All Hallows Eve

Part 4.

Spike dragged a reluctant and shivering Xander though the cemetery. "Spike, once more, why are we out here? I still don’t feel like myself." Spike had woken the young man out of an uneasy sleep, filled, once again, with misty dreams of green hills and gray skies, in order to accompany the vampire out into the night.

Spike didn’t even look back at the lagging boy. "Not surprising. That you don’t feel like you, that is. But there’s someone that you have to meet." Then he did turn around and his expression was one of apprehension. "I can’t deal with this alone. Besides, it really is your responsibility."

Xander jogged a little to catch up. "What’s that supposed to mean? You’re the one messing around with dead people and having visions and stuff. I think it’s all about you, here."

Spike just shook his head and kept up his pace until they reached his old crypt. "Here we are then," he muttered, not looking any happier than Xander felt. "We shouldn’t waste any time." And he led them both in.

There was a pentagram chalked onto the floor and Spike knelt just outside of it murmuring to himself as he lit the black candles at its points.

"Uh, Spike? This is so not something that I want to do right now." Xander’s voice quavered a bit. It wasn’t as if Willow hadn’t cornered him into participating in his share of wacky black candle and circle spells, but he had never been comfortable with it. There was something inside of him that was deeply distrustful of magic, and especially of his own involvement with it.

"Gotta be done, Harris. You have to talk to hdon’don’t you? Tried to handle it by myself, but he insists." The last was an absentminded statement as Spike completed his murmurs and candle lighting, which really only served to make the shadows in the crypt deeper and colder.

"Who?" Xander was relatively sure that they were alone in the crypt, and that made everything just so much worse when he started putting all the pieces together.

"He asked me not to tell you." Spike stood up and dusted off his hands, looking lost for a moment before returning to Xander’s side and gently pushing him toward the pentagram. "There now. Have a seat."

Xander took a deep breath. "No."

Spike didn’t even look at him. "Hmmm? No? Well, I don’t think so, mate." The vampire slid bonelessly to his knees at one of the points of the star and closed his eyes. "You, Xander my boy, are going to die on Halloween. Didn’t I mention that before? I thought I did. Anyway, I should think that you’d want to avoid that, if at all possible, and the only way I can see you doing that is if you play along for a bit. What do you think?"

Xander stood befuddled for a moment. He wasn’t used to Spike wanting to help him. It set off every alarm he had in his head. However, he had always been very interested in staying alive. Living on the Hellmouth, one developed a very keen awareness of one’s own mortality, and Xander was no exception. Living with death (and the undead) every day had turned his perceptions of life a bit askew from those of your average twenty-something young man. He accepted death, he recognized it, but he was not at all eager to confront it without an escape scenario. He turned his attention back to Spike. "I don’t know, Spike. This is all a little much. I haven’t been feeling well; I’ve been having strange dreams and I have no idea what you’re up to. Maybe you should explain."

Spike didn’t look at up but Xander could feel his irritation. "Explain. " Th" The blond rose up on his knees, shuffled backward, and settled back against the wall of the crypt. "I had a vision in which I saw you, Xander Harris, dead. There were two other men there, and both of them seemed to know me. The weirdest part was, well, that somehow it was all connected to me. That was all I got." He stopped for a minute and Xander thought he might not continue, but he was only lighting a cigarette from one of the candles. "It was weeks ago, when I was still a little buggy and livin‘ in the school basement. But, since then, as you can see, I‘m better now. I thought things were under control except that every time I saw you I got the funniest feeling that I was missing something, and there were the dreams. They were all misty and cold-like, and there was always something or someone there, just at the edge of my vision, that I couldn’t see, y’know? Tryin’ to get my attention." The vampire stubbed out the cigarette. "And that’s it. I know a ghost when I feel one, and I know when they’re trying to get attention."

"Hence the summoning?" Xander wondered aloud. "That’s what all that chanting and stuff has been about?"

"Quite. Now, are you done with the Q&A, mate?" Spike’s answer was curt, and he looked like he was definitely hiding something. But, Xander wondered, when had Spike ever been completely honest with him?

Xander thought for a minute. He had too many questions that he knew Spike was in no mood to answer, so he gave up. "Sure, Spike, we’re done."

"Good. Now, I just want you to try and relax. I’ll do all the work here, right?"

Xander nodded. "Oh. Yeah, all right."

Spike moved back into his place at the point of the star and began his incantation, sprinkling bits of crushed aloe, pepper, vervain, saffron and tobacco leaves throughout the center of star as he chanted:

Darksome night and shining moon

Harken to my witch’s rune

East then South, West then North.

Hear! Come! I Call thee forth.

With each word the crypt grew damper, colder, more oppressive. The hair rose on the back of Xander’s neck and he knew that he and Spike were no longer alone. A misty figure had begun to form next to Spike and it took all of Xander’s willpower not to run gibbering and screaming from the crypt.

When Spike finished his chant and his companion had gained clarity and solidity Xander was, to say the very least, surprised. It was a man, and he was dressed in what looked like leather and a very large, silver fur coat. His hair was dark; long, it fell in a tangle of braids and mats about his face. *Well, holy shit*, Xander thought while looking more closely at the spirit’s face. His skin was dark and worn, as though from years spent in harsh weather, and there was a nasty scar that wound from his right cheekbone into his hairline, where it had silvered the dark locks. But, for all that, the strong chin, the brown eyes and the quirky smile were all devastatingly familiar. Xander could have been looking into a magic mirror.

"Oh for chrissake, Spike, who the hell is this?" Xander was vaguely pleased that his voice didn’t crack.

Spike just shrugged and looked warily at the spirit. "You tell ‘im. I don’t want nothin’ else to do with any of it."

The spirit gave the vampire a nasty glare before returning his hungry gaze to Xander. " ’Tis simple, Alexander, the bit about who I am." He paused and cocked a brow, "I’m your son."

Xander squeaked.

tbc