As Willow and Angel entered the church, Willow wondered, < Did Angel
  deliberately pick this church for its atmosphere? > They had chosen a
  church as a meeting place for Brother Lugo to put the monk more at ease,
  but Willow had to keep herself from giggling in nervous laughter. < Talk
  about gothic! >

  It was a cavernous church and the massive interior was only kept from being
  in complete darkness by the flickering glow of a thousand candles. The
  stone pillars and columns seemed to tower from the floor in a never-ending
  ascension up through the impenetrable shadows of the ceiling. The church
  emanated an aura of sanctity and grave majesty.

  Angel grew restless, all the crosses nearby were making him uneasy. Willow
  wasn't so troubled, but then again she hadn't had time to test how crosses
  and holy water effected her. Besides finding out if her flesh burned when
  coming into contact with those things just wasn't particularly high on her
  list of things to do. Up to this point she had optimistically hoped that
  she was as unaffected by them as she was by sunlight.

  But now waiting in the shadows of the church, Willow thought about it and
  on impulse she dipped her pinky finger into a nearby well of holy water.
  She hissed in pain as it burned her and snatched her finger out. < Well,
  there goes my optimism. >

  Angel nudged her, "At least now we know you can't play with holy water."

  "Perfect. But next time I think to do a little experiment, oh...say with
  crosses, or garlic stop me," she shot back grimacing.

  They stopped their banter abruptly then as the echo of footsteps announced
  that someone had entered the church.

  Brother Lugo stepped cautiously into the church and for the twentieth time
  was unsure if he had made the right decision in coming here. The girl who
  told him to come here was a mysterious figure and he wasn't sure that he
  trusted that. He felt there was something strange about her, something he
  couldn't quite place his finger on. < But she knows about the Anointed One.
  That's why I came. She seems so young to be aware of such great evils. >

  Brother Lugo himself understood a great deal about the powers of darkness
  that lay under the surface of the everyday world. He knew of things that
  most people put down as horror stories put out by fertile imaginations. He
  knew of demons and vampires.

  Willow and Angel stepped out from the deep shadows of an alcove.

  "Brother Lugo," Willow called out softly.

  "Yes? I have come as you asked." The monk walked toward them. "Tell me,
  who
  are you?" he demanded.

  "My name is Willow and this," she motioned to her companion, "is Angel.
  We've come to Rome to find you. To ask you for your help."

  "You said that this morning. How do you think I may help you?" the monk
  asked quizzically.

  "We come from Sunnydale, California - the Hellmouth." Willow paused and
  looked up at Angel for support, then back at the monk. "Two weeks ago I was

  c-captured by the Anointed One. He tried to turn me into one of them. Into
  a vampire."

  "What?" Brother Lugo's eyes widened.

  "In a way, he succeeded," she continued.

  "Y-Y-You-You're both vampires?" Willow nodded not wanting to scare him,
  but Brother Lugo looked at Angel and Willow now with fear and started to
  back away putting his cross out in front of him. "I saw you in daylight! No
  vampire can do that...none that I know of. How is that possible?"

  "You can keep that out if it makes you feel any better, but we're not going
  to hurt you," Angel said calmly.

  "Please, listen. We are different from other vampires," Willow tried to
  make him understand.

  "Different? There is no half measure in becoming a vampire," Brother Lugo
  spat out.

  "But we're not demons! We still have our souls." Willow blurted out.

  "Why would I believe you, much less help you?" the monk asked
  incredulously.

  Willow rushed to fill in all of the details of what had happened to her.
  Explaining why they had sought him out.

  After listening intently if not skeptically, Brother Lugo asked, "And you,"
  motioning to Angel, "you have a soul as well? You were FRIENDS with the
  Slayer?" He was completely bewildered by all of this.

  "Do you believe us?" Willow questioned, her eyes shining with all the
  sincerity of her soul.

  "I don't know." Brother Lugo's mind spun. Despite his better judgement
  there was something about Willow and Angel that convinced him. Both
  exuded
  an unconscious humanity in their desperation for him to believe them.
  "I...yes, I do believe you."

  Relief spread across both their faces and Willow asked, "Then you'll help
  me?"

  "There is nothing that can change a person back from being a vampire. I
  don't even know if its in my power to anchor your soul, Willow." At her
  downcast face he added, "But I have many resources. I will check them to
  try and help you. As for the Rom, whom you spoke of as another possible
  source of help." Brother Lugo shook his head, "The Rom will not help you or
  do you any favors. They are ones to hold grudges for generations. I would
  not go to them unless you want a stake in the heart."

  He gave Willow what seemed a pitying look, "They did not curse Angelus
  without understanding what torment he would go through as a vampire with a
  soul."

  *~*~*~*

  The warm night air felt like a balm to Willow's battered soul. She felt
  calm and undisturbed here. She drifted silently along, wandering aimlessly
  down a strange road. Suddenly the ground seemed to open up beneath her
  feet. She fell, but it seemed as if she were in slow motion. Nevertheless,
  she landed jarringly onto what seemed to be the floor of a cavern. The
  cavern glowed in a fiendish, red
  light and it seemed familiar somehow, as if she had been here once before.

  Willow trembled.

  Suddenly she heard screams and wanted to run away desperately from the
  sound until she realized the screams she had heard were her own.

  She must have blacked out because the next thing she knew, she was lying
  on
  the same road she had started out on. Willow felt strange, disoriented and
  different somehow. She got up though and started walking again. Willow
  could see where she was and could feel her body, but she had no control. In
  fact, she felt separated from her body. She seemed to be going on instinct.
  She didn't understand what
  was happening to her.

  She found herself honing in on a man, coming up behind him. Almost as if in
  third person, Willow watched herself helplessly as bloodlust overcame her
  and she attacked him. She couldn't see his face, but she was bent entirely
  on obeying a primal need as her eyeteeth elongated. She sank her fangs into
  the man's neck, relishing the taste of the blood.

  As she finished draining him, she heard laughter behind her. It was
  triumphal and completely evil. Willow whirled around and saw that it was
  the Anointed One laughing. At his feet was Buffy, lying murdered at his
  feet. Buffy's dead eyes were opened and they seemed to stare accusingly at
  Willow.

  With the limp body of the man still in her deadly embrace, Willow shrank
  back in dread. Slowly she finally looked at the features of the man she
  held in her arms. Her face blanched even more if possible when she actually
  saw his face. It was Xander. < No! Oh please no, Xander, not you! >

  As she looked in absolute horror, Xander whispered dying, "Willow, why?"

  The Anointed One's laughter grew more maniacal. Suddenly Xander's body
  wasn't slumped in her arms anymore, he gained strength, his eyes glowed
  red
  and as he took on the visage of a vampire. Xander inquired with grotesque
  calm, "Why did you make me into a vampire?"

  "Noooo!" Willow screamed from the depths of her soul. She woke shaking
  and
  sobbing

  Unable or unwilling to sleep after coming home from her stakeout, Willow
  had not slept at all the previous day. So today, worn out and dispirited
  after the meeting with Brother Lugo, Willow had fallen asleep immediately.
  With sleep came her darkest nightmares.

  As she tried to erase the image of Xander as a vampire from her mind, Angel
  came in. This time knowing what to expect, he went directly to her side.
  But unlike last time Willow couldn't seemed to be comforted. Her sobs
  increased and she was unable to stop. Angel picked up her slim body and
  cradled her like a small child.

  "I can't do this anymore. It's too hard." She sobbed against his chest.

  "No. Listen to me Willow." He forced her chin upward to face him. "I don't
  know one person in a million that could have endured this better than you
  have. You are much too strong to let this beat you. I know you're scared,
  but don't give up."

  "It doesn't matter. You heard Brother Lugo, even if I do keep my soul,
  I-I'll still be a-a vampire." Tears streamed down her ivory pale cheeks as
  she spoke these last words in utter desolation.

  "It does matter." Angel said quietly. "I know what its like. I understand
  and I may be the only one who would understand."

  "God, how have you managed to do t-this for so long?" Willow whimpered.

  "When I first got my soul back I felt exactly like you do now. Scared.
  Angry. Only..." He hung his head and his whole body tensed with the
  remembered suffering.

  Even now Willow was able to look beyond her own misery and understand.
  "You
  didn't have anyone, not like I have you." Her voice extended a sympathy
  that held deep awareness of her debt to him.

  It was Angel's turn to look away. "There was that, but that wasn't the
  worst of it. I had this incredible guilt for all the things I had done. I
  still do. All the lives that I took. I deserved to be alone for that."

  Willow pulled back and shook her head in vehement denial, but he continued,
  "I almost went insane. Thank god you don't have to deal with that and never
  will," he said fervently.

  "How do you know that, Angel? I feel it waiting to take over, waiting for
  me to be weak. I could hurt someone. Someone I love even," she said. Her
  expressive eyes were alive with horror at the memory of Xander and Buffy in
  her nightmare.

  "Is that what your dreams are about?" Angel asked tentatively.

  She gave a tiny nod and another tear slipped down her face. Angel silently
  brushed away the tear streaks.

  Angel never really knew how it came about. Maybe it was in his attempt to
  let her know that she wasn't alone in her fears, but he found himself
  confiding in her. He talked about those first years when he had regained
  his soul, his attempts to redeem himself and his own worst fears. He spoke
  more about these things than he had ever done with anyone before.

  Listening, Willow wished she could wipe out all those impossibly lonely
  years he must have suffered. And in the face of his unadulterated honesty,
  she found that she could do no less than open up to him as well.

  The words once begun, flowed out of her. And for both of them it was almost
  a relief to speak aloud the words that haunted and rattled about in their
  minds like ghosts needing to be exorcised. Each found comfort in the
  knowledge that they were not alone in their mutual struggles.

  Neither knew how long they stayed up talking like this, but finally
  drifting off to sleep Willow sighed, "Stay..." and then she was asleep.

  Angel looked down at the girl in his arms. She lay there so trustingly.
  Willow was a sweet, innocent person who didn't deserve this fate. Angel had
  always imagined that he would have to endure complete isolation as the most

  unnatural of unnatural beings - a vampire with a soul. Now there was
  Willow, and it was as if she were a kindred sister. He was no longer the
  only one.

  Yet Angel would have given anything to give Willow her old life. But they
  would find a way. HE would find a way, to protect her. He shifted slightly
  as to get more comfortable and brought the covers of her bed around them as
  he too proceeded to fall asleep.