Ch. 10 Punishment

Ginny

"This is a reminder that all sixth and seventh years who refused to take part in the Purification Ceremony are to report for detention after classes on Friday in the Great Hall. Those students, in alphabetic order, are: Hannah Abbott. Susan Bones. Terry..."

Snape's message had repeatedly rang out throughout the castle during the first week of term. By now, the whole school probably knew by heart the names of those twenty or so students that had defied the Carrows at the book burning. There had been lots speculation amongst the students about what the detention would involve, and after the wildest of the ideas had been voiced, Ginny had decided it was best not to think about it.

But now she had no choice: it was Friday, classes had just finished and she was passing through the doors of the Great Hall for the detention. Pansy Parkinson was manning the door, her I.S. badge gleaming in the torchlight, disarming them all as they walked through.

The four long tables had been pushed to the side of the hall leaving the centre of the room empty. The two Carrows stood on the raised platform at the head of the hall and at the foot of the platform, a little way to either side, stood Malfoy and Nott, their wands grasped in their hands. Like little foot soldiers, Ginny thought scathingly. Pathetic.

Draco had that familiar sneer on his face; Theo's face was unreadable. Ginny looked around as more students filed in behind her and saw Goyle in the shadows at the back of the hall, his shoulders squared and wand ready by his side. And there was Snape, standing against the far wall, his face shrouded in the gloom and barely visible. When the students had all quietly shuffled into the hall, Pansy closed the heavy oak doors and silence fell.

Amycus took that as a cue to launch into a tirade about the dangers of Muggles, the importance of Purification - Ginny's stomach turned every time that word was mentioned - and how traitorous their actions had been at the book burning.

"But we understand that you are misguided due to the poor education you have had up to now. Nevertheless, it is important that you are punished and you learn from your mistakes. However, we are merciful. You will be given a second chance to turn towards what is right!" Ginny and her schoolmates stood silent as Amycus's words filled the dim hall. "When your name is called, you will each come to the front to receive your punishment...Parvati Patil!"

It seemed to take an age for Parvati to tentatively walk across the hall and up the wooden steps to where the Carrows stood. When she finally got there, Alecto turned to her.

"Hold out your wand hand, palm down." The Carrow sister demanded.

Parvati hesitated then shifted so she was standing a little straighter, looked Alecto directly in the face and held out her right hand. Alecto pointed her wand tip an inch or so above Parvati's hand and started to mumble an incantation. As a shimmer of red light emitted from her wand, Parvati let out a yelp like a startled animal and pulled her hand away. Alecto looked up.

"Hold. Out. Your. Hand." She said, her voice low and threatening.

Ginny could tell Parvati was trying hard to hide her fear as she did as she was told. Again, Alecto moved her wand an inch or so above Parvati's hand in slow, intricate movements, continuously murmuring an incantation as red wand-light swirling in the air. Parvati was gasping and whimpering, and her hand started to shake as blood began to appear on it. It initially seemed to form some kind of pattern but the bleeding was so profuse Ginny couldn't see what it was.

As Parvati's blood started to drip steadily on to the wooden floor of the platform, Ginny saw a movement out of the corner of her eye and turned to see Nott take a few hesitant steps towards the platform, his arms stretched and tense, his hand grasping his wand so tightly Ginny thought she could see it shaking. A look of anger seemed to cross his face before it became unreadable again. He came to an abrupt stop at the foot of the platform and stood as still as stone, his gaze fixed on Parvati.

"Go." Alecto commanded Parvati when she finally lowered her wand.

Parvati stumbled down the wooden steps and managed to get to Lavender's outstretched arms before she let the tears spill freely from her eyes.

"Luna Lovegood!"

Luna walked up to the platform and Ginny watched as Alecto cast the same curse on Luna's left hand. When Luna walked back to the group of students, holding her bloodied hand in her uninjured one, her expression was grave but her eyes dry.

And so it continued, the students being called in turn, Alecto's wand evoking the dark magic that caused their hands to bleed out onto the wooden floor of the platform and then the flagstones of the hall. They had been forbidden to talk, so those that had suffered the punishment were not able to tell the others what it had been like. But Ginny started to feel less fearful. At least she knew what to expect from witnessing it, unlike Parvati. Was this all it was? Ginny thought. A cut to the hand? The Carrows were just copying Umbridge's detention; they couldn't even think of an original punishment. She could handle this.

"Ginerva Weasley!" And Ginny walked forward to take her turn.

The searing pain that pierced through her hand when Alecto began her incantation came as a shock to Ginny, causing her to gasp despite herself, and she quickly realised that this wasn't just a cut to the hand after all. The pain coursed through her hand, up her arm, then her neck and radiated through her skull. It burned through her skin, her nerves and tissue, right into her bones. As with the others, the wound Alecto was making was deep and although it was forming lines, the blood flowed from the cuts so quickly, Ginny couldn't make out any meaningful shapes. After what seemed like hours, but Ginny knew could only have been a few minutes, Alecto stopped.

"Go." She was told.

Ginny walked away, trying to stop herself from shaking, and like other students before her, tried to stem the bleeding with her clothing. She continued to do so as the rest of her school mates took their turns on the platform. It was only when the final few students were going up that the flow of blood from Ginny's hand had slowed enough for her to finally see what had been cut into her skin.

And it wasn't shapes, but words.

Small but perfectly formed words that read: Blood Traitor.

After the last of the students had been subjected to the cutting, Alecto turned to address them.

"You have each been marked to signify that you have betrayed your own kind! But as we have already said, we are merciful. The mark will fade when you show yourselves to be loyal to our world. Conversely, each time you show traitorous, anti-wizard sentiments, the mark will become more...pronounced...You may go now."

As Ginny and her fellow students turned to leave, she noticed small pools of blood on the floor of the Great Hall, where various students had been standing. Each individual pool was beginning to flow into each other, mixing and seeping into the cracks between the flagstones, forming minute rivers of red. The blood of a twenty or so witches and wizards, pure-bloods and half-bloods.

And it all looked the same. Ginny had no doubt that the blood of Muggle-borns would look just the same also.

Then words that various people had spoken to her in the last week ran through her mind: Promise me...My youngest. My only daughter… you're brave, you're fierce, and I wouldn't want you any other way...Those who start with burning books end with burning people... You're Ginny fucking Weasley aren't you? The seventh child of a seventh child?! The girlfriend of the Boy-Who-Lived?!…We can't do it without you. We need you…It's something people need to cherish and to protect and to never let slip through their fingers...Because if he's alone, he's not as much of a threat...the only thing needed for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing...

And Ginny thought that, despite trying desperately to suppress her natural inclination to fight against the wrongs that were happening at Hogwarts, and despite the fact that she had tried to keep her promise to her mother to keep as safe as possible, she had still ended up with a cursed cut on her hand. And really, was trying not to comply with the Carrows regime the same as keeping safe, because Ginny wondered that actually, the DA could be the thing that kept them the safest. Not just because of the spells they would master, but in knowing they weren't alone.

Because there was strength in their unity.

And she knew she couldn't do it. She couldn't sleep obliviously between freshly washed sheets on soft beds whilst Dean and others only had forests and fields as their home. She couldn't contentedly eat three course meals in the Great Hall whilst innocent people were being put on trial and families ripped apart. She couldn't sit silently whilst the Carrows forced their pure-blood ideology on the school she loved when her boyfriend, best friend and brother were Merlin-knew where risking their lives to rid the world of the dark wizard that was the cause of it all.

So as she exited the Great Hall she grabbed Hannah and Luna and pulled them aside into an alcove as the other students shuffled past.

"Tell the others - tell them to have their galleons ready." She whispered urgently. She knew from their smiles of understanding that she didn't have to explain further.

That they knew - as Lavender would say - that Ginny-fucking-Weasley was back.