Disclaimer: I don't own anything Harry Potter.
A/N: Well, kids, I totally lied back in Chapter 12. NOW we're entering the final story arc. Hopefully, with summer coming up and everything, I can have MVV finished in the next chapter. It's a sad day for me to see it go…seeing as I've worked on it on and off for more than a year. Anyway, I've got the ending all planned out so we'll see how that goes, eh?
Chapter Sixteen: I'm in Chains
"Oomph!" Ginny grunted as she landed in the fireplace of Malfoy Manor, Harry's arm firmly strapped under her own. She tried to handle him as gently as she could, but he was so damn heavy.
It was too dark in the room she entered. Ginny dragged Harry out of the hearth and tried to dust him off best she could, avoiding his moving eyes. It was a horrid thing to see Harry's eyes move about as he watched his best friend's sister betray him. Ginny was swatting off the last particles of dust when a cold, familiar voice washed over her.
"Ginny – you have been most faithful," Voldemort said lightly, waving his wand carelessly. Numerous candles surrounding them ignited. Lucius entered with Macnair, Crabbe, and Goyle flanking him.
"You aren't going to kill him, are you?" Ginny asked helplessly. There was a note of hope in her voice, perhaps the only bit left.
Voldemort chuckled. "I would think you'd know better by now. We're not going to kill him. You are."
Ginny gasped. "What?"
Lucius spoke up. "It was an ingenious plan, thought of by our most clever Lord. It would be a fitting 'initiation,' so to speak."
"You can't be serious," she stated solemnly. This had to be a joke. Ginny couldn't possibly kill Harry, not even for Draco.
"Oh, but we are." Voldemort approached Ginny. He raised a long, spindly hand and gently cupped her face. "You remind me of a dying flower, Ginny. You were once so lovely and pure, now blackening into rotten corruption."
Ginny wrenched her face away from Voldemort, keenly aware of Harry's ability to hear and see. "I am not like you. I will not kill Harry."
Voldemort's spindly hand reacted like a whip and struck out against Ginny's face. She reeled back in surprise and pain, clutching her cheek, breathing heavily.
"You forget where your loyalties lie." He grabbed Ginny's sleeve roughly and wrenched it upward, revealing the menacing Dark Mark. She shuddered at its sight. "You will do as we say, or Draco will die because of you."
Those words stung her more than the slap, and she bristled. Clutching her wand, she watched Voldemort and his bumbling cronies exit the room. They left her with warnings and instructions to practice the Killing Curse.
Outside the room, Voldemort was approached by a nervous Lucius.
"You don't think she'll let him out of the Body-binding Curse, do you, my Lord?"
"There is a chance, of course. I would like to see what our Ginny is made of."
"Forgive me for being so foolish, but what do you mean?" Lucius replied humbly. He often overdid his act around Voldemort.
"If she does not let him go, then we know she is fiercely loyal. If she lets him go, then we know she has a certain brave quality to her. If she chooses the latter, we'll have to kill her. If the former, she'll be a healthy new edition to the Death Eaters. Either way, we win."
Lucius sneered. "What if Potter fights us and…wins?"
Voldemort's lips tightened. "I have been beaten far too many times by Potter – by luck – to let it happen again. He will not escape."
Back in the room, Ginny was pacing back and forth, gripping both her and Harry's wands in her sweaty hands. She was mumbling to herself, throwing worried glances at Harry. Suddenly, she stopped pacing and approached the frozen statue of Harry.
Taking a deep breath, she kissed Harry on the cheek with tears in her eyes. "Oh, Harry. I'm so sorry for having done this to you. I don't care what happens to me anymore. You just have to get out of here." Harry's eyes widened as he realized what Ginny was going to do.
She carefully dragged him back into the fireplace and tossed the Floo powder into the fire, instantly changing the red fire into green. Ginny had to undo the spell, but also make sure he couldn't move before she shouted his destination. It was all too tricky.
"Hogwarts!" Ginny shouted, but quickly added the spell to undo the Body-binding Curse.
Harry reached out of the swirling green hearth, yelling for Ginny, but it was too late. He was gone, and Ginny was left alone in Malfoy Mansion to face Voldemort on her own.
Harry landed face first onto the concrete floor of the dungeon he was in previously with Ginny. He still had not gotten the hang of traveling by Floo Powder. Harry pushed his glasses further up on his soot-covered nose and high-tailed it for the Gryffindor common room. As far as he knew, Ginny was going to sacrifice herself to save both him and Draco.
"Why didn't she come with me?" he wondered out loud as he sped through the corridors, causing more than one portrait to shake two-dimensional fists in fury. Harry burst through the Fat Lady's swinging portrait and tumbled through the other side, landing in a heap in the common room. Curious eyes peered over at him, and Ron and Hermione jumped up from their seats by the fireplace.
"Harry, you look like you took a bath in ashes. What's wrong with you?"
Harry stood up and shook his head, sending particles of ash everywhere. "Ginny's in trouble," he said quietly. "She tried to…" Harry hesitated, not wanting to put Ginny in a bad light. "She was trying to save Malfoy, and I guess Voldemort told her she had to bring me to him. She did, but then she realized it was…I don't know, a bad idea. She threw me back into the fireplace before I could help. She's back at Malfoy Manor, Ron – we've got to do something!"
"Why didn't you struggle?" Ron asked.
"She put me in a Body-binding Curse."
Hermione put a hand up to her mouth. "Oh, Harry. What are we going to do? Should we get Dumbledore?"
Harry shook his head. "No way. We have to go right now." He turned to Ron. "Do you have any Floo Powder?"
Ron nodded. "Just a little."
"How much is 'a little?'"
Ron tightened his lips and said quietly, "Enough for three people, if used sparingly."
Harry nodded and Ron left to retrieve the Floo powder. Hermione tapped her foot impatiently.
"Maybe you shouldn't come, Harry," she said quietly.
"What? Are you crazy?" Harry asked incredulously.
"No, just logical. Think about it. Voldemort's bound to be much angrier at you because his initial plan failed. If you're there, he's going to target you."
"Right, drawing the attention away from you, Ron, and Ginny."
Hermione huffed. "You are such a git!"
Ron reappeared at their sides and already had enough of the arguing. "My sister happens to be in life-threatening danger – may we go now?"
Ginny had been sitting in the room by herself for quite some time, rocking back and forth on the floor, clutching her robes and shaking uncontrollably. She was terrified. Selfish though it was at the moment, she was insanely afraid to die, though in her heart she knew she would.
The doorknob twisted threateningly, catching Ginny's attention. She instinctively moved away from the door, as if a greater distance could prevent her death. The door creaked open slowly, and Voldemort glided in as if he walked on the air.
"Ginny, I am so disappointed in you," he said softly. Voldemort turned to Lucius. "Lucius, you know what to do. Bring her downstairs and wait for their arrival."
Lucius grabbed Ginny by the wrist and dragged her forward. She was far too shocked to move properly, so she just let herself go like a rag doll and let Lucius guide her.
"It would have been better if you just killed Potter," Lucius snarled. "But you are a stupid girl," he added, laughing cruelly.
Ginny remained silent. She had already begun that cliché flashback of her life, beginning with her childhood and continuing until the present. She tried to pinpoint the exact moment in which she condemned herself to such a fate, and she chose the first time her lips first touched Draco's. It was such an unearthly event to have taken place; surely that would be the moment to alter her life to turn out like this. Ginny allowed her eyes to flutter shut, reliving the kiss in her mind. The warmth of Draco's breath seemed to hover over her and mingle with her own in a ghostly reminder of their first kiss, breathing life into her chapped and lonely lips. Ginny faintly remembered the lightheaded feeling that permeated her mind as the kiss deepened –
"Weasley!" Lucius snapped, waking her out of her reverie. "Bring your wrists up here."
He raised Ginny's arms and snapped her into shackles. Her feet barely scraped the ground and the pressure on her wrists from hanging was enough pain to generate tears. Lucius noticed this at once.
"Are you crying for Draco, Ginny?" he asked scornfully, misinterpreting her silent crying.
"No," she said, her teeth gritted.
Lucius smirked knowingly and left her in the dank cell. Ginny tried her hardest to gain her footing, but the ground was so wet that she slipped, her wrists yanking the chains that held her. She felt the metal cut into her wrists sharply and blood slowly dribbled down her arm. She managed to subdue the whimper of pain that threatened to escape from her throat. Ginny swallowed forcefully and forced the cries back into her chest. She would not cry.