Author's Note: Thank you, thank you to everyone who's read and reviewed! I love you all, dahlings. :) This chapter is freakishly long...fifteen pages, I believe. *cackles* I didn't mean for it to be so long, but then...gosh, it kept goooooing and gooooing....
:-) I know toward the end the writing's a bit odd; that was intentional. *nods* Fear not, I didn't suddenly lose my ability to write a grammatically correct sentence!!
Dedication: To my super-stylin' shoppin' sista Crys (PepsiAngel on Ff.N), a wonderful writer and amazing friend. Happy (very belated) Birthday! :-) Love ya dahling. MAY KIMMIE AND CANDIE REIGN ALWAYS! *cackles eeeevilly*
Er...sorry. Bye then. :-)
Chapter Seven: Fate
"Ginny, thank God."
No sooner had Ginny swung open the front door than she was greeted by Harry's desperate proclamation.
"Hi Harry," she replied, a bit unsurely.
"You've gotta help me," he said at once. "We're having company for dinner in an hour, and you know about me and cooking."
"Who's coming over?" Ginny asked, hanging up her coat and kicking off her shoes.
"Sirius and his new girlfriend," Harry replied, grinning. "He owled me earlier about her - he's completely smitten."
Ginny smiled back. "That's wonderful. He deserves it, after what he's had to face."
"Tell me about it," Harry said, then promptly grabbed her arm and dragged her into the kitchen.
Luckily, he hadn't attempted to start cooking yet. The kitchen, in fact, looked perfectly intact, and revealed no evidence hinting that he may have made another attempt at something. Say, spaghetti sauce.
"So," Ginny asked, "What are we making?"
"I don't know," Harry said, rather miserably. "How long would pork roast take?"
"Much longer than an hour," Ginny replied.
"Well, good," Harry said. "We haven't got any pork."
"What have we got?" Ginny wanted to know.
"Um..." Harry inspected the refrigerator. "Not much. Haven't been grocery shopping in a while."
"Should we magick something up?"
Harry shrugged. "I never exactly mastered conjuring food that wouldn't cause a severe stomachache afterwards...should we opt for takeout?" Ginny was about to reply, but stopped as a rather devious grin spread out across Harry's face. "Or," he added, "We could make chicken soup."
Ginny immediately felt her cheeks flush. "You're wicked, to remind me of that," she informed him. The most embarrassing incident had taken place the summer after her third year - Harry had come to stay with them, and Mrs. Weasley had asked that he help Ginny make chicken soup for dinner. It had been quite the disaster, complete with Ginny spilling the soup and scalding Harry's hands, and it wasn't a procedure that she'd like to repeat anytime soon.
"Well, we didn't have the best of luck with it the first time, did we?"
"One with a gift for extreme understatement would agree with that," Ginny responded, "But we could take another stab at it."
Harry shrugged. "Sure. Why not?"
"D'you have a cookbook?"
He tilted his head toward the open cupboard filled with assorted cookbooks. Ginny raised a questioning eyebrow at him.
"Collect cookbooks, Mr. Potter?" she inquired playfully.
"It's Susan," Harry replied, rather miserably. "She's set on making me into some great chef, and I just can't convince her that it's not a possibility. That right there is the product of three birthdays, Christmases, and random gift-givings."
"Must get old," Ginny said sympathetically, pulling her wand from her work robes and aiming it toward the cupboard. "Accio, cookbook one."
Obediently, the first cookbook flew over and into her hand.
"I'm hopeless at cooking the Muggle way," Ginny informed him, a bit sheepishly, as she began flipping through the book. It was still in perfect condition - there wasn't a single dog-eared page or splotch of sauce that indicated it had ever been opened. It was quite different from her mother's cookbook, which had pages torn from it and plastered on the insides of the cupboard doors, as well as a considerable amount of assorted substances splattered across the pages.
"Here we are," she announced, triumphantly pointing at the blue heading proclaiming Chicken Noodle Soup in bold letters.
Harry took a very dramatic deep breath and rolled up his sleeves. With an overly-grim expression he asked her, extremely gravely, "You up to it?"
Stifling giggles she replied, equally somberly, "I'll try to be strong."
"All right, then," Harry said, studying the cookbook intently as though it held the answers to all the world's mysteries. His just-the-tiniest-bit-too-long messy black hair fell into his green eyes, which were narrowed in concentration. Ginny felt her heart skip a bit, and it was a nice feeling; soothing, almost. She'd missed this, in all its sweet simplicity. . . watching an unaware Harry with the blatant admiration of a lovestruck school girl. In times like these, she felt ten years old again, before everything had gone so tragically wrong. Before Tom, before Voldemort's return, before the war, before the countless deaths...
Back when there had only been flushed cheeks and elbows in butter dishes.
"Chicken and broth."
"Hmm?" Ginny asked absently.
"We need chicken and broth," Harry repeated, giving her a small, amused sort of smile.
"Oh," Ginny felt her cheeks heat up. "Right."
Now all I need is the butter dish.
She grabbed a can of chicken broth from the cupboard above her while Harry inspected the refrigerator for chicken.
"Do you ever miss...how things used to be?" she asked, very timidly.
She snuck a glance at Harry and saw him stiffen. He stood up a bit straighter and replied, tonelessly, "A bit."
"I...I mean, not the war or anything," she added hurriedly. "Just...Hogwarts."
"God, yes," he responded, quite sincerely. "I practically even miss Snape."
"Eeek. That bad?"
"'Fraid so," Harry said. "Just...I don't know. Ron and Hermione and classes and Quidditch." He sighed. "That was the only place where I've ever felt truly at home, you know?" After a pause, he added, "I'm almost jealous of Ron and Hermione for working there."
"I saw them today," Ginny remarked.
"Really?" Harry asked, sounding a bit wistful. "I wish I would have been there."
"Hogsmeade trip," Ginny explained. Harry nodded.
"I haven't seen them in so long. It's...weird. For so long we were inseparable, and then..." He chuckled, though it sounded a bit forced. "The next thing I know, they're engaged and I see them once every few months, tops."
Ginny debated inwardly for a few seconds before asking her next question. "Does it bug you, that they're...together?"
Harry turned and grinned at her. He seemed to have forgotten about his quest for chicken.
"Nah," he said. "They were meant to be. I've known it since my fourth year - sensed it since first."
Ginny grinned as a memory of the summer after Ron's first year popped into her mind.
"I remember," she said, "Ron telling me about her the year before I started at Hogwarts." She switched her tone to one lightly reminiscent of her brother's. "'At first I thought she was a complete terror, but then she turned out to be quite all right, really.'" She resumed her normal tone. "I asked him if he liked her, and his ears went completely red." She returned to Ron-voice. "'What?! Me? Like Hermione? No way! Yeah right! Don't be a complete git, Ginny. Shut up. Go away. Leave me alone.'" A pause. "'Me? Like Hermione? Ha! I don't like Hermione!'" Another pause. "'No, really, go away. I don't want you talking rubbish like that.'"
Harry was laughing. "To think it took him nearly five years to face the facts."
"He's always been a bit slow," Ginny said with a wicked smile.
Harry nodded, then added sadly, "I really, really miss them." He paused, as though trying to decide how to phrase his feelings, before saying, "It seemed like they were the first people that ever really cared about me, you know?"
"I always cared about you."
Ginny flinched as soon as she said it. Dear God, why did she have to be so stupid around him?
An awkward albeit sweet smile tugged at the corners of his mouth.
"I know," he replied, voice soft. "I suppose Ron and I are in the same boat."
"What?" Ginny asked faintly, bewildered.
"Well, we're both quite slow," Harry said, his voice very quiet. "But I s'pose I'm worse...it's taken me a lot longer."
They exchanged rather shy smiles, Ginny's heart pounding so rapidly that she felt faint.
And in a comfortable sort of silence, they continued cooking.
* * *
"This is where they live?" Cryssa asked, wrinkling her nose in distaste.
Draco couldn't blame her as he studied the rather shabby cottage with its faded, peeling red paint. Rusty brass letters proclaimed '1414', the second four crooked from where it hung.
"Quaint, isn't it?" he deadpanned.
"One could put it that way," Cryssa responded, then quickly began to study her long, dark red fingernails. Apparently, the sight of the house was enough to sicken her. She'd been raised with just as much exposure to the finer things in life as Draco had, and quite frankly, he wasn't all too impressed by the house either.
He rapped his knuckles against the front door quickly before pulling his hand away, and Cryssa smirked.
"Repulsive?" she asked.
"Excruciatingly."
He could hear voices and laughter from inside for a few seconds before the front door swung open to reveal Ginny. Her cheeks were flushed pleasantly and she donned a radiant smile.
Great. Who knew what she and Potter had been up to.
"Draco," she said softly, the happiness quickly draining from her face. He felt a quick stab of satisfaction.
"Hey, Weasley," he replied evenly.
Ginny's eyes flicked to Cryssa, who was studying Ginny critically. She apparently didn't pass the test, because Cryssa held her head a bit higher in an instinctive effort to show off her superiority.
"Who's this?"
"Cryssa Raine," responded Cryssa at once, her lavender eyes flicking over Ginny with distaste. "And you must be Draco's new paramour."
Ginny narrowed her eyes at Draco, and he resisted the urge to stomp on Cryssa's foot, elbow her in the stomach, or something equally painful.
"I wouldn't go that far," Ginny replied icily. "And you're here because...?"
Cryssa opened her mouth to respond, a rather malicious smirk playing at the corners of her lips, but Draco cut her off hurriedly.
"Gin, can I talk to you?"
Gin!?
Oh, that had been wise of him. Real wise. Next he'd be calling her by nauseating nicknames like 'Schnookums' and 'Muffin'.
"What happened to 'Weasley'?" Ginny replied dryly.
A strange feeling oddly like desperation overcame him.
"Okay, fine, Weasley," he said, trying to keep his tried 'n true haughty, obnoxious tone. "Can I talk to you?"
"No," she said promptly, preparing to slam the door.
Draco, however, was too quick for her. He pulled his wand from his sleeve and muttered "Immobiliarbus". The door froze, and after a few useless attempts at slamming it, Ginny gave up with an exasperated sigh.
"Fine," she muttered darkly. She led Draco inside; Cryssa followed, nose wrinkled in disgust as her eyes flicked over the unextravagant decor and furniture.
"Gin? Who is it?"
Potter entered the living room, looking pitiful in a 'Kiss The Cook' apron, black hair flying every which way. His face immediately hardened in dislike as his eyes fell upon Draco.
"Why, if it isn't the great Harry Potter," Draco said scathingly. "It's just reunions galore today - first the Mudblood and the weasel, and now the glorious Boy Who Lived. It's enough to get one nostalgic."
"Why are you here, Malfoy?" Potter demanded, sneaking a glance at Ginny.
"I'm here to talk to Virginia, Potter," Draco said with mock innocence, smiling earnestly. "Surely there's nothing wrong with that."
He looked at Ginny; an odd expression that he couldn't decipher had come across her face.
"Don't call me that," she ordered softly.
"What?" Draco asked, confused. "It's your name, isn't it, Weasley?"
"It's Ginny," she replied, and he picked up the vibe that it was an incontrovertible topic.
"Can I talk to you?" Draco repeated for the third time in the last five minutes; his tone was downright pleading now, and he hated it.
"Fine." Ginny sank down onto the sofa.
"Alone?" Draco added, shooting a glance at Harry and Cryssa. Cryssa seemed to take the hint.
"Harry, I'd like something to drink," she said. "Can you show me to the kitchen?"
"It's that way," Harry replied, his eyes firmly fixed on Ginny. He cocked his head slightly to the right.
"Are you sure you can't show me?" Cryssa asked insistently.
Harry nodded distractedly.
Cryssa rolled her eyes. "Fine, then."
Draco watched as she disappeared into the hall, and waited for Potter to follow suit. The great savior of the wizarding world, however, didn't seem to quite get it, and Draco wondered for the millionth time how someone so dense could've beaten the most brilliant Dark Lord in the last century.
Pure dumb luck, no doubt.
"We're having company over," Potter informed him, green eyes flashing with pent-up loathing. "Could you come back another time?"
"I'm not coming into this wretched hovel again, Potter," Draco returned. "I won't be long."
"They'll be here any minute-"
"Harry," Ginny said, voice soft. Harry fell silent at once, and his attention flew to Ginny.
So Potter did fancy her after all. (That much was blatantly obvious by the way he looked at her.) It had sure taken him long enough.
"It's fine," Ginny continued. "How about you go check on the soup? Sirius won't be here for another twenty minutes."
Harry nodded reluctantly and made his way, very slowly, out of the living room. The door closed with a click, and Draco sighed.
"Took him long enough."
"Don't think I'm going to leap into your arms, radiating forgiveness," Ginny said. Her voice was still quiet, but somehow piercingly so. "Do you really think that I'd want to get involved with someone like you? You have no compassion, Draco. None. If you can go around saying such horrible things about someone I love - someone who I would give anything to see again - then I want you to stay away from me."
Her voice trembled a bit, and he wondered, panicked, if she was going to cry. If there was one thing Draco couldn't handle, it was crying females. Especially crying females who were doing said crying because of him. (God knew he'd been helpless at comforting Pansy Parkinson...Though in all honesty, he'd never actually tried.)
He looked over at her and discovered with relief that she wasn't crying - however, her brown eyes were dangerously glassy.
He'd better try to be nice, which was quite unfortunate, as it was something he'd always sucked royally at.
"Weasley," he said, trying to sound comforting and wincing at the sound of his voice. He sounded like a whiny girl. Great. Screw that.
"Listen, Weasley," he tried again, his normal tone returning, "I know that an apology'll sound like complete bullshit, but I am sorry."
Ginny was quiet for a moment, as though considering his words, before promptly declaring, "You're right. Complete bullshit."
"Hey, I tried," he said defensively. As an afterthought, he decided that he'd better add, "And I meant it, too."
"Meaning something requires feeling," Ginny replied, almost bitterly. "And I seriously doubt that you can do that."
"Fine," he said. "I surrender. It's obvious that you aren't going to believe me."
"Good," Ginny said. "And I don't forgive you."
"Fair enough."
An awkward sort of silence surrounded them, but Ginny broke it. "Who was she?"
"She?"
"That girl...snobby, porcelain doll one."
"Cryssa."
"Yeah. Her."
Draco shrugged off-handedly. "A friend."
Ginny raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Really?" She paused, then added in an over-exxageratedly low, velvety tone that was a rather accurate impression of Cryssa's, "Not one of your paramours?"
"Not anymore," Draco responded. A bit tentatively (or as close to tentative as Draco Malfoy could get, anyway), he added, "We used to be engaged."
Ginny's eyes widened slightly at this. "Engaged??"
"Shocking, huh?" he asked wryly.
"We both know you don't seem like the marrying type, Malfoy."
"It was arranged," he replied simply.
"Ah," Ginny said, nodding wisely. "The merging of the valuable blood." She smirked a bit. "Do tell me, Draco, which disgustingly great wizard is she a descendent of? Merlin?" Eyes sparkling mischievously, she added, "Not Godric Gryffindor, I gather."
Draco shook his head. "Salazar Slytherin."
As soon as he said it, he realized that he shouldn't have. He could remember Ginny's first year, along with all the intricate planning that had been devised the summer before. He hadn't known about it until after the attacks had stopped, of course; his father had refused to tell him.
It hadn't seemed an important issue to him in the past. The Dark Lord and his ways had never been a stranger to Draco - even before Voldemort's rise to power, Lucius had talked of him often.
But now...
Now Ginny had grown pale, and looked vaguely sickened.
And at once it hit him how downright wrong it had been; a naive eleven year old girl had fallen prey to one of the most powerful evils that had ever existed, and he hadn't realized how terrible it had been until this very moment.
"But..." Ginny whispered, very softly. "Tom. Professor Dumbledore told me that Tom was the last descendant of Slytherin."
"Dumbledore was only a man," Draco responded. "You all make him out to be some all-knowing deity. He didn't know everything."
"But..."
"Slytherin's blood line was powerless, until Voldemort," Draco said. "And then powerless after him. Most didn't even know that he had an older sister - Cryssa's great grandmother. But Cryssa possesses the kind of power that Slytherin did, that Voldemort did." He laughed shortly. "It's much weaker, of course. She only has the faintest traces...but it's there."
Ginny was studying him in a numbed sort of horror.
"How...?" she said finally. "How can you associate with her? How can you stand her? Don't you understand whose blood runs through her veins? She must be corrupted, evil-"
"She's just a woman."
Ginny studied him silently for a moment before speaking. Her voice was very grim.
"I know what it's like to have that kind of power, Draco. I had that power, that blood. Tom took over me; I could feel what it was like, to have that blood." She paused, shivering a bit. "You're endlessly hungry, endlessly craving for something that you can't quite place. You're restless, tired, superior all at once." Her voice dropped to a whisper, and he leaned forward a bit in interest. "The only time that you're ever satisfied is when you know that you're hurting people."
She spoke with a wisdom that frightened him. Her eyes looked practically deadened; her voice was nearly expressionless, yet at the same time rich with a haunting sort of knowing.
"I don't want her here, Malfoy," Ginny finished simply. "I don't want to see her again."
He knew that what she said was true - he didn't know how he knew it; it simply felt true. And yet he wanted to defend Cryssa, to tell Ginny that she wasn't like that. He didn't know quite why...Perhaps it was because she was possibly his closest friend, maybe it was due to the fact that he thought he'd truly understood her and was now realizing that he hadn't at all.
He said one word, very simply.
"Okay."
* * *
Harry glared daggers at the door to the living room, wondering why it didn't permit more noise from the conversation into the hall. All he'd heard were snatches of the conversation, the most recent being 'apology...bullshit...'
"I give up," he muttered to himself, standing up and promptly remembering the chicken soup. He rushed to the kitchen, hoping he hadn't burnt it, to find Cryssa sitting at the counter, sipping a glass of what seemed to be butterbeer that he'd snatched from The Three Broomsticks the day before after he'd finished his shift there. The corners of her lips rose in a cold smile.
"I found the kitchen."
"I see that," Harry responded, rushing to the stove and immediately checking on the soup. It seemed to be all right.
An awkward silence had filled the air, and he busied himself by lining up the dirty dishes next to the sink. He reached for the Insta-Sparkle dish soap (guaranteed to have your dishes sparkling clean, without your washing them!), preparing to fill the sink, when he felt icy fingers brush against his forearm. For a split-second, a fire seemed to erupt inside his head. He hadn't felt like that in so long...
"It's rude to neglect your company, Mr. Potter," Cryssa informed him, pulling the dish soap from his hand and setting it back onto the counter. Her hand brushed against his, and the pain shot through his head again.
His hand flew instinctively to his forehead, fingering his scar.
...His scar.
Panic immediately welled up inside of him. His scar burning...but surely, it couldn't be anything to do with Voldemort - Voldemort was dead, gone, destroyed. Harry had seen him fall, watched his power tear from his body, leaving him defenseless.
It had been a strange, terrifying thing to witness, and Harry shuddered just remembering it.
He wasn't going to think about it. Not now.
Not ever.
"So, I take it the Weasley girl's not a romantic entanglement of yours." Cryssa sunk onto a bar stool and crossed her legs gracefully in front of her.
Harry shook his head weakly, wishing that she would leave. "No."
"Got a girlfriend?"
"Sort of...not really...yeah, I guess."
Why wouldn't she go away?
The pain in his scar had stopped, but he couldn't stop fingering it, fearful that it would return.
"Indecisive."
"Hmm," Harry muttered indistinctly.
She narrowed her eyes at him. "You're not very talkative, are you, Mr. Potter?"
"Kind of...distracted," he replied, then said very quickly, "Could you leave, please?? I don't mean to be rude, but we're expecting company any minute."
She shrugged and rose very gracefully. "I'll go get Draco." With a lazy smile, she offered her hand to Harry. "It was a pleasure, Mr. Potter."
He stared at her hand blankly; there was no way he was shaking it. He wasn't going to feel that pain again, not if he could help it. Too many memories came along with it.
"Yeah, nice to meet you," Harry said, quickly busying himself with taking bowls down from the pantry.
He heard her click her tongue disapprovingly, and when he turned around, the kitchen was empty.
He let out a sigh of relief at once, then studied the dishes.
Ah well.
They'd have to wait to be done until after dinner.
* * *
"Harry? Could you help me with something?"
Ginny glared at the clasp of her necklace, which never ceased to rebel at the most inopportune of times. Sirius and his new girlfriend were due any minute.
"Sure!"
Harry entered her room, looking vaguely nervous. Ginny wondered why for a moment before remembering the previous evening's events.
She supposed she couldn't really blame him. He seemed to relax, however, when he found her fully clothed in a dark green blouse and black pants, and without the delightful Marilyn/Holly Golightly/Assorted Screen Temptresses facade.
"Can you help me with this?" she asked, holding up the necklace. "We don't get along, you see."
Harry laughed. "Sure."
He crossed the room and accepted the necklace from her, gently placed it around her neck, and hooked the clasp. One of his fingers brushed briefly against her neck, causing the spot to tingle.
This, she decided, was much nicer than demanding him to zip up her dresses.
He eyed her in the mirror once he'd finished. "So, what did you think of Cryssa?"
Ginny paused at this before proclaiming, quite matter-of-factly, "She's not one to cross."
"You got that too?" Harry asked, tone light but expression a bit nervous.
Ginny nodded, wondering how exactly to reveal what Draco had told her about Cryssa's ancestry.
Ah well. Might as well say it right out.
"Harry, she's-"
She was cut off by the peal of the doorbell, and Harry grinned. "That's Sirius."
He waited for Ginny to rise from her vanity, and they both headed to the living room to answer the door.
They swung it open, however, to find Sirius a bit distracted.
"Have I told you how beautiful you look?" he asked the woman with him. She was a bit younger than Sirius, and quite pretty with glossy dark hair and sultry eyes that reminded Ginny of old film stars.
"Only about twelve times," she responded playfully.
"Well, let's make it a lucky thirteen then, shall we?" Sirius offered. She giggled, and only then did the pair seem to notice that the door had in fact been answered.
"Harry!" Sirius said, grinning. "How are you?" He hugged his godson quickly.
"Great," Harry responded as they pulled away. "And you?"
"Perfect," Sirius replied, still smiling from ear to ear. "Ginny, it's great to see you."
"You too," Ginny returned. "Come on in."
Sirius stepped inside, hand-in-hand with his girlfriend.
"And this," he said, beaming, "Is my amazing, adorable, beautiful, beloved-"
"Let's not go through the whole alphabet again, darling," the woman said, her dark eyes sparkling. To Harry and Ginny, she added, "Honestly, I can't take him anywhere." She offered her hand to Ginny, who shook it. "I'm Hadia Aurelius."
"Ginny Weasley," Ginny responded, smiling.
Harry introduced himself, and they made their way to the kitchen. Everyone seemed all smiles (particularly a blatantly smitten Sirius), but Ginny couldn't bring herself to forget what Draco had told her about Cryssa.
And, from assorted sneaked glances at Harry, she was pretty sure that he was a bit uncomfortable about something as well.
* * *
Sirius approached Harry as soon as Ginny and Hadia began to clear the table after the meal (Ginny had insisted repeatedly that Hadia not help, but she'd finally given in when Hadia had insisted right back).
Harry couldn't help but grin at Sirius - his godfather was positively glowing.
"She's perfect, isn't she?" Sirius muttered excitedly to Harry, watching as Hadia disappeared into the kitchen with the dishes while Ginny folded up the tablecloth.
"She's really nice," Harry replied in a similar hushed tone. "I'm happy for you, Sirius."
Beaming broadly, Sirius responded, "She's amazing. I hadn't felt true happiness in ages...I'd almost forgotten what it was like. But then she showed up in my life, and wham!" Sirius made a dramatic gesture with his hands, and Harry saw Ginny smiling in amusement from where she stood by the dinner table.
"Complete bliss," Sirius finished. "I may have to reside permanently on cloud nine."
Harry shrugged cheerfully. "There are worse places."
As soon as he said it, he knew it had been stupid. Sirius's dark eyes seemed to flicker for a moment; a strange sort of distant pain shone in them, and Harry knew he was thinking of Azkaban.
Harry worried about this, things like this, often. Yes, Sirius was usually cheerful and bright-spirited when Harry saw him, but he'd always possessed a strange aura of sadness, as though a piece of his soul had been lost that he could never get back.
Sirius shivered slightly, and Harry winced.
IdiotIdiotIdiot...
Luckily, at that moment Hadia approached from behind and kissed Sirius' cheek lightly.
"Hey you," she said warmly.
The glazed-over look in Sirius's eyes immediately seemed to disappear, and Harry watched in relief as a fond smile spread across his face.
"He-llo there," Sirius responded with a low wolf whistle. Harry felt himself blushing as the couple shared a brief kiss; he locked his eyes on Ginny so as not to stare at Sirius before realizing that Ginny was no doubt wondering why he was staring at her.
Harry raised his eyebrows and cocked his head toward Sirius; Ginny smiled and nodded in response. Feeling particularly mischievous, he struck a dramatic pose and began to wave his hands with flourish. Ginny stifled giggles as she watched him. Feeling oddly like Lockhart, Harry draped a dramatic hand across his forehead when-
"I think your godson is mocking us, Sirius."
Harry paused in mid-swoon, feeling a bit sheepish and extremely stupid.
"Oh, is he?" Sirius asked, his dark eyes sparkling. "Well, Harry, the next time you and your girlfriend are caught up in the throes of passion, you're going to regret that-"
"Really frightening," Harry cut in sarcastically.
Laughing, Hadia asked, "So, Harry, how long have you two been together?" She tilted her head toward Ginny.
Harry immediately felt his cheeks go crimson.
"Ginny and I aren't-"
"We're not-"
"They're not-"
"-Together," Harry, Ginny, and Sirius finished in unison.
Harry sneaked a glance at Ginny to see that she looked just as uncomfortably red as he felt.
Good; at least he wasn't alone.
"Oh, I'm sorry," Hadia said, looking completely unaffected. "So, who is your girlfriend, Harry?"
Harry looked at Ginny again, suddenly very uncomfortable about the question. It was a perfectly innocent one, of course, but Susan just didn't...seem like a girlfriend. She was just the gorgeous blonde who occasionally snogged him stupid and gave him too many cookbooks for his own good.
That wasn't much of a relationship when one thought about it.
"She's not really my girlfriend," Harry said delicately, unwillingly feeling his eyes flee toward Ginny again. She looked almost...relieved.
Why is this suddenly bugging me? he thought, almost annoyed.
"I just date her sometimes," Harry finished. "Susan Bones."
Hadia turned to Ginny. "What about you? Do you have a boyfriend, Ginny?"
"No," Ginny replied. The odd sensation of being watched filled Harry, and he somehow knew that she was looking at him. "Nothing serious."
It was now Harry's turn to feel relieved.
Maybe she'd already forgotten about Malfoy already.
Maybe they could even set him up with Susan.
* * *
The Malfoy family owned six mansions scattered across Britain; two others in France. The one where Draco currently resided was one of the less extravagant ones, but he didn't much mind it. There was no way in hell he'd go back to Malfoy Manor, which had been completely destroyed along with his parents.
No, he was perfectly fine here.
Sighing, he pushed open the front door - Apparation hadn't seemed particularly appealing that evening - and walked inside, Cryssa alongside him. The maid, Mrs. Pearce, greeted him with a polite, "Good evening, Master Malfoy, Miss Raine" before disappearing back into the kitchen.
"I still don't know why you put up with this place," Cryssa announced, wrinkling her nose as she studied the grandly decorated antechamber. "Malfoy Manor was much bigger." After a moment's pause, she continued. "We would've lived there if we were married, of course...there's no way I could stand being here. Though I would have done quite a bit of remodeling in the parlors; nothing against Narcissa, of course, but I wasn't very fond of the decor-"
"Cryssa, shut up," Malfoy ordered, a bit angry. She knew that he hated the slightest mention of his parents, and he knew that she was doing this deliberately as some sort of twisted revenge.
"Touchy, aren't we, Malfoy?" she asked, seemingly unaffected as she slid her arm through his own.
He rolled his eyes. "I know you're mad about Ginny, Cryssa. You aren't exactly a gifted actress."
"Mad?" she repeated loftily. "God, why? I don't know where you get your delusions, my darling, but I've been completely over you for quite sometime now."
"You're particularly unbearable today."
"Right back atcha."
He sighed in frustration. "Crys, just go home, okay?"
"What's wrong?" she responded, raising an eyebrow. "Did the Weasley refuse to forgive you? She may be smarter than I first gave her credit for."
"Goddammit, Cryssa, will you ever quit that superior bullshit?" Draco exploded angrily.
She smirked at him. "Language, Malfoy."
"Don't even think about doing anything to her, okay?" he snapped. "Don't even think about it, Cryssa."
"What are you talking about?" she responded, sounding a bit frustrated herself. "Do you realize how stupid you're being, Draco? Are you in love with that slime of society or what?"
Draco studied her silently, so angry that his blood seemed to boil. Oh, if only looks could kill...
"You're jealous," he finally said.
Cryssa laughed shortly. "What?!?"
"Jealous," Draco repeated simply. "You always thought that we'd wind up together again sooner or later, didn't you? And now that I've found someone else-"
"You idiot!" Cryssa shrieked - her eyes flashed, her cheeks were flushed in anger, and all dignity lay forgotten. "Malfoy, what the hell do you think you're doing?! That little Virginia girl obviously didn't like you as much as you like her. She's smitten with that Potter, even I could see that in the, what, thirty seconds I saw them together?" She shook her head in disgust. "Give it up, Malfoy."
She spun on her heel abruptly, heading toward the door.
"Don't do anything to her, Cryssa," Malfoy hissed menacingly.
Cryssa stood frozen for a moment before turning around to face him, violet eyes dancing as she replied in an edgy whisper.
"Fine. If that's what you want, fine. I want you to be happy, Draco, and if you think she's the one to do the job, then by all means, continue on." She paused; their gazes locked. "But don't you go accusing me of doing things to her. Don't. I'm not conspiring to kill your little girlfriend, Draco."
The air was thick with tension as they stared at one another, gray eyes piercing lilac ones.
Then finally-
"Good night, Cryssa," Draco said coldly, turning and retreating up the stairs. He heard her sigh behind him before her clicking footsteps filled his ears.
* * *
"Convenient, isn't it, that they left right before dish-washing time?" Ginny asked Harry, grinning as she made her way toward the kitchen. Sirius and Hadia had just left minutes before: Sirius had remembered a pre-scheduled meeting with Arthur Weasley and Remus Lupin at the Ministry of Magic.
"Very convenient," Harry agreed, smiling back. "Almost...too convenient."
"Dun dun dun," Ginny said dramatically, then swung open the door to the kitchen and stepped inside. Thanks to the fact that Harry, for some reason, hadn't washed the dishes earlier that day, the entire counter was covered with dirty dishes waiting to be washed.
Fun, fun, fun.
Humming to herself, Ginny mused over the evening's happenings as she began to fill the sink with water. It had been a loooong day; a violent argument with Ron, slight-but-just-perhaps-there flirtations with Harry, and even an apology from Draco Malfoy, something which seemed downright impossible.
And Cryssa...
Ginny shuddered as she poured a bit of Insta-Sparkle dish soap in with the water. Despite Malfoy's proclamations that Cryssa was 'just a woman', Ginny couldn't bring herself to believe that. The descendent of Salazar Slytherin...
There was something not right about her, and it wasn't just the snobbish attitude and eerily perfect appearance.
It was something...
Evil.
"Virginia."
Ginny froze at once at the sound of the voice, cold and malicious.
It's just the wind.
"My dear, sweet Virginia, do you see what you've become?"
Just the wind.
It wasn't Tom.
He was gone, he was dead, she'd witnessed his downfall.
It wasn't Tom.
Just the wind.
"Virginia, look at yourself. I've destroyed you. You will never be free of me. Never. I may disappear, I may seemingly be defeated, but I've woven myself inside your soul, my dear..."
"No," Ginny whispered as the voice, his voice, grew louder in her ears.
"You will never be free of me. You are me. I will always, always live on in you."
Ice seemed to run through her; shivers shook her slender frame, but she paid them no mind. Her eyes were squeezed shut, she was trying to ignore him, trying to ignore his voice, he wasn't real, oh, but it was so loud...louder and louder...Virginia...he wasn't here, not really, she was only remembering, only remembering, My sweet, darling Virginia but she wasn't hearing this it wasn't real he wasn't there he was gone he was dead he was gone he was dead I've destroyed you, you are me, we are one he was gone, he had left her, Harry had defeated him Always looking to your hero, aren't you Virginia? he was gone Harry would come it would be all right she was just thinking, just imagining He won't save you now, Virginia. Now he will loathe you. Who could love you, my dear, but myself? You are part of me she was dreaming a nightmare it was all just a nightmare it wasn't real she couldn't hear him those weren't his icy fingers against the back of her neck it would be all right Harry would save her Potter can't save you now, Virginia; my lovely, sweet Virginia, I run through your veins no no no no no no no no no no no I am inside your blood, your mind, your soul this wasn't real this wasn't real this wasn't real I will never leave you
You are mine, you are mine, you are mine, you are mine, YOU ARE MINE, YOU ARE MINE, YOU ARE MINE-
She screamed; a high, piercing scream that caused her ears to ring, but her voice couldn't stop. She had to keep screaming, Harry had to find her; the basilisk, the snake, it had been her! It was her fault, she'd hurt them, she was going to kill someone, Tom was going to kill Harry, Colin, Penelope, Hermione, Harry was going to hate her, he loved Hermione, Tom had said he loved Hermione, Tom had said he would never care about Ginny...she was a simpering fool, an idiot, pathetic - Tom had said this, Tom had said all these things. She couldn't breathe she was dying her vision swam and she could only see Tom he was going to kill Harry she had to save Harry he was going to die he was going to die she was going to die YOU ARE MINE
"Ginny!"
Harry.
Harry.
It was Harry, he'd come to save her, it would be all right.
Trembling, she opened her eyes.
And there was no chamber.
There was no Tom.
But there was smoke, murky silver smoke surrounding her; where had the smoke come from? Was there a fire; was the house burning, would Harry save her?
And then...
It wasn't only smoke.
There were words.
Words, and a skull, misty and transparent; a skull and a snake.
The Dark Mark.
And the words...that was how Tom had written, a bit scribbled, perfect handwriting gone astray...
Not words, only one word...all the others had faded...one word...
Fate.