Some hours later they realized this wasn't a ghost. They still weren't quite sure what it was. It wasn't anything they'd encountered before. The books were strewn about the hall. The table had been turned over as a makeshift defensive barrier, but had been cleaved in two so it wasn't protective for the group for long. Giles was out of crossbows. Dawn was low on blowdarts but the poisoned tips weren't slowing the behemoth down anyway. Willow hit it with mystic blasts, ice, and fire. Kennedy and Buffy were beating the thing with their blades, and since it had four arms, two heads and a malleable torso, it was more than holding its own against them, sparks flying every time their metal connected with its stone-like skin. That's what gave Xander an idea.

He retreated up the stairs to the upper landing, and grabbed a tapestry that had been hanging from the wall. After ripping it off the top of the ceiling, Xander grabbed the rope which held the chandelier.

Xander then realized to make this work he'd need to cut the rope and use it like a Tarzan jungle vine. Which he couldn't do cuz he didn't have an eyeball that could shoot lasers with a glance. That'd be handy right about now. Then he remembered his trusty swiss army knife, but realized to get it out he'd have to drop the tapestry. Which he did, then fished out the knife and began cutting at the large rope. It was gonna take longer than he thought when he originally came up with this plan.

"It's a golem!" Dawnie yelled excitedly. Nose still in the book.

Giles tried not to sound too placating but, "that's very nice Dawn dear, but you mind being helpful in a more action oriented capacity?" Giles was actually dancing behind Buffy and Kennedy holding a mace, but couldn't get a clear shot at the golem without risking hitting one of his slayers, and realized it wouldn't help much anyway.

"What you want I should throw the book at him?"

"Gah! I'm so stupid!" With that, Willow ran out of the room, still holding Giles' handkerchief to her nose.

The others then looked up. Even the golem did for a moment, as they all heard Xander attempting and failing at a Tarzan-like battle cry, swinging across the hall on the rope that had been holding up the chandelier, and a large fallen tapestry in his free hand. However, the chandelier was a bit heavier than he was, and it also contained fifty white wax candles all fully lit until they began to fall. Xander was swinging into the center of the room but also up, as he dropped the tapestry attempting to aim it on top of the golem's head.

He missed and the tapestry landed on Kennedy.

Fortunately though, the chandelier missed Buffy by mere inches and landed on top of the golem. Had the golem not been made of stone, it would now be on fire. It was however, distracted, and Buffy used this opportunity to aim her scythe directly at the golem's jewel encrusted eyeball. She hit it dead center as the golem managed to remove the chandelier from its head.

A bright shaft of light later, and the golem now stood silent and motionless.

Willow then returned from the other room still holding the handkerchief to her nose but with a satisfied look, "did that work? I just remembered my golem disenchantment spell, but needed a quiet place to think. Has it turned to dust yet?"

Buffy pulled her scythe out of the golem's head. "No Willow it wasn't you. I poked its eye out."

Willow continued walking towards her friend, "No that woulda just blinded it. I stopped it from moving."

"No it was me."

"No I did it."

"Can somebody help me out of this rug?" Kennedy was still struggling from underneath it, her sword blade the only visible thing that let the others know where she was.

Xander was still hanging from the ceiling. Now with both hands. "Dammit," he said to himself. "I missed."

He closed his one good eye.

"Again. I missed again."

Below him the large golem suddenly crumbled into a cloud of dust. Causing the others to cough and gag. Xander shimmied down as far as he could but the end of the rope was still a good 25 feet off the ground and mere inches below was a big cloud of dust. It took a few minutes to settle.

"See?" Willow managed to say between coughs after a minute. "I predicted that. It crumbled to dust. That was me."

"Yay. Point for Willow." Dawn and Giles helped Kennedy up.

As the dust began to settle, Giles patted Kennedy on the back to help her cough and then removed his glasses, "I can't for the life of me understand why the owners of this castle would confuse a golem for a ghost. Their description was completely off the mark." Giles attempted to clean his glasses but it wasn't doing any good in all the dirty air.

"Well we can't worry about that now." Buffy looked up and walked herself under her friend hanging from the ceiling. She put out her arms, "Come on Xander. Just drop. I'll catch you."

He did, dutifully. Buffy caught him like he was a sack of potatoes. They smiled at each other. Buffy beeped his nose. He gave her a hug. Then he looked over at Willow.

"Yes."

"Huh?"

"I changed my mind. About that thing."

"Oh. The thing?"

"What thing?" Giles asked.

"Nothing," Xander and Willow said in unison.

Xander smiled innocently at Giles, which made Giles suspect his guilt about something, "just a ..present she was offering me. That's all."

"Present?" Giles looked thoughtful for a moment. "Willow! I forbade you to use your magic for selfish gain! Now how many times do I--"

"Quane Bathlzar Kubritwickan!"

Willow raised her arms and the dust vanished, leaving the air in the castle clean and.. well it was as if the golem had never been there.. except for the damage to the table and chandelier and everything.

"You said whenever I use magic to help myself, that road lies danger. Using magic to help other people is not."

"It's always dangerous regardless."

"Yes but it's not evil."

"I wanna do it," Xander said finally. "Giles I know you mean well but, well she offered and I.. I gotta do it. Cuz I wanna help others too, and I can't like this." He pointed at his bad eye.

Buffy didn't understand, "But Xander you did fine you hit the baddie with the chandelier and-"

"That was luck. I was trying to use the rug."

"Oh. Oh well then, yeah. Depth perception and all that. Coulda helped. But Willow I told you to just do it and Xander'd--"

Giles was flustered, "You knew about this Buffy?"

"Giles! Willow's been trying to talk Xander into this for months. Where you been?" She looked back at Xander and Willow, "what can we do to help you?"

Willow smiled. "Nuthin'" She reached over to Xander's face and took off the eye patch. "I actually did the part that I needed to do several weeks ago."

Xander opened his bad eye and it wasn't bad anymore. The others smiled. It looked as if his eye had never been gouged out by that awful preacher man.

"You did what?"

"Now don't get mad," Willow put her hand on his shoulder, "as a precursor to the magic spell, you had to be willing to accept it. Otherwise it wouldn't work. Whenever you did accept it, it would kick in. If you ever change your mind, it'll go away. It's one of many failsafes I incorporated into the incantation. I told you there was nothing to worry about. I thought of everything."

The moment was tense. The look on Xander's face was troubling and mixed. Then he just reached out and hugged his friend.

"Love ya kiddo."

"You too, fathead."