Homecoming (1/1) **This is a sequel to ‘Sacrifice’**
Author: Jena (VampGrl22@aol.com)
Rating: PG-13
Major spoilers for ‘Hero’; also this will probably make more sense if
you've read 'Sacrifice.'
Joss owns them but doesn’t love them. I love them to bits and bits but will
never make a dime off them. Go figure.
Many thanks to my darling Karya for the beta and the constant morale
support!!



11 January, 2001


Buffy,

Hi! How are you?

I wanted to thank you, the last time I wrote I think was the darkest time I
ever experienced in my life. Even worse that when Xander and Willow...but
I’m over that, thank The Powers. I’ve been planning this letter for a long
time, and I do feel bad that it took me so long to get it to you. Gosh,
Allen wasn’t even born yet the last time I wrote to you.

Let me stop here and tell you, he is the joy of my life. Every morning when
I look over at him in his bassinet, and he opens those big blue eyes to gaze
at me with an expression of such wonder and love, I feel as if my heart is
going to burst. I was right in calling my son a miracle from the beginning.

The moment we arrived here in Ireland, I felt like I was coming home. Let
me back up a little. Before we left LA, I decided I needed to do a few things,
the main one being to make things right between my parents (who, incidentally,
did decide to get divorced) and I.

I called my mom first, thinking that she would take the news of my
pregnancy by a dead demon somewhat better than my father would. As well as the 
fact that her first grandchild had been born a month earlier, without her even
knowing about it. Boy was I wrong. She really flipped out on me, insisting
that I come back to Sunnydale and all. As if. That would have been the last
thing I needed, to go back there and be totally embarrassed in front of all
of the people who used to know me- Cordelia went to LA and got knocked up,
she’s poor, and look at that outfit- no thank you.

When I finally got Mom calmed down, I explained that Angel and I were
leaving for Ireland in a few days and the tickets were already paid for, so
Allen and I didn’t really have time to come down for a visit before we left. 
By the end of the conversation, I think that she was actually relieved that we
weren’t coming, she’s definitely not ready to be a grandmother, and I think
that she’s, ewww, living with some guy.

After all I went through with her, I have to admit that I was relieved that
I got the machine when I tried to call my father. I laid out the situation as
best I could before I was cut off by the damn thing. I figured it was all
he deserved, really. After all, he hadn’t bothered to call me a single time to
see how I was doing in LA.

Mom’s actually planning a trip now to come over to see us, to meet my
little family.

I guess I need to explain about that, too.

When we arrived at Shannon airport near Limerick, I wanted to kill Angel for
dragging us halfway around the world. Allen cried nearly the whole time on
the plane, and I though the woman in front of us was going to shoot daggers
right out of her eyes at us. Until, of course, I gave her my best withering
high-school glare.

It was crazy, though, the moment we set foot out of the airport, Allen
stopped crying, and just looked around, wide-eyed, making this really
adorable cooing noise that I’d never heard before. Angel said it was because
he knew he was home. It gave me a really comfortable feeling, like we were
on the right path, you know?

Anyway. Angel had arranged for us to stay that fist night in some pub. I
couldn’t believe him- he wanted me and my child to stay at a bar!! I quickly
realized how different Ireland is from America. When the cab pulled up
outside the Lion’s Paw, there was this tiny, wrinkled old man waiting for us
outside. He hugged Angel as though he was his long lost best friend, and
kissed Allen and I both on the forehead.

I know you won’t believe this, ‘cause, after all, I am Cordelia Chase, but I
swear, I cried like a baby when he did that. This place has a feeling about
it, like nothing I’ve ever experienced before. The people are so warm, so
friendly, and it's a good damn thing too, ‘cause the weather sucks. Don’t
ever believe an Irishman when he tells you it doesn’t rain in Ireland. They
are all big talkers here; I can hardly stop myself from laughing half of the
time.

Oh, I forgot to mention. About an hour before we left for the airport, I got
a call from my mom. She said she called my Aunt Betsy, and when she told
Betsy about my trip to Ireland, Betsy reminded her about the Irish blood on
my Grandmother’s side of the family. So in a way, it's like I’m coming home,
too.

We stayed that first night at the Lion’s Paw with the O’Flaheretys, and the
next morning, after completely stuffing ourselves with Mrs. O’ Flaherety’s
cooking, Angel arranged for some sun-free transportation for us, he said to
‘see the country-side.’ I was a bit suspicious, ‘cause he had that shifty
look, you know the one, and wouldn’t say exactly where we were going, but my
son was content, my tummy was full, and I was feeling better than I had since
Doyle’s death, so I didn’t protest too much.

We drove for about an hour, and when we finally stopped, I could smell the
salt air of the sea. Angel explained the we were in a little town just
outside Galway, which is where he is from originally.

I guess that I really shouldn’t have been surprised that it ‘just happened’
to be the town where Doyle was born. And I suppose, knowing Angel as I have
come to, I should have expected that Doyle’s mother would be waiting to greet
us with open arms. My first week in Ireland, I swear I kissed and was kissed
by more strangers than I could keep count.

Doyle’s mother, Niamh, is the most incredible woman. Not quite five feet
tall, and with the second most amazing blue eyes I’ve ever seen, she cried
and cried when she held her grandson for the first time. Then proceeded to
nearly snap my head off for not calling her so that she could have been there
for his birth.

I think I’ve figured out Doyle’s attraction for me. His mother has the
sharpest tongue, even more so than mine was back in the old days.

After a day or so at her house, when I finally felt comfortable enough to act
myself again, I let Angel have it for something or another that he did, I
can’t even remember what it was now. Anyway, Niamh heard me, and burst out
laughing. She confessed to me that she had never liked Harry, you know,
Doyle’s first wife, because she is such a timid thing. She’s not really,
just in comparison to Niamh and me. It made me smile at first, but then I
started crying, thinking how Harry got that opportunity, to be his wife.

Something I would never be able to do.

Niamh got the strangest expression on her face when I explained why I was
crying, but she just held me while I cried. Later that night, I got up to
feed Allen, and I heard her and Angel downstairs, talking. I couldn’t really
make out the words, other than Doyle’s name a couple of times.

When Angel came upstairs a bit later, I pretended to be asleep. He came in
the room and kissed Allen, and I heard him whisper something in Gaelic to
my child. After he left, I turned on the light and fished out the Gaelic
dictionary I had brought with me, and it translated to something like,
"little child, your father is not far away." In response to which I
promptly went to find him, and demanded an explanation.

He tried to get an attitude with me, and said he would explain it later,
but I can be...well, rather persistent when I want something, and I was 
having none of that. So we trooped back downstairs to speak with Niamh.
I should have figured there was something odd about her, after all, the
woman did it with a demon (I can say that, mine was only half demon and at 
least looks human).

Angel confessed that, after Doyle’s death, he had contacted Niamh, and her
instructions were to ‘bring the lass and the babe as soon as the fates will
allow.’ Niamh told me that, after speaking with Angel that first night, she
had contacted Doyle’s real father, you know, the demon, and explained the
situation to him.

She’s a really powerful witch, did I mention that? She had to have been, to
call up Doyle’s father from whatever weirdo demon dimension he’s been hiding
in for all these years. Anyway. Niamh explained to him what happened to
Doyle, and pleaded his case, saying that he was called away too soon, and
that he had a babe about to be born that would need his guidance.

She did a beautiful job of playing the guilt card, saying how this child
would benefit from the guidance of his father, in learning to live with
demon blood in the human world. She said since Doyle himself never got that
support from his own father, that the least he could do would be to help
provide it to his grandchild. She laughed when she was telling me about it,
saying how she told him that in the human world, it is customary for the
father to pay money to help support his child, when his parents aren’t
living with one another.

I don’t think she had any real recourse, but she said she did imply the
slightest hint of a threat, that she would go to the oracles, who, from
what I’ve understood from Angel, sound something like Judge Judy for the
non-human sect. I don’t think that they would have cared that some demon 
didn’t pay child support, but it put the fear of the powers into Doyle’s Da,
and got him to help her figure a way to bring Doyle back.

Once Doyle’s father was on board, it sounds as though it was a fairly simple
matter to bring him back. I guess the Brachen demons have always had close
relations with The Powers, in a sort of messenger capacity, and when his
father made the proper supplication rites, They decided to bring him back. I
think it helped that Doyle’s Da carried love letters back and forth between
two of the main Powers a couple of hundred years ago.

Funny how these things work out.

So Doyle is alive. The first few days he was back were very hard for him.
He was all muddled and almost completely incoherent, and he couldn’t control
the switch back and forth from his demon face like he usually can.

Well, most of the time he couldn’t. After things had settled down a little
bit that first day (meaning his mother and I had finally stopped crying), I
brought Allen in to meet his father.

That moment is frozen perfect in my mind. I mean, here is this guy, flipping
back and forth between a human face and this blue thing with weird spikes all
over it, and he’s so disoriented he hardly knows where he is. But when I
brought Allen to his bedside, everything suddenly got perfectly still in the
room. All the gobs of relatives downstairs that had miraculously shown up
were finally quiet, and it felt like the world had stopped moving.

Doyle looked up at Allen, and then at me, and he reached out his arms, 
asking to hold our child. The instant Allen was in his arms, Doyle stopped
trembling, and when he leaned down to kiss him, his human features came
back into place.

He looked up at me and whispered shakily, "Princess."

We cried again for what seemed like hours after than, Doyle and I, wrapped
up in each other’s arms. Allen lay there in his father’s arms, perfectly
content- the only one without tears for a change.



I hear Doyle calling me, we’re going to see relatives of his this afternoon.
It’s amazing, he has about a million cousins and aunts and uncles. I think
everyone in this country is related to him in some way or another.



I expect Angel will be heading back to LA sometime soon. He loves it here,
it’s him homeland after all, but I can tell by the brood-y look he gets
sometimes that he won’t be content to just sit around here much longer. He
needs to feel like he’s out there, saving the world on a daily basis in
order to keep the guilt at bay.

I wish that you would go and visit him. He’ll be lonely without us there, I
know he will. And we sure as hell don’t want Kate keeping him company, now
do we?

Take care of yourself, keep fighting the good fight.


Cordelia Chase-Doyle

(That’s another story, I promise I’ll tell it to you soon!!)