Gently dip, but not too deep.
“Odd how the tables turned, isn’t it?”
Not believing her ears, Ginny turned around slowly and found herself face-to-face with Draco Malfoy.
“Malfoy?” she asked rather stupidly. The man in front of her had the same blond hair, the same better-than-you look that used to rile her until she couldn’t see straight. He was still as angular as he’d once been with that ridiculously haughty appearance of an aristocrat, but his face was no longer smooth with youth and his eyes had new shadows. In all, he was an incongruous sight against the backdrop of the wedding reception taking place in the distance behind him.
Though she wasn’t entirely sure it was him, his name fell from her lips out of instinct. But Ginny wasn’t worried about his appearance as much as she was by her own reaction, for a very familiar sneer had formed on her face. She couldn’t stop herself from demanding, “What do you mean?”
Malfoy favored her with an unreadable expression, and Ginny was struck by the realization that despite that familiar look of him, this boy – no, man – was far different from the one she knew at Hogwarts.
She was so disturbed by this turn of events that she almost missed his reply. “I know you Gryffindors, with the exception of Granger, were never reputed to be geniuses,” he smirked, “but I think you understand very well what I meant.”
Thankfully, the mention of Hermione was enough to break the spell his appearance had cast on her. Ginny physically shook her head in an effort to clear it. She could feel her lips twist in a grimace as she squinted against the sunlight and asked warily, “Harry and Hermione invited you?”
“Bloody annoying, isn’t it,” Malfoy said pleasantly, as though he were discussing the weather, “knowing that your friends approve of me, yet they’re still upset that you left?”
Ginny could feel her face go hot at his words. Really, she should have known Malfoy would perceive her most obvious weakness, since he’d been so adept at it when they were younger. Ginny’s tone was arch and her expression cool as she attempted to hide her emotions. “I suppose your time in Azkaban has tamed you enough for public appearances, then?”
His smirk gave her a disconcerting sense of relief. She could deal with this Malfoy. “So the kitten has claws,” he mused as his smirk widened into a smile.
Ginny stared at him, not believing her ears. This wasn’t the game of words that the old Malfoy loved; yet why did it seem that he was genuinely enjoying this new game more than the old?
When his expectant pause went without answer, he rolled his eyes and said, almost out of duty, “I suppose your time in the Continent has given you a false sense of confidence, then?”
“How did you know I was on the Continent?” she asked before she could stop herself.
“Come now, Weasley,” he said in a bored tone, his hand gesturing his dismissal. “Surely you’ve noticed that your little sob story has adorned the front page of every paper in the Wizarding World.”
The blank look on her face must have betrayed her ignorance, because he began laughing. It was an unaffected, truly amused sound, one that she’d never expected to hear from him, particularly when in conversation with her. “Really, thank you for that,” he said once he was done laughing. “I didn’t think I’d have the opportunity to laugh today.”
Ginny flushed, hating the fact that he still enjoyed laughing at her expense. But she noted his words. “I’m amazed you decided to come,” she stated, ignoring the amusement still in his eyes as she looked away towards the stage again. Someone was laughing loudly in the distance.
“I’m sure you can see why.” She looked back to him quickly and saw that his amusement had turned smug. “In many ways, attending this wedding was as important as attending the Ministry’s Christmas Ball,” he continued with a shrug.
Ginny nodded; she did see how advantageous it was to please the Boy-Who-Lived and his bride, particularly for someone who had always been considered evil. But he seemed far too relaxed to simply be there for networking. “A Slytherin to the end?” she asked cautiously.
“Of course.” His smile was flinty and Ginny suddenly wondered if it really was that sharp. “You are still a Gryffindor, I see,” he commented casually. “Naïve, bold, and too hot-headed for your own good.”
His words weren’t earth-shattering, but Ginny could feel their effect like a blow to the stomach. The sounds of the party in the distance faded away, until she could only hear her own breathing. She looked away again, not wanting him to gain more pleasure at her expense. “If you knew me,” she said in a soft voice, “you’d know I’m no longer that way.”
“Yes, too naïve for your own good,” he muttered under his breath, almost as though he were speaking to himself. Louder, he said, “That’s where you’re wrong, Weasley. Circumstances change, but you and I – we don’t change.”
His serious tone brought her eyes back to his in sharp focus. His face was earnest in his belief, which Ginny found endearing. “Of course we do,” she replied, as though to a small child. “You cannot deny that Azkaban has changed you.”
His mouth settled into a straight line and his shoulders were rigid in defense. Ginny could see that she had obviously struck a nerve by mentioning Azkaban.
“I learned from it, yes,” he gritted out, “But I haven’t changed because of it. It takes more than steel bars to cage a Malfoy.”
She raised an eyebrow at the ancestral loyalty in that, squinting in the late afternoon sun as she studied him. From the way he’d been acting so far, Ginny assumed that he’d become a pragmatist. If he had, then he apparently kept his pretences up for a few things. “Malfoy, if you hadn’t gone to Azkaban, you wouldn’t have come today. You would have seen no use in it – your money would have been enough to buy you whatever contacts you needed.”
“I already have enough money to buy whomever I need.”
Someone was ringing a glass with a utensil, probably to give a toast. Ginny belatedly realized that she wasn’t there to join in the festivities, but she couldn’t ignore the temptation to go past the obvious façade he’d created. Malfoy’s eyes were spitting fire and she knew that she was treading dangerous ground, but she replied anyway. “Then why are you here?”
She watched with detached fascination as a cool mask slipped over his eyes, hiding the hurt and resentment she’d seen only moments before. His voice as calm and a little teasing as he responded, “Why are you here?”
“Don’t be daft,” Ginny grinned defensively, even though she didn’t consider this a joke. “Harry and Hermione are my family.”
Malfoy’s eyes were still blank. “Yes, but why are you here?” He gestured back to the reception behind him and continued, “Why haven’t you joined the happy couple over there, toasting and eating?”
There was bitterness in his voice when he mentioned Harry and Hermione that caught Ginny’s attention. She watched his face carefully as she replied calmly. “I wanted to think.”
“Right.”
The finality in his tone infuriated her more than the triumphant smirk on his face. “You don’t believe me?” she asked, her voice shrill with defensiveness.
“No.” She opened her mouth to defend herself, but he held up his hand to stop her. “Don’t give me that look,” he sneered. “I know very well that this is your tame way of running away from the awkwardness of seeing Potter married to the girl who you thought would marry your brother. Not to mention your stilted relationship with the rest of your family.”
Ginny could feel the blood drain from her face. “You’re wrong,” she whispered, even though she knew she was lying.
“In fact,” he continued as though she hadn’t spoken, “I’ll wager you’ll run away again in a year or so. That taste of freedom has shown you a convenient way to avoid all of your problems.”
Ginny’s anger was coursing through her veins like a heady wine, blurring her vision and loosening her tongue. “Oh yes,” she bit out. “I’d forgotten that you were so adept at facing your own demons, Malfoy. That was why you ran from Hogwarts after Dumbledore died, isn’t it? That’s why you ran back to the Ministry when the Death Eaters came hunting for your blood, isn’t it?”
Her voice had taken on a tone that she’d never experienced before. It was bitter with the desire to finally lash out at someone or something instead of herself, for once. And as she watched Malfoy’s face pale in effect, she felt the triumphant surge of a hunter who has finally caught her prey. Her more rational side was powerless to stop her.
“You still labor under the delusion that you’re the same prat I went to school with, yet we both know you aren’t. And you’re here with me because you want me to think it as well, is that it?” She stepped closer to him, emboldened enough to point a finger at him. “So what changed, Malfoy? You’re still power-hungry and obstinate. You’re still the same boy who tried to kill Dumbledore, but was too much of a coward to do it.”
Cocking her head to one side, Ginny asked, “Tell me, have you ever admitted that you were a Death Eater?”
If looks could kill, she would have been dead three times over. There was a twitch in Malfoy’s clenched jaw that she’d never noticed before, and it was obvious just how much he was restraining his own emotions. “There was no need to,” he finally replied sullenly. “The mark is there for all to see.”
“That’s not the same, and you know it,” Ginny insisted. Pausing, she said in a mockingly inquisitive tone, “In fact, I don’t believe I’ve heard you mentioned anywhere since I returned. It’s as though the Wizarding World has forgotten that you exist. Have you been hiding, Malfoy?”
A sudden silence fell between them, heavy with the echo of her words. Silverware clinked in the background, but neither of them cared.
Suddenly, Ginny came out of her thoughts like a swimmer coming up for air. Her eyes widened in horror at what she’d just said, but the hard glitter in Malfoy’s eyes were already promising retribution before she could apologize or excuse herself.
“And what of you, Weasley?” he began in a deceptively conversational tone. “Have you told your family why you left them all those years ago? Does Potter know why his girlfriend left with no note and no explanation? In fact,” he imitated her pose, “do you know why you left?”
“You – Ron’s death,” Ginny could only stutter helplessly.
“Yes, that’s what you told them,” he said as he tipped his head towards the wedding party, “and I daresay you believed it yourself for a while. But the Weasel’s death only showed you that everyone else ignored you, didn’t it? You knew that you had nothing to offer Potter other than your body, so you sulked.”
He inched closer and bent to look into her eyes as his voice lowered. The sunlight flashed on his hair, but his face was shadowed so that Ginny could only see the steely brittleness of his eyes. “And when you left, you discovered you were worthless. So you decided to return, where you would be loved despite the fact that you were a waste of flesh and breath.”
Ginny closed her eyes, willing him to end, wanting his words to be lies. It seemed that Malfoy wasn’t the only one who enjoyed his pretences once in a while.
“I… why I left…” her voice was soft, croaky by the emotion that lumped in her throat.
“Save it,” Malfoy said brusquely, moving away from her so that the sun was in her eyes again.
She blinked and shielded her eyes, only to see that he had already turned his back on her and was walking away. But Ginny couldn’t let him go. She had to say something to make up for the selfishness of her past retreat, anything to silence his words repeating in her head.
She moved quickly and grabbed his arm. He stilled immediately at her touch; Ginny almost expected a sneer about her Muggle-loving germs or something else as equally inane and biting from their past. Instead, he turned to her with eyes like a flat iron sea and watched her impassively.
She floundered in the face of his silence, and realized that there was nothing she could say. They’d both dug too deep to escape the truth behind their lies.
“Go away, Weasley,” he whispered softly.
That spurred her to speak. “You– you only have to deal with what others think of you,” she insisted, still holding on to him as though he was her life support. “You’ve changed – don’t deny it – and if you’d show the others how much you’ve changed, you’ll find some peace. I don’t think you’d be here if Hermione didn’t like you in some way and if you didn’t reciprocate.”
Letting go of his arm, she dropped her hand to her side and fisted it in the material of her robes. “She, at least, is one person who is willing to give you a chance. I– I don’t think I have the same. I’ve betrayed them, and I know it – they know it! – every time I look them in the face. I can only deal with the mess I’ve made, but they never expected you to do what you did!” She paused to straighten her back and look into his eyes with the boldness of a woman marching to her death. “You still have a chance to make things right.”
Her eyes dared him to reply with a sarcastic joke, but she really wasn’t expecting a reply at all. So when he finally did open his mouth, she stared at him.
“Weasley,” he began in a gentle tone. She shivered.
“Weasley… don’t you think I have demons of my own making, as well?” His eyes were like a clear looking glass, straight into the stormy depths of his soul. “You said it yourself,” he grinned wryly. “I tried to kill Dumbledore, but failed to. I wanted to save Severus, but I cowered instead. I wanted to help the Order, but then I could only give them specifics.”
He pulled up the sleeve of his robe so quickly that Ginny nearly jumped back from the movement. The look on his face was bitter as he held out his arm and showed her the ugly serpentine brand. “This is my demon. This is the mess that I’ve created. I’ve done my own string of betrayals, Weasley. You, at least, found a way to escape – if only for a little while.” He pulled down the sleeve slowly. “The only escape for me is death.”
“Malfoy –” Ginny began with a horrified look on her face.
He laughed bitterly as he looked down, brushing imaginary wrinkles out of the fabric. “No Weasley, I’m not about to off myself. I’m far too obstinate to do it.” When he looked up to meet her eyes again, his were weary and disconsolate. “Whatever you may think of me, I am not here for appearances. And I am the same boy that you knew from Hogwarts, because I’m such a coward that I hide myself to survive.”
“But Malfoy,” she interrupted, “the people you might have betrayed are dead!”
She felt more horrified at her outburst than he looked. He just shook his head and said, “Do you honestly think that the dead don’t leave their burdens to the living? You, at least, took a chance to do what you wanted. I’ve only ever had ‘what ifs’ and ‘maybes.’”
He suddenly looked away in the direction of the woods, as though he couldn’t bear looking at her. Ginny idly noted that the sun peeked out from behind his head like a tiny halo before he turned back to her. “Unfortunately, Weasley, you don’t have the luxury of being the only martyr for your past. Remember that.” With that, he turned around and made his way straight to the reception.
This time, Ginny closed her eyes and turned her head away from the glare of the sun as he walked away. She attempted to process what had just happened and failing miserably. This insight into the soul of a complete stranger left her numb. But, after sharing such intimate details of each other, Ginny knew that they would always be inextricably tied. That thought warmed her far less than the sunshine could.
“Odd how the tables turned, isn’t it?”
Not believing her ears, Ginny turned around slowly and found herself face-to-face with Draco Malfoy.
“Malfoy?” she asked rather stupidly. The man in front of her had the same blond hair, the same better-than-you look that used to rile her until she couldn’t see straight. He was still as angular as he’d once been with that ridiculously haughty appearance of an aristocrat, but his face was no longer smooth with youth and his eyes had new shadows. In all, he was an incongruous sight against the backdrop of the wedding reception taking place in the distance behind him.
Though she wasn’t entirely sure it was him, his name fell from her lips out of instinct. But Ginny wasn’t worried about his appearance as much as she was by her own reaction, for a very familiar sneer had formed on her face. She couldn’t stop herself from demanding, “What do you mean?”
Malfoy favored her with an unreadable expression, and Ginny was struck by the realization that despite that familiar look of him, this boy – no, man – was far different from the one she knew at Hogwarts.
She was so disturbed by this turn of events that she almost missed his reply. “I know you Gryffindors, with the exception of Granger, were never reputed to be geniuses,” he smirked, “but I think you understand very well what I meant.”
Thankfully, the mention of Hermione was enough to break the spell his appearance had cast on her. Ginny physically shook her head in an effort to clear it. She could feel her lips twist in a grimace as she squinted against the sunlight and asked warily, “Harry and Hermione invited you?”
“Bloody annoying, isn’t it,” Malfoy said pleasantly, as though he were discussing the weather, “knowing that your friends approve of me, yet they’re still upset that you left?”
Ginny could feel her face go hot at his words. Really, she should have known Malfoy would perceive her most obvious weakness, since he’d been so adept at it when they were younger. Ginny’s tone was arch and her expression cool as she attempted to hide her emotions. “I suppose your time in Azkaban has tamed you enough for public appearances, then?”
His smirk gave her a disconcerting sense of relief. She could deal with this Malfoy. “So the kitten has claws,” he mused as his smirk widened into a smile.
Ginny stared at him, not believing her ears. This wasn’t the game of words that the old Malfoy loved; yet why did it seem that he was genuinely enjoying this new game more than the old?
When his expectant pause went without answer, he rolled his eyes and said, almost out of duty, “I suppose your time in the Continent has given you a false sense of confidence, then?”
“How did you know I was on the Continent?” she asked before she could stop herself.
“Come now, Weasley,” he said in a bored tone, his hand gesturing his dismissal. “Surely you’ve noticed that your little sob story has adorned the front page of every paper in the Wizarding World.”
The blank look on her face must have betrayed her ignorance, because he began laughing. It was an unaffected, truly amused sound, one that she’d never expected to hear from him, particularly when in conversation with her. “Really, thank you for that,” he said once he was done laughing. “I didn’t think I’d have the opportunity to laugh today.”
Ginny flushed, hating the fact that he still enjoyed laughing at her expense. But she noted his words. “I’m amazed you decided to come,” she stated, ignoring the amusement still in his eyes as she looked away towards the stage again. Someone was laughing loudly in the distance.
“I’m sure you can see why.” She looked back to him quickly and saw that his amusement had turned smug. “In many ways, attending this wedding was as important as attending the Ministry’s Christmas Ball,” he continued with a shrug.
Ginny nodded; she did see how advantageous it was to please the Boy-Who-Lived and his bride, particularly for someone who had always been considered evil. But he seemed far too relaxed to simply be there for networking. “A Slytherin to the end?” she asked cautiously.
“Of course.” His smile was flinty and Ginny suddenly wondered if it really was that sharp. “You are still a Gryffindor, I see,” he commented casually. “Naïve, bold, and too hot-headed for your own good.”
His words weren’t earth-shattering, but Ginny could feel their effect like a blow to the stomach. The sounds of the party in the distance faded away, until she could only hear her own breathing. She looked away again, not wanting him to gain more pleasure at her expense. “If you knew me,” she said in a soft voice, “you’d know I’m no longer that way.”
“Yes, too naïve for your own good,” he muttered under his breath, almost as though he were speaking to himself. Louder, he said, “That’s where you’re wrong, Weasley. Circumstances change, but you and I – we don’t change.”
His serious tone brought her eyes back to his in sharp focus. His face was earnest in his belief, which Ginny found endearing. “Of course we do,” she replied, as though to a small child. “You cannot deny that Azkaban has changed you.”
His mouth settled into a straight line and his shoulders were rigid in defense. Ginny could see that she had obviously struck a nerve by mentioning Azkaban.
“I learned from it, yes,” he gritted out, “But I haven’t changed because of it. It takes more than steel bars to cage a Malfoy.”
She raised an eyebrow at the ancestral loyalty in that, squinting in the late afternoon sun as she studied him. From the way he’d been acting so far, Ginny assumed that he’d become a pragmatist. If he had, then he apparently kept his pretences up for a few things. “Malfoy, if you hadn’t gone to Azkaban, you wouldn’t have come today. You would have seen no use in it – your money would have been enough to buy you whatever contacts you needed.”
“I already have enough money to buy whomever I need.”
Someone was ringing a glass with a utensil, probably to give a toast. Ginny belatedly realized that she wasn’t there to join in the festivities, but she couldn’t ignore the temptation to go past the obvious façade he’d created. Malfoy’s eyes were spitting fire and she knew that she was treading dangerous ground, but she replied anyway. “Then why are you here?”
She watched with detached fascination as a cool mask slipped over his eyes, hiding the hurt and resentment she’d seen only moments before. His voice as calm and a little teasing as he responded, “Why are you here?”
“Don’t be daft,” Ginny grinned defensively, even though she didn’t consider this a joke. “Harry and Hermione are my family.”
Malfoy’s eyes were still blank. “Yes, but why are you here?” He gestured back to the reception behind him and continued, “Why haven’t you joined the happy couple over there, toasting and eating?”
There was bitterness in his voice when he mentioned Harry and Hermione that caught Ginny’s attention. She watched his face carefully as she replied calmly. “I wanted to think.”
“Right.”
The finality in his tone infuriated her more than the triumphant smirk on his face. “You don’t believe me?” she asked, her voice shrill with defensiveness.
“No.” She opened her mouth to defend herself, but he held up his hand to stop her. “Don’t give me that look,” he sneered. “I know very well that this is your tame way of running away from the awkwardness of seeing Potter married to the girl who you thought would marry your brother. Not to mention your stilted relationship with the rest of your family.”
Ginny could feel the blood drain from her face. “You’re wrong,” she whispered, even though she knew she was lying.
“In fact,” he continued as though she hadn’t spoken, “I’ll wager you’ll run away again in a year or so. That taste of freedom has shown you a convenient way to avoid all of your problems.”
Ginny’s anger was coursing through her veins like a heady wine, blurring her vision and loosening her tongue. “Oh yes,” she bit out. “I’d forgotten that you were so adept at facing your own demons, Malfoy. That was why you ran from Hogwarts after Dumbledore died, isn’t it? That’s why you ran back to the Ministry when the Death Eaters came hunting for your blood, isn’t it?”
Her voice had taken on a tone that she’d never experienced before. It was bitter with the desire to finally lash out at someone or something instead of herself, for once. And as she watched Malfoy’s face pale in effect, she felt the triumphant surge of a hunter who has finally caught her prey. Her more rational side was powerless to stop her.
“You still labor under the delusion that you’re the same prat I went to school with, yet we both know you aren’t. And you’re here with me because you want me to think it as well, is that it?” She stepped closer to him, emboldened enough to point a finger at him. “So what changed, Malfoy? You’re still power-hungry and obstinate. You’re still the same boy who tried to kill Dumbledore, but was too much of a coward to do it.”
Cocking her head to one side, Ginny asked, “Tell me, have you ever admitted that you were a Death Eater?”
If looks could kill, she would have been dead three times over. There was a twitch in Malfoy’s clenched jaw that she’d never noticed before, and it was obvious just how much he was restraining his own emotions. “There was no need to,” he finally replied sullenly. “The mark is there for all to see.”
“That’s not the same, and you know it,” Ginny insisted. Pausing, she said in a mockingly inquisitive tone, “In fact, I don’t believe I’ve heard you mentioned anywhere since I returned. It’s as though the Wizarding World has forgotten that you exist. Have you been hiding, Malfoy?”
A sudden silence fell between them, heavy with the echo of her words. Silverware clinked in the background, but neither of them cared.
Suddenly, Ginny came out of her thoughts like a swimmer coming up for air. Her eyes widened in horror at what she’d just said, but the hard glitter in Malfoy’s eyes were already promising retribution before she could apologize or excuse herself.
“And what of you, Weasley?” he began in a deceptively conversational tone. “Have you told your family why you left them all those years ago? Does Potter know why his girlfriend left with no note and no explanation? In fact,” he imitated her pose, “do you know why you left?”
“You – Ron’s death,” Ginny could only stutter helplessly.
“Yes, that’s what you told them,” he said as he tipped his head towards the wedding party, “and I daresay you believed it yourself for a while. But the Weasel’s death only showed you that everyone else ignored you, didn’t it? You knew that you had nothing to offer Potter other than your body, so you sulked.”
He inched closer and bent to look into her eyes as his voice lowered. The sunlight flashed on his hair, but his face was shadowed so that Ginny could only see the steely brittleness of his eyes. “And when you left, you discovered you were worthless. So you decided to return, where you would be loved despite the fact that you were a waste of flesh and breath.”
Ginny closed her eyes, willing him to end, wanting his words to be lies. It seemed that Malfoy wasn’t the only one who enjoyed his pretences once in a while.
“I… why I left…” her voice was soft, croaky by the emotion that lumped in her throat.
“Save it,” Malfoy said brusquely, moving away from her so that the sun was in her eyes again.
She blinked and shielded her eyes, only to see that he had already turned his back on her and was walking away. But Ginny couldn’t let him go. She had to say something to make up for the selfishness of her past retreat, anything to silence his words repeating in her head.
She moved quickly and grabbed his arm. He stilled immediately at her touch; Ginny almost expected a sneer about her Muggle-loving germs or something else as equally inane and biting from their past. Instead, he turned to her with eyes like a flat iron sea and watched her impassively.
She floundered in the face of his silence, and realized that there was nothing she could say. They’d both dug too deep to escape the truth behind their lies.
“Go away, Weasley,” he whispered softly.
That spurred her to speak. “You– you only have to deal with what others think of you,” she insisted, still holding on to him as though he was her life support. “You’ve changed – don’t deny it – and if you’d show the others how much you’ve changed, you’ll find some peace. I don’t think you’d be here if Hermione didn’t like you in some way and if you didn’t reciprocate.”
Letting go of his arm, she dropped her hand to her side and fisted it in the material of her robes. “She, at least, is one person who is willing to give you a chance. I– I don’t think I have the same. I’ve betrayed them, and I know it – they know it! – every time I look them in the face. I can only deal with the mess I’ve made, but they never expected you to do what you did!” She paused to straighten her back and look into his eyes with the boldness of a woman marching to her death. “You still have a chance to make things right.”
Her eyes dared him to reply with a sarcastic joke, but she really wasn’t expecting a reply at all. So when he finally did open his mouth, she stared at him.
“Weasley,” he began in a gentle tone. She shivered.
“Weasley… don’t you think I have demons of my own making, as well?” His eyes were like a clear looking glass, straight into the stormy depths of his soul. “You said it yourself,” he grinned wryly. “I tried to kill Dumbledore, but failed to. I wanted to save Severus, but I cowered instead. I wanted to help the Order, but then I could only give them specifics.”
He pulled up the sleeve of his robe so quickly that Ginny nearly jumped back from the movement. The look on his face was bitter as he held out his arm and showed her the ugly serpentine brand. “This is my demon. This is the mess that I’ve created. I’ve done my own string of betrayals, Weasley. You, at least, found a way to escape – if only for a little while.” He pulled down the sleeve slowly. “The only escape for me is death.”
“Malfoy –” Ginny began with a horrified look on her face.
He laughed bitterly as he looked down, brushing imaginary wrinkles out of the fabric. “No Weasley, I’m not about to off myself. I’m far too obstinate to do it.” When he looked up to meet her eyes again, his were weary and disconsolate. “Whatever you may think of me, I am not here for appearances. And I am the same boy that you knew from Hogwarts, because I’m such a coward that I hide myself to survive.”
“But Malfoy,” she interrupted, “the people you might have betrayed are dead!”
She felt more horrified at her outburst than he looked. He just shook his head and said, “Do you honestly think that the dead don’t leave their burdens to the living? You, at least, took a chance to do what you wanted. I’ve only ever had ‘what ifs’ and ‘maybes.’”
He suddenly looked away in the direction of the woods, as though he couldn’t bear looking at her. Ginny idly noted that the sun peeked out from behind his head like a tiny halo before he turned back to her. “Unfortunately, Weasley, you don’t have the luxury of being the only martyr for your past. Remember that.” With that, he turned around and made his way straight to the reception.
This time, Ginny closed her eyes and turned her head away from the glare of the sun as he walked away. She attempted to process what had just happened and failing miserably. This insight into the soul of a complete stranger left her numb. But, after sharing such intimate details of each other, Ginny knew that they would always be inextricably tied. That thought warmed her far less than the sunshine could.
Author notes: One more part left!
To Be Continued.
Jawy is the author of 3 other stories.
This story is a favorite of 8 members. Members who liked Pilgrim's Prayer also liked 733 other stories.
This story is a favorite of 8 members. Members who liked Pilgrim's Prayer also liked 733 other stories.
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