Snowbound

Chapter Seven

Wesley walked along, his footsteps hastened by his anger, the faint sound they made swallowed by the thick carpet. The house was silent around him. A few yards away, Spike and Angel were doubtless discussing him with their customary frankness, beneath him, in the servants quarters, a meal was surely being prepared, but Wesley walked cocooned in a bleakness that admitted nothing but the sound of his own heart, beating quickly, driven by rage.

“How could they?” he whispered to himself, the words leaden and heavy in his mouth. “How dared they?”

His thoughts swirled in a maelstrom of confusion, scattered, shattered images of blue eyes and brown; warm hands and lips against his back as he lay, drowsy and drugged by pleasure ... pleasant images overlaid and marred by sharp voices attacking one he dea dear.

Giles...cool green eyes, watchful and keen, a low, compelling voice whispering in his ear as he held Wesley close in that first greeting – Wesley strove to recall the words but they had melted like snowflakes on flames and he could only remember the way he’d clung to Giles, feeling the strength of his arms, knowing that finally he had reached a refuge whose walls would never be breached.

He reached the head of the stairs and hesitated, wondering where Giles was. Something was telling him to relax and surrender, but that concept was too alien for him to submit to. Going to Giles, though – ah, that he wanted to do. Moving slowly now, as a child draws out the unwrapping of a gift to prolong the anticipation, he began to descend.

He had always admired Giles, respecting a mind that made clear the most obscure of texts, a teacher who could enliven the dullest lesson with his own patent enthusiasm. When they had become friends, that respect had become tinged, not unnaturally, with an appreciation of body as well as mind and spirit. Giles was no fusty, aged professor, mouldering away in a book-lined nest. Wesley had seen him fence, shoot and ride, had spent sun-lit hours on the river with him, drifting in a boat, fishing rod held loosely in inattentive fingers as he listened to Giles’ voice read poetry or ancient sagas, until the deep blue sky was leached of all but the light of the vanishing sun and the first star of evening glowed, jewel-like and remote above them.

Giles had listened, courteous and attentive, as Wesley confided in him, stumbling words quickening as he related the wonder of first love, slowing as he let slip a telling phrase that gave away more than he had intended, dying away into silence as Giles poured them both wine and came to sit beside him, his face grave but never stern. Words of warning, of caution, of advice, bluntly spoken and bringing the blood hot to Wesley’s face – aye, all of those had Giles given him – but never a word of reproach, never a look that condemned.

Angel and Spike had scolded him roundly when they found of his indiscretion, Angel withdrawn, cold and displeased, Spike agitated, stalking the room he and Angel shared, his hands gesturing in animated, wild sweeps, until Wesley gave up trying to make them listen and sat, head bowed, tears prickling his eyes that he refused to shed. They’d come to him then, seeing his distress, allowed him to explain...gone to see Giles without him, returning silent and thoughtful.

That night, Wesley had never felt as loved, as desired. Caresses, lavish and tender, their full attention bent upon him, their own desires ignored and they drove him to heights of pleasure he had not dreamed existed. He thought it contrition for their anger, never guessing it was relief at escape from scandal, imprisonment, even death. The Oxford world in which they lived was, perforce, a masculine one, but for many weeks after, all three made sure to spend time in the taverns, flirting with many a wench, Spike and Angel even, Wesley was sure, though never asked, taking them to bed. That he could not do. He knew the reason for the subterfuge, but could not school his face to a smile when he saw Spike run wine-wet fingers over the swell of a barmaid’s breasts, licking the droplets up with a practiced tongue, or pass Angel in an alleyway, when his lips were fastened to a whore’s neck, sucking and biting as she moaned with well-rehearsed whimpers and urged him on without wanting to turn away.

Now all that mattered was finding Giles. Wesley felt his senses quicken at the thought of it, so that when he reached the foot of the stairs and heard Giles’ voice coming from the room in which they’d been taken earlier, he had to pause to compose himself. He realised, with a faint curiosity, that he was aroused, but it seemed of little impoa dia distant throbbing. Giles’ voice was low, a pleasant rumble of sound, the words indistinct, but the person he addressed had no such control. Wesley froze as he heard a female voice whine high, keening and desperate.

“Please, sir! No! ‘Tis not right. I’ll be damned, I’ll burn –ah, no!”

Her voice died away and Wesley, drawn forward by a force that brooked no opposition, entered the room to see Giles release a servant girl, letting her fall to the floor as though she were a cravat he had creased whilst dressing and ruined. The girl still breathed, her arms and legs twitching slightly, spasms shuddering through her body in waves, but her eyes were open and emptied of thought.

Giles did not turn around. “Wesley. My dear boy. Come here. I have something for you.”

And Wesley began to walk towards him.

***

Angel and Spike turned and followed the corridor in the opposite direction from Wesley. They were concerned about him but thought him in no immediate peril. The corridor led them to a long flight of stairs, narrow and curving.

“This must lead to the tower we saw,” Spike said softly, peering up into darkness.

“I would venture to guess this is part of the original building,” Angel answered, running his hand over stone age-smoothed walls. He frowned pensively. “Did not Wesley tell us that Giles’ ancestor died in his tower and that it was destroyed in the storm that killed him?”

Spike ran lightly up a few steps. “All is new stone here,” he reported. “The mortar is fresh. It has been rebuilt in some fashion.”

“To what end?” mused Angel. He turned and took up a candlestick, placed handily on a table, and lit it from a wall sconce. “Let us see what lies above,” he said, his face grim. “And pray no more has returned to this place than a building.”

“Whatever killed Lord Harris cannot still live!” Spike protested. “Centuries have passed since then.”

“Evil cannot die,” Angel said, his voice sombre, setting his booted foot on the first step. “But perhaps you are correct. I hope so, indeed.”

They emerged in a room, circular and windowless and paused on the threshold, their eyes wide. The room stank of blood, the sweetish reek they knew too well from their wartime years. It was a smell that lingered in the mind, spelling out a message of pain and death – for even a small wound could get infected in the vast field hospi, wh, where men lay in huddled heaps, moaning in an agony for which death was the only cure. Dark patterns were outlined on the smooth flagstones, strange symbols that seemed to swirl and reform as the eye left them.

“Those signs...” Spike said, his voice uncertain. “Are they not alike to the ones on the bed? It seems so...”

Angel studied them, a dull ache forming behind his eyes as he strove to fix his gaze upon them. “Yes – and no,” he said finally.

“As cles mis milk,” Spike hissed, poking Angel in the shoulder, his volatile spirits lifting. “Decide!”

Angel slapped Spike’s hand away impatiently, but with no real heat. “They are alike, yes, and I’d swear they were the same language, but whatever message the runes on the bed held, it was a kind one; these stink of evil.”

“I’m sorry you feel that way,” said a voice behind them. They turned, chills chasing terror up and down their spines. Giles leaned against the doorway watching them, a faint smile touching his lips. “An experiment, no more.” He stood up and gestured to the stairs. “If you’re done...exploring, gentlemen, dinner – and Wesley, await you.”

Neither Angel nor Spike moved, unwilling to descend with Giles at their backs. He waited and then shrugged, still with that indefinable air of amusement, and started down the stairs himself, leaving them to follow him, wary as never before.

***

The four of them sat around the table as food was brought, hot and plentiful, not sauced and delicately flavoured, as was the fashion, but fresh and full of taste nonetheless. Wesley, who had greeted his lovers with a friendly, impersonal smile, ate heartily, chasing down each mouthful with sips of the dark red wine which was all that Giles served with the meal. Angel and Spike, accustomed to chiding and bullying Wesley into eating, and prising books from his fingers so that a fork might replace them, stared at this spectacle and did little but pick at the food before them. Giles ate but sparingly, making conversation on generalities until Spike found his foot tapping nervously against his chair leg, a habit of his when bored or tense. Tonight he was both.

When the plates had been cleared, Giles took them to his library and poured them port, seeming not to notice or care that two of his guests had barely wet their lips before Wesley had emptied his glass and was holding it out to be replenished, his hand steady but his eyes overly bright.

Angel frowned. It was common in their class to get drunk, and a sign of maturity to be able to hold one’s liquor, but Wesley had never been one to enjoy fuddling his mind with alcohol. Angel was loathe to comment; Wesley was no child to be chastised for overindulgence, but Spike had no such qualms.

“Wesley, if you cannot remember the head you awoke with the last time you drank this deeply, I assure you I do. Perhaps you have had a sufficiency?”

Giles filled Wesley’s glass and they exchanged a small, private smile that had Angel’s fingers tightening around the slender stem of his own wine glass as he watched.

“I believe I’m not quite the man I was then,” Wesley said, shooting Spike a look from under downcast eyes, his lips twitching as though he held back laughter. “I feel no ill effects, I assure you.”

Angel placed his glass beside him and fixed Giles with a steely glare. “Enough of this foolishness,” he said quietly. “We are fed, rested and I would have you tell us of all that has befallen you since we last met.”

Giles stood in front of the fireplace, his tall, straight figure backed by leaping flames, and nodded slowly. “I had expected this. Very well. As I told Wesley once –” The look he cast at the dark haired man, who watched him raptly, was a caress, blatant and challenging, but Spike and Angel both refused to take the lure and Giles continued. “Well. As I related, this house has seen tragedy; my ancestor died here, locked in battle, as I’ve since discovered with a beast, no animal, but a spirit from elsewhere, who came at his calling but escaped the bonds he sought to lay upon it.”

“Why would any sane man conjure forth such a beast?” Spike asked, the words bursting from him, his voice shocked and incredulous.

Giles’ lip curled contemptuously. “For power, young fool, what else? His diaries set forth the manner in which the beat might be summoned and on the same late summer night as he, I attempted to follow in his footsteps.”

“He died,” Angel said flatly, dark eyes gleaming. “Died, with the tower in which he stood crashing down around his ears.”

Giles nodded. “He did. I did not. Forewarned and armoured, I managed to quell the beast, command it as he, for all his expertise with minor magics – like enchanted beds – could not.”

Spike’s lips tightened as he recalled the previous night, when all three had been joined and close. Now Wesley was ranged against them and Giles lost in hubristic ravings. Spike felt a desolation clutch at his heart and he turned instinctively to Angel, longing for a touch, a look, despite years of schooling himself to never reveal their relationship in public. Angel did not answer his appeal with as much as a flicker of an eyelid; all his attention was on Giles.

“Where is the beast now, Giles?”

The air in the room seemed dry of a sudden; shimmering faintly in a haze of heat the fire, blaze though it did, could not account for. Giles did not answer, nor did Wesley.

They did not need to.

Angel stood, his hand groping for a sword that was not there, Spike beside him, teeth bared in a fierce smile. They stared at their two friends, one possessed by a demon whose very existence they could scarce comprehend, one controlled by a being whose malevolence seared and scorched them.

Raising his hand, his eyes glowing an eerie red, as though the fires of hell itself were ‘prisoned within, Giles began to speak, as he had whispered low in Wesley’s ear, the words meaningless yet clearly seductive and beguiling. Spike cried out in a wordless protest, striving to drown the sound, and placed his hands over his ears. Angel picked up the small table beside him and hurled it full at the creature masquerading as Giles. His concentration broken, if only for an instant as he blocked the missile with a careless sweep of his arm, Giles’ voice faltered and then gathered strength. Angel and Spike tried to stumble towards the door but before they reached it, they sank to the floor, senseless and still.

Giles glanced towards Wesley. “Take them to the tower,” he commanded.

Wesley nodded slowly, his eyes travelling to the two limp figures and then back to Giles, as though troubled. Something of his hesitation communicated itself and Giles frowned. “Wesley? Would you disobey me?”

Softening his voice, Giles stepped tow Wes Wesley, tilting his chin upwards and stroking his thumb over Wesley’s mouth in a slow, possessive caress. “Would you disappoint me, Wesley?” he asked, his voice rich with entreaty. Leaning forward, he took Wesley’s mouth in a deep kiss, until his tense body relaxed against his. When he stepped away and stared into Wesley’s eyes, he saw naught but his own reflection and smiled.

“So much better, Wesley, when you obey me. It brings pleasure, as you see. Would you like to see what disobedience would bring?”

Wesley’s eyes widened and he shook his head, fear flickering across his handsome face.

Giles arched an eyebrow, a cruel anticipation twisting his face until it barely resembled the man he had once been, as though alien features were attempting to force their way to the surface. Then Angel stirred slightly and he shrugged.

“You are saved by those who loved you; is that not touching? But you will not save them in your turn, will you? No; for you belong to me now, body and soul, and I will have need of both.” His voice dropped to a murmur. “Three bodies; three souls, one love – and from their ashes I will rise, reborn.”

And if, deep inside Wesley a spark of defiance still flickered, fanned by a fury no less potent for being chained and bound, no sign of it showed on his face as he nodded.