Summary: This story is AU. Draco Malfoy isn't from a powerful family but is moody and depressed just like we all like him. Ginny Weasley is not poor but is the same kind and fun loving person. Theses two people have never met before, but are drawn together by an ancient magic. The rest you'll see form the story. Oh and Draco family comes from Ireland that's why these people don't know each other.
Title: Ever After
Rating: R
Disclaimer: I don't own anything though I wish I did because I could make everyone happy and have fun with each other evil smirk
Note: I have bad grammar and spelling but I try to use spell check. Please bear with me people
Chapter 1
"This," the old woman said, "is for you."
Ginny studied the pendant that swung gently from the thickly braided links of a silver chain. Really, she'd only come in to browse. Her budget didn't allow for impulse buys- which were, of course, the most fun and the most satisfying. And her affection for all things impulsive was the very reason she couldn't afford to indulge herself.
She shouldn't have entered the shop at all. But who could resist a tiny little place tucked into the waterfront of a charming Irish village? Especially a place called Charms and Cures.
Certainly not Ginny Weasley.
"It's beautiful, but I-"
"There's only one." The women's eyes were faded and blue, like the sea that slapped and spewed against the stone wall barely stone's throw from the door. Her hair was steel gray and bundled into a bun that lay heavy on her think neck.
She wore a fascinating rattle of chains and pins, but there was nothing, Ginny thought, like the pendant she held in her bony fingers. "Only one."
"The silver was cured in Dagada's Cauldron over the Midsummer's fire and carved by the finger of Merlin. He that was Arthur's."
"Merlin?"
Ginny was a sucker for tales of ancient magic and heroic. Her brother Percy would have sniffed and said no, she was simply a sucker.
"The high king's sorcerer wandered through Ireland in his time. It was here he found the giant's dance, and coveting for Arthur, floated it away over the Irish Sea to Britain. But while he took magic from this land, some he also left some." Watching Ginny, she set the pendant swaying. "Here is some and it belongs to you."
"Well, I really can't…." but Ginny trailed off, her gaze locked on the pendant. It was a long oval, dulled and tarnished a bit, and centered in it was a carving on the shape of a bursting star.
It seemed to catch the murky, cloud-filtered light coming through the small shop window, hold it, and expand it, so that it glittered hypnotically in Ginny's eyes. It seemed the star shimmered.
"I just came in to look around"
"Sure and if you don't look, you can't find, can you? You came looking, all the way from England."
She'd come, Ginny tired to remember, to assist Percy with the tour group. Percy's business 'A Civilized Adventure", was very successful- and much regimented, everyone said that Ginny needed some regimentation. And Percy had been clear, brutally clear, that this opportunity was her last chance.
"Be organized, be prepared, and be on time," Percy had told her as he sat behind his polished desk in his perfectly terrifying and perfectly ordered office in London. "If you can manage that, there might be a chance for you. If you can't, I wash my hands of you Ginny."
It wouldn't be the first tine someone had washed their hands of her. In the past three years she'd lost three jobs. Well four but it didn't seem necessary to count those hideous two days she'd spent as assistant to he uncle's mother-in-law's sister.
It wasn't as if she'd spilled ink on the white valentine gown on purpose. And if the social dragon hadn't insisted that she use an old quill- I mean, really- for all correspondences, there wouldn't have been ink to spill.
But that wasn't the point, she reminded herself as she stared at the pendant. She'd lost the job and all others, and now Percy was giving her a chance to prove she wasn't a complete Moran.
Which Ginny feared, she probably was.
"You need to find your place"
Blinking, Ginny managed to tear her gaze away from the pendant and look back into the old woman's eyes. They seemed so kind and wise.
"Maybe I don't have one."
"Oh, there now, each of us has one, but there are those who don't fit so easily into the world the way other see it. And us. You've been looking in the wrong places. Till now. This," she said again, "belong to you"
"I really can't afford it." There was apology in her voice, even as she reached out. Just to touch. And touching, she felt heat form the silver, and terrible longing inside her. A thrill raced up her spine even as something heavy seemed to settle over her heart.
It couldn't hurt to try it on. Surely there was no harm in just seeing how it looked on her, how it felt.
As if in a dream, she took the chain from the old woman, slipped it around her neck. The heaviness in her heart shifted. For a moment, the light through the window strengthened, beamed brilliantly over the trinket and pots of herbs and odd like stones crammed on the shelves and counters.
An image swam into her mind, an image of knights and dragon, of wild wind and water, of a circle of stone standing alone under a black and raging sky.
Then a shadow that was a man standing still as the stone, as if waiting.
In her heart she knew he waited for her, as no one had before and no one would after. And would wait, eternally.
Ginny closed her hand over the pendant, ran her thumb over the star. Joy burst through her a clear as the sunlight. Ah, she thought. Of course. It's mine. Just as I'm his, and he is mine.
How much is it? She heard herself say, and knew no price would be too dear.
"Ten pounds, as a token."
"Ten?" she was already reaching for her purse. "It has to be worth more." a king's ransom, a sorceress spell, a lover dream.
"It is of course." But the woman merely held out her hand for the single note. "And so are you. Go on your journey, a chuid, and see."
"Thank you."
"You are good lass," the woman said as Ginny walked to the door. And when she shut it, her smile turned bright and crafty. "He won't be pleased, but you'll bring him 'round by Midsummer's Eve. And if you need a bit of help, well, that will be my pleasure.
Outside, Ginny stared at the sea wall, the dock, the line of cottages as if coming out of a dream. Odd, she thought, hadn't that all been wonderfully odd she traced a finger over the pendant again. Only one, cast in Dagada's Cauldron, carved by Merlin.
Of course, Percy would sneer and tell her that the old women had a dozen more in the stockroom ready to pass them off to bird-brained tourists. And Percy, as always was probably right. But it didn't matter,
She had the pendant and a wonderful story to go with it. And all for ten pounds. Quite the bargain.
She glanced up now wincing, the sky was heavy with clouds, and all of them were thick and grey. Percy would not be pleased that the weather wasn't falling in line with today's plans. The ferry ride to the island had been meticulously arranged.
Tea and scone would be served on the trip over, while Percy lectured his twenty-person group on the history of the place they were about to visit. It had been Ginny's job to type up Percy's notes and print handouts.
First stop would be the visitor's center for the orientation. There would be a tour of a ruined abbey and graveyard, which Ginny looked forward to, then lunch, picnic style, which the hotel provided in hampers. Lunch was to last exactly precisely sixty minutes,
They would then visit the beehive cottages and Percy would deliver a lecture on their history and purpose. The group would be allotted an hour to wander on their own, into the village, the shops down the beach, before gathering at four-thirty on the dot for high tea and the restored castle, with naturally, another lecture on the particular spot.
It was Ginny's job to keep all of Percy's lecture notes in order, to help herd the group, to watch valuable, to haul parcels should there be any, and generally to make herself available for any and all menial chores.
For this she would be paid a reasonable salary by Percy's definition. But, more important, it was explained, she would receive training and experience that, her family hoped would teach her responsibility and maturity. Which, by the age of twenty-five, she should have learned already.
There was no point in explaining that she didn't want to be responsible and mature of it turned her into another Percy. Here she was four days into her first tour and already something inside her was screaming to run away.
Dutifully she quashed the rebellion, glanced at her watch. Stared at it, dumbfounded.
That couldn't be. It was impossible, she'd only meant to slip into the shop for a few minutes, she couldn't possibly have spent an hour in there, she could-oh, gods, she couldn't have missed the ferry.
Percy would crucio her,
Griping the strap of her bag, she began to run. She had long dancer legs and a slim build. The sturdy walking shoes Percy had ordered her to buy slapped the pavement on her race to the ferry dock. Her bag bounced heavily against her hip. Inside was everything ordered from the 'Civilized Adventure' directive and a great deal more.
The wind kicked in from the sea and sent her short crimson red hair into alarmed spikes around her sharp boned face. The alarm was in her eyes, they turned quickly to despair and self-disgust when she reached the docks and saw the ferry chugging away.
"Damn it!" Ginny grabbed her own hair and pulled viciously. "That's it and that's all. I might as well jump in and drown myself." Which would be more pleasant, she has no doubt than the icy lecture Percy would deliver.
She'd be fired of course; there was no doubt of it. But she used to that little by-product of her professional endeavors. The method of termination would be torture.
Unless….. There had to be another way to get to the island. If she could get there, throw herself on Percy's stingy supply of mercy, work like a dog, forfeit her salary, and make an excuse. Surely she'd be able to come up with some reason for missing the damn ferry.
She looked around frantically. There were boats, there were people who drove boats, shed hire a boat, pay whatever it cost.
"Are you lost them?'
Startled she lifted a hand and closed tight over the pendant. There was young man- hardly more than a boy, really, she noted- standing besides a small white boat. He wore a cap over his straw colored hair ands watched her out of laughing green eyes.
"No, not lost, late, I was supposed to be on the ferry," she gestured, and then let her arm fall. "I lost track of time."
"Well time not such a matter in the scheme of things."
"It is to my brother. I work for him." Quickly now she headed down toward him where the sea lapped the shore. "Is this you boat or your father?"
"Aye it happened to be mine."
It was small, but to her inexperienced eye looked cheerful. She had to hope that made it seaworthy. "Could you take me over?" I need to catch up. Ill pay whatever you need"
It was a sort of statement, Ginny though the minute the word s left her mouth that would make Percy cringe. But then bargaining wasn't a priority at the moment. Survival was.
"Ill takes you where you need to be.' His eyes sparkled as he held out his hand. "For ten pounds."
"Today everything is ten pounds." She reached for her purse, but he shook his head.
"It was your hand I was reaching for, lady, not payment. Payment comes when you get where you're going."
"Oh thanks." She put her hand in his and let him help her into the boat.
She sat starboard on a little bench which he cast off. Closing her eyes in relief, she listened to the boy whistle as he went about settling to tern and staring motor. "I'm very grateful," she began. "My brother's going to be furious with me. I don't even know what I'm thinking of."
He turned the boat, a slow and smooth motion. "And couldn't he have waited just a bit?"
"Percy?" the thought made Ginny smile. "It wouldn't have occurred to him."
The bow lifted and the little boat picked up speed. "It would have occurred to you," he said, and then they were skimming over the water.
Thrilled, she turned her face to that wind. Oh, this was much better, than tame ferry ride, lecture included. It was almost worth the price she would pay at the end, and she didn't mean the pounds.
"Do you fish?" she called out to him
"When their biting."
"It must be wonderful to do what you want, when you want. And to live so near the water. Do you love it?
"I've a fondness for it, yes. Men put restrictions on men. That's an odd thing to my way of thinking."
"I have a terrible time with restrictions. I can never remember them." The boat leaped, bounced hard and made her laugh. "At this rate, we'll beat the ferry."
The idea of that the image of her standing on shore giving Percy a smug look when the ferry docked, entertained Ginny so much she didn't give a thought to the shiver of lighting overhead or the sudden, ominous roar of the sea.
When the rain began to pelt her, she looked around again, shocked she could see nothing but the water, the rise and fall of it, the curtain that closed off light.
"Oh, he won't like this a bit. are we nearly there?"
"Nearly, aye, nearly." His voice was a kind of crooning that smooth nerves before they could fray. "Do you see there, through the storm? There, just ahead, is where you need be."
She turned. Through the rain and wind, she saw the darker shadow of the land, a rise of the hills, the dip of the valley in shapes only. But she knew, she already knew.
"It's beautiful," she murmured.
Like smoke, it drifted closer. She could see the crash of surf now and the cliffs that hulked high above. Then in the flash of lighting, she thought, just for an instant, she saw a man.
Before she could speak, the boat was rocking in the surf, and the boy leaping out into the thrashing water to pull them to shore.
"I can't thank you enough, really." Drenched, euphoric, she climbed out onto the wet sand. "You'll wait for the storm to pass, wont you?' she asked as she dug for her wallet.
"Ill waits till its time to go. You'll find you way lady. Through the rain. The paths there."
"thanks." She passed the note into his hand. She'd go to the visitor's center, take shelter, find Percy and do penance. "If you come with me, ill buy you some tea. You can dry off."
"Oh I'm used to the wet. Someone's waiting for you," he said, then climbed back into his boat.
"Yes, of course." She started to run, then stopped. She hadn't even asked his name "I'm sorry, but-"When she rushed back, there was nothing there but the crash of water against the shore.
Alarmed that he'd sailed back into the rising storm, she called out, began to hurry along what she could see of the shore to try and find him. Lighting flashed overhead, more vicious than exciting now, and the wind slapped at her like a furious hand.
Hunching against it, she jogged up the rise, onto the path. She'd go to the shelter, tell someone about the boy. What had she been thinking of, not insisting that he come with her and wait until the weather cleared?
She stumbled; fell, jarring her bones with the impact, panting to catch her breath as the world went suddenly mad around her. Everything was howling wind, blasting lights, booming thunder. She struggled to her feet and pushed on.
It wasn't fear she felt, and that baffled her. She should be terrified. Why instead was she exhilarated? Where did this wicked thrill of anticipation, of knowledge, come from?
She had to keep going. There was something, someone, waiting. If she could just keep going.
The way was steep, the rain building. Somewhere along the way she lost her bag, but didn't notice. In the next flash of light, she saw it. The circle of stones, rising out of the rough ground like dancers trapped in time. In her head, or perhaps her heart, she heard the song buried inside them.
With something like joy, she rushed forward, her hand around the pendant.
The song rose, like a crescendo, filing her, washing over her like a wave.
And she reached the circle, took her first step inside, lightning struck the center, the bolt as clear and well defined as flaming arrow. She watched the blue fire rise in a tower, higher, higher still, until it seemed to pierce the low-hanging clouds. She felt the iced heat of it on her skin, in her bones, the power of it hammered her heart.
And she fainted.