[FFML] [Fanfic] [HP/BtVS] "Harry Potter and the Exiled Slayer" Chapter Three

[disclaimers, et al. are listed before Chapter One: the entire story as far as it has been completed can be found at: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/2778565/1/]

HARRY POTTER AND THE EXILED SLAYER

PART THREE

The gambler studied the young woman sitting across from him-with a large pot sitting between them-then tossed five black chips into the center of the table as he called out: "Five hundred."

The woman smiled, and the wraparound sunglasses she was wearing came off. The gambler saw dark brown eyes that defied his well-honed abilities to read the emotion in them, and which seemed to be boring into his own in a search for what was hiding beneath the anonymous backs of his two hole cards. It only took a second, maybe two, for her to reach down for the two stacks of chips-amounting to about two thousand dollars-- in front of her and push them forward as she replied calmly: "All in."

The gambler winced inwardly-he had been semi-bluffing with nines in the hole, and a king and a queen were sitting on the table for all to see along with three rags. The woman-who if she was twenty-one it was by the most vanishing margin-had read him perfectly, and he wasn't about to throw half his stack away on the slim chance that she was outright bluffing. He made a show of playing with his chips, then mucked his hand. The woman smiled again, and stacked the chips that the dealer raked over to her. The gambler remembered that she had sat down with the minimum two hundred dollar buy-in about two hours before, and that stack had now grown to well over three thousand dollars as she stood up, tossed the dealer a $25 chip, and said, "OK, guys-that's enough for me tonight-good luck." She deftly racked her chips and walked over to the cashier.

The attendant on duty recognized the woman and smiled as she asked, "Good night, Hope?"

The woman nodded. "Good enough." She accepted the cash in hundreds, and put the small roll in the front pocket of her jeans as she waved to the attendant and headed out to the parking lot to hail a cab. After a short ride, the cab pulled up in front of an apartment building in a middle-class neighborhood. The woman got out-having paid the driver in cash-and let herself into the front door of the building, before jogging up two flights of stairs and entering apt #302.

Faith-as she always did when returning home-breathed a sigh of relief, locked and chained the door, and took the cash over to the small slot in the floor where she kept a fireproof safe. The cash joined the rather large amount already there, and Faith closed the safe and covered it up again before walking over and slumping onto the sinfully overstuffed armchair sitting in the living room.

It had been eight months since Faith had mailed the letter to Giles from San Diego-and she had not spent one moment of it in the cramped, swaying confines of a freighter. If Buffy hadn't come after her that night in January, that would have been her escape route, but the events that followed Buffy's arrival-not to mention the five thousand dollars in cash that she had been delighted to discover hidden in Trick's car-had caused her to change her plans radically: travelling was expensive unless the accommodations sucked, and-other things being equal-she had found that she liked living in Southern California. After dumping the car in Oxnard and taking a bus down to San Diego, she had immediately started a project of misdirection with the purchase of a number of unmarked postcards that she carefully filled out with generic "wish you were here" comments and the address of Giles' flat, and by acquiring a T-shirt and jeans that would have allowed her to seduce a eunuch with effort to spare. She used the latter to separate a twenty-year old sailor from his buddies and his clothing in a small motel room near the docks, then quietly whispered a request for a favor in his ear as her hands were busy elsewhere. The young man-who would have agreed to jumping off the Coronado Bridge in a tutu if Faith had suggested it at that moment-agreed to mail the postcards one at a time from each of the ports of call that his ship made from then on until they ran out. Twenty minutes later, the sailor was staggering out of the motel room with a vacant smile on his face, and Faith was already planning her next move.

After purchasing a few more items of clothing and securing a new room in a somewhat better section of town, Faith had produced another batch of postcards, then passed them on to a re-mailing service that had been instructed to mail them from port cities all over the world over the next three years. Faith realized that Giles-or whoever was reading his mail-would probably realize that she was screwing around with him, particularly if cards being mailed by the sailor conflicted with those coming from the re-mailing service, but that didn't bother her-the point was to cause anyone looking for her to be looking away from Southern California, and she believed that the effort involved in trying to find a pattern in those postcards would do wonders for that.

After considering her options, she remembered that California was known for its poker rooms, and that she had developed considerable skill in the game during her time on the streets before Amanda-her first Watcher--found her. Of course, back then she had been playing for nickels and dimes, but she knew odds and tactics better than most who had seen her indifference to educational matters would have suspected, and-after a fake I.D. got her into a few games-she realized that she had acquired a very useful weapon for an aspiring poker player: Slayer intuition.

Faith had seen how Buffy-an indifferent student even when she attended classes-had managed SAT scores that had impressed Willow and shocked the others. No one said anything to her about it-even Cordelia wasn't tactless enough to suggest that Buffy had cheated by using the powers of the Chosen One to ace a test-but Faith had quietly satisfied her own curiosity by obtaining a sample SAT test and completing it in her room one night, taking the full allotted time to go through the test and answer all of the questions, though nine out of ten of them had her scratching her head. When she was done, she checked the answers and discovered that she-who had not spent a single day in a classroom after the eighth grade-had scored in the 85th percentile on the test. Nothing earth-shaking-and not nearly as well as Buffy had done-but it had confirmed Faith's suspicion that the same intuition that powered Slayer's dreams and gave those Slayers flashes of insight at crucial moments in battle might have more ordinary applications, such as making piles of money at poker tables.

She didn't get greedy-driving to Las Vegas and signing up for the World Series of Poker was a tempting prospect, but she knew there was a lot of luck involved in those tournaments, and she didn't want to attract attention even in the limited way that winning a tournament watched by a few thousand people on ESPN and which was of no interest to almost anyone else would give her even if she could win. On the other hand, there were thousands of players in Southern California and Vegas playing various varieties of poker, and she could win their money and remain relatively anonymous without trouble, as long as she went to different clubs, and occasionally to Vegas to let the memories of her grow fainter.

The plan had worked well: she was averaging about six thousand dollars a week in winnings, and she was careful to avoid winning enough in any one place and time to have to file any tax forms. After a few weeks, she had invested in a first-rate fake ID and cover identity, including a fake job that she could use to file taxes and keep the IRS off her back. She found an apartment in a central location in the suburbs of Los Angeles, and paid off the lease for two years-she didn't want to interact with the landlords any more than necessary. After seven months of this routine, she had put together a well-furnished residence, had over fifty thousand in cash set aside for a rainy day, and had a car-a 1970 Pontiac Grand Prix in pristine condition-that would do 135 MPH if and when she found cops or demons on her tail.

Faith sighed. -Unfortunately, it's not enough-

At least twice a week-after she had finished playing poker for the day and had put away her winnings-she would put on outfits that anyone who knew her in Sunnydale would recognize, along with various disguises such as wigs and sunglasses, and head out on the town. Some nights she would go into the most dangerous parts of the city, and-whether the prey she found was demonic or simply criminals that made the mistake of doing something stupid in front of her-the result was quiet whispers that -something-that would strike fear in the heart of a stone was out there stalking them. The demons only had the rumors of disappearances to work with-the gang members, thugs, and pimps could see for themselves the shattered limbs, black eyes, and unfocused stares that followed the passing of the deadly whatever-it-was. No one human had been killed yet by the mysterious figure, but they feared her with an intensity that had several men with multiple homicides to their names envious at the regard.

On other nights, she would simply find a bar-any bar-and sit at a table and quietly drink for a time before departing. She drew more than a little attention on these nights-no matter how she was disguised, she was beautiful and dressed to kill-but she turned away all who approached her, either politely, or with swift and blinding violence if the would be-suitor couldn't take no for an answer. Occasionally-as a young man with a disappointed expression turned away from her-she wondered at her forbearance: it had been long months since that evening with the sailor, and her biological pressures were reaching danger levels. But she knew that such encounters would inevitably increase the number of people who knew of her existence in this place, and something else was bothering her, though what it was escaped her. As she wondered, the image of betrayal on Xander Harris' face flickered in her mind just beneath the conscious level before vanishing.

Faith dismissed the moment of introspection, then stood up and entered her bathroom. First, she shed her outer clothing and put on a black T-shirt and red leather pants, before pulling on a black motorcycle jacket. She next reached for a longhaired blonde wig, which she easily pulled over her medium length hair, tucking loose hairs underneath and not stopping until the look was perfect. Next came the wraparound sunglasses, and a touch of Harlot Red lipstick. She glanced in the mirror. -All right, no use obsessing over it: it's not like anyone is going to unwrap the packaging tonight-- She grimaced at the thought, then headed out.

@ @ @ @ @

As with many other parts of her life, Faith let her regular prowls be guided by her intuition. She drove around more-or-less randomly along the freeways until she had an impulse to stop, after which she would park her car in a well-lit area that would not be a likely haunt for car thieves, and walked into the night.

On this night in early October, Faith parked in the lot of a small grocery store on the outskirts of Glendale, then walked towards a brightly-lit area of various shops, restaurants, and other small businesses. It was about seven in the evening, and many people were still around, talking to each other and going in and out of the businesses. It was just another Saturday night as far as this town was concerned, and the clandestine presence of a Slayer would not change that.

Faith walked quietly, ignoring the occasional stares from passersby as she looked into store windows and enjoyed the cool evening air. She had not seen any vampires, and there seemed to be very little which would demand the attention of a Slayer-even a quasi-reformed one who was looking for a little trouble to distract her. She was pondering the possibility of catching a movie and blowing off her usual hunting or drinking session when she spotted something across the street that riveted her attention.

Between two brightly-lit businesses in a fairly large storefront, there was an opening lined in brick, about four feet wide and six feet deep, and terminating in an ordinary looking door. The alcove was dark, and the pedestrians passing it seemed to be ignoring its very existence. More to the point, they seemed to be taking unnaturally long steps to avoid stepping on the pavement in front of the door-an effect that was rather obvious when small children did it-without stumbling or otherwise seeming to be aware that they were doing so. Faith watched for a few minutes and realized that the behavior of the pedestrians was universal-no one but her seemed to know that the doorway was there. Frowning, she waited for a gap in the pedestrian traffic, crossed the street, and walked briskly up to the doorway. Soon after, pedestrians began passing her again, with the same odd walking pattern. She tried waving as they passed, but no one reacted. She snorted in surprise, then reached out and grasped the handle of the door-which opened without any problems. After giving one last glance to the oblivious shoppers out on the street, Faith turned to the doorway and walked in.

The door closed quietly behind her, but Faith was already looking at her new surroundings-which were giving her more "weirdness" vibes than she had experienced since leaving Sunnydale. The room she had entered was lit by lanterns set in the walls, which flickered slightly as the door finished closing before they ceased moving. The walls seemed to be made from polished oak and shone in the light. Most notably, the forty-odd occupants of the room seemed to be mostly clad in dark robes, though there were a few stragglers wearing business suits that looked as if they had been manufactured for extras in a movie from the 1950's. The men-for they were all men-were staring at her with a universally interpretable expression that said: "You don't belong here."

Faith smirked-she had never been one to be scared off easily. She walked over to what appeared to be the bar and addressed the big man standing behind the counter: "Give me a shot."

The bartender blinked, and seemed to be at a loss for words for a moment before replying, "Are you sure you're in the right place, Miss?"

Faith snorted, then replied: "You serve drinks here, right?" The man nodded slowly, and Faith grinned at him and chirped, "Then I'm in the right place-what'ya got?"

The man looked at her for a moment, and Faith would have sworn that his eyes glinted a bit before he reached below the counter and pulled out a bottle that read "Old Oscar's Lava-Brewed Fire Whiskey." Some of the other occupants of the bar were close enough to read the label on the bottle, and they paled and took two steps back. Faith saw the reaction and chuckled before asking, "Looks like you're bringing out the good stuff-how much for a shot?"

"Two galleons." The bartender was not surprised to see the puzzled look on Faith's face, and he elaborated, "Thirty dollars-but the first shot is on the house. It's a tradition, you see." He poured the shot-which was emitting an ominous amount of steam-and took two steps back before concluding, "It's all yours, miss."

Faith gave the man an appraising look, then reached for the shot glass. The bartender was amused-it was not unheard of for muggles to wind up in the bar due to inherent immunity to the concealment magic, and the standard practice was to wait for them to be distracted, zap them with an Obliviate spell, and march them back out the front door. However, if someone had the nerve not to be upset by the surroundings, this was his favored method of dealing with them-one shot of Old Oscar's would knock any muggle as cold as a cucumber and wipe out his or her memories of the evening. He'd drop her off at the train station after closing time, none the worse for the wear except for being confused.

Faith raised the glass and downed its contents in one motion. The sound of forty-odd men inhaling in unison broke the silence briefly, after which there was silence again for fully two seconds before Faith slammed the shot glass down, leaned back, and howled like a banshee as steam poured out of her ears. The bartender paled for the first time as he realized that this young woman was no muggle-muggles just passed out from fire whiskey without any pyrotechnics, and their eyes certainly didn't glow brightly enough to be seen through dark glasses from drinking only one shot. His thoughts were interrupted as he was grabbed forcefully by the collar and given a kiss that would be echoing in his memories decades later in moments when he was alone and otherwise bored. Faith released him, and he fell back against the wall, gasping for air as Faith looked back at him with a lazy, somewhat sated expression and pulled out a roll of bills as she asked, "How much for the bottle?"

It took a few moments of deep breathing and hard swallowing before the man could bring himself to raise two quivering fingers. Faith nodded and pulled out two hundreds, then added a third as she grasped the bottle by the neck and retrieved the shot glass as she called out, "Thanks! Best drink I've had in a while." She walked over to an unoccupied table and poured herself another shot as the bartender poured himself a shot of a somewhat less volcanic spirit and downed it quickly to calm his nerves. His thoughts were evenly divided between, "Who is that girl?" and "I really, really, don't ever want to know who that girl is." Deep down, he was hoping that getting gloriously drunk would settle him on the latter alternative.

The room was about half full, and most of the inhabitants of the room seemed to reach a consensus that they wanted to be as far away from the new arrival as possible without being obvious about it. They slowly drifted to tables along the far wall, and surreptitiously ignored Faith's occasional curious glances in their direction. After a few moments, she shrugged and downed a second shot. The howling was a bit more sedate the second time around, but the steam still poured and Faith's eyes were clearly visible under the glasses this time before they stopped glowing. After she had recovered, she looked up and saw a man in his early twenties, wearing one of the dark robes and looking at her with an expression that she was all too familiar with. -These guys are weird, but some things are the same-- She sighed inwardly before locking eyes with the man and saying, "Yeah?"

"I saw you sitting here and thought you might like some company." The man's accent was rather familiar to Faith, and she tensed up somewhat as he continued, "A bottle isn't a bad companion, but you can do better."

--Not bad- Faith admitted inwardly. -He's being polite enough, and he's easy on the eyes-- She gave him one more look, and it confirmed her suspicions. She raised her sunglasses and gave him a direct stare as she replied, "Thanks, but I've had enough of English guys for a while-not to mention of guys out for a quick screw with a chickie who's had a little too much to drink. Nothing personal-lot of girls have no problem with either. Good luck with that." She mentally dismissed the man and was contemplating pouring a third shot when she saw a set of palms slamming down on the table in front of her, knocking over the shot glass and almost doing the same to the bottle of Old Oscar's before her superhuman reflexes kicked in and she snatched the bottle out of mid-air. She set it down, then looked calmly up at the now visibly angry man as she whispered silkily, "I'm sorry-was there something else?"

"You drunken little trollop-do you think I have any intention of putting up with your insolence?" The young wizard was a tourist, and had listened to a lot of stories about wild American witches who in legend closely resembled the young lady in front of him-and who would supposedly respond to a forceful approach. He leaned in and grabbed Faith's arm firmly before leaning in to snarl, "If you think I'm going to put up with defiance from a little mudblood bitch like you, you're sadly-URK!"

The last sound had been the result of Faith's hand moving with blinding speed to the young man's throat, and the room seemed to freeze in borderline terror as she lifted him bodily away from the table. With no apparent effort, she shifted her grip and relieved the pressure on his windpipe by grasping the collar of his robe instead, but her voice was level and deadly as she said, "I don't know what that last word meant, but I don't put up with that crap from anyone-and definitely not from a little wimp in a dress." With what looked like a negligent shrug, she tossed the man twenty feet across the room, directly into one of the oak walls, which cracked at the impact. Faith winced slightly at the damage, looked to see that the idiot was still breathing, then walked over to the bartender and peeled off two thousand dollars and offered it to the bartender: "Sorry-that guy was being a jerk. Hope it doesn't cost any more than this to fix."

The bartender shook his head, refusing the money: "It'll be taken care of. Might be best if you leave now, miss-sometimes the authorities come by and they tend to ask questions."

Faith nodded, smiled at the bartender, then-without thinking about it-headed for the clearly marked back exit of the room instead of the one she came in through. The bartender started to open his mouth to warn her, but she was already gone. As he shrugged and went back to his tasks, four wizards looked at each other with predatory expressions, then stood and left the bar through the same exit that Faith had departed through.

@ @ @ @ @

Faith took two steps forward as the door clicked closed behind her, and stared at her new surroundings.

The street she had first entered the bar from had consisted of buildings either built or upgraded in the last twenty years-this one looked like a set from a Charles Dickens story made into a movie. Robed men and women were walking around talking to each other and looking into store windows-which had signs that seemed ordinary at first, but a few of the names started to attract her attention: "Blackstone's Potion Supplies"-"Anaximander's Wands"-"Doolittle's Magical Creature Store." Her first response was to look down at the bottle in her hand suspiciously, but she was already aware that she wasn't particularly drunk-whatever the strange drink's properties were, it didn't seem to have as much of an intoxicating effect as other beverages she had partaken of. She stashed the bottle in her shoulder bag and walked into the bizarre new environment, looking around for boundaries and other new sights.

After about a half an hour, she had discovered that the area was a six block square-about a quarter mile on a side-and with clear barriers at all edges. To get out, she'd either have to leave through the bar or some other business, or she'd have to climb a building and see if she could get out that way. The latter course seemed to her to be a bit drastic, as bars were generally open to late hours and she could always go back to it.

More importantly, she had been listening as she walked, and the conversations of those around her had been enough to give her a good idea of what this place was, and who these people were. There were apparently thousands of people who could use magic by shouting spells and pointing wands, and they called themselves wizards and witches. They hid from the rest of the world, living in their own areas or concealed from the normal humans (they called them "nuggles" or "tuggles" or something like that-the wizard she had been listening to at that time had a bad cold and wasn't too easy to understand), and places like this allowed them to get the things they needed without attracting unwanted attention. -There must have been some magic that keeps normal people from knowing that bar is there, and it didn't work on me because I'm a Slayer-- She smiled to herself. -This looks like it would be a fun place to hang out, if I can find out where to get some of the money they use without having them figure out that I don't belong here--

Faith stopped and frowned. She had walked into an area where the shops had already closed for the night, and a glance over her shoulder revealed that other shops were also closing their doors. She shrugged and turned back towards the entrance to the bar. -I can come back here tomorrow during the day and look for the bank. . .there's got to be one in here that'll switch regular money for wizard money. Then I can do the Giles thing and buy some books to resear--

"STUPEFY!"

The shout came from the dark alley she was passing, and she turned instantly in time to take a red energy bolt in the chest. She felt a jolt to her system that was like someone whacking her with a large blunt object, and it staggered her for a moment. Her head cleared quickly, and she glared at the robed figure whose wand was still pointed at her as she snapped: "That hurt-and I'm really, really good at payback."

The figure took two steps forward, and three other figures came into view behind him. They were hooded and masked, and Faith felt a chill as the one in front called out, "Oh, we know you are, Slayer." Faith blinked, and the man nodded and elaborated: "That stunner was just to complete the identification after your little display of temper in the tavern. A normal woman your size would have been rendered unconscious by it, or knocked down if your garments were warded against such magic. You hardly reacted to it at all-but there are four of us, and we have far more powerful spells at our disposal to deal with you if necessary. The Dark Lord has ordered us to retrieve you, and we were planning to journey to the Hellmouth when you fell right into our laps-he will be very, very pleased with us." The speaker straightened and ordered in a proud voice:

"Surrender, Buffy Summers-or face your doom."

The Death Eater was startled when the Slayer turned beet red, and was caught completely flatfooted when she snatched at a small stone at her feet and flung it at his head. It clipped his temple hard in spite of the protection of his hood and mask and sent him staggering. As his companions began firing spells, he smacked hard into the alley wall and his world quickly faded away. Just before it did, he heard the Slayer shouting angrily:

"I'M-NOT-BUFFY!"

@ @ @ @ @

A couple of minutes later, Faith was beginning to regret her outburst. Not that she was inclined to surrender meekly to a bunch of sickos in robes who were yelling about serving their "Dark Lord"-avoiding that kind of stupidity definitely fell under B's "don't die!" rule. However, having three guys firing spells designed to smash, slice, and outright kill her for a while had caused her to conclude that simply running like hell while they were still in that alley might have been the way to go. They were coordinating their attacks well-keeping her from finding useful missiles to toss back at them-and she wasn't able to get close enough to use the two stakes in her jacket as effective darts. She was limping slightly-a bludgeoning spell had clipped one of her knees-and a violet streak of light had sliced the right sleeve of her jacket, staining the black leather crimson with dark blood. The injuries weren't slowing her down that much as of yet, but she desperately needed to reduce the odds, and quickly.

A thought occurred to her, and she ran for a nearby building with a long brick wall on one side. The Death Eaters followed, firing more cutting and blasting curses and sending chunks of brick tumbling to the ground. Abruptly, Faith stopped in her tracks, reversed direction, and began doing backflips, catching the Death Eaters off guard as she grabbed a large chunk of brick during one of her flips and landed on her feet before flinging it at the head of the nearest robed figure. A painful sounding "crunch" echoed through the streets, and the Death Eater dropped instantly. Faith grinned ferally, but she moved quickly as the remaining two Death Eaters fired back at her, and swore as another cutting curse sliced the left sleeve of her jacket.

Faith was getting a little desperate-she wondered if she could smash right through the back door of the bar without taking time to open it, allowing her to run through and make it back out onto the street in the mundane world, where she assumed that the secrecy of the magic world would force her attackers to back off at least for the moment. She was preparing to make the last desperate run before her aching knee or blood loss caused her to make a fatal error, when she heard a new voice call out, "STUPEFY!"

--Great, another one of these jokers- Faith's resigned thought was rising to the front of her mind when she turned and saw one of her attackers slumping to the ground, and the other turning to face the new arrival. She saw long, dark hair trailing down the back of the figure, and a wand leveled at the remaining hooded wizard. A loud, clear male voice with the now-familiar English accent shouted "STUPEFY" again, and the last robed wizard dropped without further ado. The man walked over to Faith and his eyes quickly moved over her, noting the injuries. He looked down into her eyes and asked quietly, "Miss, are you all right?"

Faith blinked in bewilderment. With the end of the fight and the absence of any obvious threats to her, the adrenaline was ebbing from her body and the shock of her injuries abruptly began to catch up with her. She fought the approach of unconsciousness, struggling to get a good look at the face of her rescuer. She only saw a pair of intense green eyes before everything went black.

. .to be continued

As always, comments are welcomed and desired.

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