Just another day in the life of a Druid. Ian had run errands while Tom—if anyone in the family had inherited their father’s gifts, it was Tom—concocted the spell. Their other brother, Dave, had avoided their uncle entirely and gone out to be with some new girl he’d met. It was all right with Ian; the minor spells they were producing now could be watched over by one or two people. Well, no, now that he thought of it, it isn’t all right. He wished he could have gone with Dave. He wished he could see Buffy and this time go right up and tell her how he felt.
Ian sighed. If his uncle ever learned of his feelings for the Slayer, George would have far more than a bad mood. Druids, after all, were supposed to stick with their own kind.
“Ian!” Tom’s voice was getting frantic. “I’m really serious! Something is going on in here!”
Ian put down the bag of supplies and ran for the bathroom down the too-white hall.
Tom was tending the early forms of a potion they planned to use as part of the greater spell. Ian almost laughed when his uncle told him where they were going to concoct their brew. When the builders of this quaint little place put in the bathtub, they probably never envisioned that it would someday contain a noxious liquid intended to save the world.
He found Tom waiting at the bathroom door.
“What’s the matter?” Ian asked.
“I can’t leave the potion,” Tom replied. “Uncle’s given us specific instructions.”
“Is this a problem?” Maybe, Ian thought, his brother wanted to join Dave.
“No.” Tom pointed into the bathroom. “The problem is in there. Whatever’s in the tub—I think it’s alive!”
Ian pushed by his brother and walked into the room. He stopped some three feet away from the bathtub. Something, indeed, was happening within.
The tub appeared to be filled with a dark green, viscous fluid. Little points of light shimmered on the surface whenever it was still. But it was not often still. The deep green liquid would roll and heave in a most agitated fashion, for perhaps a minute at a time, and then quiet for a few seconds, as if it might be gaining strength to begin again. Sometimes the liquid looked to be filled with air bubbles; at others, there appeared to be small, hard lumps swimming just below the surface of the dark green fluid.
“Is this supposed to be happening?” Tom asked.
“What is it?” Ian had never seen anything quite like it. It certainly didn’t look like anything they had done before.
“It’s the same brew you left me with—the preparation for the vegetation spell, to help seal the Hellmouth.”
“It can’t be.” That was one of the ancillary spells their uncle had decided would help back up the primary magic. When they had performed a practice preparation at home, three inches of liquid had swirled around the bottom of a basin.
Perhaps there was some miscalculation involved here, something their uncle had changed to deal with the power they were facing. He looked back at Tom. “Did Uncle tell you to make a larger batch?”
Tom shook his head. “This is the exact same spell we used before.”
“What could be different?” Ian asked, the answer coming to him before the question was fully out of his mouth.
“The Hellmouth!” he announced. But if the proximity of a point of power made that much difference to this simple incantation, what would it do to the great spells his uncle planned to use?
“This is very troubling.”
“Well,” Tom replied, “it is only a vegetation spell.”
But, Ian thought, that’s the very reason this was serious. And where was his uncle, anyway? He should be right in the middle of this sort of thing.
“Hey.”
Both Ian and Tom spun around to see Oz standing just outside the bathroom door.
Tom looked at the mess in the bathtub and almost smiled. Well, if he was going to be more open about what they were doing, this was a good place to start.
“The front door was wide open,” Oz said with a wave, “and this was obviously where things were happening.”
Tom nodded. “I think you could say that.”
“We seem to have a little trouble with our bathtub,” Ian admitted.
Oz stepped between them to get a better view. Both eyebrows went up as soon as he looked at the tub. “Wow. Now that’s a hair clog.”
“No,” Ian replied, “this was something we planned to do—well, sort of. We were putting together a little something to help in our uncle’s big fight against evil.”
Tom shook his head. “Yes, except this particular something never moved on its own before.”
Oz squinted at the bubbling mess in front of them.
“I think this particular something’s trying to get out of the tub.” He looked at the two brothers. “Is this anybody you know?”
Ian saw that Oz was right. The mass in the tub was heaving up and down even more than it had before. And parts of the mass seemed to heave above the tub in an almost recognizable shape. Some parts looked like tentacles, or maybe even arms. Oz was more than right. It was exactly as if something in that oozing mass was trying to find a way out of the tub.
“Anybody?” Ian heard a note of panic in his voice. “This shouldn’t be moving!”
“Well, hey, we can take care of that.” Not fazed in the least, Oz walked past the brothers and opened the doors under the sink. “Uh-huh,” he said after a moment’s pause. “This’ll do just fine.”
He pulled out a plunger, then turned to look at the very active liquid in the tub.
“You’ve got to watch it for a minute,” he told the others.
Oz was right. The thing in the tub did have a pattern. The middle of it would heave up, then the arm/tentacles would form to either side, then back to the middle again. It was getting noisier as it moved about, too. At first, Ian didn’t notice much but the expected sort of sloshing sounds. But he had begun to notice a lower, grumbling noise going on underneath.
Maybe Oz had seen something like this before. But, in all his years of Druid training, Ian never had.
“You’ve sort of got to get into the right rhythm,” Oz explained.
“Oz, wait!” Ian called. He and his brother were the spellcasters around here. They should be figuring out how to deal with this.
Oz dodged a particularly long feeler. “I think it suspects.”
The feeler receded into the tub and rose once again at the center.
“Now!” he cried and hit the top of the heaving mass hard with the plunger.
The mass paused as if in shock, then made a great moaning sound, collapsing in the middle like a soufflé that had the air knocked out of it.
No one moved for a long moment.
The liquid in the bathtub was still.
What had Oz done to the spell? Ian looked down at the now inactive sludge.
“I don’t know if you should have done that.”
“I was caught in the moment.” Oz grinned. “I don’t know what would have happened if I didn’t.”
“It was pretty quick thinking,” Tom added. “How’d you know to hit it there?”
“You sort of get an extra sense about these things after a while.” Oz shrugged. “This sort of thing happens every day around here.” He grinned. “Besides, I’m a master of drain clogs.”
Ian found Oz’s words rather chilling. “This should have been a very simple spell. It became far too powerful. I think my uncle has miscalculated. If the Hellmouth affects every spell in this way, this could be a potentially deadly problem. We may have to rethink everything we intend to do.”
Tom looked down at the now three inches of innocent, though slimy, looking liquid in the tub. “So we’ve got work to do. Where the heck is Dave?”
“Dave will show up. I’m more worried about Uncle George. With the kind of row that thing was making, shouldn’t he have checked in here by now?”
“I will kill them!” Naomi fumed. “I ordered them to serve me, and they were nowhere to be found!” Bryce and Gloria had dis
appeared. They had left her vulnerable. Once she had become a vampire, she thought she had left that sort of thing behind. But others could still betray her. How high was the cost of betrayal to a vampire? She still needed Bryce and Gloria for a day or two. But when their plan was done, she had plans for their very colorful—well, one couldn’t really call them deaths, now could one?
Eric smiled at her. “Servants can sometimes be so untrustworthy.” He waved at the star-filled sky above them. “You have to put it in perspective. What will the two of them matter when we rule the world, and everyone serves us?”
Eric always made her feel better. He had taught her so much, really. She had only been a very average vampire before he had come along. He had shown her how to change Bryce into the thing he was without allowing him to die, and he had trained her to place the still-living Cordelia under her spell.
“So you still feel it will be the two of us?” she asked softly.
“Naomi. After all this time how can you even ask? Only together can we guarantee the plan will work. I’m the one who knows the magic. You’re the one who knows the Slayer.”
He put one of his strong hands on her shoulder. “But we will have to review the particulars. Tomorrow night all our dreams come true.”
“Our dreams?” Naomi wanted to laugh. Eric made her feel like she was part of something huge.
“While I finish my part in this, you and the others will have to handle the Slayer. You must keep her occupied. Even though she knows nothing of the Druids’ spells, her interference could disrupt everything.”
He gently turned her so they were face to face. “Our plan is in motion. One more night and all will be different.”
“Different,” Naomi echoed.
“Don’t worry, Naomi. Eric will take care of you.”
She hoped so. Eric had taught her even more than he realized.
She had tasted her first betrayal in this, her new life after death. If Eric were ever to betray her, too, her vengeance would be terrible to behold.
Chapter 17
BUFFY HEADED STRAIGHT FOR THE HIGH SCHOOL LIbrary. They met there whenever things got really bad; after all, it was sort of like Giles’s headquarters. She just hoped Giles knew how bad this whole Druid thing was, and was already knee-deep in a plan.
“Buffy!” She heard Xander’s voice as she was about to walk across the high school lawn. “Boy, are we glad to see you.”
She turned to see Xander and Cordelia, along with one of Ian’s brothers. All of them looked rather the worse for wear. “Things are not sunny in the dale,” was all Xander said. “We’re going to see Giles.”
Buffy nodded. “Ditto on the bad. Ditto on the Giles.”
They headed for the one door Giles always kept open when he was in the library. The Watcher was in.
The four of them poured into the library together. Giles and Willow looked up from where both of them had been staring into a monitor.
“I had been expecting you,” Giles said in that offhand way he had.
“All of us?” Xander asked.
“Well, some of you at least,” Giles admitted, glancing at Dave and hesitating. “Things are about to occur.”
Willow nodded. “Either the computer program’s gone crazy, or it’s the end of the world.” She paused a minute, then added, “I’m hoping it’s the computer program.”
“Well, it’s not the only thing that’s gone crazy around here.” Buffy quickly told everybody about her battle with the plants.
“I’m afraid I recognize that,” Dave said when she was done.
“So the wild grabby plants are a Druid thing?” Buffy asked.
“Yes, that’s one of the spells that my uncle is planning to use tomorrow. But that sort of growth, that sort of aggression—none of that should have happened so soon. I’m sure my uncle and brothers have barely completed the preliminary incantations. If the plants react so strongly to the preparatory spells, how will they react to the real thing?”
“Perhaps,” Giles mused, “should your uncle come back here as he had promised, we might be able to talk about this.”
“My uncle hasn’t been back to talk?” Dave asked incredulously. “From everything he’d said before, the participation of the Slayer in all this was crucial. I can’t understand why he hasn’t come back to explain.”
Giles surveyed the rest of those who had just entered the room. “But none of you look particularly happy. Did all of you have to fend off these plants?”
“There’s more than a giant green thumb out there,” Xander piped up. “We’ve just survived a vampire attack.”
Buffy shook her head. “No matter what, there are always vampires.”
“Not like this one,” Xander explained. “For one thing, it’s Naomi.”
Naomi? Buffy whistled. Ms. whining-is-a-way-of-life? Out of all of Cordelia’s old gang, Buffy always found Naomi to be the most grating. And self-centered. And petty. Actually, for Naomi, being a vampire was not that much of a stretch.
“And,” Xander added, “I think she’s done the whammy to Cordelia.”
Buffy realized Cordelia hadn’t spoken once. Now this was serious.
“She’s also bit one of the local girls,” Dave interjected. “Luckily, I got there before she could drain very much blood. We got her a little water, a little something to eat—”
“Donuts,” Xander explained. “There’s not much open in Sunnydale this time of night.”
“I treated the wound with a little something I had,” Dave continued. “It cleared right up and we got her home. There’s a few things we always carry for that kind of emergency. I could give you a list.”
“I’m sure that would be very handy,” Giles replied.
“No wonder the computer program’s going crazy,” Willow added. “For some place where nothing is supposed to happen, there’s an awful lot happening.”
“Poor Barb.” Dave smiled at the thought of her. “I’m sure when she wakes up tomorrow, all of this will seem like a bad dream.”
“It’s a common occurrence in Sunnydale,” Giles assured him.
“Well, that dream sort of thing,” Buffy agreed. “There’s a lot of stuff people around here just can’t handle.”
“Hey, there’s stuff here we can’t handle,” Xander interjected. He quickly related how he noticed Cordelia was acting a bit strangely, that she was insisting a young woman—Barb—should go out in the back alley behind the Bronze, a back alley where Naomi waited. And then, as soon as she had gotten Barb to go out there, Cordelia forgot the whole sequence of events.
Giles rubbed the bridge of his nose under his glasses. “I believe that would be a mastery spell. Cordelia? Do you remember any of this?”
Cordelia shook her head miserably.
The librarian did not seem in the least surprised. “Yes, that would be in keeping with this sort of control. I’m quite certain there’s a way out of it. I’ll have to do a little research. In the meantime, Cordelia, stay close to the others. I’m sure, if Naomi tries to snare you again, the others can pull you out of it.”
Cordelia nodded. She didn’t look very convinced. Mostly, Buffy thought, she looks very scared.
“Okay,” Xander said. “Somebody’s got to ask this question. Is there any way this vampire stuff fits in with the plants?”
Giles considered for a moment before he answered. “In Sunnydale, who can say?”
“Around here,” Willow piped up, “vampires are a part of everything.”
“Precisely.”
“Vampires R Us,” Buffy agreed. “Well, unless I can stop them.”
“With the additional problem,” Giles continued, “that, as we can see, the Druids’ own magic is threatening to go out of control.”
There was a moment of silence. Even with the extra help, Buffy thought, we’re still overwhelmed.
“Well,” Giles said at last, “now that we’re all here, we should do something about this.”
Xander nodded. “If we could figure out
exactly what ‘this’ is.”
“Has anybody seen Oz?” Willow asked.
“Oz and Ian were running a bunch of errands,” Xander replied.
“Well, maybe Uncle George will explain something to him,” Dave ventured. “After his insistence on working with you people, I just can’t understand what’s happening.”
“You and everybody else in this room,” Buffy agreed.
George knew now what he had to do. He had left the cottage quietly, without a word to his nephews. But he kept the crystal in the inside pocket of his coat, close to his heart.
He could feel the stone vibrate through his cotton shirt. The power of prophecy was returning. Perhaps the Hellmouth was recharging the crystal too. The stone would be there to help him when the moment of decision came.
It was time to deal with the Slayer and her friends. He should have spoken to them long ago. How long had he sat in that room, listening to his past? The memories had kept him rooted to the spot.
How odd, he thought, that Eric had followed me here. But he was grateful to the bloodsucker in a way, for Eric’s appearance was really what shook George from his torpor.
Now his senses were reawakening. Bits of power were coming back to the elder Druid. He could hear birds call on the other side of town, feel the heat of the stars on the back of his hand. He could sense the gatherings of souls in the buildings before him and could hear those no longer alive moving together at the center of town.
But the Slayer and her friends—he knew they were all together. But with one of his nephews? How did that come to be? He could no longer read the more subtle of signs. The world around the Hellmouth was becoming more unsettled with every passing moment.
George searched the room around the Slayer. Yes, she was there, too.
Only moments before, the red had drained from the stone, and the divining crystal had begun to speak to him at last. The crystal had told him that she was the one he needed. But it was so obvious, really.
He had been blinded by remorse. He would be blind no more.
What would he say now when he finally stood in front of them, not a projection, but in the flesh?
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