Well loads of review replies to follow (sorry bad British grammar) so sorry if you just wanna get to the chapter! This one should clear a lot of thing up so I can get on with the story. Thanks for the masses of reviews and please please review this one too!

Thanks to:

Manticore-gurl071134 – feel free to post this on your site, but can you let me know the address for the site?

Queen of the Caribbean – I hope this unconfuses it again for you! If you have any questions, feel free to email me

Erak – Buffy didn't tell any of the Scoobies about her past – there will be more on that in this chapter

Goddessa39 – this is post Buffy season 7 but before the Angel team take over Wolfram and Hart. Know it doesn't quite fit with canon but just go with it for the purposes of this fic!

LilGreenImp – Glad you liked, the Lupin thing isn't so much dislike as resentment. I think I'm gonna get him in there a few more times so hopefully that will be developed. Like the name by the way!

Panther28- Dawn is around 17 in this fic, I'm saying that tentatively in case something drastic happens and I have to change it. And she's not the aunt as you'll see in this chapter, she's a vague second cousin or something confusing like that!

Ztacel – not a Buffy/Sirius fic I'm afraid! Harry's gonna have difficulties with his Aunt, not for long but they're relationship won't be perfect. I don't have the patience for long term resentment like in other lost relative fics though!

Just me – glad you liked the flashback, I've written a few others to slot in there so hopefully they will go down well too! I figured that Buffy as a anonymous muggle wouldn't be much worth as a witness for Sirius, especially against someone like Dumbledore.

TheCharmedOne – I sort of have a pairing in mind and it's not Buffy/Remus, though I like the idea.

Dreamer Child – lol course I remember you, you were one of my fave reviewers! But I'm sorry, definitely not Buffy/Sirius, I'm not tired of the pairing but I think that people might get a bit tired of seeing the same thing from me over and over

David J. Oates – thanks for the review, gave me some stuff to consider. My formatting annoys me too, it's all perfectly laid out on word when I write (my paragraphing is actually pretty good) but when I upload it onto it goes squiffy. And thanks for the tips but I really don't have the technical knowledge to repair it, as long as it's readable its gonna have to do I'm afraid. I will take the advice about the narrative; I'm more of a dialogue writer so I will try to improve!

Becks89 – ah no chapter of mine is gonna make up for the missing of HP6! I feel really bad for you, but maybe if you can get to a computer you can hear from friends what happens at least. And also, you'll be in South Africa so that pretty much makes up for it, is it a World Challenge thing? Anywho, back to the story, no Sirius/Buffy pairing, I've done it to death and refuse to write it again. The actual pairing is a big secret and shall stay that way til the end. The Harry/Hermione thing is in consideration, might do it for you in exchange for many many updates! But for now, here's my update so you owe me yours!

Also: LizaGirl, mz.sammiz, CapriceAnn Hedican-Kocur, Story Oracle, CharmedChick, gaul1, Mama T, Mari, General Mac, Meaghan, cilou, zayra, CelticHeiressFiona, vixen519, N Ashton, Botticelli'sVenus

Chapter 3

Buffy regained her composure as quickly as she could.
"Albus," she said coldly. "What are you doing here? This really isn't a good time."
His light blue eyes took in the tense stature of Buffy and Giles.
"May I come in?" he asked genially. Buffy stepped aside for him to pass without a word.

He stood in the living room, looking as if he had stumbled in from another world.

"This isn't a great time," Buffy repeated, her voice strangely empty and cold. All colour had drained from her face and her hands were shaking very slightly. Dumbledore's eyes swept over the weapons laid out of the modern coffee table, alongside the tiny mobile phone.

"I see that," he said shortly, almost apologetically. "But I need to talk to you about something important." He took a seat on the cream sofa and his eyes flicked to a bemused Giles. Buffy caught the action.
"He can be trusted," she said flatly. "Besides you've got about two minutes before I ask you to leave."

Dumbledore looked up at her for a full minute before he spoke.
"It's about Harry," he said, his eyes piercing hers. She was suddenly alert.
"Is he okay?" she asked sharply. "What's happened?"

"Voldemort has returned," Dumbledore said slowly. Buffy barely reacted, her hand loose at her side twisted into a fist.
"When?" she said in a voice that was just a whisper.
"Less than two weeks ago," Dumbledore replied. "Harry was witness to it; one of his schoolmates was killed at his side."

Buffy swallowed painfully before speaking again. Both her hands tightened into fists

"Leave now," she said tightly. "Get out." Dumbledore's eyes widened in surprise.
"I'm sorry," he said gently. "But I need to-"

"Please just leave," Buffy said in a hard voice. Giles came forward and put a hand on her shoulder.

"Buffy," he said softly. Buffy didn't look at him.

"Giles leave it," she murmured, her voice wavering only slightly. "You don't know, okay? Albus, just go. I can't- I don't want to do this again. I'm out of it. This is your fight and you can fight it yourself."
"Harry's wants to come and stay with you," Dumbledore said, eyes connecting with Buffy's. "For the summer, he wants to come to Rome."
"So Rome's okay, but Sunnydale wasn't?" she asked. "And now I'm okay to look after him too? I bet you've got no other choice. Well maybe right now's not a good time for me, in case you haven't noticed, I have a life here, a life which takes a lot of attention. So right now I really can't spare any of that for you Albus."
"I went to Sunnydale," Dumbledore said slowly. "I went there first to look for you and I saw what you did. And then I found out about the slayers, what you did for them."

Dumbledore reached into his robes and pulled out a photo. He handed it to Buffy and she looked at it for a long while. Then she looked up and her eyes were blazing.
"How are Fabian and Gideon, Albus?" Buffy said quietly, furiously. "And Edgar Bones? How about Marlene McKinnon? And now that I mention it, how's Sirius? How'd Azkaban work out for him? I bet he's having the time of his life. How about Lily and James? My sister? She didn't do too well either."
Giles felt the tension trembling in his slayer through the hand on her shoulder. He couldn't remember the last time he had seen her this furious, this incensed. And a sister….?

"They're dead," Dumbledore said heavily, eyes lifting. "We both know that. But Harry is alive and he needs you."
"He needed me thirteen years ago," Buffy said in a hard voice. "But it didn't matter then did it Albus?"

"I have made a lot of mistakes in my life," Dumbledore said after a pause. "I am only human after all and being human gives me that handicap. But I stand by my decision to send Harry to Petunia. You could not have looked after him then, you weren't ready. But now, he needs you, he needs his godmother. I know you better than you think Buffy and I know that you won't refuse him this."
Buffy stared at Dumbledore for a long time before her shoulders slumped defeated.
"You shouldn't be doing this," she said tiredly. I don't need this; I put all that behind me a long time ago. I won't fight your war for you."

"I'm not asking you to," Dumbledore said slowly. "I'm asking you to give Harry a home and a family."
"If I say no?" Buffy asked wearily.

"Then he goes back to Petunia," Dumbledore said flatly. Buffy turned away, knocking Giles' hand off of her shoulder.

"What's he like?" Buffy asked in an odd voice. Dumbledore's face softened.
"He's a fighter," he said softly. "He just escaped from Voldemort for the fourth time. He has his parents' habit of falling into trouble. The same habit you always possessed."
"When's he coming?"

"Three days," Dumbledore said.
"I'll meet him at the airport," Buffy said, deliberately not looking at Dumbledore. He nodded, stood for a few moments like he was going to say something and then disappeared before Giles' astonished eyes.

"What the bloody hell was that about?" he said in an awed voice.

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Buffy walked across the room with short shaky steps to slump down into one of the soft sofas. Giles followed her and also sat himself down.
"What's going in?" he asked bewildered. Buffy stared at her clasped hands for a long time before looking up at him.
"You think you know me by now right?" she asked tiredly. Giles nodded. "Well there's a big part of me that you don't. I wasn't always the person I am now." Giles raised an eyebrow expectantly.
Buffy began to speak, slowly, stumbling sometimes but Giles didn't interrupt until she'd finished the whole story.

"I wasn't born in America; I was born in England, born an Evans, Buffy Anne Evans. I went to primary school in England, I grew up there. I had two sisters, Lily who was six years older than me and Petunia who was nine years older than me. Lily was my favourite, when I was tiny she was my idol. I never really got on with Petunia, maybe she was just too much older, I don't know.

Anyway, when Lily was twelve, she got a letter from a school, a Wizarding school. As you can probably imagine, my whole family freaked out, we didn't even know that magic really existed. We weren't wizards, we were muggles, non-magical people, but apparently Lily was.

And so she went to this school, Hogwarts it's called and she learnt magic, learnt to be a fully fledged witch. It was different magic to Willow, not Wiccan and she used a wand. Me and my parents were so proud of her, of what she was. She was so talented and so smart. Petunia was never happy for her, she despised her for it, jealous I think of the attention she got from my parents.

While Lily was at Hogwarts, a big-bad was rising in the Wizarding world, a man named Lord Voldemort and his group of Death Eaters were attacking, trying to wipe out all of the wizards of non-magical parentage so that the pure blood wizards could rule. They were taking out the families of wizards and my parents were afraid for my life. They sent me away, my Aunt Joyce and Uncle Hank were going to America to live and when I was twelve, I was sent with them. I never really spent much time with my parents after that, they were killed when I was thirteen and Joyce became my mother in all but DNA. I still saw my sister occasionally, she came to visit when she could and when I was fourteen my sister married a wizard named James Potter. I was bridesmaid at their wedding.

Then two years on, their son was born, Harry, and I was his godmother. It was a dangerous time for them and I wanted to help. I'd just been called as slayer so I went back, joined the fight against Voldemort in the hope that I could protect my sister, my brother in law and my new nephew. Joyce thought I was just visiting my sister, she never knew what Lily was.

I joined their secret society, led by Albus Dumbledore and together we fought the big bad. I've never fought anything like it, these were people, Giles. Human beings killing each other, and for what? Nothing that I could comprehend. There was corruption everywhere, so much fear. Pure hatred, pure evil all contained in a human wrapper. For once it wasn't black and white, I was fighting human beings, not demons and it was terrifying. Their world was torn by this war. So many died but Lily and James always escaped, always got away.

But one night, the same night that Angel brought forth the Acathla; Voldemort tracked them down. He killed James when he tried to fight him and then he turned his wand on Lily. Lily died protecting Harry but when Voldemort turned his wand on Harry, his curse rebounded on him and he was destroyed. My sister died to save Harry and that protected him.

I went to England that night, after I killed Angel. I had to get out. Mom….Joyce had thrown me out and I wanted to start again. I couldn't come to you, it hurt too much but I wanted to be with my sister.All I found when I got there was their house in ruins and their bodies lying in the rubble. They were dead. And James' best friend, Harry's godfather Sirius was holding Harry. I told him to give him to me, I wanted to take him away, he was all I had left at that point. The one little fragment of life worth hanging onto. But Dumbledore took him away. I went to Dumbledore and asked to take my godson away. I wanted to come back here, to put things right with all of you and I wanted to do right by my sister by taking care of Harry as best I could. But Dumbledore said it was too dangerous for him to live on the hellmouth and he gave Harry to Petunia who despised him as much as she had hated Lily. I lost everything that night."

"Why did he give him to Petunia?" Giles asked, trying to process everything. "If she hated him and he didn't want him to come here then why not give him to another family?"

"Dumbledore always said Voldemort would be back," Buffy said heavily. "And he was proved right. After Lily was killed, Dumbledore invoked ancient magicks using the protection of love that she had laid on Harry to make sure that if he had a home wherever her blood resided, nothing could hurt him there."
"So he had to go to you or Petunia," Giles mused. "But Buffy, why did you never tell me this? I've known you for years now, I thought you would've trusted me."
"It had nothing to do with trust," Buffy assured him hurriedly. "It was because it hurt. Everything just crashed down on me at once, Angel, Lily, James and then Harry. It was easier if you guys never knew, then you'd never ask and I'd never have to talk about it. I made the decision that when I couldn't have Harry, I'd close that part of my life. But I guess it always finds you."

"What are you going to tell the others?"

Buffy sighed and twisted her hands in her lap, enclosing a crumpled photo within them.
"What I told you I guess," she said. "Harry's arriving in three days, which doesn't give me much time. Dawn needs to know, Xander, Willow. Anyone else can wait. I need to figure out what I'm going to tell Dawn."

"Where does she come into this?"
"She's my cousin," Buffy admitted. "Not sister. Hank and Joyce are her parents. But she became my sister and I love her like I loved Lily. She doesn't know about that stuff though, she thinks I'm her sister. Guess the monks couldn't make another Evans. Another thing I've got to figure out." Buffy looked directly at Giles. "I'm sorry Giles. I lied to you for a long time and I'm sorry."
"I can't say I'm thrilled about it, but I understand," Giles said carefully. "There are parts of my life before I knew you that I've kept for myself."
"When you had punk hair and listened to Pink Floyd?" Buffy asked, a wicked grin lighting up her face, which, despite its twenty eight years, still retained the youth of a twenty year old. "Sorry Giles but your secret's out, we've all seen the pictures. Giles chuckled good naturedly.
"So, your godson is coming here in three days. Will he know about you?" Buffy shrugged, the smile lingering on her lips.
"Probably," she said thoughtfully. "I mean, he needs to know what I am and what I do I guess." She smiled involuntarily. "Despite all the shit that comes with it, I'm actually excited Giles. I mean there's all this other bad stuff that's happened but wow, my godson coming to me after all this time." Her face fell. "Oh god Giles, what if he hates me? What if I can't pull off being a cool aunt?"

Giles cuffed his slayer lightly.
"He won't hate you," he said automatically. "Stop panicking. The only thing you need to think about is what you're going to tell Dawn. And Xander and Willow."
"The truth," Buffy said grimly. "It's about time."

She unclenched her hands and a crumpled photograph fluttered out. A dark haired boy looked out of it, reaching up to scratch his nose before smiling uncertainly at the camera.

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