England, here I come

Summary: Xander, Giles and Faith arrive in England and Giles homeland will never be the same after meeting Xander and Faith. Sequel to my story "The reading"

Disclaimer: I still don't own BVTS or Harry Potter. One was created by Joss Whedon and the other by J.K. Rowling. I just borrow a few bits of their verses to play with and as every fanfic author I do that for fun and not to earn money, so please sue someone else *g*

Beta: Inachis (Thank you for your work)

Chapter 1 -Merry Old England

A few hours later the three landed at Heathrow Airport in London. It was a long, but quiet flight as they spent most of the time asleep after the long evening before. Giles, as the current leader of the Council, used the diplomatic status he was granted a while ago because of this position to get them around customs. This was one of the easier ways to get all their favorite weapons with them to England. Yes, they could just rearm themselves at the new Council Armory here in their Council HQ for England, but Giles shuddered at the thought of trying to convince Faith into leaving behind her two beloved tomahawks that Xander has given to her as a birthday present two years ago. He still remembers with horror the day one of the Sit 'borrowed' one of them three months ago. He quickly suppressed that memory as the three of them left the building.

Faith, being herself, hadn't any problems in getting them a taxi and after they stored their entire luggage, Xander gave the driver the address Remus gave him, of Ms. Verner's home.

A while later they reached the location and after Giles had paid the driver, Xander looked over the nice building and said, "Ok, here we are and now we will meet our new family member, I guess."

He took a step towards the door and pressed down the doorbell. They waited for a few moments and the door was opened by a good looking woman in her thirties. At least that was what Xander guessed. "Good day to you, how may I help you?" said the woman while looking at the three people before her.

"Hello Miss, these are my fiancée Faith and our friend and surrogate father Rupert Giles and I am Alexander Harris. We're here to meet with a Miss Verner?"

The woman nodded and then replied, "Ahh Mr. Harris, yes. Miss Verner awaits you in her office."

She stepped away from the door and gave them enough room to enter, without inviting them. After they entered the entrance hall the woman spoke again, "Welcome to England. I'm Ms. Verner's personal assistant and you can call me Melinda. If you would follow me, I will show you the way."

With those words she went through the hall until she reached a big ebony door. She opened the door with a bit of effort and then went through it and they all entered a long corridor with several doors right and left. At the end of the corridor Melinda knocked at a door and after a short "Yes?" she opened the door and spoke, "Ms. Verner? Your guests have arrived."

"Good, please let them enter." They heard a female voice say from the room.

Quickly they entered the room and stood before a long ebony desk with a few visitor chairs before it. The young woman behind the desk stood up and after they introduced each other, she bade them to sit down.

"Nice to finally meet you in person Mr. Harris. Shall we go straight to business or are there some other things you want before that?" spoke Ms. Verner.

"First of, call me Xander. If someone says Mr. Harris I always look for my father and I really don't need that, and second, straight to business would be fine for me. At least regarding all things of the Black family. All things regarding Harry I would like to do later after I've met Harry and talked with him to hear his opinion about becoming my ward. I won't force him into it and after that I also would like to hire you to take care of all things related to integrating the former Malfoy assets into the Black family." Xander answered her.

Shocked, Ms. Verner asked, "Assets of the former Malfoy's?"

Xander nodded, "Yes, but let's talk about that later. Let's deal with the absolutely necessary legal matters regarding the Blacks first and then I would like to finally meet Harry. Everything else we can talk about later."

At the same time in the room above Ms. Verner's office three teenagers lay on the ground while listening through a pair of expandable ears. After they took those away Ron looked at Harry and while noticing that Hermione was holding Harry's hand, he ignored that fact and he said, "Wow, sounds like an interesting guy so far. I wonder what that bit about the Malfoys meant."

Harry nodded and replied, "Yes, I really look forward to meeting him soon and I have no clue what they meant about the Malfoys." Harry himself also noted that his hand was entwined with Hermione's, but instead of ignoring it, he enjoyed the sensation. Smiling in her direction he said, "What do you say Hermione?"

"Hmm, sounds like the Malfoys did something stupid again, which is not really a surprise I would say, and lost a few things to the Black family. I think your new guardian will tell you about it later on. I think their meeting will conclude soon and we should hurry down so they can find us a bit easier, rather than stay up here listening to them." She smiled back at Harry and was also enjoying the sensation of holding hands with the boy she was starting to see as more than 'just' a best friend.

Harry and Ron quickly agreed with her and after putting the ears back into a back pack, they hurried down to the big living room to wait on Ms. Verner and their guests.

Down in the living room again the three sat down at the table and while Hermione and Harry started to read something, Ron set up a chess set to play against himself.

A few moments later the door to the living room opened and as Harry looked up from his book, he saw Miss Verner enter. Following her into the room came three other people. One was an elder man with glasses on and he had the look of a scholar about him. He guessed that this would be Mr. Harris, his new guardian. With him were two younger people who could only be a few years older than him and his friend and damn...the girl looked like a goddess of...of...damn he couldn't say of what...but she was it.

He also noted that all three were dressed like muggles. He let out a small sigh of relief. At least he wouldn't have to deal with arrogant pure bloods.

While Harry gave those three a quick once over, Xander did the same, but was finished with it much quicker.

Taking a deep breath Xander moved through the room to Harry, held out his hand and said, "Hello Harry, I'm Xander and I'm here to get to know you and your friends and then if you agree, to become your new guardian, but that decision is up to you."

Harry looked baffled, first at Xander and then at the older man. "You?" he said in total surprise.

Xander grinned and just answered, "Me?"

Harry looked around a bit confused, "Sorry Mr. Harris, but I thought your scholarly looking friend over there would be you...ahh Mr. Harris I mean."

Xander shook his head. "First of, stuff that Mr. Harris nonsense, I'm Xander and not my father, so please, no more Mr. Harris, and that older man you mistook for me is G-Man."

Said G-Man looked up at Xander and just said, "Mr. Harris."

Xander coughed a bit and continued, "Ahh forget that Harry... I wanted to say that is Mr. Giles an old friend and more like a father to me than my real one and the beautiful goddess over there, which you happened to not miss seeing as I noted," he said with a grin, "is my fiancée Faith."

Harry blushed a bit and then gave a short nod to Giles, "Mr. Giles," and then blushing a bit more, to Faith, "Miss Faith."

Faith grinned a bit and shook her head, as she said, "Just Faith, Harry and him," pointing at Giles, "you can just call Giles, G-Man, Ripper or...Rupes."

Giles looked at Faith and just shook his head, knowing that protesting would be futile.

Faith grinned at Giles, savoring her victory, and continued, "So Harry, now that you know who we are you could introduce your two friends."

A bit overwhelmed, Harry nodded, started to say something and then had to start a second time. "Of course, these are my two best friends, Hermione Granger, the smartest witch I ever met," here Hermione blushed quite nicely, "and Ron Weasley, one of the best chess players ever."

Xander nodded to the two and said, "Hello, Miss Granger and Mr. Weasley."

Both nodded in return and said, "Hello Mr. Harris."

Looking mortally wounded Xander looked at both and said, "Pleasssseee... just Xander."

Harry grinned a bit at this. 'Xander wasn't what he had expected and he thought he could like him, even if he was an American,' he thought and laughed internally.

Xander looked for a moment at Harry and his friends and then continued. "Harry, I know that you are quite famous here and seeing you now, I would guess you don't really care for it or better, don't like it at all. Am I right?"

Harry just nodded.

"Good Harry, because if you decide that you want me to be your guardian, you have two options. We stay here in England and you can finish your education here at Hogwarts. Or we go back to America, where you can finish your education at Salem and after that go for advanced studies at Harvard or MIT. What we will do, will be your choice."

While Harry looked stunned, Hermione said, "Harvard and MIT, but those are muggle colleges."

Xander nodded. "Yes and no Miss Granger. First of, in America we don't use the term muggle. That's an outdated European Pureblood nonsense. In America we simply have magical and non-magical people, which in my opinion is better than the disparaging term 'muggle'. As for Harvard and MIT, yes, those are colleges, but they also offer several courses you can choose in addition to the 'normal' stuff, if you are magical. Things like Advanced Potions, Spell Crafting and a lot more. You know, magical Europe is kinda backwards to the rest of the world when it comes to things like that."

Hermione looked a bit shocked and said, "But Hogwarts is the best magical school in the world."

Xander shook his head, "Maybe here in Europe, but in the rest of the world? Let me explain. If you would finish Hogwarts and then you decide to immigrate to America or maybe Australia, the first thing you would have to do to get a Visa is a placement test, so that the state can see what you know and then to give you a reeducation course. You either take it and finish the test at the end or your Visa would be denied."

Shell shocked, Hermione only asked, "Why?"

"Ohh, that's quite simple, let me give you a small example," Xander said and as Hermione nodded he turned to Ron.

"Ron, you grew up in a Pureblood family. Am I right?"

Ron looked at Xander and nodded.

"Ok, don't take it wrong, please. It's just to give Hermione a small example," Xander said.

Ron nodded again. "No, problem Mr. H..ahhh Xander," he corrected himself after seeing Xander's gaze.

"Good, then let me ask you something. Ron, can you tell me the web address from Amazon or let's say from the RBS and can you tell me who landed first on the moon and when?"

Ron looked at Xander and shook his head, "Sorry the web address? And someone flew to the moon? How and with what broom?"

Xander looked at Hermione and said, "Do you see? I think that proved my point regarding the education of magical people in Europe."

Hermione was speechless.

Faith giggled and said, "Xan...I think you broke her."

Harry looked at Xander with a bit of longing and then said, "I would love to go to one of those schools, but I can't."

Faith looked at Harry and asked, "You can't?"

Harry nodded and replied, "No, sadly not. There are things I need to do here in England."

Xander looked up at that and said, "You mean that prophecy rubbish? Forget it."

Harry, Ron and Hermione looked shocked at Xander and then Harry asked, "You know the prophecy?"

Xander shook his head and answered, "No, I don't and I don't need to know it to tell you that it's rubbish. First of, a prophecy is mostly self-fulfilling and seldom goes like you think it will."

Harry looked at Xander. "But...,"

Before he could go on Xander interrupted him, "Let me tell you something. There was a very old prophecy that one of my closest friends would die at the hand of a certain master vampire and yes, she died, but not because of the prophecy, but out of stupidity."

Ron looked up at that and asked, "How so?"

"Simple. Because of that stupid prophecy her Watcher and her lover had already given up on her and instead of supporting her and giving her some backup, those two let her rush unprepared and terrified straight to the vampire. He killed her, which could have been avoided, if certain actions had been taken, but because of that prophecy, nothing was done and she died."

Giles looked ashamed at the floor and continued for Xander, "But because a certain young man didn't believe in prophecies, he forced her lover to show him the way to the master and they were right in time so that the young man could still save her with CPR. That is why Xander thinks prophecies are rubbish and now I tend to agree with him."

"So as I said, the choice is yours and not that of a stupid prophecy," Xander said.

Harry nodded and said, "I have a bit to think about that and I'll need to talk it through with Hermione and Ron."

Xander nodded. "Do that, Harry. You have all the time you need. We aren't in a hurry. First of Ms. Verner informed me that I have to go to Gringotts to claim my inheritance. That will probably take a while and after that we'll look for a nice restaurant where we'll have a nice meal and where we can talk more. Does that sound ok so far?"

"Yes, that will give me some time," Harry answered.

"Good, see you later then," Xander said and then left together with Faith and Giles to visit Gringotts.

AN: Here it is. The first chapter to my sequel of the reading, I know it took a while, but I just couldn't find the drill to write it before. I hope you enjoyed it.