No infringement of the following characters and situations is intended.
Warning: Rated [MA] Mature Adults only. Contains strong m/m sexual scenes, violence, coarse language and adult themes.
Title: The Killing Moon
Author/pseudonym: Hellblazer
E-mail address: havisham06@yahoo.com
Rating: MA
Pairing: A/W
Date: 27/11/00
Disclaimers: Don't own these characters, Joss Whedon, 20th Century Fox, Mutant Enemy, and the rest do. No copyright infringement is intended or inferred.
Warnings: sex (m/m), violence, drug references, ever more angst, wholesale plagiarism/homage.
Spoilers: Minor references to Season 2. Set before "Dear Boy".
Summary: stories before bedtime.
Notes: 'Oh, you can write lots of slashy stories for Wesley to tell', enthused a friend. Er, no. The original Arabian Nights was a collection of ancient tales linked by a narrative and I don't see why I should try any harder than twelfth century scribes who probably didn't have a day job, plus it'd take me years to finish this fic. Don't want that. I've already got 30 or so fics on the back burner. And secondly, I don't think Wes wants to work Angel up into any more of a state than he already is. If you're not familiar with the story of Arabian Nights, the stories were told to distract the ruler from murdering his bride in the morning. Wes is feeling the same sort of anxiety.
Bibliography: A Thousand And One Nights.
The stories Wes tells are from "The Cattle Raid of Cooley".
For my KOF boys. Even the American ring-ins.
| Romeo | I dream’d a dream to-night. |
| Mercutio | And so did I. |
| Romeo | Well, what was yours? |
| Mercutio | That dreamers often lie. |
| Romeo | In bed asleep, while they do dream things true. |
| Mercutio | O, then, I see Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies’ midwife, and she comes In shape no bigger than an agate-stone On the fore-finger of an alderman, Drawn with a team of little atomies Athwart men’s noses as they lie asleep; Her wagon-spokes made of long spiders’ legs, The cover of the wings of grasshoppers, The traces of the smallest spider’s web, The collars of the moonshine’s watery beams, Her whip of cricket’s bone, the lash of film, Her wagoner a small grey-coated gnat, Not so big as a round little worm Prick’d from the lazy finger of a maid; Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut Made by the joiner squirrel or old grub, Time out o’ mind the fairies’ coachmakers. And in this state she gallops night by night Through lovers’ brains, and then they dream of love; O’er courtiers’ knees, that dream on court’sies straight, O’er lawyers’ fingers, who straight dream on fees, O’er ladies ‘ lips, who straight on kisses dream, Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues, Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are: Sometime she gallops o’er a courtier’s nose, And then dreams he of smelling out a suit; And sometime comes she with a tithe-pig’s tail Tickling a parson’s nose as a’ lies asleep, Then dreams, he of another benefice: Sometime she driveth o’er a soldier’s neck, And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats, Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades, Of healths five-fathom deep; and then anon Drums in his ear, at which he starts and wakes, And being thus frighted swears a prayer or two And sleeps again. This is that very Mab That plats the manes of horses in the night, And bakes the elflocks in foul sluttish hairs, Which once untangled, much misfortune bodes: This is the hag, when maids lie on their backs, That presses them and learns them first to bear, Making them women of good carriage: This is she-- |
| Romeo | Peace, peace, Mercutio, peace!
Thou talk’st of nothing. |
| Mercutio | True, I talk of dreams,
Which are the children of an idle brain, Begot of nothing but vain fantasy, Which is as thin of substance as the air And more inconstant than the wind, who wooes Even now the frozen bosom of the north, And, being anger’d, puffs away from thence, Turning his face to the dew-dropping south. |
|
William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, Act I, Scene iv, lines 49-103 |
|
+
"Wes?" Angel called from the top of the stairs, tired and cranky after a very long nap.
Wesley was leaning on the counter with his elbows, scanning an old book in the hopes of finding something useful.
"Have you found that..." Angel started, walking up behind the ex-Watcher.
Wesley slammed the book shut, turned and caught Angel in a fierce lip lock.
Angel, surprised, tried to back away but Wesley's arms held him there.
He could have pushed away harder, but Wesley's mouth pushing open his mouth rooted him to the spot.
"Uh, Wes, this isn't the time or the place," Angel managed when Wesley came up for air, noting Cordelia beaming and Gunn looking vaguely outraged.
"Pick another place, cause I'm not letting you put me off anymore. I can't remember the last time you let me kiss you."
They locked lips again.
"Okay, tiger," Angel gave in, and led Wesley up the stairs to his room.
They snogged all the way up the stairs, tearing shirts over heads and rubbing hands over bare flesh, squeezing arses and locking tongues. Gunn thought they were going to do it on the stairs until Angel dragged Wesley up onto the landing and down the corridor in a rolling, four legged walk.
"Finally," Gunn muttered. "About time those two cats got a room."
Cordelia was still grinning.
"What."
"Wesley finally made a move. Way to go Wes."
Gunn gave her a whatever look and tried desperately to read the front page of the newspaper, trying to forget what he'd just seen, trying not to imagine what must be going on up there. They'd never obviously flirted in front of Gunn, though Gunn now realised they had. They'd bickered like a married couple, and now he realised...well, couple at least. No wonder the skinny Brit hated him. He thought Gunn was horning in on his territory. This whole thing was probably for Gunn's benefit as much as Angel's. Wes was marking is territory. Well, good for him, cause Gunn wasn't going to go there. The man was a vampire, and Gunn couldn't forget it.
Angel threw Wesley onto the bed and landed onto top of him. They rolled in an animal passion, shucking trousers, letting limbs twine and stroke where they will. Angel's strong arms around him, Angel's tongue and fingers inside him. Wesley rolled on top, rubbing himself over Angel, letting himself be stroked, pulled, pushed and probed into a hot flooding ecstasy.
Gunn had a sudden thought.
"What about Angel's curse?"
Cordelia made a dismissive gesture.
"Oh, that. It's okay. Wesley knows exactly how far he can go."
"You sure?"
"Absolutely," Cordelia beamed best whiter than white smile.
And Gunn bought it. Damn, she was getting good at this.
Angel rolled over Wes on the pillows, twined around him, breathing in his arousal, kissing him hungrily, grazing his throat and licking the pulse that flickered beneath the skin. He wanted to, so badly. Wesley wanted him to, kissing him wantonly, pressing up against Angel, but he knew Angel wouldn't. He guided Angel's hand down his side to his back. He was light headed and giddy, and he wanted everything Angel could give him. He pushed at Angel's clothing, making him strip off and join him, naked flesh to naked flesh, underneath the covers.
Angel's hand stroked down. Wesley's breath caught in his mouth as Angel caressed him inside and out. Only a few strokes and Wesley was his, running hot liquid over his stomach.
Angel kissed Wesley's forehead softly, gathering him close, feeling him tremble. "Sleep now, crazy boy," he instructed softly. Wesley burrowed against his shoulder and dropped off almost instantly.
Angel, too, slept. He rolled over in his dreams, listening to Darla's dark whispering, feeling her stroke his hunger until it burned bright. He rolled her under him, feeling her warm neck with his lips and tongue. Then it was teeth, digging deep into the skin and swallowing the warm salty blood that spilled into his mouth.
"Angel! Angel!" he heard her calling him faintly as he rode her hard, each thrust answered with a pulse of blood down his throat. He drank greedily.
"Angel..."
He woke with the moan still in his ear, to find Wesley staring at him, half terrified, half in rapture, his throat all torn and bloody.
Angel tore away from him, Wesley's blood still on his lips.
"Angel -" Wesley tried to move after him, causing more blood to gush from his throat. He stopped, swooning from blood loss, sinking back into the bed. His eyes pleaded 'don't let me die'.
Angel came back to the bed, holding his hand against Wesley's throat.
"Cordelia! Gunn!" he called.
"Wes..I..." he tried, horrified.
But Wesley just smiled at him calmly, then closed his eyes.
"Gunn!" he cried again, Wesley's blood still seeping between his fingers.
"Shit, Bro," Gunn's streetwise voice managed to convey it's shock from the door.
"I fell asleep, I dreamt...help me stop the bleeding," Angel begged.
"Wesley's right. You are hard on him, man."
"Save now, judge later," Angel commanded and they snapped into action, Angel dressing like the building was on fire while Gunn carried Wesley down to the car.
Angel drove like a man possessed, all the while cursing himself. He was right to have pushed Wes away because of the dreams. He'd been right.
The Darla in his dreams was jealous of Wes, with a deadly passion. And with good reason. Wesley was his salvation.
They carried Wesley into the ER. A few stitches, a transfusion, and he'd be fine. They wanted to keep him in, on account of the blood loss and severe bruising. Gunn promised to stand guard. Though right now it looked like Angel was more of a threat to Wes than those lawyers.
Angel loitered, almost feeding off the guilt, as Gunn observed. Gunn didn't ask what had happened. Angel would tell him in his own good time. That Angel was deep in the guilts was a good sign, at least it meant he hadn't done it for fun. And Wes would forgive him. The cat was crazy for Angel, any blind fool could see that. Something was up with Angel, he was like a loaded gun, waiting to go off, big time. Gunn suspected this little slip wasn't the half of it. Maybe Wes knew. Maybe he'd got bit, sticking his hand in the cage. Maybe Gunn should remember a leopard can't change his spots, no matter how much he might want to. Maybe Wes should remember that, too. Save the guy a whole lot of trips to the emergency room.
Wes was waking up. Mutual apologies all round. Gunn grizzled to himself in the corner. Screwed up rich white boys. No, that wasn't fair. He'd seen Wes handle Angel on a good day. This was a bad day. Angel had fallen off the wagon. Wes begging after him like his bitch. Which is exactly what he was. Promises on both sides, promises they probably both meant. Then it was getting up to sunrise. Gunn indicated the clock. Angel took off, leaving Wes looking tired and hostile. Something's wrong with Angel and he knows it. But it he won't play his cards yet, not until he gets a better hand. Gunn can see that, and respects it. Wes is becoming a player. There might be hope for him yet.
Gunn watched Angel drive off from the slatted windows. When he turned back, Wesley was trying to climb out of bed.
"No way, man," Gunn tried to push him back but Wesley would have none of it.
"Get me my clothes or I'll walk out of here naked."
Gunn gave him a speculative look. "I've seen enough of your bony white ass today," he decided, tossing Wes the jeans and t-shirt they'd brought him in wearing.
Wesley slid out of the bed, and steadied himself. He could barely stand but Gunn knew better than to offer him a hand. The man had his pride, and it was a prickly, chaffed one at that.
They tottered down to the entrance together. Gun tried hailing a cab, with no luck, and Wesley knew why. Gunn looked every inch the tough black gang leader he was, no taxi driver who valued his life was going to stop for him. So Wesley pushed himself forward onto the curb, hailed a cab and held it until Gunn slid in beside him, much to the taxi driver's consternation. He was positive now Wesley was the white bait and he was going to die. Wesley just smiled at the cigarette card of Vishnu stuck to the dashboard and gave directions, before slumping back against Gunn in the back seat.
Gunn held Wesley mostly upright, and kept a weather eye on the driver. The driver kept a cautious eye on the two boys, noting the bandage on Wesley's throat that he was bleeding through, and the dark circles under Wesley's eyes. They looked rough and dangerous and definitely up to no good and the driver sweated relief when he left them on the footpath outside Wesley's block of flats.
Gunn's first impression was that of an unholy mess, an explosion in a grotty second hand bookshop, but as he looked around again he realised it was frighteningly neat and organised. Yes, the cheap pineboard bookshelves were crammed to overflowing and every surface that could carry a book or new age trinket did so, but the kitchen and floor were spotless, the solitary plate drying on the rack by the sink was shining white, the condiments were arranged in regimental rows on the bench and he suspected the bathroom and bedroom which he couldn't see were much the same.
"Nice place," he offered to Wesley who had been dumped on the old couch.
Wesley ignored him, already intent on flipping through a few volumes within reach on the coffee table.
"There's something wrong with Angel," he announced at last as Gunn was beginning to feel uncomfortable.
"I hope so, cause I don't want what he did to you to be something routine." Gunn announced.
Wesley glanced up, and realised that Angel's attack had unnerved Gunn, to say the least.
"It is normal vampire behaviour, but Angel usually has more control than that. No usually means no," he added with a wan smile, and Gunn realised that more than Wesley's neck had been violated. Shit.
"He's losing control?"
"He's dreaming...acting out. He did this sleepwalking." Wesley indicated his mauled neck.
"You kidding me?"
"Men have been known to murder their wives while sleep walking. It happens. I think Angel might be being influenced by supernatural means, however. His need for sleep lately, it's not normal."
He waved towards one of his shelves. "Get me that bowl and fill it with water."
Gunn gave him a look of incomprehension.
"I can use it to try and see what's got Angel under it's spell."
"Oh," Gunn understood and obediently took the bowl into the kitchen to fill it under the tap. He carried it back, careful not to spill a drop, but Wesley had passed out on the couch.
Not before time, Gunn thought, putting the bowl down carefully and arranging Wesley into a slightly more comfortable position.
He glanced out of the window. The sun was rising. Angel would be sleeping again.
+
The next day...
"I believe Angel is being influenced through his dreams. Someone or something is trying to get at him through his dreams." Wesley announced the fruits of his research at last.
"What are you going to do?" Cordelia asked of him.
"Keep him awake."
"That's it? For how long?"
"For as long as it takes. Three days and night should do it. It might force them to show their hand in a more corporeal fashion."
Cordelia made a face.
"Show themselves. In daylight," he explained.
"Oh." She was still frowning. "Does this mean I do a run down to Starbucks?"
"That'll help," Wesley agreed seriously.
"Why, what are you going to do?"
"Tell him stories."
Cordelia just stared at him.
Wesley shrugged self consciously. "A Watcher's training lasts a lifetime," he continued on in spite of Cordelia's deliberate bored look. "And a good deal is based upon Druidic teachings. I started from a very young age and it's a mostly oral tradition. Before you can be initiated into the mysteries you must learn and recite legends and genealogies by heart. It becomes part of our craft."
"No wonder you're all so long winded then," Cordelia muttered, and Wesley gave her a sour look.
"The fact is, I trained half my life as a storyteller. I can do this. I can keep Angel awake, and away from whatever is trying to get to him."
"By telling him bedtime stories. That's your great plan?"
Wesley smiled to himself. "Have you never read A Thousand and One Nights?"
Cordelia shook her head.
"I thought you said it would only take three."
Wesley adopted his usual 'God give me strength' expression when dealing with Cordelia. Three nights would have to do it. He didn't know if he had it in him to last a week. The raw skin of his throat itched, reminding him of exactly why he was so very tired already.
"How are you going to make Angel listen to you? You know he's been in a mood of late." She emphasised the word mood, to indicate how difficult a shirty vampire was to be around.
"I'll play my guilt card."
Cordelia gave him another quizzical look and he indicated his bandaged throat.
"Oh. Yeah. That'll work. The guilt trip always works with Angel."
Wesley smiled, pleased with himself. "Yes, I thought so. If he's going to treat me this way I might as well try and use it to my advantage."
"You're a twisted man, Wesley," Cordelia noted, half in admiration, half in reproach.
Wesley was still grinning at her. He only stopped when Angel came back, all grumpy and smelling of cigarettes. Wesley tagged after him up the stairs, all pathetic pleading looks and concern, and she realised she was watching a skilled con job in progress. Since when had Wesley been such a callous little manipulator? She'd have to watch him in future. Watch him very carefully.
Angel listened to Wesley babble for several minutes before finally turning on him, all dark snarling resentment.
"Wes, please, I'm tired."
"I know," Wesley's eyes seemed to tremble. "I just thought..." his voice grew so quiet Angel had to listen for it. "We could talk, about yesterday."
Wesley made himself look into Angel's eyes, and was gratified to see the horror strike them, though he didn't show it.
"Wes...I..." Angel choked on the words.
"I thought, maybe...you haven't been sleeping, and we haven't been...is there something wrong, have I done something?" Wesley was no longer acting. He waited for the answer.
Angel turned away from him.
"It's not you, Wes, it's me..."
"Oh, that's reassuring. What's up? I thought we could at least talk. We used to talk. Angel..."
Angel turned on him, irritated.
"Can we not have this conversation now?"
"Sure. I'll pencil it in at another more convenient time. That'll work. The 'it's not you, it's me' speech. It's not like I haven't heard it before."
The bitterness in Wesley's voice surprised Angel and cut through his self pity like a knife.
"Wes? Are we breaking up?"
"You tell me. I thought we were fine again, but since you've moved in here...is it this place? I told you it was evil..."
"No, it's not the hotel."
"Is it me?"
"No, it's not you."
"Then what?"
But Angel wasn't willing to share that yet.
"I'm not going anywhere you know," Wes declared.
"Wes..." Angel began wearily.
"We don't have to talk about that, about whatever burr you've got under your saddle. But we need to talk. Just sit and talk and be together. I've hardly seen you."
This was true.
Warily, like dogs, they each sat down on a corner of the bed.
Angel really looked tired, and fed up. He wasn't happy but Wes had come to far to run now.
"Well?" Angel asked, expectantly.
"I thought I'd tell you a story."
Angel moved, getting off the bed. "Wes, I don't have time."
Wesley's eyes held him. "Make time," he asked. It was all he asked, and who was Angel, immortal after all, barring accidents, to deny him this one thing.
Angel resettled, still looking bored, but indulgent.
"Fine, tell me your story then."
Wesley brightened. His voice grew soft and seductive, shifting into hypnotic tones that rose gently up and down, compelling Angel to listen.
"Fect n-oen do Ailill & do Meidb r n-dergud a r leptha d b i Cruachanr th Chonnacht, arrecaim comrad chind-cherchailli eturru," he began.
"Once of a time, that Ailill and Medb had spread their royal bed in Cruachan, the stronghold of Connacht, such was the pillow-talk that befell betwixt them..."
+
The day passed and the sun set. Wesley's soft voice still held Angel in its spell, broken only by the sudden appearance of Cordelia in the doorway, post vision. Angel leapt up to steady her, set her on the end of the bed, then realised it was night, and he had work to do. The hours, the day, it had vanished, all the while he'd been held in Wesley's thrall. He shook his head to clear it, annoyed at Wesley, but Wesley just looked up at him, as innocent as a lamb, his arms around Cordelia, soothing her softly.
"A nest of demons," Angel confirmed and Cordelia nodded.
"I'll get my axe." Wesley stood, but Angel's hand was on his chest.
"Not this time. I'm taking Gunn." And it was decided. Angel left, with Cordelia trailing in his wake, down to the kitchen where the ice and painkillers lived, leaving Wesley standing there all alone in the room. Quite alone.
Wesley lay back in Angel's bed, tired and alone. Angel had Gunn to help him fight the demons now. So much for the Rogue Demon Hunter. Answering the phone and making tea seemed all he was good for these days.
He lay back, feeling the sheets under him. Vampires left no scent, no body heat, but this was Angel's bed and his presence could still be felt. At least, to one so finely tuned to it as Wesley was. He ran his hand over the sheets, remembering a time when he would have not felt like an interloper, when this would have been his bed, too. Once upon a time, not more than a month ago, this would have been his bed, too. He rolled on his side, curling up in the sheets, sad, so very sad. He hugged the pillow against his chest, rubbing his cheek softly along the fabric. Angel. His hand ran down over his chest in slow circles. Unbuttoning his jeans he slid his hand inside.
Angel. He buried his face against the pillow, muffling his gasps as he pumped himself dry.
Angel would smell it on the sheets. Maybe it would remind him of what they'd once shared. Maybe it would make him want it again. Maybe it would make him want Wesley again.
Wesley hugged the pillow tighter. He missed him. He missed him so badly.
He was dozing when Angel returned. He heard Angel and Gunn stomp in, dropping weapons like teenaged boys dropped shoes, recapping their adventures in loud hyper voices to Cordelia, still wired on the rush of the battle.
Wesley rubbed his face and wandered down, rumpled and tired, the skinny bookworm nobody ever bothered about.
"You're back," he observed, coming down the last of the stairs. In one piece he was relieved to see. It was hateful, being the one left behind to fret.
"Tea, coffee?" Might as well do what he was good at.
Angel shook his head. He and Gunn rehashed the battle a few more times. Then Gunn took off, Cordelia too.
Angel waited for Wesley to go home, too, but nothing doing.
Wesley made himself a nice hot cup of tea and sat down on the couch, watching Angel pace.
"Tough night?" He asked. "Do you want me to look at that hand for you?" He'd noticed Angel flexing and reflexing it. At the first mention of it, Angel his the offending wound in his pants pocket.
"It'll heal," Angel dismissed it.
"You seem...on edge."
"Really, Wes? I've just been in a fight for my life." He turned on him, then he saw the hurt look on Wesley's stricken face, and managed to make himself stop.
"You should go," Angel decided. "I need to sleep."
Wesley made no move to sleep, sitting there, holding his tea in both hands.
"Don't you want to know what happens next?" Wesley asked, and Angel stopped pacing.
Wesley, having caught his attention, began where he’d left off.
"Then it was that the Morrigan daughter of Aed Ernmas came from the fairy dwellings to destroy Cuchulain. For she had threatened on the Cattle-raid of Regomaina that she would come to undo Cuchulain what time he would be in sore distress when engaged in battle and combat with a goodly warrior, with Loch, in the course of the Cattle-spoil of Cualnge. Thither then the Morrigan came in the shape of a white, hornless, red-eared heifer, with fifty heifers about her and a chain of silvered bronze between each two of the heifers. The women came with their strange sorcery, and constrained Cuchulain by geasa and by inviolable bonds to check the heifer for them lest she should escape from him without harm. Cuchulain made an unerring cast from his sling-stick at her, so that he shattered one of the Morrigan's eyes.
Then the Morrigan came thither in the shape of a slippery, black eel down the stream. Then she came on the linn and she coiled around the two feet of Cuchulain. While Cuchulain was busied freeing himself, Loch wounded him crosswise through the breast. Then at this incitation Cuchulain arose, and with his left heel he smote the eel on the head, so that its ribs broke within it and he destroyed one half of its brains after smashing half of its head.
The Morrigan next came in the form of a rough, grey-red bitch-wolf and she bit Cuchulain in the arm and drove the cattle against him westwards, and Cuchulain made a cast of his little javelin at her, strongly, vehemently, so that it shattered one eye in her head. During this space of time, whether long or short, while Cuchulain was engaged in freeing himself, Loch wounded him through the loins. Thereupon Cuchulain's anger arose within him and he wounded Loch with the Gae Bulga, 'the Barbed-spear', so that it passed through his heart in his breast…."
+
The sun stretched over the lobby floor. Cordelia came in and bustled about and they moved upstairs. Evening fell and the soft velvet darkness called to Angel through the window he leant against.
He could still smell Wesley all over his sheets and it fanned a hunger he was finding harder and harder to repress. Especially with the taste of Wesley so recently on his lips.
"It bothers you," Angel spoke at last. "That we don't have sex."
Wesley hunched up on the pillows. "We have sex. We don't make love any more. That's what bothers me."
Angel turned around, his guilty conscience pricked. Wesley saw it, and it hurt even more. It confirmed his worse fears, that he wasn't imagining it, that there was something between them now.
"Once upon a time you walked through fire for me. Now you barely give me he time of day. If I've done something, please tell me."
"Nothing," Angel murmured. "I've just been a little distracted lately."
Wesley waited to hear what that distraction was, but Angel was no longer forthcoming. He'd turned his face away.
"Angel, is there someone else?"
A slight reaction, then, nothing.
"No, Wes," came the carefully rehearsed answer. "Not in this life."
Wesley sat up properly. "Memories? Is it Buffy?"
Angel shook his head and stared out the window. He'd turned away from Wesley again.
"We used to talk," Wesley prompted, but Angel would not be drawn out. Wesley cursed himself, knowing Angel always suspected his motives, that Wesley was more interested in collecting material for his files than knowing the man. It wasn't true, but Wesley's past as a Watcher still tainted their relationship. Sometimes Angel trusted Wesley's change of heart as much as Wesley trusted Angel's.
"Some people still have the power to harm us, even when we feel we're safe. That we're done with them. Shall you hear my story? The goddess isn't done with our hero yet. She still has harsh lessons to teach him. She will have her revenge on him, no matter how many heroic deeds he performs."
Angel turned around, listening intently.
"Tell me."
"Then it was that the Morrigan, daughter of Ernmas, came from the fairy dwellings, in the guise of an old hag, engaged in milking a tawny, three-teated milch cow. And for this reason she came in this fashion, that she might have redress from Cuchulain. For none whom Cuchulain ever wounded recovered there from without himself aided in the healing.
Cuchulain, maddened with thirst, begged her for a milking. She gave him a milking of one of the teats. "May this be a cure in time for me, old crone," quoth Cuchulain, and one of the queen's eyes became whole thereby. He begged the milking of another teat. She milked the cow's second teat and gave it to him and he said, "May she straightway be sound that gave it." [Then her head was healed so that it was whole.] He begged a third drink of the hag. She gave him the milking of the teat. "A blessing on thee of gods and of non-gods, O woman!" [And her leg was made whole thereby.] Now these were their gods, the mighty folk: and these were their non-gods, the folk of husbandry. And the queen was healed forthwith…"
+
"That's my ceiling," Angel complained as Wesley drove the hammer home with three blows that reminded Angel uncomfortably of his dreams. Wesley and the hammer. Pounding away like a deathwatch beetle.
"There." Wesley let it fall from his hand, a woven web. A dream catcher.
"It doesn't go with the décor."
"Humour me."
Angel shrugged. Maybe it would help.
Wesley sat down on the bed, instead of getting off it as Angel had hoped, watching the dream catcher turn slightly, settling itself.
"I don't like it. It's tacky," complained Angel.
"Live with it."
Then Wesley gave him the look. That blue eyed gaze that passed for Wesley's puppy dog look. The begging look.
And Angel, despite his reputation, was very rarely impervious to it. Usually only when his demon side had the wheel.
He shrugged. All right.
Wesley settled on his bed.
"Wes?" Angel asked. He wasn't in the mood. Or rather, he was entirely in the mood and he didn't trust himself.
"Don't you want to hear how it ends?"
Angel glanced at the dream catcher.
"I thought you were going to let me sleep."
Wesley patted the mattress beside him.
"Bedtime story?"
Angel gave in and sat down beside him.
"This is some insane sleep deprivation experiment, isn't it," Angel accused mildly.
"Do you want to hear the rest of the story or not."
"Yes," Angel answered truthfully from the heart. "Yes, I want to hear you tell the rest of the story." He lay on his stomach, looking up at Wesley expectantly.
Wesley began his tale, his soft voice rolling over Angel.
In the shadows, Darla cursed Wesley's name. Clever, clever little Watcher. Too clever by half.
Love Will Tear Us Apart, Joy Divsion