"So, if you can't do magic, what good are you?" Riley asked tiredly.

Ethan shrugged.

For some reason Giles felt the need to defend the man who had been his friend on and off for thirty years. "Even if he can't do magic, he's an accomplished theoretical magician. There's no doubt that he can be useful training any other magic users you might have."

"What Giles means to say is that I'm of no use whatsoever and you should release me from what is essentially indentured servitude immediately." Ethan said.

"Giles, we have plenty of magic users. Ethan is useful - iwas/i useful, because he is very good at what he does. If he can't do it anymore, then we don't have any use for him."

"Wonderful!" Ethan said, smiling broadly. "So can I finally take my leave of you irritatingly manly military types now?"

"He won't get his magic back. The place where it should be has been filled in." Yelena said suddenly. "And he's not really a nice enough person to keep around without his gift."

Ethan put his hand on his chest and struck a dramatic pose. "Oh, you wound me to the quick, Yelena." He waggled his eyebrows suggestively. "You certainly seemed to care for me."

Giles looked at Ethan. "You're kidding me."

"What? She's an attractive woman, Ru, you have to have noticed that."

"No, not that. You're acting like… like iXander/i. Since when are you so childish?"

"Hey, I can't be a proper Englishman like you all the time. Its gets boring after a while."

"But surely a modicum of decorum-"

"I just lost my magic. I think I'm entitled to act out a bit, don't you?"

"You think you're entitled to act out inow?/i What have you been doing ever since you were a teenager then?"

"Hello?" Riley exclaimed, interrupting the bickering. The two Englishmen sounded like a stereotypical married couple. "You do realise that it's currently the middle of the night and that we're in someone else's house, don't you? Now is the time to argue."

Giles took off his glasses and started polishing them. Ethan crossed his arms and muttered petulantly "He started it."

"Good Lord, must you be such a child?" Giles exclaimed.

"Child? You don't know what my childhood was like, Mr Born-With-A-Silver-Spoon."

"Oh, let's get into that right now, shall we? At least I never turned anyone into a-" Giles began before stopping abruptly, shuddering as a great cold washed over him before settling deep into his chest. He looked away from Ethan to see Yelena had rested a hand lightly on his shoulder.

"Unpleasant, isn't it?" Ethan said wryly. "And you wondered why I wanted out."

Yelena said something in what sounded like Russian, which Giles didn't understand. Then she said "Stop arguing. We'll be leaving now. Ethan, you're free to do what you like."

"Excuse me?" Riley said. "I don't think we've come to a decision about what to do about Rayne."

Yelena moved her hand, but the cold didn't leave with her. "Really, Major? Is there some other decision you wish to make?"

Riley looked down. "No, I suppose not."

Yelena smiled, but it didn't reach her eyes. "Good. Farewell, Ethan." She touched Giles again, and the cold faded away. She swept out. Riley stayed for a second, looking like he wanted to say something, but he didn't and left too.

"Well." Giles said, after they'd left. "She's cold."

Ethan smirked. "Not in the important places."

"Good Lord, Ethan, must you be such a cad?"

Ethan shrugged.

Looking for some excuse to change the topic, Giles' eyes fell on the necklace. "So what's going to happen to that? We can't really leave it here, and if we can't touch it-"

"Don't worry about it. It'll fade away by sunrise. One of the perks of vampire-related magic." Ethan replied. "The question is, what am I to do? I've got nowhere to stay and no means to get one."

Giles looked at him thoughtfully. He trusted Ethan rather less than he could throw him, but Ethan could hardly cause any trouble without magic. Besides, what he had told riley was true; Ethan did know a lot of theoretical knowledge. Far more than he did, although he would never admit it. And, with new and untrained Watcher's flooding in, they needed more than Willow and the retired members of the Council who had avoided Caleb's bomb.

"I was actually planning on leaving town in a few days. I think Xander and Dawn are sufficiently settled in. We could use someone of your… talents at HQ."

"Great." Ethan said sarcastically. "I'm swapping one indentured servitude for another."

"Do you have another option? More importantly, do you have another option that'll get you a bed tonight?"

"Touché."

As they left, Giles didn't notice that the amulet vanished from the table. If he had, a quick search through Ethan's pockets would have quickly revealed its location.

"So, this bed… are we sharing it?"

"Shut up, Ethan."

The following day, things weren't quite as hectic at the inn. Most of the kinks had been sorted out, and Lorelai no longer felt the need to rush around and oversee every little thing. It was when she was having a coffee break that Rory came and sat down opposite her. She looked like she had something on her mind.

"Hey there." Lorelai took a sip of her coffee. "How's it going?"

"Good." Rory said, preoccupied.

"So, a penny for your thoughts."

"I never got that expression. Why are thoughts so cheap?"

"You're stalling."

Rory sighed. "Yeah. Anyway, you know how I said I should talk to you about stuff?"

"We do talk about stuff. We talk about stuff a lot. I think people would probably be happier if we talked about stuff less. Which stuff in particular did you want to talk about?"

"Um, stuff related to Xander." Rory said, not looking at Lorelai and fidgeting with the edge of a napkin.

"God, what's he done now? Gone and assaulted the Mob singlehandedly?"

Rory shook her head. "No, nothing like that. It's about… us. And, you know, stuff that usually goes with being an us."

Lorelai didn't understand, until she looked closely at her daughter. "Oh. You mean you and him having-"

"Yes." Rory interrupted. "You wanted me to tell you before it happened, so I'm, uh, telling you."

"If you're thinking of having it, I'm sure you can say the word." Lorelai said dryly.

Rory went pink and looked up at the ceiling. "Sex." She said eventually. "Sex. I think that Xander and I might have sex."

Lorelai stopped smiling. "Are you sure you're ready for that? I mean, you've only really been together for a few weeks now."

"We actually did the long distance thing for months before we broke up at Christmas." Rory pointed out. "I just… didn't mention that to you at the time."

"Along with the fact that you're dating Zorro. At least he's not 25 years older than you."

"I think you're getting your Catherine Zeta-Joneses mixed up."

"Probably." Lorelai conceded before turning back to the matter at hand. "He's not pressuring you or anything, is he?"

Rory smiled faintly. "Oh, no. He left the state and went half-way across the country to stop us from getting intimate last time."

"Are you sure you're ready for this?"

Rory thought about the heated make out session they had had shortly after she had stopped turning into a vampire (the first time). If it hadn't been for his scar, she didn't doubt that they would've gone further. Even last night, when he had kissed her goodnight at her door, she had thought about asking him in. "Honestly? I'm kind of scared about the whole thing. But it's going to – I mean, I want it to happen."

Lorelai looked at her daughter and felt sad in a way that she hadn't since the first few weeks when Rory had moved to Yale. "Wow. You're all grown up."

Rory blushed. "Hardly."

"Still, I reserve the right to give him the scary parental talking to."

"Of course. Although I think you've already given him the shovel talk enough times by now. He's probably gotten it memorised."

Xander was walking down the street when he felt a hand on his shoulder, and it took a great deal of effort to quell the instinct to turn and strike. This was Stars Hollow, not Sunnydale.

"Hey. I want a word with you, Mister." Lorelai said.

"What is it?" Xander asked warily, instantly thinking about what had happened in Lorelai's house last night.

"I wanted to ask what you're intentions are regarding my daughter."

Xander blinked. He didn't know what he had been expecting, but it certainly hadn't been that. "What? Are you asking if I'm going to marry her or something?"

"No. She and I had a talk this morning."

"Uh, congratulations? Am I supposed to divine what the conversation was about? Because I should probably tell you that magic isn't really my strong suit."

"No. I wanted to ask you… are you going to leave town again? Or pull off some crazy stunt, or go back and try to clean up Gotham City?"

Xander rubbed his chest. "Are you asking me if I'm stringing her along? Are you iseriously/i asking me that? Do you think I would be here, building a goddamned convalescence home of all things, if I didn't have every intention of sticking around? Do you trust me that little?"

"I don't know! You're a nice guy, Xander, but you've got a history that's kind of shady. Scratch that, it's really, really shady. Like the pitch black kind of shady. And I can overlook that, because you clearly care for her, but how do I know you won't go back to that again and leave her here heartbroken?"

"Because I love her." Xander said simply.

Lorelai didn't want to be doing this. She liked Xander, she really did, and he made Rory happy. But she had been there when Rory had thought that Xander was dead, and she didn't think that Rory could survive going through something like that again. So she said "Is that enough, though?"

Xander sighed. "I wouldn't be here is it wasn't. Lorelai, I could be out there fighting the good fight and all that, but I'm here. I'm here for her. There is nowhere I would rather be. I will be here precisely as long as she wants me to be here, and I'm not going to leave to go and fight crime or whatever. She knows that. I thought you did too…"

"I had to ask." Lorelai said softly.

Xander smiled sadly. "I get that."

"I want to believe you, I just…"

"She's your daughter, and you don't want me to hurt her. I get that. My track record in that area isn't exactly stellar. And I can't say we won't have our ups and downs – you know about the argument after I pranked your parents – but I'm here for her. If you can't trust me, then trust Rory. I'm pretty sure she knows what she's doing."

"You're pretty good with words, you know."

"I think Rory's rubbing off on me."

Lorelai sighed. "I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt, Batman. But if you hurt her, then the Joker ain't got nothing on me."

Xander ripped off a textbook salute. "Yes ma'am!"

Xander returned home to find Giles packing, with Ethan lounging in an armchair. "Uh, Giles? What's going on here?"

"Oh, hello there." Giles said breathlessly, lifting a teetering pile of books. "I'm packing."

"I can see that. But why?"

"For the same reason people usually pack, you mug." Ethan said drily. "We're going somewhere."

Xander pointed at Ethan. "Shut up. I wasn't talking to you."

"Oh, that's charming, that is."

"Ethan is, for once in his life, telling the truth. I believe you are sufficiently settled in here. You don't need me around anymore."

Ethan spread his arms. "What is this, Bash Ethan Day?"

Xander ignored him. "But why is ihe/i going with you? As opposed to, say, being fitted with concrete overshoes and flung into the lake?"

"Apparently it is." Ethan muttered.

"Because, even though he is lying untrustworthy snake, he was a very talented mage. Given that I'm mildly surprised that the magic users Willow's been training haven't accidentally blown up the city yet, we can certainly use someone with a good grounding in theoretical magic."

"Oh, please, stop. The flattery is simply overwhelming."

Xander saw the logic in that. He didn't really want to, but he saw it. "Can't you at least get Will to turn him into a puppet or something?"

"And the bashing continues."

"Shut up, will you?" Xander snapped.

"Please do. We can do without a chorus." Giles added.

Ethan subsided sulkily into his chair.

"We will take every precaution, but given that he has no magic and he will be surrounded by Slayers who could no doubt take him down with one finger, the amount of mischief he can get up to will be limited to being an irritating pest."

"I'm starting to think that life would be better on the road." Ethan muttered.