Cordelia sat in the Library and tried not to tap her foot in irritation while Giles “gathered his thoughts”, what was to gather? She wanted to know about Angel.
“Well, I supposed I should start at the beginning. I will explain all the salient points first, then I’ll fill in some of the stories of things that happened between those times. To begin I shall explain the vampire line that Angel, then Angelus belongs to.”
“Okay.” Giles had paused long enough she knew he was waiting for her permission to continue. She had the feeling that he was hoping she would back down and he wouldn’t have to do this. No such luck for him.
“The order of Aurelius was founded in the 12th Century by the vampire Aurelius himself. The order was created as a sort of cult, those vampires would worship the old ones, the true demons. Most would even shun humanity in its entirety, choosing to dwell beneath the earth in tunnels and caverns to the point that most of them would lose the ability to take on a human face.” She could tell by his pacing that Giles had found his rhythm, lecture mode.
“You mean they were stuck all bumpy forever.” Yuck.
“Yes.”
“That’s not like one of those passed on things right? I mean that won’t happen to Angel will it?” Not that she would stop caring about him if it did, but she would like a little warning first, some time to prepare would be of the good.
“No, that only occurs if a vampire stops shifting from his more demonic visage to his human one. Staying in one face or the other for years without change causing a bit of a shift, nothing for Angel to worry about.”
“Good. Wait does that mean that if Angel stayed in his human face for like ever he wouldn’t be able to go all grumpy face.” If it worked one way, why not the other.
“Yes, in theory, though it has never been done before. The vampire instinct to.. go all grumpy face as you say, is too ingrained in them. They do so when they feed, when they fight, when they become excessively angry, even during intercourse. Shifting into that form is at times even done without thought or conscious choice.”
“Oh, okay then.” She was just checking, not that she had anything against Angel’s grrr face, in fact she found it very sexy, but she came here for information so she wasn’t going to hold back with the questions.
“Continuing on sometime before the year 1760 Aurelius had disappeared, he was likely gone long before then but his disappearance was not remarked upon until then and the vampire we knew as the Master took his place as the head of the family order. It is suspected by many that the Master killed Aurelius but there is of course no proof of that so to this day it is only supposition.”
“Oh he sooo did it, total power play. Just like that time freshman year when Patty Dennis wanted to be captain of the cheerleading squad and so she put this stuff in Mandy Lipcheks vitamin water that made her all moody and bitchy before she called for a vote to replace her on the team. Nobody would have known except when the vote didn’t go her way and instead Nina Hynes was elected new captain Patty totally flew into a hissy and spilled the beans about the whole thing in front of everyone.” She knew from the dazed look of confusion in Giles eyes that he was a bit on information overload. Still he continued on in lecture mode.
“Quite right. After his rise to power the Master ‘cleaned house’ so to speak. He rid himself of the vampires he believed to be unworthy or to have allegiance to others above him. Then in 1609 he turned a vampire himself, Darla. At the time of her turning Darla had been dying of syphilis after a life lived as a prostitute. He also turned another, the vampire Luke around this time but no one knows the exact date for his turning only that he was by the Masters side in the early part of the next century.”
“Wow, these are some weird names. I mean Darla, Luke, Angelus, Spike. What was up with that?” Not that she could talk with friends like Aura, but still, this was like a billion years ago when names were traditional and stuff.
“It was a tradition of sorts for the line, all vampires turned by the order of Aurelius would take a new name, one normally but not always given to them by their sire or someone of their line, thus leaving their human lives behind them completely. As far as I am aware Drusilla is the only vampire of the line to not do so.”
“Makes sense I guess, I mean it’s just like those actors that take on new names to make themselves sound more famous than they really are.”
“Indeed. Darla stayed by the masters side for a century, until she eventually struck out on her own in the mid-1700’s. Her travels eventually took her to Ireland where she met a young man whom she would later turn.”
“Angel.” Finally.
“Quite right. In fact it is believed that Angel is the only vampire Darla ever sired in her five centuries of un-life.”
“Huh, must have been love at first sight or something. Tell me about him, human Angel.”
“There’s not much known of his human life, it’s not until a person is a vampire of some note that the Council truly takes an interest and by that point most vampires are so distanced from where they originated that it’s nearly impossible to know for sure who they used to be. I do know that he was Irish by birth, that his family was of some note in the region though he himself was more considered the black sheep of the family. Beyond that I’m afraid the only person who knows anything about Angel’s life as a human would be Angel himself.”
“What was his name?” Maybe if she knew at least that much she could find out more on her own.
“Liam I believe. I don’t think anyone was ever able to deduce his surname but it was recorded by a watcher back in the later half of the nineteenth century that during a verbal altercation between Angelus and Darla she called him by his human name to get a rise out of him.”
“I guess that would do it.” Did that mean she shouldn’t mention it to Angel? Maybe she would bring it up and see how it went from there.
“Between two vampires there can be no greater insult than making mention of ones human years.” Or maybe she would keep it to herself. Then again she wasn’t a vampire, just a curious human really, so would it still be an insult?
“What else do you know?” There had to be more, Angel was like a billion year old, that couldn’t be all there was to know.
“Well after his turning in 1753 Angelus and Darla traveled Europe together as she taught him how to be a vampire. They remained together, just the two of them save for the odd traveling companion that would join them for a decade or so before parting ways, until Angelus turned Drusilla in 1860. The three of them traveled together until 1880 when Angelus allowed Drusilla to turn Spike, it is believed that he did so mainly to obtain a keeper for Drusilla more than for any other reason. The four of them transversed Europe together, their notoriety growing until they became known as the Scourage of Europe. The four most deadly vampires to ever hunt together. It wasn’t until nearly two decades later in 1898 after he’d been killing and rampaging for nearly a century and a half that Angelus was cursed with his soul.”
Wow, Angel had been cursed like a hundred years ago. Wow, Angel was totally old, not that she didn’t already know that, but still. Thinking about all the things he’d done to her in bed, she couldn’t see that as a bad thing. It was in fact all of the good.
“What else?”
“Oh no, that is the end of the history lesson for today, time to move on to the promised training. There will be more for you to learn tomorrow, in fact I do believe that I have enough stories of Angel to keep us going until the end of the school year.” Trying not to grumble as she got to her feet she conceded that he did have a point, besides now she knew the basics she could come up with some questions for their session tomorrow.
Oz waited for Cordelia out past the quad near the parking lot, he knew she had to come that way to get to her car where she stored her change of clothes for cheer practice. It really was amazing the things you learned when you just listen to the people around you. He’d noticed over the months that he’d been with the “scoobies” that they all tended to ignore Cordelia whenever she talked, so he’d been doing his best to listen to everything she said as a way to sort of balance it all out. Not that anyone really paid enough attention to know what he was doing, but he figured that at least karmically it was sort of balanced.
He’d gone over and over what to say and decided to take a stab at the Cordelia method and just try being direct, bordering on blunt. After Willow’s little ambush he doubted she would be in the mood for another surprise conversation so saying it right out would probably be his best bet if he wanted her to actually hear him out. He still couldn’t believe that Willow behaved the way that she did. He understood taking the side of a friend, but that didn’t excuse bad behavior. Seeing Cordelia headed towards her car he jogged to catch her before she left.
“Hey, Cordelia! You got a second?” He saw the thought of turning him down run through her mind for a minute before she relaxed and just let him speak his peace. The fact that he hadn’t been anything even remotely resembling hostile towards her since this whole Angel thing began appeared to be working in his favor at the moment.
Willow stood across the courtyard and watched as Oz talked to Cordelia about something that obviously was important to him from the way his brows were all scrunched up. His brows only did that when he was carefully choosing his words before he spoke. Which he shouldn’t have to do, especially with Cordelia, because he was Oz and therefore all the words he spoke were Oz words and all Oz words were good words. She watched as Cordelia’s patented bitch face melted away a little at a time until she was smiling at Oz. Smiling at her Oz.
Was she trying to steal Oz like she did Angel? Was she promising to do naughty things with Oz? Things that Oz didn’t think she would do with him. Because she would! Do the naughty things, if that was what Oz wanted. Willow started to see red when Cordelia leaned in and hugged Oz, her Oz, and kissed him on the cheek. She was trying to steal him from her! Well, she would just have to stop that from happening right now! Storming off Willow decided to head to Oz’s place and wait for him there where they could have this discussion in private.
Buffy stood at the door of Angel’s apartment and debated whether or not she should knock. If she did, that would maybe start them off on a better footing this time, but it also gave him the option of ignoring her. This was just like the first time she’d seen him after… no, bad Buffy, don’t go there.
Deciding to be civil this time, and to not just assume, she raised her hand and knocked on the door. If he ignored her, then she would just let herself in again, she thought that was a balanced compromise. When he opened the door her practiced opening line went right out of her head at the sight of his bare chest. Oh God, he was in nothing but a pair of boxers and it was making her brain go all fuzzy and lusty.
“Buffy? What are you doing here?” His words dragged her mind out of the gutter and back to the here and now. So not the welcome she’d been expecting. While he wasn’t all cold and dismissive this time, he was a little distant. Almost like he didn’t care one way or the other why she was there. Which she knew couldn’t be the case, because Angel always cared about what she was doing and where she was.
“Hey Angel, I thought you and I could talk for a bit.” She tried for a small easy-going smile, but it felt strained even to her.
Angelus looked at the desperation in the Slayers eyes and had to fight not to laugh in her face. He knew exactly why she was there, especially now while Cordelia was busy at cheer practice. The slayer was trying to be sneaky, and failing at it miserably.
“Sure we can talk. What did you want to talk about?” Making her spell it all out was always fun. Watching the girl who was feared the world over stutter and stammer was always an ego booster.
Angelus found Cordelia in the girls locker room, she was showering after her hard practice, the steam of the hot water wrapped around her like a lover. God she was beautiful! So much more appealing than the slayer. He knew she didn’t know he was there so he simply stripped down and joined her. He waited until he was right behind her, his hands ghosting along her back before he said her name in a low voice.
“Cordelia.”
Watching her jump and spin around, her eyes wide with fright did delicious things to him. God he wanted her.
“God Angel! Lurk much.” He watched her hand press against her chest as her heart raced and her breasts heaved as she tried to calm herself.
“Sorry, I couldn’t help it.” She rolled her eyes in an expression of universal feminine ire as she stepped out from under the spray of water.
“What are you even doing here? I thought we were meeting up back at your apartment later.” Even as she sounded irritated and put out, her body leaned towards him, an offering.
“We were, but I had an unexpected visitor, so I decided to just come here and find you instead. My apartment felt a little crowded.” He saw the pieces begin to slot together for her even as she opened her mouth to ask.
“Who.. Buffy.” Again she sounded resigned, like she thought it was only a matter of time before he came to his senses and left her for the slayer.
“Got it in one.”
“What did she want?” He heard the unasked question underneath, what did you decide? They both knew what she wanted, now she wanted to know what he chose to give her.
“Not what I gave her.” Which was beyond true.
He saw it take root in her mind that he wasn’t leaving her, as if he would ever leave his vixen. He’d come to a conclusion in his apartment, while he was playing with the slayer, his vixen was perfect for him. She was adventurous (both in bed and out of it), vicious (she could reduce the slayer to tears with nothing but her biting wit), and she submitted to him most beautifully. She was like a sexy mix of Darla and Drusilla, his two best girls all rolled into one killer package. His perfect woman, and he would never let her go.
As his skilled hands slipped between her legs he saw the same thought reflected back to him in her eyes, they were forever.
Dru danced around the room while she waited for her daddy to come home, there was so much to tell him. The red witch was about to be very, very naughty. She could almost taste the strawberries in her mouth, it was marvelous.
“Soon miss Edith there will be another at our tea party. We’re going to have a guest.” Grabbing her friend up she twirled her around the room as she continued to wait for daddy. No matter, she would wait forever for him, her Angel.
Kasey1939 