Disclaimer: I do not own the characters of Harry Potter. They belong to J.K. Rowling and Warner Bros.
A/N: Sorry it has taken me forever to update. (Stands waiting the angry mob with a sad face) I however have gotten a brand new computer (applause) so no more trying to type this on my phone and getting auto-corrected. Anyways. Here is the long awaited third chapter.
Love Knows No Bounds
Chapter Two
October 1997
Hogwarts School
Ginny stared out the window at the stars. Moonlight bathed the astronomy tower through the many windows, leaving a few dark places here and there. She had crept into one of those dark places, wondering why she had to be stuck at school while everyone else was off fighting in the war.
Her mother had told her that it was for her own safety. Surely Molly Weasley meant well, as did the Order Members, but the minute the Hogwarts Express took off from Platform 9 3/4, Hell had walked the Earth. Death Eaters had stopped the train, threatening the muggle born students. She had been in a compartment with Luna Lovegood and Neville Longbottom when a group stormed in. Neville did his best to defend the two girls, but was hexed back into his seat. Everything seemed to play out in slow motion as Ginny rushed to the aide of her friend and watched in horror as they grabbed Luna, dragging her out of the compartment. She had tried to run after them, but they magicked the door shut.
Not only had the students been traumatized on the train, they learned at the welcoming feast that Snape had taken over as Headmaster and the Carrows were the new Defense Against the Dark Arts and Muggle Studies. Amycus Carrow forced them to learn dark spells and curses, and practice on one another. Alecto Carrow spent her hours of teaching stating why muggles and muggle-borns needed to be wiped from the Earth because they were filth.
She had left the Halloween Feast early, not hungry for the laughter of Death Eaters sitting at the teachers table. She hated staring across the room at the places where many of her classmates should be. So she came to the Astronomy tower, a place of solitude that she called her own.
The sound of footsteps hit her ears and she crouched into the darkness some more. If she were caught it would mean detention, and detention nowadays were worse than Filch's quip about students hanging from their thumbs in the dungeons. She held her breathe as the door slowly opened and the last person she expected to walked in…Draco Malfoy.
He was alone and distraught looking. He had his wand in his hand, flicking it towards the wall where she sat. The spell hit the bricks above her head, crumbling dust and debris over her.
"Hey!" She bit her lip the minute the word slipped out.
"Who's there?" Draco demanded. "Lumos." The tip of his wand lit up and he waved it in front of him, catching her in her hiding spot. "Weasley."
"Malfoy."
They had acknowledged each other, a bit more civilly than they had done in the past. If she could remember correctly the last time she had been alone with him, well close to alone, she had cast a bat bogey hex on him. The memory made her laugh shortly before she stopped.
"What's so funny, Weasley?"
She looked up at him, biting her lip, trying to stifle the giggles. "Nothing." He sneered at her. "I was just wondering how you liked my bat bogey hex."
The sneer deepened and he huffed. "You can go now, Weasley. I need my space?"
"Go?" She stood up and walked towards him in a huff. "Go? I was here first Malfoy!"
She stood in front of him, glaring up with furious brown eyes. It was the first time that Draco had noticed their height difference. Admittedly it wasn't the only thing he had noticed about her, but then again all of the boys seemed to notice.
"You obviously don't need it anymore if you're laughing." He said simply.
"Because I'm laughing?" She asked. "Who do you think you are? Some privileged shit since the Death Eaters have taken over?"
She regretted that the moment she said it. He could go to the Carrows or even Snape and she would get in trouble. Ginny said nothing more and walked towards the door, but he stopped her. She looked back at him and then at the hand gripping her wrist.
"I'm…," He stared at her, dropping her wrist. "I'm sorry. I…I'm just having a bad day."
Ginny watched him walk towards a window, looking out it, the moonlight making his blonde hair look white. "I think we're all having bad days lately." He didn't respond and she walked towards him, a bit apprehensively. "I know you don't want to work for him." He let out a wry laugh. "Harry told me that you couldn't go through with killing Dumbledore."
Draco turned around and glared at her. "Oh so Potter thinks he knows what I'm going through, does he?"
Ginny stared at him defensively. "I didn't say that. I only said that he told me you didn't do it." She looked at him closely. "However your eyes say more than you will."
He turned to her and lifted his sleeve, showing her the Dark Mark. "I spend every day at his beck and call. I've watched him do horrible things…unspeakable things, things that will make the Carrows actions look like child's play." Tears started streaming down his face. "No one can understand what that is like! Worried that at any moment he's going to call upon you just to - just to kill you!"
She did something neither of them expected, she hugged him. He did something neither of them would have thought, he hugged her back, crying into her shoulder.
June 2002
Ginny Weasley's Flat
Ginny watched from her window as Draco crossed the street before apparating home. Chewing on her bottom lip she thought about all the things that had happened that day. She had been given her marching orders, told her mother that she broke up with the savior of the wizarding world, and ran into Draco Malfoy, whom she spent the evening drinking with. He had also walked her home. In the time that he left her once she had gotten to her flat, she remembered that first meeting they had at school at the end of the Second War.
They had made an unspoken truce that night. Both were upset about the world, both had no one to turn to. With a pact, they started an annual meeting time to just talk things out. She blushed at the thought of when those talks turned into something more.
A/N: Annnnnnnnnnd, cliffhanger. I know, I know I am an ass! Now before many of you go thinking that you figured out the entire storyline….I'm really good at plot twists. ;)