Renewal by Rainne

Disclaimer: Joss Whedon et al own everyone in this story except Lexie, Gab and Tara, because those three are mine all mine.

Summary: The Powers That Be give the new family a little surprise.

Lexie was building a ramp on the sidewalk in front of the house when Willow and Buffy woke up the next morning and, as she seemed content with what she was doing and not in need of any help, they returned to their bed and to the newly-found pleasures that acknowledged love and lust can bring to two women. Learning each other and themselves was a study that could have taken the two of them a lifetime to master, but they took a break from their efforts somewhere around noon to get showers and face the world.

The ramp was done when they came out on the front porch. It had obviously been created through trial and error, judging by the bleeding wounds on Lexie's knees and elbows and the long scrape across her face, but she and two boys from down the street were using the jury-rigged structure.

Lexie turned toward the house as Buffy and Willow sat on the top step and waved. "Hey, Mom! Watch this!" She ran to the end of the sidewalk while the two boys squatted behind the ramp, set herself on her board and pushed off. She pushed harder, gaining speed as she came down the slight incline, and then hit the ramp and went flying into the air. She drew her body down into a crouch, knees against her chest, one hand on the front of the board and the other in the air, maintaining balance. She flew over the boys and landed on the other side of them, but lost her balance as she tried to stand and wound up going ass-over-teakettle into the street.

Willow's hands had flown to her mouth, and she stood, ready to race into the street, but Buffy grabbed her by the leg of her jeans. "Sit down."

"Sit down," Buffy repeated. Then Willow understood, and sat, though her face remained white.

A moment later, Lexie pushed herself up on her hands and knees, felt at her face, and began searching the ground. Finally, she found what she was looking for. She stood, bleeding from another new leg wound, and showed it to the boys, who laughed and mocked her good-naturedly. Then she approached the women on the step. As she got closer, they realized she was also bleeding from the mouth.

She spat blood onto the lawn. "Mighta been a bad idea," she commented lightly, offering something to Willow, who held out her hand. Lexie laid an incisor on Willow's palm. "Might need a trip to the hospital," she concluded, "or at least the dentist."

"Hey Ricky! Grab my board!" Lexie shouted. The older boy grabbed Lexie's skateboard and trotted up the sidewalk to her with it.

"Nah, man, I don't care. Watch that crack in the sidewalk though. It's a killer." The kids shared a laugh, and then Lexie turned slightly. "Mom, Buffy, this is Ricky. He lives down the street. That's Toby; he lives next door to Ricky. Ricky, this is my mom, Willow Rosenberg, and my stepmom, Buffy Summers."

"How ya doin', Mrs. Rosenberg, Mrs. Summers," the boy replied easily. "Nice to meetcha. You might better go, though. When my little brother got his tooth knocked out, my mom didn't get to the doctor fast enough and they couldn't put it back in."

At the hospital, the doctor pressed Lexie's tooth carefully back into the socket, causing the child to turn an alarming shade of gray-green right before her eyes rolled up in the back of her head and she passed out on the exam table. He shook his head slightly as he placed a clear retainer over her teeth that would hold the tooth firmly in place. "Well, that'll make this a little easier," he commented to Willow, and prepared two injections. "Tetanus and anesthetic," he explained, identifying them. "She's done some real damage to the calf here, and I'm going to have to stitch."

Willow sighed and sat back in her chair. "Go ahead," she said resignedly, with a wave of her hand.

The doctor chuckled. "I can tell by the state of her arms and legs that you're no stranger to the E.R.," he commented. "You've got that battle-worn look. I usually see it on the mothers of boys, though."

Buffy patted her shoulder. "At least she came by her scars in the daylight," she commented softly, causing Willow to think back over the many times she had witnessed and assisted in the stitching and binding of Buffy's broken flesh. They were familiar in her mind - she had laid her mouth over many of those scars the night before. Buffy grinned as she followed the train of Willow's thoughts by the blush that rose on the redhead's face. "Some things never change," she teased.

Lexie came around in the middle of the stitching of her leg, sat up quickly and watched interestedly. "That's so cool," she told the doctor as the needle pierced her flesh. "I can see it, but I can't feel anything." She reached down to poke it, only to have her hand gently batted away by the doctor.

Doctor and patient bantered back and forth as he finished stitching her calf and moved on to medicate and bandage all her other wounds. Both of her knees and both of her elbows got bandages and her face got antibiotic cream. Then he stood back and checked her over. "I think I got all the spots. Can you tell if it hurts anywhere else, or are you just one big pain?"

She took quick stock of her physical sensations. "Um. Pretty much a walking throb," she replied.

He nodded. "Well, you're going to be fine. You can take the retainer off the tooth in ten days. Go see your regular doctor in three weeks to get the stitches out of your leg. Keep the scrapes covered today, take the bandages off tomorrow, keep them clean and dry. And for God's sake, wear knee and elbow pads!" He helped the small girl off the exam table. "Now get out of here."

They exited the hospital into the warm afternoon sunshine. "I'm starving," Lexie commented. "What's to eat?"

"Everything in sight, I'm sure," Willow drawled, earning herself a glare from her daughter. She grinned unrepentantly.

But Buffy had something else to think about. "Lex," she began, "what's this stepmom business?"

"Well, you are," Lexie replied. "You guys are together now. That makes you my stepmom."

Lexie rolled her eyes in the exaggerated manner of the young teenager. "It's not like you were quiet last night, guys. I'm only thirteen, but I do watch movies and I know what it means when I hear what I heard."

She blithely strolled off down the sidewalk toward the truck while Buffy and Willow stopped in the walkway and stared at one another. "We gotta work on volume control," Willow commented.

Late that night, after Dawn and Lexie had been asleep for some hours, the window of Buffy's room slid open and two figures climbed out of it to sit on the roof. They looked up at the stars together, snuggling gently and talking in hushed voices about the future and what they hoped to do together in time.

"Giles is researching a way to let me retire from Slaying," Buffy said quietly. "He thinks there may be a way. An ancient ritual that he found in one of the early Watcher's Diaries - it's actually a scroll. He was Egyptian, and the hieroglyphics are kind of obscure, but his Slayer was active for six years before they did the ritual to retire her and she became a priestess of Isis."

"Yeah," Buffy replied. "Someone else to guard the Hellmouth, someone else to risk her life every night... Spending a normal day at home with my family before going to dinner and maybe a movie, and then coming home and putting the kids to bed and cuddling on the couch with my Willow instead of going out to wander through graveyards... Maybe even being able to leave Sunnydale, go somewhere else... I've never been to New York or Florida or Las Vegas or Canada... can you imagine?"

They were holding each other close when the telephone rang. It was Giles. "I've got it," he said simply. "It's called the Ritual of Renewal. And if we're going to do it, we need to do it tonight. It's just our luck that the stars are aligned. Tomorrow will be too late, and the stars won't be right again for seven years. Do you want to do this?"

Buffy stared at Willow with shining eyes. "He's got it," she whispered. "He's got it, and he can do it tonight."

"All right," Giles said. "Let me make a phone call. There's a powerful witch living out by the ice rink whose help I'll need."

"Don't bother," Buffy replied, realizing suddenly that no one but herself and Dawn knew that Willow was back. "I'll bring one with me." She hung up before he could question her and began pulling on her shoes while Willow dashed off a note to leave in case Dawn or Lexie woke up, then they hustled down the stairs and out the front door.

"Willow, you should know before we do this ritual - I don't know what will happen. I don't know if I'll keep my strength and abilities or not. I-"

"I don't care," Willow interrupted. "I don't care if you're as weak as a kitten and you fall over every time you try to make a high kick. If this is really what you want, then go for it. I'll help any way that I can."

Buffy leaned over and kissed Willow on the cheek. "I kinda love you," she whispered in the witch's ear.

They arrived at Giles' flat to find all of his furniture shoved to the edges of the living room and a large circle chalked onto the floor. "Giles?" Buffy called.

"Now," he began as he came into the living room, looking at a crumbling scroll bearing hieroglyphics and a sheet of paper with English words written on it. "What about this witch you've brought with-" he stopped at the sight of Willow, frozen, then suddenly rushed forward and caught her in a hug. "Dear Lord," he whispered. "I hadn't thought to see you again ever."

They shared a brief embrace, then Giles controlled himself. "Yes. Well. Here is the ritual. Can you familiarize yourself with it quickly? We have to begin before midnight."

Willow took the paper, glancing at the clock. It was ten forty-five. "No problem," she replied, perching on the arm of the nearby sofa and beginning to read.

"Not much," he replied. "Stand in the circle and be very still. It might hurt. I can't tell for sure if it's the glyph for intense pain or for a rain of bunnies."

"Well if it's bunnies, we'll hear from Anya," Buffy quipped. "I'm not worried about the pain."

They began the ritual. Buffy stood in the center of the circle, facing north. Willow stood on the east point, facing west and Giles stood in the west, facing east. They began to intone the ritual words together, pausing in the appropriate places to ring a bell or light a candle. And then came the moment of truth. Giles took up a handful of red sand, stepped forward and cast it over Buffy, shouting the last word of the ritual.

It turned out to be the glyph for intense pain. Buffy had never hurt so much in her entire life. She fought not to scream, but the pain increased and she couldn't help it. She felt as though every nerve ending in her body were on fire. She fell to her knees, her body wracked with spasms, jerking uncontrollably and moaning in the intense agony that blocked out every other surrounding sensation.

Willow moved toward Buffy, and stopped when Giles shouted to her. "Don't touch her! The scroll is very clear that she must not be touched until the ritual is finished. It could kill her."

Buffy lay on her back, unable to move, unable to hear, unable to scream. She was the pain; there was nothing else in her universe except pain. And then Something happened.

She didn't know what it was, but it radiated not-pain and she yearned toward it. She fell into its embrace and suddenly the pain was gone; there was only a floating sensation and the feeling of being deeply loved.

Then the love was a palpable presence near her that communicated with her and asked her something. She didn't catch it, so she queried wordlessly and the question came again, along with an image. She saw herself in the image and knew that nothing was taken from her - she was still strong and able - but something had been given to her: freedom. And the question came a third time. Is this your desire?

YES! She projected strongly, and the Presence asked her one more question, sent one more image. She had only to glance at this one to know the truth, and with all her being, she became the affirmation.

The Presence smiled upon her, and lowered her gently back into a body that was no longer tortured - in fact, it felt new and strong and whole. Then, before it left, there was a sensation of something being torn away from her, and a sensation deep in her core of something being added. She felt the blessing of the Power that had cradled her, and then suddenly it was gone.

She lay where she was for a long moment, searching for that thing which had been added to her. She found it, reached for it physically and cradled it as well as she was able with her hands. Then she opened her eyes and smiled up at the worried faces of Watcher and Witch above her. "It worked," she whispered. "It worked."

He smiled. "Congratulations, Buffy," he whispered to her. "You're free." Then he gathered her into a hug.

When he had released her, she turned to Willow and embraced her lover gently. "Thank you, Willow."

Willow responded by kissing Buffy gently. Silently, they helped Giles clean up the chalk on the carpet and put the furniture back in place, and silently they left him and returned home. The girls were still asleep - it was just one fifteen, according to the clock in the living room - and the two women slipped upstairs to climb once again out on the roof and look at the stars, still silent but somehow closer than ever before.

And then Buffy turned to Willow. "There's something you should know," she whispered. "When I was freed... I was given a gift. It's... it's so amazing. I want to share it with you; I want to share my life with you. Forever."

Willow nodded. "You know I'm yours, Buffy. You know that I always will be." They shared a sweet, lingering kiss, and then Willow asked, "What was the gift?"

Buffy reached over, took Willow's hand, and laid it on her stomach. Willow immediately felt the tiny spark of life within, and gasped, looking up into Buffy's eyes. "Is it... is it true?"

Willow's face broke into the biggest smile Buffy had seen since they were in high school together, even as the witch's green eyes filled with tears. They embraced one another there on the roof and, even as somewhere in Nova Scotia, a young woman of seventeen was informed by her Watcher that she now bore the mantle of Vampire Slayer, the Powers looked down from the heavens and smiled upon the witch and her lover, and the life that their love had become.

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Renewal

By Rainne

Djgirl1978@bellsouth.net