Just might explode from glee...these are my favorite people:
maLfoyS GaL paL, PATIENCE101 (twice more added to her already impressive
number makes her one of the coolest people in the world), KeeperOfTheMoon (again, thanks!), fyrechild
(I'll endorse ya anytime, you're muy talented!), Honeybear, VyingQuill (thanks for a really helpful
review), kaze (hope this is enough G/D interaction for you), ArrA (your hopes will be duly noted),
Fuschia (two very VERY helpful reviews, thank you ever so much, you are awesome!), Rebuky, chimerical
(thank you as well for a very nice review), Lynn-chan (you still amuse me a whole lot), depth (sorry
I confused you), The Golden Goose (yes, you really are talented!),Rambling Idiot (sorry about the cliffie)
and BoyCrazy (thanks for the tip). Whew!
Ok, this is a pretty short chapter and also pretty hastily written, so I apologize if it's terrible. I
hope it isn't too bad. Also, next week is my exam week, so things will be crazy crazy cray. Right now,
it looks like Thursday is a pretty likely day for the next update (I know, I know it's a long time
please don't be mad!). It might be a bit earlier, might be a bit later, but absolutely no later than next
Saturday, that I promise. Please don't abandon this fic because it'll be a while between updates, I love
all of my readers and would hate to lose any of you! Keep the reviews coming, because 1) I'll review yours
as well and 2) it'll incite me to ignore my studying and update sooner! Which isn't good for my grades, but
oh well.
Also, there is a TERRIBLE cliffhanger at the end of this chapter. I'm very sorry, it's very evil of me, but
I was exhausted and not sure where I'm going from here. Reviews about the future of this story would be most
welcome. Well, that's it I think, I'll see you guys in a few days (hopefully)! On with the show:
Disclaimer: Not mine.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
She had been able to maintain a calm, dignified walk until she was out of his site. However, the
instant her feet took her around the nearest corner she felt a panic well up inside of her and
took off running, a flash of fire streaking down the corridors.
Half questions formed in her mind as paintings and tapestries sped past her vision.
'How could he...?'
'Why would he...?'
'He has no right..."
'He doesn't even know...'
She answered every one as ruthlessly as she slammed her feet onto the hard stone:
'Because he's Draco Malfoy.'
Draco Malfoy hurt people for sport. He'd done it to her often enough for it to be
commonplace...why then, was she running through the school as though her life depended on it? It
wasn't that he'd teased her about Harry, he'd done that ever since her first year and this was
never the way she reacted. She might get angry or get sad, she might ignore him and walk away as
though nothing had happened, but never before had she allowed him to affect her like this. Really,
what else had she expected? Was she such an idiot that she actually believed that a few semi-civil
words and some imaginary warmth in his gaze would constitute a friendship? Ginny had never thought
of herself as stupid before, but now she quite seriously pondered that assessment.
'All right, Ginny.' she coached herself. 'Calm down and stop this. He's Draco Malfoy. You don't
care a jot about him or what he says to you, you never have before and you certainly don't now. So
stop running and go back up to your bed like a normal person.'
As usual, this had absolutely no effect on her at all. Instead, she realized that a warm wetness was
seeping down her cheeks and soaking the collar of her robe. This set off even more feelings of irritation
towards herself which in turn caused her to run faster and make the tears fall all that much more frequently.
She might have run herself to death in her very logical, clear panic had she not at that point been so
blinded by tears that she missed the flight of stairs at her feet and went sailing out into the abyss.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Draco was not having a good time of it. Besides not being able to find that damned Weasel, he was also
suffering from an emotion that was very foreign to his Malfoy blood - guilt. It was, in fact, so
strange to him that it took his mind several minutes to identify what he was feeling. When he finally
came up with a name, he had been so horrified at the prospect of feeling guilt over something he had said to
a Weasley that he had stopped dead in his tracks, losing her trail completely. After that, he had felt so
compelled to scrub off that disgusting emotion that he actually took several steps towards the Slytherin bathrooms.
However, guilt is guilt and however much you may want to ignore it, you can't. So Draco sighed for what
seemed the thousandth time that evening and began to comb the castle for that red haired brat.
He walked silently, listening intently for any clues of her whereabouts. But as he slunk skillfully
through the corridors, a strange sense of urgency and impending danger began to grow in his heart. Soon his feet
where flying over the stone floors and Draco had the uneasy feeling that they knew exactly where they were going.
Powerless to stop them, he was dragged along for the ride.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Ginny had a moment of confused thought before she realized what she had done and began to panic. She felt her robes
flapping against her cheeks and the hem creep embarrassingly high as she plunged down into the deep, impenetrable
darkness. She fleetingly wondered at what part of the castle would Filch find her splattered body when suddenly she
heard a strangled cry and was jerked upwards so hard that her eyes rolled back in her head and her
body went limp.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Draco was still following his rather confused instincts when he cam to a skidding halt not a moment to soon. Arms
windmilling, he managed to save himself from a nasty fall more by luck than by skill. However, his sharp eyes picked
out someone who had not been quite so lucky. A flash of red escaped from the black blur and Draco
felt his breath catch and his heart stop. Still running on pure instinct, he ripped his wand out of his pocket and
barely managed to articulate words into his cry of panic.
"Berenang boros!"
He felt his knees sag with relief as her hurtling form stopped and flew back towards him. Unfortunately, his relief lasted
only moments before he saw the unnatural way her body hung, limp and lifeless. Calling himself nine kinds of fool
for performing the spell much too strongly, he snagged her out of the air and laid her gently on the ground, breath coming
in spasmodic bursts. With trembling hands, he turned her ashen face to one side and carefully laid his head on her chest,
listening with all his might...hoping...praying...there! And again! She was alive, he hadn't killed the little brat after all!
He tried to tell himself he was only worried about what Dumbledore would do if he found Draco with a dead Weasley in the
middle of the night, and almost succeeded. However, he couldn't explain away the tears that had popped up behind his eyelids
or the way his face and ear still felt warm from where he had touched her. But more important than all that and more pressing
on his mind was that she was still unconscious. He had absolutely no idea how to deal with illness or injury, in fact he was
hopeless when it came to simple wound-binding charms and he felt his gorge begin to rise at the thought of trying to save her
with magic only to kill her out of inexperience. So, with hesitating hands and a helpless, if concerned, look on his face, he
pulled Ginny Weasley into his lap and did the only thing he could think of to do: he talked.
"Uh...hi, Weasel." That didn't sound very Malfoy-ish at all, Draco thought disapprovingly. But when he opened his mouth to say
something caustic he found that no words would come out. Instead, as he stared at her oddly beautiful little face, other words
began to flow much more easily.
"I hope I didn't hurt you with that spell...I'm sorry if I did. Although it's your own damn fault for running around the castle
without looking where your going! Leave it to a Weasely to fall down a perfectly visible flight of stairs." But the jab had a
strange, half hearted quality to it and it sound almost...fond.
"I mean, really, brat. What would I have done if you had plummeted straight to the bottom? No more sleepless nights feeling your
eyes on me, no more senseless following you about a castle at three in the morning. And how would I survive without being trapped
in strange rooms with you? So that's why you have to wake up. Honestly, you know you'd come back from the grave for a chance to
humiliate me...well, your chance is right here. So wake up! Please...?" At this he lifted a hand and hesitantly reached down to
stroke the copper strands of her hair.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Ginny was getting really tired of all this melodramatic falling into strange rooms and almost killing herself by tumbling down stairs.
It wasn't her style in the least. Really, she hadn't been noticed or had even a slightly interesting adventure in the last four years
of her life and now, in the space of about thirty six hours, she had had enough to last her a lifetime. These were the thoughts that
were running through her head as the cobwebs cleared out and the blackness faded away. As her senses came back into her power, she
noticed something odd. First, touch told her that her head was lying on something soft and warm while her legs and backside were frigid
from sitting on cold stone. Second, smell told her that a very nice scent was coming from the vicinity above her head. Then, hearing
came back and she perceived an all too familiar voice pulsing in her ears.
"...know you'd come back from the grave for a chance to humiliate me...well, your chance is right here. So wake up! Please...?"
If Ginny had been able to gasp, she would have. As it was, all she could do was wonder at the strange tenderness that coated the
silver haired boy's tongue and ponder over the pleading quality it took on when asking her to wake up. Then, shock of all shocks,
she felt trembling fingers smooth the hair away from her forehead, fingers with a gentleness that she had never felt the like of. It would
be all to easy to sink back into darkness with the care and protection she felt surrounding her, but somewhere in the back of her mind
Ginny felt a niggling worry. Fighting the temptation to sleep, she forced first one eye, then the other open and found herself staring up
at the very relieved, very surprised face of Draco Malfoy.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
She was awake! The exultant thought rang through his ears and pulled at the corners of his lips. He could feel the tension running out of his body
as he stared down into the deep brown eyes that were nestled in his lap. He caught a hint of worry in those chocolate orbs, could feel a slight
shifting of the muscles in her back as though she intended to leap up and run away at the slightest wrong move.
'What did I do wrong? Why is she looking at me like that?' he thought, as he continued to absently stroke her hair. The movement caught his eye
and as he stared at his pale hand entrenched in her jarringly red tresses, he suddenly realized exactly who he was and exactly what he was touching.
Oddly enough, that thought didn't make him recoil as he expected it to. But the moment was broken, and he felt Ginny shift around and then sit up,
looking uncertainly at him.
"Um...hi." she whispered in a very tiny voice that caused his heart to thump an extra beat.
"Hi..." He noted with surprise that the usual biting tone was completely missing from his words.
"So you...you...uh, saved me, didn't you?" She glanced up to briefly meet his eyes, then looked away.
"Yeah, I guess I did." He really wasn't the master of conversation tonight.
"Why? Wouldn't you have been happy to see one of Harry's lovesick fans go plummeting into oblivion?" The hurt tone of her voice reminded him of why
she had been running in the first place. Unfortunately, the mention of Harry's name from those pink lips erased any shred of guilt he had left and
his voice found again its usual asperity.
"Well since there are too many of you for him to keep track of himself, I had to step in as knight in shining armor. But, since you've already shown
me how grateful you are that I saved your life, I think I'll just be going." With that he stood up to leave.
"Wait." Her voice touched his heart as her hand reached out and grabbed his sleeve. Suddenly, she was standing at his shoulder. "I'm sorry. I
should've thanked you. I just....I just didn't understand." Here she gave a rueful laugh. "However much I could wish that you had let me meet my
untimely end, I suppose I should say it...so thank you."
She had caught him in her gaze again. Damn that Weasel! He couldn't look away! He couldn't even open his mouth to say some properly insulting jibe.
He could feel her breath on his neck, feel her body just barely not touching his...she was clouding his senses, what with her smell of cinnamon invading
his nostrils. It..it wasn't fair! It wasn't right! But even as he felt the brief flash of annoyance he turned his head and found himself uncomfortably
close to those perfect brown eyes.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
She felt a tiny stab of guilt as he got up to walk away. Sure, he had said some really terrible things to her and that was what had sent her over the edge,
figuratively and literally, but he had also saved her life and just because he wasn't Harry was no reason for her lack of apology. So she reached out her
hand and stopped him. She stood slowly and carefully phrased the words in her head.
"I'm sorry. I should've thanked you. I just....I just didn't understand. However much I could wish that you had let me meet my
untimely end, I suppose I should say it...so thank you."
But now she was standing too close to him and that sent was in her brain again, swirling and whirling and drawing her ever nearer to those broad shoulders.
Now she was standing so close that she could feel her breath glancing off his neck and warming her nose. She lifted an involuntary hand just as he spun around
and, lost in those silver orbs, she leaned inexorably inward, closer...closer...
"Hmm...what's this? A Slytherin and a Gryffindor out of beddy-bye after lights out? Tsk tsk tsk...someone's in trouble, aren't they?"
Ginny had never before hated anyone as much as she hated Argus Filch at that moment.
maLfoyS GaL paL, PATIENCE101 (twice more added to her already impressive
number makes her one of the coolest people in the world), KeeperOfTheMoon (again, thanks!), fyrechild
(I'll endorse ya anytime, you're muy talented!), Honeybear, VyingQuill (thanks for a really helpful
review), kaze (hope this is enough G/D interaction for you), ArrA (your hopes will be duly noted),
Fuschia (two very VERY helpful reviews, thank you ever so much, you are awesome!), Rebuky, chimerical
(thank you as well for a very nice review), Lynn-chan (you still amuse me a whole lot), depth (sorry
I confused you), The Golden Goose (yes, you really are talented!),Rambling Idiot (sorry about the cliffie)
and BoyCrazy (thanks for the tip). Whew!
Ok, this is a pretty short chapter and also pretty hastily written, so I apologize if it's terrible. I
hope it isn't too bad. Also, next week is my exam week, so things will be crazy crazy cray. Right now,
it looks like Thursday is a pretty likely day for the next update (I know, I know it's a long time
please don't be mad!). It might be a bit earlier, might be a bit later, but absolutely no later than next
Saturday, that I promise. Please don't abandon this fic because it'll be a while between updates, I love
all of my readers and would hate to lose any of you! Keep the reviews coming, because 1) I'll review yours
as well and 2) it'll incite me to ignore my studying and update sooner! Which isn't good for my grades, but
oh well.
Also, there is a TERRIBLE cliffhanger at the end of this chapter. I'm very sorry, it's very evil of me, but
I was exhausted and not sure where I'm going from here. Reviews about the future of this story would be most
welcome. Well, that's it I think, I'll see you guys in a few days (hopefully)! On with the show:
Disclaimer: Not mine.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
She had been able to maintain a calm, dignified walk until she was out of his site. However, the
instant her feet took her around the nearest corner she felt a panic well up inside of her and
took off running, a flash of fire streaking down the corridors.
Half questions formed in her mind as paintings and tapestries sped past her vision.
'How could he...?'
'Why would he...?'
'He has no right..."
'He doesn't even know...'
She answered every one as ruthlessly as she slammed her feet onto the hard stone:
'Because he's Draco Malfoy.'
Draco Malfoy hurt people for sport. He'd done it to her often enough for it to be
commonplace...why then, was she running through the school as though her life depended on it? It
wasn't that he'd teased her about Harry, he'd done that ever since her first year and this was
never the way she reacted. She might get angry or get sad, she might ignore him and walk away as
though nothing had happened, but never before had she allowed him to affect her like this. Really,
what else had she expected? Was she such an idiot that she actually believed that a few semi-civil
words and some imaginary warmth in his gaze would constitute a friendship? Ginny had never thought
of herself as stupid before, but now she quite seriously pondered that assessment.
'All right, Ginny.' she coached herself. 'Calm down and stop this. He's Draco Malfoy. You don't
care a jot about him or what he says to you, you never have before and you certainly don't now. So
stop running and go back up to your bed like a normal person.'
As usual, this had absolutely no effect on her at all. Instead, she realized that a warm wetness was
seeping down her cheeks and soaking the collar of her robe. This set off even more feelings of irritation
towards herself which in turn caused her to run faster and make the tears fall all that much more frequently.
She might have run herself to death in her very logical, clear panic had she not at that point been so
blinded by tears that she missed the flight of stairs at her feet and went sailing out into the abyss.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Draco was not having a good time of it. Besides not being able to find that damned Weasel, he was also
suffering from an emotion that was very foreign to his Malfoy blood - guilt. It was, in fact, so
strange to him that it took his mind several minutes to identify what he was feeling. When he finally
came up with a name, he had been so horrified at the prospect of feeling guilt over something he had said to
a Weasley that he had stopped dead in his tracks, losing her trail completely. After that, he had felt so
compelled to scrub off that disgusting emotion that he actually took several steps towards the Slytherin bathrooms.
However, guilt is guilt and however much you may want to ignore it, you can't. So Draco sighed for what
seemed the thousandth time that evening and began to comb the castle for that red haired brat.
He walked silently, listening intently for any clues of her whereabouts. But as he slunk skillfully
through the corridors, a strange sense of urgency and impending danger began to grow in his heart. Soon his feet
where flying over the stone floors and Draco had the uneasy feeling that they knew exactly where they were going.
Powerless to stop them, he was dragged along for the ride.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Ginny had a moment of confused thought before she realized what she had done and began to panic. She felt her robes
flapping against her cheeks and the hem creep embarrassingly high as she plunged down into the deep, impenetrable
darkness. She fleetingly wondered at what part of the castle would Filch find her splattered body when suddenly she
heard a strangled cry and was jerked upwards so hard that her eyes rolled back in her head and her
body went limp.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Draco was still following his rather confused instincts when he cam to a skidding halt not a moment to soon. Arms
windmilling, he managed to save himself from a nasty fall more by luck than by skill. However, his sharp eyes picked
out someone who had not been quite so lucky. A flash of red escaped from the black blur and Draco
felt his breath catch and his heart stop. Still running on pure instinct, he ripped his wand out of his pocket and
barely managed to articulate words into his cry of panic.
"Berenang boros!"
He felt his knees sag with relief as her hurtling form stopped and flew back towards him. Unfortunately, his relief lasted
only moments before he saw the unnatural way her body hung, limp and lifeless. Calling himself nine kinds of fool
for performing the spell much too strongly, he snagged her out of the air and laid her gently on the ground, breath coming
in spasmodic bursts. With trembling hands, he turned her ashen face to one side and carefully laid his head on her chest,
listening with all his might...hoping...praying...there! And again! She was alive, he hadn't killed the little brat after all!
He tried to tell himself he was only worried about what Dumbledore would do if he found Draco with a dead Weasley in the
middle of the night, and almost succeeded. However, he couldn't explain away the tears that had popped up behind his eyelids
or the way his face and ear still felt warm from where he had touched her. But more important than all that and more pressing
on his mind was that she was still unconscious. He had absolutely no idea how to deal with illness or injury, in fact he was
hopeless when it came to simple wound-binding charms and he felt his gorge begin to rise at the thought of trying to save her
with magic only to kill her out of inexperience. So, with hesitating hands and a helpless, if concerned, look on his face, he
pulled Ginny Weasley into his lap and did the only thing he could think of to do: he talked.
"Uh...hi, Weasel." That didn't sound very Malfoy-ish at all, Draco thought disapprovingly. But when he opened his mouth to say
something caustic he found that no words would come out. Instead, as he stared at her oddly beautiful little face, other words
began to flow much more easily.
"I hope I didn't hurt you with that spell...I'm sorry if I did. Although it's your own damn fault for running around the castle
without looking where your going! Leave it to a Weasely to fall down a perfectly visible flight of stairs." But the jab had a
strange, half hearted quality to it and it sound almost...fond.
"I mean, really, brat. What would I have done if you had plummeted straight to the bottom? No more sleepless nights feeling your
eyes on me, no more senseless following you about a castle at three in the morning. And how would I survive without being trapped
in strange rooms with you? So that's why you have to wake up. Honestly, you know you'd come back from the grave for a chance to
humiliate me...well, your chance is right here. So wake up! Please...?" At this he lifted a hand and hesitantly reached down to
stroke the copper strands of her hair.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Ginny was getting really tired of all this melodramatic falling into strange rooms and almost killing herself by tumbling down stairs.
It wasn't her style in the least. Really, she hadn't been noticed or had even a slightly interesting adventure in the last four years
of her life and now, in the space of about thirty six hours, she had had enough to last her a lifetime. These were the thoughts that
were running through her head as the cobwebs cleared out and the blackness faded away. As her senses came back into her power, she
noticed something odd. First, touch told her that her head was lying on something soft and warm while her legs and backside were frigid
from sitting on cold stone. Second, smell told her that a very nice scent was coming from the vicinity above her head. Then, hearing
came back and she perceived an all too familiar voice pulsing in her ears.
"...know you'd come back from the grave for a chance to humiliate me...well, your chance is right here. So wake up! Please...?"
If Ginny had been able to gasp, she would have. As it was, all she could do was wonder at the strange tenderness that coated the
silver haired boy's tongue and ponder over the pleading quality it took on when asking her to wake up. Then, shock of all shocks,
she felt trembling fingers smooth the hair away from her forehead, fingers with a gentleness that she had never felt the like of. It would
be all to easy to sink back into darkness with the care and protection she felt surrounding her, but somewhere in the back of her mind
Ginny felt a niggling worry. Fighting the temptation to sleep, she forced first one eye, then the other open and found herself staring up
at the very relieved, very surprised face of Draco Malfoy.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
She was awake! The exultant thought rang through his ears and pulled at the corners of his lips. He could feel the tension running out of his body
as he stared down into the deep brown eyes that were nestled in his lap. He caught a hint of worry in those chocolate orbs, could feel a slight
shifting of the muscles in her back as though she intended to leap up and run away at the slightest wrong move.
'What did I do wrong? Why is she looking at me like that?' he thought, as he continued to absently stroke her hair. The movement caught his eye
and as he stared at his pale hand entrenched in her jarringly red tresses, he suddenly realized exactly who he was and exactly what he was touching.
Oddly enough, that thought didn't make him recoil as he expected it to. But the moment was broken, and he felt Ginny shift around and then sit up,
looking uncertainly at him.
"Um...hi." she whispered in a very tiny voice that caused his heart to thump an extra beat.
"Hi..." He noted with surprise that the usual biting tone was completely missing from his words.
"So you...you...uh, saved me, didn't you?" She glanced up to briefly meet his eyes, then looked away.
"Yeah, I guess I did." He really wasn't the master of conversation tonight.
"Why? Wouldn't you have been happy to see one of Harry's lovesick fans go plummeting into oblivion?" The hurt tone of her voice reminded him of why
she had been running in the first place. Unfortunately, the mention of Harry's name from those pink lips erased any shred of guilt he had left and
his voice found again its usual asperity.
"Well since there are too many of you for him to keep track of himself, I had to step in as knight in shining armor. But, since you've already shown
me how grateful you are that I saved your life, I think I'll just be going." With that he stood up to leave.
"Wait." Her voice touched his heart as her hand reached out and grabbed his sleeve. Suddenly, she was standing at his shoulder. "I'm sorry. I
should've thanked you. I just....I just didn't understand." Here she gave a rueful laugh. "However much I could wish that you had let me meet my
untimely end, I suppose I should say it...so thank you."
She had caught him in her gaze again. Damn that Weasel! He couldn't look away! He couldn't even open his mouth to say some properly insulting jibe.
He could feel her breath on his neck, feel her body just barely not touching his...she was clouding his senses, what with her smell of cinnamon invading
his nostrils. It..it wasn't fair! It wasn't right! But even as he felt the brief flash of annoyance he turned his head and found himself uncomfortably
close to those perfect brown eyes.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
She felt a tiny stab of guilt as he got up to walk away. Sure, he had said some really terrible things to her and that was what had sent her over the edge,
figuratively and literally, but he had also saved her life and just because he wasn't Harry was no reason for her lack of apology. So she reached out her
hand and stopped him. She stood slowly and carefully phrased the words in her head.
"I'm sorry. I should've thanked you. I just....I just didn't understand. However much I could wish that you had let me meet my
untimely end, I suppose I should say it...so thank you."
But now she was standing too close to him and that sent was in her brain again, swirling and whirling and drawing her ever nearer to those broad shoulders.
Now she was standing so close that she could feel her breath glancing off his neck and warming her nose. She lifted an involuntary hand just as he spun around
and, lost in those silver orbs, she leaned inexorably inward, closer...closer...
"Hmm...what's this? A Slytherin and a Gryffindor out of beddy-bye after lights out? Tsk tsk tsk...someone's in trouble, aren't they?"
Ginny had never before hated anyone as much as she hated Argus Filch at that moment.