Chapter Seven: A Malfoy and a Weasley
19th August 1992
There is an awful lot of noise from the first floor; he turns from the bookshelf he is facing to lean over the banister, and sees the boy he hates with every fibre of his twelve-year-old being.
Harry Potter.
His eyes filled with the boy, he stalks down the stairs.
When he speaks to him, it is with his usual vitriol; everything is sharp and coursing through him and his words sound sharp and violent to his own ears.
And then she steps in.
He barely hears her speak enough to deliver a quick and ruthless retort back to her, just enough to make her flinch – he had learnt well from his father over the years – but really he drinks in her long dark red hair and gold eyes and pale skin. He remembers her. It was five years ago, but he remembers her.
He remembers a small girl with impossibly long rich red hair that shone like rubies, draped over an overlarge worn coat, her skin almost the colour of the snow she had fallen backwards against. Her eyes had been wide and gold in the morning sun as she stared up at him, aged seven. He had fallen over her.
Then she had laughed, and then stopped – and then she had smiled, a perfect smile, saying, ‘You’re an angel, aren’t you?’
It hadn’t been a question really, more like a statement. She must have really believed it. Then she had reached out a small slender white hand and touched his face, his hair.
‘My name’s Ginny. What’s yours? Do you have an angel name?’
That night, when he had reached home, he had stolen an embossed piece of parchment from his father’s desk, and had written, in his childish hand, Ginny Ginny Ginny.
Ginny Malfoy.
Five years later, the sight of her only makes him hate Harry Potter more.
~
6th June 1997
It has been four hours since Harry kissed her, and Ginny Weasley slowly pulls herself out of her bed to return to the kitchen where it happened.
As she makes her way down the stairs to the kitchen, she realises that this is a habit of hers; she eventually returns to things and places where she has a distinct memory of Harry. Not necessarily a good one – she remembers standing outside the Room of Requirement once in the past year, after Harry had left her to rush for a Potions class he had almost forgotten about, suddenly seeing in her mind’s eye Cho Chang walking towards Harry, and kissing him. She remembers having stood there for a long time, silently staring through a crack in the door, even as her eyes pricked with dust and tears.
Later that day, she had helped Hermione prepare a second portion of the love potion, and felt almost nothing when she slipped it into Harry’s pumpkin juice. He told her he loved her, that night.
Harry should be asleep by now, she thinks, even as she remembers his pulling away from their brief kiss, his eyes dark.
Then he told her that he loved her. But Ginny has been unable to sleep; she remembers nights thinking of whether Hermione really believes that Harry can love Ginny, if Hermione could have done what she had done.
When she reaches the kitchen, however, she starts as she sees, in the darkness, a figure hurdled over the table where her mother usually does the preparations for cooking, and her hand grips her wand –
‘I have no wand on me, and I doubt it’s entirely Gryffindor of you if you were to point one at me like that,’ comes a voice from the figure. The figure disentangles itself, and in the sliver of moonlight streaming in from the nearby window Ginny catches a flash of white-blond hair.
‘Malfoy,’ she says, calmly, but for whatever reason she feels disconcerted. She has been thinking too much of Harry, and of what she and Hermione has done.
‘So if it isn’t one-half of the golden couple of Hogwarts,’ remarks the boy in reply, and if Ginny were not irked already by his words she would have noticed a weak thread of tiredness in his voice. ‘Not returning for an early morning snog?’
‘You saw us.’
In the dim light she could just see Malfoy give her a long, hard look before he replies, ‘Yes.’
Strangely, even as she feels a hot anger course through her at his behaviour, she is unable to rant at him about this answer. It is too short, and too honest an answer for her to rant about. And she knows all too well, in any case, that Draco Malfoy has never been above spying.
Instead, she asks, somewhat curious, ‘You’ve been here all this time?’
Sounding almost disappointed, he replies instead, ‘You’re not going to sic that famous Weasley temper on me?’
‘I’m tired.’
‘That’s true,’ he nods, and beckons for her to join him at the table. Surprising compliant, she does. It was a strange night for surprises.
~
‘Do you remember your first encounter with Saint Potter?’ he asks, when she has settled herself in and he has passed her a cookie he must have managed to scavenge from some jar or another; it has been some time since Ginny has seen a cookie in this house. Looking down at the cookie in her hand, she cannot help but feel as if it means something from another time.
‘Why would you want to know about that?’ Ginny half-heartedly retorts – she has recanted the story many times to curious fellow students, albeit never to a Slytherin, or rather never to a person who managed to inject that much dislike into the question.
‘Since I gave you a cookie,’ replies Malfoy, and Ginny wonders if it is a trick of moonlight as for a brief moment, she thinks she sees a slight, soft upward curve on Malfoy’s thin mouth. ‘I want to know, in exchange for the cookie.’
‘A cookie that is from my house and which is therefore, a ninth mine,’ answers Ginny.
‘But it was in my possession. I could have chosen to gobble it all up and not given it to you.’
Ginny raises an eyebrow, and does not notice that her own lips have quirked upwards into a slight smile. ‘You’re being ridiculously persistent, Malfoy.’
Malfoy raises an eyebrow back at her, and replies, mockingly, ‘I am ridiculously persistent, Weasley. Unfortunately you’ve just never been exposed to that charming side of me. Many girls find it rather fetching.’
Ginny leans back for a moment, studying him. Finally, she says, ‘I don’t know why I am telling you this, but it’s late and you’re ridiculously persistent, and I’ve always been slightly mad – my first encounter with Harry was in your first year, when all of you were boarding the train to Hogwarts, and I remember waving and waving to him and Ron while the train was pulling away – but, ashamed as I am to admit this, it was probably very much to him – until they were out of sight.’
When she stops she notices that Malfoy has a look of mild disgust on his features. Irked, she demands, ‘What, Malfoy?’
‘Doesn’t really sound like much of an encounter,’ replies the boy smoothly. ‘It sounds more like a crazed fan doing something just within what society would deem non-criminal.’
‘Malfoy!’ exclaims Ginny, and disgustedly she starts to rise.
‘Wait – don’t go,’ he says instead, and in a quick action pulls her back down into her seat. She is surprised to note that his hands are painfully cold, despite the June weather. His face, she notices suddenly, is abruptly guarded.
‘So you’ve got a good memory, haven’t you, Weasley?’ he asks.
‘So you want me to provide you with another answer which you’re just going to use to insult me?’
‘I’m not – well,’ Malfoy’s brow furrows, and he looks down for a moment, before facing her again. His features are still curiously guarded. ‘I was wondering – do you remember your first encounter with me?’
‘With you?’ she asks back, surprised.
He nods, but his eyes are focussed on his own cookie on the tabletop.
‘Why?’
There is a pause before Malfoy replies with an edge of mocking in his voice, ‘I thought we went through with the cookie business, Weasley...’
‘Well,’ interrupts Ginny, somehow sensing that allowing him to continue would somehow result in a quarrel which was not ready for at four in the morning, ‘it was in Flourish and Bott’s, wasn’t it? You were insulting Harry, as usual, and I stood up for him, and you insulted me. Seems to have set the pattern for all our future encounters.’
He does not answer for a while, at this, and returns to studying the cookie.
‘How was it, after your first year?’ he finally asks.
She is rather taken aback. ‘What’s with all these questions today?’
‘I just want to know, alright!’
She realises that she could tell him that he has no right to know, but for some reason does not. Instead she asks, ‘Have you been – have you been having dreams or feeling strange? Since what Tom did to you?’
There is a pause, before he replies, ‘Yes.’
She nods, and then continues, ‘I had many dreams. I think you know what it’s like – they’re disconcerting and vivid and make you feel...dirty, and unsafe. And sometimes, well – sometimes, when I try to remember what had happened to me before my first year, I feel as if there’s a chasm of something, memories maybe, which I can’t reach any more – like I believe I had a really happy childhood here, and my brothers certainly remember that they had been happy, but sometimes, I feel as if I’m not so very sure. And I can’t decide if it’s my own memories I can’t remember to account for such a feeling, or it’s Tom’s. Sometimes when I go to places, when I touch things, I remember Tom. It comes suddenly, and I’ll remember the sound of his voice, and it’s like he is with me, again.’
She stops, and Malfoy is staring at her, his face unclouded now. ‘Do you – do you know what I mean?’ she asks, hesitantly.
Slowly, Malfoy nods. He says, ‘I can’t say I know or feel as vividly or deeply as you do, but...’
But he understands. Suddenly Ginny feels tears prick her eyes.
Malfoy continues to study her, and it is as if a kind of understanding passes between the two of them. And then he asks, ‘So – what do you think we will be doing about Timothy Groan – and the two of us?’ His voice is soft yet thankfully normal in tone.
Ginny blinks, pushing away her tears. ‘I’m not sure. I guess we could – we ought to – do some research, to reverse the spell, or perhaps Timothy has rather an idea of how to reverse it, since he has been waiting so long already, just for us to appear to complete the picture.’
Malfoy nods. ‘If it’s research we have to do, we should probably be starting with the library at Hogwarts. Which I suppose shouldn’t be difficult for McGonagall to arrange – or probably Groan has some way to get us there even without Hogwarts; I wouldn’t be surprised if he does. But, well – I’m digressing – I’m surprised that you didn’t react more greatly at what Groan said.’
Ginny considers this, before answering, ‘I’m not sure I know what you mean.’
‘Don’t you feel as if he’s been lying to you?’
‘They were probably necessary lies.’
‘He wouldn’t have told you if not for Granger.’
‘Well...’ starts Ginny, ‘I think it was probably – eventually – his aim to do so. I don’t think he would have come here this summer if it wasn’t to do this.’
Malfoy smiles this time and Ginny is surprised at the expression – it is soft, and actually makes the planes on his face becoming.
‘Nevertheless I’m still surprised at you,’ he says, and his smile broadens.
Ginny finds herself smiling back despite herself. ‘Malfoy – did we just...’
‘I think you shouldn’t think too much into this,’ he interjects, but his tone is not forbidding, and the smile has not entirely left his face. ‘I’m a Malfoy, you remember.’
‘And I’m a Weasley,’
‘Really?’ I wouldn’t have guessed – what with...’
‘The red hair, and the freckles, and the hand-me-down clothes?’ recites Ginny. But for the first time the words, so familiar in the context of her interactions with Malfoy, are more friendly than hostile. It is almost as if it creates a real history between them.
Malfoy laughs at this; Ginny realises that it is a pleasant sound, when lacking in its usual spite.
~
‘So I was thinking, we should probably go to the Hogwarts library to get some more research done on – on what Riddle had done, so we can better understand how to reverse everything,’ starts Hermione the next morning, as Ginny, Hermione, Harry, Ron, Timothy Groan and Malfoy settle down for breakfast. Ginny glances at Malfoy, who is next to her, and finds herself pleasantly surprised to see that he meets her eye and that a slight smile is on his lips. ‘Do you have any concrete idea on how to undo things, Groan?’ continues Hermione.
‘I’ve found various methods to reverse the spell, Granger, but I doubt you would like to hear them during breakfast,’ replies Groan, an innocent expression on his face.
‘I hope you don’t mean that seriously,’ says Harry darkly, as he reaches for another helping of pancakes.
Groan only gives him a smile. Harry turns away from him, looking disgusted.
‘In any case, it would not hurt to do more research on the other Horcruxes,’ says Groan, ‘I’ve never actually looked into the rest of them.’
‘You’ve never...what?!’ exclaims Ron, almost choking on his cereal.
‘It was never of any importance to me, but it might be to you,’ Groan says helpfully, seemingly unperturbed. ‘I doubt the adults would protest against us going to Hogwarts, in any case.’
‘What do you mean by that?’ asks Hermione.
‘Terence Higgs told me yesterday night, before I went to bed. They are going to evacuate the muggles living within a five-mile radius of this place, and are also going to strip the Burrow of its wards after we leave the place as well.’
‘Why?’ asks Ginny, shocked at the news.
‘There was another murder by the Death Eaters last night,’ replies Groan, continuing to calmly and neatly cut his scrambled eggs. ‘A fourteen-year-old girl this time. It wasn’t the Sectumsempra curse though; they Crucio-ed her to death. And it seems they had raped her before that.’
A heavy silence falls over the table, punctuated only by the small sharp sounds of Groan’s knife against his plate as he continues cutting his food.
‘How are they accounting for the evacuation?’ asks Harry, finally. There is an edge to his voice.
‘The muggle authorities are releasing information that there’s been some environmental contamination, and that the area is dangerous to remain in. What the Order intends to do is to leave the Burrow open and empty to the Death Eaters to realise that they cannot have a hold on the Order by using the lives of the muggles in the area. I suppose we will be moving to Hogwarts, or some other secured Order premise. I think there’ll be an attack on a suspected Death Eater premise as well, to send them a warning.’
‘An attack?’ asks Harry.
‘You wouldn’t be allowed to join it,’ replies Groan evenly. ‘It would be more productive for us to work on the other Horcruxes together.’
‘We should try to access the Malfoy library,’ Malfoy says, quite suddenly. ‘If it’s not already overrun with Death Eaters – which I don’t think is likely,’ he pauses for a moment. Ginny has a sense that what he was about to say next is painful for him. ‘It was one of the first places the Ministry took over when my father was first captured.’
There is another silence, before Ginny asks, softly, ‘Would there be anything especially useful in the Malfoy library?’
‘It’s known as one of the best private libraries in the country,’ says Hermione, her voice even. ‘Many academics have consulted the Malfoy library, besides the Hogwarts library, for their work.’
‘A surprisingly fair remark, Granger,’ drawls Malfoy, but he does not continue beyond that.
‘We’re not going there unless we have to,’ says Harry, his tone curt. ‘It might be a trap.’
Malfoy turns to him, giving him a cold look. ‘Because after Voldemort carved my arm up, and after he meant for me to be killed, and after he actually rid me of my magical abilities, my heart is entirely into setting up a trap for him, Potter.’ Each word is harshly spoken, and his eyes are fiercely fixed on Harry’s.
Harry looks away first.
‘How do we enter into the Malfoy premises?’ asks Ginny, finally. Harry looks up at her, and there is a look almost of surprise on his face.
‘I doubt we could enter the normal way; it’s too dangerous for the Ministry to know we’re entering the place because we might as well be announcing our intentions to Voldemort in that case. We’ll have to enter through the forest which is part of the Malfoy land. It’ll be more dangerous, though.’ Malfoy is turned resolutely to Ginny only as he says this.
‘But it’ll be a back-up plan to Hogwarts in any case; no need to take unnecessary risks,’ Malfoy continues, still facing Ginny. Ginny finds herself not knowing if she ought to laugh at this; Malfoy and Harry have agreed with each other – eventually.
‘In that case then, we ought to start packing. I suppose we better pack as many of our things as possible; we ought probably to be staying over at the Headquarters or Hogwarts,’ Hermione says, and there is a note of familiar determination in her voice. Ginny does smile at this – this is the old Hermione she has always loved dearly.
If only they hadn’t done what they had...
~
Things only sink in for Ron, however, at mid-afternoon.
Standing in the garden, overrun with weeds by now, he realises as he puts his trunk down that this is the first time the Burrow is well and truly empty, for an indefinite period of time.
And when the Death Eaters come, there would be no telling whether they would let it stand.
The Burrow is ramshackle, and run-down, and Ron hates to admit this, but he remembers when he first heard that Malfoy had been found in Ginny’s room – that his first insane thought had been chagrin that all that Malfoy has ever said about his family’s home is true.
But in leaving, Ron suddenly has an acute sense of this being theirs. The Weasleys’.
Ginny is sobbing quietly to his right, and Harry pats him on the back; Malfoy, next to Ginny, looks up at the place, and for once neglects to say anything hurtful.
There ought not to be much to miss here. But Ron remembers his favourite post round the back garden fence, to look over into the forest behind the grounds, and the kink in the banister down the stairs that you have to be careful of when you slide down it when Mrs. Weasley isn’t looking, and thinks of the bright orange walls of his room which he has always refused to admit are a pain to fall asleep to, and the way the light falls in through the windows in Ginny’s room...
They’ve had birthdays and pets’ funerals and relatives’ weddings and blistered feet and laughter and quarrels and midnight feasts and his father’s muggle contraptions and – and almost everything Ron has ever known, full to burst within him.
‘It’s time to go,’ says Terence Higgs, from behind him.
‘We have to leave the Burrow now.’
~
‘There’s only space for you in the Slytherin dormitories,’ says Terence Higgs pleasantly; ignoring the loud groans immediately emitted by the members of the small troupe, save for Malfoy and Groan, ‘You can choose whichever rooms and beds you like as well; seems that the muggleborns’ families weren’t interested in these dorms.’
‘I wonder why,’ mutters Harry darkly. Only Harry, Ginny, Ron, Hermione, Malfoy and Groan have been left at Hogwarts; everyone else from the Burrow have left for another location which was not disclosed. Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny had tried, with what could only have been described as great futility, to protest against such an arrangement, but Terence Higgs had been a stone wall. He had calmly herded them, with their things, into a large Thestral-drawn carriage, and had equally calmly ignored all further questions from Harry.
Somehow he must have been irritated, however, because at one point on the trip to Hogwarts Harry found himself mysteriously deprived of the sound of his voice.
The Gryffindors look around at their silver and green surroundings; to Ginny and Ron, this feels like a slap in the face.
‘Well,’ says Hermione finally, ‘I do suppose we ought to start with our research.’
~
‘Found anything?’ asks Malfoy, coming up from behind Ginny. They are the only ones at the top floor of the library, a section usually closed off to students. Harry and Ron have gone to find some dinner from the kitchens, and Hermione and Groan are in another section of the library. The top floor has always been closed off to students, but they have, for once, Madam Pince’s permission to research in it.
It has been three hours since they have left the Burrow, and no news has come from the Order.
It has also been three hours of fruitless searching, and Ginny is beginning to wonder what they are supposed to be searching for in the first place.
When Ginny first entered the top floor, her breath had caught; it is really a large, expansive balcony. Three walls of the place are bookshelves lined with ancient books, at least thirty metres high – there is at least a few thousand of them; the last wall and the ceiling consists entirely of clear glass. The summer sunshine had entered fully into the room; the view is of the lake and large stretches of plains and meadows beyond. At the very centre of the ceiling hangs a chandelier of glass panes and long and slender gold bugles, the largest chandelier Ginny has ever seen.
Three hours later, however, with nothing to show from the mere one book that she was still going through, Ginny finds no comfort in her surroundings.
She looks up at Malfoy. ‘I can’t find anything.’
Malfoy nods. ‘Me neither.’
‘We’re not – we’re not helping at all, are we?’
‘I don’t suppose we are.’
‘I just – do you think...’ starts Ginny, and her voice is shaky with tiredness, and held-back tears. But she realises that the colour has drained from Malfoy’s already pale face, and he seems to be staring at something behind her.
She starts to feel a touch of coldness in the air, and realises that their shadows have started to disappear across the mahogany flooring.
‘Malfoy?’ she asks, and slowly, suddenly fearful, she turns around.
An army of Dementors are beyond the glass wall.
~
‘The wards – the wards – I thought the wards would have kept them away!’
‘Some wards don’t work very effectively on Dementors,’ mutters Malfoy, and there is a trembling note in his voice. ‘Some wards are even less effective with only glass to hold them. That’s why Father always said to stay away from windows – he always said to stay away from them and go to the dungeons if there ever were an attack – there’s no explanation for it, but somehow glass has always been a weak medium...’
‘Can they pass through? Malfoy – can they pass through!’
‘Azkaban...’ Malfoy has turned fully on her, and Ginny hardly realises that he is gripping onto her hands, and that his grip is almost cruel. His eyes are wide and bright silver with fear.
‘Azkaban has no windows.’
~
Her fifth birthday, when Ron had brought her on her first dip in the stream behind the Weasley grounds – when Percy had given her sweets from his first Hogsmeade trip – when the muggle boy from the nearest farm with the light, curling blond hair had given her a chain of daisies – her first memory of her mother’s cookies – an eleven-year-old Harry giving her a smile through the glass of the Hogwarts Express – when Colin, her first friend in Hogwarts, had sent her a series of muggle photographs that he had taken of her that first summer after Tom – when she had been among the top in her class – the feel of the first Snitch that she had ever caught, struggling in her hand –Hermione giving her a hug – Ron, coming home from his first year away at Hogwarts – Timothy dancing with her at Bill’s wedding – Harry bending down to kiss her –
‘Expecto Patronum!’ she screams, but her hands are cold and losing grip on her wand and Malfoy is holding on to her and they are surrounded...
‘Expecto Patronum!’
~
Ginny Weasley is faltering, and he has never seen such endless night.
He can barely see ahead of him, but he knows his hand is around hers now, around her small, cold hand that is gripping onto her wand; she is starting to weigh against his body.
There is no hope. There is no hope. There is no hope...
Then, suddenly, he remembers – his mother’s first sweets, sent to him from home to Hogwarts, the taste of his favourite caramel and the warmth he had felt, being the one to choose to give one sweet to Crabbe and another to Goyle; his father, giving him his first broom; his favourite sweet shop in the heart of Germany as a boy, with endless rows of colour and shine; Blaise Zabini and him, laughing fit to burst on a snowy winter evening, having pelted each other with magical flying snowballs...
The Slytherin Quidditch team complimenting him for winning a game – flying over the frozen lakes of Harbin on his broomstick – his father buying him his wand – a five-year-old asking him if he had an angel name –
‘EXPECTO PATRONUM!’
There is a rush of light, and Draco Malfoy sees no more.
~
19th August 1992
There is an awful lot of noise from the first floor; he turns from the bookshelf he is facing to lean over the banister, and sees the boy he hates with every fibre of his twelve-year-old being.
Harry Potter.
His eyes filled with the boy, he stalks down the stairs.
When he speaks to him, it is with his usual vitriol; everything is sharp and coursing through him and his words sound sharp and violent to his own ears.
And then she steps in.
He barely hears her speak enough to deliver a quick and ruthless retort back to her, just enough to make her flinch – he had learnt well from his father over the years – but really he drinks in her long dark red hair and gold eyes and pale skin. He remembers her. It was five years ago, but he remembers her.
He remembers a small girl with impossibly long rich red hair that shone like rubies, draped over an overlarge worn coat, her skin almost the colour of the snow she had fallen backwards against. Her eyes had been wide and gold in the morning sun as she stared up at him, aged seven. He had fallen over her.
Then she had laughed, and then stopped – and then she had smiled, a perfect smile, saying, ‘You’re an angel, aren’t you?’
It hadn’t been a question really, more like a statement. She must have really believed it. Then she had reached out a small slender white hand and touched his face, his hair.
‘My name’s Ginny. What’s yours? Do you have an angel name?’
That night, when he had reached home, he had stolen an embossed piece of parchment from his father’s desk, and had written, in his childish hand, Ginny Ginny Ginny.
Ginny Malfoy.
Five years later, the sight of her only makes him hate Harry Potter more.
~
6th June 1997
It has been four hours since Harry kissed her, and Ginny Weasley slowly pulls herself out of her bed to return to the kitchen where it happened.
As she makes her way down the stairs to the kitchen, she realises that this is a habit of hers; she eventually returns to things and places where she has a distinct memory of Harry. Not necessarily a good one – she remembers standing outside the Room of Requirement once in the past year, after Harry had left her to rush for a Potions class he had almost forgotten about, suddenly seeing in her mind’s eye Cho Chang walking towards Harry, and kissing him. She remembers having stood there for a long time, silently staring through a crack in the door, even as her eyes pricked with dust and tears.
Later that day, she had helped Hermione prepare a second portion of the love potion, and felt almost nothing when she slipped it into Harry’s pumpkin juice. He told her he loved her, that night.
Harry should be asleep by now, she thinks, even as she remembers his pulling away from their brief kiss, his eyes dark.
Then he told her that he loved her. But Ginny has been unable to sleep; she remembers nights thinking of whether Hermione really believes that Harry can love Ginny, if Hermione could have done what she had done.
When she reaches the kitchen, however, she starts as she sees, in the darkness, a figure hurdled over the table where her mother usually does the preparations for cooking, and her hand grips her wand –
‘I have no wand on me, and I doubt it’s entirely Gryffindor of you if you were to point one at me like that,’ comes a voice from the figure. The figure disentangles itself, and in the sliver of moonlight streaming in from the nearby window Ginny catches a flash of white-blond hair.
‘Malfoy,’ she says, calmly, but for whatever reason she feels disconcerted. She has been thinking too much of Harry, and of what she and Hermione has done.
‘So if it isn’t one-half of the golden couple of Hogwarts,’ remarks the boy in reply, and if Ginny were not irked already by his words she would have noticed a weak thread of tiredness in his voice. ‘Not returning for an early morning snog?’
‘You saw us.’
In the dim light she could just see Malfoy give her a long, hard look before he replies, ‘Yes.’
Strangely, even as she feels a hot anger course through her at his behaviour, she is unable to rant at him about this answer. It is too short, and too honest an answer for her to rant about. And she knows all too well, in any case, that Draco Malfoy has never been above spying.
Instead, she asks, somewhat curious, ‘You’ve been here all this time?’
Sounding almost disappointed, he replies instead, ‘You’re not going to sic that famous Weasley temper on me?’
‘I’m tired.’
‘That’s true,’ he nods, and beckons for her to join him at the table. Surprising compliant, she does. It was a strange night for surprises.
~
‘Do you remember your first encounter with Saint Potter?’ he asks, when she has settled herself in and he has passed her a cookie he must have managed to scavenge from some jar or another; it has been some time since Ginny has seen a cookie in this house. Looking down at the cookie in her hand, she cannot help but feel as if it means something from another time.
‘Why would you want to know about that?’ Ginny half-heartedly retorts – she has recanted the story many times to curious fellow students, albeit never to a Slytherin, or rather never to a person who managed to inject that much dislike into the question.
‘Since I gave you a cookie,’ replies Malfoy, and Ginny wonders if it is a trick of moonlight as for a brief moment, she thinks she sees a slight, soft upward curve on Malfoy’s thin mouth. ‘I want to know, in exchange for the cookie.’
‘A cookie that is from my house and which is therefore, a ninth mine,’ answers Ginny.
‘But it was in my possession. I could have chosen to gobble it all up and not given it to you.’
Ginny raises an eyebrow, and does not notice that her own lips have quirked upwards into a slight smile. ‘You’re being ridiculously persistent, Malfoy.’
Malfoy raises an eyebrow back at her, and replies, mockingly, ‘I am ridiculously persistent, Weasley. Unfortunately you’ve just never been exposed to that charming side of me. Many girls find it rather fetching.’
Ginny leans back for a moment, studying him. Finally, she says, ‘I don’t know why I am telling you this, but it’s late and you’re ridiculously persistent, and I’ve always been slightly mad – my first encounter with Harry was in your first year, when all of you were boarding the train to Hogwarts, and I remember waving and waving to him and Ron while the train was pulling away – but, ashamed as I am to admit this, it was probably very much to him – until they were out of sight.’
When she stops she notices that Malfoy has a look of mild disgust on his features. Irked, she demands, ‘What, Malfoy?’
‘Doesn’t really sound like much of an encounter,’ replies the boy smoothly. ‘It sounds more like a crazed fan doing something just within what society would deem non-criminal.’
‘Malfoy!’ exclaims Ginny, and disgustedly she starts to rise.
‘Wait – don’t go,’ he says instead, and in a quick action pulls her back down into her seat. She is surprised to note that his hands are painfully cold, despite the June weather. His face, she notices suddenly, is abruptly guarded.
‘So you’ve got a good memory, haven’t you, Weasley?’ he asks.
‘So you want me to provide you with another answer which you’re just going to use to insult me?’
‘I’m not – well,’ Malfoy’s brow furrows, and he looks down for a moment, before facing her again. His features are still curiously guarded. ‘I was wondering – do you remember your first encounter with me?’
‘With you?’ she asks back, surprised.
He nods, but his eyes are focussed on his own cookie on the tabletop.
‘Why?’
There is a pause before Malfoy replies with an edge of mocking in his voice, ‘I thought we went through with the cookie business, Weasley...’
‘Well,’ interrupts Ginny, somehow sensing that allowing him to continue would somehow result in a quarrel which was not ready for at four in the morning, ‘it was in Flourish and Bott’s, wasn’t it? You were insulting Harry, as usual, and I stood up for him, and you insulted me. Seems to have set the pattern for all our future encounters.’
He does not answer for a while, at this, and returns to studying the cookie.
‘How was it, after your first year?’ he finally asks.
She is rather taken aback. ‘What’s with all these questions today?’
‘I just want to know, alright!’
She realises that she could tell him that he has no right to know, but for some reason does not. Instead she asks, ‘Have you been – have you been having dreams or feeling strange? Since what Tom did to you?’
There is a pause, before he replies, ‘Yes.’
She nods, and then continues, ‘I had many dreams. I think you know what it’s like – they’re disconcerting and vivid and make you feel...dirty, and unsafe. And sometimes, well – sometimes, when I try to remember what had happened to me before my first year, I feel as if there’s a chasm of something, memories maybe, which I can’t reach any more – like I believe I had a really happy childhood here, and my brothers certainly remember that they had been happy, but sometimes, I feel as if I’m not so very sure. And I can’t decide if it’s my own memories I can’t remember to account for such a feeling, or it’s Tom’s. Sometimes when I go to places, when I touch things, I remember Tom. It comes suddenly, and I’ll remember the sound of his voice, and it’s like he is with me, again.’
She stops, and Malfoy is staring at her, his face unclouded now. ‘Do you – do you know what I mean?’ she asks, hesitantly.
Slowly, Malfoy nods. He says, ‘I can’t say I know or feel as vividly or deeply as you do, but...’
But he understands. Suddenly Ginny feels tears prick her eyes.
Malfoy continues to study her, and it is as if a kind of understanding passes between the two of them. And then he asks, ‘So – what do you think we will be doing about Timothy Groan – and the two of us?’ His voice is soft yet thankfully normal in tone.
Ginny blinks, pushing away her tears. ‘I’m not sure. I guess we could – we ought to – do some research, to reverse the spell, or perhaps Timothy has rather an idea of how to reverse it, since he has been waiting so long already, just for us to appear to complete the picture.’
Malfoy nods. ‘If it’s research we have to do, we should probably be starting with the library at Hogwarts. Which I suppose shouldn’t be difficult for McGonagall to arrange – or probably Groan has some way to get us there even without Hogwarts; I wouldn’t be surprised if he does. But, well – I’m digressing – I’m surprised that you didn’t react more greatly at what Groan said.’
Ginny considers this, before answering, ‘I’m not sure I know what you mean.’
‘Don’t you feel as if he’s been lying to you?’
‘They were probably necessary lies.’
‘He wouldn’t have told you if not for Granger.’
‘Well...’ starts Ginny, ‘I think it was probably – eventually – his aim to do so. I don’t think he would have come here this summer if it wasn’t to do this.’
Malfoy smiles this time and Ginny is surprised at the expression – it is soft, and actually makes the planes on his face becoming.
‘Nevertheless I’m still surprised at you,’ he says, and his smile broadens.
Ginny finds herself smiling back despite herself. ‘Malfoy – did we just...’
‘I think you shouldn’t think too much into this,’ he interjects, but his tone is not forbidding, and the smile has not entirely left his face. ‘I’m a Malfoy, you remember.’
‘And I’m a Weasley,’
‘Really?’ I wouldn’t have guessed – what with...’
‘The red hair, and the freckles, and the hand-me-down clothes?’ recites Ginny. But for the first time the words, so familiar in the context of her interactions with Malfoy, are more friendly than hostile. It is almost as if it creates a real history between them.
Malfoy laughs at this; Ginny realises that it is a pleasant sound, when lacking in its usual spite.
~
‘So I was thinking, we should probably go to the Hogwarts library to get some more research done on – on what Riddle had done, so we can better understand how to reverse everything,’ starts Hermione the next morning, as Ginny, Hermione, Harry, Ron, Timothy Groan and Malfoy settle down for breakfast. Ginny glances at Malfoy, who is next to her, and finds herself pleasantly surprised to see that he meets her eye and that a slight smile is on his lips. ‘Do you have any concrete idea on how to undo things, Groan?’ continues Hermione.
‘I’ve found various methods to reverse the spell, Granger, but I doubt you would like to hear them during breakfast,’ replies Groan, an innocent expression on his face.
‘I hope you don’t mean that seriously,’ says Harry darkly, as he reaches for another helping of pancakes.
Groan only gives him a smile. Harry turns away from him, looking disgusted.
‘In any case, it would not hurt to do more research on the other Horcruxes,’ says Groan, ‘I’ve never actually looked into the rest of them.’
‘You’ve never...what?!’ exclaims Ron, almost choking on his cereal.
‘It was never of any importance to me, but it might be to you,’ Groan says helpfully, seemingly unperturbed. ‘I doubt the adults would protest against us going to Hogwarts, in any case.’
‘What do you mean by that?’ asks Hermione.
‘Terence Higgs told me yesterday night, before I went to bed. They are going to evacuate the muggles living within a five-mile radius of this place, and are also going to strip the Burrow of its wards after we leave the place as well.’
‘Why?’ asks Ginny, shocked at the news.
‘There was another murder by the Death Eaters last night,’ replies Groan, continuing to calmly and neatly cut his scrambled eggs. ‘A fourteen-year-old girl this time. It wasn’t the Sectumsempra curse though; they Crucio-ed her to death. And it seems they had raped her before that.’
A heavy silence falls over the table, punctuated only by the small sharp sounds of Groan’s knife against his plate as he continues cutting his food.
‘How are they accounting for the evacuation?’ asks Harry, finally. There is an edge to his voice.
‘The muggle authorities are releasing information that there’s been some environmental contamination, and that the area is dangerous to remain in. What the Order intends to do is to leave the Burrow open and empty to the Death Eaters to realise that they cannot have a hold on the Order by using the lives of the muggles in the area. I suppose we will be moving to Hogwarts, or some other secured Order premise. I think there’ll be an attack on a suspected Death Eater premise as well, to send them a warning.’
‘An attack?’ asks Harry.
‘You wouldn’t be allowed to join it,’ replies Groan evenly. ‘It would be more productive for us to work on the other Horcruxes together.’
‘We should try to access the Malfoy library,’ Malfoy says, quite suddenly. ‘If it’s not already overrun with Death Eaters – which I don’t think is likely,’ he pauses for a moment. Ginny has a sense that what he was about to say next is painful for him. ‘It was one of the first places the Ministry took over when my father was first captured.’
There is another silence, before Ginny asks, softly, ‘Would there be anything especially useful in the Malfoy library?’
‘It’s known as one of the best private libraries in the country,’ says Hermione, her voice even. ‘Many academics have consulted the Malfoy library, besides the Hogwarts library, for their work.’
‘A surprisingly fair remark, Granger,’ drawls Malfoy, but he does not continue beyond that.
‘We’re not going there unless we have to,’ says Harry, his tone curt. ‘It might be a trap.’
Malfoy turns to him, giving him a cold look. ‘Because after Voldemort carved my arm up, and after he meant for me to be killed, and after he actually rid me of my magical abilities, my heart is entirely into setting up a trap for him, Potter.’ Each word is harshly spoken, and his eyes are fiercely fixed on Harry’s.
Harry looks away first.
‘How do we enter into the Malfoy premises?’ asks Ginny, finally. Harry looks up at her, and there is a look almost of surprise on his face.
‘I doubt we could enter the normal way; it’s too dangerous for the Ministry to know we’re entering the place because we might as well be announcing our intentions to Voldemort in that case. We’ll have to enter through the forest which is part of the Malfoy land. It’ll be more dangerous, though.’ Malfoy is turned resolutely to Ginny only as he says this.
‘But it’ll be a back-up plan to Hogwarts in any case; no need to take unnecessary risks,’ Malfoy continues, still facing Ginny. Ginny finds herself not knowing if she ought to laugh at this; Malfoy and Harry have agreed with each other – eventually.
‘In that case then, we ought to start packing. I suppose we better pack as many of our things as possible; we ought probably to be staying over at the Headquarters or Hogwarts,’ Hermione says, and there is a note of familiar determination in her voice. Ginny does smile at this – this is the old Hermione she has always loved dearly.
If only they hadn’t done what they had...
~
Things only sink in for Ron, however, at mid-afternoon.
Standing in the garden, overrun with weeds by now, he realises as he puts his trunk down that this is the first time the Burrow is well and truly empty, for an indefinite period of time.
And when the Death Eaters come, there would be no telling whether they would let it stand.
The Burrow is ramshackle, and run-down, and Ron hates to admit this, but he remembers when he first heard that Malfoy had been found in Ginny’s room – that his first insane thought had been chagrin that all that Malfoy has ever said about his family’s home is true.
But in leaving, Ron suddenly has an acute sense of this being theirs. The Weasleys’.
Ginny is sobbing quietly to his right, and Harry pats him on the back; Malfoy, next to Ginny, looks up at the place, and for once neglects to say anything hurtful.
There ought not to be much to miss here. But Ron remembers his favourite post round the back garden fence, to look over into the forest behind the grounds, and the kink in the banister down the stairs that you have to be careful of when you slide down it when Mrs. Weasley isn’t looking, and thinks of the bright orange walls of his room which he has always refused to admit are a pain to fall asleep to, and the way the light falls in through the windows in Ginny’s room...
They’ve had birthdays and pets’ funerals and relatives’ weddings and blistered feet and laughter and quarrels and midnight feasts and his father’s muggle contraptions and – and almost everything Ron has ever known, full to burst within him.
‘It’s time to go,’ says Terence Higgs, from behind him.
‘We have to leave the Burrow now.’
~
‘There’s only space for you in the Slytherin dormitories,’ says Terence Higgs pleasantly; ignoring the loud groans immediately emitted by the members of the small troupe, save for Malfoy and Groan, ‘You can choose whichever rooms and beds you like as well; seems that the muggleborns’ families weren’t interested in these dorms.’
‘I wonder why,’ mutters Harry darkly. Only Harry, Ginny, Ron, Hermione, Malfoy and Groan have been left at Hogwarts; everyone else from the Burrow have left for another location which was not disclosed. Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny had tried, with what could only have been described as great futility, to protest against such an arrangement, but Terence Higgs had been a stone wall. He had calmly herded them, with their things, into a large Thestral-drawn carriage, and had equally calmly ignored all further questions from Harry.
Somehow he must have been irritated, however, because at one point on the trip to Hogwarts Harry found himself mysteriously deprived of the sound of his voice.
The Gryffindors look around at their silver and green surroundings; to Ginny and Ron, this feels like a slap in the face.
‘Well,’ says Hermione finally, ‘I do suppose we ought to start with our research.’
~
‘Found anything?’ asks Malfoy, coming up from behind Ginny. They are the only ones at the top floor of the library, a section usually closed off to students. Harry and Ron have gone to find some dinner from the kitchens, and Hermione and Groan are in another section of the library. The top floor has always been closed off to students, but they have, for once, Madam Pince’s permission to research in it.
It has been three hours since they have left the Burrow, and no news has come from the Order.
It has also been three hours of fruitless searching, and Ginny is beginning to wonder what they are supposed to be searching for in the first place.
When Ginny first entered the top floor, her breath had caught; it is really a large, expansive balcony. Three walls of the place are bookshelves lined with ancient books, at least thirty metres high – there is at least a few thousand of them; the last wall and the ceiling consists entirely of clear glass. The summer sunshine had entered fully into the room; the view is of the lake and large stretches of plains and meadows beyond. At the very centre of the ceiling hangs a chandelier of glass panes and long and slender gold bugles, the largest chandelier Ginny has ever seen.
Three hours later, however, with nothing to show from the mere one book that she was still going through, Ginny finds no comfort in her surroundings.
She looks up at Malfoy. ‘I can’t find anything.’
Malfoy nods. ‘Me neither.’
‘We’re not – we’re not helping at all, are we?’
‘I don’t suppose we are.’
‘I just – do you think...’ starts Ginny, and her voice is shaky with tiredness, and held-back tears. But she realises that the colour has drained from Malfoy’s already pale face, and he seems to be staring at something behind her.
She starts to feel a touch of coldness in the air, and realises that their shadows have started to disappear across the mahogany flooring.
‘Malfoy?’ she asks, and slowly, suddenly fearful, she turns around.
An army of Dementors are beyond the glass wall.
~
‘The wards – the wards – I thought the wards would have kept them away!’
‘Some wards don’t work very effectively on Dementors,’ mutters Malfoy, and there is a trembling note in his voice. ‘Some wards are even less effective with only glass to hold them. That’s why Father always said to stay away from windows – he always said to stay away from them and go to the dungeons if there ever were an attack – there’s no explanation for it, but somehow glass has always been a weak medium...’
‘Can they pass through? Malfoy – can they pass through!’
‘Azkaban...’ Malfoy has turned fully on her, and Ginny hardly realises that he is gripping onto her hands, and that his grip is almost cruel. His eyes are wide and bright silver with fear.
‘Azkaban has no windows.’
~
Her fifth birthday, when Ron had brought her on her first dip in the stream behind the Weasley grounds – when Percy had given her sweets from his first Hogsmeade trip – when the muggle boy from the nearest farm with the light, curling blond hair had given her a chain of daisies – her first memory of her mother’s cookies – an eleven-year-old Harry giving her a smile through the glass of the Hogwarts Express – when Colin, her first friend in Hogwarts, had sent her a series of muggle photographs that he had taken of her that first summer after Tom – when she had been among the top in her class – the feel of the first Snitch that she had ever caught, struggling in her hand –Hermione giving her a hug – Ron, coming home from his first year away at Hogwarts – Timothy dancing with her at Bill’s wedding – Harry bending down to kiss her –
‘Expecto Patronum!’ she screams, but her hands are cold and losing grip on her wand and Malfoy is holding on to her and they are surrounded...
‘Expecto Patronum!’
~
Ginny Weasley is faltering, and he has never seen such endless night.
He can barely see ahead of him, but he knows his hand is around hers now, around her small, cold hand that is gripping onto her wand; she is starting to weigh against his body.
There is no hope. There is no hope. There is no hope...
Then, suddenly, he remembers – his mother’s first sweets, sent to him from home to Hogwarts, the taste of his favourite caramel and the warmth he had felt, being the one to choose to give one sweet to Crabbe and another to Goyle; his father, giving him his first broom; his favourite sweet shop in the heart of Germany as a boy, with endless rows of colour and shine; Blaise Zabini and him, laughing fit to burst on a snowy winter evening, having pelted each other with magical flying snowballs...
The Slytherin Quidditch team complimenting him for winning a game – flying over the frozen lakes of Harbin on his broomstick – his father buying him his wand – a five-year-old asking him if he had an angel name –
‘EXPECTO PATRONUM!’
There is a rush of light, and Draco Malfoy sees no more.
~
Author notes: Everything concerning glass, the efficacy of wards when it comes to glass and windows, Azkaban and its lack of windows, and the effectiveness of setting up wards against Dementors are entirely my own invention.
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