DISCLAIMER: See specifics in Part I. No infringement on the copyrights owned by Mr. Whedon, the WB, Fox, Mutant Enemy, Sand Dollar Productions much less any of the brilliant writers associated with BtVS and Ats.

RATING: NC-17

SPOILERS: Rumored ending for season four.

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by
Margot Le Faye

Over the course of their seemingly loveless affair, they had avoided being together on Buffy's birthday. For different reasons, the memory of their one perfect night together was entirely too painful. All that had gone wrong between them was rooted in that night, or so they each believed. But as Buffy's twenty-ninth birthday drew closer, each realized that all that had been right between them had been hallowed on that one night, as well. Each suspected that if there were ever to be a way back toward, if not the complete and unquestioning love they had shared, then at least some kind of peace, it would have to start on that night.

But each had grown far to vulnerable to simply be honest about it. Instead, Buffy groused about the approaching date and how she was getting older. Angel came back with something suitably sarcastic. They bickered, and argued. But they also made plans.

The coldness, felt even in the most heated of their embraces, was slowly killing them. And finally, each in their own way, Buffy and Angel came to understand that. It was not something they could admit to each other, but it had finally driven each to the breaking point.

Their hearts hungered for the love each was convinced the other no longer felt. They were starved of that love, and only the passion they permitted themselves could feed that particular hunger. But they came to realize that the very passion which sustained them was in fact poisoning them, that sex without love was destroying them more surely than any enemy they had ever faced.

Awkwardly, because each needed to do so as a matter of survival, not because either felt the other really cared, they began to soften towards each other.

And for once, It was too busy elsewhere to notice.

She was quiet that night, remembering the one time she and Angel had made love in tenderness, exactly twelve years before. It was, she realized, the only time in her life she had actually made love, not just had sex. She had tried with both Parker and Riley, but she had never felt for them what she felt for Angel. And by the time Angel's curse was modified so that intimacy was no longer a problem, love had no longer existed between them. What they had now was sex, angry sex, and it was hot and it was satisfying and for a long time she thought it might be enough, but tonight she didn't think she could stand it if that were the only thing between them.

Neither did he. He decided he didn't care if all she wanted were angry sex. He wanted more and it was about time he got it.

She wore a simple white dress, with pearl buttons down the front, and she looked as beautiful and innocent as the first time he had ever seen her. He had worn a tux, because he had told her, in the most insulting manner possible, that he might as well show her there was life after McDonalds. She had expected the tux, and she had expected flowers. She hadn't expected her reaction to them.

There were a dozen roses, one for every year that had passed. And they were so deeply red, the petals so soft and full, they might have been cut from ruby-colored velvet. She gasped when he gave them to her, there in her apartment, and tears came to her lovely green eyes, and he pretended that they were because she still loved him as he bent to kiss her. His lips were soft on her own, almost tender, and she pretended that it was because he still loved her as she lifted herself to wrap her arms around him and the roses were set down gently on a table and ignored as dinner plans were forgotten, because it was more important that he carry her to the bedroom, more important that she keep him beside her, more important that tonight they celebrate her birthday the way they had meant to when she was seventeen, before the world and an old grudge turned them into enemies and everything that had been so right had gone so wrong.

Tonight, nothing went wrong. From the first tender kiss, to the slow, reverent undressing, sweet touches and gentle caresses followed whispered endearments. For the first time since the Oracles had swallowed their lost day, they made love, with both tenderness and hunger, all rancor and anger left aside.

Even Buffy's whispered "I love you," didn't break the spell, as Angel hoarsely whispered his own love in return, and both dared to hope that there was no pretense this time.

She was holding on to him as he delicately unfastened each pearl button, and the gentleness he was showing her, a gentleness that she could only remember having been shown one other time, was her undoing. The words broke out of her, wrenched from her heart without her volition, and she held her breath, knowing that she had just given him the most potent, deadly weapon he could possibly use against her. Tears gathered anew in her eyes as she waited for him to use it.

Angel looked at her, not quite willing to believe what he had just heard. Buffy's eyes were luminous with tears, and he decided that if it were some new game on her part, he didn't care. He needed to believe, if only for a few moments, that she really did love him the way she once had.

And maybe, just maybe, he could believe it so hard it would come true.…

"I love you too," he risked saying, and he leaned towards her, slowly, his lips just tasting hers, just sipping the sweetness.

She savored the taste of him, the gentleness. He had said he loved her, and she wanted desperately to believe it wasn't just another way of hurting her, something to be offered only to be ripped away when it would do the most damage. She realized that tonight was a turning point. This was the way things were supposed to be between them, this infinite tenderness and aching beauty. She had almost forgotten it, because she had only had it once, and so much time and bitterness had come between them before they had become lovers again.

But being lovers without love was too empty. She realized that now. Here in his arms, with Angel cherishing her the way he once had, with every touch a caress, every kiss a declaration, she knew that she simply couldn't go back to the physically satisfying but emotionally empty sex she had been making do with for years. If she couldn't have Angel's love, she didn't want anyone's. And if she couldn't have sex with love, she was no longer willing to settle for sex without it.

For tonight, it seemed she had his love, and she determined to hold onto it for as long as she could. She reached up to unfasten the tiny black buttons of his dress shirt. He had never looked so handsome, she thought.

She had never been more beautiful, he thought as he slipped the straps of the dress down her shoulders and off her arms. Even in her innocent teens, she had lacked the depth the lovely woman before him had gained. Mere girlish prettiness had given way before womanly voluptuousness. Right now, he felt humbled that he had been privileged to know both the girl and the woman, and he was determined to keep the woman with him as long as he possibly could.

His hands slid over her warm flesh, as if discovering her for the first time. Buffy pushed aside his shirt, running her own hands over the hard planes of his chest and shoulders, down his back as she held him close for another tender kiss. Slowly, because, no demons were attacking, no monsters planned the end of the world, and no wicked spells seemed to need countering, they undressed each other until nothing physical was left between them. And if there were still years of bitterness in the way, they set those aside, the moment too important to be sullied by such things.

Buffy kissed her way up his chest, licking at his tight male nipples, needing to taste him, to savor the way his flesh tasted on her tongue. He rumbled deep in his chest, a masculine purr of satisfaction as she bit lightly on the dark bits of flesh. She smiled and nipped again. He let her play, tangling his hands in the raw silk of her hair to hold her close. When she had her fill, she kissed her way further; up the strong column of his throat, along his jaw, to his mouth.

His mouth…she loved his mouth, loved the way it curled at the corner in his half smiles when he was amused. What wouldn't she give to see him really smile, to see him laugh unrestrainedly? His lips were soft on hers, gentle kisses turning more demanding; she stopped thinking and allowed him to deepen the kiss.

He was going to drown in her kisses, but not before he shattered her with pleasure. Angel pressed her into the softness of the mattress, following her down. Her thighs parted, cradling his hips, allowing his manhood to nestle against her thatch of curls. Lazily, he rolled his hips to put light, teasing pressure on her sensitive bud. Restless, she stirred against him seeking more pressure. He smiled against her mouth, his mood oddly playful.

It had never been about sex for him. He had done without sex for decades at a time, had been prepared to do without it for the rest of his unnatural life. But sex with Buffy was never simply sex, no matter how much he tried to deny it. It had always been about how badly he needed her, how he was incomplete without her, about finding redemption and renewal in her arms. That hadn't changed, and it had never been more true than right now, when he dared to hope that this time, things could be set right between them.

He didn’t want to rush things, needing this to be perfect. Buffy's breathing quickly spiraled out of control as Angel slowly tormented her into a state of desperate need. She pulled him closer, lifting her hips, trying to get him nearer to where she needed him to be. He laughed and drew away: never too far, but not letting her have what she wanted just yet. She beat on his shoulders in frustration, and he grabbed her hands, holding them over her head, leaning up to smile down at her. Her frustration dissolved in the heat of that smile, warm and sensuous as a cat's.

"Patience, little one," he said, an endearment he had not used with her for years. That alone made her forget her impatience, and she shivered, allowing him to do what he wanted.

He wanted to bathe her in kisses, so he did, trailing his lips lightly over her brow, along her temples, upon the lids of each eye and down the bridge of her nose. He kissed her cheeks and her throat and her collarbone, the gentle swell of her breasts and the sweet valley between them. And all the while his manhood brushed against her femininity, promising that this was but prelude. She sighed, offering herself to his willing mouth, dissolving in the sensual bliss of his tenderness.

Her honeyed wetness was seeping from her body. He could feel the enticing dampness on his manhood, and knew that he wouldn't be able to keep himself away from her much longer. But he wanted to taste more of her satin skin and secret flesh, so he knelt up, kissing a path down her ribs to her rounded belly to her succulent thighs. He kissed the sensitive insides until she was writhing beneath him, and he had to use a firm hand on her waist to hold her down. He chuckled at her impatience, at how easily she responded to him. Still teasing, he kissed his way down her thighs to the sensitive flesh behind each knee, sucking delicately as she whimpered in need. Down her firm calves to the high arched little feet, not letting an inch of her flesh escape his tender ministrations, until she was weeping openly, and his own need was becoming almost painful.

But he could hold out just a little longer, draw it out the tiniest bit more.

When his mouth found her hidden pearl, she sobbed, arching off the bed, tangling her hands in his hair. She was so sensitized by then, he knew she would shatter for him in just a few flicks of his tongue, the right pressure from his fingers. He opened his mouth to suck in the delicious bit of flesh, when her breathy plea changed everything.

"Angel, please. I need you inside me."

Something primal and urgent in her voice made the need not only hers but his as well. Angel quickly moved over her, into her welcoming arms, kissing her hungrily even as his manhood unerringly found the entrance and plunged within.

Buffy lifted herself to fully engulf her beloved, and for a moment, the two clung together unmoving, just savoring the feel of being locked together, of the rightness of it, the completion of it.

And then, because their bond and synchronicity had only grown stronger over time, at the same instant, they began to move.

He slowly pulled out of her, until only the velvet tip of his manhood was still sheathed inside her. She tightened around him to draw him back. Slowly at first, their tongues following the same rhythm as their bodies, they celebrated the reunion of their hearts.

Angel shivered as she rippled around him, silken wet warmth intimately caressing his cock. Buffy gasped as he filled her, her body yielding around him, surrendering to the glorious sensations he created inside her. Together they sought out each nuance of sensation, each aspect of rapture, relearning the face of ecstasy that had been revealed to them once before.

Gradually, as her pleasure climbed higher and his own needs clamored for release, Angel picked up the pace. With a sigh of rapture Buffy met him, tilting her hips just a bit to bring him more deeply into her. Angel groaned, bracing himself up on his forearms, so that he could thrust harder, taking care to ensure that each strong, steady stroke hit her most sensitive inner tissues, building her need…as she built his, hips gliding up to meet his thrusts, rolling to add another twist to their mutual pleasure, her body opening to accept him more completely than ever. He growled deep in his throat, primal male possessiveness making him want to lay a final claim to her, to take her completely, to mark her as his. Angel's strokes increased in tempo and power. Crooning her delight, Buffy responded, running her hands feverishly up and down his back, surging against him, encouraging him to make her completely his. Closer they came, and closer, a firestorm of passion twelve years in the making breaking over them both. And yet, no matter how violent their need of each other, how forceful the physical expression they gave it, there was still, over and above it all, that aching tenderness and sublime beauty.

The firestorm approached rapidly, burning all before it, ensuring that nothing afterward could be the same between them. He felt the frenzy begin deep inside her, as she trembled in his arms, shattering for him in wave after wave of completion in which he was caught up, shaken in the storm, burying himself repeatedly in her silken flesh, his seed pouring into her in a cool flood of rapture which somehow intensified her own. In the height of her pleasure she broke their passionate kisses, calling his name. He frenziedly recaptured her mouth, drinking down her cries as he drank down the taste of her. She clung to him, her body no longer her own, but a vessel with which to express her love for him. Together, they endured the fires burning along their nerves and consuming their flesh. Together, they reached heights of rapture neither had ever imagined before, and sustained each other at those heights for long ecstatic moments of unrivaled bliss. And, together, they returned from those heights, coming to rest safely in the shelter of each other's arms.

So it went through the night. They made love endlessly, repeatedly, until the darkness was fled and dawn lightened the sky. Then Buffy shut the blinds and pulled heavy curtains over them, sealing out the killing daylight and returning to her lover's arms. Wrapped around each other in a sweet tangle of limbs, they fell into the deepest, most restful sleep either had experienced in twelve long years.

When It realized what had happened, It panicked. It tried to send more dreams, but It couldn’t reach them. This was bad. Fretful, It settled down to wait, knowing It would have to be very, very careful, now.

Fortunately for It, the past ten years had given It plenty of options, had sown the fields of distrust and fear so that there was a harvest of bitterness to work with. It started almost as soon as they opened their eyes.

Buffy found herself smiling into Angel's eyes and his returning smile…until she remembered the way she had declared her love to him, leaving herself vulnerable to him as never before. What had she done? Had his own declaration been real, or a vicious mockery?

Her smile had faded as soon as she woke up. Had it all been a sham, a way to get him in the last vulnerable place left to him?

Misunderstandings followed as inevitably as the unfolding of a Greek tragedy. Angel grabbed up his clothing and stormed out of her apartment, telling her he had had it with her games, and that he was through being her lap dog. She needed him to save the world? Fine. He'd be there. She needed him to save her ass? Too damned bad.

She told him his own ass wasn't worth the price of the phone call Cordy would make for him, and that she didn't need his help to save the world, either. He slammed the door shut and she gathered the roses to throw after him…but instead held them to her chest as she rocked back and forth, sobbing in despair…not knowing that Angel was braced on the other side of the door, weeping like the lost soul he was.

But It had learned Its lesson, and wasted no time moving ahead with the ultimate plan.

Outwardly, nothing much changed. If Giles and Cordy noticed that Buffy and Angel were each a bit more subdued than usual, they put it down to other problems. Giles thought the dead end on the Slayer prophecies was likely getting to Buffy as her thirtieth birthday loomed ahead. Cordy figured that Angel was just down because with Wolfram and Hart out of the picture, demonic activity in LA was at a record low, and his new cases were almost all mundane investigations an ordinary PI could handle. Her seer's visions had been coming less and less frequently, while almost all of Angel's new clients found their way to him by word of mouth. His mission to redeem himself was, by sheer body count, all but complete, as far as Cordy could tell.

So the final vision knocked her on her ass both by its power and the subject matter. And as she staggered up from the floor, heading for the bottle of aspirin she was pretty sure was still left in the medicine cabinet, she was very grateful that Angel hadn't been around when it had struck.

Because the message she had received wasn't for him, but for Rupert Giles.

"They've been what?"

"Lovers," Cordy repeated, as she reached for another cup of tea. She didn't particularly like tea, but she was still recovering from the vision that had compelled her to make the two-hour drive to Sunnydale that morning. "Except without the love. Just lots of down and dirty sex and may I just say EWW??? I so did not need to have those images burned into my brain! Scarred for life, here!" She dumped a packet of sugar substitute into her tea and took a large gulp.

"Cordelia, you have been married to Wesley for three years now. I had imagined that you would be--ah, unmoved?--by…er…displays of…of..." He gave it up as she looked at him crossly, and returned to the important point. "Buffy and Angel have been, ah, intimate, again?"

"For years, Giles. Gees! Get with the program. Yes. Buffy and Angel. Who hate each other. And who apparently can't keep their hands off each other, anyway. Why are you so surprised? They couldn't keep their hands off each other when it might have meant the return of Angelus, the Serial Killer and the End of the Entire World. Why should they let a little thing like the fact that they hate each other's guts get in the way?"

"Well, yes but," Giles paused, frowning. Cordelia's words had started him thinking, and an idea was forming in his mind. "Cordelia," he said slowly, "why do they hate each other?" She looked at him as if he had lost his mind.

"Because Buffy hurt him when she called him a blood sucking fiend when Riley got injured helping him?"

"Yes," Giles continued as the idea began to take shape. "And doesn't it strike you as a trifle odd that Angel would hold that against her for so long? Or that she would even say such a thing to him in the first place?"

"Well of course it doesn't strike me as….Oh. Wait. Actually, it does." Cordy put down her cup of tea, thinking back. "I remember that I couldn’t believe it when he told me what she had said. I wanted to come back to Sunnydale and deck her myself. But I didn't hate her for it, just thought she was being more of a bitka than usual, like the time after the Master's death. I thought it would pass. Then, when he didn't go to her to fight those demons…I mean, sure, I knew he was hurting, but he was so indifferent, telling me that the world would go on without her, that another Slayer would be called. It wasn't until later that I realized how lucky we had all been, how if she hadn't stopped those demons, the whole town would have been overrun that night, and the Hellmouth would probably have been opened at last. But Angel never even thought about it…and until it no longer mattered, neither did I. Even then, I just thought…I didn't think. I just accepted."

"As we all did," Giles said thoughtfully. "Every one of us, although we knew how deeply they had loved each other, knew the price each had paid in suffering and loss for that love…we all just accepted it would come to an end with a few heedless words."

"God, Giles," Cordy whispered, eyes round, "What were we thinking? And, what' s going on?"

"First off, I'd say we weren't thinking. And as to what's going on…well, I suppose that's why that vision you had was directed to me. Obviously your Powers think I know something that will be useful."

"Cool," said Cordy. "So…what do you know?"

They decided to leave Buffy and Angel out of it. The situation was volatile enough. Until they knew why the lovers were being driven apart, it was best to keep them in the dark. Acting prematurely might simply force things in the wrong direction, arousing suspicions and angers no one could allay just now. Meanwhile, Willow, Tara, Xander, Anya, Cordy and Wesley went over all the events of the past twelve years, trying to make sense of what was going on.

"It's no use," Giles declared at last. "We haven't gotten anywhere in months, and I've spent far too much time away from Buffy's birthday prophecies. I might as well give up on them all together.

"Buffy's Birthday Prophecies?" Tara questioned. Briefly, Giles filled them in, reading the excerpts from the Metzynsk Tablets, the Compton Scrolls, the Tarquinia Fragment, and the entire text of what had been written by the Tibetan Buddhist Nun.

"Well, I don’t know about circles," Willow said of the Tarquinia Fragment. "Could it mean rings?"

"I suppose. Although I don't see how that would make a difference," Giles said.

"Because rings thrice blessed could mean rings that are exchanged as a promise, you know, the way wedding rings are blessed by a priest. This shield person may have to exchange rings with Buffy."

"You mean marry her?" Anya asked interestedly.

"Not a marriage in the usual sense," Giles said thoughtfully. "But a union of sorts, I suppose, the uniting of the Warrior and her Shield. And if a formal declaration is made, as it seems is required, the exchange of rings in token of that declaration could very well be a part of a ritual," Giles agreed. "And Buffy does wear a lot of rings."

"Yeah, but not blessed ones," Cordy pointed out.

"Perhaps the Shield will provide the blessed rings," Wesley mused, hunting for another volume, this one on mystic artifacts, such as rings. Before he uncovered it, Cordy asked another question.

"And what's all that stuff that gets traded?"

"Gets…? Oh, invincibility and immutability," Giles said as he took the book Wesley handed him. "Umm. Undefeatable and unchangeable. I haven't a clue what it means."

"You haven't?" Cordy asked in shock. "Hello? Only Slayer to make it to twenty-nine? Undefeatable, much? And Angel? Two hundred and fifty-some years after Darla put the bite on him and he hasn't aged a day? No change there!"

"Oh. Bloody. Hell," Rupert Giles said as rather a lot of things clicked into place at once. "Of course. The Slayer who lives to be thirty is supposed to take the fight against evil from our own dimension into the heart of Hell itself. But how could she do that if she were simply a mortal girl, er, woman? Invincibility immutability trading…And how could even an immortal vampire shield her against all the evils of the demon dimension if he were still vulnerable to sunlight, stake and holy water? Somehow, Buffy has to acquire Angel's unchanging nature, and he has to acquire her ability to win every combat."

"And then he has to vow to protect her against every evil she will ever face," Willow added, excited.

"Man, we are in deep, deep trouble," Xander offered. The others looked at him, puzzled. He couldn't believe they were being this obtuse. "Angel doesn't even want to see her, let alone vow to protect her. I'd say that something nasty figured the prophecy out before we did, and has been doing it's best to screw things up."

"Which means that the prophecy could go unfulfilled, and Buffy wouldn’t become a super weapon on her thirtieth birthday," Giles said grimly. "Instead, she would die, and the fight against evil would suffer a blow from which it might never recover."

"We've got to tell them," Willow said, frightened.

"And we've also got to figure out what's been keeping them apart," Cordy added. "Because the way things have been going between those two for the past ten years, I don't think they will believe this, even if we tell them."

Unfortunately, she was right.

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