Shadows

Rating: PG-13

Summery: "He painted a pretty picture for you, didn't he Ron, what with all of his colorful lies and empty promises, how could I possibly compete with that?" A series of events leads Ron to the dark side, can anyone bring him back?

Disclaimer: Anything that you recognize I don't own

A/N I'm really sorry that it's been over a week since I last updated this story. I have been so busy lately I haven't had time to work on any of the stories that I have on ff.net. I have to get some original stuff together so I can get into this writing class that I wanted to take, so that's taking priority right now.

Chapter Five

Career Day

I awoke the next morning after only a few hours of sleep. I found the house to still be dark and quiet and decided to take advantage of the opportunity at hand. I quickly found some parchment and scribbled down a note stating that I had errands to run and would return shortly.

What they didn't know wouldn't hurt them. I grabbed a fistful of floo powder and went straight to Hogsmeade, where I hoped that there was less of a chance of seeing someone that I knew.

When I arrived I looked down mournfully at my now soot covered clothes; I was really going to have to learn how to apparate. I brushed myself off the best that I could and left the pub that I had came into to.

I smiled at my decision to come to Hogsmeade upon walking out onto the street, which was currently empty. Diagon Alley is busy no matter what time you go there, and you can always be guaranteed that you will see at least one person that you know.


Well I didn't want to see anyone that I knew. And I didn't want anyone I knew to see me, so this was all for the better. If I was going to be made a fool I better be bloody well sure that I could suffer the embarrassment on my own and not burden my friends and family with it.

I had been told in extreme discretion that if you wanted to find a job, you would find it in the morning that you wanted it the most. Or rather, it would find you. I am well aware that it sounds like a strange myth, but my brother Bill had no direction in life after Hogwarts -a fact that he has mentioned to me alone- and one day he was walking around Diagon Alley feeling sorry for himself when he tripped over a goblin.

Now normally goblins are mean feisty little creatures that will kick and bite you if you did something such as trip over them, but this particular goblin was every bit as depressed as Bill. They were understaffed at the moment at Gringotts and had no way of keeping up with their ever-growing business. They only had goblins working at that time, it was an unofficial rule of theirs, but since goblins were a dying breed help was hard to come by.

So the goblin was walking searching for an answer, when according to Bill, he slammed straight into one. After a few drinks with my eldest brother the goblin decided that wizards and witches were the way to go. They would hire people to work for them. And so they hired Bill, and he has been there ever since.

It sounds like a long and farfetched story but Bill staked his life on it. And I'm getting really desperate, so here I am, walking the streets of Hogsmeade waiting to walk straight into the answer that I have been waiting for.

I stood on the street for about five minutes before feeling absolutely silly. I looked around and noticed some of the shops; maybe my answer was in one of those.

My eyes quickly scanned the row of shops before falling onto Honeydukes. I licked my lips at the thought of having a sweet, but I knew that I must choose another store, whom could I possibly meet in a candy shop? Finally though my appetite won out over my sensibility and I made my way to the shop with a smile playing on my lips.

I vaguely registered that a bell had loudly chimed at my entrance to the store as I walked down the nearest aisle. As I was looking around for the sugar quills I saw another customer walking down the opposite side of the aisle. As he walked closer I saw that to my surprise that none other than Albus Dumbledore was coming towards me with an ever-present twinkle in his eyes.

"Mr. Weasley," he said pleasantly, "I did not expect to find you on my weekly trip for sweets. It is a little early, is it not, for you to be in Hogsmeade?"

I shifted my eyes away in discomfort, "um, yeah, well you know, never too early for a sugar fix."

He smiled slightly, "indeed. Perhaps if you are not too busy you would not mind joining me for a drink; I have always been rather fond of butterbeer in the morning."

I lifted my eyebrows in my confusion; the headmaster wanted me to join him for a butterbeer? But then again, a drink did sound rather appealing… "Sure," I said with a shrug, "I would love to join you for a drink Professor Dumbledore."

The headmaster held up a hand in defense, "please Mr. Weasley, you are no longer my student, you may call me Albus."

"Uh, all right then, Albus." God, now I felt old. The only people that I knew that called him Albus where my parents and people just as old as my parents. All of my brothers still called him Professor Dumbledore; it just seemed strange to call him anything else.

I spotted the sugar quills and quickly grabbed a box. I made my way to the counter with Profes-Albus and we respectively paid for our purchases.

I found my heartbeat picking up as we walked to the Three Broomsticks. I had always been uncomfortable to be alone in the presence of the headmaster. I silently wished that Hermione were with me, she would not allow me to say anything embarrassing or stupid.

But I didn't have Hermione; I would face the situation alone. We reached our destination in silence, only broken by Dumbledore greeting the waiter who was near the door. We took our seats and hastily ordered two butterbeers.

"So tell me Ronald, how have you been since your graduation?"

"Fine, everything has been going really well," I lied quickly.

"Ah, yes I did hear about your…interesting day in Diagon Alley with your sister and a certain Mr. Malfoy." I looked up at him in surprise and saw with some annoyance that he looked extremely amused.

"Yes well it seems that my sister has presently lost her mind, we are hoping for a quick recovery." I was gratified to see that his amusement faded slightly, this was not a laughing situation.

"Ronald, may I be frank with you?"

I resisted the urge to answer; sure can I still be Ron? "Of course."

"I know a great deal of things that go on in my school, I knew when Virginia began seeing young Malfoy. I will not indulge you in lies that he has changed, that he fights for the light; for he is neutral at the moment."

I gave an agitated groan, "why are you telling me this?"

He ignored my obvious plea for the conversation to end. "She is happy Ronald, and while I have not always been aware of his intentions I would daresay that he is happy also."

The butterbeers arrived and I took an immediate swig of one. "She is acting selfishly, she doesn't care what this will do to our family, she only cares about herself."

"But love," he said with a smile, "is never selfish." I glared at my former headmaster and he dropped the subject with a sigh, "I see that there is no changing your mind on the matter. This is not the matter which I felt important to discuss with you anyhow."

"And what," I said grateful to have something else to talk about, "did you want to talk to me about?"

"What are you planning to do, now that you are finished with school Ronald?"

I cast my eyes down on my drink, ashamed of my lack of direction. "I do not know."

His smile returned as he leaned back in his chair. "Have any of your family members told you of the demise of the Order?"

I quickly looked up, surprise evident in my face, "there isn't an Order of the Phoenix anymore?"

"I fear," he said looking at me gravely, "that we were too anxious for recruits and warriors for the light."

"But, what about the war? What's going to happen, are you just giving up?"

"I would never just 'give up' Ronald, I am merely seeking alternate means."

I nodded as if I understood exactly what he was talking about; but I had no clue. This was horrible; the Order was the only hope that I saw that we had against you-know-who. "Why did you stop it though, what happened to make the Order fail?"

"Are you aware of Professor Snape's current situation Ronald?"

I searched my mind for anything on the subject but came up with nothing. He had not been around for the last few weeks of school; we had heard that he was on a mission of some sorts. Then it clicked in my mind, he must have went back to the dark side! I always knew that he would be a traitor. "Did he betray us sir?"

Dumbledore looked at me sternly, "Severus would never betray the Order, of that I am sure. No Ronald, he was found out by Voldemort," I flinched noticeably, "I fear that no one has heard from him or of him in weeks."

I was slightly embarrassed that I had just been scolded for my quick accusations. "How was he found out?"

"Voldemort," I cringed again, "sent one of his own to spy on the Order. I am afraid that it was someone that I had trusted once and apparently was too quick to trust again. He now knows of all the members and is doing all he can to capture them all. I terminated the Order to ensure the safety of its members."

I felt bad that Professor Snape had been found out but couldn't bring myself to feel regret. "Why are you telling me all of this?"

Dumbledore no longer looked amused and happy, "because Ronald while the Order is no more we still need warriors. Without Severus I have no way of knowing what is happening on the other side. I am recruiting you."

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A/N All right so did everyone see that coming? Hopefully not. Ron is still going to be eventually dark but I really think that it would take a lot for him to go to that side, a hell of a lot more than some simple jealously over Harry. If you have any questions please leave them in a review or feel free to e-mail me. Also, please leave a review even if you have no questions, it's always nice to know that people are following my stories. Later!

Thank you so much to:

Ace of Spades (Ha, yeah 'Cleo' was always one of my favorite infomercial people to make fun of…I think that she is currently in jail somewhere.), Silent Bob 546 (Aw, thanks for the cookies and ice cream! I'm much better now though, thank goodness, because it sucked so much to not be able to eat!), Eveningstar5 (I know, sorry about the short chapters. This one was a little longer though! I'll try to make them longer in the future, I promise!), Lily~Evans (Of course I'm still working on this, lol, you can't get rid of me that easily. Updates will just be slow for awhile though because I'm really busy.), o0true0o (Well I haven't really said that he is a seer yet…but I think that it's easy to guess. What predictions has he made in the books? I have a really bad memory about that sort of stuff.), Godes of the Moon (Lol, it will definitely be a while before the 'fluff' comes into the picture. I'm a sucker for it though so there will be some before the end of the story!), tiffany-45 (thank you! I'm glad that you are following the story without any problems and it is very nice to hear that you think it's different from all the other stories!), RonandHerm4eva (Ha, nice to know that I can still write while doped up. I had to get my wisdom teeth out last week so that's what I was suffering through. I looked really pathetic sitting at my computer with my mouth all puffed out, lol.), Micemix( All right, so we all know that Voldemort will die in the last book, but we'll just pretend that he didn't so my story can work, lol. You're right though, if Ron was a true seer Voldemort would want him. This will be a R/Hr, but not for some time.), Stompy-Sanji (Thank you so much, I'm glad that you like the plot idea. Thanks for reading Cruel Beauty as well, and to answer your question Velena took in Ginny as a final revenge against her sister, to make Ginny evil. I'll be sure to send you out an e-mail too.), FantasyAngel Writer (Well, I know what the silver misty thing is but I would really love to hear what you think it is! I assure you that you're probably right, and even if you're not I won't laugh or anything. And I really like your comparison between Ron and Voldemort, but only time will tell on that one, lol.)

I'll try to get the next chapter out soon!