As soon as they got back, Giles left Buffy and the new girl, Sally, in Pamela's care and wordlessly headed for his own inner office. He could feel Ethan waiting inside and had been acutely aware of Ethan's presence tugging on him for almost the entire drive, getting progressively stronger the closer they got.

Giles found him standing near the front of the desk, looking uncertain. Ethan's jacket was off and one sleeve was rolled up high. His posture suggested he'd very much like to throw himself at Giles, but for some reason he wasn't moving.

"I'm back," Giles said, still feeling the lure towards Ethan, but Ethan's immobility seemed to hold him in place as well.

Ethan rubbed at his bare arm; his movements seemed shaky. "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," Giles reassured him then added, "I'd be finer if we were touching."

"Oh God, please."

Ethan's expression was beseeching. That broke Giles' temporary paralysis, and he closed the distance between them, pulling Ethan into his arms.

"Ohh." Ethan was now all movement, his hands rushing over Giles, finding skin, magic pouring out of him.

Ethan's magic was like a balm to Giles, soothing an ache so deep he was only completely aware of it now that it was easing. He pulled Ethan closer, letting his own magic reciprocate.

"Rupert, uh." Ethan grunted. Having managed to get under Giles' upper clothes, he seemed to be trying to touch all of Giles' revealed skin at once. He moved in for a kiss, and Giles could actually see the magic playing over Ethan's lips.

"Love," Giles murmured, drawn in like iron to a magnet to devour Ethan's mouth.

The kiss was hungry. Ethan moved demandingly against him, making small whimpering noises deep in his throat. His hands, which were moving up and down Giles' spine, were sending tiny shocks and ripples of sensation throughout Giles' nervous system. Things were quickly getting out of control, and Giles began to pull back. wanting to slow things down enough to talk. He got as far as "Ethan–" before his mouth was passionately covered again.

'Don't stop kissing,' Giles heard within his mind. 'Please. Don't stop touching.'

The plea, his own growing need when faced with Ethan's constant motion, and the equally constant influx of magic, broke through Giles' control. He gave up trying to make conversation just then. Instead, he placed his hands on either side of Ethan's face and did his best to meld them together.

Ethan's hands moved around to the front of Giles, and he felt his belt being undone. Giles pulled back only enough to work on getting Ethan out of his clothes as well. Frowning, Ethan grumbled. "I said–" Having got the belt open, he started on the button and zip. "Please."

"Have to get to skin to keep touching," Giles murmured, leaning in to kiss him once more.

Ethan moved one of his hands up to cup behind Giles' neck, clearly in an effort to stop Giles from breaking the kiss again. Giles felt the other hand slip into his boxers, magic spilling out over his belly and cock, and he groaned loudly at sensations that were almost too intense, too fast. If it had been any magic but Ethan's, it would have been.

Ethan seemed to be trying to suck on Giles' tongue, while his hand was moving uncoordinatedly within Giles' open trousers, his natural grace already subsumed somewhat by desire and urgency.

'Easy,' Giles said with his mind since his mouth was otherwise occupied and looked like it would be for quite some time. They needed to slow down, at least until the issue of clothing in the way was dealt with. 'I'm right here. Not going anywhere.'

'But you weren't,' was the reply, and far from slowing down, Giles felt Ethan's charged up hand curl around his cock; his sight actually whited out for a second at the feeling. 'Rupert!' Ethan's mental tone was somewhere between pleading and demand.

Giles growled and pulled Ethan's hand away from him. Ethan made a muffled noise of outraged complaint.

'Behave!' Giles ordered, grabbing onto Ethan's other wrist, pulling both behind Ethan's back and holding them there with one hand. With the other, he worked on getting Ethan's trousers open and out of the way, his own magic sparking along his fingertips without his conscious control.

Ethan moaned and writhed and struggled, but didn't break the kiss even now. 'Hurry!'

Giles pulled back enough to speak and growled, "Behave!" again. He tightened his grip on Ethan's wrists, pulling them upwards slightly in an effort to control him.

Grimacing in what could, at the most, only be mild pain, Ethan panted for breath and looked reproachfully at Giles. "I am!"

"Then stop the bloody squirming! I can't fuck you if I can't get your trousers off."

"Your magic..." Ethan moaned, probably trying to explain why squirming was necessary, but he stilled somewhat, although he was still trembling like a scared dog under Giles' touch.

'It's going to be all right,' Giles soothed, switching back to thoughts as he finally was able to succeed in getting Ethan's trousers open and out of the way. 'We need more than blind groping. I'm going to give it to you.'

"Please," Ethan begged, leaning his head towards Giles again as much as he could manage. 'Please.'

Giles kissed Ethan once more, hard and possessing, then spun him around and pushed him over the desk.

Desk equipment and stationery scattered everywhere as Ethan threw his arms out to stop his face slamming into the wood. "Christ, Ripper," he muttered. "Yes..." His trousers and boxers had fallen down to his ankles, but Ethan's arse, for now, was covered by his mauve shirt.

Pushing the material up out of the way, Giles guided his cock to the entrance of Ethan's body, pushing immediately inside, a stream of magic the only preparation he gave.

"Ahh." Ethan contracted his muscles around him, becoming almost impossibly tight, but then relaxed, shuddering. "Ripper," he moaned, and then in Giles' mind, 'Dearheart. Please. Show no mercy.'

At that point, Giles didn't need the encouragement; now that they had started, the same urgency that had devoured Ethan was swallowing him as well. Gripping Ethan's hips, he thrust into him hard and fast.

"God. God..." Ethan's arms moved out, knocking more stuff from the table, and his hands grasped the edge, white-knuckling under the pressure.

"Mine," Giles growled, the word falling from his lips without thought as he continued to try to fuck Ethan right through the table.

The reply was in his head as well as out loud. "Yours. Always yours."

"Yes." He thrust harder. "Always. Mine."

Giles' vision seemed cloudy, and what little part of his brain he had left to think with at first decided that he was seeing through a lust-fogged haze. Then he realised that what he was looking at was their mingled magic filling the air around them, charging it up like static electricity before a storm.

Ethan was grunting and muttering beneath him, the words little more than mindless sounds as he was pushed back and forth over the desk with every shove of Giles' body. In Giles' mind, however, Ethan was slightly more coherent. 'Love, magic, destiny, always. Love, magic, destiny, always.' He repeated it like a mantra, one word for each thrust.

Yes. In that moment, everything. Ethan writhing beneath him, their magic crackling and swirling around them, the words echoing in Giles' mind – Giles was struck by how right this all was. An absolute certainty invaded every molecule of his being; he was meant to be here, in this minute, doing exactly what he was doing. Doing exactly who he was doing as well. It was all exquisitely apposite.

Ethan's chant continued, becoming more and more desperate as the sensations surged inexorably towards the inevitable peak. The magic seemed to pulse to his words, to Giles' thrusts, everything in an inescapable rhythm that drove them onward like the drum of a slave driver. 'Love, magic, destiny, always. Love, magic, destiny, always.'

Giles' awareness narrowed to the feel of Ethan beneath him, their magic around them, and Ethan's words in his mind. Well, maybe what Ethan was saying out loud too as he was begging so pitifully. "Ripper. Please. Please, touch me." Without thought, Giles obeyed, reaching around and closing his fingers around Ethan's erection.

It was like he had completed an electrical circuit. Fire flashed through him, magic so potent it would be painful at any other time. Ethan bucked and squirmed below him, wailing discordantly, swearing and pleading. In his mind, the words of Ethan's mantra seemed to flash onto Giles' mind's eye like a lightning strike. 'Love, magic, destiny, always.' And then Ethan was coming beneath him.

There was no way Giles could've held back his own climax.

After a while, draped over Ethan's back, Giles became aware that Ethan was shivering as if cold. "Love?" Giles murmured, pulling back and letting Ethan up and then pulling him around into his arms.

Ethan's legs seemed to fold beneath him, and he clung to Giles. "Help? I think I've damaged something."

Giles' own legs were none too steady so he staggered them both over to his chair and collapsed into it, pulling Ethan onto his lap. "What's wrong?" he asked, reaching out with his magic sense, looking for any damage.

"Nothing." Ethan laughed a little breathlessly. "I just seemed to be a little spineless. I, er..." He paused suddenly and straightened then stilled in Giles' lap. "Heh."

"What?"

"Heh," Ethan repeated and wriggled uncomfortably.

Giles shifted a little, trying to help Ethan find a more comfortable position. "What's heh?"

Ethan looked at him with a cringing smile. "I feel rather like I always used to after a powerful ritual spell."

Giles frowned and reached out with his magic sense again to see if he could figure out exactly what ritual spell Ethan could have accidentally performed.

It was true that the potent and plentiful magic they had released during their activities was now all but gone. It would normally dissipate slowly, but now that Giles came to think about it, he rather felt it had been gone ever since their climaxes. It was hard to work out how the magic had been used, however. There was no residue of the kind most spells would leave.

That was worrisome; following their instincts with magic was one thing, but when he couldn't even work out exactly what it was they'd done... "Do you know what happened?" he asked.

"No, but I can guess," Ethan told him, snuggling closer. "The words I was repeating..."

"Love, magic, destiny, always," Giles murmured.

"I truly never intended... I was just... I don't know what I was doing," Ethan admitted. "The words made me feel good, added to the whole experience."

"Sex magic usually does feel good," Giles pointed out, still frowning. "So it was... a binding of some kind?"

"Really, Rupert, I don't know. I had no intention in mind as I had no idea that I was doing... whatever it was that I was doing. I'm... I'm sorry. Can it really be anything that bad with those words? Our words?"

"Probably not," Giles admitted. "It's just... We did it without knowing we were doing it, or what we did. That's a dangerous precedent."

Ethan shivered again, and he moved his hand up to rub at his other arm, the one with the rolled up sleeve. Giles realised that was the arm he'd branded with a badger-shaped mark. Their sex really was getting quite excessive, wasn't it?

He reached out and touched the brand himself, unfocusing his eyes slightly so that he could see the magically formed mark. "That I meant to do." Just in case there was any doubt.

"Heh," Ethan said yet again, his eyes staring away from Giles.

"We just have to be careful. We don't want to accidentally blow the roof off the place, after all. That might be a bit hard to explain in the insurance forms."

"Hmm, yes." Ethan definitely seemed a bit distracted. "Tell me, Rupert. That orange light on your intercom hanging off the desk by its lead there, what does it mean?"

Giles stared at the orange light, which indicated that the intercom was open, with something he was sure was close to horror.

"Oh dear," Ethan said quietly. "Lucky Pammy."

Feeling the heat in his face, Giles reached over and flipped the intercom off.

"So, let's summarise," Ethan said with some sarcasm. "First, I nearly cause you to kill yourself and two Slayers by calling at an inopportune time. Then I cast powerful magic without even knowing what or how. Then we discover that I somehow pushed a button that has revealed our sex life in all its glory to your assistant. What should I do for tea?"

"You've had a rather full day, haven't you?" Giles asked, teasing gently.

"Perhaps you better be in charge of cooking tonight, remembering that I have a history of kitchen disasters already."

"We'll pick up take away on the way home."

Ethan chuckled, but then frowned. "Um, am I in trouble?"

Leaning over, Giles kissed him gently. "Firstly, you didn't cause me to almost kill myself; that blame lies squarely with that psychotic lorry driver. Secondly, neither of us know exactly what's happening with our magic; the blame there, if there is any, would have to lie on both of us. Thirdly... Well, all right, I'll give you the revealing our sex life."

"If you hadn't shoved me over the table..." Ethan started to defend himself, but then grinned. "Want me to chat with Pammy?"

"Pamela is the least of our worries on that regard. I left Buffy and Sally with her in the outer office."

Ethan hissed. Then giggled. Then he seemed to be trying very hard to look serious, although he was failing. "Oh... dear."

"Yes, I can see you're completely broken up about it," Giles said wryly.

"Dearheart, I'm sitting on your lap with my trousers around my ankles and your posh Council office looking like it's been the scene of some dreadful bout of fisticuffs. I really can't feel anything very much but proud." Ethan's smug expression certainly confirmed his words.

The office, or at least the area around his desk, did look rather like some kind of localised windstorm had hit it. It was going to take a considerable time to tidy up. "Oh dear."

Now Ethan was definitely smirking. He cupped Giles' face in his warm hands and kissed him softly once before saying, "Of course, ultimately, this is all entirely your fault."

"How do you come to that conclusion?"

"Well," Ethan began to explain after kissing Giles again. "You decided you simply had to go to Leighton Buzzard of all places. None of this would have happened had you stayed safely at home where I could keep an eye on you."

Giles shifted in his chair uncomfortably. He really didn't want to start an argument just then, but still, his going to Leighton Buzzard had been necessary. "I had to collect Sally, and I don't think having you and Buffy trapped in the same car for the length of time it took to drive there and back would have been such a good idea."

"Anyone could have collected her, Rupert."

He shook his head stubbornly. "I'm not going to just sit in this chair and send others to do all the work. I need to keep in touch, Ethan."

"Then you need to keep in touch with me," Ethan said, really quite placidly.

"If I had kept any closer touch with you in the last half hour, we would've broken the desk."

That got another giggle from Ethan, but he insisted, "You know what I'm saying, dearheart."

He did. Giles sighed and didn't answer. He didn't know how to tell Ethan without upsetting him that their bond sometimes now felt more like chains weighing him down than the wonder of connection it should've been.

Apparently sensing his mood, or at least that something was wrong, Ethan slipped from Giles' lap, his face turned away from Giles. He restored his clothing to some sort of order, but didn't say anything. Giles watched him and idly rubbed a finger over the ring he wore. "I love you," he said because he felt like he needed to say it.

Ethan turned, and his answering smile seemed sad as he said, "Always."