Mipsy
Mipsy's confusion worsened in those last closing months. Mipsy was unable to reach Miss because he was being watched so closely, Master knowing Mipsy was a friend to Miss in her time of need.
Although Mipsy hadn't seen or communicated with Miss, Mipsy knew and had been keeping track of her pregnancy stages. If Mipsy's calculations were correct, Miss's stomach would be getting very heavy, as Miss was nearing the end of her pregnancy very soon.
Mipsy could only hope the Potter group was taking care of his Miss.
Master Draco had become much more melancholy than was usual, and was mostly away from home and at Mipsy's old Mistress' home in Italy. Although Mistress was never kind towards Mipsy, Mipsy knew she loved Master very much and was a good influence on Master when he spent much time away from Master's nasty Death Eater friends, who Mipsy didn't like.
And now that Master's father is gone, it seems as though a small weight is gone from Master's heavy heart.
"Mipsy! What is yous doing?" Mipsy heard a squeaky voice call out, "Yous been scrubbing the same table for fifteen minutes! If yous don't hurry, yous will have to shut yous ears in the pantry door again! Ketty will see to it her self! You knows it!"
Mipsy stood and hurried over to the next table, his floating bucket and rag trailing behind him.
Draco
It'd been nearly seven months. Seven months since I'd seen Ginny.
'Strange,' I thought idly one night, while lying awake in my large emerald bed, after a rather uneventful meeting with Avery and McNair, 'I can't seem to recall the number of freckles on her nose, anymore.'
Nearly seven months.
But we were getting closer to her all of the time. With every lead gone cold, with every witch and wizard tortured, with every Potter-supporter's family member threatened, we were closer and closer to locating her. I was closer.
I looked outside the window, out onto the snow-covered Italian city, where everyone would be fast asleep. Like my mother was, a hallway away. Like Ginny probably was, wherever she was sleeping. Like I should have been. For a fleeting moment I entertained the thought that maybe, just maybe, if I went to sleep I would join Ginny in her dreams and know where she was.
I closed my eyes and fell into a dark, dreamless sleep.
Ginny
I stared at the door long and hard. It was only a small wooden door, not even a half a meter higher than my head. It was simple and small and frightening. It was the door that led out of this small, location less shack.
I set down my small bag, which held very little (a single change of Hermione's Muggle clothing, a handful of sickles, and some Muggle money that I had nicked from a drawer in the kitchen), and sighed a weak, broken sigh.
Perhaps I could stay. Perhaps as time went on, things would change. Perhaps…
'No,' I decided with renewed vigor. For years I was treated as a small child who couldn't protect herself, even if she tried. Well, no more. I wasn't a child anymore, and I was determined to prove that. I was about to become a mother, for Merlin's sake! I looked down at my swollen stomach and tightened my cloak around myself.
"Don't worry, little baby. I'll protect you, no matter what," I whispered to my large stomach. I picked the case back up and opened the no longer frightening wooden door, promising myself that no matter what happened, I would do anything keep myself and my child happy and safe and I would care about their emotions and I would tell them everything no one had ever told me.
***
The door was charmed to protect the house from things on the outside, and not the inside, so it was more than easy to just open the door, step out, and leave. 'You would think Hermione would have noticed that,' I thought sarcastically, 'but I suppose there's no reason to think scared little Ginny might actually grow a spine and leave.'
As soon as I stepped outside I was assaulted with cold, cutting winds. There was snow all over the ground and covering the few trees surrounding the house.
So it was winter. No one had bothered to tell me, I suppose.
The old shack was just as shabby on the outside as in. The shingles on the roof were falling off, and the paint on the wooden walls were chipping. The shack was located on a relatively high hill.
Off in the distance I could see the faint glow of a small town, with abnormally bright lights. Christmas lights. It was nearing Christmas, maybe even only a few days before, and I wouldn't have even guessed.
The town wasn't so far off. A fifteen minute walk, maybe. A new warmth spread through me, making me more determined than ever. I could make it. Look for a pub or an inn, or even a kind home willing to lend a couch and a sip of hot cocoa.
I pulled my cloak even tighter around me and set off toward the small, glowing town.
Narcissa
I went to bed that night, after bidding my son fair sleep, quite content. Even though Draco himself obviously didn't see it, he'd changed so much from the day the Weasley girl had disappeared to now. That morning, while in a now very common thoughtful stupor, he had said "thank you" to Zippy, the house elf who gave him his toast and jam. The poor thing nearly died of a heart attack.
It had seemed as though Draco's re-location to my vineyard, coupled with my subtle hints towards his behavior had worked out very nicely. Encouraging him to stay away from his Death Eater friends wasn't a horrid idea, either, it seemed. Many a person had called me very fowl names over the years, coward and schemer never escaping them. It just so happened that the latter was true.
From the day Draco had brought the Weasley child to the Manor I had a bad feeling about it. Lucius had patted it off as perfectly acceptable, as her station was clearly below Draco's and, therefore, Draco had full right to exercise his authority over his lesser.
I shudder now to think of how my husband had altered from when we married to when he had joined the Dark Lord. He had drifted into a dark void, and then he had brought my Draco, when he was still my little boy, with him.
Normally when distressed I would turn to my sister, Bella, but then I knew she would have scolded me for denying the Dark Lord such a "precious installment to his ranks".
I never voiced a single word to her about my feelings of Draco joining the Death Eaters, and if I had I knew she would have only helped push Draco further from my arms. I had stood by and watched; watched as Draco received the Dark Mark, as he proved himself to the Dark Lord by torturing and killing a Muggle family, and as he sunk deeper and deeper into darkness.
My only regret was waiting so long to pull my Draco back from the void.
And pull him back I would.
Ginny
I walked through the final bit of dark woods that separated me from the outskirts of the small village. Normally I would have paused for a moment, to see the name of the village or even the general surroundings, but I was so cold that I just dug my face deeper into the collar of my thankfully heavy set cloak and continued on.
The walk to the small village had lasted twenty icy, grueling minutes, freezing my face, hands, and feet. Relived that my journey was nearly over, I sped up and began to jog towards the brightly lit town. I slowed when I neared a large sign. It read 'Welcome to Glasscane'.
Glasscane? What a funny name for a town, I thought, moving past the sign.
Immediately entering the village I saw small, comfortable houses, most of them dressed up in blinking lights and small plastic figures of Father Christmas. I paused, thinking of how I would approach one of these houses and their families and what I would say. But before I put in too much thought, I saw something move in one of the lit windows of a cheerfully decorated house from the corner of my eye.
Looking closer, I saw a middle aged-looking woman pulling her hair back hurriedly while in the middle of wrapping presents in colorful paper(so it was Christmas Eve!). It wasn't the woman's appearance or the gift wrapping that caught my attention. It was the fact that she had put up her hair and was wrapping those colorful presents with a wand. She was a witch, too.
Immediately I went straight for the front door and rapped my knuckles hard on the wood.
"I'll be there in just a tick," I heard the woman's voice call hesitantly from inside the house. And why shouldn't she be weary of opening the door? I thought, It was at least midnight. I heard the clicking of locks being undone, and the door swung open. "Hello," she said to me wearily, "May I help…?" Her light green eyes fell on my swollen middle and shot back up to my own chocolate ones, wide and pleading. Her face changed from hesitant to extreme worry immediately. "Oh, dear. Please, please come in."
Shaking and cold, I was ushered into the house. Warmth hit me like a ton of bricks. I was so relieved I nearly cried. "Thank you," I said to the woman as she motioned for me to sit on the living room couch, "so much. I'm so sorry to intrude, but I saw you doing magic through the window," at this she began to cut me off, clearly alarmed, thinking I was a Muggle, but I beat her to it, "I just graduated from Hogwarts a bit ago, not even a few years…and I just thought…"
"Oh, please, no need for explanations just yet, miss…" she trailed off.
"Ginny," I answered her.
"Ginny. Let's just focus on getting you warm, then we can discuss why you happened by my door at four a.m. on Christmas Eve, alone and in such a state I never saw," she chuckled, picked her wand up from the coffee table and waving it over me. Every cold cell in my body was instantly warmed. My hands were no longer white, my knees no longer shaking, and my face began to flush with comfort and joy.
***
"So you really haven't had anything to do with the Wizarding world for so long?" I asked, amazed.
"Nearly four years, now." she said, " Ever since things started to down hill at the ministry, and the Harry Potter said that You-Know-Who was back, I knew I had to get out before my family was pulled into it. My husband, Daniel, is a Muggle, and my daughter, Gracie, is much too young to be exposed to such Dark things that happened under You-Know-Who's power when I was younger. So we packed our things and moved around constantly for about a year. Then about two and a half years ago we found this place. It's so secluded, no one around for miles, and not a witch or wizard in sight," she laughed, "or so I thought."
"Where is here, exactly?" I asked sheepishly. I had felt stupid.
Her brow furrowed in confusion. "You mean you don't even know the country you're in, Ginny?" She was worried, I could tell. I couldn't even imagine what she thought had happened to me; that I would be wandering the Italian lands, frozen, very pregnant, and completely ignorant of my surroundings. "Why, this is Italy. Southern Italy, to be exact."
A/N: Whew! Sorry its so short. Lordy, its been a long...what? three months? Can you believe how much I have to do after school? Miss H, the Speech Coach, not only gave me a new Humor (10 minutes long) to memorize, but had me write and original humor (ALSO 10) and I need to have them memorized and preformable by this Saturday, the 23rd. -.- Anyways, wish me luck on Saturday, everyone! And don't forget: EVERY TEN MINUTES ANOTHER AUTHOR DIES FROM LACK OF REVIEWS AND OR CRITISISM. THAT'S A FACT. i JUST MADE IT UP, BUT ITS A F A C T.
HUGS AND KISSES AND CAPSLOCKS!
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