"I'm gonna get Willow in here," Buffy continued softly, easing her grip on Spike's wrist, her free hand tracing lightly across his trembling lips in an idly possessive way, "and she's going to get Tara and Dawn free of the spell...and we're all going to walk out of here, together. Aren't we?"

Spike nodded helplessly, choking back a sob of despair.

"You're going to go along with my story...aren't you, Baby?"

Buffy nodded leadingly, and Spike nodded again, knowing that he had no other choice but to obey her unspoken command.

"We'll tell Tara and Dawn that I was right all along...you put a spell on them that made them believe you were the victim...but really, none of it was real. You tricked them, and kidnapped them...deceived them into going with you by using magic..."

Spike's heart sank with despair at the thought of losing the trust, the friendship, of the two people in the world most important to him...but a mere moment's consideration told him that they would not be likely to believe that story, no matter how convincingly he told it.

He ventured a whispered response, his wide, shell-shocked eyes on the floor at her feet.

"They'll n-never...never believe it..."

But his words were cut off in a yelp of pain as she gripped his hair and jerked his head back hard, deliberately smashing it into the wall behind him as she leaned in close to reply in a hateful whisper of her own, mocking his stutter, the stutter he had only developed since her brutal torture of him.

"You'd b-b-better make sure that they do, Spikey...unless you want to watch everybody in this house die bloody, and know that it's your fault. Do you understand me?"

He desperately nodded, as best he could with her fist clenched in his hair, as he replied in a shallow, breathless voice of anguished terror, "Y-yes...yes, Buffy...w-whatever you tell me, please, I'll do it, just please, d-don't hurt them, please..."

"What about you, Baby?" she taunted him, her voice smooth as silk as she jerked his head back harder, the caress of her warm breath on his throat sending a shudder of revulsion through him. "Don't you care if I hurt *you*?"

Spike was absolutely terrified, having no idea what the right answer to this question would be. He didn't dare to respond, swallowing convulsively, his eyes closed in an instinctive attempt at denial as she tenderly kissed his vulnerable, exposed throat. Then, she pulled his head up again, and her mouth was plundering his in a savage intrusion that he dared not resist.

When she drew back from the kiss, which was about dominance rather than pleasure, Buffy grinned at him wickedly as she added, "Hope not. ‘Cause you've sure got it coming, Baby." She leaned in closer, her lips brushing his ear as she barely breathed against his skin, "Not that it matters to me in the slightest what you want."

Spike did not move, did not resist, as she slid her hand down to possessively cup the mark on his thigh and went on, her voice calm and soothing now.

"Now, I'm gonna call Willow and the others in here, and have her break the spell, just on Tara and Dawn. We'll tell them you've confessed...you put a mind control spell on them to make them believe your lies. You can't break it here, you've got to wait until we get home, because the spell to break it is in a book you have there. Only you can do it; no one else can."

Spike nodded slowly, though her plan did not seem to be very well thought out.

"H-how..." he flinched the moment the word left his mouth, expecting her to strike him simply for speaking without permission.

"Go on," she urged him gently, though it was a frightening, controlling sort of gentleness.

"How are you g-going to...to make Tara and Dawn believe...I mean..."

"I've found a spell...it's really more of a form of hypnosis. We'll say you're going to reverse the spell, and I just want to keep an eye on you. Then when we're alone with them, we'll place them under hypnosis, and tell them *my* version of what happened. Clear enough, or do you have any more stupid questions?"

Her tone made it clear that he had just used up the last of her very limited patience.

Spike nodded, silent, subdued, not daring to voice his remaining doubts as to the workability of her plan.

"Good," Buffy said softly, her thumb stroking lightly over the mark through his jeans, sending a twinge of pain through his body with every touch. She smiled casually as he tensed at the sensation, and did not let up as she continued in that same calm, gentle voice, "If you try anything, Baby...if you don't go along with my story, or try to get away from me...I'll kill them both...and I'll make you watch. And then, I'll kill Angel and the rest of his little groupies, too." She shrugged. "I'll probably end up having to kill Willow and Xander and Anya too if that happens, but I can live with that. Can you, Sweetheart? Can you live with knowing that they'd all still be alive if only you'd not been a freakin' idiot and disobeyed me?"

Spike shook his head, tears streaking his face at the thought of Tara and Dawn being murdered by the powerful Slayer. "No...please, Buffy..."

"I've had enough of the begging, Baby. If you say another word before I tell you to..."

Without pausing Buffy drew her fist back and backhanded him brutally, continuing as if nothing had happened, "...I'll start to get irritated with you. And you really don't want that, do you, Spike?"

He shook his head, one hand upraised to wipe the blood from his split lip.

"I didn't think so," Buffy concluded, stepping back away from him. "Now you just follow my lead...and everything will be fine. Okay?"

Spike nodded, his eyes downcast, not daring to speak.

A second blow caught him completely off guard, slamming into his face and dizzying him with the double impact of her fist, and the wall behind him. He looked up at her, wide eyes blinking dazedly in stunned confusion, as she drove her fist into his stomach, doubling him over in pain, then proceeded to hit him several times more, bruising and bloodying his face with the blows.

As he sank down against the wall, struggling not to collapse completely, Buffy crouched down in front of him, grasping his chin to turn his face toward her. Spike instinctively jerked away from her in momentary panic, but then froze at the indignant expression on her face, when he realized what he had done, trapped, terrified eyes locking onto hers as he went completely, deliberately still.

"That's better," Buffy murmured, the warning in her eyes fading slightly with his submission, her thumb rubbing across his bruised jaw as she turned his head back and forth, inspecting the damage before giving him a wicked smirk. "Gotta make it look good, don't I? I mean, after all...I don't think you'd confess to something as bad as what you did unless I beat the truth out of you...do you?"

Spike shook his head in a mechanical gesture, only because he knew it was what she expected, as Buffy stood up, towering over him as he huddled on the floor at her feet.

Not taking her penetrating, intimidating gaze off the dazed, frightened vampire, Buffy called loudly, "*Will*! I need you in here!"

Within moments, Buffy's friends had entered the room, and Spike felt a wild hope that perhaps they had overheard everything; perhaps Buffy had given herself away. But the eager, curious expressions on their faces told him that whatever they had been doing to pass the time while they waited, it was unfortunately not eavesdropping.

"He admitted it," Buffy informed them, disgust in her voice. "He used a spell on them to make them want to go with him."

"What spell?" Willow demanded, stepping toward the subdued vampire, anger blazing in her eyes. "Can you undo it?"

Spike glanced uncertainly up at Buffy, but she was looking at him with a cluelessly expectant expression, and he knew that the time for his part of the deception had come. He cleared his throat, not quite meeting the witch's eyes as he tried hard to sound as convincing as possible.

"Yeah. Just need -- just need the book I got it from. ‘S back in my crypt."

"Will, you can go ahead and wake them up -- just Dawn and Tara -- and we can tell them what he did to them," Buffy put in. "They might not want to listen, because of the spell, but we should be able to at least get them home..."

All at once, the Slayer's words dropped off, and she stared around the room in astonishment, as Willow's spell began to gradually lose its hold on the occupants of the room. One by one, Tara, Dawn, Angel, and his friends began to stir, looking around blankly at first, as if lost.

"What...I didn't take the spell off yet!" Willow declared, alarm in her voice.

"I don't get it," Buffy said tersely, and as she spoke, Spike became aware of a set of rapid footsteps coming up the stairs toward them. "You're the only one who's supposed to be able to break it, right?"

"Hold everything!"

Lorne burst through the doorway, panting, leaning on the doorframe for support, a huge, beaming grin on his face as his eyes met Spike's uncertain gaze.

"Sanctuary spell's in place, Sugar Pie!" he announced, his expression instantly changing to disgust as he turned to Buffy and informed her, "Whatever you were saying...you're done." Just as quickly his smile was back in place as he reminded Spike, "She can't touch you now. No act of violence can be performed within these walls. You're safe." He turned again toward Buffy, his face once again shifting to an expression of smug contempt as he added, "And you're a heinous bitch. But I'm sure you've heard that before. Cupcake."

Spike tensed against the wall in an instinctive reaction to the rage he could feel boiling up within the Slayer, bracing himself for a blow that was not directed at him, as Buffy drew back her fist in preparation to backhand the green demon who had insulted her. Confident in the sanctuary spell, Lorne did not move, did not even flinch, as her fist came sailing toward his face...only to hit an invisible obstacle with enough force to knock her backward a few steps, staggering as she attempted to catch her balance.

"See?" he remarked with satisfaction, his expression softening with compassion as he took in the shaken vampire across the room. "Safe."

In the next few moments, the situation became somewhat chaotic, as the seven people who had been affected by Willow's freezing spell awakened, and all began speaking at once, at a loss as to what had happened to them.

"What was that...?"

"Wait...when did Lorne get here?"

"Is the sanctuary spell done, then? I think I...zoned out for a second there..."

Tara said nothing, taking in the seemingly instantaneous change in position of various people in the room; Spike's bruised and battered face, which had not been injured a mere instant ago; and the guilty expression on her former lover's face. Willow was glancing around the room, bewildered and confused; she visibly paled, freezing completely when she saw the revulsion on Tara's face.

"Tara...Baby..."

Tara ignored her completely, turning her attention instead toward Spike, rising from the bed and swiftly making her way to him. He gratefully pulled her into his arms as she helped him rise to his feet, resting his head on her shoulder and taking in several deep, gasping breaths, his body shaking violently as she just held him in silence. Dawn slipped off the bed and quietly moved to stand behind Spike, wrapping her arms around him in an awkward, hesitant gesture.

It was not quite clear whether it was meant more for his comfort or for her own.

"Okay, I'm not trying to spoil the moment or anything," Cordelia said dryly, "but what the *heck* just happened here?"

"She put a spell on us," Tara replied without hesitation, glaring over her shoulder at Willow. "She froze all of us but Buffy and Spike. So that Buffy could get to him, and no one would be able to help him."

"No, that's not it!" Willow objected. "It was to make things...less confusing, you know? So that she could talk to him...you two were already under a spell!" she insisted, gesturing toward Tara and Dawn. "He did it; he admitted it!"

"She made me," Spike murmured against Tara's shoulder so that only she could hear, holding her tighter, apprehension in his voice at the accusation. "She said she'd...she'd kill you, and Dawnie...if I didn't..."

Dawn gasped, pulling away from Spike and turning to face her sister, a look of horrified betrayal in her eyes as tears slipped down her face.

Tara drew slowly back from Spike, her eyes smoldering with rage as she turned them first on Buffy, then on Willow, and then gently turned Spike so that he was facing them as well, though he would not raise his eyes to meet those of the mostly quiet, watching group.

"Yeah," Tara said in a trembling voice of quiet disgust. "Take one good look at his face, and ask yourself why he *admitted* it, Willow!"

"Tara, you don't understand! I'm doing this for *you*!"

"I don't *want* you to!" Tara nearly shouted back. "You can't just...just *control* me, Willow! You have to stop! If I want to be with Spike, I'll be with Spike! You can't just use a spell to change that!"

"I was just trying to help," Willow insisted, her voice softer now, her eyes welling with tears. "I don't understand what went wrong...why it didn't work..."

The last statement seemed to be more to herself, but Tara heard it, and shook her head in disbelieving disgust. Even now, faced with Tara's reaction to her overbearing use of magic yet *again*, Willow's concern was with what had gone wrong with her spell, rather than with the fact that she had used the spell at all.

"The sanctuary spell, Honey," Lorne informed her matter-of-factly from the doorway. "Prevents any form of violence whatsoever."

"Violence?" Willow shook her head in dismay. "No...it wasn't..."

"Um...yeah. Mind control qualifies as violence, Sweet Pea."

The room was silent for a moment, everyone taking in his words. Willow appeared to be in a state of deep shock, staring at the wall with a stricken expression on her face.

"Yeah...so...if mind control spells count as violence," Anya spoke up slowly, a thoughtful frown on her face, "then...how come *Spike's* spell's still working?"