#i have kind of felt like a lot of the more casual foolish watchers in dt.blr stopped watching him bc now most of it is q.smp or valo

[jefferythejelly]

I knew I made a good choice in following you because you actually watch all of Foolish’s streams and like his friends

now anon why do i feel like ur vaguing people... (or maybe thats just me)

[ampleappleamble]

reminder: yall on ao3 real nice, also i love you thank you so much

also i’m gonna go ahead and post chapter 5 here in its entirety too (under a cut, natch) just in case. meanwhile, i’m chopping and screwing screenshots into big huge frankenstein images so i can obsess over canon conversations and lore on the go! some of these screenshots are just pure comedy though. post ‘em later! anyway, here it is in case you missed it:

Chapter 5: Home and Hearth

---

Edér wondered sometimes just how long it would take his hometown to finally die.

It reminded him of this dog he used to know when he was a kid, a sweet old hound dog called Tibbeth. She was the Rask's dog, but the whole town knew her, cared for her, fed her scraps. Everyone loved that dog. By the time Edér was old enough to make lasting memories, she was reaching the end of her breeding years, and she only mellowed out further with each year that passed. He remembered her fondly from his childhood: Tibby making him late for dawn church service because she sat on his feet and wouldn't stop giving him Sad Eyes till he rubbed her tummy. Tibby wandering between two arguing friends and licking herself so ostentatiously that the argument was completely forgotten, ending in peals of laughter instead of fisticuffs.

But as he grew into an adolescent, Tibby grew elderly and decrepit. Her teeth and fur fell out. She limped. Her scat was watery and thin, and she tended to let it fall wherever she stood. Her belly distended, and she started getting mean and lashing out at those who tried to touch her, tried to help her.

He had known there was something growing inside of her that was hurting her, and what was worse, he had known that there was nothing anyone could do to help her. But to Edér, the worst thought of all was that she was still in there under it all. Under all the pain and fear, sweet old Tibby was still in there wanting nothing but belly rubs and bits of ham from your plate. It was the sickness made her snap at you, made her shit all over herself and struggle and scream while you tried to clean her up. Made her scared.

And it was this sickness that made his hometown like this, now. And just like with Tibby, there was nothing he could do to help. No way to excise the tumor. His gaze wandered to the corpse-strewn monster of a tree nearby. Nothing left to do but end it mercifully.

But he hadn't even had it in him to watch as Tibby was put down all those years ago. She had scratched and bitten the Gyrning's baby girl, and even though she was old and half toothless, she did enough damage to scar the child for life. He had run away back then, hiding the tears he had been getting too old to shed so freely anymore.

He sighed heavily, barely squinting against the feeble morning sunlight as he gazed out over the only home he had ever known.

"We're both gettin' too old for this, ain't we?" Edér murmured.

Gilded Vale did not answer him.

The hairs on the back of his neck suddenly stood on end, and he turned slowly, carefully, to look at the tree again. He wasn't alone.

---

The rest of the morning hadn't gone so badly.

She'd suffered a nightmare, she'd explained, and the strange hallucinations she'd told him about before had decided to manifest at the worst possible time: exactly when she had woken up. Hence the... episode she'd had. Understandable, given the circumstances.

Unfortunately, she did still want to go back to that tree. "For closure," she'd pleaded. "It'll only take a moment, I promise you."

They had dressed and packed their meager belongings in awkward silence, making it all the way downstairs to a table with their bowls of tepid porridge in hand before she had spoken up again.

"I'm sorry," she'd stated, stirring the beige mess in her bowl with all the enthusiasm of a prisoner fastening her own noose. "That was probably a... distinctly unpleasant experience for you. And this little detour probably will be, too. ...Please know that I truly appreciate your agreeing to accompany me nonetheless."

She sounded as though she'd been planning this apology all morning, phrasing and rephrasing it in her head until she could strike a palatable balance between being honest with him and maintaining etiquette. Aloth had accepted without hesitation, of course. He had almost apologized to her himself in return, for perhaps having seen... more than she may have wanted a near-stranger to see, but he had thought better of it and remained silent instead. He hadn't wanted to embarrass her by bringing up her strange behavior again. She seemed to appreciate it.

And now he was standing a few paces behind her in the center of town as she stared at a dead woman in a tree.

 They had been standing there for fifteen minutes.

 "She's aff 'er heed, lad."

"Nobody asked you," he sighed through gritted teeth.

---

Axa regarded the new, dark world in which she found herself with fear and wonder. She had expected to see the dead woman, feel a little foolish, and then set off on the road. She had not been expecting this at all.

Caldara de Berranzi's soul looked back at her, smiling a gentle, motherly smile.

"What is this?" She said it, but she didn't, just like in her dream. "What's happened to me?"

And the animancer responded in the same fashion. "Poor thing! You must be so confused. The world is a baffling place, and the world beyond the Shroud even more so. But that world is yours now, too, to bear witness to."

"I don't understand," Axa whimpered. She really, really didn't. She didn't even know if this was really happening.

The dwarven woman's soul smiled sadly at the little orlan, tsked in sympathy. "I know you don't, dear. It's a lot to take in. Here, let me put it this way: Whatever happened to you, it freed your soul from your body, but not all the way. You were pulled into this world--" The dwarf gestured at the swirling morass of essence and void around them-- "the In-Between of Life and Death. But! You must have only been here for an instant. Any longer, and you'd have ended up staying here, like me." Caldara gestured at herself, a bloated corpse dangling from a tree, with a sweet little chuckle.

"Your soul remembers, though. Remembers even after it returns to your body. Remembers how it sees in this world. Souls, their histories, their memories, their paths through the In-Between. All are yours to observe." The animancer nodded sagely.

"You are a Watcher, now," she chirped, "and a Watcher you will stay."

Axa blinked. Watcher. The word from her dream.

 "I... I don't know what that means at all."

Caladara sighed softly. "Oh dear, oh dear. Make yourself comfortable, aimoranet. We have a lot more talking to do."

---

Aloth was starting to feel uneasy.

It had been just over 20 minutes now, and Axa still stood in the same spot, mesmerized by the dead animancer. They were drawing curious stares from townsfolk as they passed by, and he was getting nervous about what might happen-- what might come out of his mouth-- should one of them try to start something.

He glanced around furtively, his open grimoire like a leaden weight in his hands, searching for anything to focus on besides the fact that he'd apparently elected to travel with this woman. A blond man with a pipe, leaning casually against a collapsed wall some distance away, cocked an eyebrow at him. The message was completely unspoken, but easily understood. "Uh, your friend okay there?"

He shot back a look that he hoped said both "Mind your own business, please" and "I have absolutely no idea why she's doing this," somehow.

The man with the pipe shrugged, glanced up at the dead dwarf, then turned away. Aloth took the opportunity to study him a bit further, recognizing him vaguely from his time in town. He'd seen this man around, although not as much in recent weeks. He was vaguely aware of the Vale's day-to-day goings-on, and he seemed to recall seeing less of this particular face around the same time the local lord strung up his latest hapless victim in this gruesome abomination of a tree. Aloth tried to remember exactly who that victim had been...

...before noticing, with a start, that Axa had moved. She'd snapped out of whatever strange fugue state had taken hold of her and she stood before him now, looking for all the world like a child woken prematurely from a nap: confused, angry, morose.

He proceeded extremely cautiously. "Axa? Are you alright?" He leaned a bit closer for privacy's sake. "You seemed... a bit lost, there." For almost half an hour.

Either she didn't notice his attempt at discretion or she didn't care. "According to that dead woman," she blurted, "I'm a Watcher."

He felt his eyebrows leap up to his hairline. "Oh. Well. That... explains a lot, actually."

---

Edér had watched the elf and the orlan the entire time they stood before the tree.

The elf he'd seen around town here and there recently, but he'd never interacted with the man. Of course, he'd heard others talking about him, saying all kinds of things: a haughty foreigner who thinks he can bring his high-falutin' Aedyran ass here and piss on our hospitality. But given the usual kind of horseshit his fellow townsfolk usually spewed these days, he didn't put much merit in what they had to say. At least he tended to mind his own business.

The orlan had just arrived the previous day, and when he saw Raedric's henchman approach her, he'd actually tensed up, preparing for a fight. With everything he'd heard about orlans, he was half expecting her to pull a knife, or maybe even whisper some sort of cipher magic. But instead she'd just shouted at Urgeat, mad as Hel and rightfully so. Edér had been unable to stop himself smiling at the look on the magistrate's pinched-up little asshole of a face.

Then the bell had tolled, and suddenly everyone in town had bigger issues to deal with. She'd looked positively miserable as she'd trudged past him on the way to the Black Hound Inn.

Look at that, he'd thought, watching her plod slowly forward. Practically one of us already.

She'd met his eye for a moment, and he'd raised his pipe to her in a commiserative gesture. "Welcome to our lovely town," he'd quipped. And she had smiled at him in response, even after all that abuse she'd just had to take from Urgeat.

Maybe that was why he'd decided to say something when she passed him again. She didn't look to be in any higher spirits than she had when he'd said something before, but she had smiled at him back then, so what was the worst that could happen this time?

"Seventeen-and-a-half," he called out to her, and grinned. She's a little kith, maybe she'll like this one.

She and the elf turned to him, both of them wearing facial expressions similar to ones they might have had he catcalled them in an especially vulgar manner.

...Off to a great start, Edér thought. Nothing to do but press on.

"Eighteen dependin' on if you count the dwarf woman as a full person or not. ...I think you oughtta."

She approached him then, slowly, scrutinizing him with her eerie slitted pupils, while the elven man followed behind her. "You're saying there are eighteen people hanging in that tree?"

"Last I counted. You mean to tell me you were standin' there that whole time and you wasn't even counting 'em?"

Her cheeks brightened, and she turned to the elf. "Aloth? How long was I-- were we standing there like that?"

The elf, Aloth apparently, winced apologetically at the little woman. "Oh, only about... about twenty minutes. Ish."

The orlan huffed out something between a laugh and a cough. "Only twenty minutes!" She shook her head, grinning, hands on her hips. "Excellent. I was worried I looked like a weird asshole for a minute there."

Edér laughed aloud at last, and held out his hand in greeting. "Edér Teylecg. Although y' may as well just call me Nineteen."

"Axa Mala." He felt soft, fine fur in his hand when she shook it, and with it an extremely confusing mix of emotions. The elf behind her introduced himself as well, as Aloth Corfiser, before she continued. "Nineteen, huh. You mean to say you think you're next?"

Edér smiled sadly, looking up at his friends and neighbors in the tree. "May as well be. Eighteen's my former captain in the war. Was my headman on the farm till Raedric put 'im up there for darin' to stand up for us. For me." He squinted back down at the little woman, clenching his pipe between his teeth. "Bein' honest though, way you were carryin' on with the magistrate the other day, I can't see you makin' it much further than, oh, 22, 23, tops. You seem like the sort of lady likes t' get involved."

She really did, too. For the first time since they'd started talking, her gaze met his, and the intensity of her bright violet eyes almost made him want to look away. Not quite. But almost.

She had a strange, guarded look on her face as she peered up at him. "Do you know what a Watcher is?"

Edér choked on his pipe smoke. This little gal was full of surprises.

---

"Caed Nua, huh? ...Haven't thought about that old place in a long time. Man such as Maerwald, there might be things I wanna ask him. Don't know why I never thought of that."

Obscured One, you have truly outdone yourself this time, Axa mused, a slow smile spreading across her face. This was what she'd been missing after her expulsion: A mission, a purpose, a destination in life.

I was ready to die, and you gave me this gift: an absolutely insane convoluted nightmare scenario, compelling me to try to make sense of it... and in doing so, requiring me to stay alive. I am truly grateful. She closed one eye, sending her prayer to Wael.

It was remarkable how much better she felt just knowing what was wrong with her, having a name for it. Watcher. The knowledge presented new challenges, certainly, but at least now she knew what she was up against. And she even had a tangible, short-term goal in mind:

 Get to Caed Nua. Find the Watcher, Maerwald.

The blond folk, Edér, scratched his bristly beard while he thought about her offer. But she could tell he'd already made up his mind. This couldn't go any other way. She'd seen him in her dream, alongside Caldara. A clear sign! This was meant to be!

...Okay, maybe she was taking it a bit too far there.

"I dunno about settin' out with a couple of strangers. Strange strangers at that." He glanced at Aloth and grinned apologetically. "No offense, cousin."

"I'll vouch for him," Axa smiled, stretching, preparing for the work ahead of her. "It's me you have to watch out for."

Aloth shrugged. "Either way, you're probably better off out there with us than here, being sized up for a noose by every other neighbor."

"Can't argue with that. Aw, what the Hel. Sure, I'll do some sightseeing with you folks." Edér grinned at the two of them, his broad, ruddy face brightening considerably. "Where's our first stop on this little roadtrip? We're buyin' supplies, I suppose?"

Axa winced, clutching at her sad, barren little coinpurse. "Uh. Listen... About that--"

---

[theajaheira]

very really married (9/15)

read it on ao3!

WOULD YOU LOOK AT THAT. WE HAVE AN ACTUAL NUMBER OF CHAPTERS. EXCITING !!!!!!

for real, tho, this started off as a very self-indulgent half-conceived plot bunny that came from me wanting to write a s1 where giles and jenny were fake married, and then it turned into....something...with a plot. incredible. i am so so happy to say that it’s finished, and it’s coherent, and it is something i am so proud of--and i am super looking forward to posting the remaining chapters !!!!

Giles supposed that the mystery of Jenny might trouble him more if he hadn’t gotten to know her so well over the last few months. She had proven so many times over that her primary goal was to protect the people she cared for. It was perhaps foolish of him to trust her so implicitly, but the feeling in his chest when he looked at her felt too strong to be incorrect. It also felt too strong to be simply attraction, but…that was a problem to be addressed later, he hoped. There were other problems they were facing at the moment.

“Principal Snyder’s trying to leverage that one time he saw us holding hands in a faculty meeting to get me to pass all the athletes taking his class,” Jenny was telling Giles, carding her fingers absently through his hair. Her wedding ring caught briefly, but the light tug just made Giles smile. He liked being reminded that it was his wife sitting atop his desk while he took his tea. “And I was like, I mean, we’ve done so much worse on the premises. Didn’t you feel me up in a broom closet on Monday?”

“You make it sound so crass,” said Giles, his smile widening. Leaning back in his office chair, he tilted his head back to rest it in Jenny’s lap.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” said Jenny, and leaned down to kiss him. “Didn’t you rest your hand upon my heaving bosom on Monday?”

“That’s worse,” said Giles seriously, delighting in Jenny’s laugh. “That’s—that’s terrible romance novel language, Jenny.”

“A poet I am not,” said Jenny unapologetically. She grinned, thoughtful. “Can you come up with something better?”

Giles considered this, resting his cheek on her leg as he did so. “I felt you up in a broom closet on Monday,” he conceded. “Though if I recall, you did a fair amount of feeling up in return.”

“And who could blame me?” Jenny kissed him again, then sighed. “I should probably go set up the lab.”

“Should you?”

“You’re the worst,” said Jenny, not very seriously. “Really, I should—”

Outside Giles’s office, the sound of loud, cheerful voices could be heard as the library doors burst open. “GILES!” Buffy called, heedless of any rules regarding the library being a quiet place. “We need to talk!”

“Duty calls, huh?” Jenny brushed her fingers gently against Giles’s cheek. He shivered. “At least they aren’t gonna flip if they see me coming out of your office.”

“I wouldn’t bet on it,” said Giles ruefully, sitting up. “I rather think we scarred Buffy for life with our little morgue drawer display.” He stood, turning to offer Jenny a hand. She took it, and he tugged her gently off the desk, taking a deliberate extra moment to steady her. “Be out in a second, Buffy!” he called, then kissed Jenny’s nose. She laughed.

“Giles, can you please stop making out with your wife and just come out here?” Buffy called.

Giles rolled his eyes a little, opening the office door and leaning against the doorframe. Jenny stepped up next to him. “What brings you three to the library this early?” he asked, a little concerned by the answer. “Generally our—ah—study group doesn’t meet before lunch.”

“Yeah, well, that was before Angel and I had to fend off three really nasty—” Buffy stopped, glancing furtively at Jenny. “Um, they—”

“Vampires?” said Jenny.

Buffy, Willow, Xander, and Giles all stared incredulously at her.

“Look, I, uh, know you’re shocked,” continued Jenny, completely misinterpreting their stares, “but you all seem absolutely hell-bent on placing yourselves in progressively weirder and more dangerous situation. After that stuff with the hyenas last week, I think it’s important that you all know about the whole vampire situation in Sunnydale.”

“I’m sorry?” said Giles.

“Vampires are real,” said Jenny patiently.

Buffy gaped at Jenny. After a very pointed look from Giles, she seemed to remember how to speak again. “Yep!” she managed. “Vampires! Wow, that is some shocking information right there, Ms. Calendar, and it brings up a lot of questions!”

“Like, say, how does Ms. Calendar know about vampires without Giles knowing Ms. Calendar knew about vampires?” Willow asked.

“That is a very good question, Willow,” said Buffy, giving Giles a death glare. “Why would Giles not know that his wife knew about vampires? Especially considering—”

“—that I myself am working on a paranormal book,” Giles finished very loudly, glaring right back at Buffy. “Jenny, why on earth didn’t you tell me?”

Jenny exhaled, looking up at Giles. “I didn’t want to put you in danger,” she said softly. “You find it easily enough even without knowing about vampires.”

This made sense, and didn’t surprise Giles in the slightest. Most of this information wasn’t new to him, after all. What was new was the fact that Jenny had just made her knowledge of the supernatural very clear to the children, and the children now knew that Jenny knew about vampires, which raised a lot of obvious questions as to why Giles hadn’t yet told her he was a Watcher. “I understand,” he said, smiling weakly. He did his best not to look at Buffy, Willow, and Xander, who all looked varying degrees of disapproving. “That, um, must have caused you quite a lot of worry.”

Jenny waved a dismissive hand. “We’ve been through that part before,” she said. “You know I worry about you. That’s not in question. What I want to know is why there were vampires chasing Buffy and—” She stopped, a strange expression on her face, and then said, “Angel.”

Buffy didn’t miss this. “Do you know Angel?” she asked curiously.

“You said he helped you fend off some vampires last night?” Jenny asked, so confident and casual that only Giles noticed she hadn’t answered Buffy’s question.

“Yeah,” said Buffy. A soft, slow smile spread across her face. “He had to spend the night with me.”

Jenny blanched. Willow beamed. Xander said, loud and furious, “He spent the night? In your room? In your bed?”

“Not in my bed,” Buffy corrected, still smiling. “By my bed.”

“That is so romantic!” Willow sighed. “Did you, uh…I mean, did he, uh…”

“Perfect gentleman,” said Buffy dreamily.

“Did you invite him in?” said Jenny suddenly.

Buffy looked surprised by the question. “What do you mean?”

“Did you say the words come in?” Jenny had a strange look in her eyes.

“I don’t know,” said Buffy slowly, looking a little amused. “It was kind of a life-or-death situation. You know how it is with vampires.”

“Unfortunately,” said Jenny grimly. “Buffy, Angel isn’t the kind of guy you want in your bedroom.”

“Thank you,” said Xander loudly, looking extremely pleased. “See? Even Ms. Calendar thinks Angel’s bad news.”

“You said yourself he’s not dangerous, didn’t you?” Buffy said plaintively, directing large puppy eyes at Jenny. “And nothing happened. He’s a good guy.”

Jenny bit her lip, considering. Then she said, “If anything happens, you let me know, Buffy. Do you understand that? Any single, solitary thing that seems out of the ordinary—”

“And I come to you, I got it.” Buffy beamed angelically.

Giles was beginning to frown. It was one thing for Jenny to have her secrets, but quite another for her secrets to intersect with his authority as a Watcher. Anything out of the ordinary that Buffy experienced had to be first and foremost reported to Giles, not Jenny. “May I speak with you in private?” he asked quietly, tugging at Jenny’s sleeve.

Jenny looked a little surprised. “Sure,” she said, and let him lead her back into the office. As he shut the door, she sat down on the top of his desk, surveying him with a hopeful interest. “Stealing a kiss?” she said lightly.

“Not quite,” said Giles. “Jenny, what is going on between you and Angel? It’s clear you know something about him that you aren’t divulging.”

Jenny considered this. Then she said, “Rupert, you took that new information about vampires a lot better than I expected you to. What’s up with that?”

Giles exhaled, impatient. “I research the supernatural quite extensively,” he said. “The concept of vampires being real is a possibility that has crossed my mind more than once. What don’t Buffy and I know about Angel?”

“Something that isn’t any of your business,” said Jenny. “Something that shouldn’t be any of your business, not if I have anything to say about it. He shouldn’t be staying in a teenage girl’s bedroom.”

“He seems a decent enough fellow,” said Giles quietly. “Certainly not the type to take any liberties.”

“You don’t know him,” said Jenny, looking directly up at Giles.

“And that’d be helped if you told me why I should be worried!” Giles snapped, frustrated.

Jenny flushed, looking genuinely hurt. As she crossed her arms against her chest, Giles felt a sudden, painful twinge of guilt. “If you trust me like you say you do, you’ll know I wouldn’t ever keep something from you without good reason,” she said quietly, “Believe me, Rupert, this is something I want to tell you, but there are so many other factors in play. The moment I can tell you, I swear I will. Right now isn’t that moment.” She drew in a shaking breath. “I wish it was.”

Giles felt terrible. Here he was guarding his secrets with every intention of keeping them from Jenny for as long as possible, and here she was telling him she wanted, badly, to share her own with him. “I’m sorry,” he said quietly. “It’s difficult to know that there are parts of you I don’t understand.”

“Well, hey, that’s marriage,” said Jenny with a wobbly laugh. “Not exactly a picnic, but…worth the work.” She reached out, squeezing Giles’s hands.

“I do trust you,” said Giles softly. “More than most.”

“I’d hope so,” said Jenny. There was that beautiful smile, tentative and sincere, the one that only he ever brought out.

Giles was tempted, badly, to kiss her again, but the children were outside and waiting. Reluctantly, he dropped her hands. “I’d best get back to the children,” he murmured. “And I—”

Jenny gripped his shirt, pressing her mouth firmly to his. Giles laughed a bit breathlessly, kissing her back.

Things had changed between them. Giles, half-awake in bed that night, was quite comfortable admitting that. Jenny touched him because she wanted to touch him, and kissed him because she liked him, and did the washing up because he did the cooking and she felt like it was only fair. He liked talking to her at night, both of them drowsy and safe in bed, about art and literature and that frankly ridiculous thing that some student in her class had done. Saying that he was smitten with her didn’t quite cover his growing feelings for her—not when everything he found out about her seemed to solidify how very much he cared for her.

It was these feelings that posed a problem. Giles was deeply afraid of losing her if ever she found out how much he had been keeping from her. It was true that she understood secrets, especially with some of her own, but he didn’t at all know how she would feel about the entire extra facet of his personality. To her, he was Rupert, a gentle librarian, but to Buffy and Willow and Xander, he was Giles, a Watcher and a researcher. He couldn’t at all imagine her loving both.

Caring for both.

Giles let out a frightened breath. When had he started wanting Jenny to love him?

Jenny, as always, had fallen asleep first, her head pillowed on his shoulder. It was giving Giles a frustrating amount of time to think—about her, about him, about the impossibilities that he wanted for the both of them. He imagined meeting Jenny the way they were supposed to have met, not roundabout, not married to her in Vegas before they had even learned to like each other. He thought about how they might have met in a staff meeting before school started, and he might have found out she knew more than he had expected, and she might have gotten to know him as a Watcher and a friend all in one. Him asking her out to dinner, their stumbling through a sweet, awkward courtship, them falling in love without secrets between them.

“Jenny,” he said softly.

Jenny stirred against his chest. “Mm?”

“Do you think—would we have been better, had we met the right way round?” Giles asked, his own voice weary. He wished he could fall asleep as easily as her.

Jenny hummed, cuddling into him. “I think I’m happy I’m here,” she whispered.

Something about that made Giles feel better and worse at the same time. He kissed the top of her head, closing his eyes.

The next day brought alarming news.

“Angel’s a vampire?” said Willow disbelievingly.

“I can't believe this is happening,” said Buffy, small and tired. “One minute we were kissing, and the next minute…” She looked plaintively to Giles. “Can a vampire ever be a good person? Couldn't it happen?”

Giles kept on thinking of Jenny’s words. He shouldn’t be staying in a teenage girl’s bedroom. And yet if Angel was truly a threat…how could Jenny possibly put Buffy’s life at risk? “I don’t know,” he said quietly. “By all accounts, a vampire isn't a person at all.”

“But Ms. Calendar let him stay with Buffy!” Willow objected, distressed. “Why would she do that if Angel’s a bad guy?”

If you trust me like you say you do, you’ll know I wouldn’t ever keep something from you without good reason.

“Giles?” Willow turned to him.

There had to be some other explanation. But Jenny knowing about Angel, Jenny knowing about the supernatural, Jenny showing up in Giles’s life and being so distracting, so lovely, so absolutely wonderful—god, he should have known. There was always a catch. “I need to speak to my wife,” said Giles acidly, and hurried past the children, up the stairs, through the hallway, not bothering to look back.

Jenny was setting up her classroom, humming the song that had been on the radio when they’d driven to school that morning. She turned as he stepped into the room; her smile faded at his expression. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Angel is a vampire,” said Giles.

Jenny paled. “Did he hurt Buffy?”

“I think the time for games is very much over, Jenny,” said Giles coldly. “Tell me what you know.”

“There aren’t any—any games, Rupert, and I can’t believe you would think—tell me if he hurt Buffy,” Jenny demanded. “God, please, I—I would have told you if I’d known—” She let out a choked sob, pressing her fingers to her mouth. “She’s so small,” she whispered. “She’s sixteen. I couldn’t tell you, I should have told you—”

“Buffy is fine,” said Giles. Then, “You knew he was a vampire.”

“It’s family stuff,” whispered Jenny. “It’s complicated.”

“I’m an intelligent man.”

Jenny swallowed. She stepped around Giles, shutting the door. “I don’t want to tell you this now,” she said. “I don’t. I want to tell you because I want to tell you, not out of guilt. You know me. You know I wouldn’t do anything if I thought it would hurt you or those kids. He’s a vampire, but it’s—complicated. He isn’t like most of them.”

“If there’s any chance he’ll hurt Buffy, it would help if we had some extra information,” said Giles sharply.

“He—” Jenny stared at him, wide-eyed. “You don’t trust me,” she said quietly.

“Jenny.”

“How is my word not enough on this one?”

“He’s a vampire, Jenny!” Giles shouted. “You can’t just—just speak in vague terms and tell me to follow you blindly! Buffy’s life may very well be at stake, and you’re concerned as to whether or not I trust you enough? You need to get your bloody priorities in order before you start chiding me for not trusting the stranger I drunkenly married!”

The second after he had said it, he realized his mistake like a punch to the gut. He was treating this situation like he didn’t know Jenny, like she hadn’t bandaged his hands and kissed him in a morgue drawer and looped a cross around his neck just to keep him safe. She had given him every reason to trust her, had gone so far as to beg him to understand that she didn’t want to keep secrets from him—she had even been honest enough to admit that she had secrets in the first place. And here he was yelling at her as though he didn’t have a thousand and one secrets of his own.

But Jenny was looking at him, her expression now utterly, purposefully unreadable. “You know what?” she said. “You’re right. I’m some stranger you barely know. You have every fucking reason to think I might want to hurt the kids under my care.” She nodded, a jerky motion. “I get the message loud and clear, Rupert.”

“Jenny,” said Giles weakly. He felt sick to his stomach.

“I think we’re done here,” said Jenny, and turned on her heel, walking out of the classroom without looking back.

Giles sat down, head spinning, on the edge of Jenny’s desk.

“Giles?”

Giles looked up. Willow was standing in the doorway, looking shaken and sad. “How much of that did you hear?” he asked tiredly.

“Um, you guys weren’t exactly quiet,” said Willow uncertainly. “It’s pretty lucky that everybody else is in class. This is my TA period for Ms. Calendar, though, so—”

“Willow,” said Giles.

“I heard drunkenly married,” mumbled Willow. “I covered my ears after that, though, I promise.”

Giles removed his glasses, shakily cleaning them with his handkerchief. He couldn’t quite look at Willow as she sat down next to him. But he couldn’t leave things so ambiguous, especially not if she might tell Buffy or Xander about what she had heard. Someone, at least, deserved the truth. “We met in Las Vegas two weeks before term started,” he said quietly. “We were both laid over there. She swept me off my feet in a bar, we got ridiculously drunk, and we woke up the next day legally bound.”

Willow was silent for a very long time. It took Giles a good two minutes to look up at her, and when he did, she gave him a weak smile. “Just trying to process,” she said.

“I quite understand,” said Giles wryly.

“It’s just…” Willow sighed. “You guys click,” she said. “It’s hard for me to imagine the both of you being complete strangers to each other.”

Giles swallowed. “There are many mistakes I have made in my life,” he said. “I don’t think marrying Jenny was one of them.” This felt too much of an admission. He hastened to change the subject. “But she knew Angel was a vampire, and that—I—I was afraid she was using me. To get to Buffy. Hurt her, somehow.”

“You know she wouldn’t do that!” said Willow, all but affronted.

“I had it in my head that I didn’t know her well enough to make that judgment,” said Giles heavily.

Willow huffed. “That’s crazy talk,” she said.

Giles exhaled. “I’m well aware,” he said, rather unable to look at Willow. The thought that he had caused Jenny needless pain was so much worse than Jenny being some sort of manipulative spy. “I should talk to her,” he said finally.

“Yeah, you should,” said Willow, giving him a momentary smile. “Just give her some space. I think she’s gonna need it.”

Giving Jenny space wasn’t as hard as Giles had imagined it to be. Jenny missed absolutely all of her classes, and when Giles headed to the parking lot at the end of the day, she had already left in her car. Seeing as she’d driven him to the high school, he ended up having to walk home, which gave him an unpleasant amount of time alone with his own thoughts. By the time he finally made it up the porch steps, it was dangerously close to sunset.

Jenny opened the door for him. “I’m sorry,” she said stiffly. “As mad as I am at you, I shouldn’t have left you at school.”

“Don’t you dare apologize to me,” said Giles quietly, shutting the door behind him. He made sure to give Jenny a wide berth; physical space was just as important as emotional space. “I was utterly horrible to you today, Jenny. I don’t know how I can begin to make it up to you.”

“I don’t know either,” said Jenny, staring him down.

Giles shoved his hands into his pockets, mostly to stop his physical compulsion to reach out to Jenny. Though her expression was one of resolute anger, he knew he had hurt her in a way that went beyond fury. “I was afraid,” he said finally. “Of you being too good to be true.”

“Skip the Hallmark-card bullshit, Rupert,” said Jenny flatly. “Tell me something real and I’ll consider—”

“Angry, then, how’s that?” said Giles, humiliation sharpening his words. “I was angry, Jenny, that you didn’t tell me any of this. I hated that you gave me a reason to doubt you—”

“That’s your own damn fault for not listening, then!” Jenny’s eyes flashed. “I told you I wanted to tell you everything, I just needed time!”

“How much time, hmm?” Giles took a step closer, unthinking, then stopped himself. Give her some space. “What happened if we ran out of time and Buffy ended up dead in her bed? If she knew he was a vampire, she’d have never let him in and you know it—”

“This isn’t about Buffy and it never was!” Jenny shouted. “You’re angry that your wife is a complete stranger to you and you don’t know every single fucking thought in her head! Well, guess what, Rupert, that’s what you sign up for when you’re a drunken moron who marries the first pretty girl that gives you the time of day!”

Giles reeled, drawing in a sharp, shaking breath. “I suppose I deserved that,” he said finally.

Jenny froze, mouth half-open. It was clear she’d been expecting him to throw another insult at her, and the absence of it had taken her off guard. No, not off guard—oh, no, oh, Jenny—

Without even thinking about it, Giles took two running steps across the living room and tugged a sobbing Jenny into his arms. Not once had she cried like this in all the time he’d seen her, and the thought that he had caused this was unbearable. “I’m so sorry,” he whispered into her hair, close to tears himself. “Jenny, please, I never—never meant to hurt you like this.”

Jenny sobbed something incoherent into his shoulder that sounded very much like an insult, but she was still holding onto him very tightly.

Giles drew in a soft breath, steadied by her presence. “You’re right,” he said quietly, stroking her hair. “This was never about Buffy. I was—afraid, and don’t tell me that that’s Hallmark-card rubbish—”

“I think what I said was Hallmark-card bullshit,” said Jenny. She was still crying, but her words were now at least relatively understandable. “Making our argument a little more G-rated?”

“Bloodbath would be more apropos for what went down in that classroom,” said Giles ruefully. “Though I think we both know that we have the propensity for rather explosive fights.”

Jenny made a noise between a sob and a laugh. “You could say that, yeah,” she mumbled.

“I was afraid,” said Giles again. “That your arrival in my life was somehow not a coincidence, that…that your designs on me were meant to hurt Buffy and myself.”

“Dumbest conspiracy theory ever,” said Jenny flatly, turning her head to rest her cheek on Giles’s chest.

“It’d explain rather well why—” Giles stopped, rather afraid that she could feel his heart pounding. “The more I get to know you, the more I find myself—smitten,” he said. The words didn’t come easily. “And you’re,” he laughed a little tiredly, “quite right that these admissions shouldn’t come tinged with guilt, Jenny. I’d much rather have told you this under happier circumstances. But the fact remains that my feelings for you are rapidly becoming large enough to eclipse any nefarious intent you could have had, and that’s frightening. I am, I am a man of logic, of reason, one who shouldn’t be swayed by—”

Jenny reached up, pressing her finger to his lips. Giles shut his mouth. Lowering her hand, she looked at him steadily, then said, “I believe you, and I get it. But none of that erases what you said to me.”

“I don’t want to erase it,” said Giles quietly. “I want to learn from it. I want you to be angry at me, rightfully so, and I want to prove that I can make things up to you.”

Something in Jenny’s expression softened. “Well, that’s a damn good start,” she murmured, and placed her hands on his shoulders, steadying Giles before she kissed him.

Giles kissed her back for a moment, then pulled away. “You’re not a stranger, you know,” he said earnestly.

“No?” There was clear vulnerability in Jenny’s eyes.

“No,” said Giles softly. “It was cruel of me to say as such, not to mention entirely dishonest. I was afraid, and panicking, but that doesn’t absolve me.”

Jenny swallowed, hard. “I can understand that,” she said. “I’d probably react pretty badly too if I found out you knew stuff about vampires and had been keeping it from me.”

The guilt was like a physical pain in Giles’s stomach, but he couldn’t possibly tell her now. Things were too fragile; it would have to wait just a bit longer. Unable to respond in a way that wasn’t a lie, he kissed her instead, purposefully losing himself in the blissful wonder that was kissing Jenny Calendar—

The phone rang.

“Damn,” Giles muttered, pulling away from Jenny.

“So we’ll save the makeup sex for later, huh?” said Jenny, and gave him a small, wobbly smile.

“Don’t tease,” said Giles, smiling back as he picked up the phone. “Yes?”

“Giles, we have a problem,” came Xander’s voice. “It’s Angel.”

All of Jenny’s slowly-returning happiness had dissipated as soon as Giles had told her what had happened to Joyce. She hadn’t said a word during the drive to the hospital, and seemed either unwilling or unable to let go of Giles’s hand. Both, perhaps.

“Do you remember anything, Mom?” Giles heard Buffy saying from a nearby hospital room. Jenny swayed on her feet; he slipped an arm around her waist, steadying her, and she hid her face in his jacket.

“It’s not your fault,” he whispered.

“You don’t know that,” said Jenny flatly.

“No matter what idiocy I said today, you have more than earned my trust,” said Giles quietly. “A thousand times over, Jenny, you have been here for me.”

But Jenny shook her head, pulling back to look at him. “I knew,” she said. “I knew what he was capable of and I just let him—”

“You didn’t let him do a damn thing,” said Giles firmly. “He’s a monster.”

“He’s not,” Jenny burst out. “That’s—that’s the problem, Rupert.”

“What?”

Jenny exhaled. “I’m Romani.”

This was quite literally the last thing Giles had been expecting her to say. “What does that have to do with—” Jenny gave him a look, and he coughed. “Right. Sorry. Do go on.”

“My family, generations ago, lost a daughter to Angelus,” said Jenny, never looking away from Giles. “A favorite daughter. He killed her, and so they cursed him, and I’m here to make sure that he’s still suffering from that curse.”

“All right,” said Giles slowly. This made quite a lot of sense. “But—does this curse mean that he isn’t a danger to others?”

“The curse means that he has a soul,” said Jenny. “His soul. His moral compass, which should tell him right from wrong. The idea was to, to make him feel the guilt of all the terrible things he’d done—keep him suffering for eternity.” She exhaled, unsmiling. “I don’t like that idea,” she said. “It’s endless, pointless vengeance. I wanted to do as little of my job as possible, because he seemed guilty enough as it was.”

“If he had a soul,” said Giles, “then why on earth did he go after Joyce?”

Jenny’s hands tightened around his forearms and her head fell forward. “I don’t know!” she sobbed out. “I was the only one who knew what he was and I should have told you, you’re my husband, we could have stopped this somehow—”

“Jenny,” Giles whispered, gathering her into his arms. “This is in no way your fault. You had no idea this could have happened…” He trailed off, a lump in his throat. “And there I was blaming you for all of it. I’m so—”

“I’m gonna punch you out if you say sorry, Rupert,” said Jenny into his chest.

Startled, Giles laughed. Jenny raised her head, giving him a small, uncertain smile. “Then I’ll withhold my apologies for the time being, Jenny,” he said.

A strange expression crossed Jenny’s face.

“What is it?”

“It’s just—” Jenny bit her lip. “Janna,” she said.

“I’m sorry?”

“My given name is Janna,” said Jenny. “But it—I—Jenny Calendar’s the lady who married you, you know? I like being her.” She smiled exhaustedly. “You’re the simplest fucking thing in my life, Rupert,” she said. “The rest of it’s a mess, but…” She trailed off.

Giles could think of nothing less simple than being a Watcher’s wife. But the concept of telling Jenny the truth, of possibly hurting her more after she had just been so vulnerable with him, was worse by far than keeping this secret just a little while longer. “I am happy to be whatever you need,” he said instead, and kissed the top of her head.

Jenny snuggled into his arms. “We should tell Buffy,” she murmured.

“I quite agree,” said Giles, and let go of her, just enough for her to take his arm instead. Together, they entered the room, finding Buffy, Willow, and Xander all gathered around Joyce Summers’s bed.

“Ms. Calendar!” Willow perked up. “You’re looking—”

“—kinda awful, actually,” said Xander matter-of-factly. “Finally realize you’re married to the dorkiest man on the planet?”

“I also grade your assignments, Xander,” said Jenny, fixing him with a look that immediately shut him up.

“Are you another doctor?” Joyce asked Giles blearily.

“Oh, um, no, my, my wife and I are faculty at Sunnydale High School,” Giles explained. “We came to, ah, wish you a speedy recovery.”

“Boy, the teachers really do care in this town,” said Joyce, grinning a little.

Buffy’s face was tight. “Get some rest now,” she said, pressing a kiss to her mother’s cheek and leading Willow and Xander out of the room. Giles and Jenny followed. “She’s going to be okay,” she informed Giles. “They gave her some iron—”

“Buffy, Jenny has some important information about Angel,” said Giles, squeezing Jenny’s hand.

Buffy looked a little surprised. “So you do know him,” she said.

“I do know him,” Jenny confirmed. “And…I think you all deserve to know why.”

Jenny’s explanation led to Buffy deciding that there was a factor she was missing regarding Angel’s attack on her mother, which led to Giles asking a few more questions about the friend who Joyce had let into the house. This in turn revealed that it was Darla who had attacked Buffy’s mother, and so Buffy went after Darla, and Angel ended up helping Buffy finally take Darla down.

Giles found out about Darla’s death much, much later. He had instructed Buffy to take the night off, as Darla clearly wanted Buffy to go after Angel. He would later discover that Buffy had completely disregarded his words, as always, but currently, he was carefully shepherding Jenny into their house, then shutting the door behind him, hanging his coat on the coat tree by the door. “I’m sorry about the direction tonight took,” he said.

Jenny didn’t answer. Without a word, she grasped at his sleeve, fingers brushing his wrist.

“Jenny?”

“You didn’t have to be as kind as you were,” she said, and gave him a small, wobbly smile.

“You’re giving me much too much credit,” said Giles wryly. “If you’ll recall, I was completely horrible to you when first I found out—”

Jenny shook her head. “You didn’t have all the facts,” she said. “And now here you are with all of them, and you’re taking them in stride. I…” She trailed off. “You’re almost too good to be true,” she said. “I feel like there’s got to be some catch here, but there isn’t. There’s just you.”

Her fingers were drawing quiet, deliberate circles against the skin of his wrist, and the way she was looking at him brought back a sudden flash of memory—

“—have you heard that thing about annulments?” his new wife was saying, eyes half-lidded.

“Can’t recall,” said Giles, and took a sip of the horribly fruity drink from the hotel room mini-bar. It was the last alcoholic beverage left, or he most likely wouldn’t be drinking it at all.

“That thing where if you don’t consummate the marriage, it can be annulled like—” she snapped her fingers, “—that?”

“Don’t think that’s how it works,” Giles corrected, attempting to sound as dignified as possible even through his inebriation. “It’s more…more like, if a marriage is carried out while one ‘r both of the participants are…are unsound of body or mind—”

Jenny straddled his lap and kissed him. In his enthusiasm to return the kiss, Giles spilled the fruity drink all over the bedsheets—

“—come here,” Giles whispered, and kissed her. Jenny made a soft, shaky noise against his mouth and kissed him back—

—the sheets would have to be changed, he was certain, though he felt ridiculous for fixating on such a thing when he was married, for the first time ever, and wasn’t it romantic, meeting his wife and knowing right off that she was the one he wanted to be with? Marrying her because he didn’t want to waste a day? Jenny pushed at his shoulders until he’d fallen back into the pillows, and then he heard a sound like tearing fabric.

“Shit,” she laughed, pulling back, and Giles saw that the purple dress had ripped. “Okay, okay, hold on, I need to—”

“Take it off,” Giles suggested.

“Mmm, sounds good,” Jenny agreed—

“—only I wouldn’t want to pressure you into anything you aren’t ready for,” Giles murmured, breaking the kiss to rest his forehead against hers.

Jenny laughed softly. “Are you kidding?” she whispered. “Even after you found out I’m in Sunnydale watching a vampire with a soul, you’re still worrying about me? I can handle the decisions I make, Rupert. Kiss me.”

“No decision has been overtly made, Jenny,” Giles reminded her gently. “I did mean what I say about consent being important in this situation.”

Jenny smiled a little. “I want to sleep with you,” she said softly. “I want to be close to you.”

Giles studied Jenny, a lump in his throat. He was more than aware that Jenny’s vulnerability was something he hadn’t truly earned. Taking advantage of it under false pretenses didn’t feel right, no matter how very deeply he returned her feelings. The truth had to come out now, before they became even closer. “Jenny,” he began. “I have to tell you—”

Jenny exhaled, almost a laugh. “Whatever it is,” she said, “can it please wait? I’ve wanted—I want this. And I’m not stupid, Rupert, I know there’s still gonna be stuff I don’t know about you. That’s okay. I just wanna be with you right now.”

Giles wavered—

—his hands fluttered nervously to rest at her waist, gentle and careful. Out of the dress, she looked so much smaller, less polished and perfect. He felt as though he might hurt her if he wasn’t paying enough attention.

“I’m not a china doll, husband,” she said, trying out the word with a giggle. “Husband. God. Not gonna get used to that any time soon.”

“Do you regret it?” he asked.

She didn’t hesitate. “No.”

His hands gripped her waist as he kissed her—

—and kissed her, and kissed her, and carried her into the bedroom, overbalancing in the doorway so that they half-fell onto the bed. There was a sudden sense of urgency to Jenny’s kisses, one that Giles could understand. Their connection still felt so tenuous, especially after how easily he had been able to believe that there might be some—

“Catch,” he realized, and laughed a little.

“Huh?” Jenny blinked at him, moving up to lean back against the headboard. Her disheveled hair and half-unbuttoned blouse were bringing back much more explicit memories of their wedding night.

“I find it so hard to believe that you can just be you,” said Giles softly. “Much as you feel like there has to be a catch for me just being me. The likelihood of me marrying someone so, so kind, so brave, not just a belligerent stranger who microwaves plastic—”

“Now that’s the way I want people to describe me all the time,” said Jenny, and while her words were playful, her smile was something more akin to loving. “Come here, Rupert.”

“Yes, dear,” said Giles, a low purr, and her answering shiver was delicious as he moved up the bed to press her into the pillows.