A/N: Sorry for the long wait. Now that I finally have a beta, I'm getting some feedback, and I'm trying to smooth out all the rough edges before posting.
So they're married now! And at this point we enter Part Two of the fic, where we start to see both the outside and inside.
The Safe House
~ Part Two ~
Chapter Thirteen
Molly Weasley had been closely watching the family clock for years. Since the war had begun, there were a few times when it had indicated that Arthur or some of her children were at 'home' or 'work', but the last couple of years all of the hands mostly pointed at 'mortal peril', all except two. Fred's hand had pointed at 'dead' for over three years, and for the last six months, Ginny's hand had pointed at 'lost'. That is, it had, until a few weeks ago. Molly had been rushing through the Burrow attending to her second oldest son, Charlie, who had been badly injured the month before in a surprise attack just outside of Gringotts, when she heard the distinctive click of a moving hand on the clock. It wasn't that the hands actually made that much noise when they moved, but as a mother, she had become unusually attuned to the object that was sometimes the only source of information about her family. She had stopped in her tracks and slowly made her way back to the living room where the clock was hung. It was with great fear that she approached the family heirloom, knowing that at this point in the war, it most likely was the bearer of terrible news. What she had not expected was for Ginny's hand to be wavering between 'lost' and 'home'.
At the first opportunity, Molly had asked her daughter-in-law, Hermione, if she could make any sense of the strange behaviour of the clock. She had observed that the hand had been edging more and more towards 'home', and she could not help but to hope that her only daughter was slowly finding her way back to the Burrow. Hermione was unsure of what this latest development could mean, but tentatively agreed that maybe Ginny was on her way home. When the hand came to a rest on the first of September, Molly simply cried and held onto Arthur as she stared at Ginny's hand firmly pointed to 'home' and as he stared expectantly out the front window.
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oooooOOOooOooOOOooooo
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The Pureblood Binding Ritual requires consummation of the union, and the two newlyweds had decided that since they did not have any wedding guests in attendance, they would continue that portion of the ritual within the sacred circle. Draco had lowered the canopy to the ground for them to use as a cover, and they had completed this last rite under the stars. Early the next morning, as the sun was peeking through the leaves of the trees, Ginny snuggled in more closely to her husband.
Draco smiled down at her and spoke softly. "We are married. You are now Mrs. Ginevra Malfoy. Can you believe it?"
"Yes, my darling," she said and then kissed his shoulder. "I am now the new Mrs. Malfoy. Though that definitely sounds ridiculous to me. I think Ron will have kittens when he finds out."
"Let's not talk about your brother whilst we are still lying naked in our wedding circle." He looked at her seriously and then continued, "Altho-ough I do look forward to telling him."
She smacked him lightly on the stomach. "He's your brother too, now! You will have to be nice."
"Ugh! I go back to my previous statement. Let's not talk about this right now…I love you, wife." He kissed her gently on the lips.
"I love you, husband." She nestled back into his arms, and they lay quietly as they enjoyed the sounds of the forest.
After another hour of blissful silence, Ginny shifted around and noticed the ring on her hand. "Oh, Draco, how did you get these rings? They match so perfectly!"
"We wizards have our secrets – ow! – you don't have to hit me, Ginevra. As I was about to say, they are actually from a napkin ring. Apparently the Muggles who lived here left behind one lonely napkin ring that was destined to become your wedding gift." He held their ringed hands up together, looking at the new picture they created.
"And the flowers were so beautiful. It's exactly how it would have been at the Burrow. And the fairies! Did you do that? How did you do that?" She had sat up and turned back looking at him.
"Well, it took a little persuasion, but I promised them that we would include them in our famous love story."
"Famous love story?" She quirked up an eyebrow at him.
"You know, war time lovers coming from feuding families on opposite sides. It's very romantic, don't you think?" As he spoke, he had pulled her slowly forward and finished his explanation with a kiss.
"I think that you, my darling, are very romantic. I never would have thought that underneath all that smirking and hair gel was such a sweet and tender man."
"I'm choosing to ignore the hair comment because I know you think you are funny. And I am only those things for you, Ginevra."
The couple enjoyed the rest of the day laying about and eating leftovers and cake, pretending to be on a real honeymoon. When they finally decided to clean up the wedding, it was beginning to get dark. Ginny told Draco to take a mental picture of everything since they did not have an actual camera, Muggle or magical. They stood together for a moment, remembering the beautiful ceremony they had created the day before.
It was with a sad heart that Ginny gathered up the flowers and candles. Draco noticed her melancholy, sat down the makeshift altar he was carrying, and walked over to her. He wrapped his arms around Ginny from behind and propped his chin on her head. "It's strange how powerful the ceremony was, and yet now, it will look like nothing has changed. Do you feel changed?"
"Yes, I feel … different. Strong. I feel like we are bound, and no one can ever tear us apart."
"Are you worried about that? Do you honestly think that someone will try to keep us apart after all this is over?"
"I think that it will never be as easy as it is right now." They both took in her statement, understanding the truth in it. After a few moments, she turned around to face him and leaned up to kiss him. "I love you so much."
"I love you." He kissed her again. "I promised you a long time ago that I would protect you, and I will not let anything come between us, Ginevra. Besides, I have paid for my crimes and you, my love, will be a war hero. There is no reason to worry."
They gathered the things together and took them back into the house. Ginevra took everything up to her old room and sat on the bed. She held up the vial from the ceremony and looked at it closely. It had been changed somehow with the magic of the binding. The glass had darkened and the vial felt heavy and more solid. She smiled at the memory of their first kiss as husband and wife. She hung her wedding dress in the armoire of the small bedroom and placed all of the sacramental objects including the sealed vial in there as well. These would be the only keepsakes that she would have from her wedding.
ooo
The days began to grow shorter and the nights were getting much cooler. The garden was picked for the last time, plants were transferred into the greenhouse, and Draco performed the task of killing some of the chickens. Ginny adamantly refused to even be downstairs during this terrible part of preparing for the winter. Her glistening eyes and trembling lips muttering about the Chamber of Secrets had sent Draco immediately across the room to embrace his wife and then outside to quickly take care of the bloody task. Instead, Ginny decided to begin thoroughly cleaning the house before it was too cold. She washed all of the linens, cleaned all of the furniture, and scrubbed all of the floors. They had been working very hard on tinning fruit and preparing the house, and when Halloween arrived, they were ready for a much-needed break
Draco slid into the hall, facing Ginny on the sofa of the sitting room with two bottles of alcohol in his hands and a wicked grin on his face. "I think that we should celebrate tonight. It's Halloween after all and," he paused and dipped his head, his smirk widening, "our two-month anniversary is tomorrow." He chuckled quietly and watched her mouth turn up slightly. "I think we've been working really hard and deserve to have a bit of fun."
Ginny looked up from her drawing, her latest habit and attempt at keeping herself busy, and reflected a very wicked smile of her own. "Are you trying to get me drunk, Mr. Malfoy?"
"I prefer Professor, Miss Weasley. At least, that's what you wanted to call me the last time that we drank." Smirk of Triumph.
Her eyes grew bigger as she blushed. "I can't believe you remember that!"
"Of course, I remember. I had just been caught having a very, very naughty dream about you that afternoon. And the Firewhisky was convincing me that I should demonstrate exactly what I had been dreaming."
"I wish you had, would have saved me the awful humiliation of having my own dirty dreams interrupted." She hopped up from the sofa and grabbed the Firewhisky from his hand.
"I also brought a bottle of this Muggle drink called vodka. Why not? We're married now, we can act out anything we want." He lunged for her and pinched her bum, causing her to squeal.
"Why don't we make it a little more interesting and play a little game?" She raised her eyebrows and smiled seductively. "I say we play some strip chess. And we must drink whilst the other is playing."
"You scare me a little sometimes, Ginevra. I'm just going to pretend that you are an evil genius that comes up with naughty little games at the top of her head, and not that you have ever done this before."
He lifted his vodka bottle to her Firewhisky bottle, and with a clink, they sat at the table with the chessboard. They had only been playing for a few turns, trading bottles at every other turn, when Ginny noticed Draco's hand moving strangely under the table.
She creased her brow and said, "Darling, if you can't wait, we can skip the game." He looked up at her confused. "That's what I thought. Give me the wand. You cannot cheat, Draco. There's no fun in that. Come on, give it." She held out her hand and waited patiently for him to hand her the wand.
He growled at her and then gave over the wand. "I wasn't really cheating. I was only going to move your rook a little."
"Nice try, but I will just put the wand over here on the piano where neither one of us will be tempted to use it."
It didn't take long for the game to become very heated, and the two players to become very drunk. Ginny was sitting in only her knickers, and Draco had somehow maintained half of his clothes. Ginny crossed her arms over her naked chest and frowned.
"S'not fair. You still have clothes on." She giggled suddenly and for no apparent reason.
"You can bet other things, like dirty things." He paused and made an amused face. "I didn't mean to say that out loud." They both laughed for a minute and then traded bottles again.
"I like this vodky stuff." Ginny grinned really big after she took another drink from the Firewhisky bottle.
Draco looked at her and then at the bottle in his hand and then back at her, confused for a moment, and then he smiled, too. "Thanks."
"Whad'ya wamme to bet?" She moved her arms down and revealed her chest to him in a seductive manner.
His eyes immediately darkened, and he gave her a smouldering look. "Touch yourself." Draco peered over the table to watch her and nearly knocked the chess game over.
"Like this?" Ginny caressed her breasts and licked her lips.
He just stared at her for a minute watching her chest, and then he amended, "No, like lower." At this point, he took the last drink of vodka from the bottle and leaned onto the table.
"Oh, like this." Once Ginny had placed her hand inside of her knickers, the game was completely forgotten. She rocked back in her chair and moaned, and then Draco threw the table over and pounced on her.
ooo
Ginny could only think about two things, her massive headache and the very high probability that she was going to get sick. Where the bloody hell am I? She slowly opened her eyes and saw dark wood above her and the floor beneath her. She could feel and hear Draco passed out behind her, snoring loudly. She put her hand to her head and gingerly sat up. Shite! I can't sit up. Are we under the table? She rolled to her side and slowly crawled out from under the dining table. Before she stood up, she grabbed Draco's shirt off of the floor and began to put it on. She paused as she felt something sticky on her arms and back. What were we doing last night? That better be Firewhisky. Once standing, she felt a wave of nausea and dropped back down to the floor, crawling through the sitting room and the hall to get to the toilet. After emptying her stomach of much of its contents, she laid back onto the cold floor.
"OWW!"
Ginny opened one eye and looked towards the sound. "Draco, don't sit up!" she called into the dining room from her position on the floor.
"Thanks, I kind of figured that out," he retorted. He sounded pretty pissed off so she chose not to reply.
After hitting his head on the table, Draco immediately laid back down and rolled his eyes at his missing wife. He felt a bump already forming on his scalp and grimaced. Then he felt around for his wand. "I need you to heal me!" he yelled to her.
Draco waited for a response for a few minutes and then decided to get up. Where is she? As he walked through the sitting room, he stepped on several chess pieces and yelped again. He stumbled to his left and caught himself on the piano. After spotting his wand, he made his way towards the loo where he assumed his wife was passed out.
He leaned over her, gently shaking her, and made a face as he felt the mystery substance all over her arms. "You need to move, love. I think I might get sick, and you're in my way." Ginny moaned in frustration and then pushed herself up and scooted to lean against the back wall.
"What happened to your head?" She reached out to touch the gash and bruise on his head when he sat on the floor across from her. "Oh, yeah. The table. Let me get a little more awake, and then I'll heal that for you."
"What is on you, Ginevra?" He continued to look repulsed at her and then at his sticky hand.
"I thought maybe you could tell me. I think it's in my hair, too." She looked equally disgusted and then groaned again.
"It looks like it could be food. Do you remember eating something?"
"It better be food!" She looked back down at her arms. "Ugh! Gross! Draco, we are never doing that again." He simply shrugged his shoulders.
After Ginny healed her cranky husband, the two slowly made their way to the potions pantry. They noticed an opened and half-empty jar of marmalade sitting on the counter and shared an amused look. Upon discovering that there was no Hangover Potion in the bottle, they both swore to never drink again. The rest of the day was spent silently in bed, neither wanting to move or talk or do anything at all.
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A/N: Please review! Please. :)
And thanks again to SometimeSelkie for being so awesome as a beta!
As you can tell, the fluffiness has not ended. And it will definitely continue for a while. But the outside world will be quite different. I know sometimes a fic can get overloaded with extra stuff outside of our favourite couple, but I will try to keep it interesting and important to D/G and to what is coming in Part Three.