Spike had dressed and was out in the kitchen begging for food from Jack. Didn’t they have any blood at all? Giles sat at the kitchen table looking amused. This was as good as haunting. I wonder if I’ll do that? Cordelia came in she looked as though she had been crying. He realised then that she had put two and two together after last nights’ debacle with the morphine.

He smiled brightly as she sat down next to him. He poured her some tea with sugar in it.

"Good Morning sunshine! I know you don’t take sugar but it’s the best thing for shock and weepiness." She tried smiling but her smile broke on her face. He gave her a hug while she wept on his shoulder.

"Cordelia, Shh. It’s all right. I’m OK now." Giles murmured into her hair.

"No, it’s not all right and you’re never going to be OK. Why haven’t you done anything about it Giles?" She was angry because she didn’t know the whole story. Perhaps it was time.

"Jack, can you gather everyone together in the living room. I think it’s time we decorated the tree and time I told everyone why they’re here." Giles left the table with Cordelia in tow. Oz looked rumpled as he emerged from the library everybody trooped past him.

"What’s happening?" He asked Spike he was the last in the long queue of people.

"The truth is happening. Better be quick, he’ll be asking questions!" Spike knew that it would be the other way round but it sounded good. He halted at the door staring at the criss-cross pattern of burning death on the floor.

"Oi! Someone shut the curtains. Some of us are allergic!" The floor was safe for him to enter in another moment.

Giles sat in his armchair Willow smiled at him from her picture. He took a deep breath and surveyed his comrades in arms.

"Well now, I’ve been trying to decide how to tell you for a day or two and there’s no easy way to say it. I have cancer and will die sometime tomorrow." Jack shifted in his seat. Blunt Dad, brutally blunt. They don’t believe you! He noticed that Anya and Xander were the only ones having a reaction. All the rest had guessed. Giles addressed Xander.

"I had treatment when I was first diagnosed but I knew it wouldn’t cure me. Watchers know almost to the hour when they are to die. I wanted to say goodbye to you all and say that I’ve enjoyed sharing my Slayer years with you. Is there anything you want to ask, anything at all?"

Xander cleared his throat. He opened his mouth but no sound came out. He took a gulp of tea and tried again.

"All of your stories have featured Ethan, why? I thought you hated him."

"Ah, Ethan, never far away from my fist either above or below the belt. I hated him because he created Ripper. He was a friend and the only man that I was ever attracted to. I was experimenting." Giles held Xander’s gaze steadily. Another voice snapped his head to the next inquisitor. Cordelia. He smiled.

"Not another condom comment, I hope Cordy."

"When did you and Willow get together?" He sighed and glanced at Willow’s portrait. This was going to be a mixed pleasure. "You want to hear that story? Just for you then Miss. Cordelia."

After his Slayer’s death, a Watcher is allowed a certain amount of "down-time." Otherwise, they’d flip but because Buffy was the longest surviving Slayer on record when she died, I flipped. I didn’t drink and I didn’t do drugs. My mind just seized. The Council paid for my treatment at a London Sanatorium. Where I spent my days wandering around aimlessly gazing at every blonde girl that passed me by hoping that one of them would be Buffy.

One fateful day my fellow inmates and I went on an outing from the Sanatorium to the Tate gallery in London. I remember I was admiring a painting the artist had used such wonderful rich reds and purples on the robes, when I heard a woman’s voice call my name. I turned and saw Willow. She looked at me curiously. Her eyes were compassionate and warm I must have looked puzzled because my helper came up to me to lead me away. Willow followed me round the gallery. She caught my eye continuously it was like a coy flirting game. My numb mind began to shake itself awake.

After two hours, we were herded into the Sanatoriums’ mini bus. I saw Willow’s sweet face through the back window of the bus rapidly receding in the London traffic. She waved. I didn’t wave back because I didn’t know who she was.

Willow arrived the next day at the Sanatorium in full resolve face and we all know what that means! She was not going to leave the building without me! Unfortunately, I was scheduled to have E.C.T that day and was sedated. The orderlies were not sympathetic they regarded me as rather feeble. After all, I’d been going on about a damn tree all night! The lift arrived to take me to the correct floor.

My psychiatrist and Willow got to the lift as the doors closed. Willow shot up the stairs cursing her shoes, throwing them down the stairwell. I arrived at the door of the treatment room. They parked me there briefly sharing a fag over my head.

"Willow." I whispered.

"Gawd, he’s off again! Oi, you like trees mate? You can hug ’em all you like after they fry yer brain." He sniggered.

"Giles!" Willow shrieked. The cavalry had never looked more beautiful. The orderlies moved my chair toward the door.

"You move him and you’re dead!" She screamed at them. I managed to raise my head to look at her. My psychiatrist heaved himself up the last of the steps.

"Listen to her …she knows him." He puffed.

"Giles? Rupert. Please answer me." She knelt down in front of me and willed me to speak.

"Willow." I said her name clearly and she flung her arms round my neck. It was the best hug of my life! I was wheeled back to my room and Willow waited with me while the necessary papers were drawn up for my release into her care.

I don’t think she realised what she was getting herself into. I was an emotional wreck. On more than one occasion in those early days, she had to talk me down from a near suicidal frenzy. I hadn’t been at Buffy’s side when she perished I should have died in her stead and the guilt that I felt robbed me of my reason. Willow gave it back to me.

She taught me all about cooking and gardening. We bought this house together. My hand shook as I signed my name to the deeds. I couldn’t write anything after Buffy’s death. You’re supposed to chronicle how your Slayer died and I just couldn’t. So writing was my therapy and Willow was my taskmaster. She was so proud of me when I got the letter saying my manuscript had been accepted. The first ’Spike’ stories were to be published. I felt strong again and we made plans to visit Buffy’s grave.

It was very strange being in Sunnydale after so many years. We passed by my old apartment it was shuttered and rundown. The cemetery where I had tutored Buffy on tests between dustings also had the look of decay about it.

Her solid tombstone stood out stark and white amongst the grey of the others. A single red rose lay on the grass of her grave still fresh with dew. From Angel I surmised. I knelt carefully so as not to crush her and put my flowers in the cold stone vase. I couldn’t say anything. My tears spoke volumes. Willow’s hand in mine lead me away I’d been kneeling for an hour.

Back home Willow decided I needed another distraction as if she weren’t distraction enough! She bought me some watercolours for my Birthday and I began to paint. At first, it was difficult for me and she persisted in asking me why.

I told her that I had found the illustration of the Eyghon summoning tattoo and had copied it onto our groups’ bodies for Ethan to follow and make permanent. I was the artist in our group. Without me, there would be no Eyghon.

That admission opened the floodgates and I told her everything when I had finished ranting feeling wretched and drained she came to me and draped her arm round my shoulders. I felt her love enfolding me like a warm blanket.

"I forgive you. I love you, Rupert." Those words were a balm to soothe a thousand hurts and I vowed to myself that this wondrous creature would never know a day when I didn’t return her love. She rescued me she was my friend, my lover and my soul.

The first time we made love was in the garden with the scents and sounds of May all round us. She was so fragrant as if she’d been born a flower herself. Her sun warmed skin felt silken against mine as we moved in time to the gentle breeze. There was no hurry we had all the time in the world. Her body was the colour of pearls contrasting with the flame of her hair that flowed over the verdant green grass. She was as warm as the grass was cool but eventually our slow love evolved becoming more insistent as the green fuse drives the flower to seek out the sun so we sought our completion. In the bed of her belly, I sowed my seed and from that seed, Jack grew. Our one and only child. As he grew up, I knew Jack would be a Watcher with a Slayer of his own one-day. I prayed that he would never feel the guilt I did over Buffy’s death.

"Does that answer your question Cordelia? Now let’s trim the tree and you can have the last story afterwards."

"What’s that going to be about?" Asked Spike as he dragged tinsel out of a plastic bag.

"How it was my idea to raise Eyghon and not Ethan’s." Giles tried not to notice how everyone froze at his statement.

End of Pt.8

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