So I never know what to put in my authors notes and I doubt any of you even read them anyway. You all want the story right? Well here's the next instalment….
She'd found her way in. Finally, her mission felt achievable, like she had done something that would have a domino effect. After a major memory clean-up job in the village, Ginny had spent the next few days after placing the tracking charm, watching her stalkee's movements either on a map or aparating a mile away incase of trouble. It appeared to her that since the incident in the village, the man had been demoted to a snatcher rather than a death eater. Ginny had heard of these snatchers, they were travelling about responding to anyone who triggered the Dark Lord's taboo and rounding up muggle borns and blood traitors that were on the run. More and more people were going into hiding as the new school year approached.
She didn't know how she felt about not going back to school. Obviously she couldn't, but it was her home away from home, and now she couldn't be with her family or her friends and it was hurting her. Ginny had apparated to the street that Grimmauld place was on under a disillusionment charm, but had immediately noticed death eaters positioned permanently outside. She seriously doubted anyone would go there.
To take her mind off her loneliness Ginny practiced magic and tailed the newly appointed snatcher. There seemed to be a whole camp of them in a forest and they were varying degrees of sinister. She even thought that she had seen Frenrir Greyback once from a distance and had immediately disaparated. Never the less Ginny had placed several more tracking charms on members of the various little teams and had charmed her map to heat up when they moved somewhere new.
The next time her map heated Ginny had rolled her eyes because for a week now nothing had happened, the snatchers had just been getting food or something. She was seriously beginning to question whether this was the best approach but when she checked the map, not one, but two of the men had moved to the opposite end of the country. They were somewhere up near the Lake District in the middle of night. Ginny knew instinctively that this was something different than the other time and quickly got changed.
She had also got more prepared at her 'disguise' since last time, she had bought a muggle black skin-tight jumpsuit which would have been normally way too revealing for her, but that was the point. She couldn't dress like her. It was also really easy to move in and made her look older than normal as it hugged her curves. She had also procured a death eater mask from among the wreckage of the village and decided that this was the perfect thing to hide her face. What would piss off the death eaters more than their enemy wearing their mask? Also it showed them that Ginny wasn't afraid of them, or she was trying not to be.
It took her all of two minutes to get into these and then she collected her thing and apparated all the way to the Lake District. At a light jog Ginny moved into a forest following where the map said the snatchers would be. When she heard noise ahead she slowed and crept forward trying to be as silent as possible.
She came upon what looked like a camp, it had a few tents dotted around but they all looked ransacked. By the fire were a group of snatchers, Ginny could easily spot the ones she had tracking charms on. A few yards away from them were a group of 20 people or so, men, women, children, probably the owners of the tents. They were all tied together, with their hands bound. The snatchers were currently going through their hostages' belongings, chucking what they did not want on the fire.
It was when they got to a particular item, a wedding ring, that everything went pear shaped.
"Oooh, gold…" one of them said, "reckon we could get some money for melting this down."
That was when a woman, tied up, spoke, "Please… don't take my ring." She sobbed.
The man holding said item ran at the woman, violently yanking her hair back, "What did you say to me you mudblood piece of scum?" he screamed. This caused the woman to sob even more, her words barely recognisable any more.
"Ple-hehease, it's all I have left of him." Ginny's heart ached for the woman, who had obviously been through a lot. She decided then and there that these bastards weren't going to take that ring.
"Accio ring." She muttered, using the necessary wand movements. The ring came flying through the darkness towards her, barely noticeable enough for her to catch. The snatchers who had all been too occupied with the spectacle, didn't notice a thing and the man who had been holding it obviously thought that a fellow snatcher was responsible for the disappearance. Ginny carefully put the ring on her thumb, as it was way too big for her other fingers and then slowly began to move around the camp in a wide circle.
Meanwhile from below, the snatcher was getting more frustrated with his colleagues, "Tell me who took it! That was mine that gold, MINE!"
"Jesus Christ man, none of us know where your bloody ring is." Another snatcher replied.
Ginny watched this whole thing play out as she carefully began to move closer to the hostages. When she felt she was near enough Ginny sent an overly powerful 'engorgio' at the camp fire which immediately sent a flame towering 20 feet into the air. All eyes turned to look at it, flinching away and Ginny quickly ran over to the captives and began using severing charms to untie everyone.
"What are you doing you mad girl." One old man asked in a harsh whisper.
"Saving your lives," she replied in the same tone, "don't move until I give all of you the signal."
She was just finishing the last person's bonds when, done with putting out the fire, everybody turned towards her. There was a moment when all the snatchers turned to look at her, obviously confused as to why she was wearing a death eater mask, but then they all reached for their wands.
"Now!" Ginny screamed, throwing her body backwards and twisting mid-air to disaparate. The effect was immediate, when Ginny reappeared balancing on a branch of one of the nearest trees, all of the hostages were running in different directions and their captors looked torn between finding the person who set them free, or rounding them up again.
Their indecision was part of their downfall. Some of the adults, mainly men, who had been tied, ran at the snatchers and physically knocked them to the ground. Being of higher numbers, the snatchers still standing began turning their wands on the opponents. Ginny knew she had to act fast and she couldn't possibly take out multiple people at once, so instead she did the first thing that came to mind.
"Oy! Dickheads!" she cried. "Forget about me?" and then she jumped out of the tree, sending her most powerful cushioning charm at the ground and then rolling when she hit the ground. It wasn't even that tall a tree but Ginny felt like such a badass afterwards.
By now the fist fights had ceased as the snatchers were able to throw their attackers off. Said people, five men and two women, were currently backing up towards Ginny, and Ginny noticed that both women and one of the men had managed to wrestle a wand out of its owner's grasp. Sure they were still out-matched but at least she didn't have to defend all of them on her own.
"You!" one of the snatchers, who looked faintly familiar, stepped forward pointing at Ginny and for a second her heart nearly stopped for fear that he had identified her, "it's you isn't it?! And that's my old mask!"
"Ohhh." Ginny sighed in relief, "You're one of those idiots from the village. Pleasure to see you again." She knew she was being arrogant, but she couldn't help but grin.
He looked enraged by this and turned to his companions, "This is the one who tried to kill us. And now she's here defending mudbloo-" he was cut short when Ginny's stunner hit him in the back.
She faked an overly dramatic yawn, and the said "I think I just did us all a favour, that guy was boring. Am I right?" the snatchers just starred at her. "Never mind." And then she shot a confringo at the centre of the pack and yelled "Get to the trees!" at her seven comrades.
She hid behind the first tree she came to and then began trying to shoot spells around the trunk. Lets just say accuracy was not on her mind. The line of snatchers began walking forwards and seemed to stick with the strategy if barraging them with spells. Ginny had to admit it was working, but they were getting way too close for comfort. Digging up some new knowledge, Ginny decided to use a spell she had just learnt, which built upon the spell incendio. Peeking out from the tree just long enough to sweep her wand horizontally across the floor of the camp, Ginny created a wall of fire. This meant that the people firing on her and her new acquaintances, could not get to them by foot, and since no one seemed to want to be the first to aparate to the other side of the fire, it was a successful barricade.
Unfortunately, although bodies could not get through fire, spells seemed to be just fine, especially dark magic. When a killing curse hit the tree next to Ginny, she watches the whole trunk turn black and every leaf began to fall as one. Then a second later a violent severing curse cut through half of Ginny's tree and it began to lean precariously. She fired a volley of jinxes, even throwing in her bat-bogey hex for good measure, but there was still around twelve snatchers all firing very deadly spells at the eight of them and only half had wands.
When a bird's nest fell out of the tree she was behind, which was getting closer and closer to falling over by the minute, Ginny was reminded of a story Harry had once told her about Hermione. She had researched the spell afterwards but had never tried it. God she hoped this worked.
Knowing that she only had one shot at this, Ginny stepped out from behind the tree, dodged an incoming curse which burned as it flew by and took aim at the line of snatchers. Then Ginny transfigured a nearby tent into a flock of birds and screamed, "Oppugno!".
The effect was instantaneous, the birds flew over the still burning wall of fire and began clawing and pecking at the dark wizards. Ginny must have however put much more gusto into the spell than necessary because she heard a rumbling through the trees and suddenly it seemed as though every bird in the forest had all swarmed in one place. It was impossible to see anything but Ginny and her allies just watched in shock as the birds suddenly without warning took off again, away this time. Where before there had been snatchers, there were now just pieces of ripped cloth with blood on them. The people these scraps of garments belonged to must have disaparated in the confusion of the onslaught. It was silent for a moment and then Ginny absentmindedly flicked her wand at the line of fire and it died out, leaving everybody to snap out of their thoughts.
"Are they gone?" A middle aged man to her left asked nobody in particular.
"I think so." Ginny spoke grimly. "But you guys have to get going. They might be back."
"What about you?" a younger man, one of the ones with a wand asked.
"I'll be fine." She reassured him. "You should probably all split up too. I know there's strength in numbers, but it would be a lot harder to find you if you all scattered about."
Suddenly Ginny was being hugged. She guessed by the wall of brown hair in her face that it was one of the girls. "Thank you." A voice said in her ear, "You saved my son's life." The woman pulled back and smiled tearily at her and then she began to walk briskly away probably in search of said son.
Everyone dispersed into the dark until suddenly it was just Ginny and the other woman in the ruins of the camp. She hadn't noticed before but the other woman was the one who had been so upset over the ring, and judging by the way she was searching the ground with her stolen wand, this woman wasn't leaving until she got it.
"Looking for something?" Ginny asked, and the woman's head whipped up in fear, mellowing when she realised who was speaking.
"Sorry," the woman said, "The mask is just a bit frightening…" then the woman noticed what Ginny was holding up and she rushed over, sobbing before she had even reached her.
Ginny handed her the ring, smiling under her mask. Her heart really did go out to this woman. She hoped that maybe if they won the war, this woman could have a happy ending. As Ginny turned to leave, the woman grabbed her arm stopping her.
"Do we not even get to know who you are?" the woman asked.
Ginny shook her head "Sorry but no. I can't risk my family's lives like that." The woman nodded, understanding.
"I may not be able to see your face but you don't sound old enough to be doing stuff like this." She replied
"Oh I'm not, but right now, I'm the only one willing." Ginny replied darkly. Yes she was angry that she was the only one helping, but she figured she deserved to be.
"That sounds awfully lonely." The woman stated as she began to walk away.
"It is." Ginny said more to herself that anyone, and then she disaparated.
Okay so this chapter is another one developing the story. It's a bit similar to the last one but it's an important step for Ginny's character. She's evolving, becoming more independent, but it's not easy for her, she's going to face a lot of struggle up ahead. So far she's gotten lucky, this time she had some help. Ginny is in no way invincible, and shes a human, a 16 yr old human, with feelings. So yeah expect more turmoil to come.