Fic: half a world away (she weeps)
I come bearing fic again! This one's been almost three years in the making, I wrote about a page of it while I was still in high school and never wrote any more until now, but still kept the whole plot in my head all that time. So then when I saw the prompts over at the whichwillow ficathon, I knew I would write it, for real this time!
Title: half a world away (she weeps)
Author: artemis_ephesus
Characters: Willow (Giles, Althenea)
Rating: PG (for somewhat graphic instances of violence)
Words: 4100
Summary: Willow's time in England, following on from the events of 6x22: Grave. No spoilers for season 7, if anyone still hasn't seen all of the series.
On her fist day in England, she is sure that they have brought her here to kill her. Execute her, put her to death, release her. She lists the synonyms in her mind, reeling them off one after the other. None of them sound any better than the first. None even come close to what she deserves. None of them come close to the punishment she deserves as a killer.
She doesn’t want to die. But she doesn’t deserve to live, either. Not after what she had done to another human being. Not after Tara.
But they’ve brought her here, across the Atlantic, to stand in front of the Council and the Coven and be judged and then sentenced to death. Guilty, guilty. She repeats the words over and over like growing mantras, a refrain of verdicts. Guilty, guilty, guilty. Anything to keep her mind from the part of her that somehow isn't there anymore.
She can’t remember most of the journey here, only fragments. A familiar-sounding voice speaking to her firmly, without compassion. Willow, I’m taking you to England. There are people there who can help you. The dispassionate voice projected over the loudspeakers at Sunnydale Airport. Paging passengers Rupert Giles and Willow Rosenberg on flight Y455 to London. Please report to your gate immediately for boarding. Flinching as the calloused hand from seat 34B comes to rest on her shoulder, not breaking her blank stare out the tiny window in the next seat. The feeling of wanting to keep falling every time they hit a patch of turbulence.
The rest of time is missing, hours where the darkness overpowers her ability to recognise the world around her. A different kind of darkness to the one she felt stealing its way inside her, clinging to her shadow a few months before, when everything was beautiful and Tara was alive and Willow was not a killer. The darkness that was also a rush of electricity; the addictive ecstasy of feeling herself shooting into a high of swirling stars and lights and terror.
There is no exhilarating, ecstatic rush now. This time it is a darkness of guilt, shame, grief, hurt, flashes of anger and rage shooting in sparks off her body and seeping out of her fingers like black paint; darkness in what she thinks of as her soul.
On arrival in England she is taken up to a room in an old, Edwardian house: brown wooden floorboards, wrought-iron bed frame, firm mattress, unadorned nightstand, small chest of drawers pushed against a whitewashed wall. A tiny window with white curtains allows her a view over the countryside, or at least, as far as she can see through thick grey mist. Her mind takes in the setting mechanically, cataloguing each item and storing it in her brain without her even being conscious of it. Her thoughts are with that place where Tara was; her body sits on the corner of a bed half a world away. She is not sure where she begins or ends.
She drops her few possessions in the corner of the room like a discarded life and curls up on the bed, shoes and all, staring through the whitewashed space in front of her. She’s been brought here and tomorrow they are going to judge her and kill her.
When she manages to slip into sleep it is only to see what she feels played out in surround sound. Her dreams are endless nightmares, haunted by figures with blood glistening over skinless muscles standing, and Tara, Tara, always falling, the gaping hole in her chest blossoming into a flower on her shirt, blood-red splattering on sky-blue. She tosses and turns, whimpering, crying, watching herself transforming over and over, from geeky-Willow into black-eyed vein-y Willow. Tara’s face contorts and her mouth opens into a scream as she watches her lover, this animal, rip the skin of another human being, tearing flesh from flesh, violent, brutal, angry. The sadness and anguish in Tara’s eyes as she watches her lover kill another human being shatters Willow, and she wakes up screaming, the clothes she has been wearing for the last three days drenched with sweat.
How could Tara possibly still love her after what she had done? How could Willow even wish for her forgiveness, Tara's arms around her, Tara's lips on her skin, telling her everything will be ok and I love you?
Tara is dead and Willow murdered her killer. She may as well have killed Tara herself.
* * *
When morning peers in through her tiny window, she still hasn’t slept for more than a few moments at a time. There is no mirror in her room, but if there were, the girl looking out of it would be pale, very pale, with dark rings under her eyes, and cracked lips from the air-conditioning of the airplane. A face framed by limp, shoulder-length red hair, matted in places.
Sometime in the morning there is a knock on her door, and the man she recognises from the plane slowly opens the door. She recalls who he is, the unwanted memories pushing to the surface, but she cannot quite grasp the significance of her remembering. He speaks to her, some part of her brain registers the sounds and translates them into words and meanings. She follows him through the corridors of the old house, stumbling over her own feet, forcing her fatigued body into patterns of movement. A criminal on the way to her own hanging.
The room is cavernous and dim, with shadows playing on the walls in flickering candlelight. Five women are seated at the points of a pentagram drawn on the floorboards. The air is thick with the smell of sage and dragon's blood, crackling. She feels the magics inside her becoming agitated, bristling with suspicion. The man - Giles, she whispers into the room - leads her into the centre of the pentagram. She is terrified. The darkness inside her swells up in a struggle against his arms, she begins to whimper, but he holds her firmly. She drops into the centre, her fear overpowering her grief and allowing her senses to focus on the women around her in frantic succession. A low chant begins.
She wants to be done with the world. She pulls the power together inside her, wanting it to implode, to burst inside her and take her away from this world. What does she have to heal for? There is nothing left. Not now that Tara is gone and will never, ever come back and hold her and kiss her and make the pain stop. The lights start to swirl around her, her eyes cloud over with black, every nerve in her body fires with lightning speed. She can feel other magics reaching out to her, pulling her back to the earth, back into the world, and fights against them, every muscle in her body struggling to free herself from the wiry bonds of their magic. Keeping her here.
And then she sees the man's face in the shadows at the edge of the room. Silvery lines run down his cheeks and his eyes seem to plead with her. He is crying for her.
And she remembers. The images hit her like floodwaters breaking through a dam, all the faces of people she knows and loves. Buffy's strong, compassionate features, Dawn's infectious teenage giggles, Xander's warm arms around her as she cried in his arms at Kingman's Bluff, Anya's mock-annoyed face at her borrowing from the magic box merchandise, Oz's serene, loving half-smile, the faces of Cordelia, Joyce, Riley, Angel, Jesse, even Spike. And floating over the images, the echo of Tara's voice. Shh, shh, baby. It's ok, it's ok to let go of it. You've got to let go, baby. Let go and live for them, baby. Live for me.
And she lets go. She lets the magic rush out of her like the air out of a balloon, cascading from her in black, stinking waves thick and tough as tar. She screams, expelling the last scraps of magic from her body, before the floor looms close to her face and she passes out.
* * *
When she wakes, she is alone in her room again. A tiny sliver of sunlight falls on her face as her eyes open, adjusting to the light. She feels like she has slept for an age, and for the first time since her arrival she feels that her mind is clear, that she can think straight again. The ache of Tara's death is still there, but no longer omnipresent. Willow finds that she is almost, almost, able to bear it.
She stands slowly, delicately; a butterfly emerging from her cocoon into a frail, unknown body. She walks to the window, barefoot and in a long nightgown that isn't hers, draping her blanket around her shoulders to ward off the morning chill. Outside, sunlight cuts through a soft cloud of mist, falling on wet grass, sparkling with tiny droplets of water. The colours almost blind her with their intensity - the deep, lush green of the meadows stretching out into the pale blue and yellow of the sky. Fingers reach up to caress the cold glass. When was the last time that she saw colours like this? Was it when Tara had sung to her on the UC Sunnydale campus, dancing in a swirl of colours and bright magics? At the thought of her girlfriend - once girlfriend - she feels her chest tighten and tears leak from the corners of her eyes. She stands at the window and softly weeps for her dead Tara, unimpeded by anger and hatred at last.
When her eyes are dry again she decides to face the halls, donning her jeans and sweater, which look as if they had been freshly laundered, drawing comfort from their crisp, clean smell. Feet brush over the floorboards as she makes her way to the general direction of downstairs, dreading an encounter with one of the women from the ritual, or even worse; Giles. She doesn't think she can face him, not with her now-clear memories of what she had done to him back in Sunnydale. What she had said to him, even before her black-magic, destroy-the-world rampage. How would he be able to bear to even look at her, let alone forgive her? How would she ever be able to forgive herself? And Giles was just the beginning.
The house is blissfully quiet and empty. Willow tries door after door, eventually managing to find the kitchen. How long had it been since she had last eaten? She could probably do with something in her stomach. The kitchen is large and equipped with all matter of pots and pans and cauldrons, and there is a loaf of bread, yeasty-smelling and inviting, sitting on the roughly hewn wooden table. She fills the kettle on the stove and fiddles with the gas for a moment, finding the right movements to ignite it. She isn't used to gas stoves, only electric ones from back home in California. She used to have an electric kettle too, before Tara came and delighted in making tea the old fashioned way, on the stove. At the memory of those times drinking tea and cuddling under the blankets together, she has to choke back another sob. She wouldn't ever do that again. Not with Tara. Perhaps not with anyone.
The sound of a door opening jolts Willow back into the present. She whirls around, boiling kettle in her hand, face lined with fear, feeling like an intruder in this comfortable, welcoming kitchen: an evil, magic-addicted, world-destroying intruder bent only on chaos and destruction. Hot water splashes over her wrist, she lets out a small hiss as she feel it scorching several layers of skin.
The girl staring at her can only be slightly older than Willow herself; she is wearing glasses and a mane of curly, chestnut-coloured hair around a round, friendly face. She seems to be just as shocked as Willow is to see her, but manages to regain her composure quickly.
“Oh, sorry, I wasn't expecting anyone to be here. Not that you're not welcome, of course, it's just unexpected. I mean, of course I knew you were here and all, but I thought you'd keep sleeping for ages yet.” Magic does that to you,” she says with a lilting Welsh accent, flashing an apologetic smile. It fades when she sees Willow cradling her burned hand. “Oh, I made you burn yourself, I'm so sorry! Here, let some cold water run over it.” She turns the tap on and beckons to Willow, who is still staring at her warily. The girl laughs lightly. “It's ok, I won't bite. I'm Althenea, by the way.” When Willow still doesn't come nearer, her voice becomes softer, and more serious. “And before you go off at me about how ironic that was, let me tell you that you're not going to bite either. The darks magics inside you are gone now, Willow. Besides,” she adds, with a mischievous glint in her eye, “I wouldn't let you at me anyway. I've learnt a lot since my mother finally let me start studying the magics, and I'll have you know that I can very well defend myself! Now, what about that burn? I can use some magic on it, if you want. Help it heal.”
“No!” Willow cries, her voice coming out raspy and harsh, making her flinch slightly. “Sorry, sorry,” she mutters, “but I don't think that's a good idea right now. But water, water's good.” She holds her wrist under the cold stream and feels the redness fade from her hand to her cheeks. Althenea continues to fuss over her, chatting away about the spells she'd been learning and the way her mother was always trying to shield her from anything that could even turn out remotely dangerous. It feels good to have someone talking to her, fussing over her as if she were young Willow with the broken yellow crayon again, but at the same time she feels a deep, burning shame coiling inside her. She doesn't deserve to have someone like Althenea, this bright, bubbling girl so close to her own age, taking care of her, talking to her as if she were some normal person who hadn't ripped the skin off another human being, who hadn't hunted two others like a wildcat hunting its prey, who hadn't tried to end the world on a dark magic high. Suddenly she's tired again, exhausted, wanting nothing better to curl up on her bed and fall into dreams again. She mumbles an excuse to the girl next to her, still chatting away, and slips off along the hall and up the stairs, not noticing the sympathetic glance following her out the door, or the whispered incantation for a dreamless sleep.
* * *
The days pass slowly, but surely, after that first, clear day. She doesn't leave her room much the first day, or the second, or the third, except for silent communal meals in the kitchen and the times when Althenea pops into her room to chatter on about some project she's working on or something else equally insignificant. On the fourth day she challenges herself to wander out to the gardens, sending furtive looks in all directions so as not to run into anyone. She does, inevitably, but all the faces she sees simply smile at her, some sadly, some warily, but smiling all the same. After that, she spends most of her time wandering through the coven's lovingly tended gardens, fingers brushing over fresh green foliage, stopping to caress the closed petals of a rose about to unfurl before she remembers that she is a killer and withdraws her hand hastily, as if burned.
She mourns Tara, privately, in the confines of her own room or while sitting under one of the old, gnarled oak trees fringing the gardens. Some days it hurts so badly that she feels her chest constrict; she can't breathe, her surroundings start to swim and swirl and she curls up in the fetal position on her bed for hours on end. Some days she wishes the coven had taken her life instead of the magics. But some days, the pale blue of the sky makes her realise that she wants to live, that she wants to heal, to atone.
She's started learning proper meditation with Althenea's mother, Meaghan, one of the senior coven members. She's too ashamed of herself and too much in awe of Meaghan to ask whether she was part of the ritual that drained the dark magics from her. In truth, the older witch scares her more than a little. But she's learning, slowly, how to quieten her mind, to filter her thoughts, until there's just Willow, serene, tranquil, composed. At least, she hopes that with practise, that is what she will achieve.
No one talks to her about Warren, or ending the world. And while Willow is relieved that she doesn't have to broach the subject, her dreams continue to haunt her. He is still painted on the backs of her eyelids at night, blood-glistening and lips-screaming, while Tara, Tara, watches, silent tears of rage streaming down her cheeks. She wonders if he will ever stop haunting her. If she deserves to sleep in peace, knowing that she was the one that hunted him, flayed him, killed him. She still wishes that someone, someone, would get angry at her, yell at her, make her suffer for what she did. Sadly, even invoking Anya doesn't help, because wishing vengeance on herself doesn't exactly fulfil Anya's strict criteria for creating a spot of chaos.
And sometimes, when she sits by the stream and concentrates on the clear water dancing over its rocky bed, she feels that maybe she can live a normal life again, without the guilt and shame and nightmares. Like she is a girl again, living and breathing and learning.
* * *
She talks to Giles for the first time in her fifth week in England. She hadn't dared to talk to him before then, but Althenea had suggested it a week ago, if the other girl was anything, it was persistent. In the end Willow had agreed that it was time to face him, even though the thought still filled her with dread. But part of her had needed to hear his voice again, and to ask - perhaps, if he would grant it - his forgiveness.
It is easier than she expects it to be. She waits for him in the gardens, trying to centre herself the way she's been taught, but only succeeding in making all the plants in a two metre radius stiffen and stand on end. Frustrated, she closes her eyes, wishing the sick feeling in her stomach away. The nervousness, the guilt, the fear of losing someone who had always been more of a father to her than anyone else all well up inside her in waves, crashing back into her mind whenever she has just managed to ride them out. She feels a gentle hand on her shoulder, and there he is. Her eyes search his face for anger, repulsion, disgust, but they find only kind, blue eyes and the corners of his mouth turned up into that small smile she only ever notices him wearing with his slayer.
"Willow," he says, and there is genuine warmth in his voice. "I'm so very happy to see you." Her breath hitches and she can't stop the tears that begin to leak from the corner of her eyes. He takes her hand in his, and she flinches at the contact, fingers on fingers, but then feels its warmth and strength spread into her palm like a warm summer's day.
"Giles." She doesn't quite trust her own voice to make the sounds of his name. "Giles, I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry for everything."
The burning lump in her throat swells, and all she can do is cry as his arms wrap around her shaking body and hold her close. "Just let it all out, dear one. I know. Just let it all out."
* * *Three weeks later, two figures can be seen walking across the fields and meadows of the land surrounding the coven's headquarters. They walk as equals now, with a new respect for the wisdom and power of the other. The witch is not the same one she was two months ago; her step is lighter, though sadness still seeps from her fingers like wisps of grey smoke. Sadness for what was, but no more will be. A soft sadness, like the song of a swan drifting on the breeze, a warm sadness, like that of the setting sun on a particularly beautiful day. A hawk flies overhead, calling to its mate in the forest a while away.
They continue to wander across the fields and back towards the coven's buildings until they reach Willow's favourite place, under the drooping branches of the tree that was her namesake, where the roots reach down through the earth to the bank of the stream at the edge of the gardens. They sit, cross-legged and opposite each other. She draws out several objects from the bag she has been carrying: a small bundle of marigolds and rosemary, a doll's eye crystal that Tara gave her just after they had fallen in love, a small wooden box and a black candle in a small jar. Her fingertips lingering on the smooth surface of the crystal as she places it on the soft ground, smiling sadly as she remembers the first time she held it in her hand.
"Are you ready, Willow?" Giles asks gently, his hand coming to rest on her knee for a moment. "There's nothing to say that you can't do this tomorrow, or even next week. It's all up to you."
Willow looks up, strands of hair falling across her face like he remembers it from those long afternoons in the Sunnydale High library, which feels like so many years ago. How she had changed from that shy, insecure girl she had been when he first met her. Now she sat opposite him: a strong (like an Amazon), powerful young woman, who had seen more than her share of pain and sorrow and anger and who had managed to find herself again even through it all.
"I'm ok, Giles. I want to do this now. It feels right, you know? Like she's waiting" Willow replies, opening the small box and sprinkling tiny crystals of salt on the earth around them. She feels strangely at peace. Sad, yes, but at no longer angry.
"I'm glad, Willow. I'm sure that she's watching you, from wherever she may be now." Giles takes her hand in his. "And I'm here for you. I know I haven't always been, but I will do everything in my power to make up for it now." Willow smiles softly.
It is quiet magic, not like that which she used in Sunnydale, which was noisy and wild. This magic is simpler, deeper, older, drawn from the air above and the earth below, cradling her in between. No less powerful than what she has drawn on before, but more controlled, more forgiving this time. It is a simple ritual; softly spoken words and gestures, the lighting of a candle, the whispering of a prayer. There is no dramatic flourish of latin incantations, only quiet remembrance and connection to something that is old and strong, quietly responding to her requests. Willow pours out her heart to Tara, letting the words carry on the breeze that has picked up, spiralling up to the skies. And from far away, she even hears a whispered reply, for love, and sorrow, and forgiveness.
* * *
Before she knows, she is on a plane once again, heading back to Sunnydale, to her friends - her family - there. She still feels the familiar tugging in her stomach, the anxious anticipation of seeing them again so soon after the destruction she left them with, but she can cope with it now. Soon the tyres will touch down on the tarmac with a jolt and she will be home, in the place where she belongs. And she will live and breathe and love, and remember the girl who shared in those things with her, day and night, for the time they had together. Always remember.
Title: half a world away (she weeps)
Author: artemis_ephesus
Characters: Willow (Giles, Althenea)
Rating: PG (for somewhat graphic instances of violence)
Words: 4100
Summary: Willow's time in England, following on from the events of 6x22: Grave. No spoilers for season 7, if anyone still hasn't seen all of the series.
On her fist day in England, she is sure that they have brought her here to kill her. Execute her, put her to death, release her. She lists the synonyms in her mind, reeling them off one after the other. None of them sound any better than the first. None even come close to what she deserves. None of them come close to the punishment she deserves as a killer.
She doesn’t want to die. But she doesn’t deserve to live, either. Not after what she had done to another human being. Not after Tara.
But they’ve brought her here, across the Atlantic, to stand in front of the Council and the Coven and be judged and then sentenced to death. Guilty, guilty. She repeats the words over and over like growing mantras, a refrain of verdicts. Guilty, guilty, guilty. Anything to keep her mind from the part of her that somehow isn't there anymore.
She can’t remember most of the journey here, only fragments. A familiar-sounding voice speaking to her firmly, without compassion. Willow, I’m taking you to England. There are people there who can help you. The dispassionate voice projected over the loudspeakers at Sunnydale Airport. Paging passengers Rupert Giles and Willow Rosenberg on flight Y455 to London. Please report to your gate immediately for boarding. Flinching as the calloused hand from seat 34B comes to rest on her shoulder, not breaking her blank stare out the tiny window in the next seat. The feeling of wanting to keep falling every time they hit a patch of turbulence.
The rest of time is missing, hours where the darkness overpowers her ability to recognise the world around her. A different kind of darkness to the one she felt stealing its way inside her, clinging to her shadow a few months before, when everything was beautiful and Tara was alive and Willow was not a killer. The darkness that was also a rush of electricity; the addictive ecstasy of feeling herself shooting into a high of swirling stars and lights and terror.
There is no exhilarating, ecstatic rush now. This time it is a darkness of guilt, shame, grief, hurt, flashes of anger and rage shooting in sparks off her body and seeping out of her fingers like black paint; darkness in what she thinks of as her soul.
On arrival in England she is taken up to a room in an old, Edwardian house: brown wooden floorboards, wrought-iron bed frame, firm mattress, unadorned nightstand, small chest of drawers pushed against a whitewashed wall. A tiny window with white curtains allows her a view over the countryside, or at least, as far as she can see through thick grey mist. Her mind takes in the setting mechanically, cataloguing each item and storing it in her brain without her even being conscious of it. Her thoughts are with that place where Tara was; her body sits on the corner of a bed half a world away. She is not sure where she begins or ends.
She drops her few possessions in the corner of the room like a discarded life and curls up on the bed, shoes and all, staring through the whitewashed space in front of her. She’s been brought here and tomorrow they are going to judge her and kill her.
When she manages to slip into sleep it is only to see what she feels played out in surround sound. Her dreams are endless nightmares, haunted by figures with blood glistening over skinless muscles standing, and Tara, Tara, always falling, the gaping hole in her chest blossoming into a flower on her shirt, blood-red splattering on sky-blue. She tosses and turns, whimpering, crying, watching herself transforming over and over, from geeky-Willow into black-eyed vein-y Willow. Tara’s face contorts and her mouth opens into a scream as she watches her lover, this animal, rip the skin of another human being, tearing flesh from flesh, violent, brutal, angry. The sadness and anguish in Tara’s eyes as she watches her lover kill another human being shatters Willow, and she wakes up screaming, the clothes she has been wearing for the last three days drenched with sweat.
How could Tara possibly still love her after what she had done? How could Willow even wish for her forgiveness, Tara's arms around her, Tara's lips on her skin, telling her everything will be ok and I love you?
Tara is dead and Willow murdered her killer. She may as well have killed Tara herself.
* * *
When morning peers in through her tiny window, she still hasn’t slept for more than a few moments at a time. There is no mirror in her room, but if there were, the girl looking out of it would be pale, very pale, with dark rings under her eyes, and cracked lips from the air-conditioning of the airplane. A face framed by limp, shoulder-length red hair, matted in places.
Sometime in the morning there is a knock on her door, and the man she recognises from the plane slowly opens the door. She recalls who he is, the unwanted memories pushing to the surface, but she cannot quite grasp the significance of her remembering. He speaks to her, some part of her brain registers the sounds and translates them into words and meanings. She follows him through the corridors of the old house, stumbling over her own feet, forcing her fatigued body into patterns of movement. A criminal on the way to her own hanging.
The room is cavernous and dim, with shadows playing on the walls in flickering candlelight. Five women are seated at the points of a pentagram drawn on the floorboards. The air is thick with the smell of sage and dragon's blood, crackling. She feels the magics inside her becoming agitated, bristling with suspicion. The man - Giles, she whispers into the room - leads her into the centre of the pentagram. She is terrified. The darkness inside her swells up in a struggle against his arms, she begins to whimper, but he holds her firmly. She drops into the centre, her fear overpowering her grief and allowing her senses to focus on the women around her in frantic succession. A low chant begins.
She wants to be done with the world. She pulls the power together inside her, wanting it to implode, to burst inside her and take her away from this world. What does she have to heal for? There is nothing left. Not now that Tara is gone and will never, ever come back and hold her and kiss her and make the pain stop. The lights start to swirl around her, her eyes cloud over with black, every nerve in her body fires with lightning speed. She can feel other magics reaching out to her, pulling her back to the earth, back into the world, and fights against them, every muscle in her body struggling to free herself from the wiry bonds of their magic. Keeping her here.
And then she sees the man's face in the shadows at the edge of the room. Silvery lines run down his cheeks and his eyes seem to plead with her. He is crying for her.
And she remembers. The images hit her like floodwaters breaking through a dam, all the faces of people she knows and loves. Buffy's strong, compassionate features, Dawn's infectious teenage giggles, Xander's warm arms around her as she cried in his arms at Kingman's Bluff, Anya's mock-annoyed face at her borrowing from the magic box merchandise, Oz's serene, loving half-smile, the faces of Cordelia, Joyce, Riley, Angel, Jesse, even Spike. And floating over the images, the echo of Tara's voice. Shh, shh, baby. It's ok, it's ok to let go of it. You've got to let go, baby. Let go and live for them, baby. Live for me.
And she lets go. She lets the magic rush out of her like the air out of a balloon, cascading from her in black, stinking waves thick and tough as tar. She screams, expelling the last scraps of magic from her body, before the floor looms close to her face and she passes out.
* * *
When she wakes, she is alone in her room again. A tiny sliver of sunlight falls on her face as her eyes open, adjusting to the light. She feels like she has slept for an age, and for the first time since her arrival she feels that her mind is clear, that she can think straight again. The ache of Tara's death is still there, but no longer omnipresent. Willow finds that she is almost, almost, able to bear it.
She stands slowly, delicately; a butterfly emerging from her cocoon into a frail, unknown body. She walks to the window, barefoot and in a long nightgown that isn't hers, draping her blanket around her shoulders to ward off the morning chill. Outside, sunlight cuts through a soft cloud of mist, falling on wet grass, sparkling with tiny droplets of water. The colours almost blind her with their intensity - the deep, lush green of the meadows stretching out into the pale blue and yellow of the sky. Fingers reach up to caress the cold glass. When was the last time that she saw colours like this? Was it when Tara had sung to her on the UC Sunnydale campus, dancing in a swirl of colours and bright magics? At the thought of her girlfriend - once girlfriend - she feels her chest tighten and tears leak from the corners of her eyes. She stands at the window and softly weeps for her dead Tara, unimpeded by anger and hatred at last.
When her eyes are dry again she decides to face the halls, donning her jeans and sweater, which look as if they had been freshly laundered, drawing comfort from their crisp, clean smell. Feet brush over the floorboards as she makes her way to the general direction of downstairs, dreading an encounter with one of the women from the ritual, or even worse; Giles. She doesn't think she can face him, not with her now-clear memories of what she had done to him back in Sunnydale. What she had said to him, even before her black-magic, destroy-the-world rampage. How would he be able to bear to even look at her, let alone forgive her? How would she ever be able to forgive herself? And Giles was just the beginning.
The house is blissfully quiet and empty. Willow tries door after door, eventually managing to find the kitchen. How long had it been since she had last eaten? She could probably do with something in her stomach. The kitchen is large and equipped with all matter of pots and pans and cauldrons, and there is a loaf of bread, yeasty-smelling and inviting, sitting on the roughly hewn wooden table. She fills the kettle on the stove and fiddles with the gas for a moment, finding the right movements to ignite it. She isn't used to gas stoves, only electric ones from back home in California. She used to have an electric kettle too, before Tara came and delighted in making tea the old fashioned way, on the stove. At the memory of those times drinking tea and cuddling under the blankets together, she has to choke back another sob. She wouldn't ever do that again. Not with Tara. Perhaps not with anyone.
The sound of a door opening jolts Willow back into the present. She whirls around, boiling kettle in her hand, face lined with fear, feeling like an intruder in this comfortable, welcoming kitchen: an evil, magic-addicted, world-destroying intruder bent only on chaos and destruction. Hot water splashes over her wrist, she lets out a small hiss as she feel it scorching several layers of skin.
The girl staring at her can only be slightly older than Willow herself; she is wearing glasses and a mane of curly, chestnut-coloured hair around a round, friendly face. She seems to be just as shocked as Willow is to see her, but manages to regain her composure quickly.
“Oh, sorry, I wasn't expecting anyone to be here. Not that you're not welcome, of course, it's just unexpected. I mean, of course I knew you were here and all, but I thought you'd keep sleeping for ages yet.” Magic does that to you,” she says with a lilting Welsh accent, flashing an apologetic smile. It fades when she sees Willow cradling her burned hand. “Oh, I made you burn yourself, I'm so sorry! Here, let some cold water run over it.” She turns the tap on and beckons to Willow, who is still staring at her warily. The girl laughs lightly. “It's ok, I won't bite. I'm Althenea, by the way.” When Willow still doesn't come nearer, her voice becomes softer, and more serious. “And before you go off at me about how ironic that was, let me tell you that you're not going to bite either. The darks magics inside you are gone now, Willow. Besides,” she adds, with a mischievous glint in her eye, “I wouldn't let you at me anyway. I've learnt a lot since my mother finally let me start studying the magics, and I'll have you know that I can very well defend myself! Now, what about that burn? I can use some magic on it, if you want. Help it heal.”
“No!” Willow cries, her voice coming out raspy and harsh, making her flinch slightly. “Sorry, sorry,” she mutters, “but I don't think that's a good idea right now. But water, water's good.” She holds her wrist under the cold stream and feels the redness fade from her hand to her cheeks. Althenea continues to fuss over her, chatting away about the spells she'd been learning and the way her mother was always trying to shield her from anything that could even turn out remotely dangerous. It feels good to have someone talking to her, fussing over her as if she were young Willow with the broken yellow crayon again, but at the same time she feels a deep, burning shame coiling inside her. She doesn't deserve to have someone like Althenea, this bright, bubbling girl so close to her own age, taking care of her, talking to her as if she were some normal person who hadn't ripped the skin off another human being, who hadn't hunted two others like a wildcat hunting its prey, who hadn't tried to end the world on a dark magic high. Suddenly she's tired again, exhausted, wanting nothing better to curl up on her bed and fall into dreams again. She mumbles an excuse to the girl next to her, still chatting away, and slips off along the hall and up the stairs, not noticing the sympathetic glance following her out the door, or the whispered incantation for a dreamless sleep.
* * *
The days pass slowly, but surely, after that first, clear day. She doesn't leave her room much the first day, or the second, or the third, except for silent communal meals in the kitchen and the times when Althenea pops into her room to chatter on about some project she's working on or something else equally insignificant. On the fourth day she challenges herself to wander out to the gardens, sending furtive looks in all directions so as not to run into anyone. She does, inevitably, but all the faces she sees simply smile at her, some sadly, some warily, but smiling all the same. After that, she spends most of her time wandering through the coven's lovingly tended gardens, fingers brushing over fresh green foliage, stopping to caress the closed petals of a rose about to unfurl before she remembers that she is a killer and withdraws her hand hastily, as if burned.
She mourns Tara, privately, in the confines of her own room or while sitting under one of the old, gnarled oak trees fringing the gardens. Some days it hurts so badly that she feels her chest constrict; she can't breathe, her surroundings start to swim and swirl and she curls up in the fetal position on her bed for hours on end. Some days she wishes the coven had taken her life instead of the magics. But some days, the pale blue of the sky makes her realise that she wants to live, that she wants to heal, to atone.
She's started learning proper meditation with Althenea's mother, Meaghan, one of the senior coven members. She's too ashamed of herself and too much in awe of Meaghan to ask whether she was part of the ritual that drained the dark magics from her. In truth, the older witch scares her more than a little. But she's learning, slowly, how to quieten her mind, to filter her thoughts, until there's just Willow, serene, tranquil, composed. At least, she hopes that with practise, that is what she will achieve.
No one talks to her about Warren, or ending the world. And while Willow is relieved that she doesn't have to broach the subject, her dreams continue to haunt her. He is still painted on the backs of her eyelids at night, blood-glistening and lips-screaming, while Tara, Tara, watches, silent tears of rage streaming down her cheeks. She wonders if he will ever stop haunting her. If she deserves to sleep in peace, knowing that she was the one that hunted him, flayed him, killed him. She still wishes that someone, someone, would get angry at her, yell at her, make her suffer for what she did. Sadly, even invoking Anya doesn't help, because wishing vengeance on herself doesn't exactly fulfil Anya's strict criteria for creating a spot of chaos.
And sometimes, when she sits by the stream and concentrates on the clear water dancing over its rocky bed, she feels that maybe she can live a normal life again, without the guilt and shame and nightmares. Like she is a girl again, living and breathing and learning.
* * *
She talks to Giles for the first time in her fifth week in England. She hadn't dared to talk to him before then, but Althenea had suggested it a week ago, if the other girl was anything, it was persistent. In the end Willow had agreed that it was time to face him, even though the thought still filled her with dread. But part of her had needed to hear his voice again, and to ask - perhaps, if he would grant it - his forgiveness.
It is easier than she expects it to be. She waits for him in the gardens, trying to centre herself the way she's been taught, but only succeeding in making all the plants in a two metre radius stiffen and stand on end. Frustrated, she closes her eyes, wishing the sick feeling in her stomach away. The nervousness, the guilt, the fear of losing someone who had always been more of a father to her than anyone else all well up inside her in waves, crashing back into her mind whenever she has just managed to ride them out. She feels a gentle hand on her shoulder, and there he is. Her eyes search his face for anger, repulsion, disgust, but they find only kind, blue eyes and the corners of his mouth turned up into that small smile she only ever notices him wearing with his slayer.
"Willow," he says, and there is genuine warmth in his voice. "I'm so very happy to see you." Her breath hitches and she can't stop the tears that begin to leak from the corner of her eyes. He takes her hand in his, and she flinches at the contact, fingers on fingers, but then feels its warmth and strength spread into her palm like a warm summer's day.
"Giles." She doesn't quite trust her own voice to make the sounds of his name. "Giles, I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry for everything."
The burning lump in her throat swells, and all she can do is cry as his arms wrap around her shaking body and hold her close. "Just let it all out, dear one. I know. Just let it all out."
* * *Three weeks later, two figures can be seen walking across the fields and meadows of the land surrounding the coven's headquarters. They walk as equals now, with a new respect for the wisdom and power of the other. The witch is not the same one she was two months ago; her step is lighter, though sadness still seeps from her fingers like wisps of grey smoke. Sadness for what was, but no more will be. A soft sadness, like the song of a swan drifting on the breeze, a warm sadness, like that of the setting sun on a particularly beautiful day. A hawk flies overhead, calling to its mate in the forest a while away.
They continue to wander across the fields and back towards the coven's buildings until they reach Willow's favourite place, under the drooping branches of the tree that was her namesake, where the roots reach down through the earth to the bank of the stream at the edge of the gardens. They sit, cross-legged and opposite each other. She draws out several objects from the bag she has been carrying: a small bundle of marigolds and rosemary, a doll's eye crystal that Tara gave her just after they had fallen in love, a small wooden box and a black candle in a small jar. Her fingertips lingering on the smooth surface of the crystal as she places it on the soft ground, smiling sadly as she remembers the first time she held it in her hand.
"Are you ready, Willow?" Giles asks gently, his hand coming to rest on her knee for a moment. "There's nothing to say that you can't do this tomorrow, or even next week. It's all up to you."
Willow looks up, strands of hair falling across her face like he remembers it from those long afternoons in the Sunnydale High library, which feels like so many years ago. How she had changed from that shy, insecure girl she had been when he first met her. Now she sat opposite him: a strong (like an Amazon), powerful young woman, who had seen more than her share of pain and sorrow and anger and who had managed to find herself again even through it all.
"I'm ok, Giles. I want to do this now. It feels right, you know? Like she's waiting" Willow replies, opening the small box and sprinkling tiny crystals of salt on the earth around them. She feels strangely at peace. Sad, yes, but at no longer angry.
"I'm glad, Willow. I'm sure that she's watching you, from wherever she may be now." Giles takes her hand in his. "And I'm here for you. I know I haven't always been, but I will do everything in my power to make up for it now." Willow smiles softly.
It is quiet magic, not like that which she used in Sunnydale, which was noisy and wild. This magic is simpler, deeper, older, drawn from the air above and the earth below, cradling her in between. No less powerful than what she has drawn on before, but more controlled, more forgiving this time. It is a simple ritual; softly spoken words and gestures, the lighting of a candle, the whispering of a prayer. There is no dramatic flourish of latin incantations, only quiet remembrance and connection to something that is old and strong, quietly responding to her requests. Willow pours out her heart to Tara, letting the words carry on the breeze that has picked up, spiralling up to the skies. And from far away, she even hears a whispered reply, for love, and sorrow, and forgiveness.
* * *
Before she knows, she is on a plane once again, heading back to Sunnydale, to her friends - her family - there. She still feels the familiar tugging in her stomach, the anxious anticipation of seeing them again so soon after the destruction she left them with, but she can cope with it now. Soon the tyres will touch down on the tarmac with a jolt and she will be home, in the place where she belongs. And she will live and breathe and love, and remember the girl who shared in those things with her, day and night, for the time they had together. Always remember.