Trickster´s Treat Sequel –
Janus´ Shadow 12
Xander felt hands slide up his back, scratching lightly so that he could feel his skin come alive by inches.
"I´ll make ya forget, mate," Spike promised in a low whisper as Xander backed him to the bed. That made Xander pause. Now Spike´s mouth nipped at Xander´s bare neck in supplication, and an electrical charge ran through Xander´s body, triggering both lust and a frustration that slowly grew out of Spike´s assumption that he needed distracting. Of course, he did need distracting, but that didn´t matter as much as Spike assuming that he did.
Xander stepped back away from Spike, his hands wrapped around Spike´s upper arms to keep him in place.
"I don´t need you to help me forget, childe," Xander warned, and Spike´s hip, which had canted out at a salacious angle, slowly straightened so that Spike stood up, his head lowered a little in a look Xander had learned to associate with confusion. Xander ran his hand over the fabric of Spike´s shirt. The silk flowed under his fingers, cool and smooth, and he slowly popped one button after other open to reveal the strong chest below.
"I´m not so weak as to fall apart," Xander said as he popped open the last button and pushed the fabric open. He wasn´t sure he believed it, but he said it.
"Never said––"
"Hush, my hellcat. You do get yourself in trouble with that mouth of yours. We´ll have to find something to keep it busy," Xander ran his thumb over Spike´s lower lip, and vampiric ridges pushed to the surface, skin stretching over inhuman angles. "Strip," Xander ordered, and Spike quickly popped the button of his jeans open, the slide of a zipper filling the silent room as Xander walked to the weapons rack tucked behind the bed.
So many days he´d wandered the demon bazaar choosing one item after another, dreaming of what he could do. Now as Spike moved to obey his orders, Xander pushed away everything except the power that settled around him as he searched through chains and scabbards in his quest for the long straight board near the back of the triangle shaped space. The plank, with its heavy bolts on either end, had mage charms that made it damn near unbreakable. Xander pulled it free and turned to find Spike leaning against one of the bed poles.
"What now?" Spike asked, his cock already half full and hanging heavily. Xander didn´t answer, but walked to his childe and grabbed the back of his neck, claiming Spike´s mouth in a heated kiss. When Xander pulled back, Spike was more than half hard and taking small panting breaths.
"My hellcat does know silence," Xander observed as he walked to the empty center of the room and dropped the board to the concrete with a dull ringing sound. "On the floor," Xander ordered as he turned back to the racks on either side of his bed to find the right type of shackles. He wanted something Spike would feel if he tried to fight. He finally chose iron chains with no padding.
When he turned around, Spike sat near the charmed wood plank, leaning against one knee while his other leg bent up so that Xander could only see a hint of cock. Xander stopped to just look at his strong childe: long muscles curved into each other, yellow eyes watched attentively, slim fingers twisted and tapped in constant motion.
"Plannin´ on doing somethin´ then?" Spike finally asked, stretching so that his full cock bounced a bit and his head fell back against one shoulder. Xander could almost feel his own inner vampire struggling to drop fangs. He could practically taste his childe´s blood in his mouth: salt and strength and fury and iron. That taste had faded in the years since the spell, but now Xander could feel the thick substance in his mouth and sliding down his throat, the memory of it made him long to claim, to take, to own.
"Lay down," Xander ordered curtly as he walked over and knelt next to Spike, arranging the plank. Spike gave a dirty leer and lay back, spreading his arms so they lay on the board. In a silence broken only by the rattle of chains, Xander quickly chained each of Spike´s wrists to the metal bolts in the ends of the board. When he stood up, he could hear wood groan as Spike tested his bonds.
"Mage charmed. Fight all you vant, my hellcat, you vill go nowhere," Xander promised as he went for more supplies. Chains rattled and wood groaned. Xander smiled.
"Not plannin´ on going anywhere," Spike finally answered.
"And again vith the mouth. You are not good at silence, are you my hellcat?" Xander asked as he returned with various supplies tucked in a bag where Spike couldn´t easily see them. "Surely I can find a better use for it."
Xander straddled Spike and then slowly opened his jeans and pulled himself out. He moaned as he stroked himself slowly, his fingers tracing the vein on the underside of his cock. Spike moaned too. Slowly, Xander knelt so that he crouched over Spike´s head, his cock dangling out of his jeans. He shifted forward so that his cock barely touched Spike´s chin, and then he leaned back on his heels and watched Spike´s hands flutter closed and the muscles in his arms and shoulders bulge as he strained against the restraints.
"Vant something?" Xander asked, amused. Spike glared up at him, his sexy smirk replaced with one of frustration.
"Not ´specially," Spike said as he pulled his mouth into a tight pucker and looked up. Xander laughed.
"My hellcat." Xander ran the back of his fingers down the side of Spike´s face before bracing his hands on the concrete and bringing his cock to Spike´s mouth. As he expected, Spike opened. Lips sealed around the head, and Spike started sucking. When a tongue pressed into the slit, Xander nearly came. Instead he closed his eyes and panted as he struggled to regain control.
When he opened his eyes again, he found Spike´s head tilted back a little as Spike looked up toward him. Xander´s cock still within his sucking mouth made his cheeks swell, but even so, Xander swore that Spike smirked even with the cock in his mouth. "Cocky little bastard," Xander whispered, and the suction on his cock increased as another inch disappeared into Spike´s mouth. Now Spike´s cheeks bulged out and Xander closed his eyes before the sight made him lose control.
Xander couldn´t wait any longer. He pulled his hips up so that his cock came out of Spike´s mouth, precum staining Spike´s lips as the vampire tried to hold his treat. Then Xander thrust down. The edge of a tooth slid the length of his cock, tracing a line of fire, and Xander growled his need as he pulled a back and thrust again, and again. Below him, Spike could only writhe, his own arms spread wide and useless as Xander used him. Finally, Xander felt the pressure explode down his spine as he stiffened and came.
Spike noisily sucked under him, and Xander trembled. Then he collapsed, throwing most of his weight to one side where he lay crushing Spike´s arm with his hip. Spike´s head turned so that he could keep sucking at the limp cock. Xander wanted to push Spike away from the overly sensitive skin that burned and ached with each touch, but he couldn´t come up with the strength to protest as he lay with his naked chest pressed against the cold concrete.
Long minutes, Xander floated even as the concrete crushed his hip and Spike´s teasing made him shift uncomfortable with a painful heat that seemed to circle his hips. Eventually Xander´s hand fumbled its way to Spike, gently pulling the cock free from greedy lips.
"Taste bloody good," Spike commented smugly, and Xander could hear his childe´s arrogance at making his sire come so quickly. With a struggle, Xander pushed himself up onto his knees and tucked himself back in.
"Greedy childe," Xander accused him as he trailed fingers up Spike´s stomach to a nipple. "How much control do you have?" he asked curiously. He knew he had very little control around Spike, but then he could always claim the weakness of a teenage body that seemed entirely too eager.
"You´re a Master Vampire in your own right, even if you are my childe, so how much control can you claim?" Xander rolled a nipple between his thumb and finger, watching as Spike threw back his head and twisted his body as much as he could with his arms stretched. Again, the sight of that exposed neck made Xander flash on the memory of strong blood filling his mouth.
"I think we´ll find out," Xander said as he shifted to one side of Spike and pulled his bag to his side. From out of the black sack, he pulled two red candles: fat pillars of wax with thick wicks. "Spread your legs," Xander ordered with a tap on Spike´s knee. Without hesitation, Spike spread his legs, his full cock now resting on his stomach as he exposed himself.
Xander put a candle on the inside of each of Spike´s thighs so that Spike couldn´t close his legs without knocking over the candle. Spike watched suspiciously as Xander pulled out a match and ran it across the side of the box. Fire flashed and a bitter odor filled the air.
"Best be careful or you just might get burned," Xander warned as he lit the two candles. Xander could see Spike tense at the presence of fire. The way the light flickered and reached for dead flesh sent fear rippling through the vampire memories, and Xander could see that same fear reflected in every line of Spike´s body. The thigh muscles strained away from the flame, and Xander took a moment to stroke the stiff leg.
"Have you done anything to warrant fearing me?" Xander asked quietly. Spike´s eyes bobbed between Xander and the flickers so close to his flesh. Xander waited. Many vampires, Nusa included, would fill a room with candles to prove their control, but the demon never stopped flinching. Spike´s gaze eventually settled on Xander.
"Don´t think so," he finally admitted carefully. Xander stoked the tense thigh under his hand. Some days he wanted to dismantle the entire Aurelius clan. He allowed his fingers to simply trace invisible lines as Spike slowly relaxed.
"I am not Darla. I won´t turn on you without cause," Xander said quietly. "I staked my own childe for abandoning my Nusa and leaving her to die when I ordered him to her side, but short of betrayal, I will never destroy you," he promised. The leg relaxed more, but Spike´s eyes continually returned to the flame now sending islands of heat across his ankles. Xander passed his own hand over the flame, and felt his skin crinkle before he took it out and sucked the slightly burnt finger into his mouth.
"Hurt you a little maybe, but not maim or destroy you," Xander added after he popped the finger out of his mouth.
Reaching into the bag again, Xander pulled out a small bowl and vial. As soon as he uncorked the bottle and started pouring, the strong smell of alcohol drifted out into the room. "Wait here," Xander said with a slap to Spike´s hip before he got up and went to the kitchen. When he returned with a bowl of ice water and a foot long wooden match, Spike was straining at the board and breathing loudly. Such a strange habit for a vampire.
Ignoring all that, Xander took a square of cloth from the bag and draped it over the edge of the bowl so that the fabric soaked up alcohol as he arranged himself with all his tools in hand. Slowly, he lifted the alcohol–soaked fabric and traced a circle on Spike´s stomach, and now that stomach rose and fell in staccato breaths. Xander stuck the phosphorus head of the match into one of the pillar candles, and the match flared to life. Spike jerked.
One of the candles rocked as Spike´s ankle tapped it, and Xander sat with the match in hand, watching as the candle steadied. Only then did he bring the match to Spike´s stomach. The slight pause allowed most of the alcohol to dry, so only a faint blue glow chased around the flammable circle. Spike hissed his breath in through clenched teeth, and a few faint hairs curled and withered with a bitter scent. Even though Xander was prepared to catch the candles as Spike fought, the vampire´s legs remained steady and the pillar candles continued to burn.
"My beautiful hellcat," Xander murmured as he ran a thumb over the fire´s trail. He could still feel a faint trace of heat remaining. He picked up the alcohol soaked fabric again and traced a squiggle line from between the nipples down to the belly button. The match had died, and Xander put the wood end into the candle flame again, and this time he touched the alcohol´s path much more quickly.
The flame leapt across Spike´s body in an impressive line, gathering speed until it reached the belly button where the pool of alcohol fed a blue flare rising inches from Spike´s body. With his hand, Xander wiped the flame from Spike before it could burn him more seriously. One of Spike´s heels rose and then hit the concrete in an almost spastic jerk before his knees locked.
Xander picked a floating ice cube out of the white, plastic bowl and traced the line down Spike´s chest. When he reached the belly button, he swirled it around the smooth flesh before reaching down to suck the water back out of Spike´s navel. Using his tongue, he explored the curve of Spike´s stomach and the line where soft skin turned to the slick of the burn. Spike hissed again, and even though every hiss sounded pretty much the same, this time Xander could feel Spike struggle to control himself through the pleasure.
Backing off a little, Xander blew across the damp skin and watched Spike´s skin rise in a mountain range of bumps. Xander could feel Spike´s cock twitch and brush his cheek as he explored the width of Spike´s belly with his mouth. He used his tongue to retrace the fire´s path north until he finally ended up between Spike´s nipples. Then he lifted his head and looked Spike in the eye before leaning over and biting a nipple hard enough to taste a hint of Spike´s blood.
The body below him arched off the concrete, and Xander quickly glanced toward his hellcat´s feet, but Spike´s legs remained open and didn´t even touch the candles.
"Such control," Xander praised as sat up. The body which had tightened into a coil relaxed at that word of praise. Muscles that had stood out in sharp cords melted back under the skin.
Xander picked up the alcohol soaked cloth again. Spike´s vampire ridges fell away so that blue eyes watched, the demon controlled and caged within. As reward, Xander pressed his thumb into the head of Spike´s cock. The game face hovered just under the surface making Spike´s face shimmer and then it sank back down under the human features. Xander slowly trailed the long, wooden match above Spike´s body just close enough for the vampire to feel the heat as small bits of ash dropped onto the pale skin.
"Truly a Master Vampire. Can you feel panic clawing at you like a hungry animal?" Xander asked curiously. Spike didn´t answer, but his eyes fell closed in a show of trust that made Xander want to rip into Spike´s throat and then offer his own in return. Since that couldn´t happen, he picked up the alcohol–soaked cloth again.
Xander traced a swirling pattern on Spike´s chest and almost immediately touched the match to the wet trail. The fire raced along Spike´s body, reducing a few thin hairs to ash curls and glowing brightly. Xander watched the blue heat devour the alcohol and turn the skin red. Then he drew his hand through the flame, pushing it out of existence. With his hand on Spike´s chest, Xander felt the hot flesh and the rapid movement as Spike gasped broken breaths. A foot bumped one candle, and Xander watched as hot wax splattered onto Spike´s ankle. Immediately, Spike threw his head back and arched his neck out invitingly.
Since Xander couldn´t effectively bite his childe into submission, he did the next best thing. He dropped down and sucked Spike´s cock into his mouth. Spike growled a long string of syllables without actually forming a word, and the board under his arms creaked loudly as Spike´s whole body convulsed. One foot kicked so hard that a red candle flew across the room and slammed into the wall between the living room and the kitchen, scattering drops of red wax in a fan shape across the concrete.
Xander abandoned Spike´s cock and snatched the second candle before it could follow. Blowing out the flame, he then concentrated on the feel of Spike´s cock against his tongue, filling his mouth as he tried to hold down a thrashing vampire. Spike thrust wildly upward into Xander´s mouth only to have Xander pull back so that he always had just the head in his mouth. Reaching down, Xander grabbed a tight curl and yanked firmly. Spike made a strangled sound, and thrust even higher, his heels braced against the concrete and his back arched.
Xander took more of the cock into his mouth and wrapped a hand around the base of it, squeezing as Spike thrust up once more and then started coming. With heavy spasms shuddering through him, Spike spurted several times and then collapsed back to the concrete, his mouth sagging open as he breathed heavily. Xander wiped the back of his hand over his mouth and chuckled.
"So much for having more control than me," Xander said, fully expected a smart–ass reply. Instead Spike lay silent and possibly boneless, even his hands motionless in their shackles. Xander stroked the vampire´s side, tracing the outlines of the runes which had lost their blackened edges. "Nusa used to play this game when I was young," Xander said as he shifted around so he could lay next to Spike. He wished they were in the bed, but fire and bedding hadn´t seemed very mixy.
"Lucky you," Spike finally answered after several minutes.
"I vas," Xander agreed. "I played with Jalon, but he never could control the demon. He never lost his demon´s face when I played with him."
"He the one you staked?" Spike asked, but Xander couldn´t hear any suspicion or wariness, just curiosity.
"Igen," Xander agreed.
"He didn´t soddin´ deserve ya," Spike complained without energy.
"I don´t know about that." Xander pulled the shackle key from his pocket and reached up to Spike´s wrists. Reaching over to unlock the far wrist, Xander caught a strange expression on Spike´s face.
"He bloody well shouldn´t have turned on ya. If you ordered him to Nusa´s side, it was his place to turn to soddin´ dust before he left it."
"But he didn´t, did he?" Xander pointed out. "Should does not matter. In our world, the only law is to be strongest, and I wasn´t. My childe feared others more than me, and my sire died for it." Xander finished unlocking the second shackle and then sat up and crossed legs as he played with the silver key.
"Not your fault." Spike pulled himself up so that he sat facing Xander, who only made a short derisive bark of laughter. "Bloody hell, Peaches staked his own sire and still explained it away."
"Nusa died, and I sat in the shadows watching," Xander said as he turned the key to catch the glints of light from the track lighting in the kitchen.
"You watched?" Spike said, his voice growing loud.
"She ordered me to not let Dracula see me; she didn´t order me away, and I wouldn´t leave her. I thought..." Xander stopped and swallowed. "I thought Dracula would punish her for defying him. I thought he´d hurt her and then accept her back like a thousand times before. I wanted to be there."
"But he dusted her," Spike finished.
"He let his other brides do it for him, and I stood by helpless." Xander could feel his chest ache with loss. "I failed."
"Seems like you followed orders."
"I failed. I failed my sire, I failed Jalon, I failed Buffy," Xander whispered the last part. "I failed Giles."
"You bloody saved the world; think that puts you right with the slayer and the watcher."
"I killed someone. Think that puts me wrong." Xander looked up at the ceiling for a second as he pushed back the tears that threatened.
"Not like I can talk on right and wrong, here," Spike reached out, resting a hand on the wrist that twisted the key right and left. Xander looked at his childe, "but I don´t see the wrong in defending what´s yours."
"Yeah, vampire logic. Slayers aren´t big with the vampire logic," Xander dropped the key. "And hey, I´m fucking up with you right now. You need a strong sire, and here I am telling you what a fuck up I am." Xander shoved Spike´s hand away and stood up. For a second, the world tilted around him, and he stumbled back only to find Spike´s hands at his waist.
"I may be your childe, but I´m a Master Vampire in my own right. Not goin´ to confuse grievin´ with weakness." Spike´s hands pulled at him. Xander fought the embrace, but the hands that held him were too strong, and he could feel a rage at his own weakness rise in his chest. He´d never really been fond of himself, but Xander really resented the fact that he hated himself.
"It is weak," Xander said as he pushed at the arms holding him.
"It´s bloody human," Spike corrected him.
"Yeah, you see, human. I´m human; you´re vampire. And never the twain shall meet." At Xander´s words, Spike´s arms tightened until Xander found himself crushed to Spike´s chest.
"Wot? You sayin´ you want me out?"
"What? Shit! NO! Okay, that did actually kinda sound like that, didn´t it?" Xander struggled to turn and look at Spike, but the arms around his waist held him so tightly that he could only look over on shoulder. Yeah, he obviously wasn´t tracking well, and now Xander´s guilt at screwing Spike up equaled his frustration at himself for not being strong enough to physically overpower Spike. And really that was just stupid since he could order Spike to let him go, but Xander had decided that his vampire brain had a few logic holes.
"The brain got sucked out somewhere over there," he tried joking, but Spike just tilted his head again.
"Not lettin´ you go," Spike finally answered.
"You see, you should want to. I don´t want you getting the fuzzy, dirty, linty end of the lollipop again, and you should run like hell. Wait, you did try running like hell," Xander corrected himself. "If I was a decent sire, I should let you run. If you stay, I´m going to fuck up and do something that gets you dusted, and I´m terrified because I don´t know what I´m doing." Xander stopped. "God, can we just stop talking before Oprah comes out of some closet with a camera crew and starts asking about our childhoods?" Xander pushed away again, and this time Spike´s arms released him.
"Our childhoods?" Spike echoed.
"A bit complicated in my case what with the whole son of a Duke who I disappointed by growing up to eat him instead of taking over the castle as was traditionally expected. Of course, I could go with door number two where I just told Tony Harris what he could do with certain pieces of his anatomy and offered to make a demonstration if necessary. Yeah, let´s not talk family," Xander finished as he sat on the end of the bed. "See, nice pattern of failure there."
"Failure?"
"Yeah, like when Giles thinks I´m a good guy and I–" Xander stopped again and blew air out his mouth as he tried to get that emotion back into the ´yes, it happened but we will never speak of it again´ box. It was a pretty damn big box, but not quite big enough. Xander felt his chest tighten.
"You´re strong enough to do what ya need to," Spike said carefully as he walked over, stopping right in front of Xander.
"And now I´m confusing the hell out of you with the irrational crying over things I can´t change."
"Not like I haven´t been there." Spike sat on the bed, making the whole mattress tilt.
"I can´t–" Xander stopped since he had no ending for that sentence. He remembered the shock on the soldier´s face as he slid across the hood. Xander felt tears start. "Can we just have sex again because the whole talking about our feelings... I can feel myself turning into a woman." Xander took a deep, staggering breath as he tried to stop the tears.
"Won´t find me turning down a good shag," Spike agreed.
They sat on the bed in silence, and Xander stared at his hands. A small brass clock on his desk make a clicking beat, and Xander moved his stare to the concrete floor as he traced the tiny cracks. Spike shifted on the bed. Xander sighed.
"God, I´m losing my mind," Xander whispered to the air.
"Bloody hell, pet, not like I haven´t been there, too."
Xander felt a strong arm curl around his shoulder, and he allowed himself the weakness of leaning into that strength. Then Spike used inhuman strength to pull both of them up and onto the bed where he curled around Xander. Arms and legs and thighs pressed into Xander, and fingers made dents in his skin. Xander settled his head on Spike´s shoulder.
"I shouldn´t. You need–" Words failed.
"Shhh," Spike crooned. "Dru used ta cry about her mum and her da all the time. Get to cryin´ until she forgot what she was and tried ta go spinnin´ into the sunlight. ´Course, that´s not the best example of it bein´ okay seein´ as how her grief made her a bit off her rocker."
Xander hiccupped as he lay in Spike´s arms, the grief so overwhelming that for one blissful moment he felt nothing before he could feel the pain settle around him. The image of the soldier rolling off his hood played in his head over and over. Spike´s arms held him closer, and he could feel Spike´s.... Xander considered what to call it. Despite what Angel and Giles had always said, he still thought he could feel Spike´s love.
"I near crawled in a bottle and died after that soddin´ spell ended," Spike said softly. "Felt so bloody alone with Dru nattering on about ´Daddy´ and the minions not havin´ a brain among ´em. Woulda cried ´cept one of the minions would have taken it as an invite to stake me."
"God, I´m sorry." The first true sobs escaped Xander as he considered how badly he´d failed, both as a White Knight and as a sire.
"Don´t be. I was so bloody angry, I would have broken your neck if ya tried to keep me. And at the mansion... I wanted to bloody rip you apart. You reminded me of what I´d lost when Peaches went and got the soul. You reminded me and then ya went and got a soul of your own." Spike sighed and went silent for a moment.
"And then I saw ya standing there refusing to be humiliated even by Angelus. Ya smelled of fear and death, and you had the great wanker´s scent all over ya from where he´d pawed at ya, but you stood there and made a play to save the world. And when I touched ya, you still wanted me. Could smell it even under the fear." Spike´s hand slid up Xander´s back, fingers following the line of the backbone up to the neck as his other hand worked the button and zipper of the jeans. Xander lay there and let tears run down his face for the soldier and for Spike and for himself and what he suffered that night after Angelus took him back from Spike.
"I don´t know what to do," Xander admitted, a small part of him growling at the admission. He could feel a coldness settle into his bones, like ocean water stealing the heat of his body on a November night.
"Just let yourself grieve, and I´ll take care of ya. Later, we can go to dinner and devil the slayer into givin´ herself a stroke," Spike said, and strong hands pushed at the jeans until they lay together, naked limbs tangled. Xander lay in Spike´s arms as the vampire started rocking. A dam broke and now the sobs came one after another, making his whole body heave. Spike´s fingers dug into his skin and held him together as he cried.
