Disclaimer: The usual drill. I don't own any of it. The characters I just like to borrow and bend to my will on occasion. The setting is part of the marvellous world someone else created. And even some of the plot points never belonged to me, but are borrowed, and worked around.

Ice

I wanted to run to her and comfort her, but I stopped myself. She'd had a week to think about the kiss, and what it meant. Maybe she had decided to ignore it. Ignore me. Maybe when I saw her next, it would be in class, and she'd be paired with someone else. I'd managed to pass my OWLs, and so had she – because of the deal we had made with Dumbledore, we had both been sent both sets of results. She'd received O's in almost all of her classes, sprinkled with a couple of E's. I was astonished. She'd even managed to bump my grades up. I got a lot of E's, with an O in potions, since she'd taught me to stop reading ahead. That had been my main problem, I realised now.

Instead of going to her, I sat and watched her. She didn't seem to interact much with her friends, though I was relieved to see she did eat a reasonable meal. Maybe it was just the clothes she was wearing that had made me think she had lost more weight. She barely glanced up, though it seemed I felt eyes on me every time I looked away. But the moment I looked back she was staring at her food. I didn't know if it was her who had been looking at me, or someone else I hadn't caught, but apart from the food on my plate, she was the only thing that had my attention in the room.

Dumbledore welcomed everyone back – apparently he hadn't had his mead yet. But I was prepared to wait. Perhaps he was saving it for a special occasion. And what occasion could be more special than welcoming students back to school? I had been waiting, over the holidays, and particularly on Christmas day, to hear word of his death, but there had been nothing. But all that meant was that he hadn't felt like having some mead yet.

I tried to catch up with her in the rush of people heading back to common rooms and dormitories, but she seemed to slip out quickly. By the time I thought I'd caught up with her red hair, I saw that it was actually her brother. Rushing quickly away before he saw me, I made my way back to the Slytherin common room, and my own dormitory.

I would talk to her tomorrow, I decided. With that in mind, I decided to write a note to her, that I could slip to her in potions, which we had first period. I would ask her to meet me in the empty classroom after class was over for the day. At least then I'd know for sure. If she came, that would mean she wanted to have something with me as much as I did with her. If she didn't, then obviously that meant that she wanted nothing to do with me.

Of course, I wasn't planning to accept that lying down. If she didn't show up after class, I planned to camp out in the prefects bathroom. She was bound to show up there sooner or later.

Sitting at my desk, I paused with my quill over the scrap of parchment. What should I say? Saying that I loved her seemed to come out too strong, but it was also what my quill wanted desperately to write. No, I wouldn't. She might run away if I said that, and I couldn't risk that.

G -

I think there is something between us. If you do too, please meet me at our place

- D

I decided to stick to our initials, and just a short note, in case someone else picked it up. If one of the trio found it, they would probably assume it was from Dean. Chances were, after the cheating scandal, they would throw it out. But if they did that, I could write her another note.

Hoping for the best, but preparing for the worst, I woke up the next morning and got dressed. I had decided to skip the prefects bathroom last night. I wanted to give her the note first, and try and talk to her reasonably in the empty classroom, before I confronted her in the bathroom. Somehow the idea of talking to her when she was naked in that milky water she favoured distracted me, and I knew that if I were to do that, we wouldn't be talking. Since I didn't know how she stood, with us, yet, I was determined to find that out first, before I put her in that kind of situation. I don't think I'd be able to control myself this time. I wouldn't do anything horrible, the kind of things that my father might have done. The kind of things that Voldemort has probably tried to do in her dreams.

That thought stopped me still. Her dreams. She must be having them again. She looked so tired, and when she'd left, she'd looked so happy. How could things have changed so much for her in a week? Of course. The glasses. No matter what happened, I decided, and no matter whether she felt the way I did, or not, I would get her to wear those glasses again.

I was telling Blaise this, under my breath, at the breakfast table, when she came down. She looked even more tired. Did she get any sleep last night. When she walked her robe flicked up a bit, and I thought I saw more stings on her ankles.

"No." Blaise drew me out of my thoughts suddenly and I turned to look at him.

"No?" I questioned. What was wrong with that? If I told her what the glasses did, she would wear them, to stop her dreams. It was simple.

"Dream magic is more complex than that." Blaise sighed, and pulled out the worn copy of the Quibbler that he'd shown me before. "You didn't even fully read this thing, did you?" I shook my head, and he rolled his eyes. "Well, you obviously remember the punch line, that she needs to wear the glasses during the day, or he'll be able to get into her head at night." We were whispering, sitting at the end of the table. Most people were away from us. They'd grown to accept that what we wanted to say, we didn't want them to hear. Crabbe and Goyle were the closest to us, and even they were out of earshot.

"And if she knows that, she'll wear them." I pointed out. Blaise just opened the article, going past something about the uses of ground up horn of the crumple horned snorkack, to Luna's article. I knew why he still carried this issue around with him. It was the most recent one. The new one was due out his week, and I'm sure he was going to special order it, and read it as soon as it came out, before carrying that one around in the pocket of his robe.

"Not straight away." Blaise said, finally. "If she starts wearing them again, and knows what they do – Voldemort will know what it does too, and he'll be able to break the spell on the glasses. Now, if she were to just wear them, thinking that she just needed glasses again, then she would still have a couple of dreams, before everything blacks out again." He sighed again. "Besides, Voldemort's not stupid. Even if she does start wearing the glasses again, and just thinks they're for her vision – he'll put two and two together. He'll be able to break the spell on the glasses."

"Fuck." I swore, and looked at where he'd pointed out that part. "Wait, so what would have happened if she knew what the glasses were for when she was still wearing them? She could have been able to just keep them on."

"Except if she didn't. If she took them off, for even one day, like she did at the Christmas party, after she'd known about the spell, it would have opened the door for him." I groaned at the complicatedness of it.

"So what happens if she read this copy of the Quibbler?" I demanded. It didn't add up.

"You really should read the whole thing." Blaise said, and pointed to the final paragraph.

For my friend, I know that this is a serious matter. She is a good friend, and reads my articles. She says she reads the whole magazine, but I don't mind. I know she tries. I don't want more than that. I made a custom copy for her, with the article concerning a private matter that only she knows about. Ron, Harry, Hermione, if you read this, you must on no account warn Ginny of the charm on her glasses.

"Really? That seems a bit extreme." I was sceptical enough of this whole thing, this final paragraph seemed to much. "She actually published that bit? Couldn't she have just informed Ginny's friends?" I wanted to tear the article up, but I knew what it meant to Blaise, so I just pushed the magazine away from me. "So, if I the glasses are now useless, what can I do?" I asked, my eyes pleading. Maybe there was something in the article that I hadn't bothered to read, (for good reason, the whole thing read like an instruction manual to crazy).

"I don't know, Draco. If I did, I'd tell you. Maybe you should do some research on dream magic?" I sighed. Not very helpful. It was time for us to go to classes then, and we stood up. As we headed to Potions, I got an idea. Blaise cursed under his breath when he saw my face.

"What?" He demanded, stopping in the middle of the corridor, letting other people walk past us. "What's with the look?"

"Loo-na," I caught myself just in time, "seems to know a fair bit about dream magic." I started. He just waited. "And she does seem to like the idea of people reading her magazine..." I hoped he'd get my drift soon.

"You think I should question her, for you?" He raised a perfectly arched brow.

"Well, I'm happy to ask her myself. But I thought if you questioned her, you might win her heart over, something I know you're eager to do." He cursed under his breath again, and glared at me.

"You know, sometimes you're too smart for your own good." He muttered, before walking off. I smiled. It would be perfect. Even if Luna didn't know anything more of dream magic, Blaise would be able to make her fall in love with him, of that I had no doubt.

I sat down in my usual seat, surprised to have beaten Ginny, and the trio. When they arrived, I expected Ginny to pair up with her brother, or with Harry or Hermione. Instead, she came and sat down next to me. When I was about to pass her the note I'd written, she passed me one of her own, which startled me.I wanted to read it straight away, but at that point Slughorn came in. Trust him to ruin my happy moment.

We worked on another potion together, talking only as much as we had in previous lessons. I was getting better at not reading ahead, and she didn't need to stop me from adding anything too early this time. It meant that I didn't get slapped, which was a huge relief. Though, when I thought of it, she hadn't slapped me for a long time.

When Potions was finished, we went to History of Magic, which seemed like the perfect place to read her note. Ginny was the only one in our class who seemed to try to take any notes. I had noticed last term that she had eventually given up, and gone to sleep, just reading the books, like I, and everyone else in the class, did. But today she was trying to take notes again. Which definitely meant that he was back in her dreams. She didn't want to go to sleep.

Draco -

We need to talk. After school, the empty classroom. For now, don't let on that we don't need to be partners any more.

Please

-Ginny

It was simple, and the note made me smile. That had to mean she was at least willing to think about being mine. At this point I didn't even care if she did want to be boyfriend and girlfriend. As long as I could hold her in my arms.

The day seemed to go excruciatingly slow from that point on. We barely spoke in our classes together, only what we needed to get the work done, which is how we had been in classes the last semester. It made me miss our bathroom conversations. They were always interesting. When she wasn't nearly dying, that is.

Eventually, the school day was over, and we made our way to the empty classroom. On the door was another note, which confused both of us. I let her read it first. With a weary looking smile she gave it to me to read.

I have booked this room for the two of you for the rest of the year, in the hopes that you will continue to work together on your school work, as together you make a formidable pair.

- Dumbledore

How did that man know? It wrenched at my heart briefly as I thought of the poison waiting for him to drink it. Had he had it already? Would we know straight away, or would we find out hours, days later?

"Okay, so we need to talk." I said, leaning against the desk I had been using when we had worked together in this room. To my surprise, Ginny dropped her bag, moved towards me, and kissed me again. I think I could get used to this.

A/N: So, this is the fifth chapter I have written since I've taken this up again. And I've got quite a few more already written, just waiting to be posted. (I'm sure I've mentioned this before) but I really am trying to post them all slower, so you don't get a gigantic fix of ten or so chapters, followed by a year or more of nothing.