Author note: Okay, wow. Apparently a lot of people like Tonks and Draco together, and they like the snark. This chapter is absolutely full of it. It also ends on a bit of a cliff-hanger, but not as big as chapter ten's. *cue evil laughter* Anyway, thanks for all the wonderful feedback.

I ialmost/i forgot to post this chapter, which would have been bad considering there would be absolutely no time to do it when I wake up (so not a morning person) and work has all the sites I post this beauty to blocked (damn web filter—I NEED MY LJ). Ergo, you would have had to wait until around 8 pm central time, and wouldn't that have sucked? Luckily, I remembered just as I was putting on my headphones as I was climbing into bed.

My head has been wrapped around NaNoWriMo for the past week, which paid off as I'm just over 30,000 words. I went on a retreat with my local writing group I've been a part of for the past two years, and we stayed at a cabin in the middle of nowhere (and I'm in Arkansas—when I say nowhere, I imean/i nowhere) and just wrote. Also nearly shot some poor dude (again—in Arkansas, of course I own a gun, and doesn't that image terrify some of you?) that came around our place at midnight who decided our little cabin looked like the campground office before realizing that the crazy writer women inside were inot/i to be screwed with, but that's a whole 'nother story. Enjoy this one instead!

This chapter is light, and there is some Draco/Buffy innuendo going on, but not as big as chapter ten's. *cue evil laughter… again* So you have a lot to look forward to next week… including your first glimpse at Pansy and Harry. That's right! They finally show up. Needless to say, you all will love and hate chapter ten with a passion, just like my lovely beta Jacy. *loves hardcore*

But this is chapter nine, and I hope you all like it. Feedback feeds the soul, and it puts a smile on my face. Also, questions are appreciated because that lets me know if I have gaps in the story. Again, this was three years in the making, and a lot of stuff didn't go down on paper that I had in my head. I may have left out plot information that I thought I wrote in. If I haven't responded, let me know.

Sequel information: *gasp* What is this? A sequel? Yes, there is a sequel. Good news? It'll be done in seven months. Bad news? You won't be able to see it until seven months from now. I'm doing it for the Draco Big Bang, which you can read about at .com . The rules state that I can't post it publically until June 26th, so that's the earliest you'll see it. But it's coming! I was pondering not even bothering, but it is coming! So yay for that.

I've rambled enough. Onto the story!

…………………..

The house was quiet since it was early morning. Tonks had gotten up earlier than anyone else since she was hours ahead of everyone. She was clad in only boxer shorts and a t-shirt, and was rummaging around the kitchen for something to make breakfast with. Everyone would be up soon, and she was entertaining the idea of making breakfast for her new hosts.

The front door opened and Tonks heard voices coming from the front. She peeked around the door facing the dining room and grinned when she saw who had come in.

Xander turned from his conversation with Giles and stared confused at the head in the kitchen. "Giles, are there any pink haired demons that we know of?"

Giles looked up and his eyes widened. "Oh, bloody hell."

"Giles!" Tonks shouted as she ran towards him and gave him a big hug. The Watcher "oomphed" from the force. "How are you, old man?" she asked as she pulled back and smiled at him.

Dawn peeked between Giles and Xander and stared at the person standing in her dining room. "Who're you and what are you doing in my house?"

Giles removed his glasses and started cleaning them on the edge of his sleeve. "This is Nymphadora Tonks. God help us all, because she's Draco's cousin."

"You look nothing like Draco," Dawn said with her eyebrow raised. She crossed her arms and looked at Tonks critically. "So how're you two cousins?"

"Our mothers are sisters," Tonks replied with a grin. She scrunched her face and her pink hair was gone, replaced with short, black hair and a pale, heart-shaped face. Her mother wished she would always keep her original face, but Tonks preferred the crazy styles instead. "I can change my appearance at will, so we don't always look related."

"Don't always act like it either, with one of us running around falling over herself all the time," Draco said lazily as he came down the stairs. He pecked Tonks on the temple before continuing on to the kitchen. "You didn't try to make breakfast did you? I'd hate for you to burn the place down!"

Tonks' hair went from black to red as she narrowed her eyes and Draco. "Oi! That was once, you little ponce! And it was all Kingsley's fault." She crossed her arms and pouted. "And Moody's. iAnd/i yours!"

Draco turned just enough so she could see him rolls his eyes. "I wasn't even in the kitchen. I was outside. Don't try to pin it on me. I didn't know it was possible to burn water." Before he could get very far into the kitchen, Giles cleared his throat. Draco stopped and let out a sigh. "Let me guess; you'd like to speak to me in private?"

With a pinched smile, Giles gestured to Draco for him to follow him. Tonks nudged him as he passed her.

"Someone's in itrouble/i," she said in a sing-song voice.

Draco spun around and pointed at her, glaring. "After this, we're going out back to settle this. Your arse is mine!"

"Ew. Incest much?" Dawn said with a grimace that quickly disappeared at Draco's dark look.

"She's joining us now," Giles said calmly. The cousins both glared at him. "I'm going to see just how angry you were yesterday."

Tonks started laughing. "Now you're ireally/i in trouble."

"Is that really necessary?" Draco said angrily. "Giles, I am not a child who needs reprimanding. You're not my father."

"If he was, he'd be cheering you on right now instead of getting on to you," Tonks said as she stood next to Draco before turning to Giles. "I looked last night right after. He's fine now, Rupert. You know I'd tell if he wasn't."

"I'm right here, you know," he snapped before turning around and marching into the kitchen.

Tonks and Giles gave each other a look before following him into the kitchen. He was slamming cabinet doors and putting down plates so hard they were on the border of cracking.

Xander and Dawn just looked between the British guests. "I'm so lost," Dawn whispered. "Why is Draco in trouble?"

"Draco is in trouble because he saved the day and fixed the problem!" the wizard snapped, still getting out silverware and plates. When he was finished, he looked around and sighed, putting his head down on the island counter. "Merlin, I need a house-elf."

Tonks snickered and walked over to Draco before giving him a hug. Her cousin straightened and glared at her, but allowed the hug. "Correction--you need Harry."

"Same thing."

Tonks smacked his arm and smiled at Giles. "He's fine, see?"

"If it's all the same, I want the details," Giles replied gesturing to the backyard.

Draco sighed and made his way out the back door with the Watcher following. As soon as the door was closed, Dawn rushed over and put her ear against the door.

"Don't bother," Tonks said, getting some eggs from the refrigerator. "Draco will have warded it so you can't hear anything or see anything. Now, does either one of you know how to make a good brekkie?"

Xander stepped forward and cracked his knuckles. "Let the Xan-Man through. Breakfast will be ready shortly. And unlike what would happen if Dawnie cooked, it will be edible"

"Hey!"

………………………

Draco had his arms crossed and made sure his back was to Giles. "I hate it when you do that-when you question me in front of everyone. I get enough of that from the rest of the Wizarding world. I don't need it from someone I thought trusts me."

"I do trust you Draco," Giles said, walking up to the young man. "That is why I continually question what you do not for my sake, but for yours. As long as you trust yourself, then I trust you."

"Your trust feels a bloody awful lot like doubt."

After a brief pause, Giles cleared his throat. "So, what happened yesterday?"

Draco sighed. "I found out that Rack put an iincendia substrictus/i on Willow's magic. I tracked down Amy to take it off."

Giles put his hand on Draco's shoulder and forcefully turned him around. Draco smirked at Giles. "Sure you still trust me?"

"What did you do?"

"I took it off."

"Damn it, Draco!" Giles shouted and shook Draco's shoulder. "What happened to her?"

He kept on smirking until he thought Giles was going to attack him to make him speak. "Aunt Andi came to fetch her and take her to the facility in England. That's why Tonks is here, to cover for her mum legally. She can say they were visiting." Draco matched Giles' stare. "I didn't kill her. I know that's what you want to ask."

"It is," Giles reluctantly agreed. "What changed your mind?"

"Nothing changed my mind. I even considered finishing her off after Buffy and Willow went upstairs but I knew that would raise more questions than I care to answer. I flooed Aunt Andi and she arrived last night to pick her up." Draco sighed and looked away. "Willow's magic stopped my own from killing her in the process. It's a sign she's come such a very long way, that her magic would react with her emotions and thoughts without her having to manipulate it to, but I wish it had been for something else."

Giles stared off into the backyard. Willow was making incredible strides in her magical communication, and this was something that very few people could do—have their magic so in-tune with them that the magic does their will without even being asked. She was returning to her former self.

"Very well. Did it take you long to locate Amy?"

Draco shook his head and started to walk back towards the deck. As far as he was concerned, the question and answer time was officially over. "She was in Los Angeles. It was easy to track her there, but it took me a bit to find what hotspot she was in."

Giles looked at him curiously. "So what took so long if you left almost forty-eight hours ago?"

The question stopped Draco in his tracks. He froze and didn't turn around. There was no way he could work around this, and there were some things that Giles just couldn't know. As far as he was concerned, the don't ask-don't tell rule was still in effect between Giles and himself.

There had been hours in between when he found Amy and when he'd called to get everyone out of the house. There were more hours in between that phone call and when he actually arrived.

He was saved when Buffy came out the back door. Her eyebrow rose at his 'caught in the headlights' look.

"Something going on?"

Giles coughed lightly. "I'm just trying to figure out what Draco was doing once he located Amy. He hasn't been very forthcoming with the details."

Buffy took one look at Draco's worried face and knew she'd have to revert to some training she hadn't had to use since high school. She was going to have to lie to her Watcher and hope he didn't notice.

"It's my fault. Right after you guys left and he showed up with Amy, I demanded an interrogation session with her. It took a while. I didn't get anything useful, before you ask."

Buffy came down the steps to stand shoulder to shoulder with Draco.

"Thank you," he muttered out of the corner of his mouth before turning around to face Giles.

"Well, that's cleared up then," Giles said after a long moment of staring between Draco and Buffy. "Let's have a good breakfast and then we can get everyone caught up on the past few days."

Buffy snorted. "You can skip breakfast. Dawn's adding stuff while Xander isn't looking."

"I think my stomach would kill me if I ate anything she made," Draco replied, making a face.

……………………

Draco and Buffy avoided Giles for the rest of the evening, claiming they needed to help Willow when he would act like he was going to ask a question. Dawn was completely enraptured with Tonks and insisted she change her hair and face every time she could get a word into Giles and Tonks' conversation on what had been going on back in England. Xander was catching up on some alone time with Willow since he hadn't seen much of his friend.

Buffy was sitting on her bed cleaning some weapons from her trunk when Draco walked in. He leaned against the doorway and watched her polish a sharp machete.

"Are you going patrolling tonight?" he asked.

The slayer jumped and glared at him. "Now who needs to wear the bell?" she asked snidely before putting down the weapon. "Yes, I am. Xander and Giles have done a good job holding down the fort for me since I've been focused on Willow, but I need to get back in the swing of things. Why?"

"I want to come with you. Actually, I want to bring Willow along and I know Tonks will want to join us. I think it's time Willow got out of the house and started being proactive with her magic. With this dark magic no longer restricting her, she'll progress a lot faster. The best way for her to relearn to use it is to ineed/i to use it."

"You're going to throw my best friend at vampires to see if she can get in touch with herself? What the hell is wrong with you?" Buffy snapped. She was beginning to doubt Draco's ability with Willow. Anytime healing involved being in mortal peril didn't seem like real healing to her.

"Willow will be protected and I want her to get used to being out again. If she feels the magic and can call on it safely, we'll work on it." Draco fully entered the bedroom and sat down on the bed next to her.

Buffy didn't reply but started to clean the machete again, glaring at him the entire time. Draco always seemed so confident and she just wanted to smack those smirks off of his face.

He smiled at her and lay back on the bed with a sigh, putting his hands behind his head. "No, it's you I'd like to throw at the vampires."

Draco blinked as suddenly Buffy was sitting on his stomach with the machete pressed against his throat. A slow smirk spread across his face and his eyes were hooded. "Do I sense some unresolved tension? Is that why you need to go out and beat things into oblivion?"

The slayer was still glaring at Draco. Her breathing was controlled, but Buffy's heart was racing and she could feel the blood pulsing through her veins. She wasn't about to tell him how true he was. There was no one who could continually push buttons like Draco did, and he could never be baited himself. The man beneath her looked as calm and collected as he had when he had walked into her bedroom unannounced. That also irritated her.

"Are you going to slash my throat or just sit there staring at me all day?"

Buffy made sure to push off of him by putting a hand on his chest and using it as leverage to force all her weight off his body. He grunted and rubbed his hand where her hand had been. That made Buffy grin.

"What time are you leaving tonight?" he asked, sitting up.

"Whenever the hell I feel like it." Draco's annoying grin returned as he stood and started to leave the room. Buffy stopped him with a question. "What did happen yesterday with Amy?"

Draco stopped, just as he did earlier in the morning when Giles had asked the same question.

"Don't ask questions you aren't prepared to hear the answers to."

"To me, the line you walk between good and bad isn't as defined as you'd probably think. I have priorities, and keeping my family safe is the first. You helped keep my family safe. And sometimes I've had to do things I'm not proud of to get what I want. If you don't want to tell me, it's fine."

Draco smiled at her over his shoulder and left the room. Buffy pouted and put down her cleaning supplies. "That was a rhetorical 'if you don't want to tell me', damn it."

………………………

"This isn't a good idea," Willow said, making the other three people in the group groan. Her eyes were darting in between the dark shadows of the cemetery. At every little noise, she would jump. Her hands were gripping Draco's arm tightly.

"Willow, you have been saying that since we left the house. You're fine. Nothing is going to happen. Now let go of my arm before you rip it off or I lose blood circulation."

Willow turned nervously to Draco as she slowly let go. Her hands started to play with the edges of her sleeves. "But something iis/i going to happen. It just is."

Buffy sighed and kicked at a root protruding from the ground. "If that's true, then why haven't we seen any activity in the past hour? Giles told me they've had three to four dustings a night. I mean, I know I'm good, but I'm not so good that they'd run and hide."

Draco snorted and Buffy kicked the root at him. He ducked quickly as it shot past his head and made a large crack in the side of a nearby mausoleum. He hadn't considered that Buffy was truly getting mad at him. Pushing buttons was what he did best and it was oh so fun to see her reactions.

"It's all Draco's fault," Tonks said cheerily as they continued to walk. She had insisted on coming along as well, wanting to see the slayer in action.

Willow made a face. "Really? Or are you just saying that because he's your irritating cousin?"

"Oh no, it's really Draco fault. It's because of the curse Aunt Bella put on him," Tonks replied with a smile. "Vampires can sense the Dementor in him and they won't come near him. It came in handy when You-Know-Who swayed vampires to attack out of the Forbidden Forest once. We just had to make Draco stand on the edge of the grounds and they were too scared to come near."

Draco let out a sigh as Tonks started to laugh. It always made her giggle when she thought about him standing on the edge of the grounds about to piss his pants because he could see the vampires on the edge of the forest. True, they wouldn't come near him, but it wasn't an experience he liked to remember.

"But you said Dementors suck out souls. Vampires don't have souls," Buffy said, confused.

"That just means they're going to go through hell while a Dementor looks for one. It just sees a body that moves and tries to remove a soul that isn't there. It's eternal torture to a vampire." Draco replied. "Also, a Dementor plus a dark wizard can't be good for the undead community. Dark wizards tend to kill people who don't agree with them. Best you keep that in mind."

As the group continued through the cemetery, Buffy scoffed. "Oh please. I think the time spent this afternoon on my bed showed how good my reflexes were."

Draco immediately started laughing and had to lean against a nearby tree to hold himself up. Willow stared at Buffy with an open jaw and Tonks giggled, leaning against Draco.

"That was not how it sounded!" Buffy quickly said, a horrified expression on her face. "That is not what I meant at all!"

"Just because I nearly killed the world with my magic does not mean you can't tell me when you do the horizontal tango!" Willow said. "I want details, but not too graphic because hello, I like the girls, but still! Details!"

Draco was still laughing loudly and eventually had to slide down the tree to sit on the ground. Buffy's face was very red as she glared at Willow.

"He irritated me and I put a very large knife to his neck."

"Kinky," Tonks said kicking Draco's leg. "Does Pansy know that you like knives in bed now?" Draco started to laugh harder, despite Tonks' constantly nagging him.

Buffy pouted and turned to Willow. "Please help me."

The witch immediately shook her head. "Girls, remember? No man parts for Willow."

"Oh Merlin, stop! I can't breathe!" Draco was trying to take deep breaths and calm his laughter. Tonks kept nudging her cousin to get him to stop, but the smile on her face showed she didn't mind much.

"Can we completely ignore this, forget it ever happened and get back to why it's completely quiet?" Buffy growled, starting to pace. They had gone through two cemeteries and there had been no activity. This either meant that what Tonks said was true, or there was something big coming.

Draco, down to chuckles now, stood up with a grin. "I'm afraid as long as vampires can sense the Dementor in me, they'll stay away. There's an easy way to cloak it though." He turned to Willow, whose eyes widened.

"Wait, you want ime/i to cloak you? Are you sure that's a good idea? I could end up putting a permanent blanket on your magic and you'd never be able to access it again!" Willow started to panic. "I can't live with myself if I do that! There won't be enough dough in the world to bake enough cookies for that massive guilt!"

"Well we better make that you don't," he replied, going to sit on a tombstone with a flat surface. Willow started to hyperventilate, and Draco just smirked at her. Her nervousness was amusing, but he knew that she could control her magic and it would do what she wanted. "Willow, you know you can do this. Just take deep breaths, concentrate on the magic, and be gentle with it. Coax it into working with you," Draco said, getting comfortable as he sat.

Tonks and Buffy stood a few feet away watching. "He sounds like he's coaching her on training a poodle," Buffy whispered to Tonks, who giggled. Draco glared over at them but turned back to Willow and closed his eyes.

Willow bit her lip nervously and closed her eyes, doing what Draco told her. She looked within herself and focused on her magic. Communicating with it was getting easier, but sometimes it was still difficult to use it. Slowly, but surely, magic from the earth came up through her and surrounded Draco like she asked it to, blocking his own magic and the Dementor nature within him.

Draco grinned as he opened his eyes. He had felt the warm blanket of magic slowly drifting down upon him.

Buffy looked around. She could still sense the vampires, but she had felt no change.

"Well?" she asked impatiently. "Did it wor--"

She was cut off as a vampire tackled her from the side. The slayer went down with an oomph. As she rolled away and got to her feet, Buffy pulled the stake out of her jacket and took a defensive stance. There was laughing in the background.

"That answer your question?"

Buffy decided she was going to tackle Draco to see if he liked it when she was done for the night. Arrogant bastard.

Draco sat back on the tombstone and watched as Buffy fought the vampire. She was extremely fluid in her motions, and her kicks and punches were perfectly timed for delivering the most damage in the most vulnerable place. He could tell she had done this for many years. As she staked one vampire, another one came up and took the other's place.

Another vampire came from another angle and Tonks immediately started casting different spells to disarm it, but not destroy it. Draco let out a growl.

"Tonks, just kill it will you? Stop playing with the nasty evil dead thing," Draco said drolly. His cousin just grinned excited at him and blasted off a hex that severed the vampire's head, turning it to dust. "Cheater. You're not supposed to know how to do that."

The Auror laughed and tossed her wand in the catching it on the downfall. The effect was ruined when she nearly fell over reaching for it. "I'm a Black, cousin. I know a lot of things I'm not supposed to."

Willow was grinning as she watched the two relatives snip at each other. Buffy had disposed of the vampires that had been circling her but as she turned around to face the group, she froze.

"Draco, look out!"

The wizard grunted as he was grabbed from behind and held against the vampire's chest. "You didn't have to grab ithat/i hard you know."

"Shut up!" the vampire hissed, and Draco rolled his eyes.

Tonks aimed her wand at the vampire's direction, but Draco narrowed his eyes at his cousin. "If you fire off one spell, it's going to hit ime/i and not ihim/i. Don't even try it Nymphadora Tonks. Same goes for you Willow. Do nothing."

"Brave talk for a dead man walking."

"How did you know my life story?" Draco asked, and then let out a wheezing laugh when the vampire pulled him closer. "I didn't know you lot liked to snuggle."

"Just shut up!" The vampire started backing up out of the cemetery, using Draco as a body shield.

Draco walked backwards with the vampire, trying not to trip. "Look, if you're trying to get out of not getting a stake to the chest because you have me in front of you, it's not going to work. The slayer likes me just about as much as she likes you."

"Oh screw that," Tonks said, about to march forward but stopped when she couldn't move her feet. Willow and Buffy tried the same thing. Tonks glared at Draco. "Literally gluing us to the spot? Why?"

"I was curious about what it'd feel like before you all mangled this sodding bastard."

At that, the vampire paused. "Well I might as well get a good meal out of the deal."

He barely had time to smirk at Buffy before the vampire sunk its fangs into his neck. Draco winced and moaned a bit. "I was going to negotiate using the wrist because I'd hate to have the marks in full view."

"You are being sucked dry by a vampire and this is all you can say?" Buffy asked a bit hysterically. She was desperately trying to move her feet, but no matter how much strength she used, there was no way she could get to him.

"Sucked? Yes. Sucked dry? No." Draco smirked as the vampire withdrew his fangs and lurched back, choking. "I'm not an idiot. I came prepared."

Draco released the spell on the three women and they all rushed forward to check on him and watch the vampire. Smoke was beginning to come out of the vampire's mouth. Buffy tore the edge of her shirt and pressed the cloth against Draco's bleeding throat.

"What the hell were you thinking?" she demanded, getting a small amount of satisfaction at seeing him wince at the pressure.

"I was thinking I've always wanted to know what it was like to get bitten by a vampire. Not entirely unpleasant, but not something I want to experience again." Draco tried to move back from Buffy's pressing hand. She glared at him before grabbing her stake to finish the job. But as she turned to the vampire, she stopped in shock. The vampire looked like it was finishing off itself.

Willow stared at the vampire, now lying on the ground screaming. "What did you do?"

"Had a little cocktail of holy water and ashwinder eggs before we came."

Tonks immediately started hitting him on the arm while Willow gaped at him. "Are you insane? You could have killed yourself by ingesting that. Ashwinder eggs are extremely dangerous."

"And I was trained by the most prestigious potions master in Europe for my entire life. I know what I was doing. Holy water burns the esophagus and the ashwinder eggs are—"

Draco was interrupted when the vampire suddenly burst into flames. Buffy and Willow lurched back from the flaming corpse. He smirked and finished his sentence. "—extremely flammable."

"That could have been you!" Tonks said, still hitting his arm. She was clearly worried about him. "You're barmy!"

"I'm a Black," he retorted. His cousin just glared at him. "The eggs were completely frozen and then ground into a pulp. I used the Dementor curse to keep them frozen. As soon as the holy water started burning his throat, the dust particles in my blood ignited. I just wanted to see what happened and I didn't think I could get a vampire to volunteer."

"You're so irritating!" Buffy exclaimed loudly before spinning on her heel and storming off. Her mind was flashing to Draco's face when he received the bite and then seeing images of Riley as the vampire bit into his arm. Suddenly, she couldn't breathe and decided that there would be many more vampires that would get the pointy end of her stake. If she stayed one more moment, she was going to lose control and stake Draco. "You're going to get yourself killed!"

Willow stared after her friend, confused. "Buffy, where are you going?"

The slayer didn't even turn around. "I'm going to do my ijob/i. Go back home! I'll be back later!" With that, she ran further into the cemetery.

Draco just smirked as he watched Buffy stalk off and pressed the ripped portion of her shirt against his neck.