Wait
By Andrew Belcher
Synopsis – Ginny lands in room filled with people who are supposed to be dead in the arms of a man she is supposed to hate. Now she has to learn to live with the things she's done, and the person she has become.
Authors Note (Important); Now it may strike most of you who read this story that the beginning is a little... well odd, this is because the premise of the story is not my work and I must make that abundantly clear, it comes from a lovely story written by AmourVie (aka Crazy Jes) called Betrayal and Deceit which unfortunately at the time of writing this note has been discontinued *you don't need to have read this story to get it, everything will be made clear*. Throughout reading this story I had the idea of taking it in a completely different direction and as the story has been taken down by the author and this being fan-fiction were no one really owns anything I figured writing my own conclusion (all be it a tremendously long conclusion which does everything but conclude) wouldn't be treading on anyone's shoes too much. To those who have read this story I must also make it clear that this is my take and as such things will be different and certain things I have left out (this will be made clear when reading however) all I have taken are some of the events, the overall plot will be very different. Aside from simply giving credit were credits due, another reason I feel the need to stress that this is a continuation from a previous story is that (as with a sequel) characters have already developed away from that of the books and although I hope to show this in the flashbacks at the beginning of this story if this feels rather glossed over you now know the reason why for which I apologize and hope you do not lose faith in me as a writer.
Yet Another Authors Note (Slightly Less Important); I apologize for being patronizing and babying you as a reader however something else I must mention is that this story is rated mature for a very good reason, and as well as what you may expect such as sex and swearing and all that good stuff that makes reading interesting, this story contains scenes of rape which I imagine are just as upsetting to read as they were to write so anyone who is uncomfortable with this will find aspect of this story very hard to read however it is my believe that these scenes are necessary and meant to upset, so I hope it doesn't put anyone off and I must also say I treat such scenes with a great deal of care.
With all that annoying stuff said let us get on with the story, oh and it has been made clear to me that some people like to read a list of all the 'AU' aspect of stories so I'll provide one at the bottom of this page so as not to risk spoiling the plot for those who do not want to know.
Chapter one – Wait...What!?
"Can someone please tell me what the fuck is going on" it felt necessary for Ginny to swear at the particular scene that had unveiled itself before her, her heart was racing and her eyes where darting around the room as she struggled to make sense of how this could possibly be happening.
She was stood in Dumbledore's office, she knew by Draco's expression when they landed that this was not where the port key was supposed to take them; however it was not this that was causing her current emotional trauma. As she stood and looked around her she saw.... Harry... then Hermione, then Ron, as well as the rest of her brothers Bill, Charlie, Fred, George (though Percy didn't seem to be there) and in front of her sat the old headmaster, smiling, looking down at her with the trademark twinkle in his eye. It was not the scene itself that was at this moment causing her to have what she imagined was a mental breakdown, in fact given any other circumstances this scene would be more then comfortable, however given the fact everyone in this room was dead, the scene that had greeted her coming out of the port key was causing her considerable discomfort to say the least.
Was she dead.
She supposed she must be, maybe Voldemort had put up wards round the castle to prevent people port keying out who weren't supposed to, or maybe they were killed in one of the fights they had and the rest of the journey was their 'heading for the light at the end of the tunnel'. She supposed it was fine; she had wanted this for a long time. She struggled to remember a time she didn't wish for this except maybe very recently. But Draco was there; that was all that mattered.
Dumbledore looked at her, a knowing smile etched his lips "no my dear, you have not died, though I understand that as you look round this room, you may think yourself to be somewhat... uncommon, in that regard" he smiled again. 'To the point' was not a phrase Dumbledore had ever heard of, Ginny imagined, at any other time she would be amused by this but anger was slowly over powering her fear as she wanted to simply understand what was happening.
"Oh well that clears that up" sarcasm was thick in Draco's voice "'Cause of course it's perfectly normal to find yourself in room full of people who are supposed to be dead". As he said this Draco gently pulled Ginny off the ground, she had been too weak to keep a firm grip on the old boot and was too frozen in shock to push herself up. As he did this he held her close, whispering in her ear "you are real right, I didn't die did I" she looked up at him to see him smiling.
"I'm real" was Ginny's response, not finding his remark the least bit amusing
"Well you would say that" Draco smiled down again as he said this. Ginny wasn't sure when a man who had lived life with no sense of humour suddenly found everything funny but it was a trait she at present found incredibly annoying.
"Can you please stop touching my sister" for the first time someone other than Dumbledore had spoken, it was Ron. He didn't sound too angry, now was not the time; however he couldn't keep himself quite. Ginny groaned in her head, 'Don't tell me I have to tell him everything that's happened, aren't the dead supposed to watch over you or something' it was then that a spark or realization ignited in her mind, but she quickly pushed it away, she dared not think that, besides it didn't make sense.
"Ron please just be quite" Ginny didn't say this with much force, she was too tired, and in no mood to argue with her dead brother, though she didn't know when such a mood would arise. She turned back to Dumbledore "please just... what's going on" she tried her best to sound calm and apologetic, she didn't enjoy swearing in front of the old man, or letting him know how impatient she was getting.
Dumbledore was quite for a moment, fixing Ginny with an analytical stare which was quite unnerving "I feel it might be best if you would share what it is you believe to have happened, on the night you were captured would be an appropriate starting point".
"I'm sorry Professor" Ginny was finding it difficult to keep the annoyance out of her voice now "but I think it's you..."
"I really do feel its best if you begin" Dumbledore seemed to have an ability to be incredibly forceful whilst still smiling and sounding entirely pleasant. After he said this he held his arm out signalling Ginny to sit in the chair in front of his desk and she did as she was told, Draco standing behind her with an arm on her shoulder.
It was at this point Ginny became aware of how silent the room was, considering all of the 'people', if that's what they were, occupying it. She imagined them all giving her the same analytical stare that Dumbledore was, it seemed they were waiting for this very thing. No one got up and hugged her, or told how much they missed her and that everything was fine now, something she would imagine would happen straight away if she were to meet them again, dead or otherwise. She defiantly had to admit though, she didn't feel dead, and this certainly wasn't the afterlife she pictured except for everyone being there. She figured it was just best to do as she was told and hopefully some explanation would follow. She also didn't know quite how to feel herself, after all she didn't well up with excitement when seeing her friends and family either; people who for the longest time she didn't believe herself capable of living without. But she was. In fact she had learned to disregard all these people as either weak or idiotically noble and some she had simply grown to hate, it wasn't something she was proud of and often reflected on her feelings when it was safe to show emotion on her face, but it was something she had to do to keep strong.
"What exactly is it you want me to say" her voice cracked as she said this, these were memories she learned to block out and her ability to prevent herself from crying had frayed more than a little as of late, she composed herself with a cough "me and Neville were bringing bodies back into Hogwarts, people were trying to flee from the raid but death eater had stayed outside to guard the entrance, we managed to use some stone debris that fell when they broke in to protect ourselves, that's when we all herd you'd been killed." Ginny broke eye contact with the old man and just looked at her feet, it was a moment she had replayed a hundred times in her head, when the sickening announcement rang out through the castle "That's when we saw Harry, he just walked past us and didn't say anything" again she had to cough for composure, not so much to stop herself from being upset but to stop the anger rising within her, she had grew to hate Harry during her time in the cell, whatever was going on she had nothing to say to him "Then he started fighting with whoever he could find wearing a cloak" she was struggling to keep the anger away from her words "that's when the green light hit him, I tried to run over to him but Neville hit me with a stun spell, and I knocked my head against the stone block I was stood behind, the last thing I remember was seeing Neville overwhelmed by the death eater, that's when I woke up in the cell" for the first time the people around her began to murmur to each other, it seems her mention of the word cell was the topic of conversation, how could they not know she was imprisoned.
"Look this is stupid" Ron rose from his chair irritated "why don't you just ask her why she thinks we're dead, I mean we know why she thought Harry died everyone did but you said she thinks we all died"
"You did die I saw you!" Ginny didn't turn and look at her brother as she shouted at him, she couldn't bare it. She was on the verge of tears now. "I saw him kill you and I was glad! I was glad because it meant you didn't have to suffer and was jealous of you!" She couldn't help herself anymore and the tears began to flow, she didn't know what caused her to lose herself, maybe it was her brothers ignorance to what had happened to her, maybe she just couldn't keep herself composed any longer. Draco kneeled beside her and gave her a tissue, she took it leaned into his chest sobbing quietly.
Draco continued for her "It's true, I saw it too, about a week after the siege on Hogwarts Ron and Hermione were brought into the main hall of our base of operations" Draco looked around at them both after he said this, Ron was simply staring at him infuriated, he seemed to be angry at the mere sound of him speaking, or maybe it was the sight of him consoling the man's sister. Hermione simply looked upset, the last comment had shuck them all, none of them knew what it was like to wish for death "and they were executed, the prisoner were forced to watch". He looked at his feet and trailed off as he said this, though this was an act, he tried to put some emotion into his voice as well but he didn't think it came off, the truth was he was too hardened to such things.
"Oh and I suppose you were forced to watch" Ron sneered at Draco
"Believe it or not Ron I held no pleasure in seeing you die" Draco attempted to keep contained but it was difficult, the man couldn't see how much he was upsetting his own sister.
"Ron? So now because you think you've changed your gunna start calling me Ron now" his face was turning red "oh but blood traitor was so much catchier!"
"Can you two stop this; he saved Ginny's life for god sake!" Hermione spoke for the first time, her voice was cracked and she had clearly been pushing back tears, they remained silent for a moment.
"It wasn't them was it" Ginny spoke up again, her voice was more composed but she was still fighting tears "it was just some fucking poor bastard with polyjuice potion, when they raided the castle they could make it for anyone, why didn't I think of it I'm such a fucking idiot" Ginny's language had caused the room to yet again fill with murmurs, Draco even thought he heard a small gasp from Hermione, none of them were used to hearing her speak this way, the only one who seemed unfazed was Dumbledore. Draco cringed whenever he heard Ginny swear, it reminded him of how much innocence she had lost, he was quick to correct her.
"We didn't think of it because it doesn't make sense. Why would Voldemort pretend to kill people, he'd rather just torture his followers until we found them for real" It would be a while before Draco thought he'd remember to not include himself as a follower.
"Ah" Dumbledore answered "does it not make sense? Can you see no reason why Voldemort would like to give the impression he had killed his most prominent opponents?"
Draco searched his head for meaning "well he would always lie about how successful his champagnes were to give people moral and prevent disaffection, but to say he had killed Harry Potter and his friends when he hadn't, it doesn't make sense, it was his passion to finally get the people who had stopped his raise to power so many times".
"Was being the key word" Dumbledore said with a half smile, being fantastically vague as always "you see after Harry was killed he did in fact come back to life" Draco and Ginny shot perplexed looks at each other, Dumbledore noted this and for the first actually began to explain "do you know what a Horcrux is Ginny?"
"Yeah, Draco told me about them; it's how Voldemort stayed immortal. We had to wait till Nagini died before it meant we could finally kill him" Ginny searched her brain to make sense of all this, in all honestly she didn't really understand Horcrux's, the first she had herd of them was when Draco burst into their room in the middle of the night, rambling on and on about a dead snake and 'now was our time to strike'. She looked up at Draco for clarification and he nodded to tell her she was right.
"Well you see for reasons, I dare say, not even I am able to fully grasp on the night Voldemort attempted to kill Harry all those years ago, as the curse backfired and vanquished Voldemort, a part of his soul was transferred to harry"
"So he became a Horcrux" Draco thought out load.
"Precisely" Dumbledore said with smile "so when Harry was hit with the killing curse a second time Voldemort did in fact only kill the part of himself that was imbedded within Harry, and as such he managed to cheat death once again" Dumbledore gave a smile towards where Harry was sat "and when Harry awoke and fled with the others, Voldemort and a group who are now deceased managed to spot this with some horror I imagine. However by witnessing this miracle Harry Potters relevance suddenly dawned on Voldemort, you see Voldemort had known all along that making a person a Horcrux was bad for two reasons; firstly, this person would eventually die, and secondly due to the laws of magic people would not be reluctant to destroy such a Horcrux more than any other because as this person has two souls they have two lives, and the less prominent soul is always the first to go. So when Harry awoke Voldemort managed to convince himself that Harry was only relevant all this time because of the fact he was a Horcrux, and now he had taken this away from him he was now just another child".
"I still don't understand" Draco spoke up perplexed "Harry was still a mortal enemy of Voldemort" Draco still felt uncomfortable using Potters first name but he knew he needed to seem as friendly as possible, playground antics would not do now "why wouldn't he still have us kill him, or Ron and Hermione for that matter"
"I believe you already know the answer to that question" Dumbledore again smiled rather mischievously, Ginny wondered if he enjoyed revealing these things to them, he certainly seemed to draw it out as long as possible "you see after the fall of Hogwarts Voldemort developed, for want of a better word, principles, I believe this is something you are both aware of" Ginny looked down at the rose tattoo on her forearm remembering what it really meant, she and Draco nodded and Dumbledore continued to explain " Voldemort believed he had won after he had toppled Hogwarts and killed me, so he began to give certain orders to his regime; he had achieved his goal of mass revolution and now it was time to rebuild. Harry, Ron, Hermione, now were just children, there was no need to waste resources on a vendetta."
"So why pretend to kill them" Ginny interrupted slightly angry at how little sense it all made.
"well you see though he finally understood the relevance of Harry, it was not something he could reveal to his followers. After all a lot of people believed Harry was the 'chosen one' and therefore the only one who could finally vanquish Voldemort, if people were to find out that it was in fact possible for anyone to kill him after the Horcrux's were destroyed he would leave himself open for attack. So to prevent this, he solved a nonexistent problem (or indeed pretended to) by encouraging the myth that Harry Potter was dead. You see in those times people were much more willing to except the idea that Harry had been killed, rather then he had woken up after being hit with a killing curse and fled with a group of students, Aurors, and teachers no one had heard from since the attack, unsurprising really".
At this Ginny managed to strain herself to glance at Harry, curiosity was overwhelming her sense of hatred. Harry had a look of intense concentration etched on his face and was simply glaring into space, he seemed to be considering where this was all going the same as she was, it seemed they both knew the time where she would have to tell them all what had happened to her was fast approaching, but first Ginny had questions.
"I still don't understand why Voldemort pretended to kill my brother and Hermione, I mean they were never 'chosen ones' and it's not as if we needed another blow to our moral, we were all captured" over the conversation Ginny had managed to suppress all the emotions she was feeling at this moment in time; she was clam, collective and cold, she now just wanted to know the facts".
"That my dear was nothing more than an elaborate show for you" Dumbledore seemed saddened by these words "you needed to believe that your ties with your 'old life' where completely broken, that meant losing your best friend and your closest brother, and no doubt you where encouraged to believe the rest had also been killed" though Ginny never saw her brothers die she quickly lost hope they had survived "and because of this you lost all hope of rescue, it was only at this point that Voldemort could take advantage of your complete hopelessness and begin to have you do as he wished."
"Do as he wished, what do you mean do as he wished, you just gave up 'cos we were dead" Ron once again chimed in insensitively, he seemed to get angrier every time.
"Look you don't understand" Ginny for the first time was defensive, this was something she was dreading, the truth was she didn't know how to justify herself, she wasn't even sure whether what she did was right or extremely selfish and evil, it was difficult for her to tell the difference nowadays "I thought you were dead, I thought everyone was dead what was I supposed to do I had no were to go"
"...Escape!" Ron said rising from his seat "just run away, I don't know...just...fight!"
"I did alright! I did fight" Ginny raised her voice to match her brothers, fighting tears, she turned round to look at him "for a whole year I had to take their torture; the maces, the whips, the fucking Crucio curses from Voldemort and every time I kicked, I punched, I insulted hoping this would finally be the time they killed me or just let me bleed to death but it never came!"
This speech really did draw gasps from everyone, it seemed Dumbledore hadn't told them the extent of the torture Ginny had suffered, maybe he didn't know himself though he appeared unfazed by this revelation, they all seemed to be attempting to ask questions though unfortunately no sound escaped from their lips, they just gawped at each other and then at Ginny.
"Alright, alright" Draco said softly, he again placed Ginny's head against his chest letter her sob, though he mainly wanted her to turn away from her oaf of a brother, who was looking at them both positively irate.
"I gave up okay" Ginny said, her voice was long past broken "after 13 months they took me out and they pampered me, along with Luna and everyone else, they told us they have a new policy and we weren't going to be treated like prisoners anymore, even though we still where, and I don't know I just accepted it. I didn't at first obviously but I didn't see what else to do, they could easily keep me there without killing me and they weren't making me do anything except live in the castle and go along with their 'new world' plan so I didn't see any point to doing anything else."
Draco hated every word of this speech, in some perverse way it was better when Ginny was in the cells; at least she was fighting, going against his plans whenever she could. It was only when he heard she was now trying to kill herself that he pushed to have her released. He knew she was trying to irritate the guards enough so they would finish her off but there's a big difference between that and doing it herself, it had meant she really had lost all the principles she once held dear and now she just wanted the pain to end and Draco couldn't stand it any longer. She wasn't being a stubborn little weasel as an old deceased version of him would have put it this was real, Voldemort had already won.
"Wait you were tortured for 13 months" Hermione was the first one to find words, she sounded positively horror struck.
"Yeah, I only found out when they let me out" Ginny had managed to harden her voice again "the only light we had was when they opened up the latches to stop us going blind, I thought they did this once a day but if that was true id have only been in there a few months, it was only when they once moved me to a cell with a window when they were cleaning out mine when I realised they did it pretty much randomly" She remembered hearing the latches down the corridor opening and closing for no real reason and her heart sinking.
Ginny didn't want to play down her experience because she knew it would be difficult for them excepting just how much she gave up, especially Ron, but there were some things she would never say, like the fact the cells were only cleaned out because the smell of shit and blood put off the torturers (a difficult feat she imagined). She remembered how much she hugged the toilet that first day in Draco's room.
"Ginevre my dear, please, if you can, tell us what happened after you were released" Dumbledore said calmly
Ginny took a deep breath and then sighed, looking at Draco who was giving her a loving smile, she imagined this was hard for him to do as he must be under the same assault of emotions she was and she silently thanked him for this.
"We were taken out of our cells one day and placed in the main hall" Ginny swallowed slightly, she knew what piece of information she would soon have to reveal "and I was placed in front of him first, he said it was time for us all to fulfil our purpose, I told him to fuck off and he stated to Crucio me" Ginny swallowed and noticed a very uncomfortable silence fill the room as she did "I didn't scream" she said turning and smiling at her brother, the first time she had done so "I never screamed" a proud look etched their faces, momentarily breaking their looks of concern. She smiled again to herself more than anything and turned back to Dumbledore "that's when he said he wasn't gunna kill us because we were all pure bloods and having now been 'rehabilitated' where gunna serve under other pure blood families, keeping us alive".
"so you were slaves" Harry for the first time spoke up, his voice was very calm and considering, not exactly friendly but in no way crass or mean but they still burned through Ginny.
She simply ignored the fact it was him who asked the question and answered to Dumbledore. "That's what everyone thought, even those receiving us, but it turned out Voldemort had different plans"
"The new world order" Dumbledore chimed in knowingly.
"Yeah what is that" Ron said, the anger was gone from his voice and he now appeared genuinely curious.
Ginny sighed once again "It turns out Voldemort wanted his own little high class society of pure bloods, probably to amuse him or something, but since there wasn't enough to go round he had to get people who hated him to join in"
"Ah but his reasons were much more complex then that Ginevre" Dumbledore interrupted "you see after Voldemort believed he had toppled society he had no need to kill all who opposed him, it is my believe that Voldemort genuinely thought he was rehabilitating you from your, if you mind the expression, blood-traitor ways"
"If you say so" Ginny didn't enjoy being sarcastic with Dumbledore but she was in no mood to discuss the philosophy of Voldemort "anyway I was place with Draco"
"So what you had to pretend you were like, Draco's sister or something" Ron said amusement in his voice, laughing at the absurdity of such a task.
Ginny swallowed hard, and gave a slight cough "err...well actually you see, me and Draco are...well...married".
A/N – Well wasn't that fun, for those who needed an AU list before they could commit to reading the first chapter here we go;
Harry isn't the one to kill Voldemort he's just a Horcrux.
The ending of the 7th book is different i.e. when Dumbledore dies Harry went nuts and got himself killed (but for how long??).
The raid on Hogwarts in my story was the finale battle and the good guys lost, though most managed to flee, oh and the people who died in the finale battle of the real book are all still alive, or may not be I haven't decided yet, but they aren't necessarily dead.
Oh and Draco's good and Snapes fairly decent, and if that's too weird for you then this probably isn't the story for you.
Hope that isn't too confusing and for those who have read the chapter please let me knows if I've missed anything out.