Hello I know I have not been up to date AT ALL but here we are, Flying the Nest returns to your computers with a new part which I hope you will like. Thanks for the great reviews –keep em coming! And please check out my other fics which don't worry are both only one chapter –easier to read!

Love and kisses –skinnyrita xxx

Last line of prev part:

"Bellatrix Lestrange is dead."

FLYING THE NEST PART 15

Harry stood by the sink in the kitchen of Number 12 Grimmauld Place. He was peeling potatoes by hand. It was strangely relaxing. He focused on the little potato knife in his right hand, which slipped every so often and nicked his wrist before he could snatch it away. He studied the tiny scratches critically. He was out of practice. At peeling potatoes. Because he wasn't at the Dursleys' any more. He wondered what they were doing. Probably renting out his room. Nah, knocking the wall through to give Dudley more space most likely. He balanced the white, damp, squashed ball on top of the others in the colander, and reached for another one.

Ginny sat on a tall stool pointing her wand at a large cooking cauldron and muttering 'cook damn you, cook!' while giving Harry furtive glances, replaying his fit and his words over and over in her head:

H- Bellatrix Lestrange is dead.

Silence. H stares at Snape, who is white and has a knot in the hair near his left temple.

H- I saw her die.

S- I. She.

H -(in unnervingly calm voice) I didn't do my occlumency last night. I was too tired. I dreamt that Voldemort had sent the Lestranges on a mission. I saw his face. He was smiling.

Lupin -smiling?!

H- Smiling. They were sent to kill someone important. It wasn't me. It wasn't Dumbledore. They failed in their task. The man they were sent to kill was not at home. They did not find him. Bellatrix Lestrange asked Voldemort for more time. He told her: you are the reason the Ministry of Magic is looking for us. And now you can't even kill one man for me?

S- who did she have to kill?

H (ignores Snape)- He tortured her. With the cruciatus. I felt her pain. He showed no mercy. She is dead.

Malfoy -Jesus.

Lupin- who were they sent to kill Harry?

Silence. Harry looks at Snape, and Snape knows.

H- Severus Snape.

Ginny began levitating the potatoes over the cooking cauldron, amusing herself trying to keep them up while they were sliced. She wasn't a very domestic person. The potato she was working on fell with a loud plop into the cauldron and stew leapt out onto the stove and spat at her. Harry finely chopped the remaining potatoes with the finesse of a natural chef and sprinkled them evenly into the mixture. Ginny armed herself with a long handled wooden fork with long prongs like a trident and poked the contents of the cauldron dubiously.

"How long will it take to cook, d'you reckon?"

"Half an hour or so. You can test it," said Harry, wandering over to a cupboard and extracting a butterbeer. "Want one?"

"OK."

They opened the bottles and set the stew for a long simmer. Ginny tried to transfigure the stool into an armchair and managed a car seat. She settled back and surveyed the cauldron, which was bubbling quietly and giving off steam. Harry seated himself at the kitchen table and stretched out so that his legs covered three chairs. They drank for a while.

"What did it feel like?" asked Ginny, very quietly. Almost a whisper into her bottle. Harry rubbed his nose. He couldn't pretend he didn't know what she was talking about.

"Like being ripped apart. Inside. I've ...felt it before." Ginny spilt some of her butterbeer on the car seat but didn't say anything. "But this was worse. It was incredible. And it seemed to go on and on for ages."

"It wasn't you know."

"I know. But it felt like ages. And then it got really, really bad, and I knew that He must be getting really pissed off. She was screaming. I was screaming. I was her. And then it stopped."

"Because she was dead."

"Yes."

"Oh."

They drank again. Harry shook his fringe out of his eyes and rested an arm on the table. Ginny relaxed. Then Harry laughed. Ginny's drink went down the wrong way and she sat up suddenly, coughing -his laugh was so unexpected in the circumstances. Harry waited for her to calm down.

"Now I want to ask YOU a question." he smirked into his bottle. Ginny whacked herself in the chest and gave a loud and final cough.

"What?" she croaked.

"What's going on with you and Draco?"

Ginny blinked. Harry tilted his head sideways and looked at her. His cheekbones shone in the firelight, and green eyes sparkled with mischief.

"Nothing," said Ginny, a little too quickly. She pursed her lips and turned her attention to the cauldron. Harry snorted.

"I've seen him looking at you, you know. He's grown up a bit. We all have."

"Really?" Ginny's spoon paused on its journey round the bottom of the bowl, scraping at the slightly burnt bits. "Well. I couldn't care."

Harry was about to answer her when the door opened and Snape entered with Draco behind him.

"A word, Potter."

Ginny turned to the stove, concentrating on her culinary skills, with her back to Draco. He picked up Harry's half drunk butterbeer, took a swig, and swallowed because his throat was dry.

"That's Harry's one," said Ginny, without looking round. Draco smirked and picked up Ginny's instead. "Back-wash in that and I'll jinx you so many times you'll end up as a butterbeer."

"Why would you think I'd do that?"

"I have six brothers." Ginny stirred the stew three times clockwise and once anticlockwise.

"Your cooking usually good, or should I order takeaway?"

"Potions was never my strong point," said Ginny ruefully, ladling up a spoonful of beef and potatoes to inspect it. She needed Harry to come back and fix the dinner. She needed Draco to go away. Draco observed the car seat for a moment, and transfigured it into an armchair first time. Ginny groaned inwardly. "Were you looking for something?" Shit, that was rude.

"Drink. Company other than Snape. Armchair."

Ginny turned around and looked at Draco. His eyes were closed, face tilted to the ceiling and slightly toward the fireplace. She examined his neck. It was long and pale.

She wanted to touch that neck. Damn it.

"They found out I was a spy from Bernard Prod. He was an auror they captured weeks ago. We thought he was dead, but now it turns out that he was tortured and he told."

"Why would he tell? They killed him anyway."

"Everyone talks on the third day."

"You didn't."

Snape stopped pacing the study and stared at Harry.

"Dumbledore told me. You didn't talk, so they decided you had nothing to hide and welcomed you back. How did you stay quiet under veritaserum?"

"I invented a counter-potion."

"Bloody hell."

"It was never completed. I had been perfecting it on the day they came for me, and slipped the vial into my pocket. It was the only sample. The lab was destroyed. There is no way of getting it back now."

"You could use Occlumency."

"Occlumency! Potter, why didn't you do your Occlumency?! Idiot boy! Your father was foolhardy and cocksure too. As you were inside the mind of Bellatrix Lestrange, you could have been passing information of this place on to Him!"

"But you wouldn't have known they were after you again."

"Damn it Potter! You will make me lose my temper; do you really think all our spy hopes rest on me? Just one man?! I have had no less than eleven owls today informing me of His plans. If you will not listen to me, then listen to Dumbledore: you must do your occlumency!"

Harry gazed about at the room from his seat in one of the twin armchairs. He hadn't been in here since he had arrived. The desk was littered with papers and scrolls that he couldn't see, and there were five cages each housing an owl completely different from its neighbour. He was itching to go and look at the Order plans on the desk, but he didn't dare move. Snape began pacing again.

Ginny reached out a quivering forefinger and touched Draco's neck. It was cold. He tensed but didn't open his eyes. They heard their heartbeats hammering in their heads. Her fingertip travelled upwards, ghosting over his Adam's apple, coming to rest on the right side of his face. He opened his eyes, which were cool grey with long silver eyelashes. He looked up at her. The orangey light caught her hair, so that her face was wreathed in flames. They stared at each other.

Then Draco Malfoy, Heir of Lucius Malfoy, the great enemy of Arthur Weasley, pulled Ginny Weasley towards him and their lips met for exactly twenty-three point seven seconds.

"Professor?"

"What."

"I need to check on the dinner. Ginny's not very... experienced."

"Go away then."

Harry closed the study door quietly and crept down the stairs. He was met at the top of the stairs down to the kitchen by Ginny coming the other way. She gave him a guilty look and vanished up to her room. In the study above, Snape poured a large measure of Odgen's old Firewhiskey and downed it. Harry entered the kitchen and registered Draco sitting in an armchair, staring at the cauldron, which was bubbling over.

"Ok Draco, what did you do to her?"

END OF PART 15.

ok that was quite long but hey, I got into it.

Please review –next part up soon –I hope! Xxxxxxxx