New Beginnings

Disclaimer: All the following and preceding chapters, the chacterization of buffy and Julian Luna belongs to respected owner. they are not mine.

Chapter 1
The Slayer

***Flashback***


Two days ago…


Six months had passed since Archon’s murder. No matter that it was murder technically it was Kindred justice. Since then, everyone had been on his or her best behavior. Julian still does not trust the Brujah clan even though they have a new leader. Even Frank, whom Julian has counted on to stir things up, has been on his best behavior.


Everyone is keeping their distance. Then, there is Caitlin who does not remember what she and Julian have shared. As Prince, Julian had to protect the masquerade. Even if he had to give up someone, he loved. He had Caitlin transferred to another state to work at in a larger more prestigious newspaper office. Julian could not live with the knowledge that she was here in his city and he could not touch her.


He was tired. It was one o’ clock in the morning. He felt stifled. He needed to get out of the house. Everyone was treating him as if he was fragile. He was definitely getting tired of it. He did not have any peace. Every few minutes, someone would ask if he was okay, or if he wanted something to eat or drink. They hovered constantly, even Daedalus, who was the most stoic of any person he knew.


Arghhh, I need a break, he thought as weariness enveloped him.


He quickly walked to the front door, looking behind him. However, he did not see anyone. He got into his car and drove through the gates.


Sweet freedom, he sighed as he breathes in the night air.


***~***~***~***~***~***~***~***


Sasha, Julian’s niece had happened to glance out of one of the multiple windows in the huge mansion and saw her uncle driving through the gate. “Cash?”


“Mmm,” said Sasha’s boyfriend and her Uncle Julian’s bodyguard.


“Which guard is with Uncle Julian?”


“Why do you want to know?” said Cash who was lounging on a sofa reading a magazine.


“He just drove through the gate.”


“Shit! Are you sure?” he said springing up to look out the window, just in time to see a car’s headlights rounding a corner. “Shit, Shit. How many times do I have to tell him not leave the house without a guard,” Cash said, running towards the open door and down the large staircase, his mouth set in annoyance.


Upstairs, Sasha drew the curtains, looked around the room and sighed. There goes my evening, she thought, disappointed.


Cash and several Gangrel guards went into separate cars in the hopes of catching up with Julian, but they never did.


***~***~***~***~***~***~***~***


Meanwhile, Julian had found himself at the beach. He stood staring out at the ocean waves. He was feeling introspective. When his wife Evelyn had died, he had lost hope, and then Archon embraced him. Archon became not only his Primogen and sire, but also his mentor and friend for several years. Then Alexandra came into his life. With her, he also had hope. Now, they are both gone. He wanted to stay until sunrise and let the sun take him, because the body had been dead for several years, and all that was left was his heart and soul. Now those are dead too. Maybe he should walk in the sea and let it carry him away. That would end it all.


Something at the corner of his eye caught his attention. Someone or something was floating in the ocean. This is a tourist town and debris were constantly been thrown in the ocean. It was a moonless night and although his vision was perfect, something made him hesitated. He looked around him, but the beach was deserted. It had rained earlier in the day, and everyone seems had disappeared. He was not a callous person, but he did not want to deal with some mortal and their problems. But he couldn’t let someone died, because he doesn’t wanted to be involved. He peered intently at the water; someone was definitely in the water. He dove in after quickly shed his jacket and shoes, swimming towards the submerging figure in the water.


It was a woman. She was unconscious and she whimpered as he gathered her up into his arms.


“I got you,” Julian said, his voice as a soft burr, as he lifts the waterlogged body into his arms. She was just a little thing. “You are safe,” he said softly, walking towards his car. He quickly retrieved a blanket from the trunk of the car and wrapped her into it, gently putting her in the back seat.


It was a twenty-minute drive to his home. Every few minutes, he looked back at the woman, who continued to whimper and make noises. “Shh, you are safe,” he said, making his voice as soothing as possible as he took out his cell phone to call Cash.


“Julian, where are you? How many times do I have to tell you to let someone know where you are going to be?” Cash ripped out the words impatiently.


“Cash?” Julian asked, looking at the phone in his hand.


“You could be dead, lying in a ditch somewhere,” Cash insisted.


“Cash!” he said firmly.


“Do you know how long, we’ve been looking for you and trying to call you?” said Cash, with returning impatience. “Why don’t you keep you cell phone on?”


“Cash, shut up!” Julian said, frustration sounded in his voice.


“Yes, my Prince,” he said, gritting his teeth.


“I so glad that I got your attention,” Julian drawled with distinct mockery. “I will be at the house in few minutes, please send for Daedalus.”


“I knew it!” Cash said, his eyes tightened in resignation. “Where are you hurt? How bad is it?”


“Calm down. It is not for me. It is my passenger,” said Julian driving frantically through a red light.


“Passenger?”


“Yes, I found someone on the beach. She is frostbitten, sunburned, maybe dehydrated, and she also has several lacerations on her body.”


“A mortal? Cash asked startled. “Why don’t you drop her at the hospital? It’s on your way,” Cash questioned.


“No!” Julian shouted. His hands tightened reflexively on the steering wheel. “No,” he said, this time calmly. “I am driving through the gates now. Meet me at the door,” he said hanging up. Following his instinct, he knew she was going to be important.


Cash hurriedly ran through the front door, as Julian’s car droved through the gate. A human, what was Julian doing with a human? He was confused, baffled.


Julian got out of the car and tenderly cradled Buffy in his arms.


“Here,” said Cash, coming forward to relieve Julian of his burden.


“I got her,” Julian said, ignoring Cash outstretch arms. “Is everything in readiness?”


“Yes, we prepared a room and Daedalus is waiting for you.


“Good,” Julian said, striding forward into the house.


Daedulus stood at the top of the stairs, stoically waiting for the guest. No one looking at him would notice that he was feeling apprehensive. He would be attending a human; the thought tore at his insides. He did not like to be in their presence, especially once they got a glimpse of his face. Daedalus is Nosferatu. He had a baldhead with protruding forehead and slanting gray eyes. He rather be in his basement lair working on his art, safe and happy, than to be attending a mortal. Reluctantly, he followed, Julian and Cash into a large bedroom, one of several guest rooms, his movements stiff and awkward. After a few minutes working on the patient, he said, “She will heal and she will also need a lot of liquid and some rest. That is all I can do for this moment.” He bowed slightly to his Prince and walk quickly to the door, thanking providence the woman did not awaken.


After Daedalus had left the room, Cash who had stood in the background watching Daedalus work creped closer to the bed. Looking at the soaking wet, blonde haired girl, he asked. “Who is she?”


“I don’t know,” said Julian, crossing over to sit in the chair by the bed. He grabbed a large white towel warmed in the microwave and wrapped it around the girl’s head. “Wake up little one,” he said his voice a husky whisper. She made a movement dislodging the heated towel from her head. Faint, occasional shivers racked her body. He murmured soothingly, rubbing another warm towel on her cold flesh.


For the next two days, Julian watched her breathe, never leaving her side. He was there to soothe, when she have nightmares. In those nightmares, she seemed to be searching for several people, but two names seemed to crop up, Angel and Mom, He made a mental note to ask her, when she woke up who this Angel was. He also nagged Daedalus about her not waking up, but Daedalus put up with the questions, because he saw that finally Julian was alive again.


***~***~***~***~***~***~***~***


Two days later…


Now she was a wake and crying in his arms.


Tears glistened on her pale cheek, Buffy stirred in Julian’s arms.


She stiffened, momentarily abashed. “I can’t believe I did that,” she said, pushing Julian away. She didn’t like the afterness, it made her feel oogy. Here she didn’t know anything about this man, this vampire and she was crying into his arm. She was still wondering why he didn’t kill her, not that she wanted to die, but she wanted to know where she stood. Maybe he was like Angel, before the old Angelus debacle, a vampire with a soul. She opened her mouth to ask him, but he beat her to the punch.


“Are you going to tell me your name?” Julian asked, moving to sit in a chair once again. “After crying in my arms, I deserve at least that much.”


Buffy, in a fit of childish pique wanted to put out her tongue at him. It was weird, but she felt comfortable with him. She felt an affection coming from him, but her first instinct as the Slayer was not to trust him. However, the longer she was around Julian, the more she wanted to tell him her secrets. But he was so disturbing to her in every way and she was tired of running.


She hugged her knees to her, with her head bowed, her body slump with despair. A hot tear rolled down her cheek and her throat seemed to close up, but she got the courage to tell him. She told Julian how at age fifteen, she was called to be a slayer. How disbelieving she was, when she had found out about vampires and other creatures of the night. How she could not explain to her friends and family, this great secret and burden she had. How when she went to the Hellmouth, she met a wonderful group of people who understood her. She told him what had happened to her on her seventeen birthday, how she felt responsible for all the destruction Angelus had created, because she couldn’t killed him. Then she told him about how each of them died, because she wasn’t there to save them, her Mother, Willow, Xander, Giles, Oz, Cordelia, Faith. She told Julian how she had lost the last ten years of her life and she tried to kill her self, by putting her self in every possible dangerous position.


“But I knew I wanted to live when the car I was driving crashed into the San Francisco bay,” Buffy concluded, her voice fragile and shaking.


He realized then how much she must have had to grow up in the last few years. Buffy was an old soul trapped in such a younger body, with secrets and fears hidden deep inside her. He knew there was something special about her from the beginning. His heart swelled with a feeling he had thought had died when Caitlyn left.


“Buffy,” Julian said, looking in her luminous eyes. “It is not your fault these things happened. I have been around a long time. I know this to be true. Fate determined the path each of us takes. Your path is to be here. There is something greater in store for you. If it was not so, then you would have died in Sunnydale or in that car crash.”


“Do you think so?” Buffy asked lip quivery slightly, the tenderness in his expression amazed her. Oh God, I am turning into a leaking faucet.


“Yes,” Julian said positively. “Now dry those eyes.”


“Okay,” she said sniffling slightly. “I know you are a vampire, but you seem different from the ones I know. How are you different?”


“What is different between me and the vampires you have met in Sunnydale? Number one, we do not kill our prey in order to feed. We have rules. Second, we do not harm mortals. Any one caught breaking the masquerade will be severely dealt with," Julian said matter-of-factly.


"Well, the vampires I've met so far never have such high self-esteem," Buffy remarked dryly.


"Those are remnants Buffy, hybrids of the Nosferatu, they only lived on the Hellmouth.


“What!” intense astonishment touched her pale face.


“They are remnants, they only lived on the Hellmouth,” Julian repeated, an easy smile played at the corners of his mouth. Her reaction seemed to amuse him.


Then a shock of discovery hit Buffy full force. She had been given a brand new start. Everyone and everything she knew has gone. Why not a complete start? No one knows that she was alive. She thought about that for a while. Yes this might work. “I am destiny free. I am no longer named Buffy,” she spoke with quiet, but desperate, firmness. “My new name is Elisabeth Winters. Buffy Summers no longer exist. She died twelve years ago in hell.”


“Okay, Elisabeth it is,” said Julian, his voice was carefully colored in neutral shades. However, from what he had discerned by the look he had seen in her eyes, he knew she had made up her mind. “Elisabeth is quite a mouthful, how about if I called you Liz,” he said, watching her wearily.


“Liz!’ Buffy squeaked her voice rose in surprise. “No! Definitely not.” It’s bad enough to be named Buffy, but to be called Liz, ewww, she shuddering slightly at that disturbing thought. Although the name Buffy had grew on her, it was what her mom named her. But it is time to put away childish things. When I was a girl, my name was Buffy, now I am a woman, my name will be Elisabeth.


“How about Beth?” he asked, searching for a plausible name.


“No, it sounds too much like Buffy,” she cried, dismay.


“There are not a lot of choices to choose from. How about Elisa or Eliza?” his tone held a note of impatience.


“I don’t like either one,” Buffy said stubbornly.


“Well, it has to be one or the other,” said Julian exasperated.


“I don’t like it,” Buffy said with a pout.


“You are the one that chose Elisabeth,” said Julian, gritting his teeth, fed up with her. She was a most infuriating little bit of baggage. Any man that gets her gets trouble. Maybe I need a little bit a trouble in my life, he mused, raking his eyes, boldly over her. With some food in her, she will be in fighting form.


“I know!” a cry of relief broke from her lips. “How about Lissa?


“Lissa Winters,” Julian mused, in a grudging voice. “It might work.”


“Might? It will work,” Buffy said with dazzling determination. “My name is Elisabeth Anne Winters, but you can call me Lissa.” Nervously running her fingers through her hair, she said in a rush, “I wanna thank you, for holding me, when I went all angsty.”


“It was my pleasure,” he said, making a dismissing gesture.


“I just wanted to thank you,” she mumbles, turning her face away from him.


Julian walked over to the bed and put his hand under chin, turning her toward him. “It was my pleasure,” he said with quiet emphasis. Moving back to the chair, he said. “Okay Lissa, as I was saying, before you interrupted me,” Julian said, making light of the situation. With her confidence spiraled upward, Buffy put out her tongue at him. Julian just rolled his eyes; a faint light twinkled in their depths. “As Kindred, we tried to be useful members of society. We work for a living and pay our taxes.


“So you all are a bunch of nice citizens,” Lissa said softly, mockingly. “Did you win the humanitarian award?”


“Two years ago,” he said, the beginning of a smile tipped the corners of his mouth. “But do not get me wrong it took us many years to evolve.”


“Did you really win that award?” she asked, caught off guard.


“I did.”


“How was it?” She regarded him with curiosity.


“It was great,” said Julian, remembering the pride and satisfaction he had felt when he received the award. The Kindred had come a long way, but they still had a ways to go. *“The Kindred were once savages, merciless killers who hunted humans at night, gorging on their blood. We had to leave behind what we were, no longer beasts. However, it is a constant battle we must fight each day against our primitive instincts.”*


“So what you are trying to tell me, is that you are not too far from the… What did call them?” Buffy said sounding a little puzzled. “Ah yes, remnants.”


“Yes in 5000 years, we still have not reached that place the we need to,” Julian said sadly.

“In keeping with the masquerade, don’t these remnants live anywhere but the Hellmouth? I know they do, because I have been killing them since I came to San Francisco.”


“Yes they do, they lived everywhere. We have demons and were-animals all over the world. However, not just the Kindred are in the masquerade, but they are also. They tried to blend in. Plus, just like your Sunnydale, people see what they wanted to see. Maybe there will come a time when Kindred can no longer hide.”


“In Sunnydale, I only knew one type of vampire, tell me more about your Kindred,” she said, scooting up in the bed, no longer looking pale in a white cotton nightgown.


“The first clan to evolve was the Nosferatu, whose primitive form includes fangs, claws, and reptilian eyes. Like those remnants in your Sunnydale.


“I’ll never forget them,” said Buffy.


“The Nosferatu are ferocious. Do not underestimate them. They once ruled the other clans, who had feared them for their power.”


“Do they still rule?”


“No, they tend to stay below ground. About a thousand years ago, the Nosferatu allowed the Ventrue, to live above ground and to become bankers and politicians so that the Nosferatu can maintain power. Once humans and Kindred had coexisted. However, because of our sensitivity to sunlight, they hunted us down and tortured us. Those who feared the Kindred burned us alive and called us monsters. As a result of this persecution, the clans joined together to create the Masquerade, a set of laws punishable by death that are intended to keep the Kindred from being seen as anything other than human. And the Nosferatu are able to live peacefully out of sight of humans below ground. The most important rule of the Masquerade is that Kindred must follow the Laws of Man.”


“You told me about the Nosferatu and the Ventrue. Are there any more Kindred in the clan?”


“Yes, there are the Gangrel, who are our foot soldiers, the Toreadors who are born entertainers, and there is the Brujah.


“I cannot believe I am telling you all this,” Julian said, his voice rose in surprise. To tell others about the Kindred was to embrace them or kill them. But he never felt any hesitancy telling Buffy, no Lissa, about the clans. Maybe because she lived with secrecy all these years, Julian knew he could trust her.


“You needed someone who understands what is like to be different, but not part of the problem,” said Buffy, thinking about her own situation. “I know how it is like to be different and how it is not to tell the people who share our world about who we really are because we fear reprisal. So, do you have any powers?” said Buffy abruptly, half-joking.


“We each have different powers, but what we all share is the ability to see a past event by looking into an object,” Julian said.


“Can you really can do that?” Buffy asked intrigued. The vampires she had known didn’t have any type of magic. The only thing she would consider magic was to hide their true face. That is type of magic isn’t it?


“Yes,” Julian said nodding, sounding a little bit abashed. “We also have the ability to enthrall people.”

“Really, like Dracula?” asked Buffy.

“Yes, like Dracula,” Julian nodded.


“Does he exits?”


“Dracula?”


“Sort of. We created Dracula from the imagination of Kindred using bits and pieces of each Kindred clan. We do not actually live in the basement and in coffins. The author of the story was a Kindred. We decided to put a story out there so that humans do not bother us. Garlic and holy water do not do any thing to us. If you stake us, we don’t go poof.”


“You don’t,” asked Buffy puzzled. “What happened to the bodies?”


“We have to burn the bodies. That is one way to kill us. We can be out in sunlight if we feed. We can shape shift by using the fowl of the air and beast of the earth. We are one with nature. The other difference between you and I is that I drink blood,” Julian said, ending on a whisper. He did not want to turn her off.


“I wish I had magic powers, maybe I could have saved them,” Buffy said, with a stab of guilt, thinking about her missing colleagues.

“I will introduce you to my niece, Sasha,” Julian said lightly, trying to get Buffy off that dark path, her mind had wondered.

“Do you think she will like me,” Buffy asked, putting the negative thought aside. Then she thought of sometime else and the thought tore at her insides. She was once the most popular girl in school, now that has change. She doesn’t know how to cultivate friendships anymore and if she learn anything being the Slayer, is that popularity can fade and the only thing that mattered was being alive.


“Of course, you’ll get along great,” Julian said, with such an air of confidence that Buffy had to believe him.


“When will we meet?” she asked.


“Tomorrow, when you get some more rest,” said Julian, getting up to tug the sheet up to Buffy’s chin.


“But I am not tired,” Buffy protested, with a pout.


“Yes you are,” Julian counted. “You had been in an accident and your body needs rest to recuperate.”


“But I have been in bed all daaay,” she said on a yawn.


“See, what I have told you.”


“Don’t be a party pooper,” said Buffy, eyelids starting to close. Wow, I am feeling a definite sparkage here.


“Get some rest, little one. I am right here,” said Julian, sitting back in the chair, he had spent the last forty-eight hours in.