Childe of my Heart ~ Chapter Twenty-three
by Shanyah
 

Spike didn’t find a Gangr’al twice his size to pulverize on Main Floor. He did, however, bet his way into a fight with a bragging Sixth Ranker and stayed on in the gaming pit on the back of winning the fight. Several fights later, he’d won a deep gash on his forearm, three cartons of cigarettes and booty of dubious value.

“Jude,” he said. “Look me up when you’ve a real demon to fight me.”

He packed his winnings into the satchel, took himself off to his favorite refreshment stand in a quiet corner of the Town Square and smiled at his usual on-street table. The party of four Earners grunted at him and moved to alternative seats, puffed out chests saying, ‘you don’t scare us, we were shifting to a table with a view anyhow.’ Spike’s table wasn’t good for close-up viewing of the market, and the sounds of fighting from the pit were stifled by distance. But Spike claimed that far back table because it afforded him a spread out picture of the Town Square: seven gates around the Square, each gate opening onto a path, each path leading into a tunnel. Six of these paths privileged with street lighting and the mouths of their tunnels glowing yellow-orange with torchlight. The final gate, the one closest to him, was the odd man out. It opened onto a path that had no street lighting and that darkened into a pitch-black tunnel mouth.

The proprietor of the drinks stall brought out a jug of blood and a mug, set them on Spike’s table and left, no words exchanged. Spike occupied himself with drinking blood and watching his wound knit. He healed quicker with every passing day. It made sense, he supposed, that his demon would grow stronger in a place like this and therefore accelerate his healing. Truth be told, he’d been worried that it had outgrown him. But listening to the sounds of violence from the dirt pit without feeling the pull to wade back in, Spike came to the happy conclusion that he’d filled out into his demon, was in charge again. Had to be in charge, it’s what made the difference between minion and master. Minion was ruled by his fangs, Master ruled his fangs. If it moves, shag it, was the minion’s creed; a Master drew the line at the six-legged being. Minion was at the mercy of his greed for all things brutal, Master was at the mercy of no one. Master Spike downed his last mug of blood and left for home, shook off his game face as he walked into his room.

Had he not retracted the fangs outside the door, they likely would’ve cringed back into his gums by themselves seeing the really too syrupy scene on his hearth. Xander, Dawn and Fred lay in a cozy row on the fluffy, pale gray rug, Fred on her back, dropped grapes into her mouth, silly smile as she chewed. Xander on his side and facing the door, dozed with his eyes open. Dawn on her stomach, read from the black book that went everywhere with her.

“Hey Spike,” Dawn briefly glanced at him and went back to her book. “One door requiring little labour,” she read, “the other door requiring much, for it has four keys and each key bears two teeth. The former door is hailed as the Saint's Way, the latter as the Devil's Pass; the doors being sisters of true likeness...”

“And the cupboard was bare,” Spike intruded, turning away from the open wardrobe doors to face the cozy trio.

“What’s in the bulgy bag, Mi Amo?” Xander asked.

After a moment’s giddiness at that guileless ‘Mi Amo’, Spike emptied the satchel on the rug. The cigarettes, three malachite encrusted goblets and a handful of gold coins and assorted pieces of jewellery tumbled out, causing Dawn to gasp, “we’re rich!”

“Hardly,” Spike took off his tunic, boots and socks and stuffed the tunic and socks into the laundry basket. “Where’s all the bathrobes gone? Got to get the bloody washing done Harris.”

“There’s that black dressing gown on a hanger, use that.”

“And towel?”

“New stack in the bathroom closet and I’ll start on the washing tomorrow,” Xander scooped up a pair of fishbone rings from the pile of winnings, tilted onto his front and brought the rings close to his face.

“Until then, I’ll walk around in the buff shall I?” Spike asked, growled almost.

“I’m not the wife of you Spike, of any of you come to think of it.” Xander’s outburst was a fifth presence in the room, one that became uncomfortable with Xander’s strained attempt to rectify, “You could all help a lot more around here.”

He’s frightened, Spike thought, of used socks. There Xander went again, fidgeting with the rings and aiming shifty looks at the washing basket.

Spike stepped into a pair of flip-flops, wedged the lid onto the basket and grasped its handles. “Fair comment,” he said. “I stake out the gaming pits for information as usual, but slight change to the rest of the routine. Harris cooks, gets the shopping in and sees to the furnace and fire pit. Nibblet and Fred see to cleaning and dishwashing. We all do our own laundry, yeah?”

“Not yeah, Spike. Shopping’s not a chore and cooking’s easy compared to cleaning the bathroom, furnace room and courtyard…and doing the dishes three times a day. Then we’ve still got training and researching and-”

“Fine,” hangers clanged in the wardrobe as Spike pulled out the dressing gown. “Nibblet cooks, chops wood and wakes up before anyone else to light the furnace and fire-pit, keeps them burning all day long and half the night, and did I mention, Bit, that I get tetchy when my blood’s not heated just so?” Hamper in his arms and dressing gown over his shoulder, he walked out on Dawn’s graceless retraction.

*    *    *    *

Lathered from head to toe, he stepped back into the hot shower spray and thought on Xander. Dread of socks was a new one on him, but the solution for all types of dread was universal. Nip fear in the bud, he always said, best way to do that was to talk about it, or if you were a vampire, take an iron rod to it. Not that he’d have long to wait before Harris talked, he always did eventually, whether with eyes or hands, Xander talked. Talked loudest with the gob, couldn’t keep it shut. Was Xander’s failing, that mouth.

He turned the taps off, toweled dry and wrapped the robe on. And that was another funny thing, Xander buying him stuff. He hadn’t asked Harris to buy him this very nice gown – black silk, knee length, deep pockets, could’ve picked it himself – or the matching pair of jim-jams. Definitely hadn’t asked for those pairs of flaming moccasins Xander had bought him last week. The black pair was alright, he might wear them one day when his name was Florence.

He got back to the room and sure enough, Harris was in full-throttle yapping.

Pillows that had been thrown on the floor were now arranged neatly on the bed - Xander’s apology.

The satchel was re-packed and hung on the door, and a packet of cigarettes left out on the bedside cabinet - Xander’s second apology.

The girls were gone, in a hurry seeing as Dawn’s book had been forgotten on the table - Xander’s hope for a noisy boys’ night in.

Good, Spike thought, going to warm by the fire.

He bent his chin to his chest, enjoying the heat as it spread through his calves and up the back of his thighs. Xander sat not a foot away from him, his study of the wishbone rings speaking of his love for pretty things.

The rings had caught Spike’s attention straight away too. Broad, curved, silver thumb rings, one overlaid with sheer gold-red metal, the other in gold-purple. It was as though the jeweler had taken an anvil to a sheet of gold, hammered until the sheet’s thickness was thinner than a veil’s and then fused the gold leaf over the rings, spraying ruby dust on one and amethyst dust on the other.  

Xander tried them on, letting out a soft cluck of disappointment when they stuck at his thumb’s first knuckle.

“Here,” Spike moved closer and extended his arm down, holding his thumb up against Xander’s. “Jude reckons they’re a matching pair, can’t have one without the other,” he said as Xander transferred the rings to his thumb, twisting them round until their arches were stacked and their seams soldered together.

“They’re knock-outs,” the smile up at him was Xander’s truce and it prodded Spike into irritated arousal.

All Xander had to do to rev his randy was sit on the square of fur with his legs tucked under him and a smile on his face. Sit and smile, so bloody easy. It was a joke to say he’d fucked Harris. The little backseat driver had done the fucking. Not tonight though.

He clasped Xander’s hand and pulled him up, slid both hands down and round to link his fingers in the small of Xander’s back. The gap between their faces and bodies was the joke, a gasp of air that couldn’t seriously call itself space. Xander’s smile went goofy, the slight backward arching of his back a subtle message to Spike: that’s close enough…too close. Step the hell back. Spike didn’t smile and didn’t step to anywhere. He tightened his arms in unsubtle rejoinder: can hold you here all night if I want and you can’t stop me.

A frown from Xander, a nibble on his lower lips. He veered his glance from Spike’s; right, up, right, down, another nibble, eyes left. Melted wax pooled around a low burning candle on the mantelshelf, flame of the drowning wick guttering. A log popped in the fireplace, sap dripped from it and hissed in the fire. The hissing died down and still Spike’s arms were steel bands, his gaze tight on Xander’s wavering one.

“What?” Xander met his eye, glares galore.

Spike slid his hands to his elbows, his forearms now pressing where his fingers had been linked. Gap between their bodies banished, he took care of the other one, the one between their faces, laying his lips on Xander’s as he said, “I’m going to fuck you tonight. Going to teach you the good of slow.”

Xander drew in a breath, hissed it in like the fire had been hissing a minute past.

*    *    *    *

“Did you see how Spike ate from Xander’s plate at lunch?” Fred asked, raising the shoji screen along one side of the bed.

Dawn climbed into bed and rolled to the screen side, leaving the wall side for Fred. “So what?”

“He did it last night too,” Fred closed the shutters.

“Please leave a shutter open, it gets so hot,” Dawn burrowed under the three blankets on their bed and pulled the sheet around her ears. “Spike has a thing for human cuisine and Xander’s plate was closest.”

Fred crawled over Dawn and got into bed. “Hm,” she said.

“What do you mean hm?”

“He didn’t try to stab Xander with the fork. Don’t you find that just a little peculiar?” Fred asked.

Hand flapping, Dawn beat the sheet back from around her face. She took a good look at Fred then burst out laughing. Howled in fact, mouth agape, tears gathering in the corners of her eyes.

“I’m way off, huh?” Fred said with a smile.

Dawn’s nodding was frantic, her laughter choking her. “You’re way out there. Way!” She brought her amusement under control with considerable difficulty and arranged the bedcovers around them both. “Fred,” she smiled, “Xander almost got married and Spike would marry Buffy in a beat. Those guys are straight as you and I,” she eyed Fred speculatively, “you are straight?”

Fred faced the wall and hugged her pillow, snuggling into it. “Get some rest, Dawnie. You have wood chopping at first light.”

*    *    *    *

He could kiss Xander for an age. Did it too, undressed him and kissed him, slipping the buttons on his tunic as slowly as he drew Xander’s tongue into his mouth. Dancing and not dueling for a change, his palms skating on fire-warmed skin, lips skimming on a hardened nipple, fingers stroking stubble-roughened jaw, cock grinding on Xander’s in slow motion frottage. Xander was an apt pupil, cupped him over the gown and, hot palms rubbing silk into his ass, matched him move for move, muffled sigh for whisper. Offered his mouth for deep, lazy kisses, taught him a thing or two, actually, kissed him dizzy. Brought the lube and read his mood, did nothing to speed up the prepping. Xander stayed in the zone with him…until they were laying on the rug, a couple of cushions under Xander’s hips and Xander’s bucking ass under his hips.

“Spike…Spike, go in harder.”

He took hold of Xander’s hips and clasped him close, glided home inch by inch. They panted, out of synch breathing, conflicting groans.

“Don’t fight me luv, move with me.”

“I will if you move faster,” Xander said, his bucking thwarted by the strength in Spike’s hips.

Spike supported his weight on his hands either side of Xander’s elbows and settled into steady thrusts. “With me,” he said.

“I can’t,” Xander humped the pillows, lost in a rhythm of his own.

Waiting to be heard over the echo of the pissed tone, Spike bent his brow to the back of Xander’s head. “Because I’m hurting you?” He asked, moving his lips in the dark hair.

“Because you’re not,” Xander jerked his head away, “you’re not and it’s too much, I can’t.”

His gut wrenched, understanding the meaningful revelation in there. His lust-addled brain failed to work out the meaningful, best it came up with was, “Want me to stop?”

“No…no,” panic.

“So work with me,” he drew back and swiveled his hips as he sank in, brushed against that hard nub inside Xander. “Yeah pet, that’s it,” he said at Xander’s sudden whine. “That’s it,” he repeated, knotted with hunger but keeping his thrusts smooth, curling his toes into the rug as Xander’s whine broke into groaning. Gradual as a second turns into an hour, he lowered onto Xander, draped onto him fully, said what the man wanted to hear, gave him what he needed to feel. “I’ll make it good if you let me,” he said, “make it so good it hurts. Pain of pleasure, luv, both you and me screaming with it, if you let me take you my way.”

When Xander moved with him, jutting his ass up for the slow slide in, he tongue-tracked the blood cruising in Xander’s jugular, latched his lips on the Claim Mark he wished was there and fucked his boy the sweet, long song of a piano. Took it up a note and another note. Stoked them to the brink, then drifted them down from it, unmoving but for the pulsing of his cock against Xander’s slick walls. Soaked up the heat and started over.

And when Xander was hoarse, when his arms were dimpled with sweat and his hair damp with it, his back locked out with fine tremors…when the pain of pleasure became too acute for Spike to hold back from, the taste of copper-under-skin too enticing, he levered up, bringing Xander onto knees and elbows. He took a handful of his robe, wrapped silk and fist around Xander’s dripping, diamond hard erection and jacked. Xander swore inventive and colorful, his voice rough and rich, his come melding the silk to Spike’s palm.

Spike inhaled and let go, coming and coming and…god, just about blacking out.

*    *    *    *

The floor’s chill infiltrated the rug and the low fire gave out negligible warmth. No longer comfortable, Xander and Spike disentangled and cleaned up. Xander pulled on pajama bottoms and fell into bed, asleep before his head hit the pillow. Spike shimmied into his last pair of clean trousers, put on his coat and went out, clicking the door to.

Lighting a cigarette, he patrolled the yard’s walled fence, stopped to drop the gate latch into place. A breeze eddied around his ankles when he got to the girls’ door and he heard the characteristic banging of wood on wood through the door. Thinking it nuts to have the shutters open on such a nippy night, he knocked, got no reply and went in.

Wind came in through the open window, gusting into the paper screen along the side of the bed. He closed the shutters, hooked the metal S shaped latch on one shutter into the protruding eyelet on the other and set about seeking the sweet scent that he’d noticed as soon as he’d come in. He sniffed the contents of the pitcher on the bedside cabinet. Water. He prowled to the room’s four corners, found nothing and niggled, looked over the chin high shoji screen, couldn’t resist smiling. Dawn’s loosely clenched fist rested on Fred’s temple and Fred’s foot lay on Dawn’s stomach, flexed leg threatening to boot the teen off the bed.

A breeze still came through, misting Dawn’s breath, walking over Spike’s grave.

He shivered, returned to the window and jammed down the levers on the side of each shutter so that the slats lay flat. Whispering his goodnights at the screen, Spike crept out of the tranquil room and walked out to an angry courtyard.

A squall stripped the tree of leaves, whirling them in the air and bringing the branches into frantic life. The pit’s fire sent up sparklers and Catherine wheels, sky-high fireworks remarkable enough for any Bonfire Night.

“Buggerin’…”

He got a mouthful of wind and gagged on the sickly-sweet odor of rotting flesh. In his ears was the buzz of blue bottles, a swarm of them settling onto a decayed feast. In his bones was the knowledge that this was not ordinary wind or fire.

He made across the courtyard bent double as the wind buffeted him, clawing icy fingers at his trouser legs and snatching at his duster, didn’t see the white shadow until he’d almost reached the tree. Xander lay curled in the hammock, blue-lipped in peaceful sleep and the anorexic white shadow sat on the edge of the sisal bed, slowly rocking it.

The buzzing in Spike’s ears rose to deafening, the stench swelled to suffocating and he morphed, launching at the man and impossibly getting stuck in the air. Dilute blue eyes raking Spike, clenched fist raised and pointed at him, the man turned up his lips in a thin sneer. He bent and straightened his knees with his feet flat on the ground, lulling Xander with the rock-a-bye movement and taunting Spike about the fact that there was more than one way to chip a vampire.

“What’s your bleeding story?” Spike snarled, rage liquefying his innards.

Posture ramrod straight in defiance of the wind and white cloak gathering debris in its flagstone-sweeping hem, the skinny, white man strolled to the gate and slid through its bars, enfolding the stench, buzz and wind in his gaily waving cloak.

Spike crashed down to the flagstones.

The fire ebbed and the courtyard went back to normal.

Xander slept on.

*    *    *    *

First thing Spike did was run his nose along both sides of Xander’s throat. He detected their untainted, combined scent and sagged onto the flagstones, knees chilled at what could have happened. It hadn’t, but it could have done. He could’ve smelt interference on Xander, or he could’ve hung in the air, watching the interference…

“Bloody impotent and just watching,” he said, a whisper and a growl in one.

Easy, patient, he worked his arms under Xander’s shoulders and knees and carried him into their room, lowered him to mattress and pillows, a last nose-brush to his throat. Straightened up to find round eyes on him.

“What are you doing? I w-woke up and you were…” Xander shrank into the pillows. “What were you doing S-Spike?”

The only big things about the six-foot man at that moment were his eyes and his terror. No good would come of telling him that he’d been levitated from their bed by some weird type shit. He took the cigarette packet and Zippo out of his coat pocket, placed them on the nightstand and slipped the duster off.

“Was coming back to bed after a cig,” he lay down facing Xander, smiled with effort.

Xander tugged the covers over their heads, fidgeting until the two of them were as seamlessly stacked as the rings, Xander’s back shielded by his chest.

“Please don’t stand over me like that again. Not when I’m sleeping, Spike, not even when I’m just dozing off.”

“I won’t,” he mouthed on Xander’s nape. “I won’t,” he said, clearer.

Neither would he tell Xander that he had a demonic Valentine who’d paralyzed The Big Bad with no effort at all.

CHILDE OF MY HEART ~ CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

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