“Willow, I get that you miss magic, I do. But this is our world now. So maybe finally this is a fight we can win.”

It’s not Buffy’s fault. I know that. But as she battles a vampire in front of me for the zillionth time, it’s hard not to want to shake her. She doesn’t get it. She can’t get it.

She’s never known what it’s like to be powerless.

It’s been months since magic left the world. And everything’s changed.

But apparently, I’m not the only one experiencing the downside. I first realised after a big rain when I saw the rainbow. With two colours. Music, poetry, everything is going bad. This isn’t just me not liking new trends.

No one can hit a note. Everyone’s auto-tuned. Coke doesn’t taste right anymore. People wander around aimlessly.

I see examples everywhere. It’s not just that there suddenly aren’t witches and the occult around now. Suicide rates are moving up every day.

It’s the inspiration. The dreams. All the things that make life so wonderful. It’s just not quite… there… like it used to be. So I’m setting out to do something about it. To bring magic back.

I decided to team up with Angel, who’s on his own mission to bring back the late, great Rupert Giles. I guess we’re all just trying to pick up the pieces. Together, we found a way into the magic blue yonder, using Buffy’s Scythe. It took us to a dark place, but I needed to find a little light for what comes next… Say what you will about intuition. Go on. Say it.

“Okay, things are going on here. Possibilities. And me without my camera phone.”

It’s not easy to describe. The sky is a burnt orange. Not because of the sun going down — as if it’s literally burning. The only thing I can see in front of me is jagged rock. Minimal green. The vegetation I can see is burnt. There’s a river flowing through the valley below me. The water is black. Is that a volcano?

“Hey!”

So much for my sweet air walking. Best be careful, after what almost happened in Quor’toth. Gotta relearn some things in this brave new world. Let’s start with an old trick Giles taught me for divining arcane concentration.

If I find a strong enough surf, maybe I can bring some of this mojo with me, Wi-Fi-style. Save the world. It’s what we do. But all the rifts I open shut too quickly. Earth’s portals are closed for business. Here’s hoping the way will present itself when I get… wherever.

“Okay. Now an offering of blood…”

Wait. No. Not blood. Not after what Quor’toth almost made me. No Dark. Bad time to go Dark. When there’s no one to snap me out of it. Any bodily fluid should do.

So I dig deep into my nerd lore: Leo taught Kate to do it in Titanic. Spit like a man.

“This one’s for Xander.”

And nothing. “Underwhelming. Maybe I do need blood.”

And then it fires up in front of me. Flames taller than me, from the centre of the pentagram. It nearly singes my eyebrows.

But okay.

“Okay! That really, really worked!”

“Never should have doubted you, Willow. Now follow the Hellish brick road back.”

The light from the flames snakes out as if it’s alive, a pure trickle of flame, along the cold, hard ground. It’s not exactly singing Dorothy.

I notice the noises above me before I see where they’re coming from. They aren’t bats. Or birds. They’re demons, creatures with bat-like wings. Snakes almost, with bat tails.

Oh!

And they’re shooting flames at me! Aah!

“I can still do this. Thank Artemis my power is back on!”

“Excudo!” The lightning comes out of my hands. Finally. I feel a surge come up my arm, like goose-pimples. Unfortunately, I don’t see if I hit any of the snake-bats.

“Too many.”

Discretion is the better part of valour, as they say. So I run, through the thick, squelchy mess on the ground. I don’t want to know what it is.

I think I’ve lost the winged snake-monkeys.

And then I see the worm. At least, I think it’s a worm. It looks like a big, long worm, with sharp teeth.

“Oh crap! Oh crap! Wait, flying monkeys, come back!”

I inch myself away from the worm. It could be like a T-Rex? Movement-coordinated? No? Maybe shouting will work?

“Back, you slimy… oops, teeth! Come any closer and I’ll keep backing away in an intimidating fashion.”

I didn’t see where the blast came from. Somewhere behind me. The snake-bat-monkey things fall from the sky, like clay pigeons being hit and dropping like a stone.

Luckily for me, the worm eats them as they fall. At least someone’s fed and happy.

“And that could’ve been my head!”

And then my would-be saviour’s voice comes from behind me.

“Humans are too sweet for the bogworm.” I turn slowly, not recognising the voice. I’m surprised as I turn around. The voice was normal, human – not gravelly.

The saviour standing in front of me is anything but.

He has horns coming from his head, and blank pupilless, yellow eyes. Kinda like a troll. His face is like Ludo from Labyrinth. With no Bowie swagger. His stick looks like it could hit things, like little red-headed witches.

“It feeds on the wingheads. You attracted it by attracting them with your pyrotechnics.” He’s huge. Way bigger than me. And he’s holding onto Buffy’s Scythe. As if it means something to him.

“Oh, well of course! Eat well, sickening mouth maggot. Happy to be of service.”

Convincing enough? I really hope this guy doesn’t misunderstand my pipsqueak charm and eat me.

He doesn’t. He hands me back the Scythe. “Thanks for the help.” Can he hear my voice shaking? Wouldn’t do to look scared of the beasty. And then, politely and graciously, the big horned dude gives me a name.

“Call me Marrak. I am a fellow traveller.” We start walking through the trees. At least it’s company. I ask him if he lives around here, but he surprises straight away, telling me that he’s not from this dimension, whatever it’s called. He’s from the same world as me. Earth. I tell him my name. Manners cost nothing.

“I don’t remember a ton of animal-man sorcerers, and I kinda got around. Geographically. I mean.”

“Dark magic made me look this way. I have come here for years, for supplies. I can get them nowhere else. I’ve tried to go back on my path, back across the void, but I cannot. I could not access any of the routes that worked before.”

Another life ruined because of the Seed of Wonder being destroyed? Damnit, how far does this thing spread? How much damage did we do? Is it even repairable?

“You’ve been here a while then. All routes are closed.”

“But if you made it through, there must be a passage?”

Oh Goddess, he sounds so hopeful. And I have to disappoint him.

“‘Fraid not. I had a one-way ticket. Magic just stopped working – everywhere, on our world.

“Is that true? All magic. Gone?”

The way he asks the question, devastation that we caused in his voice. Now I wish I hadn’t said anything.

“What kind of bastards would neuter our world like that?” His language takes me by surprise. It’s only then do I realise he’s been speaking English the whole time. How? Did he get it from me? “This just makes it all the more important to bring power back, and with it vengeance.”

Vengeance? Quick to violence, much? “I don’t think that’s what the world needs, more vengeance, I mean…”

And then he interrupts me.

“You don’t know what I’ve been through. It’s taken all my wits to survive this long. I will do whatever it takes to get back. This trail, this divination spell you cast – it was to find some mystical cache?” He looks down at my little light, still trickling, still guiding.

“Sort of. I cast my net kind of wide.” He follows along with me, but I shiver when he speaks behind me, a little too close, like he’s a devil or angel on my shoulder. “Imagine being back. The only witch in the world. Imagine what you could do.”

“I’m not doing this for me,” I tell him. Which is the truth. “It’s the whole world that needs the magic. If there’s some mystical faucet to turn it back on, or whatever, then that’s what I’m going to do.”

We continue walking, and he becomes more chatty as he goes along. He wants to go home, essentially, and I can’t blame him for that. Isn’t that what we all want? To be safe and warm and looked after? He also says he would like to keep his power when he gets there, which gives me some pause. But he offers to help me in my quest, and I’m kinda running low on team players. So, Marrak, welcome to the team.

“You know this place better than me. I’m not really sure what to expect. I studied a lot of occult histories before I left. If I can find a strong enough magical source – stronger than anything on Earth – I still have to figure out how to open a permanent connection to our world.”

“Have you considered that you could serve as that connection? You could be the source.”

Sounds dangerous. So I tell him so.

“Sounds dangerous.”

I look up and suddenly I realise how long we’ve been walking. The light is getting dimmer, but I don’t see a sun in the sky anywhere. Marrak tells me, as he perches on a nearby boulder for a rest, that there’s no sun or moon in this dimension, but there is a day and a night like Earth. If he knows how that works, he doesn’t explain it to me. I don’t suppose it matters in the long run.

I hear the noise again before I see anything. This time it’s a thunder sound, like rumbling. And then the ground in front of me rises up to meet me. I yell for Marrak – “What’s happening?” – but then I see it. A giant bogworm. But this one is no baby bog worm. This is mama bogworm, looking for lunch.

It lurches at me, it’s mouth burying in the ground where I was a few seconds ago. I move, as quick as I can, and then a quick spell and ZAP!

“Flamma frigus!”

When the bogworm barely notices my blast, I yell at Marrak again. “Stall it!”

“I hope you said kill it.” As I watch from where the worm threw me, his stick, that up until this point hasn’t been anything more than a rudimentary cane, starts to create a red glow above it. It looks beautiful: red, swirling energy, growing bigger in size. And he fires it when it’s ready. straight at the maw of the bogworm. He yells in delight as he hits it.

The bogworm yells in anger as it shrugs it off. And, surprise, surprise, it’s now angrier than ever! And then I realise: it’s not angry. It’s not screaming at us in rage. It’s mocking. It’s laughing at us.

“We’ll see who laughs last!” yells Marrak to my left. I have another idea however, and ask him to keep the thing busy. I begin to chant in Latin.

I close my eyes and place my hands on a nearby boulder. It’s part of this terrain, so should contain what I need. I chant, continuously, almost not hearing as Marrak continues to yell, first to the beast, then at himself and finally me. “Use your blade,” he warns me. Finally, after what seems like forever, mainly cos I’m out of practice, I do it.

“Got it!”

“You want to let it chase you for a while?” Was that sarcasm? From Marrak?

“Just lead it through here!” I lead Marrak forward, past two large boulders that I’ve been lulling to my side. As the bogworm tries to pass the rocks, it stops, trapped, like a fly in amber.

“Yes!” Voila! One masterfully executed binding hex, using the rocks.

Marrak congratulates me on a job well done. “This should hold it for about six hours.” I start to move on, tell Marrak that we should be miles away by then, but he takes the Scythe from my hands. Before I can get the broken handle back, he’s killed the bogworm, unable to defend itself in my trap.

“How dare you! I had it under control!”

There was no need. The creature could have just waited and slept. How could he? What right did he have to kill the native creature? Another red alert alarm for me. His answer, however, does have a smidgen of logic to it.

“This is an unforgiving place. You can’t let a foe simply be. Also, we need to eat.”

He hands me back the Scythe. I have nothing to add. He’s right.

A few hours later and he has a fire going, cooking the meat and helping himself to what I think is his fourth piece of worm. I sit there watching him, trying not to judge, failing epically.

“It wouldn’t be so bad except for all the eyeballs and random teeth.” Seriously, I’m not that brave. Help yourself, really.

“Not the worst I’ve had.”

He lies back on his cloak, stretching his arms. “It will all be worth it,” he says, crossing his legs. “When I am back home, my power restored.” He makes himself comfortable. I lay down on the dirt, my arms underneath my head.

“That’ll be good times alright,” I can’t help but agree in a way – it will be so good to be home, to feel the magic in the air again.

I close my eyes, and somehow, drift into what passes for sleep.

We’re up early the next morning, or whatever time of day it is. The sky is light enough to see to walk. And that’s what we do. For hours. Following the little trickle of light through the same barren land – devoid of everything except gnarly trees and blackened sludge underfoot. As we approach a tree line with more leafless trees, the light goes straight through it. It clearly doesn’t care that we’d need to clear a path.

“The trail might be harder to follow in here.”

“Maybe this forest is the source we seek.”

As I follow Marrak through the foliage, I find that there’s a clear path inside. Looks can be deceiving.

Never forget that.

“Okay. Enchanted forest. We’re here. Show us where the magic tree is and we’ll be on our way!”

Marrak looks ahead to where the light is leading. He urges me to follow, realises I was being sarcastic, but then gets excited. “Willow! I think you found it!”

He leads me to a crystal clear lake. Completely not out of place in a dark, dank forest. No sirree.

“Well, we can fill our canteens at least,” I tell him, but he’s still looking at me.

“No, don’t you get it?” He points at the water. “I’ve not seen a spring so pure, so radiant like this since I’ve been here. Maybe this is what we need.” He stops short of jumping in. I grab hold of his cloak the second before he touches the pool.

“Hang on there a minute, Thirsty! Haven’t you ever read a fairy tale? This wonderful, beautiful, convenient spring might put us to sleep for a thousand years.” I don’t think he’s being serious when he asks me if I want to boil it first.

“I’m worried about magic, not dysentery. Here.”

I pull the pendant out of my pocket. Something Kennedy bought for me before we… before I broke us up. I cover my pain with a smirk, although why Marrak would care is beyond me.

“I’m not totally unprepared. This has just been a paperweight for a while now, but here. It should work.” Good, Willow, lie about it. Pretend it’s not something you never take out of your pocket.

“A purity pendant. Druid?”

“You know your stuff, Marrak. Two more seconds…”

I dip the pendant in the water, just enough to cover it. It comes up glowing green. The water is save to drink. “Chug-a-lug,” I tell my companion. But then I realise he’s walked away from the pool’s edge. He’s rubbing his mouth. He starts to say something, but I don’t hear it properly.

“Whoa. Something is up.”

My head spins. Not literally. My brain feels like its being folded – not in a horrible way – like someone flicking through a book. A book of my life. Like it’s all happening right now…

“Yeah, you’re the Slayer, and we’re like, the Slayerettes.”

“… got this Xander. I can hack into their systems and…”

“Well, I like you. You’re nice and you’re funny. And you don’t smoke. Yeah, okay werewolf. That’s not all the time. I mean three days out of the month, I’m not much fun to be around either…”

“I can do stuff… but I get tapped out quickly. And I’ve used every spell, I know, practically…”

“Tara? Baby? Baby, c’mon!”

“And for the truth, I choose the Trickster…”

I shake out of the high, restored to normal, the fog lifting like I’m coming down off anaesthetic. And then thinking about all that makes me self-conscious. I wrap my arms around my waist. I look up at Marrak, who’s staring at me. “Didn’t get all that, did you?”

“I was just kicked in the face by every failure in my life, if that’s what you mean,” he says, rattled like heck. “I thought you said the water was safe!” He’s not angry, more annoyed. I hope.

“You’re amulet promised you’d not be poisoned. It didn’t say it wouldn’t make you recall things most important.”

Marrak turns at the new voice, but I already have. The pool. That water must be 80% proof because, I swear, that’s the only way I can account for what I see in front of me.

It’s a caterpillar. Smoking a hookah. Reading a book which I can’t see the title of, but if it says Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, I wouldn’t be surprised. This guy, all of him, is ripped straight out of the book!

“The pond’s a spring of memories from which you drank. Save now and in time you’ll think of me with thanks. Whatever we do, wherever we go… Our memories are all we really have, you know.”

“Marrak, that water’s making me see a big, fat caterpillar speaking in bad verse. You?”

“Same thing.”

Thank Goddess.

I approach the caterpillar and smile graciously. I may have done a little curtsey. This is way too Wonderland. I don’t realise until I say it, that I’ve said it aloud. I don’t think the caterpillar is happy. In fact, he stands straight up. taunt, just like the movie.

“I’m 3,000 years old, young lady. Carroll based that character on me!” Ouch. Must be a sore point.

He tells us the water is life-giving, just with a few extra ‘benefits’. No magic though.

“Is there some source, some kind of concentration of magic? Something that could put magic in a place where, say, there isn’t any?” If you don’t ask, right?

“Why would you be looking for something like that, pray tell?”

Straight to the point. But he asked. So…

“Magic was taken away from my home. People there are hurting. They need it.”

He lowers himself down to me. “Your home has no magic? Sounds terrible.”

I ignore his presumed sarcasm. “Exactly! The world needs the light – I just wanted to heal the damage that’s been done.”

Marrak looks at me, takes me to one side, cautiously. “Willow, I know you’ve tasted dark magic. That’s where the real power to change this lies.”

“I have. It’s why I need to stay pure.”

The caterpillar looks down at me, inquisitively. “You believe it’s like that? Tell me, do they have dark science where you’re from, too?”

For the third time since I’ve been here, I hear something before I see it. A crunching noise, pervading the air. I ask the caterpillar and Marrak if they hear it too. They do, as the caterpillar stops talking mid sentence.

“Light and dark are not so easily disentangled…” The crunching noise is getting louder, getting closer and more frequent.

He stops. Looks at us point blank. “Uh, you didn’t happen to kill anything on your way here, did you?”

Then a mighty roar and the bog creature is among us. This one is not a worm. If the last one was a mama, then this one is the daddy. I lose count of it’s eyes. And his teeth that I can only just make out through the clicking mandibles that want to shred us.

The caterpillar just looks at us. “You did, didn’t you?”