IWRY Fic: "Return to Me" 3/3

[thecarlysutra]

See part one for notes.

Hours later, the fever finally extinguished itself, and they lay still on top of one another, almost afraid to move, as if that might compromise the soundess of flesh and clarity of mind that was slowly coming back to them. They let their breathing come to normal, their heartbeats, and mentally tried to claw back onto reality.

It was harder for Buffy, who’d had no break from the spell. One hand, curled around her lover’s side, was strangely sticky and moist; she’d pulled it up to investigate as her senses began to sharpen and had realized with an instant heavy nausea that it was covered with blood. It couldn’t be hers; she’d hurt him. She could hardly remember: she had a vague memory of Angel crying out, but . . . she barely remembered, and now it hurt her so badly that she was near tears, but she couldn’t even find the words to address the situation. Instead, she wiped the dried blood off on the sandy stone ground as best she could, and then searched for her clothing. She felt bare and cold, suddenly, even though the desert night was far from frigid. She got dressed hastily, helped Angel into his clothes. He twisted painfully and she could see a dark stain coloring his dressings. She flinched, and they dressed in silence. When they’d finished, they found a familiar position of comfort against the stones: Angel half-reclined, leaning back against them, and she in his arms, lying against his chest.

“Where are we?” she asked after a long silence. She’d thought at first that they were just going to drift off to sleep like that, with no complications, but she couldn’t stand not knowing anything.

“Khatmiya.”

He didn’t seem upset that she was complicating things. He never did.

“What happened?”

“We almost got eaten by the demon.”

“Yeah, I kind of worked that out. How? We were . . . we were under some sort of thrall, weren’t we?”

“I think so, yes.”

“But how? We didn’t drink that magic water.”

He was a moment in answering, lost in thought and the calmative motion of stroking her hair. She relaxed against his shoulder, closed her eyes.

“I think we may have been misinformed,” he said finally. “Maybe it’s not the water that’s the aphrodisiac; maybe it’s the jebels.”

She opened her eyes, looked up at him. He was looking down at her fondly.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, we didn’t drink the water, did we?”

“No.”

“And – as much as I love you, as attracted as I am to you – that wasn’t natural lust, was it?”

“No.”

“And we didn’t feel like that until we were on Aweitila, did we?”

“No . . .”

“So maybe it’s the mountain. Or maybe it’s that mountain after sunset. Or . . .” He sighed. “I don’t know. We’ll call Dawnie in the morning, see what she thinks. Right now, we need to get some rest.”

He kissed her forehead. Buffy closed her eyes and relaxed against his shoulder, settled down to sleep.

***

Buffy woke to a tongue roughing her face. She squirmed against the hot, coarse pressure – just five more minutes – until it struck her that a tongue was an odd thing to be worrying about, and opened her eyes, squinting against the African-bright sun. Once her pupils had adjusted to the light, they focused on . . . another pair of eyes. She shrieked.

“What is that?” she squealed, toppling uncoordinatedly to her hands and knees and scrambling backwards until she jolted against Angel. He made a muffled hurt noise, but she was too alarmed to let the worry of what did I hit surface into the main realm of her conscious.

“It’s a goat,” he mumbled, not sounding as though that were anything out of the ordinary, let alone anything to be alarmed about. “Calm down.”

She glanced manically back at him; he’d closed his eyes. He couldn’t possibly be going back to sleep.

Something tugged at her pants. She jerked her attention back to her tormentor: he’d multiplied! There was another one now, pulling at her jeans with its goat mouth. She jerked away with a little whimper and backed into Angel.

“Calm down,” he said again. “They’re just goats. We were almost eaten alive last night; this really pales in comparison.”

She really agreed. She didn’t know why she was being so touchy; she felt raw all over, and not just physically, although she couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt so open and weak after sex, like she’d been scoured, kneaded. There was a blood taste in her mouth, and her muscles were all tight and fireshot. And he was only a man now . . .

She shook her head, trying to clear it, and let her eyes focus on the goats again. They were actually kind of pretty, despite their pants-eating and creepy eyes. They had fine short coats in black and tan; the texture of their pelts glistened against the contrasting smoothness of the rocks; their little horns and hooves were like polished bone.

She reached out a hand to pet one of them, but it jerked away from her as the heel of a weathered tamarind staff and a dusty dark foot stamped into view.

Buffy barreled into Angel again.

“What is that?” she demanded, panicked, praying he hadn’t gone back to sleep.

He couldn’t be sleeping: he was laughing.

“Goat herder,” he replied, chuckling, his hands suddenly cradling her back, drawing her to her feet as he came to his.

The goat herder’s craggy features were a kind of sand-coverered that would suggest he’d been sitting in dunes for twenty years or so, and he was scowling like it was a second occupation. He said something menacing in Arabic, and Buffy – reminded of Khartoum Airport – huddled back against Angel’s broad form. He slid his big hands around her waist and responded to the goat herder, his tongue quick around the foreign syllables, his tone pleasant.

Impossibly, the man laughed as he replied, a sound that would fill canyons. Buffy looked back anxiously at Angel; he was smiling, his eyes sparkling.

“What did you say?” she asked nervously.

“He asked what did we think we were doing here, and I explained—”

“You explained?!”

“Well, I lied.”

“Oh. Good.”

“I said we were on our honeymoon. He said he could have guessed that.”

“Where is . . . where is the here that we think we . . . where are we?”

“Khatmiya. I told you that.”

The goat herder let his laugh trail off and sang some more Arabic at Angel. Angel babbled back, and then said to Buffy, “Apparently, though, we’re further west than I’d thought, closer to the souq. Which is why he was upset: we’re in the way of his goat traffic.”

“Apologize.”

“I did.” A few more words; the hint of a smile began to bloom on Angel’s face. “He’s congratulating me on my beautiful wife.”

Buffy’s cheeks lit. “He did not say that.”

“He certainly did.” The smile grew. “And he’d like to know if you want to buy a goat.”

So did Buffy’s blush. “What would I do with a goat?”

Angel grinned full out. “Cook it for your new husband.”

She rolled her eyes. “I’ll pass.”

“He’ll give you a discount,” Angel said sincerely.

“I’ll pass,” she repeated, and stifled the dual urges to hit him and kiss him.

“Your loss,” Angel said pleasantly, enjoying himself a little too much. He pressed a kiss to her hair – a peace offering? – and returned to his conversation with the goat herder. Buffy felt precocious here, having to always stand idly by while Angel spoke. She wondered if that’s how women always felt in Muslim countries, although Angel had told her that Sudan was arguably the most liberal Muslim nation in the world, the best place in on Earth to be a Muslim woman. Sana was a doctor . . . but it still wasn’t fair. The world was confusing. Buffy had thought that, by now, she’d have something figured out, but she didn’t really know how anything worked: people, religion, men. Herself. Her stupid heart. She was in the same place she’d been since high school, the same place she’d been almost half of her life, stupid in love with a man she wasn’t sure she could have, but who she couldn’t get out of her blood . . . a man who made her feel childish, sometimes, like this, standing clueless waiting for him to finish speaking his mystery tongue, but who also made her feel more grounded and whole and home and dizzy and alive and perfect and right than she ever had ever.

She’d thought too much, and now she was hungry for him. She turned from the foreign discourse and buried her face in the hollow of his shoulder, breathing in his sweet scent, her hands winding around his bandaged middle. She wished he’d hurry up and heal: she hated knowing that there was weak flesh under that rope of gauze, and she was tired of not being able to touch him without the mute. She wanted just his body, just Angel. It was selfish, but she didn’t care.

She remembered his cry of pain last night in the jebels and flinched; she’d probably set his healing back a few days. Torn stitches at the least.

Angel automatically wound a hand tighter around her waist, brought one up and ran it through her hair. She thought about what he’d said last night: I’m glad you left your husband. She closed her eyes and just concentrated on the precious rhythm of his heartbeat, on the memory of those words. She knew they’d been rent from him in a moment of weakness, his heart and head sullied by magic. And she didn’t care. In matters of love she was selfish, but she had to be, and she held greedily to the gem Angel had let slip: He was glad. He was glad because he loved her, and he wanted her for his own.

It might take him some time to say it, but he felt it.

That was enough.

***

The goat herder left after a bit and Angel walked Buffy down to the souq – not too far off; he was right – to buy some breakfast. Angel apologized for talking so long with the man; he’d wanted to ask some questions about disturbances in the jebels and the murdered couples. Buffy forgave him easily, letting herself be bought for a few kisses and a mango from the souq.

“What’d you find out from the goat man?” she asked, running her tongue over the facets of her mouth, trying to catch all the sweet juice. It was so ripe, and all the fruit from the souqs was amazingly better than fruit from American supermarkets: Technicolor for the palette.

Angel seemed slightly distracted in his response, his dark eyes following the movements of her tongue. He was usually more subtle than that, and Buffy usually would have blushed, but she reasoned that they were both still wrecked from their lovemaking enough that it suspended the usual rules.

“Actually, not much we don’t already know. He tries to avoid the tourists except to see if they want to buy goats . . . he’s noticed, though, that there’s fewer and fewer of them going up to the jebels, and of the ones going up there, hardly any of them come down. He did say, though, that he’d wondered what had happened to the baboons; they’ve stopped coming down into the village and causing a ruckus. Oh, and we should make sure to stop by the well on our way out of town and drink. It’ll bring us good luck, and make sure that . . . make sure that—” He blushed, and a fluttering feeling bloomed suddenly in Buffy’s loins; it was an insanely attractive expression on him. “—that you’ll bear me sons.”

Buffy knew that the kind thing would be to let him out of her gaze to recover, but she didn’t do that. Instead, she arrested him in it, smiling sweetly. He squirmed, the flush deepening to crimson, his eyes lowering.

“That’s very interesting,” she said finally, but only so that he’d be forced to look back up and find her still looking at him.

“Stop it,” he whispered harshly.

Slowly, unblinking, she tore a sopping piece of mango from the bulb of the fruit and brought it to her mouth. His nostrils flared, but this time he didn’t drop his gaze; he locked eyes with her stubbornly even as his blush began to blaze again. She’d finished slowly running her tongue over the sumptuously curved edges of her mouth and had brought up one sticky finger to lave when he faltered.

“You’re being cruel,” he said softly. “I don’t understand it. There’s nothing to test me for.”

She stopped torturing him, relaxing her hands, the juice running down her arms in rivulets that would dry in sticky runs in seconds under the desert sun, easing her punishing glare.

“I left my husband for you.”

He shook his head. The flush was fading from his tanned cheeks. Tanned. Angel had a tan. “Not just for me.”

She hung her head. That was true. How did he always know everything, even before she knew it?

“You’re right. I’m sorry. You don’t deserve that, those . . . tests. Tell me what I can do to make things better. Tell me what I can do to prove that I would have done it just for you.”

“Marry me.”

She looked up, abruptly. He looked so, so beautiful standing there, framed by the golden glow of the Sahara sunlight. She’d thought for years that he was the most beautiful man that she would ever see, but that was before she’d seen him in the sun. He more than took her breath away; he took away every breath she’d ever think of having.

“No. It’s too soon. I don’t want to be foolish with my love for you.”

He considered her, almost smiling, for a long moment before speaking.

“Good answer,” he said finally. “Okay. Just . . . promise that you’ll stay with me long enough for me to change your mind?”

A radiant smile bloomed over her features. “That I can do.”

***

They bought what amounted to, after the exchange rate, an eight-dollar bottled water from one of the cafes at the base of Totil. They drank the water hiking to Khatmiya’s famed village well under the rising sun; by the time they reached the landmark, Helios was fully overhead in all his sweltering glory.

The well was much more like what Buffy expected to see in a tiny Sudanese village than the now empty eight-dollar bottled water clutched in her hand. It was short and squat and hand-hewn, made of wood and stones and looking like something you’d see on the Discovery Channel. She expected more goats nearby.

“Bear you sons, huh?” she asked Angel with a sly glance.

“Nice. Make fun of me all you want, just get some water.”

They’d decided that, even though they believed now that it was the either the jebels themselves that were responsible for the heightened arousal and not the Khatmiyan well, they didn’t want to take any chances, and they’d decided not to test the water until they were back at the hospital in a safe and private location. Buffy quickly filled the water bottle with well water and then hopped quickly back to Angel and pecked him on the cheek.

“Possibly sexy water, check. Let’s go.”

***

They had a quiet, scowling, non-English-speaking bus driver for the trip back to Souq Ash-Sha’abi, and neither one of them much cared. The ride back was much more painful than the ride out, and they rode mostly in silence, flinching as the hard seats and lack of mobility and shocks made their various injuries and tender parts sing. At one point, taking a hard shoulder near the desert gardens, Buffy actually saw Angel grab his side, heard him stifle a noise of pain, and she tried to replay the moment last night with more clarity, when she’d hurt him, tried to slow it down and figure the details: how hard, how bad had she injured him . . . ? But it wasn’t any use. Her memory was fuzzy, like she’d been drunk, and she couldn’t recall the force of her blow or even much beyond how badly she had wanted him, how good he’d felt, the sensation of flesh on flesh . . .

She had to stop thinking like that. She took a deep breath to try and clear the unsoundness of sex from her flesh and mind, and slid her hand over Angel’s. She kissed his cheek, and he slid his eyes over to her. They were slightly spooked, like a horses: a big, high-strung animal, a creature that’s been injured and isn’t quite sure who to trust, isn’t quite sure which loud noises are thunder and which are gunshots.

“I think you’re a day from needing your bandages changed,” she said gently. “But we’ll have Sana do them a day early, okay; I think we may have torn some stitches.”

He nodded. “Okay.”

She was a little worried by his reticence. “I’m sorry about that, by the way . . . I didn’t mean to . . .”

He looked surprised. “No! No, it’s good you did, or we . . . we could be dead now . . .”

She barely remembered that. “Oh. Oh, right, but . . . I’m still sorry I hurt you.”

He nodded absently and went back to looking out the window. She frowned. How did there go back to being distance between them? Nothing was simple.

***

He’d torn six stitches. Sana was annoyed; she had a pretty good idea of what they’d been doing when the stitches had been torn. She patched Angel up and warned them both against strenuous activity.

“We better hope this magic water’s a dud, then,” Buffy said morosely.

Angel laughed. “Don’t worry, sweetheart, I’ll be up for strenuous activity in no time.”

She brightened. “Promise?”

“Promise.”

She eyed him suspiciously. “Just with me, right?”

He looked perfectly innocent. “Of course.”

She produced the bottle of well water and skipped over to where he was sitting on his hospital bed. “Maybe I should do this alone?”

He frowned. “Well . . . to risk sounding like a rogue . . . I’m not sure it’ll even work with one person. I mean, what if it’s like the hills and only works when you’re with the one you love?”

She grinned. “You’re sure this isn’t an excuse to get in my pants?”

He smiled. “You can never be sure of a thing like that.”

She glanced around quickly; there were almost a dozen other people in the room. True, almost all of them were sleeping or in some state of fevered delusion, and none of them spoke English, but she still didn’t want them to see her getting frisky with Angel.

“How about we find someplace a little more private to do this?”

“Good idea. Did you have someplace in mind?”

***

They sat side by side on the cool tile floor of the small shower in the tiny little bathroom on the ground floor.

“This is terribly romantic,” Angel said.

Buffy sighed. “Shut up. I’m not very good at this; I don’t have any practice. You’re the guy, you’re supposed to take me places.”

He rolled his eyes. “Fine. At least there’s no audience. If this even works. You go first.”

“Why me?”

“Because you’re a lady, and it’s polite.”

“Oh.”

She uncapped the bottle and, with a final nervous look at Angel, took a long swig. Then she handed the bottle off to him, and he drank, too.

They sat in silence for a moment.

“Anything?” she asked finally.

“No,” he breathed.

She sighed. “Damn. Maybe . . . maybe we should try and get it started. Kiss me.”

He looked at her strangely. “What?”

“You heard me. Maybe . . . maybe it just needs a little warming up. Kiss me.”

He sighed but indulged her, cupping her face in his hands and kissing her long and hard.

“Anything?” she asked breathlessly when he broke it off.

“Nothing more than the usual Buffy-lust.”

“Damn.”

“You’re upset by this?”

She frowned. “I wanted to have sex.”

He chuckled. “We can have sex when I get my stitches out. Be patient.”

She whined. “I’m not good at being patient. I’m starving for you. You be patient.”

***

Buffy called Dawn back with the information from their trip to the jebels. She was selective with details, playing heavily on anything demon or atmosphere related – including the disappointment of the well water – but skipping over the mystery aphrodisiac part, except to say that they were a little confused as to what was causing the surges in psychic energy and what was feeding off it. Dawn pressed her on this point, and she reiterated lamely about drinking the water and it not working.

“But that doesn’t really explain—”

Buffy cleared her throat awkwardly.

“We just . . . Angel and I . . . we felt a little psychically weird is all,” she fumbled.

There was a brief agonizing pause from Dawn. “What do you mean?”

Buffy closed her eyes in duress.

“We got a little, um . . .”

“You had sex,” Dawn accused suddenly.

Buffy’s eyes flew open.

“We did not,” she lied weakly.

Dawn made a little groan of irritation. “You did too! I cannot believe you! You idiots!”

“But I thought you wanted us to have sex!”

“I did! I do! You should! But not magically induced, demon-feeding sex! I can’t believe you could be so—”

“What are you, Giles? It’s not like it was some plan we had, we were all . . . hypnotized or hexed or whatever. Not our fault.”

“You guys could be in really big trouble, Buffy. I’m serious.”

“Why? What’s the harm?”

“The harm is . . . if it’s the demon I think it is . . . ?”

“I thought you didn’t know what demon it was.”

“Well, I didn’t before. But now you’ve given me all sorts of new information, remember, that’s the reason you were actually there, not to get your swerve on? This sounds like an aesma daeva demon, and it sounds like you and Angel have gotten yourselves in a whole lot of trouble.”

“What do you mean?”

“Okay, you know how you were thinking the water was an aphrodisiac—”

“But that’s a dud, we tried it—”

“Shut up and listen to me. You know how you were thinking the water was an aphrodisiac, and couples were drinking it and getting aroused and the demon was feeding off of their sexual energy, and then you tried the water and found that wasn’t true, and then you decided well maybe the hills themselves were the aphrodisiac, since the water didn’t work and since you and Angel got all hot there, you idiots?”

“Yeah . . .”

“Well, you’re wrong there, too. It’s not the water, it’s not the hills. It’s the damn demon.”

“But it doesn’t make any sense for him to feed off sexual energy if he creates it—”

“I know. He doesn’t feed off sexual energy. He feeds off life force; he uses sexual energy to get dumbasses like you and Angel distracted long enough for him to slaughter them by sucking out their life force in – ew, you so don’t want to see the pictures. That’s why all the victims are couples, that’s why Angel was all right when he was by himself; he didn’t have you there to get him all worked up, so he was able to get away.”

“But he didn’t have me there to protect him, either—”

“You’re not listening to me. Do you have a damn death wish, Buffy?”

“What? No! I have a kill-this-demon-and-get-out-of-Sudan wish!”

“Then listen carefully: not only does this demon have a super thrall – as you’ve already experienced – but once you’ve been under it, the deeper he can pull you. And if he thralled you and Angel into getting all horizontal, then he’s already got a foot in the door re: sucking out your life force.”

“That’s bad.”

“I know. Dumbass.”

“It was really good sex,” Buffy offered after a long moment of tense silence.

“I hope it was worth getting the life force sucked out of you and your partner in stupid.”

“Dawn—”

“I know,” she said tersely. “You didn’t mean to, it’s really not your fault. I’m just worried and this is messy and we really could have done without this complication.”

“You sound like Giles,” Buffy complained. “It’s gotta be the Watcher thing; this whole unfun attitude comes from dealing with dusty old books all day.”

“It comes from dealing with you,” Dawn countered. “Not one of my dusty books – or any of my Slayers, either – is half as difficult as you.”

“Yeah, I’m the difficult sibling, Miss Made-of-Energy-Has-a-Hell-God-After-Me—”

“Oh my God, that was almost ten years ago! You have to stop milking it.”

“I died, it’s not a small thing—”

“Angel died, and he’s stopped whining about it.”

Buffy rolled her eyes by habit, regardless of the fact that her sister couldn’t pick up on that gesture of annoyance over the phone. “Fine. Whatever. So. How do we kill this asthma diva thing?”

“Aesma daeva,” Dawn corrected her slowly. “And any number of your normal pointy things in vital organs should do it; the trick is to not get killed first.”

“That’s easy—”

“It is not easy. I’ve just told you how it’s not easy.”

“I’ll just go without Angel. Easy.”

“And how are you going to arrange that?”

“I’ll explain to him that he’s too weak to help fight the demon—” Dawn made a little noise of disbelief, so Buffy changed tactics. “—or I’ll hit him over the head with a frying pan like in Roger Rabbit.”

“Yeah,” Dawn said. “That’s a good, honest basis for a relationship.”

“I don’t want him to die,” Buffy replied grumpily. “And, if I can at all help it, I’d prefer that I not die, either.”

“Well, there may be a way to counteract the thrall,” Dawn said in a kind of slow, drawn-out way that Buffy recognized from Giles as ready-to-research voice. “I’ll get some aesma daeva-specific books and look into it in more detail; maybe there’s a spell or something you can do to at least weaken its hold . . .”

“Or I could go alone.”

“It’ll still have that foot-in-the-door thing, Buffy. You guys blew it. I know it’s not your fault, but the demon has the upper hand now. I’ll call you back when I have something.”

“Great,” Buffy said glumly to the dial tone. “Just great.”

***

Angel was disappointed, but not all that surprised, by Buffy’s report of Dawn’s news. He was glad that they’d narrowed down the demon; no, he’d never come across one before, although he was familiar enough with the species to decipher what Buffy meant when she mangled the unfamiliar Persian words in her retelling. She told him the part about the thrall carefully, with the hope that he’d offer to let her take it on by herself, thus eliminating the possibility of a recurrence of the previous night’s events. No go.

“We’ll just wait for Dawn to find us a spell to counteract the thrall,” he said instead.

She huffed. “But you’re still hurt!”

He frowned. “And you’re vulnerable to it, and you’re insane if you think I’m going to let you go back out there by yourself.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “Let me?”

He sighed. “I meant I’d follow you, Buffy, not that you require my permission. Don’t make a fight where there isn’t one. You’re going to need your strength for the real battle ahead.”

She relaxed. “Oh, right.”

He was right. Of course he was right. And he would follow her; he was as stubborn as she was. She closed the distance between them, kissed him softly.

“Angel,” she murmured, letting her hands rest comfortably on his pectorals, feeling what was becoming the familiar rhythm of his heartbeat. “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“Where in Sudan can I buy a frying pan?”

He blinked and drew arm’s length away from her so that he could study her face.

“What?”

She sighed and cuddled back against him. “Nothing, sweetheart.”

***

It took Dawn another two days to get back to them, but the waiting part was much better this time. They still had the worry of their impotence, and they had the pain and frustration of healing, but this time they had the promise that Dawn’s answer would lead them somewhere, and the awkwardness between them had been lifted, so in the meantime they were able to find comfort in one another. The hospital was oppressive, so they spent a great deal of time exploring Kassala. They took in the sights of the gorgeous desert and the manic city, and Angel took Buffy down to the souq, where he offered to buy her a frying pan; she told him hastily that she’d been joking, but she did allow him to buy her a piece of exquisite silver jewelry from a Rashaida woman who had the bottom half of her face veiled but not her hair.

At night, or when their trips to the city left them too hot or too sore, they spent their time lying together in Angel’s bed, talking quietly. Real things, no more shallow conversation. Buffy’s heart swelled; she couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt this fulfilled, the last time she’d been so honestly and recklessly happy.

It was late evening when Dawn called and so they were in, lying drowsily in each other’s embrace. Buffy jumped up at hearing the startling noise; such was her celerity that she had the receiver off the cradle and to her ear after only two rings, and the phone was in the next room.

“Hello?” she said breathlessly.

“Got your spell,” Dawn announced happily.

Buffy grinned.

***

The ingredients were easy to come by; they purchased almost all of them at the main souq the next morning. There were two they were lacking, and Angel picked one of them up from a local witch while Buffy waited impatiently back at the hospital. (He’d insisted on taking a taxi, and she had refused to get in one ever again). When he returned, they prepared the spell with mortar, pestle, and cauldron borrowed from the same witch. They worked quickly, adding the final ingredient – their blood – in taut silence.

“Ready to rock and roll?” Buffy asked when the spell had come to a simmer and let off the red plume of smoke that Dawn had told her meant it was viable.

Angel carefully poured the potion from the cauldron into the same bottle they’d brought back from Khatmiya.

“Yes. Let’s do this.”

***

It was late afternoon when they caught a bus out to the jebels. They got a non-chatty driver, and sat near the back, feeling non-chatty themselves. They’d brought a duffle bag full of weapons purchased at the souq – Buffy was ecstatic when she saw the arsenal available to her at the outdoor market – and they felt uncomfortable and conspicuous traveling with it among all the normal tourists with their cameras and honeymoon ideations. Buffy had healed completely from their sexual escapades, but her bottom was again punished by the horrible seats, and Angel and his newly stitched side suffered only slightly less than last time. Thus, they both failed to appreciate the beauty of the passing scenery, and they were both cranky and keyed up for the fight when they arrived at their destination.

It was getting dark when they arrived at the jebels. They started their trek to Aweitila, slipping unceremoniously by the vendors jumping at them like puppies in a pet store. Buffy was for once glad she didn’t speak Arabic; she couldn’t understand their sales pitches. Angel was hurting already; he bowed without a fight when Buffy offered to carry the duffle bag. It didn’t matter. Soon this would be over, and they could leave Sudan and go somewhere beautiful and private where he could convalesce.

They were passing the mosque; Buffy stopped.

“Think we should put on our chastity belts now?” she asked.

Angel regarded her without comprehension. “What?”

“The potion thing. You wanna do it now? Since we’re by a church and all.”

He was looking grim. She should have fought harder to get him to let her do this alone . . . but then, he never would have backed down. He was stubborn to the point of mulishness. She tried to pretend that she wasn’t, and that she didn’t find that attractive . . . she needed, definitely, to not be thinking about things about Angel she found attractive.

“I guess so,” he said finally.

Buffy unzipped the duffle bag and fished out the bottle containing the potion. It was dark and unappetizing-looking; she wrinkled her nose.

“Yuck.” She glanced over at Angel. “Ladies first again?”

“Whatever you’d like.”

She grimaced. “I can’t believe we have to drink blood to keep from getting our life forces sucked out . . . although I guess you’re used to it . . .”

Angel smiled indulgently.

The apples of her cheeks colored. “Sorry.”

“It’s all right. I’ll go first, if you want.”

“No, I’m just whining . . . here goes.”

She uncapped the bottle and took a deep swig. She almost gagged; truth be told, there was very little blood in it – the potion was mostly other ingredients, herbs and a pomegranate and some other things – but it was thick and viscous and it tasted awful. Buffy forced herself to swallow, wiped her mouth on the back of her hand, and handed the bottle to Angel.

He barely flinched. Stupid stoic Angel.

“Ready?” he asked breathlessly – ha, he was affected – handing the empty bottle back to her.

She stuffed it in her duffle, rezipped the bag, and nodded in assent. They continued the climb up Aweitila in silence, too tense to speak.

***

They’d been wandering around Aweitila for a quarter of an hour when they began to get anxious.

“I think we look suspicious,” Buffy said finally. “Just wandering around looking like demon hunters. We should be more natural, and we should . . . you know, set out some bait.”

“How? What bait?”

Buffy set down the bag full of weapons. “Kiss me. Then we’ll look like a normal honeymooning couple, plus it’ll get me all aroused, which is demon bait. Hurry, time’s a’wastin’.”

Angel regarded her curiously for a second before responding.

“You know, that’s actually not as horrible an idea as it sounds.”

She beamed. “Thanks, honey.”

He took her in his arms, brought his lips to hers gently. She pulled away, looked at him askance. “No, no, that’ll never do. You have to act like you’re all demon-spell-love-crazed for me. Come on. Ravage me.”

He narrowed his eyes. “You are just aching to be spanked.”

She grinned. “There’s plenty of time for that later. Right now you’re ravaging me.”

He rolled his eyes and pulled her to him roughly. She gasped in pleasure and raised her face eagerly as he descended upon her with much more insistent kisses.

“That’s more like it,” she breathed when he let her up for air.

He started to make a quick comment back, but all of a sudden, something changed: the folly went out of her eyes; they’d hardened to Slayer eyes, all business. Simultaneously, her muscles under his hands steeled to battle-ready.

“It’s party time,” she whispered against his ear. “What did I tell you . . . we get cuddly, and our friend would just crawl out of the woodwork.”

“I call the broadsword,” he responded dully. “Anything to add before we begin?”

She hesitated; she was somewhat unwilling to let go of him. She was wishing, suddenly, that she’d bought that frying pan after all.

“I love you,” she decided on finally. “Please be careful.”

He kissed her firmly. “You too.”

They broke apart and tore quickly into the duffle. Buffy came up with a stake and a small axe, abandoning the broadsword to Angel. The demon was still several yards away; Buffy had just felt the prickle of its presence, and now the two of them were operating on the rough outline of its figure, the glint of its eyes under the Saharan moonlight. It was very dark in color and very reptilian in appearance: sharp angles, tight body, all scales and claws, glistening yellow lizard eyes.

Buffy wrinkled her nose. “Why are the demons with thrall always the ugliest?”

“It’s even uglier up close,” Angel replied softly.

She winced sympathetically. “Sorry, honey.”

They waited for a moment in battle positions; it didn’t advance. Buffy glanced anxiously at Angel.

“Well?”

“I’m thinking we need to take the offensive here.”

“Glad it’s not just me.”

“Any particular thoughts?”

He smiled and gestured gallantly with his sword. “Ladies first.”

She was so hoping he would say that. She threw her stake at where she assumed the demon’s heart was; it made contact, but bounced off and rolled away into the night.

Buffy and Angel exchanged glances.

She swore. “Dammit.”

Her take on the offensive did, however, have the effect of pissing the demon off; he started slithering in their direction. Angel started to say something about her choice of attack, but she cut him off.

“I’d like to take another crack at it, if you don’t mind.”

“Be my guest.”

Without further ado, Buffy took a running start and then landed a flying kick into the demon’s chest. He flew back into the rocks with a crash and the scrape of scales on stone and stones sliding by each other. Buffy and Angel trotted after him, weapons raised. Buffy planted her foot on his chest and in a flash of silver, Angel’s sword was raised and then down.

It was over quickly.

***

Their bus driver on the way back to the hospital was the smiling, English-speaking Dinka. He was ecstatic to see them, either delighted to be able to break out his English or remembering how generous Angel was with tips.

It was the last bus of the evening so it was quite full, and they sat near the back, completely ignoring the translated tour notes and the gorgeousness of the moonlight on the Gash and the desert gardens, instead just sitting holding hands and kissing like teenagers under the bleachers on prom night. They were so distracted by the time they’d arrived back at Souq Ash-Sha’abi that they accidentally left the duffle bag onboard; they wondered, giggling, the next morning what the bus driver thought when he found it. By the time they’d reached the hospital it was almost midnight and by the time they got upstairs they were kissing desperately; they were half-undressed by the time they reached Angel’s bed.

***

The next morning, it was determined that they had torn out four of Angel’s stitches. Sana was furious, but it didn’t matter, because Angel checked out of the hospital as soon as she finished repairing the damage and bandaging him up again. They thanked her profusely – and Angel paid her more on top of whatever he’d already given her for all the frustration they had caused her with their Angloness and their sexcapades – and left for the railway station.

“So,” he asked slowly. “Where do you want to go?”

She cuddled against him, even in the heat of the morning.

“I don’t care. As long as it’s with you.”

Comments

[carlyinrome.livejournal.com]

Because there's the part that it says Danny picks her up at the airport (or was waiting for her?).

Oh! That I meant, like . . . she meets the man who will be her husband while waiting for her flight back to Rome. She never makes it back because he convinces her to stay in Los Angeles; that's where she is when Angel calls her four years later, and -- in my mind; obviously it's not in the story, but like the story needed any more padding, LOL -- she never gets on her plane.

Not sure lol, but I liked it that way. Meaning it didn't need to be cleared up to "get" the story lol. Wow, I'm such a dork.

You're adorable.