TITLE: The Plague of the Moonflower
AUTHOR: Zmedlebum
RATING: PG
GENRE: Drama/Angst
SHIP: Harry/Ginny
WORD COUNT: 2,593 Part One
SUMMARY: Magic can levitate feathers and hide great big castles from prying Muggle eyes, but it cannot save a dying girl when she has so much to live for. Prequel to Silverwater, although it can be read as a stand alone.
WARNINGS: Character death, teenage angst, leukaemia.
DISCLAIMER: Harry Potter and co. do not belong to me. Rather, they belong to a woman with killer cheekbones (JK Rowling).

Dedicated to a childhood friend. It has been ten long years but you've opened my eyes in a way no one ever could. Rest in peace.

PART I

"Here, perhaps you would like to read this."

Hermione's eyes scan the page until she finds the passage is was looking for. She clears her throat audibly and begins to read, "Leukaemia is a form of cancer in which the white blood cells multiply at a rapid rate in the bone marrow or lymph nodes. These cells do not mature and crowd developing red blood cells and platelets, leading to anaemia and clotting."

She shuts her copy of The Encyclopaedia of Health and Medicine and places in your hands. You know that the book contains what medical doctors and scientists claim to be the cold, bare facts for many years. You are so offended by this, so you bat the book away from your face. "No," you say rather harshly, "I don't want to read it."

Hermione is hurt but she puts the book away anyway. She sits next to you at the dining table. It was a horrible idea, she thinks.

Who in their right mind would seriously think that reading about leukaemia would help somebody through their grief?

After much prodding and poking, you had finally agreed to stay with Hermione on this night, the night of your birthday. Anywhere is better than Privet Drive, you say. Much to yours and Ron's disappointment, you can't stay at The Burrow during the summer. It is most definitely out of the question, no matter how much Mrs. Weasley insists. With all the chaos that is happening at their house at the moment, you can't bring yourself to burden the entire family with your presence. Your main priority is to get her better, right?

Despite the year that was, Dumbledore was adamant in his request for you to return to the Dursleys until further notice. Hermione was livid when you broke the news to her. She believes that you should stay at her place, that there was no need for you to stay with your relatives.

Ron was upset too when he heard the news, but his mind is more focused on Ginny nowadays. He walks around in a daze and sometimes he forgets that he is Ron Weasley and he still has a life to live. You can't blame him, really.

However, that doesn't mean that he doesn't want your company. As a matter of fact, he wants it more than anything in the world right now, but you can't give it to him. You had to stay with the Dursleys for the summer. You alone know why you had to do it and you knew that it had to be done, no matter how much you didn't like it.

And you know Hermione too well. She gave in and obeyed Dumbledore in the end.

While you were at the Dursleys, Ron and Hermione wrote to you frequently. Hermione wrote to show that you still had a friend in her, that she really cared. If ever you need someone to talk to, she wrote in her letters, you know that I'm always here. All you have to do is just call me and I'll be there.

You never took up on that offer though, because you knew that if she came, she would nag you to have something to eat and get some sleep. You didn't need that. You were capable of looking after yourself, thankyou very much.

Ron wrote to give you updates on Ginny's condition. She's been sleeping all day, he wrote. Some of his letters were full of hope for Ginny's speedy recovery. Whenever you read his letters, you could almost see his bright and happy face, long nose and all, swim around in your vision. She's been eating a bit more today, he'd write with glee. I don't know what it is, but today she seems a little bit more energetic. Do you think there could be a chance that she could get better much sooner than we think?

When Ginny was finally diagnosed with cancer during the last week of the school year, Ron had not known much about it. In fact, he didn't know anything about it at all, so naturally he was petrified. This was all strange to him. As far as he knew, people only died by standing in the line of fire or by old age. Very old age. Natural sickness is not common among the younger wizarding folk. To a boy who had been a wizard since he was born, young people were almost invisible. He was invisible. So was his sister.

And you also thought that you were invisible in more ways that one. And because you were invisible, so was Ginny.

Unlike Ron, you most certainly knew what cancer was. You also knew that if it isn't detected early it ended in a slow, painful death.

Death by the Killing Curse was mercy. It was quick and painless. Cancer is torture.

Remember last year? You can't remember most of it, probably because you've blocked that memory out on purpose, but let me remind you: that dilemma that happened in the last school year had all the ingredients of a New York Best Seller. It had all the drama, the mystery and the intrigue as well as the pre-requisite bad guy, who wanted nothing more than your head on a silver platter, mop top, glasses and all. You know who he is.

He kidnapped you, tortured you for days before the blessed Order could rescue you. End of story. There is nothing more to know.

You had wanted this ordeal over and done with. He was in such close proximity to you. You could have killed him sans wand if you wanted to. You wanted to destroy him right there and then. But you couldn't do it, face it. And Dumbledore didn't want you to do it either. If ever you were going to do it, you had to wait.

But you were so goddamn close.

Because of this, Lord Voldemort is out there now, spreading discord that reached even the most unlikely places, and you're here in suburban London just waiting ... waiting ... waiting for any signs while dear Ginny struggles to hold on to life.

While you knew that something was wrong with her, she was finally given the bad news the day after you returned to Hogwarts, while in the Infirmary unaware of what was going on.

The evening she was sent home, Mr. and Mrs. Weasley had come up to the school to collect their dying daughter and take her home. Later that night, when you returned to Gryffindor Tower, you heard Ron speak to Hermione in the Common Room. While you listened, obscured from view, he told her the full account of Ginny's diagnosis.

Did you know that Ron wasn't going to tell you about it until her anticipated recovery? Honestly, what did he take you for?

The Muggle doctor (to whom they finally turned to at Mr Weasleys suggestion) told the family that Ginny was diagnosed with myeloblastic leukaemia. She was at the very late stages of the disease. It was too late. They left it too late. She was going to die in a matter of months, weeks even.

Mr. Weasley broke the news to Ron and gently as he could, but Ron was still shattered. It wasn't his first encounter with death but it was one that hit very very close to home.

Ron and Hermione spoke well into the early hours of the next morning. You listened as Ron blamed everybody he could think of. He was ticking off a mental checklist with his fingers.

He blamed Hermione for not being smart enough to pick up on the symptoms of Ginny's sickness (to which she vehemently exclaimed, "I'm not a doctor, Ron! It takes a very sharp eye to detect them, and she insisted that she was fine!")

He blamed his mother and Madame Pomfrey for wasting their time by trying every magical potion and natural remedy under the sun, all of which were fruitless in the end.

He blamed his father for not taking the initiative to bring her to a Muggle doctor earlier.

He even blamed Ginny for being in denial this whole time.

He also blamed himself for not being a good brother.

That's funny. He didn't blame you. But you blame yourself anyway.

Ron's next topic of conversation was you, and how you were coping. He was talking about how scared you were when you saw that her health was rapidly declining, right before the official diagnosis. With every nosebleed she had, all the blood drained from your face as well.

"You know," he told Hermione, "I sometimes see him tremble in his sleep. They're just like the time he was having those nightmares, remember that?" Hermione nodded. "After all that stuff he's been through with You-Know-Who-."

"Voldemort, Ron," Hermione corrected him. "Use his proper name."

"Right, er ... After all that stuff with ... You-Know-Who, he couldn't have that on top of everything else as well." Ron paused for a moment, sighed and then ran a hand through his ginger hair. "You know at the time I hoped for his sake more than mine, that Ginny wasn't that sick. I know it was crippling her to the point that she couldn't function normally anymore, but I hoped that it wasn't that bad. I hoped that she was going to get better right away." He paused dramatically, waiting for a response from Hermione. When he didn't come he continued, "I know that he'll blame himself."

Hermione seemed to have hope for you at the time though, "He won't blame himself," she said as she placed a hand on Ron's arm.

"You wanna bet?"

It looked as though Ron won the bet.

She'd been sick for a long time, hadn't she? Two years, ever since her fifth year. The two years you had been her 'significant other'. You never noticed it. Nobody ever noticed it. Now she's dying.

She had been sick for two years, but you were too blind to see it, because you had been so caught up in your own problems, you tosser.

After you listened to your friends speak, you sat by the window in your dormitory. As you watched the moon hide behind the clouds against the night sky, you tried not to cry. Harry Potter doesn't cry, after all, even if he should from time to time.

Being at the Dursleys as Ginny was dying drove you mad and Ron's letters were no longer of any use to you. Even the optimistic letters couldn't enlighten you anymore.

However, your mind is brought back to Ron's last letter, written in his untidy scrawl:

Dear Harry,

Despite all these pamphlets Hermione gave me and all the information I've gotten from Dad, I still don't understand what's happening to Ginny. I know she's got cancer. Healers know what's wrong with her but there is no magical potion to cure her. There aren't any potions that will kill all the cancerous cells in her blood right away.

Muggle treatments are supposed to increase her chance of survival a little bit, but I don't think that they're working. I don't understand why, Harry. I don't understand why. She's getting worse! I walk into her room and I see a stranger lying in her bed. I want to kick that girl out because she is invading Ginny's bedroom, but I can't because I know that it's her, and she's dying.

I also don't understand how we can make feathers fly up in the air with a flick of a wand and hide great big castles but not save a dying girl when she has so much to live for. Why isn't there a magical cure to rid Ginny of this sickness?

It was a call for help, but he called the wrong person.

And while Ginny fights for life, Lord Voldemort continues to create havoc among the community, killing people like it is some sick, twisted game he enjoys playing. You also feared the possibility of Lord Voldemort showing up at the front door and blasting you to smithereens. You are away from your safe place, after all, even if it is only for one night.

That is also part of the reason why you were hesitant to accept Hermione's offer to stay at her place. If ever Lord Voldemort tracks you down, you don't want him to show up in some Muggle London suburb and kill her first before you. Oh, if only you had killed him earlier when you had the chance, Harry.

You explained this to Hermione and she didn't accept that. "That's silly," she scoffed at you just before you came here. "I don't want you at the Dursleys on your birthday. There is no excuse for that. You need to be with a friend. End of story."

You relented in the end, only because she is formidable when she doesn't get her way.

Moments after you arrived at Hermione's place this evening, the two of you received an Owl from Ron. After Hermione had opened the window to let Errol in, she untied the parchment from his leg and began to read out loud, "She's getting worse. I know Harry is going to be there with you tonight. The both of you have to come immediately. Bill should be coming shortly to pick you up. I don't expect you to spend the night at such short notice, but please be here. Harry, Ginny needs you now more than ever."

That is why the two of you are waiting for Bill at the dining table at this present moment. The two of you are too upset to eat dinner, so you don't.

Your face twists in pain as you remember the note from earlier. The end might come for Ginny tonight.

Hermione is reading from the book that she tried giving to you earlier. You place a hand on the book and interrupt her reading. "Can I borrow it for a moment?" you ask. She nods and hands it to you.

As soon as you open it, the first passage you see jumps out at you from the page like a jack-in-the-box.

A common cause of death for a Leukaemia sufferer is internal haemorrhaging, particularly in the brain-

SLAM!

You don't want to continue reading. There is no need to get upset over what a silly book says.

With a sudden POP that might startle the whole neighbourhood, Bill suddenly appears in the Grangers' kitchen and asks the both of you if you are ready to go.

To be continued … Please review>

A/N: for those who are still sticking around, if anyone is out there, thanks for reading. This took me a year and half to get out of my system, and it's only two chapters hides PART TWO is coming soon. I plan to write more in this universe, I just don't know when. I hope you liked it and please review.