Chapter 20

Title: Chapter 20
Series: House's Key
Author: Sevangel
Disclaimer: BtVS-Joss Whedon & House-Created by David Shore, owned by Fox
Rating: PG-13

-

"So Dawn can use this key thing to heal people?" Wilson says, mostly to himself. "Think of what that can do, the people it could…."

"Seeing how they'd either have to drink almost all of her blood or share blood during sex, I don't see her 'healing' anyone but me." House interrupts. "And I'm pretty sure Willow said something about medicine not mixing with magic."

"Since when do you listen to what anybody else says?" Wilson frowns.

"I'm not so arrogant that I can't admit when someone knows more than me." House says.

"Since when?" Cuddy asks disbelievingly.

House quirks his lips. "Okay, so I am that arrogant but thanks to my wife's freakish blood powers I can now converse telepathically with her. Not a side effect that I'm going to enjoy and an indicator of why mere mortals like us shouldn't mess with magic."

"You just called your wife a freak." Wilson says disapprovingly.

"No, I called her blood freakish." House corrects. "She's just Dawn."

"So, do you have any idea where she might be?" Cuddy asks. "Or are we just driving around for the hell of it?"

"Nobody said you had to come with us." House glances into the back seat. "You invited yourself along."

"Dawn's my friend, despite the company she keeps." Cuddy looks at him pointedly. "And I'm worried about her."

House doesn't say anything, just flips his cell phone between hands, willing it to ring. Calling Willow was a last resort, Dawn not answering any of their phone calls or his mental ones. Not that he really knew what he was doing when he tried to mentally call her but he did try.

His phone rings, breaking up the silence in car. "Where is she?"

"Well, hello to you too." Willow's chirpy voice says.

"I don't do the touchy-feely thing that Dawn is so fond of, unless it's with her." House growls into the phone. "And I also don't make small talk. Where is she?"

"Rosewood Cemetery, it's about three miles from where you are." Willow says.

"Why is she in a cemetery?" House asks after a moment of hesitation.

"I think that would be better coming from Dawn." Willow says hesitantly.

"I didn’t ask what you think, I asked why she's in a cemetery." House growls into the phone. "I'm going to assume that you spoke to her…"

"Telepathically, yes." Willow cuts in. "And there's no need to be rude."

"Wait a second, you can talk to her telepathically but I can't?" House frowns into the phone. "Dawn said our 'bond' was strong."

"It is." Willow agrees. "She's blocking you out."

"She's what?" House shouts into the phone.

"Blocking you out." Willow repeats. "We've told her how much power is in blood magic and I partially blame myself because I should have stayed around to warn you but I was worried about Faith. Right now, Dawn is experiencing an enormous amount of blood lust, enough to drive a person insane honestly. The safest way to get rid of that lust is sex. Lots and lots and lots of sex. Like you would need Viagra to keep up, that's how much sex. Denying herself that, it's gotta be all kinds of painful. The other way is killing stuff. And by killing, I mean as violent and bloody as she can get it. So that's what she's doing, looking for things to kill."

"So she's what, looking for demons?" House asks.

"Vampires." Willow corrects. "And if I wasn't completely drained, I would be going to get her. It's…she's like a crack addict right now, looking for her next hit. She'll have no sense of self preservation or any real sense of reality. All she's going to care about is killing the blood lust."

"Fuck." House mutters under his breath. "Why the hell didn't she tell me that?"

"I think Dawn should…."

"Rosenberg, answer me." House orders.

"Because she feels bad enough for what happened that she didn't want to force you to have sex with her when you're mad." Willow sighs. "She's going to kick my butt for saying so but she'd rather get the living hell beat out of herself than force you to do something you don't want to do."

House shakes his head, hand clenching around his cane. "Dawn said something about a private island."

"Wolfram & Hart has one, yes." Willow says, confusion evident in her voice.

"Arrange it." House orders. "We'll be ready in the morning."

"No, you'll still be having sex in the morning." Willow argues. "I'll arrange it for noon."

House doesn't wait for her to say goodbye or say it himself, instead just flips his cell phone closed and directs Wilson where to go.

"Why am I driving into a cemetery after dark?" Wilson casts a glance at his best friend.

"To get my wife." House leans forward, eyes squinting as he searches the graveyard. "Over there."

Wilson pulls the car over where House indicates, leaving it running, and then the three doctors pile out of the car.

House grinds his teeth, hand clenching around the cane that he doesn't actually need. "She is in so much trouble."

-

Dawn grunts when a fist connects with her cheekbone. It hurts but the hurt feels good, feels better than it should. Her lip is already bleeding from where she was kicked in the face a few moments earlier. She falls with the punch, a headstone digging painfully into her back, and kicks out her legs at the vamp. Knocking him back a few feet, she pushes away from headstone and drives her knee up into his groin. As he falls to the ground, she slams her knee into his face, breaking his nose. And then does it over and over again until his blood is coating her pants.

"Fuckin' bitch." The vampire growls, loudly, hand clasping around Dawn's ankle.

Dawn screeches as she hits the ground, the wind knocked out of her. The vampire straddles her waist, slapping her across the face as he leans down to, fangs covered in blood.

"Nice try, overbite." Dawn bucks her hips, flipping them over until she's straddling him. And before he can move again, she reaches into her back pocket for the stick she picked up and drives it through the vamp's heart. She collapses backwards on the cool damp grass, which feels wonderful on her scorching skin, and pants. She's slayed more vamps in the last three hours than she has in the last three months. But it doesn't matter because nothing feels different, she still feels like she's going to crawl out of her skin. She feels movement beside her and quickly pushes to her feet.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" House grabs Dawn by the arms, shaking her slightly.

"Greggy?" Dawn blinks, head tilting to look at her husband. "What are you doing here?" She looks behind her husband to see James and Lisa. "Jimmy, you okay?"

"He just exploded." Wilson gasps, mouth hanging open.

"Yeah." Dawn licks her lips, smearing blood across them. "They tend to do that, vamps." She shakes out of Greg's grasp. "Look, go back to work, I'll be home in a couple hours."

"No." House says lowly. "You should have fucking told me about the blood lust, Dawn."

"My problem, not yours." Dawn says. "I'll take care of it."

"By what, getting the shit beat out of you?" House reaches forward to touch her cheekbone.

Dawn hisses between her teeth. "Greggy, I can't stay here and argue with you…I don't…I have to go." She starts to walk away, intent on finding more vamps, when a strong hand clasps over her wrist. And before she can even protest, she's flipped over a slightly muscled shoulder, her already bruised face bouncing off a mostly bony ass. "Damn it, Greg."

House smacks Dawn's ass with his cane and carries her towards Wilson's car. "Come on, Wilson, let's go." He tosses Dawn into the backseat none too gently and follows her in.

"Greg, I can't breathe." Dawn grinds out. "I can't…I feel like I'm going to die and I have to go. Just let me go, I'll be fine, I promise."

House gathers Dawn onto his lap, hands sliding under the back of her shirt as he finds her mouth.

Dawn gives a low, guttural moan, legs moving to straddle Greg's lap. She sucks greedily on his tongue, her hands fisting at the front of his shirt. She's soaking wet, her cunt throbbing and nipples achingly tight. She wants to be fucked and she doesn't care that they're not alone. Doesn't care about anything but having Greg inside her. She reaches between them, fumbling for his pant's buckle.

"Jesus, baby, no." House grabs her hands and forces them away from his cock, gripping her seemingly fragile wrists in one of his hands. He breaks the kiss, growling when Dawn bites his lip. "Hotel."

-

"Need you to get me scrip." House tells Wilson.

"House, I am not getting you more Vic…"

"Viagra." House interrupts. "Bring it to room 104." He doesn't wait for Wilson to respond, just jogs back to the room he deposited his wife in. He doesn't even make it into the room before she's on him, her long legs wrapping around his waist and her wet, warm cunt rubbing against his belt buckle. He walks her into the room, kicking the door shut behind him as he fumbles with his belt buckle. He pushes his pants down far enough for his cock to spring free and spins around, slamming her back against the door.

"Inside." Dawn orders, her mouth sucking at his neck. "C'mon, please…." Her head falls back on a moan as he thrusts deeply, inside her. She cums instantly.

-

"Thanks." House grabs the pill bottle out of Wilson's hand. "Tell Cuddy we'll be back in a couple days, I'm taking some vacation days."

"Is Dawn….okay?" Wilson asks, head cocking in an attempt to look into the room.

"She's fine." House replies. "Or as well as she can be, given the circumstances."

"Have Dawn call me when she's herself so that I know she's okay." Wilson says.

"She's my wife, I can take care of her myself." House scowls.

"But she's my little sister, remember." Wilson points out. "I'm allowed to play the concerned older brother."

"Fine." House rolls eyes. "See you." He slams the hotel door shut and pops open the pill bottle, throwing back one of the blue pills even as Dawn tugs on his hand. He manages to close the bottle before her warm mouth wraps around his flaccid cock, but it drops to the ground moments after. If they keep up at the rate they're going, leg magically fixed or not, he's going to need the cane in the morning.

-

"Do we need to take her to the hospital?" Wesley kneels down, concern marring his face.

"No." House glares at the British man, tugging Dawn more fully onto his lap. "I am a doctor, remember?"

"Yes, I do remember." Wesley pushes to his feet, hiding a smile at the possessive show. Seems both Summers girls fall for overly possessive men. "But by your appearance, I think you might need a doctor also."

"We've done nothing but have sex for the past sixteen hours." House says. "What do you expect?"

"Given that, exactly what you two look like." Wesley nods. "She does know better but Dawn has a soft spot for Illyria. She thinks that if there's one part of good in her, than whatever the key is can't be completely evil. I think she believes that if she can save Illyria, make her more human, it will by result save her."

"What do you think?" House asks, curious in spite of his exhaustion.

"That it's like comparing oranges to apples." Wesley replies, seating himself across from the doctor. "Illyria and Dawn originate from the same time and I guess technically speaking, they were on the same side, but their world wasn't like this one. They battled like we breathe. They didn't kill out of anger or passion or hate, they just killed. It was about power."

"So why isn't Dawn like her?" House runs a hand through his wife's tangled locks, the twenty-one year old passed out on his lap.

"Dawn is a human being first and an old one second." Wesley replies. "In fact, she very rarely touches the key elements of herself. She's only done so a few times. She's….Illyria is an infection, a disease that destroyed Fred with no more malice than a viral phage. She doesn't have emotions or feelings that you and I can comprehend. She doesn't understand our world or us, at all. Dawn is her only connection to humanity and she only obeys her because she has no choice. But she would kill everyone of us if Dawn told her to without hesitating. She doesn't feel like we do but she's not evil, per say."

House just arches a brow.

"Angel is one of the greatest mass murders that walk this Earth." Wesley tries to explain. "Without a soul, he killed thousands upon thousands of people, for fun. He enjoyed every strike, every bruise, and every drop of blood. He was a soulless monster that killed like a plague, only he did it on purpose and enjoyed every moment of it. But with a soul, he would die to save this world. He would give up everything that he has, is, to protect a world that will never know of his existence. He gave up his son, the only child he will most likely ever have, to give him a better life."

"What does this have to do with Dawn?" House arches a brow.

"Illyria is soulless." Wesley says. "Dawn is not."

"Jeffery Dahmer had a soul and it didn't stop him from cannibalizing the neighbors." House points out.

"True." Wesley agrees. "Having a soul doesn't necessarily make one good or evil. That's a decision that a person makes." He waves at Dawn. "The power that is inside her body, I don't think anything like it's walked the world since the old ones or will walk the would again after she's dead. If she let Illyria teach her, there's no end to what she could do. But she doesn't. Even if her power is completely evil, completely black, Dawn isn't."

"So that whole taking over the world…." House lets the sentence trail off.

"If she wanted to, there would be almost nothing that could stop her." Wesley says. "Fred's body couldn't contain Illyria's powers, we had to remove a good majority of them otherwise California would have been blown quite literally off the map. But Dawn's body was created for the sole purpose of housing an infinite amount of power. She would make Illyria look like a child by comparison if she ever used that power."

House glances down at the woman, girl really, curled up on his lap.

"Yes, it's rather daunting, isn't it?" Wesley comments. "In all probability, the largest concentration of power to exist in one being is currently sprawled across your lap."

"Huh." House murmurs, shifting Dawn a little on his lap. "That's extremely hot."

-

Dawn whimpers as she wakes up, her body feeling like one big bruise. One big, very sore bruise. As her eyes open, she knows she's not in her bed or Greg's, the mattress is too soft. Like feather soft. She has to blink a few times to get her bearings straight and is surprised her head doesn't hurt. She's naked and by looking down at herself, bruised. Some are old, Greg's fingerprints on her hips and ass, while some are new, such as the bruising between her legs and on her upper arms. Her memories are vivid, clear images of healing Illyria, doing a blood exchange with Greg, fighting vampires, and then Greg angry. Pissed off. Mad in a way she doesn't ever remember seeing him. Him growling into her ear as he pounded into her from behind. Turning her over his knee and spanking her like a child, which she came twice from, and him between her legs, doing things with his tongue and teeth that had her screaming over and over again, begging to come. Which he held off until she was actually sobbing for release. And all over this, over and over again, for hours.

But mostly, she remembers the betrayal in his eyes, the anger at what she did. She promised herself from almost the moment that they started sleeping with him that she would never try to force him to do something that he didn't want to do. That she wouldn't try to change who he was or what he does. But she did and she very well might have ruined her marriage because of it.

Climbing out of bed sends bolts of pain to every part of her and by the time she's in the shower, she's near tears. The hot water has her hissing between tightly clenched teeth but she forces herself to remain under the hot spray. But it hurts, hurts so much that her knees buckle and she hits the shower floor with a pain-filled gasp. Then it's just too painful and she doesn't even care to get up, instead just leans against the shower wall, tears sliding down her face. So lost in her self-pity party, she doesn't hear the bathroom door open or footsteps crossing the room until she's being lifted off the shower floor.

"C'mon, Dawn, you know I'm not good with crying." House mutters as he carries his sobbing wife into the bedroom. But she just tightens her arms around him, her tears warming his neck. He's never been good with tears, if it were anybody else he'd walk away but he can't. Not with Dawn. He wants to, wants to be able to walk away from her because he doesn't like needing anyone but he needs her. So he does something he never thought he'd do, holds someone while they cry.

"I'm sorry." Dawn whispers shakily after a few minutes.

"I know you are, Dawn." House brushes her wet hair away from her face. One hand gripping her hip, he leans over to he table beside the bed for a bottle of pills and the bottle of water he left there. "Here, take this."

"What is it?" Dawn asks after she dutifully swallows the pill.

"Dawn, you don't ask that afterwards." House shakes his head. "You ask that before."

"You wouldn't give me anything that'd hurt me." Dawn shrugs, leaning into his body with a happy sigh. "So, what was it?"

"Vicidin." House says. "You're in pain, aren't you?"

"Oh, yeah." Dawn nods. "We uh…we were a little rough, weren't we?"

"Yes." House gently tumbles her back onto the mattress. "Doesn't anything hurt in a way it shouldn't?"

"Everything hurts, Greggy." Dawn tugs on his hand, pulling him down with her. "But I'll be okay."

"Yeah, well, I want to check." House pulls away and urges her arms down. Her body is peppered liberally with bruises, some from the fight but most from last night. Her hips and ass are pretty much permanently marked with his fingerprints and now so are her arms, maybe from him grabbing her in the cemetery or from one of the times he held her down while he fucked her senseless, he's not really sure. The inside of her thighs are bruised too, chafed from his hairy legs. Her cunt is red from overuse, the pain filled gasp she gives when he barely brushes it telling him that she's very sore there. Not that his cock isn't sore as hell too, peeing actually hurts.

In all honesty, she looks like a rape victim and the bit of guilt that he feels shocks the hell out of him. He didn't rape her, not even close to that, she was begging him the entire time, with him in everything that they did, so he shouldn't feel any guilt at all. But he does and that cements everything; no matter what, he's never letting her go.

"So, am I okay?" Dawn asks, eyes drifting closed as the wonderful medicine pushes through her blood stream. Her body will heal itself rather quickly, as long as she doesn't do anything further to injure herself. And most likely because of the blood exchange, Greg's body will heal just as quickly. "How long was I out?"

"About four hours." House replies. "Wolfram & Harts' jets are insanely fast."

"Yep." Dawn agrees.

"Do you remember last night?" House asks.

"Uh huh." Dawn nods. "I'm so sorry Greg, I didn't….I shouldn't have done that and I know you're pissed off that I did, and I don't blame you. And I'll ask Willow to find a way to fix it or block the connection…."

"I'm over that." House interrupts. "I was pissed and I don't like it but I'll deal, especially if it's possible to block each other out."

"That's not hard as long as you have emotional control." Dawn says. "And you totally do so it'll be a snap for you."

"You can explain to me how later." House says. "Now we need to talk about your stupidity."

"I'm not stupid." Dawn opens one eye to glare at him but instead ends up smiling.

House smirks, the dilation of Dawn's eyes and her almost drunk behavior amusing him to no end. She's so damn adorable when she's drunk and he doesn't think anything's adorable. "No, you're very intelligent but with absolutely no common sense. What the hell would possess you to fight vampires when you were tripping on some blood lust thing."

"Greg, if I didn't I would have went completely insane." Dawn says. "You saw how I was last night…."

"Why didn't you tell me that?" House asks. "Did you really think I was going to say no?"

"No, I know you would have said yes." Dawn replies. "Because you would feel responsible or something."

"Dawn, I don't feel responsible for anything." House shakes his head.

"You were pissed and I didn't want to force…."

"Do you think I'm going to end this if you don't do what I say or if you disagree with me?" House asks.

"No, of course not." Dawn shakes her head.

"Or if you try to get me to do something you think I don't want to do?" House sits down and lifts her onto his lap. When she doesn't answer, he tilts her head back to look into her eyes. Most of the time, he forgets how young she really is, how innocent she is, but then moments like this happen and her insecurities flare up. "I don't talk about my feelings, you know that. I love you, Dawn, and I'm fairly sure there's nothing that you can do to change that. I know you're not going to try to change me and I'm not going to divorce you if you don't like something I do or want me to do something that I don't want to do. Okay?"

After a few moments, Dawn nods, hands tugging Greg down on top of her. She doesn't really hurt anymore, she's actually pleasantly numb. "I love you too and I don't want you to change and I promised myself that I wouldn't try to make you change."

"I know." House kisses the top of her head and rolls over to gather her against his side. "You need to get some more sleep."

"Have you slept?" Dawn asks, arms and legs wrapping over him.

"No." House grabs the sheet bunched up at their feet and pulls it over them. He walked on the beach some, ran a good amount, and then came in to watch her sleep. Something he'll never tell anybody. "Go to sleep."

"M'kay." Dawn yawns. "Love you."

House doesn't say anything, just kisses the top of her head before closing his eyes and joining her in slumber.

-