This is for the gorgeous and talented Pearl (PrincessPearl) on her birthday, which was the 26th of October. Yep, I'm a month late and I suck. I'm so sorry, Pearlie, I just hope you like this enough to make up for it.
Everyone else, go read Pearl's adorable HarryGinnys Lemonade At Yuletide, Blueberry Scones and Hot Chocolate Kisses. After you've read this one, of course ;)
Chocolate When Loud Voices Die
Harry stood in the headmaster's office, looking up at the two headmasters closest to his heart. Albus Dumbledore was sound asleep in his chair, glasses sliding off the end of his nose, but Severus Snape paced back and forth in front of his backdrop of Slytherin curtain.
"Thank you for helping me," Harry said to those two, then, turning his attention to the entire wall of portraits, added, "All of you."
Phineus Nigellus cracked an eye open and, in a creaky, sleep-thickened voice, said, "You did well, Mr. Potter. You did well."
As Harry nodded and the deceased headmaster closed his eyes again, a timid little knock sounded at the door. A second later, it sounded again, louder and braver this time. Though every logic told him a Death Eater wouldn't knock and wait politely outside to run in and kill him, he still gripped the hilt of his wand as he called out, "Come in!"
A pale face appeared around the edge of the enormous door, freckles standing out beneath blood and brilliantly purple bruises and short red hair identifying her as Ginny Weasley. "Knock knock," she whispered with a smile. "Ron said you were up here." She crossed the room to stand beside him and gaze up into Dumbledore's kind old face. "I bring tidings of great joy: the Malfoys have all given themselves up to Kingsley and his Aurors."
"Great," Harry said in a dead monotone, not tearing his eyes away from Snape's set face. Ginny stepped in front of him, interrupting his long silent contemplation. Snapping out of whatever trance he'd put himself into, he focused in on Ginny and his eyes widened in shock as he looked at her. Really looked at her. "What happened to your hair?"
"Got set on fire when I was fighting the Carrows," Ginny said, matter-of-factly, as if she spent every night fighting for her life against Death Eaters that outnumbered her side two hundred to one. "Kingsley sliced off the burning part with a charm. Sadly, most of it was burning." She ran her hand ruefully through the newly-short strands.
"Did you get hurt out there?" Harry asked, distracted now, wondering if the baggy pyjamas she wore, hand-me-downs from Ron that trailed a good few inches behind her feet, hid bruises like the ones on her face, or perhaps even worse injuries.
"Seven toes broken, a sprained ankle, about a thousand bruises, massive burn on the back of my neck from the jinx that set my hair on fire, splinched off two fingers when I tried to Side-Along Apparate an injured fourth year to Madam Pomfrey and loads of cuts and grazes, mostly from falling down the stairs when we all ran outside because you were pretending to be dead," Ginny explained proudly, tossing her hair and showing off the smouldering fire in her eyes.
"Did you get Madam Pomfrey to fix you up?" Harry asked, really worried for her. Despite her nonchalance, seven broken toes and a sprained ankle was nothing to joke about. Not to mention the missing fingers, massive burn and numerous cuts and bruises.
"She was busy trying to save the girls who got attacked by Greyback, and Firenze, who got trampled by You-Know…Voldemort's giants." There was a sort of bitterness in Ginny's voice, but she gave him a forced smile a moment later. "But Mum and Fleur's knowledge combined fixed me up. I'm fine."
"Ginny, you don't have to deny how hurt you are," he said, reaching out and taking her hand. "You don't need to stay strong for anyone anymore."
"Harry, why don't you take your advice?" Ginny exclaimed, pulling away from him and ignoring the frantic beating of her heart at his touch. It was just pathetic, absolutely disgusting that she still fancied him that much. "Stop acting like the big saviour of the wizarding world and just be Harry, minus the Potter! For once in your bloody life, tell me what's bothering you so I can get off my bloody arse and do something about it!"
Harry just stared at her for a moment before shaking his head with a smile twitching his lips. "You know, I forget how like Ron you really are," he said. A moment later he was eating his words as he found himself staring cross-eyed at a wand trained at the tip of his nose.
"Never say that again if you want to survive to your eighteenth birthday," she said, removing her wand and stowing it away.
"The way I see it, I'm lucky to have even survived to my second birthday," Harry said wryly. Ginny laughed and the tension was finally defused.
They sat side-by-side on the floor, leaning against the headmaster's desk, almost touching, but neither of them willing to betray the strength of the feelings they still had for each other. "Where is Ron, anyway?" Harry asked, desperate to break the rather awkward silence that had fallen over them.
"In bed, all tucked up snugly in Gryffindor Tower," Ginny said with a giggle. She poked him hard between the ribs. "You should be too. Merlin's frilly pink knickers, you're skinny."
Harry laughed, looking down at her shocked eyes. "Now you sound like your mother." Ginny whipped out her wand, a steely gleam in her eyes.
"Oh, you are going to pay for that remark, Harry James Potter!" she shouted, slashing her wand through the air. Three enormous bogies leapt onto Harry and the fabulous, brave saviour of the wizarding world screamed, throwing himself backwards across the desk.
"No, Ginny, don't attack me with Bat Bogies!" he screamed, falling to his knees as the creatures wrapped around his face and Ginny's triumphant laughter rang out across the room. "Ginny, I'm sorry, I was joking! Please, get them off me!"
"Quiet!" two hundred past headmasters and headmistresses of Hogwarts shouted at them.
"We're trying to sleep here!" Armando Dippet added in his wheezy voice.
"Sorry sirs and madams," Ginny said, raising a hand in a cheeky salute even as she called of the Bat Bogies and they wheeled away into a cloud of green dust. As a breathless, red-faced Harry with his glasses hanging from one ear sat up and glared at her through dazed green eyes, she finally gave in to her urges and threw herself onto him, planting her lips on his in a long kiss.
"Ah, young love," Dilys Derwent murmured, wiping an imagined tear from her painted eye.
"So beautiful," Dumbledore agreed, while Snape simply stared down at the young couple.
"So like that young Potter boy and the lovely Evans girl," Dexter Fortescue observed. "Whoops, sorry, Severus, old bean. Know that's a sore subject with you." Snape just gave the dead headmaster his most quelling glare.
"Twenty points from Gryffindor for inappropriate public displays of affection, Mr. Potter and Miss Weasley," he said. Armando and Dexter laughed while Dumbledore looked rather outraged.
"Taking points away from my house even as a painted figure, Severus?" he asked. "That's low, very low. However, it shouldn't make much difference. The point hourglasses are destroyed."
"Besides, who deserves the House Cup this year more than Gryffindor?" Dilys chipped in.
"Oh, shut up, you dusty old paintings, I'm trying to sleep here!" Phineus shouted irritably.
"You're watching these two young lovers, Phineus, you dirty old man!" Dexter exclaimed. "But, I agree, we should all sleep and give them a little privacy." The meaning in his final word made it clear that all of them would peer at the couple while snoring rather more loudly than necessary.
Oblivious to their irritated exchange, Ginny finally pulled away from Harry with a wink, leaving him gaping like a goldfish and straightening his steamed-up glasses. She sat back against the desk, pushing her mussed-up hair back into place and redoing the undone buttons of her shirt. "Honestly, Harry, anyone would think you'd never kissed a girl before!"
Harry made a strangled noise in reply. Laughing, Ginny pulled a wrapped rectangle from her pocket and yanked the wrappings away to reveal a slab of Honeydukes chocolate. "Chocolate is good for shock," she said, breaking off a chunk and popping it into his open mouth. "Isn't that what Remus taught?" She laughed again at his unmoving expression and darted forward to take a bite of chocolate from Harry's mouth.
Which, of course, led to them finding themselves entwined like snakes around each other, knocking over plenty of spindly little tables. When Ginny pulled away for a moment's long breath, Harry murmured, "Marry me, Ginny."
Ginny looked down at him in shock, rolled off him and sat cross-legged on the floor, looking for a moment the little girl he'd met all those years ago, despite her untidy hair, unbuttoned shirt and the marks on her neck that showed signs of later turning the most vivid purple. "W-what did you just say?" she asked. It was the first time in their years of friendship that Harry had ever heard Ginevra Molly Weasley stammer.
"In the heat of the moment," he said apologetically. "I'm sorry; I know you can't want it. Everyone's dead, everything's destroyed, everywhere is filled with bodies. I'm sorry, Ginny."
"No, Harry, say what you just said again," Ginny murmured, looping her hair behind her ears, fingers overlapping his where they rested on his knee.
"Ginny, I know it's not terribly formal or politically correct," Harry began. "I haven't got your parents' permission. I'm not down on one knee and I don't have a ring. But I do love you and I want you by my side until we both die as old man and woman. Ginevra Molly Weasley, marry me?"
"Yes!" Ginny whispered tearfully. Harry reeled back, smacking his head painfully on the corner of the desk. Ginny and two hundred dead teachers winced collectively as he groaned and rubbed the back of his head.
"What did you say, Ginny?" he asked, slit-eyed with pain. "You should know that wasn't my real proposal and we're both so young, and-" He was cut off by Ginny kneeling on his chest, knee digging painfully into his windpipe.
"Harry James Potter, if you didn't mean every word you just said, so help me, I will set my overprotective brothers on you," she growled, every syllable dripping with a very serious threat. "You'll be nothing more than a green-eyed jelly by the time they've finished with you. As for what I said, I said yes to that proposal…that is, if you meant it."
"Ginny, I don't know…" Harry was again cut off in his strangled sentence when Ginny put a finger to his lips and reached into the chest pocket of her pyjamas. She groped for a second and then produced a ring, the silver band tarnished by time but the tiny diamond set into the metal sparkling as the day it was newly made.
"Mum gave this to me before the battle," Ginny explained, still not allowing Harry to speak. "It's the ring Dad gave her, nearly thirty years ago. She told me to wear it when I got engaged. So, Harry James Potter, the real question here is if you will marry me."
Finally, she let him speak. Instead of using his valuable respite to speak, Harry just lifted his head and kissed her, pushing her backwards until she slid off him, having caused minor damage to his vocal cords and squashed him considerably. "Ginny, nothing would be a greater pleasure to me than marrying you."
Ginny grinned and kissed him once. "Like to do the honours?" she asked, wiggling the ring in front of his eyes. He smiled and snatched it out of the air, raising her hand and sliding it onto the third finger before kissing her again.
An outburst of cheering and clapping surrounded them and they both looked up to see all the portraits that had a second ago appeared to be deeply asleep cheering for them. Dilys was openly crying, wiping her eyes and even Snape appeared to be giving them his version of a smile. "Well done, laddie!" shouted a bearded man in tartan garb. "She'll make a fine wife for yeh!"
They left with the clapping still sounding, Dumbledore smiling down on them from above and telling Phineus, "Seen it coming since her first year, really."
"Wait 'til I tell Neville and Seamus I defeated a dark wizard and got engaged to Ginny Weasley in one night!" Harry crowed as they walked down the corridor with hands linked.
Ginny looked outraged and had already pulled her wand out, ready to curse him, when a light exploded in her eyes and a horribly devious grin spread across her face.
"Fine," she said. "If you tell Seamus and Neville, then I'm telling Ron." And she took off, heading for Gryffindor Tower.
"No, Ginny! Wait, I was just joking! Ginny, I don't want to get brutally murdered by my best mate! GINNY!"
He only caught up with her as she slipped into the Gryffindor Tower and by then it was too late. He walked in with the stooped back and shuffling gate of a doomed man, only to be almost blown away by an explosion of sound, courtesy of a red-haired, freckle-faced fury in ill-fitting pyjamas.
"HARRY POTTER, WHAT THE BLOODY HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING GETTING ENGAGED TO MY LITTLE SISTER?"
Oh, I am mean to Harry, even post-Voldemort. I hope you enjoyed this, the touches of humour and the nosy portraits.
Happy birthday again, Pearlie. I meant it very literally in your birthday song when I said your fic wasn't done yet ;)
Please, if you liked this enough to favourite, don't do so without reviewing, thankee very muchly.