Chapter Twenty-Five

Darla clenched her fists, glaring at Dru. “No,” she said between gritted teeth. “You cannot bring the dog to dinner. Angelus!” she appealed to him.

Dru was equally adamant. “Mr. Buttons is a very good dog, and Miss Edith says he shall go!” she ended on a shriek, stamping her foot.

Mr. Buttons yowled when she smashed one of his feet and danced around before crawling under the hem of Willow's skirt. “Please don't bite me, please don't bite me,” she chanted under her breath.

William reached under her skirt to fish the dog out, holding it by the scruff of his neck. “I say we kill him, and have him stuffed,” he told Darla. “With any luck, she'll think he's just like Miss Edith.”

Darla's eyebrows rose at this remarkably astute idea.

Willow looked down at the ground trying to summon some kind of feeling for Mr. Buttons that didn't greet the prospect of his untimely end with relief.

“Naughty William,” Dru pouted at him, retrieving her dog. Conscious of her clothes, she held him at arm's length with a frown and then turned to Willow, ready to dump the dog in her arms.

“Oh, no, you don't,” Angelus got between them. “You take the dog, and he's your responsibility, Dru. No dumping him on Willow when you get bored, or he starts barking to go out. She can't walk alone at night.”

Dru scowled. She looked at the dog and at her dress. The dress won. She shoved him in Matilde's arms, patting him on the head. “Bye, bye, Mr. Buttons. Mummy will be home soon and shall tell you all about the pretty people.”

Still offended by Darla for starting the argument, she linked arms with Willow instead, her elegant fingers smoothing the smoky gray of her bodice. Willow's dress was very simple. The bodice was gray satin with a soft drape of nearly translucent tissue silk in a matching shade of gray that swathed her shoulders. A jet lozenge chocker circled her throat. A matching bracelet circled her wrist. The skirt was black, and sewn with tiny black beads that glittered in the light.

She still looked a little under the weather. There was a slight chalkiness to her complexion that the gray silk underscored.

Darla was wearing a more elaborate evening gown with huge sleeves that narrowed at the elbow in lace from the elbow to the wrist in shades of gold and cream. A pendant pearl hung above her décolletage. She ignored Dru's display of petulance, frankly relieved not to have her hanging on her as she donned her outerwear, carefully arranging the hooded cape over her elaborately styled hair.

Willow dipped her head towards Dru. “You look very . . . regal,” she said.

Dru was wearing a purple velvet gown. It was a newer style. The bodice appeared to crisscross from waist to shoulder forming a modified raised collar to frame a softened v-neckline. The overskirt was velvet, pulled up towards a slight bustle and held with velvet roses in white. The underskirt was ivory.

“I am a princess,” Dru reminded her.

When everyone was ready to go and the carriage was drawn up at the door, they left the house, trailing Angelus and Darla who occupied one seat while Dru, William and Willow were forced to squeeze in on the opposite side. William solved the space problem by picking Willow up and seating her in his lap.

Angelus watched them. William was being very pointed in his attentions to Willow over the last two days. There had been the incident with Dru, who had been more confused than anything about why she had almost accidentally killed Willow, shooting down Angelus' theory that William had goaded her into it to make it impossible to incorporate Willow into his plans. When it came time to walk the dog today, William flatly refused to let Willow leave her bed, slamming the door shut and apparently joining her there.

One of the minions was dispatched to take the dog out on the semi-shaded shed side between the house and the stable, so it wasn't a problem but it was odd that William hadn't acquiesced. Dru wanted the dog walked by Willow and what Dru wanted, William made his mission to provide. He had also made it very clear that he didn't welcome any further interruptions.

He took a discreet sniff of the air, wondering if the girl was bleeding. Her periods were light and irregular, something to do with her checkered past, according to Darla. When she was having one, William was more possessive and attentive.

He picked up no trace of blood in her scent.

They weren't going far, barely two blocks, that could easily have been walked, but Darla wouldn't even consider walking, and he knew better than to suggest it even if he privately agreed with William that it took more time to go by carriage, especially since they had to wait in a slow-to-advance queue of arriving guests, similarly minded.

William's head bounced on the upholstered back of the seat. “Bloody hell,” he muttered. “We'll be here half the sodding night,” he grumbled, sliding his hands inside of Willow's cloak.

She made a protesting sound as he settled her against his chest. “Oh, hush,” he grinned at her. “I'm cold, and you're all toasty warm in there.”

“Miss Willow is deliciously warm, especially between her legs,” Dru observed.

Darla's fingernails dug into Angelus' arm. “Angelus,” she growled.

He sighed. “Drusilla? Company manners, princess,” he reminded her.

Dru waved her hand airily. “Miss Willow does not mind.”

William rubbed her back, and Willow allowed herself to feel comforted, though for all she knew he was just warming his hand on her.

The carriage lurched into motion and Darla snapped her fingers at William. “Behave!” she hissed at him. “When that carriage door opens, I do not want to see Willow hopping off your lap like a bar maid.”

He cast a long-suffering look at Dru. “Shove over a bit, Princess,” he requested, setting Willow between them. Dru took her hand to hold lightly.

When they arrived, Angelus was the first to exit the couch, handing Darla down. William followed him to help the girls and they approached the door as a group. This was always a tricky moment. Willow felt herself tensing as they approached the open double doors and the barrier that the vampires could not penetrate without an invitation, though Angelus had her working on a spell to negate that that she, in turn, had no intention of ever finding.

The majordomo welcomed them formally to the house, bowing the party in. The host and hostess were standing at the back of an oval-shaped foyer on a gleaming black and white marble floor. Willow guessed that their hostess chose her dress with the colors in mind. She was wearing crimson satin, and she looked very striking against the black and white of the floor.

“Princess Stavarsky,” Darla executed a very credible curtsey when she was introduced to the woman.

Princes and princesses were, at least in certain parts of Europe, a dime a dozen, on the order of an English baron or earl depending on the country of origin. The Prince and Princess Stavarsky were from Walachia. The princess was an Anglo-Irish hybrid from Boston whose father had made a fortune. Her husband was an older, thin, graying man who might have looked distinguished if he'd been able to tear his gaze away from Darla's breasts.

Angelus introduced Drusilla, “My sister, Drusilla,” he introduced.

Dru's courtesy was deep and graceful. “I am a princess too,” she announced loftily.

Darla's brittle laugh sounded as she launched into a sotto voce explanation that was cut off by the Princess Stavarsky who clasped Dru's hand. “Anyone could see that,” she said kindly.

Dru preened, shooting Darla a triumphant look before graciously allowing herself to be introduced to the prince.

“Our cousin, Miss Willow Grant, and my wife's brother, William Crawford,” Angelus completed the introductions.

Concentrating on controlling her skirt and executing a credible curtsy, Willow found herself committing the social solecism of “How do you do?”

But the princess, recognizing both the greeting and the accent, simply smiled at her. “An American! How wonderful,” she enthused. “Where are you from?” she asked.

“C-california,” the improbable, but utterly true answer came.

“California! How exciting!” the princess enthused, handing her guest to her husband before greeting the last of the group. “Welcome to our home, Mr. Crawford,” she murmured as he air-kissed the back of her hand.

They were ushered into a grand salon that was at least four times the size of the room, but with the same dignity as their smaller and much more modest town house. Two huge rock crystal chandeliers glittered from above. Willow guessed that there were at least two dozen people milling around the room, more seated and perhaps a dozen more waiting in the foyer. She concentrated on not stepping on anyone else's skirt, as well as her own. The unnatural profile of skirts never seemed so perceptible as in a crowded room when her natural inclination was to draw in her shoulders and make herself a little smaller.

She felt William's hand tap her waist lightly and realized that she was doing the thing with her shoulders, and made herself stand with her shoulders back without looking down to see if her shoulders were back too far, in which case her chest would be sticking out in a terribly embarrassing way.

Harry saw her in the shifting crowd, and felt an enormous sense of relief. David had torn a strip off of him for being so forward with her in the park. Sensitivity wasn't something he expected to find in a young woman who had spent years as the consort or pet of a vampire, but David insisted that she was embarrassed and alarmed by his behavior. Now that he had a chance to observe her, Harry wondered if perhaps David hadn't exaggerated. She looked absolutely charming, and beautiful in a very simple evening gown, but also uncomfortable from the slightly stiff way she was standing, as if she was trying very hard not to fidget.

He felt a shiver of excitement. The man whose hand was resting very lightly on her waist was, if he wasn't mistaken, none other than William the Bloody. What was less clear was which of the three vampires sired him, but it had happened in London approximately eighteen years ago.

David joined him, careful to put his shoulder between Harry and the vampires who had joined the party. “Need I remind you that it is very unlikely all of the people in this room would survive if they provoked into an attack?” he asked pointedly in a very low voice.

“No,” Harry admitted. Actually, he hadn't given it a thought and it was a difficult thought to hold on to now that they were so close. “I think that may be—“

“There's no mystery to it,” David handed him the calling cards that he had gotten from a footman, steering Harry to a window, so he could paw through them without being noticed.

Bold as brass, their names were engraved on cream vellum, with assumed surnames that he ignored. Darla. Sired by Heinrich Joseph Nest. Angelus, sired by Darla. Drusilla, sired by Angelus. William, again a bit of a question as to his origins, but undoubtedly sired by one of the elder trio, and, he came to the last card. Willow. It was an unusual name. Pretty. It suited her very well, he thought before he handed the cards back to David who tucked them in an inside pocket.

“Well . . . “ Harry grinned. “Shall we mingle?” he suggested.

Frau von Borselin was looking for them as the room filled up. “There you are,” she waved them over.

David wanted very much to throttle Harry, who made his way over with difficulty. “I was just telling Herr and Frau O'Niall how anxious you were to make the acquaintance of the young lady with the dog,” she said. “This is Lieutenant Windom, and Mr. Giles,” she introduced the pair to Angelus and Darla.

“Ma'am,” Harry bowed over Darla's hand. “Very pleased to make your acquaintance,” he said. “Mr. O'Niall.”

David followed with bland greetings.

“You've met our Willow?” Darla said, sounding like she didn't much care for the sound of that.

“Hardly that, ma'am,” Harry hastened to assure her. “I have seen her walking her dog,” he gestured awkwardly with the cane. “Part of my convalescence is to hobble around useless with Mr. Giles to keep me from falling flat on my face,” he said with a self-deprecating air. “I had the great fortune of being mistaken for a sapling by the dog,” he said wryly, “and occasion to speak to her very briefly. I'm afraid I imposed on our inadvertent acquaintance and may have offended the young lady.”

Curious, Angelus scanned the crowd for William and gestured for him to join them. He arrived a few moments later while Harry was still apologizing for any offense he might have caused, and accepting a scolding from Frau van Borselin, who thought she smelled a potential romance in the air.

Willow's step slowed when she saw who Angelus and Darla were speaking with, and William handed Dru to Angelus to be introduced.

Harry started to explain the Mr. Buttons connection and Dru, delighted to have someone to talk to about her beloved dog, happily chatted with him, giggling over his account of his two meetings with Mr. Buttons.

She heard Angelus making the introductions. Lieutenant Wyndham. Mr. Giles. Wyndham. Giles. Wyndham. Giles. WyndhamGiles WyndhamGiles WyndhamGiles. The two names crashed around crazily in her head. It was too ridiculous. It was . . . there were no coincidences in the unreal world, she reminded herself, wondering if she looked over her shoulder, would she see characters from the Mad Hatter's tea party, or maybe Xander in a really old-fashioned suit.

Then Angelus was introducing her, and she knew that everyone was watching her, waiting for her to say something, but she was terrified of what might come out of her mouth if she let her lips part. They would think she was crazier than Dru. She felt the room swimming around her. Overly-loud voices, Harry Wyndham bending over her hand—he looks nothing like Wesley, and yet he sounds like a prig. She heard David Giles responding to something Angelus was saying, and there was nothing of Rupert Giles in him that she could see.

William put it together effortlessly. He rested his hand on the small of Willow's back, keeping her by his side as they were introduced, feeling through the silk how her heart started to pound. His arm circled her a bit more firmly, not sure exactly what set her off, but aware that something was frightening her. Not giving a good rat's ass what anyone made of it, he gently turned her face to his.

“It's too close in here for you, isn't it?” he said. Her eyes were huge and a little wild and she was as white a sheet.

“There's a chair over hear,” Frau van Borselin said, shooing an acquaintance out of the chair for the faint-looking English girl.

“I'll get a glass of sherry,” David volunteered. He had a very bad feeling about this. His concern that they were going to get the girl killed resurfaced.

Willow forced down her rising hysteria, taking a deep breath, then another. She cast an apologetic look around. “I'm sorry,” she said softly. “I never can seem to relax when there are so many people around,” she offered. “Hello . . . Lieutenant Wyndham, is it?”
He bowed over her hand and she had to resist the impulse to snatch it back. “And Mr. Giles?” she inclined her head, managing to evade his eyes, afraid of what she would find there.

“You met in the park?” Darla questioned.

“Mr. Buttons makes your acquaintance whether you like it or not,” Willow pointed out, feeling William beside her, standing too close from the looks Darla was shooting him. Replaying the comment in her head, she felt her cheeks warming as she realized how rude it sounded.

“Mr. Crawford, your obedient servant,” Harry declaimed, tongue firmly in cheek.

William's left eyebrow lifted. “And yours,” he batted back.

Harry Wyndham's head cocked to one side. “Crawford? You didn't go to Charterhouse? 82?” he asked.

“Winchester,” William corrected. “Why?”

“No reason. Thought you looked familiar. Played cricket,” he said. “Not much of a batsman. You didn't play, did you?”

“No,” William said shortly. “I was a bit of ponce, back in the day. Nose stuck in a book.”

Willow resisted the crazy desire to slip in an, “Eh, wot, old chap.”

“Giles, here is a Wellie,” he said. “Right, old man?”

A semi-hysterical giggle escaped Willow. Pretentiousness could be a hereditary trait she thought.

“It is ridiculous,” Giles followed up on her giggle. “Grown men, prattling about their old schools. We would be in a scrum over who has the best cricket tradition, were we not shamed by your mirth, Miss Grant.”

For the briefest moment their eyes met, and David Giles felt old and a little shaken at the fleeting glimpse he had of a soul in real torment.

William lifted her hand to his lips, catching a warning glint in Darla's eyes if he raised eyebrows about the nature of his relationship with his brother-in-law's cousin, Willow's official designation in the family of late.

“I don't suppose I have any hope of convincing you to allow me to take you in to supper, Miss Grant?” Lt. Wyndham begged.

“Not a single shred of a hope,” William answered before she could.

There was an awkward silence which Angelus filled, with a cough, and a blandly improvised, “There's been no formal announcement, being as it is a bit awkward that they are living under the same roof,” he said to Frau van Borselin in a tone that conveyed awkwardness with the subject. “But, it is understood that—“

“Oh. Oh!” she caught on at once. “Of coarse,” she smiled her understanding, slipping her arm through Harry's. “Miss Drusilla could not lack for escort, I'm sure,” she hinted.

Dru, in no way annoyed at being second choice, beamed at him happily. “We shall have ever so much to discuss,” she said, leaving Giles to offer his arm to Frau van Borselin when supper was announced.

They were dining in a conservatory, which delighted Dru. It was very informal, Willow deduced. There were several buffets scattered the length of the room and round tables set for as many as twelve and as few as four. They ended up at a table for twelve. Harry Wyndham made a beeline for the chair beside Willow, but Dru, accustomed to sitting next to William ,simply ignored him, forcing him to hastily follow her to assist with the cane-backed chair at William's side.

He noticed that Drusilla did little more than move food around on her plate, not even bothering to taste the punch in the dainty cup she had been provided with. There was a kind of art to not eating at these things, or at least not appearing to have eaten a lot, so this behavior went unremarked. William, who had not even bothered with a plate, wasn't above eating from Willow's, occasionally catching the disapproving glare of the older female vampire and responding with an utterly unrepentant grin.

Giles was also observing the interactions, and marveling at how effective they were. Darla was perfect as the disapproving and somewhat put-upon wife and sister saddled with a charming but mentally-deficient sister-in-law and a rather provoking, borderline rude brother. Angelus played off her neatly as patriarch, and protective older brother, keeping one ear cocked for any conversational drifts Drusilla meandered off on, gently steering her back on topic. The younger vampire was a bit more playful and astonishingly demonstrative and affectionate with the lone human in their bizarre ménage.

In a slight break with protocol, the Princess Stavarsky had graced their table sitting beside Willow, which is how David and Harry discovered that the girl was an American. It was the reason the princess had made a point of joining their party. It disrupted the male/female composition of the table, and required the removal of a place setting, since the prince was dining at the other large table nearby in an effort to divide their attention amongst the large party.

“California?” the Princess prompted. “It might as well be another country,” she commented. “How did you come to live there?” she asked.

“I was born there, Your Highness,” Willow explained.

“Where?” she asked. “Your Highness from a fellow American sounds . . . very undemocratic.”

“And that would be the trouble with hereditary monarchies . . . ma'am,” Willow substituted gamely.

“Very true,” the Princess murmured. “You were telling me where you are from in California,” she prompted.

Nope, just stalling, really, Willow thought. “Sunnydale,” she said, and she made a face. “It sounds ridiculously prosaic, doesn't it?”

“Massachusetts is full of Indian and English names. Penobscott on top of Quincy,” she pointed out. “Sunnydale,” she repeated. “It sounds charming.”

“Well, it's not,” Willow assured her. “It's a little bit of nowhere in particular with not much more than missionaries and repressed indigenous people.”

“Ah, and since you aren't a repressed indigenous person, I take that your parents were missionaries,” the Princess deduced.

“Were,” Angelus, looked up at the ceiling, “God bless them. Taken in '79 in an epidemic of typhus,” he said. “Tragic loss. Wonderful, Godly people,” he told her. “Willow's mother was my cousin on my mother's side, one removed. Darla and I,” he gave Darla a mournful look, “were devastated to learn that the very mission, to bring the word of our lord and savior to the savages of the plains, that we underwrote, took dear Clara and Daniel from us, leaving Willow an orphan.”

Willow stared at Angelus, indignant. These were her fake parents, not his. “My father would turn over in his grave if he heard you referring to the Chumash as savages,” she told him. “They were a peaceful tribe, driven off their land, hunted into extinction, and left to die in squalor and disease.”

Sensing a kindred spirit the princess seized her wrist. “Tell me, what are your views on suffrage?” she asked eagerly. "I heard Mrs. Stanton speak at a Unitarian Church in Boston, and I must tell you, she was absolutely thrilling!”

Suffrage. Oh, crap. Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified . . . when? She had no idea. Most of the newspapers that Angelus favored were published in Europe and news from the United States was sparse. “In the United States? It's hard to follow U.S. politics in Europe, but since the territories have been enfranchising women, it seems to me that it is a tide that has turned,” she ventured cautiously. “As for the ownership of property, I would say to anyone who is foolish enough to believe that my cousin,” she inclined her head to Darla, “is anything but competent to make decisions and to act on her behalf in any realm, that they have made a grave mistake.”

Princess Stavarsky turned her attention to Darla, and Willow practically slumped in her seat in relief. “Care for a stroll?” William suggested, since supper was drawing to a close.

Darla wasn't that lost in her conversation. “Take Dru with you,” she told William when he rose, giving his hand to Willow.

David Giles watched as annoyed resignation appeared on the younger vampire's face. His expression cleared when he looked at Drusilla, becoming openly affectionate. “Princess? Shall we walk under the stars?” he asked her.

“Walk, and spin, and dance,” Drusilla agreed with a dreamy smile.

“No dancing. There's no music in the garden,” Angelus told her.

“William can make music,” Dru announced.

He offered her his free arm, but Dru was looking at Mr. Wyndham expectantly. Willow's eyes flew to his cane. “Dru, it is dark, and with Mr. Wyndham's--,” her mind sorted through words, rejecting them as too personal or pointed or overly aware that Mr. Wyndham had legs, which she understood to be a bit of a gaffe. Stupid manners.

“How very considerate of you to notice Harry's difficulty getting around,” David rescued her. “And, Harry, really, old man. You should rest a bit. I'm sure Mr. Crawford is happy to walk with the ladies while you wait here.”

“I'm fine, David,” Harry bit out as he rose, leaning on the cane. He knew why David did not want him to go out in the garden, and yes, it was dangerous. But, my God, the opportunity. To be able to say that you dined and chatted with half of the Scourge of Europe in the thick of a night in a foreign city. David had the heart and soul of an archivist. He lacked the imagination to appreciate the opportunities their work afforded.

“I think I can manage a simple turn around a garden,” he said testily, not about to be denied. “Miss Drusilla?”

Dru looked up, eager to be out under the star-strewn sky. “Let's walk outside,” she smiled beatifically.

There was a terrace beyond the conservatory and they were not the first who thought to explore it, and the gardens laid out on three levels below with a fountain spraying a large plume of water on the second to lowest level.

Dru wanted to dance and William was his usual obliging self, humming something suitable to waltz to for her. They were off to one side of the second-to-lowest level of the garden, which was paved with broad, flat stones. A balustrade created a barrier to what appeared to be a steep slope, populated with tall, thin evergreens and scrub. Lt. Wyndham let his weight rest against the balustrade with a sigh of relief that seemed genuine.

“I'm afraid that I let my stubbornness exceed my stamina,” he said ruefully. “I did not expect to contend with so many stairs. Mr. Giles is a good friend, but he can be a bit of a mother hen at times. It's embarrassing,” he confessed.

Willow cocked her head to one side, wondering what was really going on. She did not think that encountering William the Bloody in Bristol was an accident. The presence of two men who bore the surnames of the two watchers she knew in the real world was probably not a coincidence.

William and Dru were dancing farther away, carried in great, swooping circles. It was in part due to their enhanced physical abilities. When she danced with William, she always felt the twitchy restraint as he held himself in to keep from moving too fast for her to follow.

She could hear the music of their voices. William humming, and Dru chattering away. They were too far for her to make out the words. Vampire hearing, being what it was, she shrugged and hoped for the best. She was facing away from the two vampires, and it was always possible that they were too wrapped up in each other to be paying attention to her.

“I've never met watchers without a slayer, except once, and I wasn't impressed,” she said. “I'm still not impressed. If this is an exercise in observation, you've already failed. You've drawn too much attention to yourselves.”

This cool, emotionless appraisal left Harry gaping at her.

“What do we know about you? You are foreigners, guests of Frau van Borselin,” she recounted. “You'll be missed if you disappear entirely, but there is no guarantee that you will meet such an easy end. Angelus or Darla might consider either of you an interesting project, in which case, they will probably turn you and learn everything you know,” she said softly. “And then? Maybe send you back to the Council in . . . London?” she guessed. “Start looking over your shoulder from this night on, Lt. Wyndham,” she advised.

He recovered his composure. “I mistook you,” he bluffed. “You are very much their creature, aren't you?”

“Are you laboring under the delusion that they give fair warnings?”

His gaze flicked to the two vampires, judging the distances. “What you must know of them,” he began. It was another misstep, he realized, trying to read her closed expression, though he wasn't sure why. “We could guarantee you sanctuary under the Council's protection,” he offered rashly, too flustered to remember David's advice about how she should be dealt with, and that he had absolutely no authority to offer her anything. He was simply curious as to how she would react to the offer.

“In exchange for which, I trade one cage for another,” she concluded. She knew what her choice would be, but she had no illusions about it, either.

He had a feeling that she would know if he lied, so he said nothing.

“Well, we all die,” she observed with a shrug. “But I won't die stupidly, and I won't deal with you,” she added. “Tell your Mr. Giles that.”

Before he could respond, she walked over to a rose bush, seemingly intent on admiring the flowers.

The dancing slipped the restraints that Dru had maintained on her wavering sanity. She wasn't violent, but she was in her stream-of-consciousness mode, which meant that anything could come out of her mouth at any moment. She flitted over to Willow, stripping rose petals by the handful and showering them over her head, raising her torn palms and fingers to her mouth to lick the blood off of them with a wicked, mischievous look on her face.

Her arms slid around Willow's waist and she leaned forward to whisper in her ear. “The stars whisper lovely things, psst, psst, psst,” she said teasingly, “Midnight tea parties, honey and cakes,” she swayed sinuously. “We should have a garden. I would braid flowers into your hair,” she promised.

On the plus side, it was a good mood, Willow thought with a sigh. “Then, we should go home,” she said diplomatically, raising her voice to carry. “Lt. Wyndham, if you would be so kind as to let my cousins know that William and I are taking Drusilla home, I would be in your debt,” she said.

William looked amused. “That's right. We'd be eternally grateful,” he mocked, collecting his two girls and leading them to the house, leaving Harry to limp behind them.

He lost sight of them before he reached the house and had no choice but to rejoin the party at the table, conveying the message Willow had charged him with. There were sympathetic looks all around that could be interpreted as, ‘pity, such a lovely girl, but clearly not all there', which left David to marvel again at how adept they were at playing this game.



“We'll see you home, pet,” William told her as they walked back to the house.

She knew without his saying anymore that he was taking Dru out to hunt. Mostly she felt relief at the prospect of having a few hours alone to process the events of the evening, and then the wrongness of that as the inevitable conclusion of their hunting nibbled at her awareness.

He used to take her with them. Sometimes he used her as bait, playing on her past, or what he understood of it, recreating the night in the alley when he had met her, only in a bizarre twist he ‘rescued' her from her fate before it went too far, killing the men who thought that they were getting a quick fuck in some filthy alley from a whore.

The subtext to this was, she supposed, that they had it coming. That they deserved it. In William's twisted mind it was purely, she suspected, because they had been stupid enough to be lured. In her mind, it was more complex. The attitudes that shaped her understanding of prostitution and the hideous plight of the women and children forced into the trade made her see the seller as a victim and the buyer, holding all of the power, as an aggressor. It wasn't that simple. Jane carried a knife for a reason, not just to protect herself, but to enforce her position in a territory that she considered her own.

In Calais, it had been a private establishment for gentlemen and women with exotic tastes. She had thought that they were going to a party, and had been moved to a mild sense of wonder when she saw herself fully dressed for the evening. It had been in the early 80s, when full skirts were just passing out of fashion. The dress was oyster satin with tiny puff sleeves. The overskirt was caught up with satin roses.

Her hair, just growing out to shoulder length was pulled up to the crown of her head and carefully arranged in artless curls and a long pearl necklace was doubled around her throat and secured with a ribbon tied in a neat bow at the nape of her neck.

She had felt like a fairy princess, watching the great bell of the skirt float around her. Unable to process the conventions that would have told her that all was not as it appeared, she was completely unaware of what kind of establishment they had entered. There were other equally well-dressed people, mingling in nicely-furnished rooms, and they fell into conversation with another English couple, retiring to what appeared to be a sitting room, sipping champagne.

Stupidly, she had fought, not realizing that that was what was expected, even desired. With her wrists tightly secured in leather manacles over her head, her face to the paneled wall, the older English girl, blond, beautifully dressed, with a blasé accent, beat her with a flogger. It didn't hurt particularly much. It was a toy, designed to deliver an element of pain without damaging the skin. It was just . . . startling, and humiliating, and it made her feel stupid for being so naïve.

And deep down, as each blow fell, she knew what was bound to happen.

She was on the floor, in the tattered remnants of her seemingly virginal ball gown, the wool carpet fibers scratching the raw, reddened skin of her back. A bolster pillow had been pushed under her hips to force them up at an obscene angle and the English girl, still dressed, a hair hardly out of place, had her head buried between her thighs. She could see the hairpins and the false hairpieces worked into her coiffure.

On the sofa, William had the man bent over, his trousers down around his knees, groaning and writhing as he fucked him. He pushed his head to one side, licking his victim's exposed throat and drained him dry in a matter of seconds while his wife, or lover, or whatever she was to him, frantically flicked her tongue over Willow's clit, two fingers fucking her. With each stroke Willow could feel a ring scraping the delicate, tightly stretched tissue at the gulf of her vagina.

Later, William had ripped the ring off her finger, holding it up to the light. It was a cluster of four pearls with small diamonds. He had pocketed it while Willow numbly dressed in the dead woman's clothes and he arranged the bodies in a grotesque tableau that made her think of a History Channel program that she had watched about serial killers and their habits.

When she didn't dress as quickly as he wanted, he simply pushed her hands aside and finished it for her, dragging her out into the night. She had thrown up somewhere between the house and the lair, and he had finally given up on her walking and picked her up, humming a bit of a song that sounded familiar.

When he stopped taking her hunting, she had stopped worrying about who he was killing. It wasn't right, but it was a kind of conditioned response that kept her from losing her mind. Dru was gliding ahead of them, graceful, powerful, and completely batty. Her insanity frightened Willow as much as she sometimes envied Dru her most uncomplicated moments.

William unearthed a cheroot from an inside pocket. He had smoked the last of the cigars pilfered from the Hamilton's and he was out of cigarettes as well. He had more or less decided to give up cheroots altogether. Willow hated the things. They stunk worse than cigarettes. He started to light a match and looked at her with a playful smile. “Don't suppose you could, presto, give me a light?” he said.

“In case you've forgotten. You are a vampire. Highly flammable,” she reminded him. “Want me to practice on you?”

He chuckled, “Put that way, no, but it would be bloody convenient in a strong wind or absent a match,” he pointed out. “Feel free to practice on the more annoying minions,” he joked. “Just don't get caught at it,” he warned, so maybe he wasn't joking.

Dru was walking along the edge of the curbstone, like a tightrope walker, without her arms extended for balance.

“Did you get enough to eat tonight? You picked at your dinner,” he pointed out. “Do you want me to order someone to bring you a tray?”

“No, thank you,” she said. “I'll fix something if I get hungry. I'd probably find a dead rat or ground glass in anything the minions prepared.”

He shot a sharp look at her. “That's a joke, isn't it? Has anyone threatened you?”

If there was one thing she understood a little of, it was the dynamics of vampire relationships, which were predicated on proximity to the golden circle, of which Angelus reigned supreme. Nothing endeared a minion to a master like personal attention, even of the most unpleasant variety. “I'm human. They hate me. It's a vicious cycle. I trust them as far as I could throw them.”

“Well, keep your baby claws sheathed, kitten. If anyone seems intent on hurting you, you bring it to me and let me deal with it,” he counseled. “Lose your temper again, and I will be cross,” his tone was light.

Dru spun around, walking backward on the curb. “The night calls,” she reminded him.

“Give me a mo', princess,” William said, walking Willow up the stairs. The door opened revealing Andreas, on duty.

“Safely home,” he announced. “You? Take her things and hang them up. I'm sick and tired of you stupid bastards playing your silly sodding rivalries out. You ought to be ashamed of yourself. You're a demon, not a four-year-old. Grow a set and quit worrying about what is no bloody concern of yours in the first place.”

Andreas opened his mouth and shut it with a snap of teeth. “Thank you. I'm sure that will clear everything up,” Willow told him.

“Ah-ah,” he pointed at his lips. “None of your cheek, if you please. Give me a kiss and go inside,” he demanded.

Feeling oddly shy about it, standing on one step above him so that they were nearly eye level, Willow leaned forward and placed a dry, chaste kiss on his lips.

He looked amused by that. “You call that a kiss?” he scoffed, giving her a little push to get her moving, “I'll collect on that later,” he told her.

Left in the foyer with a very annoyed vampire, Willow removed her gloves and the dressy cloak she was wearing, looking apologetic. “I'm sorry,” she said. “He's bossy. He just gets that way sometimes. It has more to do with making you do what he wants than anything else. It makes him . . . happy, I guess.”

Like the rest of the minions, Andreas had a full compliment of memories of the young woman before him. The only thing he had against her really is that she smelled like something he wanted to eat and was forever out of reach. Which really wasn't her fault. She was some peculiar fetish of Master William's, who was not one to be crossed. After the set to after the dinner party it was apparent to him that she was probably not as helpless as had been assumed.

“Yes, ma'am,” he said neutrally, and then cursed himself for assigning a title of respect to her. “Is there anything else you require?”

She looked a little taken aback at the question. “Is everyone out this evening?” she asked.

“Yes,” he nodded.

“Oh . . .” she gestured to the stairs. “I'm going up to my room, then,” she said. “Thank you, Andreas.”