Title: Protecting the Boy

Author: Caliadragon

Cartegory: AU/Pre-Slash

Pairing: None

Part 1/1

Fandom: Buffy

Spoilers: Season 3

Warnings: Swearing and Willow bashing

Rating R?

Archive: Any list I send it to, those with prior permission and BC

Summary: Oz and Doyle call everyone together to explain about Willow and the danger Xander is in.

Part 3 in the About a Boy Series.

Thanks to Edi for the beta.

Protecting the Boy
by Caliadragon

Oz sat quietly at the table. Sadness and exhaustion showing clearly on his face. Buffy and Faith stood side by side. It was easy to see that the two felt awkward with one another. Cordy and Faith kept shooting glances at Xander and even Giles was watching the dark haired boy.

Xander was wondering why Willow wasn't there, but at the same time he was glad that she wasn't. Something had happened to his girl. The sweet girl who never hurt anyone had become someone he didn't know. It hurt to see her this way. Yet at the same time she was all he had. Or at least all he used to have.

Angel watched his boys. Faith and Buffy had wanted to stake Spike when he first came into the library. It had taken a lot of talking to keep the two Slayers from killing his Childe, but eventually they had settled down and had not killed him. Angel noticed that the only one absent from the meeting was Willow, and from the look on Oz's face it was deliberate.

"Well, what's with the meeting? You want to clue us in Oz-man?" Xander asked, with a faint sign of his normal cheek.

Oz nodded and looked down. When he looked back up his eyes held such pain that it made Xander's breath catch.

"Willow has been tainted by her magic. She's been doing dark spells on all of us. Mostly on Xander, though. She has placed a spell on him that makes any woman he has feelings for turn against him if they get...intimate. I think she cast a spell that made Giles and Buffy turn away from Xander and I know that she was using magic to influence our response to Wesley. Doyle had a vision that Faith is going to kill Xander in a week, after they have sex." Faith and Xander looked at one another in shock.

Then Faith snarled at Oz, "I don't know who this Doyle is, but he's lying. I wouldn't hurt the Xan-man. Besides Buffy he's the only one here that has accepted me. He even let me crash in his room a couple of times. Besides, as cute as he is, he's not my type."

"Just like you wouldn't use him as bait for a demon or ignore the fact that he had been missing for weeks and that you never checked to see if he was alright?" Wesley asked coolly.

Faith looked startled and then looked away, ashamed. "That was Willow's doing also. Something changed in her after the soul restoration spell. She doesn't even feel like Willow any more,"
Buffy said, speaking for the first time.

Giles frowned. He, too, had noticed a change in Willow after the spell. She had also become more obsessed with Xander and what he was doing.

"Could she be possessed, like I was?" Xander asked hopefully.

Giles paled and looked at Wesley, a look of horror on both their faces. "The Gypsy," Wesley whispered. Giles nodded in agreement.

"We'll need Ethan," Giles announced. Wesley only nodded while the others looked around in confusion.

Angel closed his eyes in grief and realized why it was that he went from loving the red haired girl like a daughter to hating the mere sight of her. Willow was holding a piece of the gypsy bitch that
cursed him. What had she sacrificed to resoul him, and would he lose both Willow and his boy before it was resolved?


The End For Now

AN: I just want to thank Kate R. for the idea of Willow being possessed by the soul of the gypsy that did the original curse. It was done by her first.