The ritual was carried out in exacting detail. First he drew the chalk outlines, so carefully that he only marked an inch with every minute that passed. It took him five hours. Then the ululations, strange and ill-shaped words that didn't fit in his mouth, that made his throat feel like a gasoline engine turning over and revving up. He spoke those for two hours.
Finally, the animal sacrifice. He grasped the chicken, held it over the floor despite how it pecked and scratched at his arm, then drove the dagger into it, deep enough that the point almost hit him when it came out the other side. As the blood dribbled out, he ran it in concentric circles over the chalk ideogram, activating the countless minor spells of the ritual one by one.
At long last, it was finished. He could feel the power rising. He could feel the spell working.
He could feel himself growing hard.
***
Cordelia didn't know what the worst part of this 'patrol' bullshit was. She didn't have to stay shut up in the library with that creepy old perv Giles doing research, or hang out with Princess B-Cup in the mall after dark hunting that Monistat Demon or whatever it was.
But she had to walk through the cold, creepy cemetery at night, her hair getting all brittle and precious sleep-hours being removed from her skin, while Willow Rosenberg tagged along like some teacher's pet out to make sure no one was having any fun.
She probably didn't mind wasting her beauty sleep on trudging through a misty old graveyard. What was the worst that could happen to her looks? She'd already been born a ginger.
"So," Willow said, sounding less nervous than usual in talking to Cordelia. Great, Willow was getting used to being in conversation with her. Next thing you knew they'd be
bonding.
"How're things with Xander?"
"Besides the fact that he's the Dr. Kevorkian of ending my social life? Absolutely great, Wills. How're things with your Troll doll collection?"
"They're Cabbage Patch Dolls," Willow replied, more appropriately sullen. But she got a second wind. Must've been the rush of endorphins from all that running she did through Xander's friend zone. "Why do you act like you're not dating him? We've all seen you, y'know, dating him? Buffy walked in you after you'd been... dating him for a while."
Cordelia stopped, leaning against a gravestone and ignoring Willow's little yap of offense. "First off, Xander may've dated, I didn't. Not that I would've 'dated' if he stuck his whole fist inside me, but trust me, he's a long way from getting
anything
inside me and I'm a long way from 'dating' him. So think of us as friends with benefits, without the friends and with very few benefits where I'm concerned."
Willow swallowed her indignation over Cordelia profaning sacred ground. It was a cross-shaped headstone, after all. "That's what I mean. Why are you dating him, or not dating him, or almost dating him—"
"He wishes 'almost," Cordelia muttered.
Willow pressed on bravely: "If you don't even like him. Since I'm sure there are a lot of women who would love to date him if he'd love to date them too..."
"Not enough wine coolers in the world for 'almost'. He'd have to buy absinthe to get me almost dating him—" Cordelia condescended not to ignore Willow for a moment. "And who are these women that would love to date him? Can't be you, he's ever so slightly too masculine for a lesbian—"
"I'm not a lesbian."
"Are we talking about that praying mantis he tried to have sex with?"
"I had sex with Oz."
"Or that mummy he tried to have sex with?"
"Oz is pretty manly. He has body hair. Sideburns..."
"Hunh. I wonder if Xander thinks I'm a demon or something. Maybe he just has a fetish. That is so like him to have a fetish."
Willow shook off her own train of thought. "You didn't tell me why you're dating him."
"I don't know," Cordelia said off-handedly. "Guys like it when girls are in a relationship. Makes them feel like they're in a competition. Single girls are just pathetic." Cordelia glanced at Willow. "If I said no offense, would you believe me?"
"So you're just going to leave Xander as soon as some guy you really like comes... courting you!" Willow gasped.
"Like he's not gonna leave me as soon as some gargoyle hits on him," Cordelia replied bitterly.
"He wouldn't," Willow said. "He really likes you. And he's actually really sensitive, so if you're not, you know, really dating him, maybe you shouldn't? Because, uh, that should be a special thing, not just... a non-special type thing."
"You're right," Cordelia said. "He is really sensitive. And not much with the body hair. Maybe you should date him. Once I'm bored of him eating me out, of course."
"Wait, what?"
Cordelia took out her stake and mimed sucking it for a moment. "Geez, are you sure vampires come out of these graves? I think Buffy just comes up here to make out with Angel. She's totally goth under all those pastels, like her black roots under all that peroxide. You ever wonder if she's part Mexican?"
A vampire arrived before Willow could decide which should come first, telling Cordy that Buffy wasn't Mexican or telling her that it didn't matter whether or not she was the least bit Mexican.
This vampire was not one of the scavengers they might've hoped to take off the playing board in a war of attrition with the forces of darkness; an easy target who'd been preyed upon and had now turned, and would go after other easy targets in turn. Not doing much damage, but gathering up in numbers to serve this year's fall Big Bad, increasing vacuum cleaner sales throughout the region.
No, this was six foot five of nasty muscle, a future Angelus or Spike, the demon in him fitting to its twisted new body like it was a second skin.
Cordelia took one look at him and ran.
Willow took one look at him, considered whether she knew and could work any spells that would work better than a firm lecture, decided the firm lecture had a better chance of working than any spell she cared to attempt, and ran. She was a quick thinker. She started running almost as soon as Cordelia had.
The vampire bounded after them, face shifting instantly into a gnarled mask, long nails extending from its fingers to snatch at them. They clawed into Cordelia's minidress, snagging in it and tearing shreds from it, and Cordelia was so scared she couldn't even much care that a crime against fashion was being committed between her shoulder blades.
Willow had outpaced her—who would've guessed the little redhead would know more about running except that it was what men did in the other direction?—and was at a crypt, throwing the door open, hurling herself inside right ahead of Cordelia. And Cordelia was right behind her, only the vampire's nails sunk into her dress
again,
this time getting a solid grip. Cordelia threw herself forward regardless, trying to unbalance the vampire like she was deliberately fucking up a cheer routine.
Cordelia wasn't a bulimic like some of the girls on the cheer team, cough, Harmony, cough cough. She had meat on her bones, as Xander put it; her brain stubbornly refused to come up with better phrasing. The point was, she might've been tall and leggy, but she had some voluptuousness on her. Full breasts, womanly hips. If it were Harmony, or a midget like Willow, the tug of war with the vampire would've ended with her being yanked back out into the night and getting used as a human scratching post.
But, since she was Cordelia, her routines required exquisite muscles, and she ate both well and healthily: when she threw herself forward, her weight overcame the force the vampire exerted pulling her back, at least long enough for the material of her dress to
fail
to overcome that force. It ripped right off her, she hurled into the crypt, and Willow slammed the doors shut in the vampire's face.
