A/N: Final Author's Note for this story. Thank you for all of your reviews, as they really helped to motivate me to finish this story (and in a timely manner). xTearsx This is bittersweet, saying goodbye to this story. But all good things must come to an end, and no, there will not be a sequal to this story, sorry. I hope you all enjoyed reading my story just as much as I enjoyed writing it, and I hope you stick around for my next project, which I'll be starting immediately. It's going to be even better and darker than this one, and I think you all will enjoy it just as much. Until then, Ciao!
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Draco slowly opened the door, peeking his head into the Grand Ballroom. From the kitchen entrance he had a perfect view of the crowd, Tom Riddle's throne, and the huge wooden doors that were currently open to allow guests in an out as they pleased. After noticing the throne was empty, Draco quickly scanned through the crowds, even though he knew Ginny wasn't in here. Tom must have taken her somewhere else.
Draco pulled out the pocket mirror from his cloak. "Luna. You there?" The familiar girl's face appeared in the mirror. "Are you in his rooms yet?"
"We're here, Draco. They're empty. Nobody's been here."
Draco's heart dropped. This wasn't good. "She's not here, either. Have you heard from the others?"
Luna nodded, an anxious look on her usually worry-free face. "They got to the dungeons fine but they had to knock out a guard. There were a few prisoners down there, Muggles mostly, but the girls weren't there."
"Damn!" Draco cursed. Where were they? He had planned everything perfectly. He knew Tom would keep Ginny in one of these three places, yet she wasn't here. Where else could he have taken her? He couldn't think of any other bedrooms as nice as his where he would take her to…Draco didn't even want to think about that.
And then, as if on queue, silence descended on the room. The music stopped playing, the people quit dancing, and everyone turned to stare at the main entrance. Draco craned his neck to see. Others seemed to be doing the same.
Ginny. There she stood in front of the huge oak doors, unmoving. Draco stared along with everyone else at her appearance. She was wearing a wedding dress that looked like it had seen better days. It was splattered and smeared with blood, Draco wasn't sure if it was hers or someone else's, and torn as if she had been in a struggle. Her hair was a red mess, falling into her face, which held an expression of extreme confusion and shock. In her right hand was the dagger the old lady had given them, it too covered in blood. The dagger tumbled from her loose hand, clattering loudly in the deathly quiet room. Ginny lifted her eyes, staring at the crowd before her. She whispered "Your Dark Lord…is dead…" and collapsed to her knees.
Draco found himself running though he didn't tell his legs to move. The sounds that passed his ears were a jumbled mixture of gasps of shock, declarations of outrage, and threats of death. He cursed anyone that got in his path as he forced his way through the crowd, throwing a shield around Ginny. She didn't seem to notice that there was a mob of angry Death Eaters surrounding her trying to kill her.
Draco held up his mirror as he ran. "I think now would be a good time to attack!" With that he dropped the it, not caring where it landed or what happened to it, and dashed the last few meters to Ginny. Just as he was reaching her he heard cracks of Apparations. The Order began attacking the Death Eaters and chaos ensued as a bloody battle began between the enemy groups. Draco scooped Ginny up into his arms, checking her over quickly to make sure she wasn't hurt. "Let's get you out of here."
She seemed to snap out of her daze, at least briefly. "No! Sorcha! Sorcha is around here somewhere!" She struggled to free herself from his grasp, her eyes wild. Draco cursed himself for forgetting about the little girl and her mother.
"Are they together?" Ginny looked confused. "Fianait and Sorcha? Are they together?"
She just shook her head sadly. "Draco…Fianait is dead."
He didn't have time at that moment to mourn or feel angry. The shield he had put around Ginny was weakening. Draco strengthened it and then began to scan the crowds for the little girl. It was so chaotic he didn't think he would find her.
Until he saw a flash of yellow, that is, as a little girl in a fancy dress ducked under a table to hide. Draco ran with Ginny in his arms, crossing to the far side of the room. He slid under the table feet first, nearly running into the small child who crouched quivering against the wall. As soon as she saw him, the Elven girl threw her arms around Draco. "It's okay, you're safe. Now, let's get the hell out of here."
He held both girls in his arms and Apparated away just as the table was blown to smithereens by a wayward spell.
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Five Years Later
The Order was victorious, in that battle at least. They took Malfoy Manor and seized any Death Eaters that did not flee. Draco's mother, unfortunately, was one of the few who escaped, leaving Draco, sole Malfoy heir, the entire Manor. He gladly turned it over to the Order of the Phoenix, which converted it into the newly established Order headquarters and used the dungeons to lock up captives. Draco wanted nothing more to do with the place and its horrible memories.
While the Order was cleaning Malfoy Manor out and searching it for valuables and traps, they uncovered a massive grave of bodies. Fianait, Blaise, and Alex were all found buried there among other nameless victims. Draco and Ginny took the bodies for burial beside the official graves for Ginny's family, which she had redone professionally after Draco received his inheritance. However, it seemed Ginny too no longer wanted to live in her old home. She gave Ron and Hermione and their two children the Burrow and all of its property, including the small cemetery that now held nine graves. In that first year after the battle Ron rebuilt the entire place, making it smaller and a bit tidier than it had been before.
Ginny, Draco, and Sorcha, whom they officially adopted after the two were married, bought their own property on the coast by the ocean. It was a little house made of stone set on a rocky cliff that overlooked the pounding ocean. They bought all of the surrounding land, including a small, private beach, ensuring they would not be bothered by the Muggles that lived in the nearby town. Ginny and Draco, after a quiet year of recovery, bought a library in town and began to run it as part of a mutual decision to live a quieter, less hectic life.
Their lives finally began to return to normal. Sorcha, over time, overcame her grief over the loss of her mother and grew up to be a healthy little girl. Ginny, who took much longer to cope, finally began to live her life again. Sometimes, rarely, Draco would notice a haunted look in her eyes. She would wake up from a nightmare or become jumpy and nervous around Draco or he would catch her talking to herself. He knew, in the back of her mind, her demons still haunted her; they would for the rest of her life. But she got better. They all did. And they were happy. And being happy, being free, it was a wonderful feeling.
Draco pulled up to their small dock in his newest gift for Ginny. Today was her birthday and he had bought her a sailboat, something she had always wanted. It was a beautiful boat, small, just big enough for their family, and pristine. The white sails flapped in the wind and the handles of the wheel were polished to perfection. Custom painted, in swirly, shiny black letters, was Little Fire on the side. It was Ginny's name in Elven, and he knew she would appreciate the gesture.
Sorcha ran down the dock to meet him. "Daddy, Daddy! Wow! What is it?!"
"It's a sailboat. Muggles use it for recreation. I bought it for you and your mother. Where is she?"
The seven year old smiled, her bright face lighting up. She had grown up to be a beautiful child with brown hair so dark it looked black and brilliant blue eyes that shone like the ocean in the moonlight. When she smiled, the whole world seemed to brighten. It was no wonder her name translated into Radiant in English.
"She's up on the porch napping. She said she was sleepy."
Draco ruffled the little girl's hair. "Well, why don't you go get her down here. Then we can play pirates on our new ship." He held up a pirate hat and fake sword he had bought for her at the Muggle toy store. The little girl turned and ran up the beach as fast as her small legs would take her.
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Ginny stood in the darkness of a huge cave, a place she had seen many times before in her nightmares. Around her Death Eaters were gathered, masks covering their faces, as they kneeled before a throne. In the throne sat an apparition, so faint it would have been invisible but for the purple-black aura of evil and power that surrounded it. The chaotic creature stared right through her as did the Death Eaters—in these dreams, she was merely a spectator.
"My Lord…" A woman bowed before the stone throne, holding out a box of some sort. "We have it. One of the items you were looking for."
"What is it?" The voice was familiar, yet foreign. It sounded as if it came from far, far away. From another world, or another dimension, perhaps. From the world of the dead, she knew now.
"Her blood, Sire. Ginevra Weasley's blood."
He seemed to flicker before coming into focus sharper. His eyes focused on the box. "How?"
"Well, we still haven't found her, My Lord, but her blood, we found it on one of the torture devices we used in Azkaban. It is one of the last of the reagents you were looking for."
"Place is beside…others." The image flickered in and out of sight and the voice faded. "…else do we need?"
"We have your body, Sire, preserved as it was the moment you died. Healed, of course. Then we have the dagger used to kill you, the rings you wore when you were wed, and now her blood. All we need now, My Lord, is the girl herself and a willing sacrifice. And you know any of us are would be honored, My Lord Voldemort."
The apparition smiled. "Good…find her. Find my Ginevra."
The woman did not say anything for a while, but from the way her body was hunched over, she looked apprehensive. "My Lord Voldemort…that is the hard part. We can not seem to find her at all. None of our tracking spells worked. The Order is too strong for us to attack any of the people close to her in order to gain knowledge. We can't even step foot in England, Sire. We don't know where she is or even if she is still alive."
Tom didn't say anything for a long time. "Of course she is still alive. I would not be here, even in spirit form, if she were dead. It is only our link that keeps me eternally stuck between life and death."
"Yes, well, we don't know where she is, but we are trying-"
"Try harder!" He suddenly became more visible, more solid, in his anger. His eyes glowed completely red now; they always did in these strange dreams. "Find her and bring her to me. I can wait forever, I can return her to her youth when she is again in my grasp, but if she dies, then I too go with her."
"Ye-yes My Lord Voldemort! Yes!" The woman groveled at his feet some more before scrambling away from him.
Tom stared into oblivion, as if he were looking not into this world but another. "Ginevra, Ginevra," he murmured. "I will find you again. I will be restored to life. And when I am, we will be together forever."
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"Mommy? Mommy, wake up." Ginny groggily opened her eyes, trying to focus. A child's face came into her vision. "Mommy, are you okay?"
The woman sat up slowly, groaning in pain, and rubbed her head. When the world finally stopped spinning she chanced to look up at her daughter. "What's the matter, sweetheart?"
Sorcha worried her bottom lip. "You were having a nightmare again, Mommy."
"Was I?" The nightmares were rare, usually she went months without seeing them, but she still hated for her daughter to see her returned to her old state.
The little girl nodded. "You were sweating and moaning like you were in pain. And your brow got all creased like this." Sorcha demonstrated with her own face.
Ginny laughed, pulling the little girl into her lap. "Well, I'm all better now, thanks to you. Now, what were you going to tell me?"
The child jumped up, grabbing Ginny's hand. "C'mon! Daddy got you a present for your birthday." Then the Elven girl began to practically drag her down the beach to the dock.
Ginny gasped, staring in awe at the gorgeous sailboat that sat tied to her dock, and even more so at the incredible, handsome man who rested against the mast without a shirt on, his lean, tan muscles glinting in the sun, his blonde hair almost as bright as the sun's reflection off of the water. He leaned over the edge, pulling Ginny onto the boat as Sorcha climbed up the ladder.
"Draco, it's beautiful."
"I thought you would like it." He grinned that sexy smile that still made her knees shake, his stormy eyes smoldering. "Happy birthday, Ginevra Molly Eithne Weasley Malfoy." She snorted at the use of her full name. His voice lowered to a whisper. "I have another gift for you tonight."
Ginny grinned, kissing her man full on the lips. He spun her around, wrapping his arms around her waist and kissing the top of her head. As the boat began to glide along the water, they stared out at the ocean, the sun setting over the horizon. "So, do you like it?"
She smiled up at him. "It's no happily ever after…but it'll do."
End
