The Wizards Duel 9
Author: Lee Velviet
Disclaimer: I don't own anything! (Except that heavenly thing I call my computer! ^-^)
9. Hell Freezes Over…
Draco was very reluctant to meet Ginny's parents-he'd insulted them so many times he couldn't help but feel a bit uncomfortable about them inviting him to their humble home to stay over the holiday break while he and the others searched for Ginny.
He needn't have worried, however – Molly Weasley had greeted him with the same crushing hug that she'd given the others.
Arthur Weasley had been a bit more conservative, shaking his hand briefly while giving him a skeptical look that reminded Draco strongly of his son, Ron.
Draco examined the 'burrow' as Weasley had referred to it, realizing that though the Weasley's home was shabby, it wasn't anywhere near as awful as he'd thought it would be. Molly Weasley kept her home painfully neat and clean, and the furniture and décor had been tastefully chosen, even if it was now a bit on the shabby side.
His Mother would have laughed at it.
"You can kip in Percy's room," Weasley told him grumpily as he toted Granger's bags past his shoulder. "It's empty now he's moved into London."
Draco vaguely remembered Percy Weasley – a tall, serious, red – headed boy, a Prefect, if his memory was correct.
He walked after Potter as they climbed the narrow set of stairs, a part of him blanching at the fact that he was actually carrying his own luggage.
Granger was settled into Ginny's room, which Draco noticed with surprise, hadn't been painted pink and decorated fluffily like he'd imagined. The brief glance he got of it showed plain white walls and soft green drapes, a white-canopied bed, and a matching green comforter. What set his temper to simmering, though, was the fact that she had plastered every picture of Potter she'd ever found in the Daily Prophet on her walls – he didn't seem to notice she had ton's of other pictures of her brother and Granger up, too.
Draco settled into Percy's room, which was, thankfully, quite plain – his own suite of rooms at the family home had been so over - decorated in silver and green, so ridiculously ostentatious, he'd hated coming home to it during the vacations.
He was hanging up his robes in the small closet when a knock sounded on the door.
"Come in,"
Arthur Weasley opened the door and stepped inside. "A word, Malfoy?"
Draco felt his lips twist – so this was how it was to be, then. "Of course, Mr. Weasley."
The older man narrowed his eyes suspiciously behind his glasses at the show of respect, and Draco sighed impatiently. "I'm a guest in your home, sir – and I might remind you, I am not my father. You can call me Draco."
He watched the man blink and clear his throat. "Er, yes, well…I guess you may call me Arthur."
Draco inclined his head slightly. "What did you want to talk to me about?"
"I want to know if you have any idea where my daughter is."
"None." Draco stared back at the man steadily. "I may be a 'stinking Slytherin', but I'm not evil. I have the mark of a death eater, but that doesn't make me one. You can believe me when I say I want to find Ginny as much you do, and I had nothing to do with her disappearance."
Arthur nodded. "All right."
He watched Ginny's father walk about the small room, picking up objects here and there. "Was there something else?"
"Ron tells me you and Ginny had a bit of a rivalry going on back at the school."
Draco snorted. " Rivalry is a bit of a nice word. War would be more apropos."
"He also told me she spent the night with you in the infirmary."
His throat tightened, but Draco looked him straight in the eye. "Yes, she did."
"Alone."
"I guess you could say that…"
Arthur pulled off his glasses and rubbed them on his shirt. "You do know she's only fifteen years old."
"Almost sixteen," Draco felt moved to point out.
"What I want to know is, what exactly are your intentions where my daughter is concerned? Quite frankly, I find the whole situation ridiculous. Our families have been on the odds with each other for generations – I wonder at the sudden relationship you two have seemed to developed. Why would you, a Malfoy, care about what happens to Ginny?"
"I'm in love with her." Even Draco blinked when that came out. He'd said it, well and truly come out and said he was in love with that infuriating little brat Ginny Weasley. Hell must have frozen over…
Draco almost would have grinned if the man hadn't seemed so serious – Arthur Weasley dropped his glasses and stared at him.
"I can see where you might be skeptical about all this – but Ginny and I have been through a lot together this year. I care about her, and judging by her actions when we were taken by my- by the death eaters, I believe she cares about me. And I haven't taken advantage of her, if that's what you're wondering." Yet, added Draco silently with an inward smirk.
"I – I see." Arthur retrieved his glasses and slipped them back on. He ran a hand through the thinning hair on his head, and sighed. "Well, then, if that's how it is…it's time we've dropped this whole family rivalry nonsense."
He held out his hand and smiled at Draco for the first time since he'd arrived at the burrow. "Welcome to the family, Draco."
~***~
"Draco, dear, eat up – you've barely touched a thing. You'll make yourself sick, picking at your food like that. You're wan looking already – you could do with some fattening up," Molly Weasley clucked as she dropped another stack of pancakes onto his plate.
Draco's eyes widened at the huge amount of food, and he winced as she dropped three more sausages onto his plate as well.
"Mum, he always eats like a bloody bird – he can't eat all that." Weasley, who'd stuffed his mouth so full his cheeks were bulging, complained from across the table.
Draco, already full near to bursting with best tasting breakfast he'd ever eaten in his life, narrowed his eyes determinedly and picked up his fork again. "May I have another helping of eggs, Molly?" he asked charmingly.
The red –haired boy glared at his use of his mother's name, while Molly beamed and bustled about her kitchen.
Potter actually grinned at him.
Draco smiled smugly, but then groaned inwardly again when he saw the plate.
~***~
"This is bloody pointless! We can't find her this way!" Draco finally erupted in frustration at the end of their second day checking out the list of possible places Potter's 'contact' had given him.
He was near choking on floo powder, and fireplace ash. His robes – and his hair, he suspected, if Weasley and Granger were anything to go by – were dusted liberally with soot, and he was fairly sure he'd ground his teeth into bits listening to Weasley's barbs all day.
"We can't exactly apparate, yet, and we'd look more than a bit conspicuous zooming about the countryside on our brooms," Potter muttered impatiently, pulling a cobweb out of his hair with distaste.
Molly came along, gasped at the sight of them standing in her living room, and bustled them out the door to shake off their robes.
Draco rolled his eyes, aggravated, as the meddlesome woman clucked her tongue and ruffled her hands through his hair to shake out the soot. He grudgingly stripped off his robe and pressed it into her waiting hands. Pushy woman. He wondered briefly if that was how Ginny would behave about their house when they were married.
The realization that he'd just contemplated marrying Ginny Weasley struck him hard. A biting wind chilled his skin through the gray cable knit turtleneck sweater and black trousers he wore, and he stared blindly at Molly Weasley's smiling face, still in mild shock. He could see the shadows in her eyes, the unhappiness and worry she hid from everyone else – she feared for her daughter, and it was wearing on her. But she kept up appearances for everyone else's sake…it was obvious where Ginny had gotten her strength – and her stubbornness. A shiver ran through him and he stiffened his back against it.
Draco couldn't tell if the shiver was from the cold or the thought of actually marrying into Ginny's family. He looked over at Ron Weasley and his freckled, soot smudged face, and smirked. The prat would have had an apoplexy if he'd known what he was contemplating just then.
"C'mon, Draco, dear, in you go – I've got cocoa waiting inside,"
He let himself be tugged inside the cozy little burrow and seated himself at the kitchen table. It might not be so bad, really, marrying Ginny. He'd have her completely, and utterly to himself – he almost grinned gleefully at the thought – and that alone would be worth being related to Ron Weasley.
Draco wrapped his hands around the warm mug of chocolate he was handed, and he stared into it tiredly. Ginny…he'd found he couldn't bring himself to think about her too much – the thought of what could be happening to her, of what she might be going through – it made him both furious and ill at the same time.
Draco looked at the clock above the table and examined the hands. Arthur was still hard at work at the ministry – the man had been there for almost sixteen hours…and Ginny…hers was still pointed at 'mortal peril'. No surprise there. At least she was still alive. He swallowed and was about to look away when he caught sight of something that made his throat tighten.
His name had been added to a hand on the clock, and the hand was currently resting at 'home'.
Draco shook his head and excused himself abruptly - he had a much needed appointment with a bottle in his room.
~***~
Draco sat upright in the bed, cold sweat pouring down his face, his breath coming in short gasps.
As soon as he was awake enough to notice, he gripped his forearm with his hand and gritted his teeth against the blinding, burning pain that swept through it.
An icy chill shot through his veins as he was hit with a jolt of realization, and he took a deep, calming breath.
He was being 'summoned'.
~***~
The first thing Draco did when he arrived was to look down and make sure he hadn't splinched himself.
He'd been forced to apparate, and though he'd done it with his father plenty of times in the past, he'd never done it himself. And of course, there was the fact that he'd just done it illegally, without a license. He'd have a warning letter from the ministry waiting on him back at the burrow when – if – he got back, he had no doubt.
Draco looked around the dark, gray stone ruins of the castle he'd arrived in. Green lichen and moss climbed the walls, and snow had settled in sloping drifts throughout. He looked up and saw the night sky clearly – the roof of the place was long past gone, and he could make out the constellations plainly. The sky was slowly turning gray – it was near dawn.
He rubbed an aching temple with his palm – he really needed to stop drinking himself to sleep every night. He wasn't sure how much longer his head could hold out.
A scraping noise behind him caught his attention, and he gripped his wand tightly as he whirled toward the sound.
"Ginny!"
Draco took a step forward in surprise, wondering at the feeling of relief spreading through him. He was still piss drunk – he had to be, he was seeing things.
Ginny approached him slowly, looking so familiar, and yet so different it made his heart seize up in fear. Her soft brown eyes looked as if they'd aged fifty years since he'd seen her last.
She looked pale, but other than that, he couldn't see a mark on her. But he knew better than anyone, that some scars weren't visible.
"Gin…are you all right?" He walked across the rubble to meet her, and before he knew what he was doing, he'd pulled her into his arms.
She felt stiff and unresponsive, and he pulled away from her to look down into her face.
"Ginny?"
Tears coursed down her face as she stared back at him, unseeing.
He cursed. She was under the Imperious.
His eyes flickered down to her hands, and he only caught a brief glimpse of silver before she suddenly raised her arm and tried to bury the wicked looking dagger in her hand in his chest.
Draco released her and jumped back, almost losing his balance – he lost his death grip on his wand, and watched the damn thing go flying with a frustrated growl.
Ginny leapt forward, and took another vicious swipe at him.
"Ginny, damn it, stop!" He ducked her and whirled around her to come up behind her and grab her arm.
She elbowed him sharply in the gut, he doubled over with a gasp before straightening, throwing his arms up just in time to block a blow aimed for his throat, and received a nasty wound in the smooth muscle of his forearm.
Draco hissed in pain, and then hooked a foot behind Ginny's knees, making her fall back onto the ground.
An evil laugh caught his attention as he grabbed the pulsing rip in his arm, and his eyes darted over to see Pansy Parkinson standing several feet away.
"Aww. Your girlfriend giving you some trouble, Draco, darling?"
"You bitch…save your false sympathy for yourself," he snapped, and took a threatening step towards her. "Take the curse off of her, now – if you value your life."
"How melodramatic of you, Draco. Don't worry, the curse will be gone – after I watch her kill you – and then kill herself. " The girl laughed again. "When my lord expressed his wish to dispatch you, I begged him to be allowed to see to it for him. It's been rather satisfying, seeing you and those worthless Gryffindors run yourselves into the ground searching for this silly brat." She motioned to Ginny, and she stood, the dagger still clenched in her hand. "I can't wait to see the look on their faces when you both turn up on their doorstep – dead, of course."
"The only thing that ends up dead around here is going to be you, you bloodthirsty witch," snarled Draco furiously.
"I don't think so – look at you, Draco, befriending those insignificant bugs. You've gone soft."
He glared back at her, his eyes glinting like molten silver. "I'll show you soft, you over-fed cow,"
Pansy stiffened, her carefully made - up face twisting unpleasantly.
Draco took advantage of her anger to knock the dagger from Ginny's hand and set her safely out of the way before snatching up his wand and turning back to face Pansy.
Only she was nowhere to be seen.
He turned in a slow circle, his breath coming quickly.
All around him, the world was waking up – the sky was turning pink with the dawn, and the stars were fading…it was New Years eve, he remembered suddenly, vaguely wondering if he'd see the next year…
And then, almost before he could blink, Pansy was directly in front of him, the discarded dagger flashing wickedly as it arced downward.
Draco ducked, but the sharp point of the blade caught his cheekbone, slashing it open deeply. He flung himself backwards, and clamped a hand over the pouring, pulsating gash.
Pansy snickered. "Oh, Draco, not your poor, perfect face! What's the matter, darling? You were always so jealous of Potter – now you'll have a lovely scar of your own for everyone to stare at, too. Aren't you happy?"
His features twisted in rage, Draco tackled her – he knocked the dagger from her hand and grabbed the front of her robes.
"I don't care how long it takes, one day you're going to be repaid in full for that – I may be in love with Ginny Weasley, but I'm far from going 'soft'. I'm still Draco Malfoy, and no one touches my bloody face!" He snarled in a fierce whisper through his teeth.
Pansy only laughed at him – and suddenly disapparated right out of his arms.
Draco listened to his own heavy breathing for a moment before rolling over and forcing himself to stand. He gripped his aching arm, finally noting with dark humor that the cut had slashed right through the center of the death eater mark. He heard a small whimper and looked up.
Ginny was sitting on the ground, her eyes wide, her small form shaking violently.
"D – Draco?"
He stated towards her immediately, only to have her scramble unsteadily to her feet and back away from him. "J-just stay away from me…I - I want my mother…"
Draco swallowed, and took a deep breath, trying to tell himself he didn't feel horribly disappointed. "It's all right, Gin…it'll be okay. I'll take you home."
She buried her face in her hands and shook her head, her shoulders shaking violently.
He thought she was crying, and moved forward to comfort her – by her next words and the sight of her robe sleeves falling back from her hands, and what they revealed made him stop in his tracks.
Draco felt his heart stop as the dark mark on her forearm was exposed.
"Nothing will be all right, Draco. Nothing will be 'okay' ever again…"
TBC
(A/N: Okay – so how many of you guys want to slap me? ^_^ Don't worry, I have explanations, really! Next, we'll see how the Weasley's react to Ginny's return and how everyone celebrates the New Year. We'll also see if Ginny really wants anything to do with Draco anymore…We're nearing the end of this fic ::sobs pathetically:: and I'm taking my time with it to make sure it ends exactly the way it I hope it should – and hopefully you guys will like it! Anyway, hope you enjoyed this; let me know what you think! Thanks! ^-^ ~Lee)
Author: Lee Velviet
Disclaimer: I don't own anything! (Except that heavenly thing I call my computer! ^-^)
9. Hell Freezes Over…
Draco was very reluctant to meet Ginny's parents-he'd insulted them so many times he couldn't help but feel a bit uncomfortable about them inviting him to their humble home to stay over the holiday break while he and the others searched for Ginny.
He needn't have worried, however – Molly Weasley had greeted him with the same crushing hug that she'd given the others.
Arthur Weasley had been a bit more conservative, shaking his hand briefly while giving him a skeptical look that reminded Draco strongly of his son, Ron.
Draco examined the 'burrow' as Weasley had referred to it, realizing that though the Weasley's home was shabby, it wasn't anywhere near as awful as he'd thought it would be. Molly Weasley kept her home painfully neat and clean, and the furniture and décor had been tastefully chosen, even if it was now a bit on the shabby side.
His Mother would have laughed at it.
"You can kip in Percy's room," Weasley told him grumpily as he toted Granger's bags past his shoulder. "It's empty now he's moved into London."
Draco vaguely remembered Percy Weasley – a tall, serious, red – headed boy, a Prefect, if his memory was correct.
He walked after Potter as they climbed the narrow set of stairs, a part of him blanching at the fact that he was actually carrying his own luggage.
Granger was settled into Ginny's room, which Draco noticed with surprise, hadn't been painted pink and decorated fluffily like he'd imagined. The brief glance he got of it showed plain white walls and soft green drapes, a white-canopied bed, and a matching green comforter. What set his temper to simmering, though, was the fact that she had plastered every picture of Potter she'd ever found in the Daily Prophet on her walls – he didn't seem to notice she had ton's of other pictures of her brother and Granger up, too.
Draco settled into Percy's room, which was, thankfully, quite plain – his own suite of rooms at the family home had been so over - decorated in silver and green, so ridiculously ostentatious, he'd hated coming home to it during the vacations.
He was hanging up his robes in the small closet when a knock sounded on the door.
"Come in,"
Arthur Weasley opened the door and stepped inside. "A word, Malfoy?"
Draco felt his lips twist – so this was how it was to be, then. "Of course, Mr. Weasley."
The older man narrowed his eyes suspiciously behind his glasses at the show of respect, and Draco sighed impatiently. "I'm a guest in your home, sir – and I might remind you, I am not my father. You can call me Draco."
He watched the man blink and clear his throat. "Er, yes, well…I guess you may call me Arthur."
Draco inclined his head slightly. "What did you want to talk to me about?"
"I want to know if you have any idea where my daughter is."
"None." Draco stared back at the man steadily. "I may be a 'stinking Slytherin', but I'm not evil. I have the mark of a death eater, but that doesn't make me one. You can believe me when I say I want to find Ginny as much you do, and I had nothing to do with her disappearance."
Arthur nodded. "All right."
He watched Ginny's father walk about the small room, picking up objects here and there. "Was there something else?"
"Ron tells me you and Ginny had a bit of a rivalry going on back at the school."
Draco snorted. " Rivalry is a bit of a nice word. War would be more apropos."
"He also told me she spent the night with you in the infirmary."
His throat tightened, but Draco looked him straight in the eye. "Yes, she did."
"Alone."
"I guess you could say that…"
Arthur pulled off his glasses and rubbed them on his shirt. "You do know she's only fifteen years old."
"Almost sixteen," Draco felt moved to point out.
"What I want to know is, what exactly are your intentions where my daughter is concerned? Quite frankly, I find the whole situation ridiculous. Our families have been on the odds with each other for generations – I wonder at the sudden relationship you two have seemed to developed. Why would you, a Malfoy, care about what happens to Ginny?"
"I'm in love with her." Even Draco blinked when that came out. He'd said it, well and truly come out and said he was in love with that infuriating little brat Ginny Weasley. Hell must have frozen over…
Draco almost would have grinned if the man hadn't seemed so serious – Arthur Weasley dropped his glasses and stared at him.
"I can see where you might be skeptical about all this – but Ginny and I have been through a lot together this year. I care about her, and judging by her actions when we were taken by my- by the death eaters, I believe she cares about me. And I haven't taken advantage of her, if that's what you're wondering." Yet, added Draco silently with an inward smirk.
"I – I see." Arthur retrieved his glasses and slipped them back on. He ran a hand through the thinning hair on his head, and sighed. "Well, then, if that's how it is…it's time we've dropped this whole family rivalry nonsense."
He held out his hand and smiled at Draco for the first time since he'd arrived at the burrow. "Welcome to the family, Draco."
~***~
"Draco, dear, eat up – you've barely touched a thing. You'll make yourself sick, picking at your food like that. You're wan looking already – you could do with some fattening up," Molly Weasley clucked as she dropped another stack of pancakes onto his plate.
Draco's eyes widened at the huge amount of food, and he winced as she dropped three more sausages onto his plate as well.
"Mum, he always eats like a bloody bird – he can't eat all that." Weasley, who'd stuffed his mouth so full his cheeks were bulging, complained from across the table.
Draco, already full near to bursting with best tasting breakfast he'd ever eaten in his life, narrowed his eyes determinedly and picked up his fork again. "May I have another helping of eggs, Molly?" he asked charmingly.
The red –haired boy glared at his use of his mother's name, while Molly beamed and bustled about her kitchen.
Potter actually grinned at him.
Draco smiled smugly, but then groaned inwardly again when he saw the plate.
~***~
"This is bloody pointless! We can't find her this way!" Draco finally erupted in frustration at the end of their second day checking out the list of possible places Potter's 'contact' had given him.
He was near choking on floo powder, and fireplace ash. His robes – and his hair, he suspected, if Weasley and Granger were anything to go by – were dusted liberally with soot, and he was fairly sure he'd ground his teeth into bits listening to Weasley's barbs all day.
"We can't exactly apparate, yet, and we'd look more than a bit conspicuous zooming about the countryside on our brooms," Potter muttered impatiently, pulling a cobweb out of his hair with distaste.
Molly came along, gasped at the sight of them standing in her living room, and bustled them out the door to shake off their robes.
Draco rolled his eyes, aggravated, as the meddlesome woman clucked her tongue and ruffled her hands through his hair to shake out the soot. He grudgingly stripped off his robe and pressed it into her waiting hands. Pushy woman. He wondered briefly if that was how Ginny would behave about their house when they were married.
The realization that he'd just contemplated marrying Ginny Weasley struck him hard. A biting wind chilled his skin through the gray cable knit turtleneck sweater and black trousers he wore, and he stared blindly at Molly Weasley's smiling face, still in mild shock. He could see the shadows in her eyes, the unhappiness and worry she hid from everyone else – she feared for her daughter, and it was wearing on her. But she kept up appearances for everyone else's sake…it was obvious where Ginny had gotten her strength – and her stubbornness. A shiver ran through him and he stiffened his back against it.
Draco couldn't tell if the shiver was from the cold or the thought of actually marrying into Ginny's family. He looked over at Ron Weasley and his freckled, soot smudged face, and smirked. The prat would have had an apoplexy if he'd known what he was contemplating just then.
"C'mon, Draco, dear, in you go – I've got cocoa waiting inside,"
He let himself be tugged inside the cozy little burrow and seated himself at the kitchen table. It might not be so bad, really, marrying Ginny. He'd have her completely, and utterly to himself – he almost grinned gleefully at the thought – and that alone would be worth being related to Ron Weasley.
Draco wrapped his hands around the warm mug of chocolate he was handed, and he stared into it tiredly. Ginny…he'd found he couldn't bring himself to think about her too much – the thought of what could be happening to her, of what she might be going through – it made him both furious and ill at the same time.
Draco looked at the clock above the table and examined the hands. Arthur was still hard at work at the ministry – the man had been there for almost sixteen hours…and Ginny…hers was still pointed at 'mortal peril'. No surprise there. At least she was still alive. He swallowed and was about to look away when he caught sight of something that made his throat tighten.
His name had been added to a hand on the clock, and the hand was currently resting at 'home'.
Draco shook his head and excused himself abruptly - he had a much needed appointment with a bottle in his room.
~***~
Draco sat upright in the bed, cold sweat pouring down his face, his breath coming in short gasps.
As soon as he was awake enough to notice, he gripped his forearm with his hand and gritted his teeth against the blinding, burning pain that swept through it.
An icy chill shot through his veins as he was hit with a jolt of realization, and he took a deep, calming breath.
He was being 'summoned'.
~***~
The first thing Draco did when he arrived was to look down and make sure he hadn't splinched himself.
He'd been forced to apparate, and though he'd done it with his father plenty of times in the past, he'd never done it himself. And of course, there was the fact that he'd just done it illegally, without a license. He'd have a warning letter from the ministry waiting on him back at the burrow when – if – he got back, he had no doubt.
Draco looked around the dark, gray stone ruins of the castle he'd arrived in. Green lichen and moss climbed the walls, and snow had settled in sloping drifts throughout. He looked up and saw the night sky clearly – the roof of the place was long past gone, and he could make out the constellations plainly. The sky was slowly turning gray – it was near dawn.
He rubbed an aching temple with his palm – he really needed to stop drinking himself to sleep every night. He wasn't sure how much longer his head could hold out.
A scraping noise behind him caught his attention, and he gripped his wand tightly as he whirled toward the sound.
"Ginny!"
Draco took a step forward in surprise, wondering at the feeling of relief spreading through him. He was still piss drunk – he had to be, he was seeing things.
Ginny approached him slowly, looking so familiar, and yet so different it made his heart seize up in fear. Her soft brown eyes looked as if they'd aged fifty years since he'd seen her last.
She looked pale, but other than that, he couldn't see a mark on her. But he knew better than anyone, that some scars weren't visible.
"Gin…are you all right?" He walked across the rubble to meet her, and before he knew what he was doing, he'd pulled her into his arms.
She felt stiff and unresponsive, and he pulled away from her to look down into her face.
"Ginny?"
Tears coursed down her face as she stared back at him, unseeing.
He cursed. She was under the Imperious.
His eyes flickered down to her hands, and he only caught a brief glimpse of silver before she suddenly raised her arm and tried to bury the wicked looking dagger in her hand in his chest.
Draco released her and jumped back, almost losing his balance – he lost his death grip on his wand, and watched the damn thing go flying with a frustrated growl.
Ginny leapt forward, and took another vicious swipe at him.
"Ginny, damn it, stop!" He ducked her and whirled around her to come up behind her and grab her arm.
She elbowed him sharply in the gut, he doubled over with a gasp before straightening, throwing his arms up just in time to block a blow aimed for his throat, and received a nasty wound in the smooth muscle of his forearm.
Draco hissed in pain, and then hooked a foot behind Ginny's knees, making her fall back onto the ground.
An evil laugh caught his attention as he grabbed the pulsing rip in his arm, and his eyes darted over to see Pansy Parkinson standing several feet away.
"Aww. Your girlfriend giving you some trouble, Draco, darling?"
"You bitch…save your false sympathy for yourself," he snapped, and took a threatening step towards her. "Take the curse off of her, now – if you value your life."
"How melodramatic of you, Draco. Don't worry, the curse will be gone – after I watch her kill you – and then kill herself. " The girl laughed again. "When my lord expressed his wish to dispatch you, I begged him to be allowed to see to it for him. It's been rather satisfying, seeing you and those worthless Gryffindors run yourselves into the ground searching for this silly brat." She motioned to Ginny, and she stood, the dagger still clenched in her hand. "I can't wait to see the look on their faces when you both turn up on their doorstep – dead, of course."
"The only thing that ends up dead around here is going to be you, you bloodthirsty witch," snarled Draco furiously.
"I don't think so – look at you, Draco, befriending those insignificant bugs. You've gone soft."
He glared back at her, his eyes glinting like molten silver. "I'll show you soft, you over-fed cow,"
Pansy stiffened, her carefully made - up face twisting unpleasantly.
Draco took advantage of her anger to knock the dagger from Ginny's hand and set her safely out of the way before snatching up his wand and turning back to face Pansy.
Only she was nowhere to be seen.
He turned in a slow circle, his breath coming quickly.
All around him, the world was waking up – the sky was turning pink with the dawn, and the stars were fading…it was New Years eve, he remembered suddenly, vaguely wondering if he'd see the next year…
And then, almost before he could blink, Pansy was directly in front of him, the discarded dagger flashing wickedly as it arced downward.
Draco ducked, but the sharp point of the blade caught his cheekbone, slashing it open deeply. He flung himself backwards, and clamped a hand over the pouring, pulsating gash.
Pansy snickered. "Oh, Draco, not your poor, perfect face! What's the matter, darling? You were always so jealous of Potter – now you'll have a lovely scar of your own for everyone to stare at, too. Aren't you happy?"
His features twisted in rage, Draco tackled her – he knocked the dagger from her hand and grabbed the front of her robes.
"I don't care how long it takes, one day you're going to be repaid in full for that – I may be in love with Ginny Weasley, but I'm far from going 'soft'. I'm still Draco Malfoy, and no one touches my bloody face!" He snarled in a fierce whisper through his teeth.
Pansy only laughed at him – and suddenly disapparated right out of his arms.
Draco listened to his own heavy breathing for a moment before rolling over and forcing himself to stand. He gripped his aching arm, finally noting with dark humor that the cut had slashed right through the center of the death eater mark. He heard a small whimper and looked up.
Ginny was sitting on the ground, her eyes wide, her small form shaking violently.
"D – Draco?"
He stated towards her immediately, only to have her scramble unsteadily to her feet and back away from him. "J-just stay away from me…I - I want my mother…"
Draco swallowed, and took a deep breath, trying to tell himself he didn't feel horribly disappointed. "It's all right, Gin…it'll be okay. I'll take you home."
She buried her face in her hands and shook her head, her shoulders shaking violently.
He thought she was crying, and moved forward to comfort her – by her next words and the sight of her robe sleeves falling back from her hands, and what they revealed made him stop in his tracks.
Draco felt his heart stop as the dark mark on her forearm was exposed.
"Nothing will be all right, Draco. Nothing will be 'okay' ever again…"
TBC
(A/N: Okay – so how many of you guys want to slap me? ^_^ Don't worry, I have explanations, really! Next, we'll see how the Weasley's react to Ginny's return and how everyone celebrates the New Year. We'll also see if Ginny really wants anything to do with Draco anymore…We're nearing the end of this fic ::sobs pathetically:: and I'm taking my time with it to make sure it ends exactly the way it I hope it should – and hopefully you guys will like it! Anyway, hope you enjoyed this; let me know what you think! Thanks! ^-^ ~Lee)