Love In Vein: Book Three - Chapter 1

The sky seemed to be on fire, burning red as it scorched the earth below. The ground beneath her feet was bubbling, melting in the intense heat that dried out her eyes and made them sore as she tried to withstand the force of the wind.

She could see flames breaking free of the broken surface, licking at her boots and acting like miniature volcanoes as they spewed up the molten tarmac.

Buffy raised her eyes and watched the scene as it unfolded in front of her. She could feel the white heat of the inferno as it ate away everything she knew.

Sunnydale was burning.

Again.

The roar of silence filled her ears, and she braced herself against the gale, struggling to remain standing as she watched the world she once loved turning to ruins in front of her eyes. She didn’t flinch as the nuclear wind tumbled cars past her like leaves in the autumn breeze, sending them crashing into the houses that flanked her, decimating them.

She knew they wouldn’t touch her.

They never did.

She stood firm, watching the hot gale incinerating the palm trees that lined her street, and her eyes lowered to look at the scene again. She could smell the bodies on the cracked pavements as they burned, the sickening stench of them filling her senses and making her stomach turn.

A low rumble signalled the collapse of another building, the structure burned to nothingness by the unrelenting fire that raged across the city.

Across the world.

Feeling an itching sensation, she slowly raised her hand up.

None of this affected her, not the people, not the cars, not the buildings.

She watched the flesh on her fingers blister and peel away, falling in cinders from her bones and then watched those as they turned to ashes, too.

None of this affected her.

Because she was already dead.


Buffy woke with a start, jolting forwards in her seat as her hand immediately clutched at her chest. Her eyes darting in panic, she looked at the people surrounding her, the rows of people peacefully asleep, the rows of people all alive. She breathed deeply as she realised she was fine, it was just another dream, the same dream she’d been having for almost a month.

She slowly slumped back into the chair, closing her eyes as she struggled to get her heart rate back to normal and wiping the back of her hand against her brow to clear it of the cold sweat.

Pushing up the little blind that covered the aeroplane window, she gazed out into the darkness and took long slow breaths.

It was just a dream.

It didn’t mean anything.

She almost laughed as she told herself that. She knew it meant something and she knew it was more than just a dream. If it was just a regular non-vision nightmare then Giles wouldn’t have called her yesterday and told her in detail what she’d been seeing in her dreams--even when she’d told no one.

She’d been afraid to mention it to anyone, scared that her mother would overreact, or that her friends would panic. They would have every right to, she supposed.

She’d never had a vision this bad before.

Had never seen herself die each night, each time she closed her eyes.

It seemed like she’d been having the dream since waking memory, she’d had it so many times now that she couldn’t remember anything else. It was always there, waiting for her on just the other side of sleep.

She’d been shaken up enough by the repeated vision, but when Giles had called her from the Council, she’d been petrified as she listened to him relay in almost intimate detail what she’d been seeing.

It had been enough to convince her to get on the next available flight to England to meet with the Council and see what else they knew.

And everyone knew she hated flying.

Giles hadn’t told her how he knew. When she’d pressed the subject, he’d told her that he couldn’t discuss it over the phone, as though the line was tapped. She’d pressed it for a little longer in the hope that he would crack but he’d remained steadfast and unmoving in his opinion.

She had to come to England.

So, go to England she would.

Besides, Willow and Tara were there training with the Coven that Giles knew and it would be good to see them again after these long months apart.

She swallowed noisily as she thought about that and dropped her eyes to rest on her hand where it was resting in her lap. Her eyes traced over the ring of Amara and she suppressed the tears that wanted to fill her eyes as she thought about everything that had happened.

After the temporary defeat of the First, she’d found herself alone in the middle of her friends. Willow had helped her home and saw she was settled in her room, their room, before going downstairs to explain to her mother what had happened.

Her mother had offered her more comfort than she could have imagined possible when she burst through the door, immediately wrapping her in a tight hug that spoke volumes of understanding and love.

She’d cried the whole night, sobbing into her mother’s chest as her arms continued to hold her strongly, her fingers working to soothe her by stroking her back gently.

The next day had felt empty.

She’d felt lost, a little disorientated, but still not alone.

Her mother had gone from the room, and no one else had been with her but she hadn’t felt alone. She’d stared at the ring for hours, not moving from her bed for anything, not even the bathroom.

She felt immobile, unable to do anything now that he was gone.

But he wasn’t gone.

She kept telling herself she was imagining it, but her heart held out hope that if he was dust then she would feel it, and it would feel as bad as the time he’d broken the claim in order to instigate a new one.

Over the next week, her friends repeatedly came to visit her, Willow often staying for most of the day as she tried to cheer her up with little success.

Buffy found herself going into Slayer mode, shunning the girl inside and focusing on the hunt. She spent long nights out in the cemeteries. The second it got dark, she would leave the house, not touching her food, but heading out to face whatever fate had in store for her.

She knew she was never alone.

Her mother and him saw to that.

Each night that she hunted, Angel followed her. He tracked her from the cover of shrubs and trees, watching her as she went through the motions and dusted vampire after vampire, demon after demon.

Still nothing.

Not one feeling, not one iota of pain when she was nearly bested.

She felt empty.

A month into Spike being gone, she was starting to lose hope that he would return. Her feeling of loss was compounded when Willow announced that she was leaving Sunnydale to train with the Coven, and Tara was going with her. Willow’s promises of calling her and getting information from Giles didn’t do anything to improve her outlook.

Another two were leaving her.

The day after that, Angel declared that she was perking up sufficiently and that he really had to get back to Los Angeles. The whole entourage left with him, Fred, Wesley and Cordelia all following their boss back to their world.

Leaving her lonely in hers.

She hadn’t said goodbye.

She’d locked the door to her room and stared at the ring, much like she was now.

When she began to eat again, her mother stopped asking her to see a psychiatrist and that was reason enough to put the little amount of food in her mouth. She didn’t know what her mother had expected to gain by trying to send her to a psychiatrist. Had she even mentioned her vampire mate, she would have been immediately incarcerated and then where would that get her, or the world?

Her remaining friends still visited, Willow phoning whenever she could. They all told her that she was making great progress, that she was getting back to normal and she was doing so well.

How could anyone expect her to be ‘normal’ when her love was gone?

It had been forty days since she’d seen him at that point.

She had Giles researching portals, no longer trusting Wesley and Fred to do the job since she was holding them responsible for the loss of her mate.

The whole Council was at her beck and call, and she was making them work like dogs to bring him back to her somehow.

And all the while, her ‘friends’ were telling her to let go.

How could she? How could they ask her to do that?

She knew he was alive, well, as alive as he’d ever been and for all she knew he could be trapped in some unspeakable torment, waiting for her to save him.

During the next month, she came more and more out of her shell, much to her mother’s joy. She clawed her way back from the abyss, telling herself that Spike wouldn’t want to see her that way and that she had to be strong for him. He would return to her.

It was day number one hundred and twelve that the first vision had hit her.

Her dreams had been turbulent, to say the least, since Spike had been pulled into the portal, but this was beyond that. She’d woken in a cold sweat, her heart smashing so hard against her ribs that she thought it was going to stop and she’d scrambled out of bed in a blind panic. Almost tearing the curtains off their pole as she threw them open, it took her a few seconds to realise that the world wasn’t burning.

She’d spent the whole day curled up on the sofa after that.

Her mother had thought she’d had a relapse and had sat with her the whole day, not saying a word but holding her and bringing her tea in the hopes that she’d come out of wherever she’d gone.

She hadn’t meant to scare everyone, but the vision and the smell lingered in her memory as though it was real and she’d been right there, seeing it all.

Right there dying.

She’d not slept that night, frightened that the terrifying vision would come back.

She’d gone an entire four days without sleep before she couldn’t keep her eyes open any longer.

It had been waiting for her like she’d predicted.

A month she’d been suffering these visions and each time she looked in the mirror she could see the toll it was taking on her. Her skin was greyish, the dark circles under her eyes betraying the restlessness of her slumber and the horrible things she’d seen.

Still she couldn’t bring herself to tell anyone.

After everything they’d been through over the past few months, they would think she’d gone insane.

They would worry.

She couldn’t let them do that, had to protect them from whatever it was she’d seen, from whatever it was that was coming.

Letting the ring on her finger come back into focus, she blinked away her tears and sat stock-still for a few moments. She wondered if Giles had told anyone else, or if he believed that she had. Surely he must have spoken to Willow. Could he have mentioned it to her and discovered that she hadn’t told anyone about her vision?

She hoped he hadn’t.

When Giles had called her, he’d sounded in a hurry. There had been a commotion behind him and for a moment, she had panicked, thinking that the Council was under attack. The noise of banging furniture and muffled shouts soon subsided and she moved her concentration to what Giles was telling her.

In scary detail.

It still made a shiver bolt up her spine each time she thought about it.

Her eyes moved to the window again, watching the sun as it began to creep over the curving horizon and wondering just what this day had in store for her.

She cast a glance at the people in the row of seats across the aisle, in the middle of the plane. They were beginning to stir now, as though their subconscious was telling them they were reaching their final destination.

She just hoped it wouldn’t be that final.

Soft murmurs of voices filled the cabin and she looked at the empty seat beside her, silently thankful that the flight was quiet enough that no one had taken it.

She didn’t want to imagine trying to explain to someone onboard exactly what had her waking up in near hysterics.

The flight attendants announced that they were thirty minutes away from landing, and that everyone should fasten their seatbelts. Buffy felt her stomach drop with the plane as it descended a few thousand feet and she gripped the arms of her chair tightly.

Her nerves began to spiral out of control.

What was she expecting when she arrived at the Council? What was in store for her?

How the hell did Giles know?

Taking a deep breath, she held it in, trying to calm herself. She smiled as the stewardess walked past her, checking her seatbelt was done up, and then let her eyes move back to the window.

Looking out at the sun, she felt the unease in her stomach grow worse as she saw it rising large and red, and reminding her of the inferno she witnessed each night.

As the plane began its descent into London, she closed her eyes, her fingers toying with the ring on her finger and her brain racing with a million questions as she tried to guess what was going to happen next.

She just hoped that Giles had the answers she needed.

Review This Story/Chapter!

It only takes a minute to send me feedback, but it makes my whole day. Simply fill in the form below: