AB/BtVS FF: Alive at Last 54/? (Willow/Asher)
TITLE: Alive at Last
AUTHOR: 38gnihsurc
RATING: en.sea.xvii overall
PAIRING: Willow/Asher
SPOILERS: Up until Micah for AB; the two series for Buffyverse stuff.
DISCLAIMER: I don't own anyone. I'm just having a little fun.
NOTES: This story is AU, since it's a crossover; because of that, I've taken a few creative liberties with explaining why the BtVS vampires are different than the AB vampires, and so on.
Previous Chapters: 1-3, 4, 5, 6-7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23-4, 25, 26-7, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32-3, 34, 35-6, 37-8, 39, 40-1, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49-50, 51-2, 53
PART FIFTY-FOUR
"Oh god," Willow whispered. "Oh... oh, god."
"Did they break her?" Edward asked Anita, over Willow's quiet babbling.
"I... I don't know," Anita said quietly.
Willow looked up at them and frowned. "Giles told me to be careful. They taught me to be careful. I knew how to be good... and out there... it... it stripped away and..." she trailed off and shook her head, before mumbling to herself.
"Who's Giles?" Edward asked.
Angel stepped into the foyer, soaked from the rain, but ready for battle. "An old friend," he told the blond man. He knelt down in front of Willow and looked into her eyes. She knew some found his demonic visage to be terrifying but she found comfort in his greenish eyes.
"Angel," she whispered. "I broke my promise. Giles told me to be careful... but it was so easy. I felt them... so strong and so weak and so connected... one more twist and---"
"What happened to her?" Richard asked.
Started from her ramblings, Willow watched as Anita looked at the werewolf and said, "Can you take her up to my bedroom, Richard? Angel can help us fight the slayers off, but I'm worried that they'll target her. They know she's a witch and she's not at full strength right now. She's fodder."
"Afraid of what'll happen to Ash---"
"If she dies, Asher could die. If he dies, I don't quite know what Jean-Claude'll do, and you and I are pretty invested in his reactions," she snapped. "Take her and keep her safe until she's less..."
"Broken?" Edward finished for her when she trailed off.
Before Angel or Willow could protest, Richard picked the red haired witch up and carried her further into the house, all the way to Anita's bedroom. He set Willow on the bed and closed the door; then, Willow watched him as he paced and checked every window to see how the war was progressing.
"Thanks," Willow whispered.
"Yeah," Richard mumbled as he watched their surroundings.
"I... you should go," she said quietly. She rubbed her hands over her arms. Nothing felt right. She felt twitchy, and something darker than she didn't want to identify. "I'm not safe right now."
"You can't hurt me."
Willow heard his growled words and she burst out laughing. Her laughter turned into giggles and that was when Richard turned around to look at her. He looked so surprised and she found that incredibly hilarious. The scent of Warren's blood and innards surfaced in her mind and Richard didn't think that Willow could hurt him. She laughed until her sides ached and until she could barely breathe.
"You are an idiot," Willow growled back, threats and amusement mixed together in that unfamiliar tone of voice that made her stomach tighten in dread and desire at the same time. "You don't know what I've done... what I wanted to do out there. Skinning you alive with a flick of my hand might not kill you, but it will definitely hurt. A lot. You think I can't find ways to---"
"Willow?"
She sucked in a sharp breath when she saw how wide Richard's eyes had become and she shook her head. "Don't come near me," she pleaded, her voice softer. "It's... it's all under the surface. Every fear, every wish. I can feel how much you want Anita all to yourself. I can feel how much you don't want to be Ulfric, or even a werewolf at all. I can feel how much you hate me... and that hate sings to the dark parts of me. It's warm. I can wrap it around myself and use it to recharge my batteries." She whimpered. "I've done too much magic. I shouldn't be here. I should not be here. I should've kept running away."
"Willow... I don't---"
"They sent me away! The coven tried to heal me and it couldn't. I wanted to kill those girls with my bare hands---or, well, my magic---for simply following us across the city!" She exclaimed, cutting him off. "Giles didn't trust me anymore... and when the laws... they all looked at me like I was so strange. Like I was the danger. I am the danger. And now, I've put you guys in the middle of---"
"You didn't put us in the middle of anything, witch," Richard grumbled as he looked back to the window. He turned and faced Willow again. "This was happening before you got here. We didn't know about slayers or the twisted law firm until you showed up."
"But---"
"Do you want to die today?" Richard asked.
Willow swallowed hard and shook her head. "N-no."
"Do you want any of us to die today?"
"No," she whispered.
He gave her a grim smile. "Then, let's call that a plus."
"You should go downstairs," she mumbled.
"And yet, I'm here," he grumbled in reply. "What does that tell you?"
"You love Anita more than you hate her," Willow said softly. "Which is surprising, because I think she thinks it's the other way around."
"Your friends are fighting downstairs and you want to give me relationship advice?"
WIllow swallowed and shrugged. "I can feel it. You. It... whatever. I..." she trailed off and shivered. "It gets too strong and I can't shut it off. I can feel everything. Everything's connected. You, her, everyone downstairs. Even the slayers. I could taste their pulses and feel their fear when I pushed back against them. The rush of conjuring the storm made it easer, but it was the danger they posed that brought everything back," she confessed.
"Why do you think everything's connected?"
"Because it is," she whispered. "We're all connected, to everything in this world. You're connected to Anita... to Jean-Claude... but not in the way you think you are. You're connected to your pack... to the pard, and to the rodere. You're connected to the vampires... to the people. To everything in this world."
"How---"
Willow looked at the bed she was sitting on and concentrated. She had only ever performed the exercise when she was sitting on the ground, so she didn't pull an exotic flower through the mattress. Instead, she pulled a daisy up into the bedroom, using the root system from around the house.
"Is that a spell?" Richard asked as he watched the flower develop.
She shook her head. "It's from outside. Everything's connected, Richard."
"So what does that mean?" he asked as she made the flower return to its natural habitat. "Why does that make you crazy?"
"Because good and evil are connected, too," she whispered. "Can't have one without the other. Nature doesn't exist in a vacuum, or whatever," She frowned and then continued with her confession: "I felt what I could do... and I don't know if I'm strong enough to ignore the evil inside of me."
"Well, if you do, we're probably all screwed," he pointed out. "I guess you knocking me unconscious would be the least of my worries."
Willow nodded. "Yeah."
"How... how can I help?"
The witch gasped and looked up at Richard. She had never expected him to say anything like that to her before---or, really, at all---and it shocked her that the words had left his mouth.
"Look, I don't trust you," Richard continued. "And, I'm not that crazy about you. Side effects of you knocking me out, I guess. But---"
Gunshots rang out, keeping him from saying whatever else he had to say. Willow's eyes widened and she jumped to her feet as a loud commotion came from what she guessed was the kitchen. She could hear hand to hand combat, crashes, and hollering from Gunn and Angel.
"I... I have to go down there," Willow said quietly as the need to protect everyone flooded her system.
"What are you going to do?" Richard asked. He gasped when she turned to look at him. She arched an eyebrow in silent question. "Your eyes..." he said quietly.
"They do that sometimes," she said as she turned back towards the door. "I can make them leave... give you guys a chance to get to the Circus," she said as she made the door open, as she walked towards the doorway. "I can hold them off for a little while and you guys can get to safety."
Richard asked, "What about you?"
Willow was already halfway to the commotion when the question left his lips. She descended into the fray to see Angel fighting hand to hand with Arnia, Spike with Caley, and Gunn and Connor with a short girl with thick, curly brown hair and a light dusting of freckles on her nose and cheeks. Edward and Anita were using gunfire to back them out of the house---or to try to back them out of the house. Micah hadn't been there, but in a flash, he had jumped back into the room, some sort of man and leopard hybrid, with black fur that glistened in the dimly lit home, that was very determined to throw Caley across the room. His bodyguard, Merle, was with him, too. For a brief moment Willow wondered where Richard's guards were but she didn't explore the curiosity much.
She put her hands up, palms facing towards the madness. Lightening cracked across the stormy sky and thunder roared down upon the house.
"Terra, Ignis, Aqua," she said loudly, over the din of battle, "all three... elements of astral I summon thee. Earth by divinity, divinity by earth... give the enemy the power to see that with the strength of the elements by my side---" Willow looked at the slayers and saw one of them pick up a knife so she quickly finished her spell "---no rules of magic I shall abide."
With a mental push, she sent each girl flying out of the house, through the open door towards which Anita and Edward had been trying to shepherd them. She faltered for a moment, the power almost overwhelming and then said, "Get out. Go back home."
"Willow---"
"Get everyone out," Willow said, looking at Anita as Richard came into the room. "Run back the way they came, through the backyard, and get to the Circus."
"What are you going to do?" Anita asked.
Willow frowned. "I don't know."
Angel stepped forward. "Willow... come with us."
"They'll catch up," Willow reminded him as she walked towards the front door. "And I can hold them off." She smiled a little. "Go."
"What about---"
"Resolve face," Willow said quietly as she paused to look at them.
"It's a touch hard to follow your orders when your eyes are all black as coal, Red," Spike pointed out.
Willow shrugged and continued walking towards the door. Angel reached out for her but she waved her hand and pushed him back a few feet. He growled but she ignored him. She went to the doorway and saw the slayers slowly getting to their feet. She couldn't deny that she felt some pleasure in watching Caley look at her with worry lining her face. The slayer knew her magical powers weren't enough and something inside of Willow wanted to show Caley just how 'not enough' those powers really were.
An arm grabbed her. She turned and saw Richard holding onto her arm.
"What?" she demanded.
"It doesn't have to take over you," he said.
"Coming from the man who won't embrace his beast," she said, her voice thick with magic, "that is kind of funny."
"Let me use my beast to remind you how alive and connected the world is," he said, after hiding the flinch her words caused. "So you can come back."
"H-how?" she asked as her tone softened.
"I've done it for Anita and we're connected... but you can connect to me temporarily, through magic, can't you?" he asked.
She swallowed and nodded.
"Do it," he insisted.
She reached out to touch him, to foster that mental connection, but movement from the slayers distracted her. The one whose name she didn't know had thrown a knife towards Willow; the witch reversed its path with a wave of her hand. She heard the girl yelp and then the other girls cried out her name, and Willow knew she was Brogan.
"Go," she growled to Richard before turning away from him and his offer to help.
Anita called out for Richard and then the noise of the others faded away. They were leaving. She looked at the slayers and saw that she had only sliced Brogan's arm and black sweater. Part of her was satisfied, and a little afraid, but part of her wanted to inflict more pain upon those girls.
"You little girls," Willow growled as she walked into the storm, "abusing your powers. You have no idea of what you represent... what you insult."
Caley started to conjure something. Willow smirked and decided to let her finish---she knew that it wouldn't be anything she couldn't handle. The wind howled around them and Willow laughed as the rogue slayer with the unnaturally red hair send some sort of weak energy her way.
Willow absorbed it, made it her own, and then sent it back towards the slayers. They stumbled to the ground, to their hands and knees, and Willow knew she could punish them for attacking her and her new family. They were a family. Even if Willow wasn't sure she wanted to be in Anita's family, she knew she was. And Willow's magic curled up inside of her, threatening to lunge free and act against the force that wanted to hurt her new family.
And then she felt someone's hand on her arm and a cool power flared through her body. She turned her head and Anita was standing next to her. Sirens wailed in the distance and Willow wanted Anita to get as far away as she could, but when she told her to run, Anita refused and slipped her hand into Willow's hand and wove their fingers together.
Before Willow could say or do anything else, she felt trees and bushes against her arms and legs. She felt fur under her hands. The air felt damp and fresh and green. She closed her eyes for a brief second and she saw everyone running through the foliage. Angel and Spike were covered in a blanket each, just in case. Micah, still in his hybrid form, ran with Merle. Gunn followed Connor, inspired by the young man's ability to keep up with everyone else. Claudia was running behind them all, her gun still in her hand. She knew, when she opened her eyes and looked at the slayers, that it was Richard, running behind them, catching up to them.
She could feel the world again---not just the magic that surged through her body, begging to be used. She felt the earth and the trees, the wind that Richard created against his skin when he raced through the trees, and she felt it all through Anita's bond to him. He was the wolf king; she could feel all that the title implied. Anita was something that defied categorisation; but she could still feel the things to which she was connected.
It was all there: the woods, the sky, the house, their bodies, their blood, the warmth of the beast, and the chill of the grave.
Willow pushed with her power and made the girls collapse. Then, she set up a barrier with a few whispered words and she dragged Anita towards the backyard and the wooded area behind it.
Willow almost screamed when big, fur covered arms gathered her up and took her faster and further into the trees. She looked and saw a wolfish man with dangerous amber eyes holding her, his teeth sharp and his breath coming in hot pants against her cheek and nose; without words, she knew it was Richard and she instantly calmed. She looked around and saw that Micah, in his leopard-man form, was carrying Anita.
"Why aren't you with the others?" Willow asked quietly, her voice jarred by the heavy strides Richard was taking.
"We had to come back when we knew you were coming," Richard panted in a somewhat distorted voice.
"O-oh," she breathed.
Minutes later, Richard and Micah were bursting through the bushes and Willow could see the vehicles parked on a relatively quiet street. Angel and Spike were in their car, but she could see that they looked concerned. Micah helped Anita get into a vehicle that Claudia unlocked and then Gunn approached Richard and Willow.
"You okay?" he asked.
Willow nodded. "Y-yeah... I think so," she replied quietly, even though she had no idea how she felt or what she thought. "I'll feel better when I get to the Circus."
"Get her in the car," Richard said, growling a little.
Gunn nodded and took her from Richard's arms. Willow was in Angel's car, sitting between the two vampires in the back seat, before she processed what had happened.
TBC...
AUTHOR: 38gnihsurc
RATING: en.sea.xvii overall
PAIRING: Willow/Asher
SPOILERS: Up until Micah for AB; the two series for Buffyverse stuff.
DISCLAIMER: I don't own anyone. I'm just having a little fun.
NOTES: This story is AU, since it's a crossover; because of that, I've taken a few creative liberties with explaining why the BtVS vampires are different than the AB vampires, and so on.
Previous Chapters: 1-3, 4, 5, 6-7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23-4, 25, 26-7, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32-3, 34, 35-6, 37-8, 39, 40-1, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49-50, 51-2, 53
PART FIFTY-FOUR
"Oh god," Willow whispered. "Oh... oh, god."
"Did they break her?" Edward asked Anita, over Willow's quiet babbling.
"I... I don't know," Anita said quietly.
Willow looked up at them and frowned. "Giles told me to be careful. They taught me to be careful. I knew how to be good... and out there... it... it stripped away and..." she trailed off and shook her head, before mumbling to herself.
"Who's Giles?" Edward asked.
Angel stepped into the foyer, soaked from the rain, but ready for battle. "An old friend," he told the blond man. He knelt down in front of Willow and looked into her eyes. She knew some found his demonic visage to be terrifying but she found comfort in his greenish eyes.
"Angel," she whispered. "I broke my promise. Giles told me to be careful... but it was so easy. I felt them... so strong and so weak and so connected... one more twist and---"
"What happened to her?" Richard asked.
Started from her ramblings, Willow watched as Anita looked at the werewolf and said, "Can you take her up to my bedroom, Richard? Angel can help us fight the slayers off, but I'm worried that they'll target her. They know she's a witch and she's not at full strength right now. She's fodder."
"Afraid of what'll happen to Ash---"
"If she dies, Asher could die. If he dies, I don't quite know what Jean-Claude'll do, and you and I are pretty invested in his reactions," she snapped. "Take her and keep her safe until she's less..."
"Broken?" Edward finished for her when she trailed off.
Before Angel or Willow could protest, Richard picked the red haired witch up and carried her further into the house, all the way to Anita's bedroom. He set Willow on the bed and closed the door; then, Willow watched him as he paced and checked every window to see how the war was progressing.
"Thanks," Willow whispered.
"Yeah," Richard mumbled as he watched their surroundings.
"I... you should go," she said quietly. She rubbed her hands over her arms. Nothing felt right. She felt twitchy, and something darker than she didn't want to identify. "I'm not safe right now."
"You can't hurt me."
Willow heard his growled words and she burst out laughing. Her laughter turned into giggles and that was when Richard turned around to look at her. He looked so surprised and she found that incredibly hilarious. The scent of Warren's blood and innards surfaced in her mind and Richard didn't think that Willow could hurt him. She laughed until her sides ached and until she could barely breathe.
"You are an idiot," Willow growled back, threats and amusement mixed together in that unfamiliar tone of voice that made her stomach tighten in dread and desire at the same time. "You don't know what I've done... what I wanted to do out there. Skinning you alive with a flick of my hand might not kill you, but it will definitely hurt. A lot. You think I can't find ways to---"
"Willow?"
She sucked in a sharp breath when she saw how wide Richard's eyes had become and she shook her head. "Don't come near me," she pleaded, her voice softer. "It's... it's all under the surface. Every fear, every wish. I can feel how much you want Anita all to yourself. I can feel how much you don't want to be Ulfric, or even a werewolf at all. I can feel how much you hate me... and that hate sings to the dark parts of me. It's warm. I can wrap it around myself and use it to recharge my batteries." She whimpered. "I've done too much magic. I shouldn't be here. I should not be here. I should've kept running away."
"Willow... I don't---"
"They sent me away! The coven tried to heal me and it couldn't. I wanted to kill those girls with my bare hands---or, well, my magic---for simply following us across the city!" She exclaimed, cutting him off. "Giles didn't trust me anymore... and when the laws... they all looked at me like I was so strange. Like I was the danger. I am the danger. And now, I've put you guys in the middle of---"
"You didn't put us in the middle of anything, witch," Richard grumbled as he looked back to the window. He turned and faced Willow again. "This was happening before you got here. We didn't know about slayers or the twisted law firm until you showed up."
"But---"
"Do you want to die today?" Richard asked.
Willow swallowed hard and shook her head. "N-no."
"Do you want any of us to die today?"
"No," she whispered.
He gave her a grim smile. "Then, let's call that a plus."
"You should go downstairs," she mumbled.
"And yet, I'm here," he grumbled in reply. "What does that tell you?"
"You love Anita more than you hate her," Willow said softly. "Which is surprising, because I think she thinks it's the other way around."
"Your friends are fighting downstairs and you want to give me relationship advice?"
WIllow swallowed and shrugged. "I can feel it. You. It... whatever. I..." she trailed off and shivered. "It gets too strong and I can't shut it off. I can feel everything. Everything's connected. You, her, everyone downstairs. Even the slayers. I could taste their pulses and feel their fear when I pushed back against them. The rush of conjuring the storm made it easer, but it was the danger they posed that brought everything back," she confessed.
"Why do you think everything's connected?"
"Because it is," she whispered. "We're all connected, to everything in this world. You're connected to Anita... to Jean-Claude... but not in the way you think you are. You're connected to your pack... to the pard, and to the rodere. You're connected to the vampires... to the people. To everything in this world."
"How---"
Willow looked at the bed she was sitting on and concentrated. She had only ever performed the exercise when she was sitting on the ground, so she didn't pull an exotic flower through the mattress. Instead, she pulled a daisy up into the bedroom, using the root system from around the house.
"Is that a spell?" Richard asked as he watched the flower develop.
She shook her head. "It's from outside. Everything's connected, Richard."
"So what does that mean?" he asked as she made the flower return to its natural habitat. "Why does that make you crazy?"
"Because good and evil are connected, too," she whispered. "Can't have one without the other. Nature doesn't exist in a vacuum, or whatever," She frowned and then continued with her confession: "I felt what I could do... and I don't know if I'm strong enough to ignore the evil inside of me."
"Well, if you do, we're probably all screwed," he pointed out. "I guess you knocking me unconscious would be the least of my worries."
Willow nodded. "Yeah."
"How... how can I help?"
The witch gasped and looked up at Richard. She had never expected him to say anything like that to her before---or, really, at all---and it shocked her that the words had left his mouth.
"Look, I don't trust you," Richard continued. "And, I'm not that crazy about you. Side effects of you knocking me out, I guess. But---"
Gunshots rang out, keeping him from saying whatever else he had to say. Willow's eyes widened and she jumped to her feet as a loud commotion came from what she guessed was the kitchen. She could hear hand to hand combat, crashes, and hollering from Gunn and Angel.
"I... I have to go down there," Willow said quietly as the need to protect everyone flooded her system.
"What are you going to do?" Richard asked. He gasped when she turned to look at him. She arched an eyebrow in silent question. "Your eyes..." he said quietly.
"They do that sometimes," she said as she turned back towards the door. "I can make them leave... give you guys a chance to get to the Circus," she said as she made the door open, as she walked towards the doorway. "I can hold them off for a little while and you guys can get to safety."
Richard asked, "What about you?"
Willow was already halfway to the commotion when the question left his lips. She descended into the fray to see Angel fighting hand to hand with Arnia, Spike with Caley, and Gunn and Connor with a short girl with thick, curly brown hair and a light dusting of freckles on her nose and cheeks. Edward and Anita were using gunfire to back them out of the house---or to try to back them out of the house. Micah hadn't been there, but in a flash, he had jumped back into the room, some sort of man and leopard hybrid, with black fur that glistened in the dimly lit home, that was very determined to throw Caley across the room. His bodyguard, Merle, was with him, too. For a brief moment Willow wondered where Richard's guards were but she didn't explore the curiosity much.
She put her hands up, palms facing towards the madness. Lightening cracked across the stormy sky and thunder roared down upon the house.
"Terra, Ignis, Aqua," she said loudly, over the din of battle, "all three... elements of astral I summon thee. Earth by divinity, divinity by earth... give the enemy the power to see that with the strength of the elements by my side---" Willow looked at the slayers and saw one of them pick up a knife so she quickly finished her spell "---no rules of magic I shall abide."
With a mental push, she sent each girl flying out of the house, through the open door towards which Anita and Edward had been trying to shepherd them. She faltered for a moment, the power almost overwhelming and then said, "Get out. Go back home."
"Willow---"
"Get everyone out," Willow said, looking at Anita as Richard came into the room. "Run back the way they came, through the backyard, and get to the Circus."
"What are you going to do?" Anita asked.
Willow frowned. "I don't know."
Angel stepped forward. "Willow... come with us."
"They'll catch up," Willow reminded him as she walked towards the front door. "And I can hold them off." She smiled a little. "Go."
"What about---"
"Resolve face," Willow said quietly as she paused to look at them.
"It's a touch hard to follow your orders when your eyes are all black as coal, Red," Spike pointed out.
Willow shrugged and continued walking towards the door. Angel reached out for her but she waved her hand and pushed him back a few feet. He growled but she ignored him. She went to the doorway and saw the slayers slowly getting to their feet. She couldn't deny that she felt some pleasure in watching Caley look at her with worry lining her face. The slayer knew her magical powers weren't enough and something inside of Willow wanted to show Caley just how 'not enough' those powers really were.
An arm grabbed her. She turned and saw Richard holding onto her arm.
"What?" she demanded.
"It doesn't have to take over you," he said.
"Coming from the man who won't embrace his beast," she said, her voice thick with magic, "that is kind of funny."
"Let me use my beast to remind you how alive and connected the world is," he said, after hiding the flinch her words caused. "So you can come back."
"H-how?" she asked as her tone softened.
"I've done it for Anita and we're connected... but you can connect to me temporarily, through magic, can't you?" he asked.
She swallowed and nodded.
"Do it," he insisted.
She reached out to touch him, to foster that mental connection, but movement from the slayers distracted her. The one whose name she didn't know had thrown a knife towards Willow; the witch reversed its path with a wave of her hand. She heard the girl yelp and then the other girls cried out her name, and Willow knew she was Brogan.
"Go," she growled to Richard before turning away from him and his offer to help.
Anita called out for Richard and then the noise of the others faded away. They were leaving. She looked at the slayers and saw that she had only sliced Brogan's arm and black sweater. Part of her was satisfied, and a little afraid, but part of her wanted to inflict more pain upon those girls.
"You little girls," Willow growled as she walked into the storm, "abusing your powers. You have no idea of what you represent... what you insult."
Caley started to conjure something. Willow smirked and decided to let her finish---she knew that it wouldn't be anything she couldn't handle. The wind howled around them and Willow laughed as the rogue slayer with the unnaturally red hair send some sort of weak energy her way.
Willow absorbed it, made it her own, and then sent it back towards the slayers. They stumbled to the ground, to their hands and knees, and Willow knew she could punish them for attacking her and her new family. They were a family. Even if Willow wasn't sure she wanted to be in Anita's family, she knew she was. And Willow's magic curled up inside of her, threatening to lunge free and act against the force that wanted to hurt her new family.
And then she felt someone's hand on her arm and a cool power flared through her body. She turned her head and Anita was standing next to her. Sirens wailed in the distance and Willow wanted Anita to get as far away as she could, but when she told her to run, Anita refused and slipped her hand into Willow's hand and wove their fingers together.
Before Willow could say or do anything else, she felt trees and bushes against her arms and legs. She felt fur under her hands. The air felt damp and fresh and green. She closed her eyes for a brief second and she saw everyone running through the foliage. Angel and Spike were covered in a blanket each, just in case. Micah, still in his hybrid form, ran with Merle. Gunn followed Connor, inspired by the young man's ability to keep up with everyone else. Claudia was running behind them all, her gun still in her hand. She knew, when she opened her eyes and looked at the slayers, that it was Richard, running behind them, catching up to them.
She could feel the world again---not just the magic that surged through her body, begging to be used. She felt the earth and the trees, the wind that Richard created against his skin when he raced through the trees, and she felt it all through Anita's bond to him. He was the wolf king; she could feel all that the title implied. Anita was something that defied categorisation; but she could still feel the things to which she was connected.
It was all there: the woods, the sky, the house, their bodies, their blood, the warmth of the beast, and the chill of the grave.
Willow pushed with her power and made the girls collapse. Then, she set up a barrier with a few whispered words and she dragged Anita towards the backyard and the wooded area behind it.
Willow almost screamed when big, fur covered arms gathered her up and took her faster and further into the trees. She looked and saw a wolfish man with dangerous amber eyes holding her, his teeth sharp and his breath coming in hot pants against her cheek and nose; without words, she knew it was Richard and she instantly calmed. She looked around and saw that Micah, in his leopard-man form, was carrying Anita.
"Why aren't you with the others?" Willow asked quietly, her voice jarred by the heavy strides Richard was taking.
"We had to come back when we knew you were coming," Richard panted in a somewhat distorted voice.
"O-oh," she breathed.
Minutes later, Richard and Micah were bursting through the bushes and Willow could see the vehicles parked on a relatively quiet street. Angel and Spike were in their car, but she could see that they looked concerned. Micah helped Anita get into a vehicle that Claudia unlocked and then Gunn approached Richard and Willow.
"You okay?" he asked.
Willow nodded. "Y-yeah... I think so," she replied quietly, even though she had no idea how she felt or what she thought. "I'll feel better when I get to the Circus."
"Get her in the car," Richard said, growling a little.
Gunn nodded and took her from Richard's arms. Willow was in Angel's car, sitting between the two vampires in the back seat, before she processed what had happened.
TBC...