Lusty Wrong Feelings
Charon edged the barge up to the shore with expert ease, having done so countless times. Oz and Anjelica waited
in the bow while Nighna said her goodbyes.
“You know I would come with,” they heard Charon say, in a voice rough with a kind of sincerity unexpected in a
Hellbeast.
“Charon, you have your hands full. But I appreciate the sentiment,” Nighna said.
Charon touched one webbed finger to Nighna’s forehead. “You takes care of ya’self, Nig’han’net. Rip that Luxe a
new set of orifices just for me.”
Nighna joined them on the bow. “Plan to,” she said. With a nod, the three exited the barge and stepped once again
onto solid land. Clarisse fanned a wing and preened its length with her beak, managing to still look exceedingly
uninterested.
Charon pulled his rudder pole from the sludge and crossed to the other side of his craft.
“Gotta get back before all Hell breaks loose,” he said with another burst of hearty laughter. “Breaks loose!” he
howled. The sounds of his continued laughter echoed back to them as they watched the black barge grow smaller
and smaller against the horizon.
Oz turned on the path, taking in for the first time the twisted, teeming tangle of trees that lay ahead.
“Spooky forest,” he said. “Kind of cliché.”
Nighna faced them both. “Clichés have roots in truth, do they not?”
“Just saying,” Oz said.
Nighna said, “We are entering the Second Circle. We want to pass through as quickly as possible. Don’t stray from
the path. Don’t eat the food. Don’t drink the water. Be ever watchful. And never, never give them anything of
value.”
“Them?” Anjelica said.
“Gypsies,” Nighna said. “You’ll see them. They have made this place their home since they were banished here
centuries ago. They thrive quite well in these woods.”
Anjelica took an instinctive step in Oz’s direction. Nighna noted this with a snag of pain in what passed for her
heart. It was so bothersome, getting attached to these silly little humans. They were so messy and breakable and
rash. Much worse than puppies. Such thoughts led her to think of Luxe, of how he never cultivated such
attachments and condescended to her because she did.
And while she was on that thought path, she rounded the bend to find memories of Andrew. Had he gone along with
Luxe rather than chop off his hand, he would be irrevocably dead by now. Luxe would have killed Andrew to lessen
the price of passage with Charon for sure. Nighna would have to pull an Orpheus/Eurydice in reverse to get Andrew
out, and she knew those kinds of things ended badly. At least now, she had the bit of Andrew that she needed
back. All that was left was her craving for vengeance. The Second Circle of Hell seemed a fitting place for such
violence. Her hope was that they caught up with him in time.
Nighna returned her attention to her humans. Her humans, she thought gravely. Oh dear. That did not bode well.
The Slayer girl was saying, “No, I’m not a fan. He had a wife and a little girl and so much to live for, but still he put a
gun to his head.”
“Not in debate,” Oz countered. “Cobain’s suicide was his worst career move. But that in no way diminishes
Nirvana’s impact on the musical landscape of the 1990s.”
“More musicians,” Nighna said with a smile. “I can recall when Nirvana was just a realm of elevated consciousness.”
“Some parallels can be drawn,” Oz said.
“Please,” Anjelica said. “The only higher consciousness Cobain ever got was injected in his arm.”
Oz lifted an eyebrow. Nighna grinned.
“Well, well,” the demon said. “Aren’t we snappy?”
The girl flushed darkly. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m not normally so… spunky.”
Oz leveled a steady gaze on her. He said, “Don’t worry. It suits you.”
“All right,” Nighna said. “Enough delay. Here,” she pulled a shimmering dagger from her shoulder bag. Once again,
Oz and Anjelica were given to speculation as to where these items came from. Oz was pretty sure an unsheathed
weapon of such length would cause problems in an ordinary leather pack.
But wonders being of the non-ceasing variety, Nighna used the blade to hack out a hearty tuft of grass.
“Hold this,” she said, passing it to Oz. Before either could protest, she turned the dagger to her own forearm and
cut a deep furrow into her flesh.
At the coppery scent of her rich, flowing blood, Oz felt that twinge again. This time, it caught like a wriggling spider
in the back of his throat. He hacked a full-body-wracking cough that shot stinging tears to his eyes.
“Oh, God!” Anjelica shouted. “Oz. Are you all right?”
Oz wheezed. Anjelica caught his arm while he sputtered and rasped. Clarisse, sensing the unease, began to screech
and caw and generally make things worse. Nighna stepped in. She pushed Oz to his knees.
“Hold on to him,” she commanded. “It’s the blood, and this place. It will bring out the worst in him.”
Nighna wrenched the grass from Oz’s clenched hands and left them. She moved away from the shore, to a place of
relative quiet where she could work. She could hear the girl soothing him, just as Nighna tried to calm Clarisse.
Nighna knew just from observing that the boy had considerable self-control. She tried to assure herself that they
would be just fine. But the other, more rational self reminded her that Hell was no place for humans.
“I have no idea what I was thinking,” Nighna told Clarisse. “Don’t start with me.”
The bird made a hmph-ing sound. Nighna positioned her arm over the stalks of grass and let her blood mingle with
the roots. She began to whisper a Kimaris chant of making. The roots elongated, growing thickly and vigorously into
the shape of her desire. She urged them with the flow of her blood to take form. Under her hands, the grass
twisted and writhed into four wheels bound together on viny axles. The green shoots weaved themselves into a lush
carriage. It wouldn’t last, but it would be enough to take them through the forest.
Clarisse left Nighna’s shoulder to settle on the leafy canopy of the carriage. The bird nodded her approval. Nighna
returned to see how her humans were faring.
Much better, it seemed. Oz was on his hands and knees, but the coughing fit had ceased. Anjelica held his
shoulders while he steadily regained his awareness.
As Nighna approached, both raised their heads to look at her.
“Sorry about that,” Oz said hoarsely. “It doesn’t usually…”
“I know,” Nighna said. “On your feet now. We must leave these shores. They are soon to become unbearably
crowded.”
Anjelica twisted her head in the direction of the river. She saw no sign of Charon’s barge, but Nighna was right. It
was just a matter of time before it returned, and with Oz going all hairball, she didn’t want him to suffer more than
was necessary.
Once they mounted the carriage, the thing sent out shoots of grass that lashed onto objects along the path in
order to propel itself forward. Within minutes, the carriage was pulling itself through the underbrush. The forest
loomed ahead, full of light and mystery.
Anjelica said, “Gosh, this place is really…”
“Beautiful,” Oz finished. His breathing had settled to its regular pattern. The forest oozed with a kind of
invigorating essence that seemed to thrill and calm him at the same time. It smelled of honey and cinnamon and sun-
baked greenery. Maybe beautiful wasn’t strong enough a word. Awesome came to mind. As did ripe and gorgeous
and dazzling. “I don’t know,” he said. “I figured Hell would be more… hellish.”
Anjelica crawled to Oz’s side and nestled in beside him. Nighna watched them, noting with sorrow how quickly their
inhibitions were melting away. She would have to keep constant watch, she resolved. Oz laced his fingers in
Anjelica’s as the shadow of the forest at last enveloped them.
This boy’s hands weren’t like the other’s, Dawn decided. The other’s had been like magic. Those hands had found
the place inside her that was hot and weak and thirsty for his touch. After she’d gone off like Mount St. Helen’s, the
pictures had flooded her mind and she was finally able to put them to the page.
But this boy…
He was a sweet guy from her school. They had been in chemistry together, before Dawn started ditching. His name
was Augie, and he was the type to wear sweater vests and Buddy Holly glasses. She remembered once that he
admitted liking American country music. That was the extent of her knowledge concerning Augie, except that he
had never, ever had his hands on a girl before.
What he lacked in experience, he made up for with eagerness. Dawn tried to adjust around him, to get his fingers in
the right place. He had her against the wall, and they were both encumbered by clothes she refused to shuck. She
made a frustrated sound as he maneuvered himself into yet another disagreeable place.
“Augie,” she whispered into his reddening ear. “You gotta… kinda like…”
“Sorry, Dawn,” he said, gasping. She felt the knob of his erection against her leg, and for the thousandth time, she
wondered what the hell it was she was doing.
But then he managed to put his fingers in just the right spot and her body spasmed against his.
“Oh!” she squealed. “Just there. Stay. Right. There.”
Augie puffed and sweated. His glasses slipped down the blade of his nose. He put one hand against the wall to steady
himself. Dawn brought a leg around his body. The friction between his fingers and the bunch of denim encasing hard
flesh that rubbed against her thigh caused a swirling heat in her belly.
“That’s it, Augie,” she said, loving the sultry sound of her own voice, of the power she wielded over this hapless boy
who probably never expected this when he went out for comics this morning.
Experimentally, she ran a hand over the hard ridge of flesh in the boy’s jeans. He groaned and bucked at the touch.
His body went suddenly still, as did the fingers that had so dutifully worked inside her.
“Wait. Don’t stop,” Dawn mewled.
Augie’s eyes, unfixed and glazed, fell on hers. “I’m sorry,” he said. Dawn felt a spreading warm wetness on her
thigh and, with much embarrassment, understood. She choked down a laugh and kept him within the cage of her
legs.
“It’s okay,” she said soothingly, running her hands up his arms. She pulled his face to hers and kissed him. “I just
need you for a little bit more. Okay?”
He nodded weakly. His fingers squirmed erratically at first, but with a little encouraging undulation from Dawn’s
hips, found a rhythm of their own.
Fire bloomed again, fanned out and ignited. Dawn squeezed her thighs around his arm. Once. Twice. On the third
time, the flame burst inside her, spilling through every nerve and capillary with molten luxuriance. Dawn’s eyes
rolled back, and the images swarmed up at her, flickering in her mind’s eye like a 1940s newsreel. Demons. Fairies.
Places. People. Dozen and dozens of flashes like black and white wildfire in her brain.
Dawn pushed Augie away. Breathless, she fastened and zipped her pants, adjusting her panties through her
pockets. The embers of her climax aftershocked through her. She did her fevered best to hold on to it long enough.
“That was it. You were perfect, Augie. Thanks,” Dawn said, going for her book bag and her pencils. She darted
through the beaded curtain that separated the storeroom from the rest of McBride’s Heroes and flung herself into
the semi-dark of the vinyl booth in the back of the shop.
Dawn pulled her sketch pad from her bag and flipped hastily to a blank page. Her hand flew over the page, tracing
first the outline and then contours of a distinctly non-human face.
Augie emerged shyly from the shadows. “Dawn?” he asked.
She glanced up from the page, barely noting Augie or his crestfallen expression. She returned to her drawing. She
caressed the page with charcoal strokes and crosshatches. The shape of a trident inside a circle formed in the
center of the creature’s forehead.
Dawn forgot all about Augie. That was the best part of all of this, what made it every bit worth the effort. For the
moment while she drew, she could forget everything: Buffy, Andrew, Connor, Xander, Willow. Nothing mattered but
her empty page, which she filled up with her fervent effort of her fingers.
Entering the forest was like twilight’s swift fall into night. It brought with it a hushed sense of majesty that
wrapped around them like a cloak of velvety softness. Light suffused the languid air. Clarisse danced excitedly on
the roof of the carriage at the myriad songs and calls of birds and frogs and monkeys. They glimpsed the brightly-
colored plumage now and again between the ropy strands of the carriage’s exterior. The sun seemed to coax the
perfect blend of jungly scents from the plentiful flowers and fruits that bedizened the trees around them.
Nighna perched, keeping vigil at the front of her carriage. She directed it smoothly along with the force of her will,
but doing so did not so occupy her that she couldn’t listen to the sounds of their conversations. She remained
watchful, lest she needed to intervene. She noted with some disdain that their tones grew reverent and tender.
Their legs entangled at the ankles. Hands intertwined. Heads bowed and foreheads touched.
Of course, they seemed oblivious. But Nighna watched.
This was the place for those condemned of Lust. It had a strong effect on people, especially if they already felt
drawn in some way.
“Oh fine,” Anjelica said, pouting. “Let Grohl have his Foo Fighters. He was way better off without the concrete
boots that was Kurt Cobain. Why do we even have to bring Nirvana into the discussion where he’s concerned?”
“Well, because,” Oz answered softly. “That’s where he got his start. Otherwise he’d be rootless. Like a tree.”
“A rootless tree,” Anjelica said. She smiled. “You’re staring at my lips.”
“Am I?” He continued to stare.
Just as Anjelica was leaning in, the carriage shuddered to a halt.
“Listen,” Nighna ordered.
Oz sat forward. He did hear something wildly discordant and eerily melodious. It was a whipped, frenzied cacophony
of flutes and strings and wailing voices. He felt the crawly itch under his skin again at the sound of it.
“Um, Nighna,” he said calmly. “I have a bad feeling about this.”
Nighna crouched in the bowl of the carriage. She opened her shoulder bag and drew out a long sword and a mace.
She handed the sword to Anjelica and pressed the mace into Oz’s hands.
“Be ready,” she said. “And hang on.”
The carriage lurched forward, lashing onto vines to climb steadily higher into the canopy. The forest streaked by
them in a blur of liquid green. The music persisted, however, growing in pitch and lunacy the faster they flew.
“There!” Nighna shouted. The carriage levered itself toward a meadow. It swung and dangled and twirled through
branches until it landed with a crash in the clearing. Torn leaves showered down on them. Nighna rent a hole in the
carriage’s side and clambered from it. Clarisse fluttered onto an enormous glowing toadstool, showing them the
trail’s head.
“On foot from here,” Nighna said. “Quickly.”
Oz scrambled from the carriage carcass. The music sounded far distant now, and the crawliness of his skin subsided
to a minimal itch. He hefted the mace to his shoulder. Beside him, Anjelica tested the weight of her sword in her
hand.
“This is a well-crafted blade made to my exact specifications,” she said. She sliced twice through the air, delighting
in the way the blade whistled. “I can effectively wield this.”
“When you talk that way,” Oz said. “It’s kinda sexy.”
“Really?” Anjelica said.
“I’m turned on,” he said.
Nighna groaned. “All right, you two. We’re a long way from cold showers. This way,” she said. Following Clarisse’s
lead, Nighna disappeared into the woods.
“Cold shower?” Anjelica snorted. “What does she mean by that?”
Oz shrugged. “I have no idea.”
Anjelica struck off down the path behind Nighna, swinging her blade over her head. Oz watched her for a moment
before bringing up the rear.
Dawn came in to find Andrew had overtaken the entire dining room. He had spread out clippings from magazines and
newspapers, photocopies of maps and schematics, printed emails, actual letters and books. Lots and lots of books.
His near-mint-condition 1979 Boba Fett kept a heedful watch from its perch on the back of Giles’ chair. Andrew
himself stood back under the archway that led into the hall, his hand stroking his stubbly chin. He paid no mind to
her as she entered and slammed the front door.
She came to rest beside him, trying to glean what it was he found so consuming from the paper rubble.
“It’s a good thing Giles isn’t here,” she said at last. “He’d freak over the mess.”
“It’s not a mess. It’s organized chaos,” Andrew said without looking up.
“Yeah, well. He’d still freak,” Dawn said.
Andrew moved forward. He shifted one photo of the crater that once was Stonehenge to the left five inches and
returned to his stare down.
“Hmm. Good luck with the insanity,” Dawn said. “Where’s Spike?”
“At the school,” Andrew answered.
“Again?” Dawn nearly shouted. “Does he ever come home?”
Andrew finally dragged his attention away from his research disastrophe. “You smell… funny.”
Dawn hugged her arms to her chest. “I do not,” she said, all defend-y. “You’re the one who smells funny. Know the
meaning of scrub brush?”
Andrew sniffed her. “You smell like McBride’s. And you have charcoal all over your fingers. You went comicing
without me.”
“I –” Dawn began. She hid her hands behind her back.
“Don’t try to deny it,” Andrew said sullenly. “I can smell a plastic sleeve from a mile away. What’d you get? The New
X-men? Underworld?” His eyes widened. “You got the new Poison Elves, didn’t you?”
Dawn rolled her eyes. “Look, whatever. Okay? I’m just gonna get some sleep. Tell Spike I need to talk to him when
he gets home.”
After Dawn tromped upstairs, Andrew returned to his studies. He had devoted every waking moment over the last
two weeks to the task Giles’ had assigned. He clipped every reference to the recent “Cleansing”, as his fellow
Watchers were calling it. He pored through his texts and networked his networks in search of first-hand accounts
to add to his collection. Every time he cast out his net, he came back with more information than his brain lobes –
big and manly though they were – could assimilate.
Even though his task was one of recording for posterity’s sake, Andrew kept getting the sense that there was a
pattern in what he read. There was something larger and greater and mightier than he was seeing. Like in Close
Encounters, when the guy molded the mountain from his mashed potatoes, Andrew kept feeling that there was a
sign. That it meant something.
Andrew scratched absently at the now thinly bandaged nub of his ex-hand.
“Tell me, oh Great Ones,” he muttered to the amassed stacks of pages before him. “Let your secrets be revealed.”
Andrew sighed. “I need Squeezy Cheese,” he said. He went off to the kitchen for a private moment with cheddar
from an aerosol can.
Trudging through the forest on foot was not as pleasant as gliding along in the grass carriage. For one, the moss
that clung to the trunks of the baobabs and strangler figs looked deceptively plush and inviting. Every time Anjelica
tried to lie down against the cool green carpet, Nighna yanked her up quite painfully and set her back onto the
path.
Moreover, the path became less like a path and more like a non-path. With brambles and fuzzy leaves that
tantalized and tickled their legs like a thousand fur-tipped fingers. Spores floated around them in an intoxicating
drift that left them a whole lot punchy.
Nighna was beginning to rethink her attachment to her humans. They were now very much like annoying, yapping
little puppies who strained at their leashes in their rapacious need to discover every wild scent and flower.
Clarisse flew ahead of them and circled back, plainly as frustrated as Nighna.
Nighna caught Oz before he dived into a patch of succulent orange berries.
“I told you,” she said sharply. “Don’t eat… Anjelica!”
Nighna spun in time to pull Anjelica down from climbing into a tree.
A flash of green light caught Nighna by surprise. Fortunately, it was bright enough to snap Anjelica and Oz back to
attention. Unfortunately, it was a spright. And she wasn’t alone.
Nighna glanced at the woods around them. The sprights fluttered and flickered like fireflies against the backdrop of
the canopy.
“What are they?” Anjelica asked. She brought up her sword to defend the three of them.
“The Gypsies,” Nighna answered. “They’ve caught up to us at last.”
Charon edged the barge up to the shore with expert ease, having done so countless times. Oz and Anjelica waited
in the bow while Nighna said her goodbyes.
“You know I would come with,” they heard Charon say, in a voice rough with a kind of sincerity unexpected in a
Hellbeast.
“Charon, you have your hands full. But I appreciate the sentiment,” Nighna said.
Charon touched one webbed finger to Nighna’s forehead. “You takes care of ya’self, Nig’han’net. Rip that Luxe a
new set of orifices just for me.”
Nighna joined them on the bow. “Plan to,” she said. With a nod, the three exited the barge and stepped once again
onto solid land. Clarisse fanned a wing and preened its length with her beak, managing to still look exceedingly
uninterested.
Charon pulled his rudder pole from the sludge and crossed to the other side of his craft.
“Gotta get back before all Hell breaks loose,” he said with another burst of hearty laughter. “Breaks loose!” he
howled. The sounds of his continued laughter echoed back to them as they watched the black barge grow smaller
and smaller against the horizon.
Oz turned on the path, taking in for the first time the twisted, teeming tangle of trees that lay ahead.
“Spooky forest,” he said. “Kind of cliché.”
Nighna faced them both. “Clichés have roots in truth, do they not?”
“Just saying,” Oz said.
Nighna said, “We are entering the Second Circle. We want to pass through as quickly as possible. Don’t stray from
the path. Don’t eat the food. Don’t drink the water. Be ever watchful. And never, never give them anything of
value.”
“Them?” Anjelica said.
“Gypsies,” Nighna said. “You’ll see them. They have made this place their home since they were banished here
centuries ago. They thrive quite well in these woods.”
Anjelica took an instinctive step in Oz’s direction. Nighna noted this with a snag of pain in what passed for her
heart. It was so bothersome, getting attached to these silly little humans. They were so messy and breakable and
rash. Much worse than puppies. Such thoughts led her to think of Luxe, of how he never cultivated such
attachments and condescended to her because she did.
And while she was on that thought path, she rounded the bend to find memories of Andrew. Had he gone along with
Luxe rather than chop off his hand, he would be irrevocably dead by now. Luxe would have killed Andrew to lessen
the price of passage with Charon for sure. Nighna would have to pull an Orpheus/Eurydice in reverse to get Andrew
out, and she knew those kinds of things ended badly. At least now, she had the bit of Andrew that she needed
back. All that was left was her craving for vengeance. The Second Circle of Hell seemed a fitting place for such
violence. Her hope was that they caught up with him in time.
Nighna returned her attention to her humans. Her humans, she thought gravely. Oh dear. That did not bode well.
The Slayer girl was saying, “No, I’m not a fan. He had a wife and a little girl and so much to live for, but still he put a
gun to his head.”
“Not in debate,” Oz countered. “Cobain’s suicide was his worst career move. But that in no way diminishes
Nirvana’s impact on the musical landscape of the 1990s.”
“More musicians,” Nighna said with a smile. “I can recall when Nirvana was just a realm of elevated consciousness.”
“Some parallels can be drawn,” Oz said.
“Please,” Anjelica said. “The only higher consciousness Cobain ever got was injected in his arm.”
Oz lifted an eyebrow. Nighna grinned.
“Well, well,” the demon said. “Aren’t we snappy?”
The girl flushed darkly. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m not normally so… spunky.”
Oz leveled a steady gaze on her. He said, “Don’t worry. It suits you.”
“All right,” Nighna said. “Enough delay. Here,” she pulled a shimmering dagger from her shoulder bag. Once again,
Oz and Anjelica were given to speculation as to where these items came from. Oz was pretty sure an unsheathed
weapon of such length would cause problems in an ordinary leather pack.
But wonders being of the non-ceasing variety, Nighna used the blade to hack out a hearty tuft of grass.
“Hold this,” she said, passing it to Oz. Before either could protest, she turned the dagger to her own forearm and
cut a deep furrow into her flesh.
At the coppery scent of her rich, flowing blood, Oz felt that twinge again. This time, it caught like a wriggling spider
in the back of his throat. He hacked a full-body-wracking cough that shot stinging tears to his eyes.
“Oh, God!” Anjelica shouted. “Oz. Are you all right?”
Oz wheezed. Anjelica caught his arm while he sputtered and rasped. Clarisse, sensing the unease, began to screech
and caw and generally make things worse. Nighna stepped in. She pushed Oz to his knees.
“Hold on to him,” she commanded. “It’s the blood, and this place. It will bring out the worst in him.”
Nighna wrenched the grass from Oz’s clenched hands and left them. She moved away from the shore, to a place of
relative quiet where she could work. She could hear the girl soothing him, just as Nighna tried to calm Clarisse.
Nighna knew just from observing that the boy had considerable self-control. She tried to assure herself that they
would be just fine. But the other, more rational self reminded her that Hell was no place for humans.
“I have no idea what I was thinking,” Nighna told Clarisse. “Don’t start with me.”
The bird made a hmph-ing sound. Nighna positioned her arm over the stalks of grass and let her blood mingle with
the roots. She began to whisper a Kimaris chant of making. The roots elongated, growing thickly and vigorously into
the shape of her desire. She urged them with the flow of her blood to take form. Under her hands, the grass
twisted and writhed into four wheels bound together on viny axles. The green shoots weaved themselves into a lush
carriage. It wouldn’t last, but it would be enough to take them through the forest.
Clarisse left Nighna’s shoulder to settle on the leafy canopy of the carriage. The bird nodded her approval. Nighna
returned to see how her humans were faring.
Much better, it seemed. Oz was on his hands and knees, but the coughing fit had ceased. Anjelica held his
shoulders while he steadily regained his awareness.
As Nighna approached, both raised their heads to look at her.
“Sorry about that,” Oz said hoarsely. “It doesn’t usually…”
“I know,” Nighna said. “On your feet now. We must leave these shores. They are soon to become unbearably
crowded.”
Anjelica twisted her head in the direction of the river. She saw no sign of Charon’s barge, but Nighna was right. It
was just a matter of time before it returned, and with Oz going all hairball, she didn’t want him to suffer more than
was necessary.
Once they mounted the carriage, the thing sent out shoots of grass that lashed onto objects along the path in
order to propel itself forward. Within minutes, the carriage was pulling itself through the underbrush. The forest
loomed ahead, full of light and mystery.
Anjelica said, “Gosh, this place is really…”
“Beautiful,” Oz finished. His breathing had settled to its regular pattern. The forest oozed with a kind of
invigorating essence that seemed to thrill and calm him at the same time. It smelled of honey and cinnamon and sun-
baked greenery. Maybe beautiful wasn’t strong enough a word. Awesome came to mind. As did ripe and gorgeous
and dazzling. “I don’t know,” he said. “I figured Hell would be more… hellish.”
Anjelica crawled to Oz’s side and nestled in beside him. Nighna watched them, noting with sorrow how quickly their
inhibitions were melting away. She would have to keep constant watch, she resolved. Oz laced his fingers in
Anjelica’s as the shadow of the forest at last enveloped them.
This boy’s hands weren’t like the other’s, Dawn decided. The other’s had been like magic. Those hands had found
the place inside her that was hot and weak and thirsty for his touch. After she’d gone off like Mount St. Helen’s, the
pictures had flooded her mind and she was finally able to put them to the page.
But this boy…
He was a sweet guy from her school. They had been in chemistry together, before Dawn started ditching. His name
was Augie, and he was the type to wear sweater vests and Buddy Holly glasses. She remembered once that he
admitted liking American country music. That was the extent of her knowledge concerning Augie, except that he
had never, ever had his hands on a girl before.
What he lacked in experience, he made up for with eagerness. Dawn tried to adjust around him, to get his fingers in
the right place. He had her against the wall, and they were both encumbered by clothes she refused to shuck. She
made a frustrated sound as he maneuvered himself into yet another disagreeable place.
“Augie,” she whispered into his reddening ear. “You gotta… kinda like…”
“Sorry, Dawn,” he said, gasping. She felt the knob of his erection against her leg, and for the thousandth time, she
wondered what the hell it was she was doing.
But then he managed to put his fingers in just the right spot and her body spasmed against his.
“Oh!” she squealed. “Just there. Stay. Right. There.”
Augie puffed and sweated. His glasses slipped down the blade of his nose. He put one hand against the wall to steady
himself. Dawn brought a leg around his body. The friction between his fingers and the bunch of denim encasing hard
flesh that rubbed against her thigh caused a swirling heat in her belly.
“That’s it, Augie,” she said, loving the sultry sound of her own voice, of the power she wielded over this hapless boy
who probably never expected this when he went out for comics this morning.
Experimentally, she ran a hand over the hard ridge of flesh in the boy’s jeans. He groaned and bucked at the touch.
His body went suddenly still, as did the fingers that had so dutifully worked inside her.
“Wait. Don’t stop,” Dawn mewled.
Augie’s eyes, unfixed and glazed, fell on hers. “I’m sorry,” he said. Dawn felt a spreading warm wetness on her
thigh and, with much embarrassment, understood. She choked down a laugh and kept him within the cage of her
legs.
“It’s okay,” she said soothingly, running her hands up his arms. She pulled his face to hers and kissed him. “I just
need you for a little bit more. Okay?”
He nodded weakly. His fingers squirmed erratically at first, but with a little encouraging undulation from Dawn’s
hips, found a rhythm of their own.
Fire bloomed again, fanned out and ignited. Dawn squeezed her thighs around his arm. Once. Twice. On the third
time, the flame burst inside her, spilling through every nerve and capillary with molten luxuriance. Dawn’s eyes
rolled back, and the images swarmed up at her, flickering in her mind’s eye like a 1940s newsreel. Demons. Fairies.
Places. People. Dozen and dozens of flashes like black and white wildfire in her brain.
Dawn pushed Augie away. Breathless, she fastened and zipped her pants, adjusting her panties through her
pockets. The embers of her climax aftershocked through her. She did her fevered best to hold on to it long enough.
“That was it. You were perfect, Augie. Thanks,” Dawn said, going for her book bag and her pencils. She darted
through the beaded curtain that separated the storeroom from the rest of McBride’s Heroes and flung herself into
the semi-dark of the vinyl booth in the back of the shop.
Dawn pulled her sketch pad from her bag and flipped hastily to a blank page. Her hand flew over the page, tracing
first the outline and then contours of a distinctly non-human face.
Augie emerged shyly from the shadows. “Dawn?” he asked.
She glanced up from the page, barely noting Augie or his crestfallen expression. She returned to her drawing. She
caressed the page with charcoal strokes and crosshatches. The shape of a trident inside a circle formed in the
center of the creature’s forehead.
Dawn forgot all about Augie. That was the best part of all of this, what made it every bit worth the effort. For the
moment while she drew, she could forget everything: Buffy, Andrew, Connor, Xander, Willow. Nothing mattered but
her empty page, which she filled up with her fervent effort of her fingers.
Entering the forest was like twilight’s swift fall into night. It brought with it a hushed sense of majesty that
wrapped around them like a cloak of velvety softness. Light suffused the languid air. Clarisse danced excitedly on
the roof of the carriage at the myriad songs and calls of birds and frogs and monkeys. They glimpsed the brightly-
colored plumage now and again between the ropy strands of the carriage’s exterior. The sun seemed to coax the
perfect blend of jungly scents from the plentiful flowers and fruits that bedizened the trees around them.
Nighna perched, keeping vigil at the front of her carriage. She directed it smoothly along with the force of her will,
but doing so did not so occupy her that she couldn’t listen to the sounds of their conversations. She remained
watchful, lest she needed to intervene. She noted with some disdain that their tones grew reverent and tender.
Their legs entangled at the ankles. Hands intertwined. Heads bowed and foreheads touched.
Of course, they seemed oblivious. But Nighna watched.
This was the place for those condemned of Lust. It had a strong effect on people, especially if they already felt
drawn in some way.
“Oh fine,” Anjelica said, pouting. “Let Grohl have his Foo Fighters. He was way better off without the concrete
boots that was Kurt Cobain. Why do we even have to bring Nirvana into the discussion where he’s concerned?”
“Well, because,” Oz answered softly. “That’s where he got his start. Otherwise he’d be rootless. Like a tree.”
“A rootless tree,” Anjelica said. She smiled. “You’re staring at my lips.”
“Am I?” He continued to stare.
Just as Anjelica was leaning in, the carriage shuddered to a halt.
“Listen,” Nighna ordered.
Oz sat forward. He did hear something wildly discordant and eerily melodious. It was a whipped, frenzied cacophony
of flutes and strings and wailing voices. He felt the crawly itch under his skin again at the sound of it.
“Um, Nighna,” he said calmly. “I have a bad feeling about this.”
Nighna crouched in the bowl of the carriage. She opened her shoulder bag and drew out a long sword and a mace.
She handed the sword to Anjelica and pressed the mace into Oz’s hands.
“Be ready,” she said. “And hang on.”
The carriage lurched forward, lashing onto vines to climb steadily higher into the canopy. The forest streaked by
them in a blur of liquid green. The music persisted, however, growing in pitch and lunacy the faster they flew.
“There!” Nighna shouted. The carriage levered itself toward a meadow. It swung and dangled and twirled through
branches until it landed with a crash in the clearing. Torn leaves showered down on them. Nighna rent a hole in the
carriage’s side and clambered from it. Clarisse fluttered onto an enormous glowing toadstool, showing them the
trail’s head.
“On foot from here,” Nighna said. “Quickly.”
Oz scrambled from the carriage carcass. The music sounded far distant now, and the crawliness of his skin subsided
to a minimal itch. He hefted the mace to his shoulder. Beside him, Anjelica tested the weight of her sword in her
hand.
“This is a well-crafted blade made to my exact specifications,” she said. She sliced twice through the air, delighting
in the way the blade whistled. “I can effectively wield this.”
“When you talk that way,” Oz said. “It’s kinda sexy.”
“Really?” Anjelica said.
“I’m turned on,” he said.
Nighna groaned. “All right, you two. We’re a long way from cold showers. This way,” she said. Following Clarisse’s
lead, Nighna disappeared into the woods.
“Cold shower?” Anjelica snorted. “What does she mean by that?”
Oz shrugged. “I have no idea.”
Anjelica struck off down the path behind Nighna, swinging her blade over her head. Oz watched her for a moment
before bringing up the rear.
Dawn came in to find Andrew had overtaken the entire dining room. He had spread out clippings from magazines and
newspapers, photocopies of maps and schematics, printed emails, actual letters and books. Lots and lots of books.
His near-mint-condition 1979 Boba Fett kept a heedful watch from its perch on the back of Giles’ chair. Andrew
himself stood back under the archway that led into the hall, his hand stroking his stubbly chin. He paid no mind to
her as she entered and slammed the front door.
She came to rest beside him, trying to glean what it was he found so consuming from the paper rubble.
“It’s a good thing Giles isn’t here,” she said at last. “He’d freak over the mess.”
“It’s not a mess. It’s organized chaos,” Andrew said without looking up.
“Yeah, well. He’d still freak,” Dawn said.
Andrew moved forward. He shifted one photo of the crater that once was Stonehenge to the left five inches and
returned to his stare down.
“Hmm. Good luck with the insanity,” Dawn said. “Where’s Spike?”
“At the school,” Andrew answered.
“Again?” Dawn nearly shouted. “Does he ever come home?”
Andrew finally dragged his attention away from his research disastrophe. “You smell… funny.”
Dawn hugged her arms to her chest. “I do not,” she said, all defend-y. “You’re the one who smells funny. Know the
meaning of scrub brush?”
Andrew sniffed her. “You smell like McBride’s. And you have charcoal all over your fingers. You went comicing
without me.”
“I –” Dawn began. She hid her hands behind her back.
“Don’t try to deny it,” Andrew said sullenly. “I can smell a plastic sleeve from a mile away. What’d you get? The New
X-men? Underworld?” His eyes widened. “You got the new Poison Elves, didn’t you?”
Dawn rolled her eyes. “Look, whatever. Okay? I’m just gonna get some sleep. Tell Spike I need to talk to him when
he gets home.”
After Dawn tromped upstairs, Andrew returned to his studies. He had devoted every waking moment over the last
two weeks to the task Giles’ had assigned. He clipped every reference to the recent “Cleansing”, as his fellow
Watchers were calling it. He pored through his texts and networked his networks in search of first-hand accounts
to add to his collection. Every time he cast out his net, he came back with more information than his brain lobes –
big and manly though they were – could assimilate.
Even though his task was one of recording for posterity’s sake, Andrew kept getting the sense that there was a
pattern in what he read. There was something larger and greater and mightier than he was seeing. Like in Close
Encounters, when the guy molded the mountain from his mashed potatoes, Andrew kept feeling that there was a
sign. That it meant something.
Andrew scratched absently at the now thinly bandaged nub of his ex-hand.
“Tell me, oh Great Ones,” he muttered to the amassed stacks of pages before him. “Let your secrets be revealed.”
Andrew sighed. “I need Squeezy Cheese,” he said. He went off to the kitchen for a private moment with cheddar
from an aerosol can.
Trudging through the forest on foot was not as pleasant as gliding along in the grass carriage. For one, the moss
that clung to the trunks of the baobabs and strangler figs looked deceptively plush and inviting. Every time Anjelica
tried to lie down against the cool green carpet, Nighna yanked her up quite painfully and set her back onto the
path.
Moreover, the path became less like a path and more like a non-path. With brambles and fuzzy leaves that
tantalized and tickled their legs like a thousand fur-tipped fingers. Spores floated around them in an intoxicating
drift that left them a whole lot punchy.
Nighna was beginning to rethink her attachment to her humans. They were now very much like annoying, yapping
little puppies who strained at their leashes in their rapacious need to discover every wild scent and flower.
Clarisse flew ahead of them and circled back, plainly as frustrated as Nighna.
Nighna caught Oz before he dived into a patch of succulent orange berries.
“I told you,” she said sharply. “Don’t eat… Anjelica!”
Nighna spun in time to pull Anjelica down from climbing into a tree.
A flash of green light caught Nighna by surprise. Fortunately, it was bright enough to snap Anjelica and Oz back to
attention. Unfortunately, it was a spright. And she wasn’t alone.
Nighna glanced at the woods around them. The sprights fluttered and flickered like fireflies against the backdrop of
the canopy.
“What are they?” Anjelica asked. She brought up her sword to defend the three of them.
“The Gypsies,” Nighna answered. “They’ve caught up to us at last.”
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.Chapter Index.
Anywhere Out
of This World
Blood, Pressure
The Drawing Board
All's Well
Anywhere Out of
This World
Mourning Sickness
Welcome to Hell
Relative
Matters of Time
& Fishes
International Calls
Empty as Houses
Lusty Wrong Feelings
Enthralled
Thanksgiving
Seduced
Innocents Lost
Burn
Flashback
Not A Chance In Hell
Empty Rooms
Two Roads Diverged
Starfall
Blindsided
Not Her Own
Outta Here
The Valley of the
Shadow of Death
Comes the Rain
Smoke and Mirrors
Drawn to You
Team Angel
By Fire Reborn
Salvage
Ashes to Ashes
Life Is...
With A Little Help
Appearances Deceiving
Familiarity
Sweetness
Not All Who Wander
That Old Black Magic
For Lorne
Drawn Together
Lost to Sand
Fall of Triumvirate
Parallel Lives
The Lovers
Avenger
Double Cross
Pursuit
Ripper's Girl
Pandemonium
Negative Space
Raveled Threads
Asunder
Human Hands
Singular
Fragmented
Symmetry
Plans
Rogue Squadron
Legends
Mea Culpa
Things Unsaid
Home Sweet Gone
Eleventh Hour
Last Call
Time Is Running Out
Primal
Anywhere Out
of This World
Blood, Pressure
The Drawing Board
All's Well
Anywhere Out of
This World
Mourning Sickness
Welcome to Hell
Relative
Matters of Time
& Fishes
International Calls
Empty as Houses
Lusty Wrong Feelings
Enthralled
Thanksgiving
Seduced
Innocents Lost
Burn
Flashback
Not A Chance In Hell
Empty Rooms
Two Roads Diverged
Starfall
Blindsided
Not Her Own
Outta Here
The Valley of the
Shadow of Death
Comes the Rain
Smoke and Mirrors
Drawn to You
Team Angel
By Fire Reborn
Salvage
Ashes to Ashes
Life Is...
With A Little Help
Appearances Deceiving
Familiarity
Sweetness
Not All Who Wander
That Old Black Magic
For Lorne
Drawn Together
Lost to Sand
Fall of Triumvirate
Parallel Lives
The Lovers
Avenger
Double Cross
Pursuit
Ripper's Girl
Pandemonium
Negative Space
Raveled Threads
Asunder
Human Hands
Singular
Fragmented
Symmetry
Plans
Rogue Squadron
Legends
Mea Culpa
Things Unsaid
Home Sweet Gone
Eleventh Hour
Last Call
Time Is Running Out
Primal