom.

"I considered music, when I was planning all this?" Willow said, as they walked into the bedroom. "But then I just had this vision of like, Barry White music and polyester suits and people with bad hair. Quiet's better."

Willow laid herself down on the bed. She still held Faith's hand. Faith hesitated a moment, standing by the side of the bed, and then got into bed with her. Willow knew she was nervous again. She held her in her arms.

"You don't have to, sweetie," Willow whispered. "You can be my pillow queen tonight if you want. Especially since I'm not done eating that pretty lil' cherry of yours."

"What's a pillow queen?"

"After you gayed me up I sorta got into the scene a little? Pillow queen's sort of like a straight girl who's experimenting...y'know, seeing how the other side lives. They think they might be bi, or maybe even gay, but they're not sure? They like being touched, and being kissed..." Willow started caressing Faith's pussy, going right for her clit this time, gently massaging it. This time, Faith opened her legs for her without hesitating. "Especially right here, baby? But they don't know if they wanna kiss another girl there. So they just lay back on the pillow..." Willow moved herself down between Faith's legs. Faith opened them wider for her. "And they just let their girlfriend handle everything. And this girlfriend? Not complaining, baby." Willow looked closely at Faith's pussy, gently moving her pubic hair aside. The room was dark, but the moonlight coming in through the balcony doors was strong, and she could see Faith's pussy clearly. She thought it was beautiful...it was small, and it looked tight, with very light pink lips. Willow decided she was going to shave Faith's pubic hair in the morning, so she could see her better. She had a beautiful pink rose there, too beautiful to cover up...

Willow began licking it. Faith's scent was stronger there now, and Willow felt it affecting her again, driving her into a near frenzy. She licked Faith's pussy lips, and sucked on her clit, as Faith squirmed around on the bed and began squealing. Faith was so wet now, dripping with it, that Willow was actually drinking her as she licked her, lapping up her pussy juice and swallowing it. Faith tasted sweet, fruity...like a peach. Willow hadn't had much of a chance to really taste Faith before, in the living room, because Faith had come too fast...she reveled in her now...

Faith came again, too fast. She lasted more than a minute this time, but only barely. And she cried again.

Willow moved up beside her again, and held her, and rubbed her belly.

"I love you so much," Faith whispered, as tears rolled down her cheeks.

"I love you too, baby," Willow whispered back, and kissed her tears away.

Once Faith calmed down, she curled up against Willow's breasts, and started kissing them again.

"You're my goddess," Faith whispered.

"I'm yours, baby," Willow said. "I'm for you."

Faith nodded. "I want you to show me now. I want you to show me how to kiss you there."

"Are you sure? I don't want you doing stuff you don't really wanna do."

Faith suddenly rolled over and jumped on top of Willow, and pinned her down by the wrists. She touched her nose against Willow's as she laid on top of her, and smiled down at her, and looked into her eyes.

"I ain't no pillow queen, honey," Faith said, and smiled.

Then she let Willow's wrists go, and kissed her neck, and her breasts, and kissed her way down her stomach...

"Show me?" Faith said, as she moved between Willow's legs.

Faith proved to be an attentive student and a quick learner, as Willow showed her just how she liked to be kissed, and licked, and caressed, between her legs, and it didn't take long at all for Faith to bring Willow to an orgasm. The first time Faith licked Willow's pussy that night, she was lying on the bed, but the second time she had Willow sit up on the edge of the bed, so she could get down on her knees in front of her. Faith kissed Willow's feet for a long time as she knelt in front of her, before she licked her pussy. She looked into Willow's eyes as she kissed her feet, and called her a goddess...

They spent the night making love, exploring each other. Faith's body thrilled to Willow's touch. Willow touched her in places she had never been touched before, and made her realize that there was more than one way to have an orgasm, that there were other parts of her that were just as sensitive to Willow's expert fingers and tongue as her pussy was. "You're full of buried treasure, baby," Willow whispered, as she had Faith lay on her stomach, and she caressed Faith's foot, and licked her in a certain spot behind her knee. Faith moaned; she felt like her body was tingling. "Your body's got little hidden treasures everywhere. Bright, beautiful jewels. You just gotta know where to dig."

Faith's ears, her neck, her stomach, her fingers, her knees, her ankles, her feet...Willow explored them all, and showed Faith that every part of her body was an instrument, just waiting for the right musician to play it...

Willow certainly didn't ignore Faith's pussy, because she couldn't get enough of it, but Faith always came too fast, and cried when she came, and Willow always wanted to hold her in her arms and comfort her until her tears had passed. It didn't give Willow much time to stop and smell the roses...specifically the beautiful soaked pink rose right in front of her. But by the end of the night Faith had made some strides: she held out nearly three minutes before Willow brought her to her sixth orgasm.

Their lovemaking didn't so much end as get postponed temporarily; the sun came up and they both realized they needed some sleep. So Willow held Faith in her arms, and Faith curled up on Willow's breasts, and sucked on her nipple, and went to sleep.

They slept until noon. When they woke up, they showered together, and then Willow told Faith she had a quick errand to do. And she promptly got dressed, went to the Copley Place mall around the corner, bought a pair of sharp scissors, a good razor, because the one she and Faith used for their legs wouldn't do, some shaving cream, and some aloe vera gel. When she came back twenty minutes later, Faith was lying in the bed in the bathrobe Willow had bought her, waiting for her.

"What's that stuff?" Faith said, noticing the little bags Willow carried.

"Get undressed, sweetie," Willow said. "I'm choppin' down that forest of yours."

When Faith got undressed, Willow sat her down in the leather chair, and knelt in front of her, bringing her legs up over her shoulders.

"How come...how come you're doin' this?" Faith murmured, moaning a little, as Willow cut her pubic hair down as far as she could with the scissors, and then gently rubbed the shaving cream into it. Faith hadn't ever given thought to her pubic hair before, other than to make sure it didn't get too long. Every few months she cut it with scissors and didn't think about it beyond that.

"Because I'm gay, so I think your pussy's really pretty? I wanna be able to see it when I'm kissing it, sweetie."

"You really think...it's pretty? Seriously?" Faith watched curiously as Willow slowly began shaving her between her legs, wiping it off into a facecloth after every stroke.

"I think it's beautiful, baby," Willow whispered, and gave Faith's pussy a little kiss.

When Willow was done Faith's pussy was completely hairless and Willow could finally see it. She washed it with a facecloth and soap and warm water, and then she massaged the aloe vera gel into Faith's skin there, until it was soft and smooth as the day she was born.

Faith's pussy really was beautiful, Willow thought, as she knelt in front of it, and really saw that little pink rose for the first time.

"Such a pretty cherry, baby," Willow whispered, and began kissing it...

They spent the rest of the day in bed. Faith worked on perfecting her pussy-licking technique, timing Willow against the new antique clock they had picked up to replace the old one, to see how fast she could make her come, while Willow worked on teaching Faith to come slower. Willow knew Faith was one of those girls who came easily--which she thought was ironic, considering that Faith had always thought she was frigid--and five minutes was about as long as Faith was able to hold out when Willow got started on her pussy. But five minutes would do; it gave Willow time to revel in Faith's pussy, to take in her scent, to really taste her. They got out of bed to pull in the room service tray, but that was the only time they got out of bed. They spent that day making love...that day, and that whole night too.

That night, they finished the champagne. Willow poured the rest of the bottle over Faith's body, and licked it off her...licked it off every part of her.

"I'm drunk with you," Willow whispered.

They couldn't keep their hands off each other. They finally made it out of bed on the third day, actually putting clothes on and managing to venture outside to a restaurant; the weather was warm and spring had finally asserted itself. They had planned to go to a movie after the restaurant, and it was a movie they both really wanted to see, too: the Brattle Theatre in Harvard Square was doing a Bogey and Bacall series and they were showing To Have and Have Not that night. Faith liked Lauren Bacall and she had never seen that one, so she was looking forward to it. The Brattle was a great old place with a balcony and curtains in front of the screen and vintage movie posters adorning the walls and the best popcorn of any movie theatre in town, but halfway through dinner at Abe and Louie's on Boylston Street they were already touching each other under the table and they practically sprinted back to the hotel without even ordering dessert.

The next day they tried to go see the movie again; the Brattle was doing one last matinee showing of To Have and Have Not that afternoon before they brought out The Big Sleep that night. Willow and Faith actually managed to get to the theatre this time, but then they fucked in the balcony. The matinee showing was sparsely attended and no one was up in the balcony because the floor seats offered a better view, and ten minutes into the movie Willow was kneeling in front of Faith and licking her pussy. Faith could get loud when Willow was licking her pussy, and it was starting to present a problem. They giggled, as Faith kept on involuntarily squealing and then trying to look nonchalant with her complete lack of acting ability as people down in the floor seats kept staring up at her to see what was causing all the commotion. They couldn't see Willow; Willow was on her knees between Faith's legs. All they saw was a strange girl who kept on making strange noises.

"That was, uh, a really good part, y'know?" Faith said once, as Willow did something to her clit that made her shriek like a banshee and everyone down on the floor looked at her again. "It was like, really moving."

Willow was giggling between her legs...

The movie made them both realize they were perverts who liked sex in public but they definitely needed to do something to keep Faith quiet. Willow could come quietly when she had to, but Faith couldn't control herself. Whenever Willow tried to cover Faith's mouth with her hand Faith would always start giggling and licking her hand until it felt ticklish and Willow had to take it away. Finally, one cool, windy afternoon when Willow fingered Faith's clit in the ladies room at the Museum of Fine Arts--Faith was still bored by the museum but getting fucked there made it worthwhile--Willow gagged her with the silk scarf she had worn. A dowdy old woman came into the ladies room, and checked her makeup for an interminably long time in the bathroom mirror; Willow could see her through the little half-inch opening between the stall door and the wall as she stroked Faith's clit. Faith was standing in a shopping bag--it was their standard procedure now for ladies room fucking--and Willow was holding her still with one hand around her waist while she stroked her clit with the other. "You better not get us caught, baby," Willow whispered, standing up for a moment and speaking into Faith's ear. "You better be a good kitty for me."

Faith shook her head, and let out a muffled giggle. Willow saw the woman through the little opening in the stall, turning around and looking at her now. But then the woman went back to her makeup, and she was gone a moment later.

"Bad kitty," Willow said, and smiled, as she went on stroking Faith's clit. Faith nodded, and giggled again through the scarf. "Bad kitties need to be punished, don't they sweetie?"

Faith nodded again, and came...

Willow knew how it had been between Faith and Buffy...she knew what Faith liked in the bedroom.

And Willow was prepared to do those things for Faith, but she wasn't sure how much of Faith's proclivities in that area were due to her being the Slayer, and how much of them were just who Faith was. Willow knew Faith--at least in the old history--liked power games. She was a natural submissive most of the time, though Willow still wasn't sure how much of that had been due to Buffy's influence--Buffy tended to dominate Faith, and everyone else, in the bedroom. Willow wasn't a Slayer but she had Faith's memories of it, and she knew Faith and Buffy both equated sex with power...to a Slayer, sex was a hunt. Willow knew Faith usually liked to be the one being hunted.

At least, that's how it was before...

When they came home from the museum, Willow decided to find out if that's how it was now...if this Faith liked power games, or if that would have to wait until she was the Slayer. Willow told herself she was only doing this because she wanted to make sure she was taking care of Faith and doing all the things Faith wanted...

But part of Willow knew she was comparing herself to Buffy.

Willow had decided, the night she first made love to Faith a week before, that she wouldn't do the things Buffy had done...wouldn't penetrate Faith, wouldn't love her the same way Buffy did. She didn't want to have to compare herself to Buffy. But she knew she was comparing herself...she had the memories, and no matter how hard she tried, she thought of Buffy when she made love to Faith. She thought about what Buffy would do.

No matter how hard Willow tried, she still thought of Faith as Buffy's...

Willow decided now that she wanted to do some of the things Buffy had done, so Faith wouldn't be missing anything.

The memories were there...Faith's memories, of Buffy...but they didn't leap out at Willow anymore, didn't intrude upon her like they always had in the old days. Willow had learned how to separate herself from them, get some distance, so she could hold on to who she really was. It had taken years, but she had managed it, and now Faith's memories were always somewhere off to the side...Willow had to concentrate in order to access them now. But they were always there...

She remembered how Buffy penetrated Faith that first time...when the Slayer in her came out, and took Faith, and fucked her, and whispered terrible things in Faith's ear...

Faith had nodded her head, and whimpered, and cried, as the Slayer in Buffy whispered those things to her, and pulled her hair, and rammed into her from behind, making her come...making her come...

You're mine, Willow remembered Buffy whispering. If anyone ever tries to take you away from me, I'll kill them.

"You're a bad kitty," Willow said, as they walked into the hotel room. "Aren't you, baby?"

Faith giggled, and nodded.

Willow sat down in the leather chair in the corner of the bedroom. She knew she had to be careful with this. She thought Faith wanted this, but she could be wrong...and she didn't want to make her uncomfortable.

"C'mere, kitty," Willow said, and stretched her legs out in front of her, and kicked off her sneakers. It had been a cool day and she was wearing jeans and a sweater.

Faith approached her, still giggling, and stood in front of her.

"I'm bad," Faith said.

Willow took her socks off.

"You are," Willow said. "Kneel down."

Faith knelt in front of her. She wasn't giggling anymore. She was blushing a little now.

Willow kissed her.

"You need to show me you can be a good kitty, okay baby?" Willow whispered. "And then you gotta be punished for being bad too."

Faith nodded.

"I can be good," Faith said.

"You wanna show me?" Willow said. "You wanna show me how you can be good?"

Faith nodded, in the dark. The sun was going down; it had been a brilliant, clear day, a little on the cool side, but still wonderful. But now the night was coming on, and Willow could see the stars coming out through the balcony doors, one by one...they had spent the day in the light, but now they were in the dark... laid bare.

"How are you gonna show me?" Willow said, as she sat barefoot in front of Faith, a queen on a throne.

Faith took Willow's foot in her hand, and kissed it.

"Good kitty," Willow whispered.

Willow knew Faith liked doing this, so she let her take her time, caressing Faith's hair as Faith kissed her feet. After about ten minutes, Willow kissed her again, and smiled.

"I knew you were my good kitty," Willow whispered, and sucked on Faith's tongue.

"Your kitty loves you," Faith whispered, breathlessly, when Willow was finished.

"I love her too. I'm gonna love my kitty forever. Even if she's bad."

Willow unbuttoned her jeans, and took them off. It took some doing. Faith had to help her wriggle out of them. They were tight. Faith always picked out tight jeans for Willow.

Willow kicked her jeans off, and then pulled off her sweater and unhooked her bra too. She sat in front of Faith in only a pair of black thong panties. Faith immediately made a beeline for her pussy. Willow took her by the hair, and stopped her.

"First you gotta be punished," Willow said, shaking her head. "Then you can lick my pussy after." Willow smiled. "Maybe. If you ask me really nicely. Get undressed, kitty."

Faith blushed again, and stood up. She kicked off her shoes, and unbuttoned her blouse, and unzipped her skirt, as Willow sat in the chair and watched her.

When Faith was wearing nothing but her panties, Willow got up and sat down on the side of the bed. "Bad kitties get spankings," Willow said. "Get over my knees."

Faith had been blushing the whole time she undressed and she was blushing like a fire engine now.

She laid herself down over Willow's knees.

Willow kissed her hair, and whispered to her.

"I love you," Willow whispered. "We're just playin' a little game now, okay sweetie? Anytime the game stops being fun, you let me know. Okay?"

Faith nodded. She looked uncomfortable. But Willow wasn't sure what to make of that; Willow knew Faith liked to play-act in situations like this. Faith was being the bad girl who needed to be punished now, so giggling or even smiling wouldn't have been appropriate. Still, Willow couldn't be sure...

Willow knew she had to be careful here. After what Faith's mother had done to her, something like this could be dangerous.

But Willow knew Faith had always liked it when Buffy did it...

"Pull your panties down," Willow said.

Faith pulled her panties down, to about the middle of her thighs.

Willow spanked Faith's ass, hard, but not too hard; there was a delicate balance she had to maintain. On the one hand if she was going to do this it had to be real; it had to be a real spanking, and hurt a little, and make Faith's ass red, or there was no point in bothering and Faith wouldn't enjoy the game. On the other hand it couldn't hurt too much.

Faith whimpered. But she stayed there, and didn't try to get up.

Willow spanked her again. The smack echoed through the room like a firecracker.

"I want you to tell me how you're gonna be a good kitty from now on, okay baby?" Willow said. "While I'm spanking you I want you to tell me you're sorry for bein' bad, and you're gonna be good from now on."

Faith nodded. Willow spanked her again.

"I'm sorry I was bad," Faith whispered. "I'll just...I'll just only be good now. I'll be a good girl."

Willow spanked her again. Faith squealed this time. Her ass was turning red.

"I'll...I'll kiss your feet every night and worship you. You're my goddess and I wanna, I wanna worship you all the time."

Willow spanked her again. Faith's squeal was nearly a scream this time, and she had a tear in her eye now. Faith was squirming around in Willow's lap a little, and her ass was nice and red now. Faith wasn't squirming around like she was trying to get up. She was arching her hips...like she wanted to be fucked.

"I wanna...I wanna kiss your pussy, Willow," Faith whispered.

Willow caressed Faith between her legs, and inserted a finger into her, as Faith gasped. Willow had never done that before...penetrated her.

Faith's pussy was drenched.

The spanking lasted awhile. The pussy juice on Willow's finger was proof that Faith liked it, so Willow kept it going. She carefully modulated the force as she brought her hand down on Faith's ass, making sure she gave her a little bit of pain, but not too much. By the time they were done Faith had tears running down her cheeks, and her ass looked like a tomato.

"Can I...can I kiss it now?" Faith whispered, when Willow was done.

Willow nodded, and Faith got down on her knees, and licked her pussy...

That took awhile too. Every time Willow came, Faith kept on going. Willow counted four orgasms by the time Faith finally stopped drinking her.

After Faith was done, they laid down on the bed together, and Willow took Faith in her arms.

"I love you," Willow said. "Do you love me?"

Faith nodded, and hugged her. "I love you so much, Willow," she whispered.

"Okay. I'm gonna ask you something now, and I want you to be honest with me, okay? We love each other, and people who love each other are honest."

Faith nodded again.

"The spanking and stuff?" Willow said. "I did that for you...because I thought you'd like it. Now, here's the thing I want you to remember. I liked it? I had fun? But I can live without it. I can be perfectly happy never doing that again, sweetie. I did it for you. So if it makes you uncomfortable, if you don't wanna do it anymore? Tell me, okay? I won't mind. I just want you to be honest with me. Did you like it? Do you wanna do it sometimes? Or do you want to not do it anymore?"

Faith blushed. "I wanna do it sometimes...if...I mean...y'know...if you're okay with it."

Willow smiled, and kissed her.

"Bad kitties are gonna get spankings from now on, huh baby?" Willow said.

Faith nodded, and rubbed her feet against Willow's, and giggled.

"But I'm a good kitty," Faith said, and moved herself down between Willow's legs, smiling up at her as she did. "I'm a pussycat."

"Come back up here, pussycat," Willow said. "I think that well's tapped out for awhile. Let me take care of my baby now."

"Ruinin' all my fun," Faith said, and giggled again, as she moved back up beside Willow.

"Up here," Willow said, and pointed to her lips. "I know a brand new way you can have fun."

"Like this?" Faith said, and moved up over Willow's chest, kneeling above her.

"Like this, baby," Willow said, and grabbed Faith's ass and brought her closer, until she was directly above her lips, and began kissing her pussy.

Faith liked it that way, in fact she loved it that way. Faith spent the rest of the night straddling Willow's lips, as Willow expertly licked and sucked and fingered her pussy. Faith always came so quickly that Willow could never spend as much time on Faith's pussy as she wanted to, but in this position she was able to kiss and lick her for nearly an hour; Faith loved it so much that even though she cried she didn't move from her spot above Willow's lips.

Faith came eight times, riding Willow's face, thrusting against her lips, fucking them. By the time Faith finally got off her, and rolled back down on to the bed, exhausted, utterly spent, Willow felt like her tongue had run a marathon and she was wearing Faith's Pussy flavored lipstick.

She wasn't complaining. She couldn't get enough...

When they went to sleep, Faith held Willow in her arms this time, curled up behind her, holding her tight.

"You're a bad kitty too," Faith whispered in her ear, as she rubbed her feet against Willow's under the covers, and giggled. "You were bad, wanting me up there ridin' you that way."

"Maybe I was," Willow said, and yawned, as she drifted off to sleep. "Talk's cheap. Whatcha gonna do about it, Boston?"

"You'll see, Sunnydale," Faith whispered.

The next day, the Earth shook.

It was the last day of April and it was a beautiful, sunny day without a cloud, the kind of day Boston only experienced very rarely; Willow thought spring in Boston seemed to last about two weeks before summer rolled in and the humidity ramped up and being outside suddenly felt like walking in a bowl of soup. But this day was gorgeous.

Willow and Faith were eating at a pizza place called Baldini's on Boylston Street across from Copley Square when it happened. Willow was bringing their pizza back to their table when she suddenly lurched forward and nearly dropped it. She had to grab on to the table for support. It was as if the entire building had tilted, somehow. Willow didn't understand it...

"Hey, you okay, girlfriend?" Faith said, leaping up out of her chair and taking Willow's hand. "You trip or somethin'?"

Willow was looking around. Everyone was eating and drinking and smiling. Outside, people were strolling along through the square as if nothing had happened...

"You didn't feel that?" Willow said.

"Feel what?"

It happened again. This time Willow was thrown backwards, and she would've fallen, if Faith didn't grab her arm.

"What the..? What the hell happened?" Faith said.

Everyone in the pizza place was looking at Willow now. None of them had experienced it, she realized. Whatever it was, it had only happened to her...

Or maybe it was just that she was the only one who could feel it...

Faith was worried. "Honey!" Faith said. "What's...what's goin' on?"

Willow looked around again, but this time she didn't just look with her eyes...

And then she sensed it.

"Wait here!" Willow shouted, and wrenched herself free of Faith. "Wait right here!"

Willow ran out of the pizza place. She'd never felt such a powerful magical disturbance before. Even Loki hadn't ever created this sort of effect on her...she couldn't even begin to imagine the kind of power she was dealing with...

Faith ran after her, and grabbed her arm.

"No!" Faith screamed. "No, no, you...you can't leave me, Willow. You can't leave me. Please? Please don't leave me?"

Willow turned to her. Faith was crying. Willow knew Faith had no idea what was going on, but Faith was a quick thinker, and Faith understood her: she knew from Willow's reaction that something serious had happened, something magical that she couldn't help Willow with, or even understand. So Faith was worried now...she was scared now.

Willow hugged her.

"Baby," Willow whispered. "What are you talkin' about, huh? Leave you? You know I'd never do that. I'd never leave my sweetie. Never."

"But...but...there's some big magic thing goin' down, right? And it's..."

Willow was thrown out of Faith's grasp. She stumbled backwards, as if the whole street had suddenly tilted, and fell to the sidewalk. Faith screamed, and ran to her, and laid herself on top of her. People were staring.

"No! NO!" Faith screamed, her tears flowing freely now. "I won't let them, I won't let them, I won't let them! I WON'T LET THEM TAKE YOU AWAY! I WON'T! I WON'T!"

"Sshhh," Willow whispered, and hugged her, as they laid together on the sidewalk, and Faith sobbed into her shoulder. "You're not gonna lose me baby, you're never gonna lose me, okay? But I need to go check this out. I need to figure out what this thing is before it gets worse."

Willow was afraid, but she knew she couldn't let Faith know that. Even Loki didn't have this kind of power. No one did...

The closest thing Willow had ever felt to this...the only other being Willow had ever encountered who made her feel this way...was herself. Six years before, when the darkness in her overflowed...she'd felt this kind of power... flowing through her.

And then that power reached out, like a terrible black claw, and killed four-million people...

"I'm comin' with you," Faith said, as Willow sat up, and got to her feet. "Deal breaker." Faith held on to Willow as she stood up, hugging her as hard as she could. Willow hugged her back. She felt Faith shaking.

"Faith, this is a magic type thing? And, yeah, it's only affecting me? But it doesn't feel like an attack. It feels like...like this is something that's happening all around us, but I'm the only one who can pick up on it. I don't think it's singling me out...it doesn't feel like there's an intelligence guiding this. It feels more like... a byproduct of something maybe. But the thing is? If I'm wrong, if this really is an attack? Having to protect you at the same time makes it harder for me to fight. That's why I need you to stay here while I look into this, okay?"

Faith was shaking her head as Willow talked.

"Faith, sweetie, I need you to--" Willow started to say, when she saw him.

She saw an old man, sitting on a bench in the park across the street, in front of the flower garden.

She was thrown again; luckily this time a parked car behind her broke her fall. Faith whimpered when she saw Willow go flying again, and ran to her, and hugged her. But Willow didn't take her eyes off the old man.

The disturbance was coming from him. Willow could see it now, distorting the air around him in giant, thundering waves...

The man looked frail. He had an old, gnarled walking stick in one hand. He was feeding the pigeons...

He had one eye. The other one was a socket overgrown with skin.

And then Willow realized who he must be.

He didn't belong here. He was far too powerful: his very presence was damaging the world. An hour, two at most, and he would rip the fabric of reality itself apart; Copley Square would collapse into a black hole, and the rest of Boston, and then the North American continent, and then the entire world would follow...

Willow knew the old man would sit there until she talked to him. He wouldn't leave. He'd let Copley Square collapse into a black hole if he had to. He'd let the world end.

Because he was Odin, the All-Father of the Gods, and when he summoned you, you damn well came.

"Fuck," Willow said.

"What...what is it?" Faith whispered.

"Good news and bad news, sweetie," Willow said. "Good news is we're not in danger, and no one's trying to hurt me. Plus, I can go see to this thing while you watch, I'm just gonna be right across the street in the park there."

Faith followed Willow's gaze, and saw the old man, and didn't understand.

"That little old guy?" Faith said. "This whole thing's about him?"

"Yeah."

"Seriously?"

"Looks can be deceiving, sweetie. I need to talk to him. He won't leave until I do, and if he doesn't leave soon the world will collapse."

"The world will...wait, what?"

"His name is Odin. Remember I told you about Thor and Loki? He's their father."

"That little dude? He's the dad to like, a big huge guy who throws lightning bolts and punches holes in mountains, and a super-magician who's even better at magic than you?"

"Yeah. Thor's powerful, okay? And Loki is the greatest magic-user in existence. But Odin? He's not powerful, he IS power. He doesn't use magic. He IS magic. He's too heavy to be here, the world can't bear his weight. It'll collapse soon if he doesn't leave. I'm the only one who can feel the effects now, but pretty soon everyone will be able to feel them. I gotta see what he wants."

Willow separated herself from her, but Faith still held her hand.

"But...you said good news bad news, right? What's...what's the bad news?"

"No idea. The thing is, when Odin wants to talk to you? It means something major's going on. Odin doesn't like, hang out. He doesn't make conversation. He almost never leaves his halls, he's never been on Earth before. If he's here it's major."

Willow hadn't taken her eyes off Odin the whole time. She couldn't...he was like a magnet.

She made herself look at Faith.

"Baby," Willow said, and caressed Faith's cheek. "I love you with all my heart. I'll never leave you, okay? I'm just gonna be right across the street, you can watch me from here the whole time. This won't take long, and I promise, he won't try to hurt me. Yeah, he's powerful? And, okay, um, kinda scary? But he's one of the good guys."

"I love you too," Faith whispered, standing there with tears in her eyes, and sniffling. "I love you too."

Willow smiled, and kissed her. "Tonight we'll just cuddle all night, okay baby? Instead of goin' to the movies like we were gonna? We'll rent some movies instead, and we'll bring home double chocolate fudge brownie ice cream, and hang out in our nightgowns on the couch, and just cuddle, okay baby?"

Faith nodded, and smiled, as Willow wiped her tears away, and smoothed her hair out of her eyes. "That's better," Willow said, and kissed her again. "There's my pretty baby."

Then Willow turned away from her, and walked across the street.

"Don't really know the protocol here," Willow said, as she stood beside Odin's bench, and looked down at him. He was throwing crumbs of bread to the pigeons. "Do I bow? Kneel? Genuflect? Curtsy? Maybe like, pledge allegiance?"

He looked like a skinny little old man, balding, wearing a wrinkled old black suit and scuffed black shoes. He looked small; he was shorter than she was and he couldn't have weighed more than a hundred and twenty pounds.

It was an illusion. Willow knew Odin could be as tall as a skyscraper if he wanted to be and his strength was second only to Thor. The battle-armor he always wore was forged of silver and steel, fashioned specifically for him by the Dwarves, and it was studded with enough rare and precious gems to buy the entire city of Boston and everything in it. But Odin liked disguises. Willow thought that was where Loki got it from...like father, like son.

"Sit," Odin said. "I would talk with you awhile."

His voice wasn't part of the illusion; it wasn't the voice of a harmless little old man. It was Odin's voice, a voice like trumpets, and it carried every iota of its usual authority. Willow sat.

It was like being in the eye of a storm; she felt the waves distorting the world all around her, but she was inside them now; they couldn't affect her while she was sitting there. But they were getting worse...

"Not too long awhile I hope," Willow said. "The longer you stay the more damage you do here."

"Midgard will bear my presence awhile yet. My sons tell me you intend to stay here, in this time, where you do not belong."

"Intend isn't the word. Intend means like, as long as circumstances permit. I'm staying."

Odin nodded, and threw bread to the pigeons, and looked at the flowers.

"That maiden across the avenue," he said. "You love her."

"Yeah."

Odin looked at Willow for the first time. His one eye was like a drill, boring straight through her.

"You know me," Odin said. "You know all the tales. You even chronicled some of them, I believe."

"Wrote a book. I never liked how Jesus and Allah and those guys get all the press. I wanted more people to know about you guys."

"You know how I lost my eye."

"You gave it away in exchange for wisdom...so you could drink from Mímisbrunnr, the Well of Knowledge. Then you hung on Yggdrasil, the World Tree, for nine days, to learn the things the Well of Knowledge couldn't tell you."

"So goes the tale. But it is only half right."

"But wait...Thor told me all that. Are you saying he's wrong?"

"I am saying he's half right. I did not tell him the whole tale, and I did not gainsay him when he told you the tale of Odin hanging from the World Tree...the tale he believes to be the truth, but it is not. But now I shall tell you the tale, and I shall tell it right."

"You came here to tell me about how you hung on the World Tree for nine days? Why?"

"Odin's reasons are his own, Willow. Allow an old man his fancies."

Willow knew Odin was clever...ruthlessly so. He played chess while everyone else played marbles. He never did things for no reason. But sometimes you never learned the reason.

"I did indeed exchange my eye for wisdom; for I knew I would need it, to lead my people," Odin said. "I was a great warrior in my day, and I was wise, to a degree. But I knew it would not be enough. I knew the threats that hemmed Asgard all around would require cunning greater than mine to deal with. So I gave my eye for my people, and I have not regretted the bargain. Though there are days I wish I could go back to the simple, comfortable ignorance of my youth, I understand, as I understood then, that someone must know all the terrible truths that control our lives, that determine the arena in which we fight our battles. But, Yggdrasil...I did not hang myself from that tree to acquire more wisdom. Nay, I received all the wisdom I care to have from the Well of Knowledge. I hung myself from the tree, for nine days and nights, pierced through the side by my own spear, as an atonement...a penance."

"A penance? For what?"

"Not for any sin of mine, though of those there are aplenty," Odin said, and smiled. "There is a tale, in one of your people's books...'Bible', I believe the book is called. This particular tale tells of a man, who was nailed to a tree, for three days, and a spear pierced his side."

Willow felt something, in her stomach. It was the strangest feeling...she couldn't describe it. She thought she had felt it once before, but she couldn't remember where...

"You're talking about...Christ," Willow said. "You're talking about Jesus Christ...how he was crucified."

"You have studied the histories of many peoples...you know many tales. Have you not wondered about the similarities between my tale and his? Two men, hanged upon a piece of wood, pierced by a spear, tortured, and yet they are reborn when the torment is finally ended, reborn to greater wisdom, greater power?"

"Yeah, but...I guess...I always thought it was just a coincidence."

"I do not believe in coincidence. Everything happens for a reason."

"So what's the reason for this? You said you were doing some kind of penance...but not for your sin? Then for whose?"

"Humanity's," Odin said. "They hurt someone I care for, very much. And I wished to show Her, in my own small way, that I regretted it...that I honored Her, and shall always honor Her, and that though She may see humanity as a band of savages, graceless, unworthy of Her love, they are not; there is hope for them. For I carry them in me: I am humanity's creation, as are all the Gods...all but the One. And if humanity's offspring--for such I am--wouldst do penance, and seek absolution for the crime they committed against Her, indeed, if I wouldst do three-times a penance, for he hanged for three days, and yet I hanged for thrice three days, then I hoped She would look upon my sacrifice with favor, and so find it in Her heart to forgive Her children...all these poor, lost mortals, who seek only to find a way through the darkness that besets them...who only seek, unknowing, Her light to lead them. But it has been taken away...ever since the crime humanity committed against Her, She took Her light away from them, and left them in darkness. I hoped that in some small way, my sacrifice would convince Her to give Her light back to them."

"Who...who are you talking about?" Willow said. "Who's She? And what crime did humanity commit? What does it have to do with Jesus on the cross?"

Odin stood up.

"I must go," he said. "You would do well to come with me. You do not belong here."

"I'm staying. But hey, thanks for coming by and like, totally confusing me? You're like Deep Throat on The X-Files. You drop by, say some totally weird cryptic stuff that makes no sense and then you just take off."

Odin smiled.

"You still speak strangely," he said. "But thou shalt not walk in ignorance forever. Nor shall humanity always walk in darkness, I pray."

"Um, good to know? Um...I guess."

"Knowledge is a burden, Willow. But there are some whose fate it is to bear it...they must bear it, lest the world be crushed beneath its weight. You walk in blissful ignorance for now...but not forever."

Odin looked at Faith. She was watching him. When he looked at her she flinched, and immediately looked away.

"You're making a mistake, staying here," Odin said. "The longer you stay, the more damage you do. But you're doing it for love. I understand that."

Willow stood up with him. "You do? But you're all like, always logical and tactical and, um, kinda ruthless. I didn't think you did stuff for love. Okay, this is all coming out wrong? I don't mean this like it sounds. I'm not saying you're like, a jerk or anything. But...I mean you're in charge. You're like, the general. You have to sacrifice people sometimes...you always have to see the big picture, make the hard choices...you're not...you're not sentimental."

"I'm a father. My son, Loki, has tried, on many occasions, to destroy everything I've built. He has betrayed me before and he'll do it again. He has hurt innocent people. He will kill us all someday; Asgard, and Midgard, will fall, because of him. And yet, I could stop him with a thought. I could strike him down, now, just by thinking about it. But I do not."

"Because Ragnarok has to go the way it's supposed to?"

"Because he's my son," Odin said. "And I love him."

Odin looked at Faith again.

"Tell her I said hello," he said. "Tell her I'm sorry I frightened her."

"Okay," Willow said. "Thanks."

"Goodbye, Willow," Odin said, as a shimmering light enveloped him. "Until we meet again."

"Will we?"

"Aye," Odin said, and smiled, and disappeared.

Willow spent that night holding Faith in her arms. She laid naked with her under the blankets on the couch, rubbing her belly, and kissing her. They ate ice cream and watched a movie too, but they didn't pay attention to it, and they weren't hungry. Faith was still a little nervous from that afternoon and Willow wanted to reassure her. So she held her, and kissed her, as the movie played on, and the ice cream melted, and they didn't pay attention.

"I just...I don't know...I got all freaked out I guess," Faith said.

"I'll never leave you, baby," Willow said. "Look, my life's pretty out there? Fightin' bad guys and stuff? I'm not gonna lie to you. I could die someday. But anyone could die someday. That's just life. But I won't leave you, baby. Okay?"

Faith nodded, and curled up against Willow, and snuggled up on her breasts, as Willow rubbed her belly.

"I love you, Faith," Willow whispered.

"Love you too," Faith whispered back.

"You sleepy? You wanna go to sleep?"

Faith nodded, and closed her eyes.

"I'll never leave you, sweetie," Willow said, and kissed her forehead.

"You better not or I'll give you a spanking."

Willow smiled.

And then, for some reason, Odin's words came to her again...

She took Her light away from them, and left them in darkness.

"That old guy was pretty freaky," Faith said. "Didn't look like much, but when he looked at me I was all, whoa."

"He told me to tell you he said hi. Told me to tell you he was sorry he freaked you out too. But that's just Odin...he freaks everybody out."

"Yeah? He really said he was sorry for scarin' me? He really said hi?"

"Yup."

"How come? Why's he care about me? I mean, bein' like a god and all? And you gotta set me straight on all these gods. It's all like, kinda confusing."

"He cares because he knows you're important to me...because he knows I love you."

They were quiet for awhile after that. Willow rubbed Faith's belly, and Faith purred, and eventually drifted off to sleep.

But before she did, she looked up at Willow again...looked into her eyes.

"Before you found me? I was in the dark, y'know?" Faith said, and took Willow's hand, and kissed it. "I was always lost in the dark. But now...now it's like I'm in the light. I can see the way ahead now...I'm not lost anymore."

"I'm a lazy kitty," Faith said, the next morning, and grabbed Willow before she could get up from the couch.

Willow's back didn't hurt. They'd figured out how to sleep on the couch. The key to the couch was lots of blankets and lots of cuddling.

"Oh you are, huh?" Willow said, and kissed her.

"Mmm-hmm," Faith said, and giggled. "Lazy kitties don't wanna do anything. They just wanna lie down and snuggle with their Momma cats."

"Okay," Willow said.

The snuggling turned to sex, and lots of it, after awhile, but they spent the day in bed. They ordered room service, and they showered, but that was it.

The sex was a little different...Willow noticed Faith was more assertive. She pinned Willow's wrists a lot, and giggled down at her when she did it, holding her nose against Willow's, and sometimes putting her teeth on Willow...on her nose, on her neck. She never bit down, but she held her teeth against her. Willow knew what she was doing. She saw the Slayer peeking out at her when Faith put her teeth on her...

Faith might not know it yet, but Willow knew Faith was marking her territory. She knew part of Faith--maybe a part Faith wasn't aware of, but nevertheless it was there--wanted to bite her...mark her.

Faith told Willow she was going to spank her someday, because she knew she was secretly bad. When Willow wanted to lick her pussy, Faith straddled her face.

Willow didn't mind...

May was a beautiful month, and it went by too fast: the days were gorgeous and warm, and Willow showed Faith the town: eating in the North End, shopping in the Back Bay, dancing in Cambridge; Willow took Faith everywhere. They took day trips sometimes too, renting cars and driving up north to Gloucester to eat lobster and see the ocean, or south to Hanover to go hiking in the woods; Faith had never really seen places like those, places without slums and dirty alleys, places with trees and mountains, with the woods literally across the street from wherever you were. Faith loved it...she loved walking under the trees, she loved seeing the mountains.

As they sat on a blanket in a clearing at the foot of a mountain range eating their picnic lunch after a long hike one sunny afternoon in Hanover, a small town in the woods about thirty miles south of Boston, Willow decided they should take a vacation together. Day trips were fun, but they had enough money to go wherever they wanted to go, for as long as they wanted to go there, with Warren's credit card. Why not indulge themselves?

"You wanna go on a trip with me, sweetie?" Willow said, as she laid down on the blanket with Faith, and rubbed her belly when they were through eating, and they watched the sun sink behind the mountains. Faith always liked it when Willow rubbed her belly after a big meal.

"Yeah," Faith said. "A trip where?"

"Well, since you're a Boston girl, I figured we could try Cape Cod first. Everyone from Boston goes there eventually, and it's really nice."

"What's it like?"

Willow knew Faith had never been there...she had never been anywhere. No one had ever taken her anywhere.

"It's kinda like this. Woodsy, lots of little cottages, rivers and lakes and stuff to swim in. Cute little restaurants. Y'know, rustic."

"What's rustic?"

"Like, quaint? Old-fashioned in a cute way. We could buy bathing suits and just swim every day, and look in all the little antique shops, and eat lobster, and hang around in the woods at night, and go for walks on the beach when the moon's out."

"How long would we go for?"

"As long as we wanted to, sweetie. At least a couple weeks anyway. We'd rent a cottage, lay out on the beach, and I'd rub suntan oil all over your hot little body. Sound like fun?"

Faith jumped on top of her, and pinned her wrists down, and giggled.

"You're a bad kitty," Faith said, as she held Willow down, and pushed her nose against hers. "You wanna do bad stuff. I bet you wanna kiss me in all kinds of bad places."

"I do, baby," Willow said.

Faith pulled her shorts off, and put her teeth on Willow's neck.

"You're my bad kitty," Faith said.

"Mmm-hmm," Willow said.

Faith took her panties off, and straddled Willow's face. She lowered her pussy to Willow's mouth, and pinned her arms again.

"Show me," Faith whispered.

Faith gave Willow a spanking one night a week later, when they came back from dancing.

It was a hot, sultry night toward the end of May; it was still spring but it felt like summer. They hadn't danced at the Roxy. They had been out dancing a bunch of times since they had gone to the Roxy but Willow hadn't taken Faith back there. Willow told herself it was because she wanted to show Faith the town, and Boston and Cambridge had a lot of great dance clubs. But she knew it was because she was worried about Faith seeing Evan...she knew Faith was attracted to him.

They had danced at the Middle East, a club in Central Square, a part of Cambridge that bore the stamp of the generations of college kids from Harvard and M.I.T. who had passed through; the neighborhood featured an eclectic mix of restaurants, especially Indian and Thai, which Willow and Faith loved, and a thriving club scene. The Middle East had live bands most nights, and they'd had a funk band that night, and Willow and Faith had danced for hours and Faith had loved it there. The club was miles better than the Roxy; the ladies room was actually pleasant. But the DJ who came on between the band's sets wasn't anywhere near as good as Evan. Faith noticed that. And sometimes when Faith looked at her that night, Willow thought Faith also sensed the real reason they hadn't gone back to the Roxy...

Willow had worn a sexy skirt that showed off her legs, and she'd gotten a lot of interest at the club...especially from women. Willow had long ago resigned herself to the fact that lesbians could sense her a mile off. Faith was flattered that her girlfriend was drawing all that attention, but she was jealous too; and not just playfully jealous, Willow noticed, but really jealous. Faith stared daggers at the women who asked Willow to dance, or tried to buy her drinks, or give her their phone numbers; the prettier the girl, the sharper the daggers. After a few hours of this she finally brought Willow to the ladies room, and took her into a stall, and pulled her panties down and stroked her clit until she came, whispering in her ear the whole time: whispering that Willow had been a bad kitty for being so sexy, and attracting all those girls, and that she was going to get a spanking later. Faith put her teeth on Willow's neck while she stroked her clit, and she bit down a little.

After Willow came, and Faith made her say she was sorry for being bad, they spent another hour or so at the club, just relaxing and having a few drinks, but unfortunately one of the women who had been hitting on Willow--the one who was the prettiest, and had been the most persistent about it, even obnoxious--kept popping up. She had stared at Willow the whole night, sent a drink to her table even though Faith was sitting right there, and kept making excuses to talk to her for a minute or so here and there whenever Faith was out of earshot. She had actually sat down in Faith's chair earlier in the night while Faith was in the ladies room. "You're a good girl, right?" the woman said. She was a pretty Latina who looked to be in her early twenties, with beautiful, thick black hair that hung down to her waist, big breasts, gorgeous cocoa skin, and almond eyes. "Kinda vanilla? You should let me show you some things. You should let me show you the wild side. White's pretty? But you'd look beautiful in black, honey."

Willow giggled at her, and patted her hand. "Sweetie," Willow said, and looked the woman in the eyes, and smiled. "If you ever saw me in black? I'm pretty sure you'd pee your pants. I got a girl. And yeah, points for goin' after what you want? But you've misjudged me. I'm not what you think, I'm not even close to what you think. You think you could handle me. You're wrong. Now, pretty please, stop hittin' on me? You're real pretty, and it was flattering at first? Now it's borderline stalking, and it's not flattering anymore."

But the woman--her name was Magdalena, Willow found out, because she had told her even though Willow hadn't asked--just kept on coming back and pushing harder, watching for her chances whenever Faith was away from Willow for more than a few seconds. Finally, Magdalena propositioned her. "You're something special," she said, intercepting Willow as she came back from the bar, cutting across the dance floor. "I'd lick every inch of that fine body all over, from your head to your toes. I'd do things to you that brainless little high school girl you're slumming with can't even spell."

It was a mistake.

Willow stopped walking, whirled her head around, and looked at Magdalena...her face contorting...becoming ugly...her eyes beginning to darken...the green fading away...

"What did you say?" Willow growled.

Willow took Magdalena's wrist in her hand and crushed it, with strength far greater than she should have had. The bones in Magdalena's wrist popped and Magdalena shrieked in pain. But the music was so loud no one could hear her.

"You wanna see me in black?" Willow said. "Is that what you want, you little fucking cretin? Maybe you'll get your wish."

Magdalena's mouth opened, and she began to scream again, but no sounds came out. Magdalena's eyes were squeezed shut, and tears flowed down her cheeks.

"Thought you liked the wild side, Magdalena?" Willow said, and smiled now...an ugly smile, that made Magdalena shudder when she finally opened her eyes and saw it.

Willow's eyes were two pools of colorless gray now, steadily darkening, as she looked back at Magdalena.

"You vanilla all of a sudden?" Willow said. "Can't take a little pain? You think this is pain? This is nothing, whore. I've burned people alive."

Willow squeezed Magdalena's wrist harder, and forced her down on to her knees. The dancing and the music went right on all around them. No one even noticed them yet...

"You insult the girl I love, and you think I won't hurt you? You think I'll let you get away with it? Is that what you think in that tiny little brain of yours, whore? Is it? IS IT?!"

"I'm...I'm...I'm sorry," Magdalena whimpered...

And Willow saw the terror in the woman's eyes...

And she saw herself there, too. Like a distorted reflection...Willow saw a monster with black eyes...

Willow relented. She pushed the black back down.

She let Magdalena go.

"Leave," Willow said.

Magdalena leaped up and ran straight out of the club as fast as her feet would carry her.

Willow stood there, in the middle of the dance floor...alone in a crowd.

She wondered if she really was a monster.

She saw herself, watching Warren suffer...she saw herself, killing four-million people...

When she saw herself, she saw a monster with black eyes...

"Hey, beautiful," Faith said...and Faith's arms were suddenly around her, and Faith was kissing her neck, and they were suddenly swaying together...and Willow wasn't alone anymore.

Willow smiled, and the green returned...and the black was forgotten.

"Hi baby," Willow said, and turned around, and kissed her.

"What did you say to that girl?" Faith said, as they showered together that night in their hotel room, and Faith knelt in front of Willow, and washed her feet, and kissed them. "The one who kept hittin' on you? I saw her runnin' outta there when I was lookin' for you...kinda looked like she was runnin' away from you."

"Why would anyone run away from me?" Willow said, and smiled.

When they came back to the bedroom, Faith sat on the edge of the bed, and patted her knees.

"C'mere, bad girl," Faith said. "Time for your spanking."

Willow smiled again, and laid herself over Faith's knees. Faith had been threatening to do this for weeks now...and Willow realized she had been looking forward to it.

"I love you," Faith whispered, as she caressed Willow's ass in the dark.

"I love you too," Willow whispered back.

"I love worshipping you, honey. I love bein' on my knees for you... kissing your feet. I could do it forever. You're my goddess."

Faith spanked Willow's ass, hard. Willow gasped; even preparing herself for it, the pain, the quick, sharp sting, was shocking.

"But tonight you're gonna cry for me, honey," Faith said.

Willow nodded, as Faith began spanking her...

It only took a minute of that for Willow's first tears to come; they just squeezed out of her. Faith was hitting her hard, thumping her ass with good, solid whacks. Not so hard that Willow couldn't take it, but hard enough to make her cry...for her to know she was being punished.

"You've been bad," Faith said. "Not just those gay gals who wanted you tonight...not just jokey stuff. You've been bad in another way too...a real way. We're gonna discuss it tonight. We're gonna have a good long talk about it, honey."

"Wh-what do you mean?" Willow whimpered, as Faith's hand kept hammering down on her ass. Willow's ass was stinging now; she felt like she had a sunburn there.

"You know. You tell me."

Willow was quiet. She wasn't sure what Faith meant...

Faith spanked her.

It lasted five minutes, and by then Willow's ass was red and very tender. Faith rubbed some lotion on it, the aloe vera stuff Willow had bought the month before when she shaved her. It worked wonders; the stinging went away immediately.

They laid on the bed together, and Faith was curled up behind Willow, massaging the lotion into her ass, and hugging her, and kissing her neck. Willow's face was still red from crying.

"Better, honey?" Faith said.

"Yeah," Willow said. "Feels better."

Faith kissed Willow's neck, and moved her mouth close to her ear.

"I'm gonna fuck you tonight," Faith whispered in her ear, as she finished massaging the lotion into Willow's ass, and she ran her fingers down toward Willow's pussy. "I'm gonna stretch this tight little pussy out, honey. Plus we're gonna talk about how you're bad."

Faith was still curled up behind Willow, hugging her, and gently stroking her pussy now; Willow was still looking away from her.

"I don't...I don't know what I did," Willow whispered. "Tell me what I did, baby? Let me make it up to you?"

Faith slipped a finger inside Willow's pussy from behind. Willow was tight; Faith couldn't get her finger all the way in. Willow whimpered again, as Faith began thrusting her finger into her, deeper and deeper with each thrust...stretching her out.

"Let me in, honey," Faith whispered in her ear. "Open your legs for me. You know you're mine. This pretty lil' pussy? It's mine."

Slowly, Willow opened her legs. Willow hadn't had a man inside her in six years; her pussy was so tight now that even Faith's finger was too thick for it. But Faith was relentless; she kept thrusting, kept fucking Willow with it... stretching her out...

"You belong to me," Faith whispered in Willow's ear, as she fucked Willow with her finger. "Say it."

"I...I belong to you, baby," Willow whispered, breathlessly, as Faith's finger made it all the way inside. Willow arched her hips, and moved herself back and forth on Faith's finger now, thrusting against it, fucking it.

Faith held Willow by the hair. Willow gasped. "That's fuckin' right, beautiful," Faith whispered in her ear.

Faith slipped a second finger inside her. Willow whimpered again as it slid in; she was still too tight for it, and Faith had to work it in, slowly. But Faith was always careful not to hurt her. She stretched Willow's pussy out with her fingers, but she did it slowly...gently.

And Faith had long fingers; she went deep into Willow's pussy with them, as she stretched her out...

"I belong to you too," Faith whispered. "I love you."

"I love you too, baby," Willow whispered back, with tears in her eyes. Faith wasn't hurting her but her fingers were a steady, relentless pressure inside her. "I love you, I love you so much, baby, I've always loved you so much..."

Faith's second finger finally made it all the way in, and now she started fucking Willow harder; she was ramming both fingers into her now. Willow squealed, and thrust back at her, as Faith fucked her with her fingers. It felt good now...Willow's pussy had adjusted. Willow had forgotten how good it could feel, being penetrated...

"You're gonna come for me when I fuck you, huh beautiful?" Faith whispered.

"Uh...uh...uh..." Willow moaned, as Faith fucked her, and Willow moved with Faith's motion, fucking her fingers. "Yeah...uh...uh...yeah...baby..."

"You understand that I love you, honey? That I'm doin' all this 'cuz I love you and you're my girl?"

"Uh...uh...yeah..."

"You sure? You sure you understand that I love you? You sure you understand you're my girl, and I don't wanna be with no one else?"

"I do...uh...uh...uh...I....do, baby..."

"Then why are you trying to keep me from seeing Evan?"

Faith stopped fucking her. She kept her fingers inside Willow, but she stopped thrusting with them. She kissed Willow's neck, and hugged her with her other hand.

Willow didn't answer her. Faith gently took her fingers out of her, and turned her around.

Willow had tears in her eyes. Faith kissed them.

"I don't...I just...don't wanna lose you," Willow whispered.

"You're my girl, honey," Faith said. "How come you think you might lose me?"

"You and Ev...you were..."

"We a couple, me and him? In the old history, the way it went before. You mentioned I knew him but whenever I bring him up you get kinda weird about it... like you're keepin' secrets."

Willow had never told Faith what happened to Evan. She had told her almost everything else...but not that.

"You guys...you never really got a chance," Willow said. "You were about to be a couple, but then you had to leave for Sunnydale...Kakistos was after you. But...it's just...you and Ev...you guys were like...it was like instant attraction, y'know? Not just because he's hot. He could've been the one for you. If you hadn't left and met Buffy? He would've been the one, you would've been with him. And I just...I just worried that..."

"I don't need to see him, beautiful," Faith said, and kissed Willow's hand. "I knew you were keeping me away from him? But I don't need to see him. You're all I need. But I just don't want you worryin', okay? I'll never leave. I'll never cheat. I'll never love anyone else. I'll only ever love you."

"But...but you loved him before. You loved Buffy before. And I'm just... I'm always afraid that...when you see them again...when you see Ev, when you see Buffy...you might...you might...love them more than me."

"That was the old world, Willow. That world's gone."

"I'll never have Tara, even if I wanted to? She'll be with the other Willow now. But...it's just that I'm so much older than you and...I worry...when you're my age, I'll be forty. I just...worry that..."

"You're gonna be beautiful when you're forty, Willow. You're gonna be beautiful when you're ninety. And I'm gonna still be with you, worshipping you, kissing your feet every day, because you're my goddess. But there's just so far we can go with words, honey. Words take us around in circles. We're not gonna talk about this anymore, okay? Instead of tellin' you I'll never leave? I'm just gonna never leave. Instead of just tellin' you you're my girl? I'm gonna show you. Okay? Okay, beautiful?"

Willow nodded, and smiled, with tears in her eyes. Faith kissed them away.

Then Faith got on top of her, and started fucking her. Willow moaned, and opened her legs, as Faith thrusted against her...

Faith kissed her, and looked down into her eyes.

"I love you, Willow," Faith whispered. "I'd die for you."

"I love you...love you too...baby..." Willow moaned, and closed her eyes, and put her hands on Faith's shoulders, as she felt Faith's pussy rubbing against her own. She moved in time with Faith, arching her hips, and rubbing her soaked pussy against Faith's, as Faith fucked her...

"My girl really likes this huh?" Faith said, and smiled. "My girl loves when I fuck her like this."

Willow opened her eyes, and smiled too. And she blushed a little.

"Yeah," Willow said, and wrapped her legs around her.

"Are you gonna come for me, honey?" Faith whispered, and kissed her, and fucked her faster. "You gonna be a good kitty and come when I fuck you like this?"

"Yeah...yeah, I'm...I'm gonna...right now..."

Willow came, whimpering through gritted teeth with her eyes squeezed shut, and kicking her legs out as far as they could go, holding them quivering there in the air, and pointing her toes like a ballerina. She held on to Faith, as tight as she could, her hands digging into her shoulders.

Faith hugged her, and kissed her hair, as Willow gulped in air, her chest heaving, and trembled as the aftershocks of her orgasm rippled through her.

"That was a record, honey," Faith said, and smiled down at her. "That was like, less than a minute it took you to arrive."

Willow blushed again. Faith was caressing her hair now, and looking into her eyes; Faith's brown eyes reflected golden in the moonlight coming in through the balcony doors, as she stared down at Willow. Willow thought they were hypnotic...looking into them just then made Willow feel like she was floating.

They looked into each other's eyes for awhile, in the moonlight. Neither of them moved. Faith laid on top of Willow, and Willow stayed beneath her, her nipples hard, her legs spread again, her hips arched, her pussy dripping, her feet still trembling a little from her orgasm.

Faith took Willow's legs in her hands, and lifted them over her shoulders, and got up on her knees as she did, curling Willow up into a ball, and pressing herself against her. Willow moaned, and started breathing faster.

Faith straightened up, and looked down at Willow, while Willow's legs were balanced on her shoulders. Willow's legs were still shaking a little from her orgasm; her feet were still trembling. Faith caressed Willow's feet, and kissed them, until they weren't shaking anymore.

"From now on we're gonna do this every night, okay beautiful?" Faith said. "I'm gonna take good care of my girl like this every night, because I know she likes this."

Willow nodded.

"You sure I gayed you up, hon?" Faith said, and put her teeth on Willow's big toe, and made her giggle. "I think my girl maybe wants a good hunk o' meat. I think she wants to snap into a Slim Jim."

"Well...I used to be straight, y'know. I guess...maybe it's like ridin' a bike. You never forget."

"Time to get in gear honey," Faith whispered, and fucked her again...

"Today's a lazy kitty day," Faith said when they woke up the next morning. She giggled, and grabbed Willow and brought her close to her. She wrapped her legs around Willow under the blankets in a scissor-lock, and curled up behind her, giggling into her ear, and kissing the back of her neck.

"Oh it is, huh?" Willow said, and took Faith's hand, and held it over her breasts. They had slept naked together...they always slept naked together now.

"I'm a lazy kitty," Faith whispered, still giggling into Willow's ear.

They'd had lazy kitty days before. On lazy kitty days, Faith decided when they woke up that they would stay in all day and be lazy and not get dressed. They spent lazy kitty days in bed, fucking all day long and ordering from room service.

"How come my kitty's so lazy?" Willow said, and tried to turn around, but she couldn't move: Faith was holding her completely still, her arms and legs wrapped tight around her. Willow laughed, as Faith giggled into her ear, and started gently tickling her stomach now.

"I'm a kitty who likes bein' with her Momma cat," Faith said, and made purring sounds in Willow's ear.

"My kitty's lazy. She always wants to be lazy when all the other kitties are, y'know, doin' tricks. Chasin' balls of yarn and catchin' mice and stuff."

"I can do tricks," Faith murmured in her ear.

"Talk's cheap, Boston," Willow whispered.

When they made love now, it was different: Faith was different. She was taking over, dictating how it went, more and more each day. She mounted Willow the way a man would, and fucked her, rubbing her pussy against Willow's while Willow writhed around beneath her, her legs over Faith's shoulders, whimpering and squealing and trembling with pleasure as Faith looked straight down into her eyes. Willow loved it. She always came like a rocket when Faith fucked her that way; she couldn't get enough of it. They did it every night now. And when Willow ate Faith's pussy, sometimes Faith straddled her face, rubbing her pussy against Willow's lips while she held her arms like reins, riding her. Willow loved that, too. She loved looking up into Faith's eyes, as she ate Faith's pussy... she loved Faith controlling her. The more Faith took, the more Willow gave her...

They were lying on the bed together one night in June, exhausted after they had finished a marathon fucking session, their longest ever: Faith had fucked Willow, mounting her and holding her legs over her shoulders and grinding their pussies together, for almost an hour. Willow had come five times. She had never done this with anyone else before. She thought that was one of the reasons she loved it so much: it was something she had only ever done with Faith...

She looked forward to it every day now, lived for that moment every night when Faith's eyes stared down at her, golden in the moonlight, and Faith grunted and snarled as she fucked her, and made Willow say she was hers...

And then, afterwards, Faith always curled up against her breasts, gentle as a kitten.

"My baby's all a soft little kitty again now, huh?" Willow said, as Faith kissed her breasts, and rubbed her feet up and down her ankles.

Faith nodded, and giggled. "This kitty likes bein' with her Momma cat."

"And you do great tricks."

Faith giggled again. Willow rubbed her belly.

"My baby's tummy's rumbling," Willow whispered. "I can feel it. You hungry, sweetie? Wanna order from room service?"

"Yeah. Could use like, burgers or somethin'. Somethin' beefy."

"And I bet my baby wants ice cream too, huh? My baby loves ice cream."

"Double chocolate fudge brownie?"

"Momma cat will handle it. You order us some steaks. Filet mignon. Champagne too. I'll hit the store."

Willow got up.

"Wait," Faith said. "You don't gotta...y'know, I mean...it's late. You don't gotta get dressed and everything and go out there now and pick up ice cream just for me."

Willow sat back down on the side of the bed, and kissed her, and caressed her hair.

"Yeah, I do," Willow said. "Momma cats always gotta take care of their kitties. Mommas love their kitties."

"Kitty's gonna take good care of Momma when she gets back," Faith said.

"Kitty's gonna eat my pussy when I get back, isn't she?" Willow whispered in Faith's ear, and licked her neck. "Kitty's gonna be my lil' pussycat tonight, huh?"

Faith nodded, and giggled again.

The god appeared in the night sky, bright as a star, descending through the clouds in a corona of lightning. Borne upon the wind, he was silent, as he approached her; the lightning around his hammer flashed, illuminating all of Boston for miles around, but it didn't make a sound.

He landed, graceful as a cat, right in front of Willow, in the middle of Boylston Street.

Willow was on her way to the Store 24 across the square to pick up the double chocolate fudge brownie ice cream, while Faith waited for the steaks. It was past ten, and the street was deserted.

"Um...hi," Willow said.

"I would...speak with you, Willow, if I may," Thor said.

He stood there, on the sidewalk in front of the Burger King, impossibly tall, impossibly beautiful...he didn't belong there.

But that wasn't really true, Willow realized, as she watched him, took in his beauty, his power, his improbable grace; the city seemed to fall into place around him. It was the same everywhere he went, she had always noticed: the world always seemed to reorder itself around him, making him the center of things. He was like the sun.

It wasn't that Thor didn't belong there, Willow realized. Boston didn't belong there. It wasn't worthy of him.

"I'm sorry," Willow said. "I was...I was so mean and bitchy to you and..."

Tears ran down her cheeks, suddenly flooding from her eyes before she even knew she was sad.

"I don't...I don't...I don't deserve you," Willow whispered, shaking her head. "I never did. I'm sorry."

He hugged her. She fell into his arms...

"I had come to apologize to you, Willow," he said, and smiled. "But as long as our conversation ends this way, I'm satisfied."

Willow giggled into his chest. "You're just so you sometimes, you know that? Of course you came here to apologize to me, even though I was like a total utter bitch and all you ever did was treat me good and respect me and bend over backwards to help me out. Of course you were coming here to apologize. Why wouldn't you?"

"I thought I had hurt you...that I was...callous, when I told you how it had gone on Midgard. I did not...take your feelings into account. I'm sorry."

"Shut up?" Willow said, and giggled again, and kissed his cheek.

They sat in the park in Copley Square. On the same bench she had sat on with Odin.

Thor didn't shake the world. He belonged in the world, in a way his father never could. Odin was above the world...superior to it, and he knew it. He sat on his throne in his castle in the sky, weighed down by all the terrible secret things only he knew, and he hardly ever left it, unless something monumental was happening. But Thor would come down from the sky to apologize to a girl whose feelings he had hurt. He came down sometimes to sit with some old Swedish fishermen over ales, and talk about the catch that season. He had once appeared in Greenland to help an old woman whose house had been destroyed by a hurricane: he rebuilt her house himself, cut down the trees, sawed the wood, hammered it together, shingled it; it took him three days and he did it without even being asked, because she had prayed to him once when she was a little girl, more than half a century before, and he happened to like her. So he built her a house, and then she cooked for him. He spent a week with her in that house. She cooked him meals--meat he had hunted for her in the woods that hemmed the house around--and they talked by the fire every night.

Willow knew, because she had been there with him. One day they had been together in Asgard, and Thor had been showing her the mountains; the next, he told her they had to go back down to Earth to help an old woman whose house had just been destroyed. So they went. Willow couldn't help rebuild the house, but she was great with growing things, and she had restored the woman's devastated crops, healing the soil and making the crops grow a whole season in less than a day, and putting a blessing on the land to make it spectacularly fertile for as long as the woman lived.

Willow knew she didn't deserve Thor...she didn't deserve someone like him in her life. But every time she saw him, she was thankful he was there.

"I was hoping you'd come by eventually...so I could, y'know, tell you what an ass I was," Willow said. "Plus, I have your other cape, the one you were wearing before? Um, I had it dry-cleaned."

"Actually, it has been less than a day since last we spoke, by my reckoning," Thor said. "But I see the seasons have changed here. Time travel is a strange thing. Even in my chariot, I cannot always predict it with certainty."

"So...wait, have you guys done your big invasion thing yet, in 2009?"

"We are still debating over it, in Odin's council. Most want to go to march on Midgard now--they are in great haste to do so, for the sight of those demons despoiling fair Midgard burns our hearts. Indeed, nearly all wouldst go, immediately...only two of the assembled warriors urge patience."

"Which two? Bet Freyja's not one of them."

Thor smiled. "Nay, Freyja can scarce contain her rage. It is all I can do in council to calm her hot temper. She loved humanity, as much as any of us, and perhaps more than most. She wept bitterly when Midgard was overrun. She blusters and thunders and prowls about in Odin's council like a caged hawk."

"So which two warriors want to wait?"

"Thor...and Loki."

"Why? And this has gotta be the first time you two have ever agreed on anything."

"Not the first time, but it is a rare thing, when the two sons of Odin are allied. And I am not at all certain we are allied now. I do not know Loki's mind; I do not know what it is that stays his hand. I do know he burns to smite those demons, as much as any of us, so whatever his reasons, they must seem important to him."

"He hasn't told you? He's all like, wait, let's not invade just yet, but he's not sayin' why?"

"He doesn't know why...at least, so he says. He thinks we are overlooking something, something vital, but what it might be, he knows not...so he says."

"And what about you?"

"I think we are overlooking something too. And I think you are the key to it, Willow. I will not ask you to come back with me, because I know you do not wish it. I will only say, do not so hastily abandon your old life, the world that came before...your friends, your loves. I do not think all hope is gone, though I cannot see any hope yet. But there is a saying amongst mortals: it is always darkest before the dawn."

He stood up, and raised his hammer. Lightning flashed, and the wind picked up; the trees bent in the gale like they were being yanked out of the ground by the roots. But Willow sat at the eye of the storm, unmolested.

Thor looked up at the sky. Then he looked back down at Willow.

"We are in a black night, and we do not see the way ahead," he said. "But mayhap there is a way...if we do not give up hope. If we believe that good can win through, though Hel itself bars our path...if we have faith."

"I'll...I'll try," Willow said.

The god smiled. "Tell Faith I said hello," he said.

And then he disappeared in a bolt of lightning, and Willow was alone...

A week later, they laid together on the private beach outside the cottage they had rented on Cape Cod. They were naked on a blanket in the sand, tangled up together...tangled up in each other. Faith held Willow's wrists down, gently, and Willow had her legs wrapped around Faith, and they fucked under the moon, and Faith looked down into Willow's eyes as they did, and made Willow say she would always belong to her...

It was late, and the night sky was clear and black the way it only got in places like this, away from the city lights, but they could still see: the moon, full now, lit the world in silver.

The night was warm but the breeze was cool, and salty with the sea. The air smelled like pine trees. The sound of the surf was thundering around them; the tide was coming in. The water was only a few feet away from them now. But they kept fucking. They had been fucking for hours...Willow couldn't stop...

She felt like a riptide was carrying her away...like she was losing herself...

She didn't mind.

Faith fucked her, staring down at her with eyes that were bright and hard and reflected golden in the moonlight, as she took her, relentlessly, over and over again...and made Willow say she belonged to her...

"You're mine," Faith whispered, grinding her pussy into Willow's as Willow whimpered and moaned and screamed beneath her. "Say it."

"I'm yours...yours...yours," Willow murmured, with tears in her eyes, as Faith fucked her...took her...Faith's strong arms held her down, and Faith's body moved like a piston as she fucked her, smooth and fast and relentless...Faith's scent was all around her, the smell of her hair; her breath was warm on Willow's neck...Willow looked up into Faith's eyes, trapped in them, like a prey animal that had been run to ground...she looked up into Faith's eyes, and listened to her breathe, and felt Faith's heart beating against her own, as Faith grunted down at her, and showed her teeth to her, and took her.

Faith held Willow's arms down, but Willow could still use her mouth: she sucked on Faith's tongue, and licked every part of Faith's body she could reach, loving the taste of her sweat...she ran her feet up and down Faith's legs, reveling in the smoothness of her flesh, in the feel of the muscles moving, strong and fluid, beneath her skin...

And Willow came...over and over and over again...

The tide rolled right in over them, a shock of icy cold.

They fucked in the water...

Later, they were laying together on the couch in front of the fireplace in the cottage they had rented, a rambling, ranch-style place with a big patio that looked out on the beach; the cottage was full of books and old board games and curious, kitschy little knick-knacks, and things from the sea decorating the walls: paintings of ships, a fisherman's net, a mounted swordfish that may or may not have been real. The floors were wood and the walls were wood-paneled and the whole cottage creaked whenever you moved, but other than that it was perfectly quiet: their own little hideaway, separate from the world, a perfect place for laying on a couch together in front of a fire. It was too warm for a fire, but they liked having the fireplace going anyway. They liked watching it, as they laid together. The cottage had a television, and a VCR, so they rented movies sometimes...but they liked watching the fire more.

"Did my girl like that?" Faith said, as she laid curled up behind Willow on the couch, rubbing her feet against hers, and kissing her neck.

"Your girl loved it," Willow murmured, and kissed Faith's hand. The fire was warm on her skin. Faith's arms were warm around her.

They were quiet. The fire drew their eyes, and gently held them.

"We haven't talked about the future much lately," Faith eventually said.

They hadn't. They'd hardly talked about it at all once they officially became a couple...once they made love that first time. They'd both decided then that the old future was gone...that the new one was theirs.

But sometimes, just out of curiosity, Willow looked back at her old memories...Faith's old memories, that were still there whenever she wanted to dredge them up...because she could never figure out why Faith seemingly had no memory at all of most of 1997. Willow couldn't swear that Faith had memories of 1997 before...maybe she'd never had them. Willow was an expert on memories; she'd spent years trying to make sense of Faith's. Memory was a subjective thing under the best of circumstances. You might think a day was gone, forgotten for good, but then a sound, or especially a smell, might bring it rushing back...

It could have been that Faith never really did remember much of 1997 before Rebecca came into her life. Certainly as far as Faith was concerned, nothing in her life before Rebecca was of any consequence, and Willow knew Faith didn't care enough to bother trying to hold on to the memories of anything before Rebecca. But Willow could have sworn the memories were changing... when Willow had first come back to 1997 and saved Faith from Warren, in January, she was pretty sure Faith didn't have any memories of anything after the first week of January, all the way up until about March or April. But then it had changed, and Faith suddenly had no memory of anything before late summer. Now it was changing again...as if Faith's memories were in flux, going back and forth...trying to settle on a date...

But one thing was always the same: after the gap that started in January, Faith's first memory in 1997 was sitting on a park bench on a sunny day, in Copley Square, near the fountain, and not knowing how exactly she had gotten there. A woman was walking away from her, crying...actually, Willow was certain now that the woman was running away. Faith only had a glimpse of the woman, in profile, obscured by the bright sun, as she ran off. The woman had dark hair. Faith didn't notice the woman's clothes, because she was focused on her face: she saw tears running down the woman's cheek, and she heard her sobbing. And Willow could have sworn now that the woman whispered a word... but she couldn't make out what it was. After that, Faith put her hand in the pocket of her jeans and came out with a wallet with three-hundred dollars in it.

It had been her leather coat before. Faith had taken the wallet out of the pocket of her leather coat, when the memory happened in March or April, or at the end of summer...but now it seemed to be in mid-summer, and she was no longer wearing the leather coat in the memory.

But other than that one detail, and the whispered word, the memory was always the same, and it was always the first one after the gap. The specific day was different: though it was always a sunny, warm day, it had been spring before, then it had changed to late summer...now it was the middle of summer.

Willow had no idea what any of it meant...no idea what to make of it.

"Thought we decided not to talk about that stuff?" Willow said. "At least, not until Becca gets here."

"I was just thinkin', it's kinda funny," Faith said. "About Buffy, I mean. This all comes down to her."

"What? Whatcha talkin' about, sweetie?"

"It's just...think about it. The way it went before. Buffy was gay, right? Like, in denial at first, but still gay."

"Yeah."

"So then I show up in town, and I think I'm straight, but then me and Buffy get together, and bang, I go gay. Then you get my memories, and even though you were definitely straight, you get kinda like, rewired 'cuz of me. Then you get together with Buffy for awhile, and that sort of seals the deal, and you officially like gals. And now you and me are together. But neither of us are really gay, or at least we didn't used to be. Buffy made us this way, she made us both this way. You got into magic because of Buffy too. If it wasn't for Angelus, and havin' to try to give him his soul back, you might never have gotten into magic at all. Then you stuck with it and got real good at it too, because you wanted to be able to help Buffy fight. Without magic, you wouldn't have been able to time travel back to me. Without Buffy makin' me like gals, my memories would never have made you like gals. We're together because of Buffy, everything's because of Buffy. It's like, even though she ain't here, she's still runnin' things."

"Yeah, but...you're not...you're not hers anymore. You're mine. You're... mine, right?"

Faith kissed her.

"Forever, honey," Faith said.

Willow nodded, and started to cry. Faith hugged her.

"I'm sorry, honey," Faith whispered. "I was playin' you a little. I brought all that stuff up because I wanted to see...if you still feel guilty about it. You do, don't you? You feel kinda like....you're stealing me away from her. Taking something that wasn't supposed to belong to you."

Willow nodded. She couldn't look at Faith. She buried her head in Faith's chest.

"Willow," Faith said. "You don't get to decide who I belong to, and neither does Buffy Summers. I decide. And I decided I belong to you, beautiful. Okay?"

Willow nodded. Faith lifted her head, and kissed her again.

"We're gonna be goin' to Sunnydale someday," Faith said. "You need to get past this, honey. You need to stop feelin' guilty about this."

"I just...I just love you so much and...I want you to be happy," Willow said. "I want what's best for you."

"You're what's best for me, Willow. You're my goddess."

Willow nodded, and tried to smile, as Faith kissed her tears.

"I think we're gonna need to work through this," Faith said, and grinned. "Maybe get all Oprah on its ass. Like, face the issue head-on. Maybe get kinda proactive."

Willow laughed, and wiped the rest of her tears away. "You are like, entirely too into Oprah. I gotta get you away from Oprah. People should never say words like 'proactive'. I think from now on I'm giving you spankings if I catch you watchin' Oprah."

"Promises, promises."

Willow got off the couch, went into the kitchen, and took a bottle of Cristal champagne out of the ice bucket on the table. There were eleven more bottles in the cabinet; they liked drinking champagne.

She came back into the living room, and stood naked before Faith in the firelight.

She knelt down beside her, and opened the champagne.

"I'm gettin' proactive," Willow said, and lifted Faith's foot up above her mouth. "I'm gonna proactively pour this champagne all over you, and drink it off every part of your body. I'm gonna work my way up. Got a feelin' I might get kinda bogged down when I reach your pussy though, baby." She poured champagne over Faith's foot, and drank it off Faith's toes.

"I'm gonna proactively give you a spanking later for bein' bad," Faith said, giggling, as Willow lifted her other foot, and poured champagne over it, and licked it off. "Plus? I don't think Oprah ever told anyone to do this."

"Oprah's fat. We're fabulous. And someone's gettin' spanked tonight, that's for sure."

"Thinkin' it's you, Sunnydale."

Willow smiled, and poured champagne over Faith's legs, and licked her way up her ankles.

"Talk's cheap, Boston," Willow said.

"C-6," Faith said, looking suspiciously at Willow across the kitchen table, three nights later, wearing only her bra and panties.

"Miss," Willow said. She was still dressed, but her socks were on the floor. She was leaning back in her chair, with her feet up on the table.

"E-2?" Faith said.

Willow smiled, and drank some more champagne. They'd worked their way through half a bottle. They weren't drunk exactly, but they were both feeling extremely relaxed. "Miss. You really suck as a sea captain. Lucky you got other skills, baby."

"Still got my shub and my patrol boat."

"Your shub?"

"Sub. I'm gonna give you a spanking. Plus you're like totally drunker than me by the way."

"Got more clothes on than you too."

"Game's not over. Still got two boats."

"For now. E-2."

"Miss. How come you took your socks off first?"

"Because I know you love massaging my feet. F-8."

"Shit," Faith said. "Hit my patrol boat. How the fuck did you find the thing? Thing takes up like, two little...things."

Willow smiled, a devilish little smile. "You wanna kiss my feet tonight, don't you baby?" she said.

Faith blushed, and smiled. "Maybe," she said.

"Maybe I'll let you, if you're good and you say please. Maybe I'll let you do my nails too, if you're extra good."

"I can be good. I can be fuckin' awesome."

Willow finished her champagne, and giggled. "No complaints so far, sweetie."

A storm had moved in that afternoon while they were antique shopping, and the rain had come down so hard and the thunder had been so loud and the wind had been so powerful that Willow thought at first that Thor was on the way. But he wasn't; it was just New England weather, up to its old tricks. The temperature had dropped into the fifties, the sky was an iron-gray mass of clouds, the thunder sounded like cannons, the lightning was practically blinding, the rain was like being thrown off a boat into the middle of the ocean and the wind kept nearly picking them up and carrying them away. They sprinted back to the car with the little scrimshaw carvings they had picked up, giggling; the wind and the rain and the sudden cold soaked their clothes through, and made them feel alive.

But when they got back to the cottage there was nothing to do because the storm had knocked out the electricity, taking the television and the VCR with it. Whenever there was nothing to do in the cottage--and it happened a lot, because Cape Cod was a lot of things, but fabulous wasn't one of them--they laid out on their completely awesome private beach, which was their favorite place for fucking, and rubbed suntan oil on each other's bodies and worked on their tans, and fucked. But they couldn't fuck on their private beach with that storm roaring all around them. The house was pitch-black and they had to light candles, and they got into dry clothes and then sat at the kitchen table drinking champagne in the candlelight. Then Faith remembered the stash of lame old board games in one of the bedroom closets and said, "Strip-Battleship."

It wasn't Electronic Battleship, which was a crushing disappointment to Willow after she'd had two glasses of champagne and cared about things like that, because she had always liked the sounds it made when you scored a hit. Plus the little screen lit up. But with champagne, and especially the stripping, non-Electronic Battleship was pretty fun too. And the thunder outside actually sounded a lot like ships being blown up by torpedoes anyway.

"F-7," Willow said, and re-filled Faith's glass. She thought she actually was a little drunker than Faith and that was just unacceptable.

"Miss!" Faith said, and took a big gulp of her champagne, and grinned. "Snap girl, how do you like me now?"

Willow laughed so hard she almost choked on her champagne.

"You undershtand I got another turn before you get to go again?" Willow said, when she finally got her laughing under control. "You undershtand that if the rest of your little boat isn't on F-7 then it's definitely gotta be on F-9? You undershtand I'm gonna say F-9 next? You undershtand I'm totally in love with you and I wanna marry you someday?"

Faith got out of her chair, came around to Willow's side of the table, and kissed her.

"Yeah," Faith said, and smiled. "You keep sayin' 'undershtand'."

"That's 'cuz you totally got me drunk so you could have your way with me. Bad kitty."

Faith knelt in front of her. Willow took her feet down from the table, and looked at her.

"You're beautiful, Faith," Willow said. "You're beautiful with candles."

"You...you wanna marry me?" Faith said.

"Yeah. It's not legal anywhere yet? But in 2009 out-of-state gay couples will be able to legally get married in Massachusetts."

Willow knelt down on the floor with Faith. Tears came into Willow's eyes.

"Okay, I'm a little tipsy but...but I mean this baby," Willow said, and kissed Faith's hand. Will you marry me? Yeah, okay, in twelve years, real long engagement? But...will you marry me?"

"Yeah," Faith whispered, and kissed her, and started to cry.

The storm passed, and summer returned, and every day was perfect at the little cottage. They went antique shopping, and ate at wonderful little seafood restaurants, and grilled up steaks and burgers on their patio, and danced on the patio to the boombox they had picked up for the trip. They laid out on the private beach together, and rubbed suntan oil on each other's bodies and basked in the sun during the day...and made love under the moon at night...

It went by too fast. They had been there three weeks and they couldn't stay any longer because the people who owned the cottage would be coming back.

On their last day, their luggage all packed and ready and waiting out on the patio, they laid out on the beach, one last time. They didn't work on their tans. They held each other, and looked out at the water.

"What I said last week?" Willow said. "About getting married? I know we haven't talked about it. But I meant it. I want to marry you. Do you...do you still wanna marry me? I'll...I'll be older then...I'll...be forty."

"You'll be beautiful," Faith said, and smiled, and kissed her. "I wanna marry you."

They looked out at the water. The sun would be setting soon...they would have to leave soon.

"You got my memories," Faith said, eventually. "All of 'em...the stuff my Mom did to me too."

"Yeah," Willow said, and hugged her, and brought her closer.

"There was this one day, my Mom took me to the beach? We built sandcastles together. She told me...she told me she loved me. She never really said that to me before, y'know? Never really told me that, and...on the beach...we were just sittin' there in the sand like, laughin' about stuff and buildin' sandcastles and it was nice, y'know? And she told me she loved me. And I thought...I thought things were gonna change then. I thought she wouldn't... wouldn't hit me anymore."

Faith shook her head.

"But she didn't really love me," she said. "Didn't stop hittin' me either. That day...how we laughed and stuff, and she said she loved me...it was all just sandcastles. Tide came in, washed 'em away."

Faith curled up against Willow's breasts.

"But now I got you," Faith said.

"We're forever, baby," Willow said, and tears ran down her cheeks. Faith was crying now, too.

Faith nodded, and held on to Willow, and shivered a little. The breeze had gotten cold, and the sun was hidden behind the clouds.

"I don't know...I don't know why she couldn't love you, baby, when you're so special, so beautiful?" Willow said. "But I'm gonna love you. I'm gonna be your Mom from now on, okay? Is that...is that okay, baby? Will you let me love you that way too?"

Faith nodded. Willow brought Faith's head to her breasts, and Faith kissed them. She took Willow's nipple in her mouth.

"I'll always love you, Faith," Willow said, and started crying, as she held Faith in her arms, like a baby, and Faith sucked on her nipple. "I'll always, always take care of you. I'll be your Mom. Every night, I'll hold you, just like this, and I'll make sure you know you're special...make sure you know that I love you. Every night, every night, every night, baby."

Faith nodded, and cried.

When they got back to Boston they didn't leave their hotel room for a week. For one thing, it was July, and the weather had turned steamy and muggy and uncomfortable, and the room had an excellent air conditioner. But Willow knew the real reason they hadn't gone out was that she didn't want to let Faith out of her sight...didn't want to let go of her, for a second. She held her, all the time now...as if she thought she might slip away.

They made love at night, and afterwards, Willow held Faith in her arms, and Faith sucked on her nipples, and went to sleep that way.

At first, Willow had been doing it for Faith...but now she realized she had gotten used to it. She wanted it now, every night: she wanted to hold Faith that way, to love her that way...like a mother.

"I love you, baby," Willow always whispered in Faith's ear, when Faith drifted off to sleep at night. "I love you, Momma," Faith always whispered back.

They both needed this, Willow had realized...

And when she thought about it, sometimes Willow felt like she was on the verge of something...some memory, or a revelation. In her mind, it felt like doors were opening...it felt like the petals of a flower unfolding...

But she could never hold on to the revelation, whatever it was. It would always slip away...

They left the hotel room on the eighth day, because even though the air conditioner was nice it was hard being cooped up in there, and then everything ended.

They were on their way to eat at Stephanie's on Newbury Street, when it happened. They were crossing Copley Square when a little boy with blonde hair suddenly ran out into Boylston Street toward the park, right into the oncoming traffic. Faith saw him before Willow did, and tackled him a second before a truck would have run him over.

And then Willow saw the angel.

She didn't look like an angel. She looked like a woman. A pretty one, but she didn't have wings, there wasn't an aura of light around her, or a halo around her head. She wore jeans and boots and a tee shirt. She was average height, petite, with long, black hair, pale skin and gray eyes with long lashes, and a pretty, lopsided smile. She looked like an ordinary woman, but Willow knew she was more powerful than Thor, or Loki, or even Odin.

Willow knew, because she had met her once before...

The woman approached Willow, smiling, and all the sounds, all the movement everywhere else on the street, suddenly stopped. When Willow looked around, the whole world was frozen...as if time had been paused.

"You're Rachel, right?" Willow said.

"Yes. Hello again, Willow," Rachel said.

"What...did you to do to them?" Willow looked at Faith. She was lying in the street, holding the boy in her arms...frozen.

"Nothing. I did something to us. We're existing between moments right now. We need to talk."

"Existing between moments?"

"I slowed down time, just for us, so we could talk. When we're done talking, I'll set things back as they were."

Willow knew it was useless to argue. And she knew she didn't have to worry, Rachel would never hurt her, or Faith, or anyone...

She was an angel.

They crossed the street to the park, and sat on a bench by the flowers. The park's fountain was going now; water shot up into the sky, and the sun sparkled off it, creating a little rainbow. But the water was frozen now, too. The rainbow hung in the air, like the world was a canvas and someone had painted on it.

"I keep talking to really powerful like, magic people on this bench," Willow said. "Why this bench?"

"Because I like the flowers," Rachel said. "Some things are just coincidences."

"Odin said there's no such thing as coincidences."

"Odin needs to learn to relax."

Willow laughed. She liked Rachel. She had immediately liked her the first time she'd met her, too...

"I saw you at the fort...the last time," Willow said. "The time we won against the Horsemen and the First. But now...we lost, somehow."

"Yes."

"You came to me then because I prayed...prayed for an angel, so I could get a message to God. To save the world."

"Yes."

"Is there a God? Because...it doesn't feel like there is. It doesn't feel like anybody cares."

"You care. I care."

"Is there a God...a Goddess?"

"Yes."

"So where is she?"

Rachel smiled. "That's a long story. And the story hasn't ended yet."

"We lost the battle at the fort this time...the way history was changed, we lost, so...why are you here now? I'm not gonna let it get out of control again in 1998. I'm gonna make sure we get the Key before the Horsemen are released this time."

Rachel took Willow's hand.

"You have to leave, Willow," Rachel said. "You have to return to your own time. You don't belong here."

"What? But...but I have to be here! I have to stay! It's...it's the only chance for the world...if I stay, I can make sure the battle at the fort never happens, the Horsemen never get released, the world doesn't end!"

"Willow. Time isn't what you think. It's a loop. And the loop must always be completed. You have to leave. If you don't..."

"I'm not," Willow said, and looked Rachel in the eyes, her face becoming red. "I'm staying."

"Then the world will end...the universe will end. It will end, Willow... tomorrow."

"What? What are you...what are you talking about?!"

Rachel raised her hand. A necklace of glowing blue crystal appeared in it.

"Do you remember this?" Rachel said. "You used this necklace to explain the nature of time to Faith."

"I...sent one back to the past."

"No. First, it appeared to you, in one of your own time portals, and you knew that therefore, you must have sent it back to yourself from the future."

"So?"

"And then, moments later, you sent it back to the past, because you knew you had to. It had appeared in the past, so you must have sent it from the future. When the moment arrived that the future became your present, you sent the necklace back to the past. Because the loop must be completed. When Faith asked you why you sent the necklace back to the past, you told her you had no choice, and you were right." Rachel lowered her hand, and the necklace suddenly disappeared. "And you have no choice now. You must leave here, tomorrow, July nineteenth, 1997...but not because I'm telling you to. You must leave, Willow... because that's when you left."

Willow felt a shudder go through her. The air suddenly felt cold, the sky seemed to darken. She looked around. All the people in the park were still frozen, happy, smiling in the sun...in the street, Faith was still falling to the ground, still shielding the boy in her arms, just out of reach of the oncoming truck...

"What...what do you mean?" Willow whispered...and her eyes filled with tears.

"Time is a loop," Rachel said. "You've completed this particular loop before, and now you must do it again. Faith has no memories of anything between January ninth and tomorrow...because you erased them."

"Me?! But...but...but no!" Willow shouted, and leaped up. She felt like she was flailing around in a hurricane, desperately trying to hold on to something, anything, as her whole world spun away from her. Her tears were running down her cheeks now... she felt them. "Her memories, they've been like, like, going back and forth! First the gap ended in like maybe April? But then like, August or September...now July? What the hell does that even mean? If I'm supposed to leave tomorrow, because, because that's just the way it's supposed to go? Then why were her memories different?!" She looked at Faith again, holding the boy in her arms. "It's like...they were trying to settle on a date, like...like..."

And then she knew.

"The boy," Willow said. "I had to...I had to wait...until Faith saved him."

"Yes."

Willow sat back down.

"This...this was all about him?" she said. "But...then why did Faith's memories keep changing? Who is he?"

"He's just a boy, Willow," Rachel said. "But that doesn't mean he isn't important. Every life is important to the Goddess. That's why She wanted you here until Faith could save him. Coming into Faith's past, you've altered her path just enough, to put her in the path of that boy...to save him. Faith's memories changed because the boy's family was planning a trip here, but they weren't sure when they would be coming. They planned on April, then September...finally they settled on July."

"But...Odin, a few months ago? He told me I should leave, that I was damaging things being here? But that was the end of April. But if I left with him then the kid wouldn't be saved today! So like, what, Odin was just wrong?"

"Odin is a human creation, Willow. He is very clever and very powerful, as far as humanity's gods go. But to the Goddess he is a child. He can catch glimpses of Her, but he cannot know Her mind, because Her mind isn't for him to know. He gave you what he thought was good advice. But remember, he is clever, and so he probably knew you wouldn't take it. He planted a seed of doubt in your mind, and that was probably all he set out to do. Yes, he sees somewhat of the future, as does Loki, and some of the other gods as well, but only the Goddess sees everything. Nothing can happen out of Her hand."

"So...I have to go...because that's when I left before? But...okay but...what happens if I don't go?"

"As things stand now Faith's path is intact: she will meet Rebecca, she will meet you, Buffy, Tara, as she was meant to. But if you stay even one moment longer than you were meant to, her path will be changed...and the loop will not be completed...and everything will end."

"End? But...but...why end? What do you mean, end?"

"Because you will have created a logical impossibility. You did come into Faith's life in her past--and Rebecca's life, and Tara's life, and all of those events were incorporated into the timeline. The very first time you met Faith, in that alley in 1998, all of this had already happened. Faith had spent part of the previous year with you--the version of you from 2009--but she didn't remember it, because you had erased her memories. Tara came to Sunnydale because she met you when she was a girl, and you told her to come. Rebecca sought Faith out, because you told her to, in 1972."

"But...I was fixing stuff. I only told Becca and Tara to do that stuff because they already did it before."

Rachel smiled. "And they already did it before, because you told them to. Time is a loop."

"I don't...but I don't...I don't wanna leave. I love Faith and...I wanna be with her."

"But you must leave, don't you see? You must leave, because you already left. When you met Faith in 1998 you had already left her, on July nineteenth, 1997. If you don't leave her again tomorrow, you'll crack the world in half, Willow...you'll create a paradox, and the universe, and every single thing in it, will cease to exist. Tomorrow. Tomorrow, Faith, and everyone else, will cease to exist, unless you leave, as you were meant to...as you already did before."

Willow looked down at the grass, and cried.

Rachel took her hand.

"I'm sorry," Rachel said. "But there is a reason. There is a Goddess...and She does care."

"Doesn't feel like it," Willow whispered. "Feels more like, like she yanks us around. Breaks our hearts. Lets us fall in love and then...and then..."

Rachel hugged her.

"Love is the engine that drives the world, Willow," Rachel whispered. "Because the Goddess loves. Sometimes She doesn't love wisely...She loves with Her heart, not Her head. But She always loves."

"Thought...thought the Goddess is supposed to be like, perfect, or whatever," Willow whispered. She was holding on to Rachel now...hugging her as hard as she could. She didn't even know why. It just felt right. She had always liked Rachel.

"She loves, Willow. So Her heart can break too. When people She loves are hurt, She can become angry...She can lash out. She isn't perfect. But She loves. Everything She does, She does for love."

"So what...what do I do now?"

Rachel wiped Willow's tears away, and smoothed her hair out of her eyes.

"Spend the day with Faith...love her," Rachel said. "Enjoy her. Tomorrow you must erase her memory, and send her back on to her path...to Rebecca. But today, enjoy her."

"So how come...if it's all about that kid over there...how come I get an extra day with her? I mean if this was all about Faith saving him? Why didn't I just leave right now?"

"The Goddess didn't want you to. You love Faith...so does She. She wanted you to have another day together."

"So I gotta...gotta go back to like, 2009? Even though it's gone? Where do I go? What do I do?"

Rachel kissed her cheek, and stood up.

"Asgard," she said. "And as for what you must do...I can't reveal everything to you. You are on a path, and you must travel the last part of the road alone. But you're almost at your destination, Willow, and you already have your answers...you just need to start asking the right questions."

"What questions?"

"You won the battle at the fort before. How?"

"But I don't...I don't know how. I was inside, and I didn't see the fight. No one knows how we won."

"The people you loved aren't with you now, but they are still your greatest resource...your greatest weapon. Let their wisdom guide you..."

Rachel smiled.

"...Think tactically," she said.

And Rachel shimmered, and faded...and disappeared in a ray of sunlight.

Willow sat there for a long time, crying. The people all around her were still frozen. She knew why.

She had preparations to make, and Rachel wanted to give her as much time as possible with Faith, before she had to leave.

So Willow got up, wiped her tears away, and walked down to the pawn shop on Harrison Avenue. It was a cramped little place in the seedier part of Boston's downtown, and it was crammed with clothes and jewelry and musical instruments and sporting equipment and electronics, and a hundred other things, all arranged on shelves that went all the way up to the ceiling. Faith's Doc Marten boots were on one of the shelves. Her coat hung in a dusty corner. They both had price tags on them.

Willow needed them. Faith wasn't wearing them in the memory in the park in Copley Square, but she remembered Faith had Docs and a leather coat in Sunnydale, in 1998...Faith needed to have them. They would help keep her warm when the weather got cold in a few months.

Willow knew Rebecca would find Faith in November. Faith would have four months on the street, but for three of those months the weather wouldn't be cold, at least. The thought made Willow happy, as far as it went.

Willow realized she was crying again.

She took the money out of her wallet, and left it on the counter. When she counted the money left in the wallet, there was exactly three-hundred dollars there. But then, she knew there would be. She took Faith's coat and her boots, and walked back out the door.

She was a zombie again, she realized, as she walked back to the hotel. She had to do this, and wanting to do it, or not wanting to, didn't matter. She just did it. Zombies didn't have choices. The city was still frozen, and silent. Everything looked like a movie on pause. An airplane hung in the sky.

Faith held the boy in her arms. Willow stopped beside her, and kissed her.

In the hotel room, she found Faith's old backpack, shoved the leather coat and the boots inside, along with a couple of Faith's old tee-shirts, two blouses, one sweater, a pair of jeans, underwear and socks, a hairbrush, deodorant, toothpaste and a toothbrush. Then she slung the backpack over her shoulders, and walked out.

She walked to the YMCA. Walked down the alley with all the graffiti tags. Slipped in through the window with the broken lock. Hid the backpack behind the boiler.

By the time she came back to Faith, and crouched in front of her, in the middle of the street, ninety minutes had passed. But not for Faith, or anyone else...

Willow waited. After a few seconds, time got started again, for everyone else in the world...or maybe time just slowed down again, for her. Either way, she was part of the world again...as much as a zombie could be part of the world.

Cars honked their horns. The truck barreled past, and the driver slammed on his brakes, too late. Someone screamed. Faith fell to the street, holding on to the boy. He cried.

Willow was crouched in front of Faith, in the street, as cars screeched to a stop all around them, and people came running over to them to make sure Faith and the boy were all right.

Faith held the boy in her arms.

"Kid, you okay?" Faith said. "You okay?"

The boy nodded, as Faith stood him up. Willow stood up with them.

"Kinda not too smart, runnin' out into traffic, y'know?" Faith said, and dusted herself off, and smiled.

"I...wanted to run in the fountain," the boy said.

"Yeah," Faith said. "I woulda wanted to run around in there too. Looks like fun."

His parents were there a second later, hugging him and kissing him and thanking Faith profusely.

"Just in the right place at the right time," Faith said, and smiled again.

Willow looked at the boy. She wanted to be angry with him. He was the reason she had to go.

But she couldn't be angry with him. He was just a boy.

They didn't leave the hotel. They made love the rest of that day, and ordered food from room service.

Willow never let go of Faith. They stayed in the bed, and Willow held her. Whenever Faith went to bring in the room service tray, Willow went with her, and held her hand.

"You're a little different today, honey," Faith whispered to her that night, as she laid curled up on Willow's breasts, sucking on her nipple. "You're all...I don't know...like thinkin' about stuff."

Willow smiled down at her. She wanted Faith to be happy, every single moment.

"Just thinkin' about my baby, and how much I love her," Willow said, and caressed her cheek. "How much I love bein' her Momma, and taking care of her."

Faith nodded, and sucked on Willow's nipple, as she felt sleep overtaking her.

"I love you, Momma," Faith whispered.

"I love you too, baby," Willow whispered back. "I always will. I'll always take care of you, no matter what. Always, baby. Always."

When morning came Willow made love to Faith again, ravenously...they were running out of time...

The closer they got to the moment, the more Willow seemed to understand. She knew now that it had to happen at five minutes past one. She knew the weather would be sunny but not too hot and not humid: a perfect day. The wallet with three-hundred dollars in it went in Faith's right jeans pocket. They would sit on a bench near the fountain...

And Willow knew now who the woman with dark hair was, sobbing and running away from Faith with tears streaming down her cheek...

For their last meal, they ate steak and drank champagne, and had double chocolate fudge brownie ice cream for dessert, and after they were finished eating, they laid on the couch together, and Willow rubbed Faith's belly, and told her she would always take care of her...

They dozed off. When they woke up again, the clock said 12:56.

Willow made herself smile. She got up and changed into a skirt and blouse and put shoes on. She knew she had to wear a skirt and a blouse, and the open-toed heels Faith had bought for her; she'd seen them in the memory. She wore the necklace and the ankle bracelet Faith had bought her too, even though she hadn't noticed them in Faith's memories, but she'd be damned if she was going to leave them behind. She'd let the universe end before she left them behind.

"Let's go out, sweetie," Willow said. "Looks like a beautiful day out there."

Faith had put on the outfit Willow had seen in the memory: jeans, a blouse, sneakers. Willow had given her the wallet to hold on to. Faith put it in her right jeans pocket. They sat on a bench by the fountain. Faith liked the fountain. There was a big digital clock directly across the street from the park: it said 1:03.

Willow forced herself not to cry. She wasn't going to cry...

But she knew she would. In two minutes...

Willow smiled.

"You're my baby," Willow said, and hugged Faith, and kissed her hair.

"You're my Momma," Faith said, and curled up against her bosom. "And my goddess. You always...you always take care of me. I'm so lucky, Willow. I'm so lucky to have you."

Willow held her. The day was warm, and bright. People walked through the park, smiling. Willow smiled too, because she had to.

Faith felt warm, in her arms. Willow felt Faith's heart beating against her.

"You're special, Faith," Willow whispered. "You're my Faith...you're always in my heart, baby. You always will be."

The clock said 1:04.

It would take a moment, going into Faith's mind and eliminating the memories. Willow realized she had to get started now.

She touched Faith's hair, and kissed her forehead.

She looked down into Faith's eyes.

...And reached into Faith's mind...

"I love you," Faith said. "We're gonna get married someday? You're gonna marry me?"

"Yeah," Willow lied, and made herself smile again...and felt her tears coming.

The clock said 1:05...

Willow kissed her...the best kiss they'd ever had. A kiss to last a lifetime.

Then Willow broke the embrace...and looked into Faith's big, beautiful brown eyes, golden in the sunlight...and whispered in her ear...

"Forget," Willow whispered.

Willow let go of Faith, and stood up. Faith looked around, confused.

Willow's tears came, when she looked at Faith, and saw that Faith didn't know her...that what they had was erased, torn out of existence as brutally and irrevocably as all her friends had been...

And that she was the one who erased it.

"Sandcastles," Willow whispered.

Willow broke down crying, her whole body heaving, wracked with sobs...

And she ran away from Faith, with tears streaming down her cheeks.

Continued...

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