“When I was a kid,” Willow said suddenly, “we went on vacation in Maine. Remember, Xander? With my aunt and uncle? I got up one morning to watch the sun rise over the ocean.”
“Was it pretty?” Oz asked.
“It was weird. Something not right about the sun coming up over the water, instead of setting on it. Like everything was turned around in the wrong direction.”
Oz gave her a swift kiss of reassurance, then another, more lingering, just for the heck of it. The three of them were sitting on the rocks where she had found Ariel, watching the no longer utterly dark sky.
Giles had sent them all home to rest, taking Ariel back to his apartment with him. Oz, Xander, and Willow all ended up at Buffy’s house instead of their own, without any real discussion about it. They had meant to shack out there, sort of a group relaxation program, but they had all been too fidgety to actually get any real rest.
Finally, Buffy had called Giles, who seemed relieved as well to get things moving again.
So here they were, outside at dark, in a place where both merrows and vampires were known to frequent.
“Is it just me,” Xander said suddenly, “or does this place give everyone else the creeps?”
“A little,” Oz agreed.
“No!” Willow said. “Well. A little.”
It was the dark, that was all. Dark, and knowing vampires were on the prowl . . . But in about an hour, maybe forty-five minutes, there’d be a gorgeous, vamp-killing sunrise behind them. Or at least there would if the clouds ever got out of the way. Willow cast a last worried look at the sky, then shrugged. If you spent every second of your life worrying about vampires, you wouldn’t be able to function at all. And right now, they had something else to do. Other monsters to worry about.
“Hey.”
All three of them jumped a little.
“Oh,” Willow said. “Hey Angel.”
“Everything going all right?” the vampire asked.
“Yeah,” Xander muttered. “Just waiting for Buffy and Giles to finish doing . . . whatever it is they’re doing.”
Angel looked toward the water, where the Watcher and Slayer were talking, and nodded. “Stay alert,” he warned. “I found a couple of merrows torn up, a couple of miles away. Might be nothing, but . . .”
“He’s another one who’s always comforting,” Xander said as Angel went down the beach to join Buffy and Giles. “Why doesn’t anyone ever give us happy news?”
“Because we live on a Hellmouth?” Oz asked.
“Good point.”
Ariel had been curled up at Willow’s feet all this time, snoring softly, a cute little burbling noise. Not even Angel’s sudden appearance had been enough to wake her.
The selkie had been pretty well traumatized by the fight the night before, instinctively recognizing the merrows for what they were and knowing that she had been in danger of being eaten. But when Willow had finally managed to coax her into letting go of the death grip Ariel had had on the redhead’s sweater, the selkie had gone out like a light. Nervous exhaustion, Giles had called it.
And he’d been right: Ariel had woken a few hours later, revived and ready to go. And this morning, it was like the fight had never happened. Animals were like that, living in the moment and not dwelling on stuff that scared them. Willow frowned. But Ariel wasn’t an animal. Was she?
When you lived on the Hellmouth, that was a pretty valid question. Was Angel a person? Willow didn’t have to think about it. Demon or no, Angel was a person, not a “creature.” It had to do with caring, she supposed, and with being aware of what you did and how it affected other people. . . .
Ariel is a person, Willow told herself firmly. A kid-person, but people. More important, she was a friend.
When they’d first gotten Ariel out of Giles’s car, she’d started running straight for the ocean, then stopped on her own, sniffed in the ocean’s direction, and tugged at her sealskin with a pitiful sadness in her eyes that had made Buffy get down and give her an impromptu hug.
Willow smiled a little at the memory. “Even Buffy’s gonna miss her,” she said softly. Oz, picking up on her mood, gave her a hug.
“It’s good, Ariel’s going home.”
Willow leaned into the hug for a moment. “I know. I just . . . never had a little sister. Everyone’s always been bigger than me.”
“I’m not.”
Willow giggled at that, and Ariel woke up with a squeaking noise, stretching a little, then turning to look up at the two humans.
“Hey there. Almost ready?” Willow asked her. The selkie must have guessed what she’d said from her tone, because Ariel nodded eagerly, looking down at the waterline.
The water was still blue-black, but now you could see the waves breaking with tiny white foam on the beach. In water that color, it was easy to imagine something lurking below the surface, waiting to drag you in.
“Between merrows and the swim team, I think I won’t take up surfing,” Xander decided.
“Good choice,” Oz agreed.
Giles, Angel, and Buffy were walking down the length of sand, discussing something that involved a great deal of arm waving on the Slayer’s part. She was dressed for the occasion in white shorts, sneakers, and a spandex sports top. Willow looked down at her own denim shorts, and felt a momentary, and very familiar resignation.
They’re not much, as legs go—too pale, too short, and not exactly what you’d call coordinated, but they’re mine. And Oz likes ’em.
Xander had arrived wearing a tee shirt, and swim trunks so astonishingly plaid, nobody could find a comment suitable for them. Oz, on the other hand, stuck to an old pair of jeans and a faded flannel shirt, the sleeves rolled up.
Even Giles had made some small concession to the risk of getting damp, wearing a stiff pair of jeans ironed to a crease and a gray sweater that had definitely seen better days. But his shoes really weren’t suited for walking on wet sand.
“You can take the man out of the tweed, but you can’t take the tweed out of the man,” Xander said, following her gaze.
“Can’t imagine Giles in shorts,” Oz said.
Xander shuddered. “Please, my trauma plate is already full, thank you.”
“Dul abhaite anois?” Ariel asked plaintively.
Willow looked down at the selkie, who was now tugging at her shorts. “Yeah, you’ll be going home soon. I hope.”
Ariel made a contented sound and settled down again to wait, secure in the knowledge that these humans would be able to help her.
This had better work, Willow thought, her stomach turning butterflies at the idea of another failure. Is this what it’s like to be a parent? I’m not ready for parenting . . .
“You’re freaking, Will,” Xander said.
“I am? How can you tell?”
Xander shrugged. “How many years have I watched you freak over stuff?” he asked rhetorically. “Stop worrying. You know what you’re doing.”
“Yes, but . . .” She stopped. “No buts. No freaking. I’m calm. I’m capable. I’m . . . Wonder Wiccan!”
Both Oz and Xander grinned. But Ariel suddenly shot to her feet, craning her head to see better. She’d spotted something out in the waves.
“Anois dul?”
Xander winced at the shrill tone. “Geez, Ariel, down a notch, okay? We know you want to get home. Boy, do we ever!”
“Soon, Ariel,” Willow said, soothingly. “Soon. Promise.”
“Looks like you’re on,” Oz said, offering her a hand up off the rocks.
Sure enough, Giles was waving at Willow, indicating that she should join them. Taking Ariel by the hand, she left Oz and Xander and walked down to the water’s edge. The selkie pulled at her, trying to get her to see whatever it was she had seen.
“I think that we should get started as soon as possible,” Giles said. “Ariel’s kin are more likely to be nearby at this hour, early morning or twilight being traditional times for magical beings, as well as better feeding times—” Catching a glimpse of Buffy’s expression, he added hastily, “The longer we wait, the farther she will have to go to find them again.”
“Oh. Oh. I hadn’t thought of that before. You don’t think she’ll have any trouble getting back to them, do you?”
“She knows where she is,” Buffy reassured Willow. “It’ll be like walking home from school. Really. Right, Giles?”
“It should be, yes. Assuming—” He looked at Willow’s face, and changed his words midsentence. “Assuming that we are able to get her back into her skin properly.”
“Okay,” Buffy said, “obvious stuff here: We aren’t going to get it done unless we start.”
A flicker of amusement crossed Giles’s face. “Excellent point. Willow, this time we have more room, so we don’t have to abridge the preliminaries.”
“A circle! Right! We can draw a ritual circle about us first. You know,” Willow added to Buffy, “hold the good stuff in, keep the bad stuff out—well, I’m simplifying, but—”
“Uh-huh,” Buffy said. “Easy on the Giles-speak, we got it. Oz and Xander watch the road, Angel and I cover the shoreline, you guys do your stuff, and we get Ariel re-skinned, and on her way home.”
* * *
Dr. Julian Lee pushed open the library doors cautiously, a plastic-coated field journal in one hand. He didn’t feel right about this—it was uncomfortably close to breaking and entering.
But the school is a public building, he reminded himself yet again. As a law-abiding citizen, I have every right to be here.
But not at . . . a quick glance at his watch . . . 4:39 A.M., a small voice chided him. Not when you fully intend to riffle through someone’s personal belongings.
That the blond girl had been trying to keep him from the small office had been painfully obvious. He hadn’t wanted to push it, hadn’t known how to get around all of them. But he had to know what they were hiding. Had to find some clue, some piece of evidence that would lead him to the selkie, before more damage was done.
They would understand, once he explained it all to them. They wouldn’t be grateful—no one ever was, to have their trust abused, their heart broken—but they’d understand.
“Or not,” he said to himself, his voice a harsh whisper in the dead air of the library. He wasn’t sure he cared, anymore. The image of Sean’s mangled body forced itself back into his mind. If he hadn’t been killed by a selkie, then the selkies had definitely led whoever did ashore. They were all dangerous.
Stepping more confidently across the library, he opened the office door and went inside.
* * *
An hour later, Lee straightened, stifling a frustrated groan. Books, papers, pamphlets—and nothing he could use! Yes, there were a fair number of books on oceanic research lying unshelved, but those could just as easily be left over from some school project on marine ecology. He didn’t want to admit defeat, but another glance at his watch . . . 5 A.M. . . .no, he didn’t dare stay here much longer.
Wait. Something under that table . . . a crumpled scrap of paper . . .
Lee scooped it up, heart racing. Too much to hope, and yet . . .
He frowned over the scrawled handwriting. Directions, a familiar sounding street name . . . And then Dr. Lee let out a hiss of disbelief.
“The idiots! The utter, utter idiots!” Lee cried, and ran for the library door.
* * *
Cordelia paused in front of the library door. This was ridiculous. Giles had seemed pretty sure that those merrow-things wouldn’t show up anywhere there were a lot of people, something Sunnydale High on a Sunday absolutely did not qualify as. In other words, it was seriously unsafe in the school building—what was she doing here? She should be home, getting the essential sleep she needed to keep her complexion at its prime.
And it’s not as if they asked me along. Not that I would have gone, anyway.
But . . . well . . . that kid, the seal-girl, whatever she was, really was cute. And it was kind of sad to think of her stuck here.
Among all those losers.
Right. Besides, the last thing this town needed was another supernatural creature taking up permanent residence.
All right, she was here, she’d check. She wasn’t going to risk her neck on the beach, but it wouldn’t hurt to maybe mind the front office for them. Maybe see if Angel had anything to report, or some weird fax appeared on Giles’s desk, telling them the crisis was over, all merrows being recalled to wherever it is they came from.
And besides, if any more of those merrows showed up, she wanted to be where the weapons were.
And maybe they’ve found a way to ward them off, like shark repellent, or something. God, I hope it doesn’t clash with my perfume!
Decided, Cordy started forward—and the library door flew open, nearly hitting her. A man stormed out.
“Dr. Lee! What are you—”
“Where are they?”
Cordelia blinked. “I beg your pardon?”
“Don’t play stupid; you’re not. Your friends! The selkie!” He grabbed her by the shoulders. “Don’t you see? Your friends are in terrible danger!”
Cordy pulled free, smoothing the line of her linen top. “What do you mean, danger?” Omigod, he knows about the merrows! No, there’s no way he could— “Oh,” she said in her most “beyond bored” tone. “Is this all about Ariel again? Because Buffy can hold her own against some kid. Trust me on this.”
But she was talking to empty air. Dr. Lee was already storming off at a determined clip, obviously looking for someone else to harass into giving answers.
“Oh, great. If he starts blabbing to everyone . . .”
Cordelia followed, not certain what she would do to stop him, anyway, and watched the man run smack into the two old guys who mopped up the floors and gunk like that. What are they doing here on a Sunday morning? Right, getting paid. Okay, what am I doing here on a Sunday morning?
Worrying. Like it or not.
Dr. Lee backed away from the water that had sloshed over one of the pails, and asked them something, his posture seriously intimidating. She caught up with them just in time to hear the guy with some hair left say, seriously defensive, “I don’t know what they were doing this time!”
His partner snarled, “Yeah, just once I wish they’d clean up their own mess. I mean, green slime is one thing, but that smell! They call, we come, but the union’d better do something about the conditions here, or we’re going to have a walkout.”
None of which seemed to satisfy Dr. Lee, who muttered a terse thank you and strode off, Cordelia following on his heels.
“Okay, hang on a second!” she said, finally reaching the end of her patience. If this guy was going to run around, probably make her miss her hair appointment this afternoon, which would take absolutely forever to reschedule, he had better start giving up some information, like now. “How, exactly, is Ariel a threat? ’Cause, right now, you’re the one who’s acting like Looney Tunes Guy. Give me a good reason I shouldn’t call the nice men with the white coats and butterfly nets on you!”
Lee stared at her, his eyes weirdly blank, like he was totally inside his own head, and not processing what was in front of him.
“The beach,” he snapped. “That’s where those idiots have gone! Don’t they realize the danger’s greater closer to their element? Sean learned that, too late, and they—they could be torn apart like him, discarded—”
He brushed past her, heading for the main door.
Great. And you just know they’re going to blame me if he shows up and ruins everything . . .
Irritated beyond belief, Cordelia went after him.
* * *
Buffy dug her heels more firmly into the sand, and watched a small greenish brown crab scuttle along the beach. Guard duty, when there wasn’t something actively rushing you, was kind of peaceful, in a boring, rather-be-elsewhere kind of way. About ten feet down the shore, Xander looked almost as bored. Angel and Oz were on the other side of the circle, clearly fascinated by what Willow and Giles were doing.
Yeah, it was kind of interesting, she had to admit. If you paid attention to what Giles called the mechanics of magics. The two of them were drawing a circle in the sand, and being Willow and Giles, were making it precisely round by the old “pin in the center, string tied to pin, pencil at end of string” method. Of course, this time, the pin was a piece of driftwood, and the pencil was something that glinted under the cloudy morning sky like silver.
It was silver, Buffy realized, that ornate silver letter opener Giles had gotten as an award at some Librarian Convention thingy.
Hey, he finally found a use for it!
“Ariel!” Xander yelled suddenly. “Get back here!”
The selkie had bolted out of the circle while Willow and Giles were preoccupied. She headed for the sea, evading Xander like he was standing still.
“Oh, no you don’t. Not yet,” Buffy said, catching her by the arm. Ariel whirled to her, eyes wild and unseeing. “Hey, cool it. Chill. You know you can’t go back home without the skin.”
Angel came up beside her, murmuring what Buffy guessed was an old Irish form of “Chill.” His accent was different from Giles’s, sounding smoother, but Ariel didn’t respond to him.
Giles called impatiently, “Ariel!” He gestured, adding something in his shaky Gaelic that was probably, “Come here or else!” Meekly, the selkie reentered the circle, which Willow, with a sigh, redrew.
“Now?” she asked Giles.
He had an arm around the selkie, holding her in place. “Now,” he said firmly.
Willow reached into a little pouch and drew out a handful of crystals, then raised her hands, palms up, and began the ritual again.
“In your truest form I conjure you.”
The glow formed over her palm again, a stronger shade of blue-green this time.
“In your truest form I cleanse you.”
In the darkness, the glow looked as though it was sparkling, as though there were tiny bits of mica suspended within the color.
Willow’s hands tilted, and the spell ingredients fell onto Ariel’s head, the sea salt they used giving off a smell that was the same, but somehow different from the smell of the ocean all around them.
“In your truest form, I release you.”
The first part of the spell completed, Willow waited while Giles gently smoothed the mixture onto the skin Ariel held as well. The glow floated from Willow’s hands, down to the top of Ariel’s head, and waited there.
Ariel held very still, but she was practically quivering in excitement.
Then Giles nodded, and Willow resumed the chant.
“Aegir, look upon your child with favor.
“Aegir, look upon your child with love.
“Release the bonds of human making.
“Release her to the waters.
“Allow her to come home.”
The sealskin gave a slight twitch as the glow dissolved into it, and Willow and Giles molded the skin around Ariel’s slight form. Then, at a nod from Giles, Willow focused her will and began molding the magical power she could feel still hovering under her hands.
“Fanacht,” Giles murmured to the selkie. “Wait. Just a moment longer . . .”
A yell, then a thud—something was happening just outside Willow’s range of vision.
“Oh, argh!” she said, her concentration broken. She risked a look over her shoulder, still trying to hold the spell together.
Oz and Xander were struggling with a third person, trying to keep him back from the circle. A person who looked horribly familiar . . .
“Dr. Lee!” she cried out in dismay. Then she saw what he was trying to do. “No! Don’t!”
Angel swore, and started back toward the circle. Buffy passed him, sprinting across the sand. She saw Oz go down, predicted the arc of Lee’s arm that knocked Xander backward, and knew that they weren’t going to get there in time.
Giles swept Ariel up in his arms, and Willow stepped in front of both of them, her face twisted as she shouted out some kind of warning—
And then time seemed to slow down as Lee lunged at them. One foot landed right on the line of the circle. Smudging it—and the fragile form of the spell shattered with an almost audible crack. For an instant, all Buffy could hear was the blast of warm wind as all that energy escaped outward. And, carried on that wind, the faint, but very distinct sound of Giles saying, “Oh, bloody hell.”
Then time snapped back into focus. Ariel was making some kind of hysterical high-pitched moaning. Willow was flat out on the sand, unconscious; Giles was on his knees beside her. He had a nosebleed, but otherwise seemed okay.
The magical backlash had also hit Lee. He was lying on his butt on the sand, his jaw working but no sound coming out. Then his eyes focused on Ariel, unprotected, and he rolled to his side, struggling to his feet, hunting for something under his sand-covered jacket.
“Buffy, stop him!”
Cordelia? No time to look for her. Quickly gauging distance, Buffy hit Lee with a low flying tackle that would have made any college football scout drool, taking the scientist down again. He landed hard, with a painful “Ooof!”
“Don’t make me do that again,” Buffy said, pinning him. “Much as I would enjoy making you eat a whole lot of sand. Anyone have something of the tying-up sort with them?”
“Emergency Supplies ’R’ Us,” Xander announced, holding out his hand. Oz, without a word, pulled a pair of handcuffs out of his jeans pocket and handed them to Xander.
“Guaranteed strong enough to hold back wolfboy,” Xander said, snapping them around Lee’s wrists. “I think they’ll do for Doctor Annoying here.”
“Good job. Giles? Is Will okay?”
The Watcher looked up from his ministrations. “Yes, she’ll be fine. Just a little knocked about.”
As if to prove his words, Willow stirred slightly, then tried to sit up.
“Be careful,” the Watcher cautioned her. “Backlash is nothing to take lightly.”
Willow nodded, then winced. “Anyone catch the number of that truck?”
Ariel stopped her moaning and scurried forward, the skin still molded to her shoulders and sparkling slightly from the aftermath of the spell, to hug the redhead like a favorite toy.
“Yes, Ariel, I’m okay. Oh!” Willow cried, seeing the magical shimmer. “The spell! It got interrupted again!”
Buffy sighed. “So we’ve got to do it all over again?”
“Right now really wouldn’t be a good time,” Angel said from behind her. Buffy turned to stare at him— then saw what had caught his attention: a dozen merrows emerging from the surf, the water glistening off their sea-green scales in a way that could have been pretty, but wasn’t.
Cordelia, who had been picking her way gingerly along the beach, trying not to ruin another pair of shoes, reached them just in time to hear the exchange. She froze, her face a comic combination of disbelief and resignation.
“Could this get any worse?” she asked.
“Uh, guys . . . ?” Xander pointed to the far end of the beach. “Worse.”
Buffy swung around, the hair rising on the back of her neck telling her what she was going to see. Vampires, emerging one at a time from a wide storm drain and dropping down onto the sand. Ten, all looking really, really pissed, their attention focused tightly on the merrows.
Merrows to the left. Vampires to the right. Humans—and vampire, and selkie—in between.
With a whimper, Cordelia summed up the entire situation as only she could:
“You guys are just a magnet for the weird, aren’t you?”