Title: A Kind of Magick
Author: DhampyrX2
Genre: X-over w/ Harry Potter
Series: none...yet
Rating: PG-13, just to be safe
Summary: Xander accompanied Giles and Willow to England to make sure she settled in well with the Devon coven after her Darth Willow episode, and has a chance to check in with some of his lesser discussed relations.
Timeframe: Between seasons 6 & 7.
Disclaimer: I don't own these characters. Don't sue me, I'm poor.
The tension could be cut with the proverbial knife as Giles and Xander sat in the living room of the cottage Rupert was renting as he aided Willow in her recovery. The young Wicca in question was taking a nap after a few hours of serious training, and some weak gushing about meeting someone as famous as Albus Dumbledore.
"Just ask already, Giles. I'm too jaded by it to get offended, and you're about five seconds away from making clucking sounds with your tongue," Xander finally began to break the silence that had settled between them.
"It just comes as a bit of a shock. You hardly seem the type to come from a Wizarding family, or to have non-demonic ties to the supernatural. You've certainly never mentioned before it in even the direst of circumstances," the Watcher began tentatively.
"Yeah, well, like I said, I try to avoid that end of things. My family and I don't tend to interact much what with me being an outcast child of a disowned squib and, ugh, Tony Harris," Xander replied evenly.
"I find it hard to imagine they would just cast their own daughter aside like that..." Giles remarked angrily.
"They sent her to the Hellmouth on purpose, Giles. I'd almost swear to it. Whether it was to get her killed, or to hope she'd find some kind of demon magick she could work, I can't say. I can say my grandparents and great-aunt and great-uncle weren't nice people. I can see them abandoning her there real easily. Hell, outside of Aunt Rommie and her husband, every other family member still alive in Mom's generation, blood related and by marriage alike, are Death Eaters or suspected Death Eaters. These are not folks I feel comfortable contacting for any reason. They made you and Ethan look like choir boys," Xander cut in.
"Good Lord," Giles exclaimed heavily as he wiped his brow in agitation.
"Yeah, well that's the 'Noble Black Family' for you. The Wizarding World's answer to the Corleones. Only I'm from Fredo and not Michael," Xander replied with a snort.
"That's why you wanted to come here. To make sure the Ministry wasn't involved in what happened to Willow," Giles declared with a hint of astonishment.
"Got it in one, G-man. Besides, I think there's like four wizard families that all live near here. I needed to know she was safe," Xander confirmed.
"Yes, I am aware of that much. I believe the Weasley family lives not too far from here. It /was/ something I could assure you I had checked on if I knew you were aware of them," Giles stated with a pointed look over his glasses.
"Feh, and yet Bumblebee himself was here to check to see if Willow had taken the Dark Mark. I learned a long time ago not to trust them and their world, Giles. Do me a favor and make sure you have a way to get hold of Buffy and Faith both, just in case. These aren't people you should turn your back on," Xander warned.
The look in Giles' eyes as he said that spoke volumes to Xander. The man thought he was somehow responsible for the bitterness that was drowning the young man's spirit. "Xander I..." he began before trailing off.
The White Knight shook his head ruefully and grinned at the sight of Giles' concern. At least the G-man had a genuine reason to care, and wasn't spouting off generic pity. "Don't sweat it, G-man. I've had issues with them longer than I've known you, and this has been a hell of a year. I just need to unwind, is all," he assured him.
Giles nodded at that, he could understand just how much the pressures could get to you fighting demons. PTSD was an all too common killer even among the most solid of the council.
After a time, the Englishman decided to try to broach a subject that might be worrisome, but still needed to be brought up. "Xander...Dumbledore did mention wanting you tested. I know being the child of a squib doesn't necessitate being one yourself. I don't want to offend you but..." he hedged.
"Am I a Wizard?" Xander asked in a tone that showed he had both expected and dreaded that particular query. "Nope. Do I have magickal talent? Probably. But I want nothing to do with them. I'll leave the regular Scooby mojo-ing to Willow, and the funky mojo sticking to my cousin Tonks," he declared with a small smile.
"You /do/ realize they can sense such things away from background noise like the Hellmouth, and you might have to register even if you refuse to practice actively," Giles informed him pointedly.
"I'm probably already in the system as an untouchable Hellmouthy guy or something. My cousin Tonks is an Auror, one of their cops. I can't see her neglecting to report what goes on with me. Cover it up from the general public? Maybe. But not ignore it altogether. Besides, like I said, I don't know and I don't care. If I want to unlock a door without a key, I can use a crowbar or a good kick instead of a spell. If I want to dust, I can get off my ass and get a rag. I want to come to England? I buy a plane ticket. I want to talk to someone? I use a phone. I want to get rid of a demon? I call you and Buffy. If not that, I get my axe out and start swinging. Frankly I live just fine without their isolationist routine," Xander responded in a voice that said he had thought about this all before, and knew where he stood.
"Quite," Giles replied with a small grin at his reference to calling Buffy or himself first. Giles knew full well Xander would handle his own affairs before he would endanger anyone else. "Like you called Buffy when you ran up against that slime demon tribe six months ago?" he inquired innocently.
"I had no choice there. I was the only one in the area. Besides, it proves my point. I'm here, they're not, and no mojo was used in the harming of those demons," Xander shot back resolutely.
"Indeed," Giles agreed with a small smile. If nothing else, his little distraction had lifted his surrogate son's spirits.
"You have to be joking, Albus!" Severus Snape raged in the Headmaster's office around the same time as Xander and Giles' conversation.
"Hardly, Severus. Draco needs someone to open up to, and if Narcissa and Nymphadora both wanted it to be him, it must be serious. Mister Harris is well versed in subterfuge and stealth. I dare say he could sneak past you without the benefit of an invisibility cloak if he needed to. He could visit safely and quietly for a time and see just where the lad stands." Dumbledore replied sagely as he popped another lemon drop.
"Albus, you're talking about an untrained boy barely old enough to be on his own that lives and works /willingly/ on a portal to Hell. One that refused to come here because he loathes most Wizards," Snape retorted coolly.
"And one that cares deeply for his family, with the possible exception of Bellatrix. I suspect that if a Death Eater in her own right and wife to Lucius Malfoy can reach out to her disowned nephew..." Dumbledore began.
"Don't feed me that rot, Albus. I've known Lucius and Cissa since I was a student. I know how bright she really is even if he has always failed to see it. I also know she watched the boy through her contacts, disowned squib for a mother or not. Once upon a time, I helped her make a few of those contacts. Which is what worries me the most about this. She wouldn't tip her hand like this unless she thinks my godson is in life-threatening peril. She always considered Alexander her wildcard for emergencies. Anyone who can take out a tribe of zombies basically unarmed and without magick is not someone to be taken lightly. If he ever learned to harness his magick He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named would be on him in a second to either recruit or destroy him," Snape returned.
"I agree. I also think young Mister Malfoy would hardly benefit from following either his father's true path, or the razor's edge you yourself are resting upon. He needs all the allies he can get. Young Mister Harris will make for a staunch one indeed. We can't protect them all, Severus. We must not turn away when help arrives in any form," Albus replied evenly.
"I still don't know how you expect to hide him, Albus. He's too old to be a student, lacks the qualifications for anything but a new DADA professor, and can't be risked being seen publicly around Draco. This whole thing will be dodgy at best," Snape finally responded with a scowl.
"For the moment, I've arranged for him to have a room in the Hog's Head after auror Tonks arranges some proper cover for him. He'll loathe it, I'm certain, but it has to be done. After that, we will see how things play out," the wizened old wizard replied. "Care for a lemon drop?" he offered at the sour look of Severus' face.
Later that day, in the early evening hours, Xander met Tonks at a small cafe' on Charing Cross road.
"What? No way, Sprite. Nuh-uh, not happening. Forget it," he stated forcefully to his cousin as she smirked at him.
"Now Xander, how else will you blend in to a Wizard's town like Hogsmeade? You simply need the proper accessories like robes and a wand," Nymphadora replied with a wink.
"The robes I'll give you," Xander replied through clenched teeth. "But the mojo stick is /out/. I'll carry around a twig or something. I am /not/ getting a wand. Are you /trying/ to make me an obvious target?" he growled hatefully at her.
"Hardly," Tonks shot back with a less amused look. "But this is the only way you'll focus your aura enough /not/ to stick out to anyone with the proper eyes to see it. Crimoney, Alex, did you really think this would be like when we'd visit your Aunt?"
"I /think/ I'm being set up," Xander responded in a monotone.
"Maybe just a bit," Tonks admitted with a giggle. She sobered at his look and added, "I'm not saying you have to use it, just that you have one. Hell, I recommend /avoiding/ using it untrained. It could be damned dangerous."
"And just how are we paying for all this, hmmm?" Xander inquired in an attempt to stave this non-sense off.
"Oh, /honestly/, you aren't that foolish. You have at least six accounts in your name at Gringotts this very second totaling 1,500,000 Galleons altogether. Money the Ministry couldn't touch even if Auntie's husband ever fell. And that's only the 'laundered' accounts Auntie has in your name. Merlin only knows how many there are with the rest of the family," Tonks spat back, careful not to name names.
"So I'm a tax shelter? Great," Xander spat sarcastically.
"Well, the smallest one was set aside for you by Sirius when he found out about you, and Auntie opened the next one for you to use if you ever gave in to her wheedling about visiting Ollivander's. Here are the keys for those two, by the way," Tonks replied as she handed him the two keys. "Those two together only amount to roughly 7,500 Galleons," she further explained.
Xander did some mental calculations, something you had to learn to do quickly when ordering materials at a construction site, and nearly swallowed his tongue as he replied, "That's like 55 grand! That's roughly two-thirds what I make in a year right now as junior site foreman, and I have it for /spending money/?"
Tonks shrugged as she replied, "It's a good chunk of cash, I'll admit, but look at who set the accounts up. One spends more than that on any three shopping trips, and the other wanted to make amends for your grandparents when he broke out of Azkaban. You should see the accounts he set up for Harry and his friends. How a man that generous came from that woman, I'll never know," Tonks sniffed irritably.
"Who do the other three really accounts belong to?" Xander asked when he couldn't think of anything else to say.
"One is Puff's. The others are Auntie's. The Arsemunch knows nothing about any of them. Where he hides his family money 'isn't for her to know'." Tonks replied.
"Which means she knows, but he thinks she's too stupid to know, and she'll have it before he sees it if things hit the fan," Xander responded with a feral grin.
"Obviously," Tonks replied with a sly grin of her own. She may not appreciate the shady dealings her family favored, but she liked the thought of Lucius Malfoy getting his when he got his fool arse hauled in.
Three quarters of an hour, a trip to Gringotts bank, A purchase of several fine robes Tonks swore looked 'smashing' on him, and a lot of grumbling later found Tonks, currently sporting bright pink hair that reminded him of Oz, dragging her favorite cousin into Ollivander's for what she felt was long overdue.
"Ah, Mister Harris! You're here at last! I've been waiting for you for /ages/," the old man behind the counter stated.
"Imagine that," Xander replied in a deadpan, even as he let out a little 'oof' as Tonks elbowed him in the gut.
"Ignore his attitude, most of us do," she advised the proprietor with a wink.
"If you say so, Miss Tonks. And how is your wand faring? Still serving you well?" he asked pleasantly.
"As the day I bought it," the auror replied with a smile.
"Good, good. Now, then let's get started, shall we?" the kindly proprietor asked with a grin as he began to test Xander for a proper wand fit.
Twelve wands, three fires, two tornados, and a great deal of griping about not wanting a 'damned mojo stick' later, the old man came back with a box from the back. "Well then, let's try this one. Thirteen inches, ebony, strong and flexible, with a shard from a manticore's tail stinger for a core. As exotic a wand as I've ever made. Its odd looks make it seem harmless, but it's powerful and dangerous in the right hands," he explained sagely as he opened the box and handed Xander the wand.
Xander just groaned as he said, "I don't freaking believe this." The black wood was almost perfectly straight, and had a strange silvery discoloration at the tip. All in all it looked like a stereotypical stage magician's wand. Xander shook his head ruefully even as he waved the ridiculous wand, and finally showed he had a winner. "Only me," he said with a sigh.
"True enough," Tonks agreed with a chuckle as Xander paid the owner and stalked out of the shop with his stupid little mojo-sti...er new wand.
"Oh, it's not so bad," Tonks called out ad she rushed to keep up with him. "Look at it this way, now we just have to portkey over to Hogsmeade. Albus already paid for your room at the Hog's Head to apologize for this experience. I'll treat you to a proper dinner in muggle London, and then we can go whenever you're ready. You can even change in my room at the Leaky Cauldron and freshen up first," she offered.
"I will only dignify that with a response if we're going to that pizza place you took me to when I visited after high school graduation," Xander sniffed haughtily, doing his best to mock acertain Aunt /cough/ Bellatrix /cough/ with his tone.
"Done and done," Tonks agreed with a laugh, glad he was still able to poke fun. It meant he wasn't nearly as cross as she had anticipated.
END PART 4