(no subject)
"Braeden says you haven't been sleeping well recently."
Wesley looked up at Jalisha as the elderly woman walked into his rooms, her ever-present leather and fur bag hanging from her arm. Letting out a sigh, he set the book he was reading on the table and sat back, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "Braeden is too much of a mother hen sometimes."
"Mother hen?" she asked as she set the bag down on the nearby chair.
"Never mind," he told her, knowing that it would take way too long to try to explain his slang. Oriens didn't even have an animal that could be compared, so it wasn't worth it. Instead, he decided to answer the question that he knew she would ask next. "I've been having dreams."
Opening her bag, she rooted through it before pulling out a small burnished metal container, which she uncapped. "About?"
"Them," he told her, closing his eyes, so she could daub the contents from the container on his eyelids. She didn't ask who them were because she knew. She had heard enough about them, especially after he had learned of their deaths. "I dreamed they came to me last night."
The images from the dream washed over him as he sat there - Fred and Angel walking toward him, Sam in Fred arms. Fred kissing him, tasting of tacos and smelling of her shampoo, before he turned to Angel. Angel embracing him tightly...and then kissing him as well. Not just on the lips, but deeply and passionately with the same love and fervor as Fred's kiss. Wesley melting against him despite the surprise that ran through him while Fred pressed against him from behind, wrapping her arms around him.
He had awoken with a raging erection, one that had taken a long time to settle. And every time he had tried to sleep again, the images would come back to mind, taunting him with what he'd never have. He wished he had a chance to tell Angel how much he had meant to him just as he wished he had been able to tell Fred again that he loved her and to be a father to Sam as he grew up. Finally, in the end, he had given up and got up to return to the books as at least they offered a distraction.
"Perhaps your dreams are trying to tell you something," Jalisha remarked as a soft cloth ran across his eyes. "There. You shouldn't need those things you call glasses ever again now."
Blinking, Wesley opened his eyes. Whatever was in the ointment she had been applying to his eyes over the last few weeks, it certainly did work. He could see more clearly now than he could even with his glasses on. "Thank you...but what do you think my dreams are telling me? That what I want, I can never have again? I believe I knew that."
Snorting, she shook her head and took out another container, which she opened. Coating her fingers with what was inside, she massaged a bit of it to his temples. "You'd be surprised, Prince. But this should help you sleep for a bit. You need to be rested for what's ahead."
By the time Wesley opened his eyes again a few hours later, he found that he had indeed managed to sleep and felt much better. Pushing himself off the bed, he stretched and was thinking about going for a walk when he heard a rather loud whoshing sound outside, followed by...what sounded like a car and a thump. Frowning, he hurried over to the window and looked down, not believing what he saw down below.
That looked like Angel's car.
And that looked like Angel...and Fred...and...was that Sam?
But they were...
Rushing out of his rooms, he practically ran into Braeden, who was coming up the stairs. "Sir, there's..."
"Where are they?" he asked, not sure if he was dreaming but at the moment not caring. He had to see.
He reached the main entrance hall of the castle just as the doors opened, and they were ushered inside by several of the Lux people. When Wesley saw them, his chest constricted and a painful knot formed in his throat while tears came to his eyes. "Oh, God...I thought--are you really here?" he said hoarsely, wanting to reach out and touch them, but afraid that if he did, this truly would be a dream. "Please tell me you're real."