"Don't be silly! It's only a little water!" She coaxed, her hair slicked to her head and face and her white t-shirt and jeans soaked through so that he could see the pink bra beneath.

"Yes, but its wet!" He argued back, standing underneath the porch-like overhanging. She was standing in the pouring rain, soaked to the bone, trying to convince him that it was fun. Fun to look at? Yes.

"Draco, what are you so afraid of? Washing the gel out of your hair?" She teased, taking a step closer. He rolled his eyes, but took a step back.

"I don't wear gel anymore, but even if I did that wouldn't be the reason. It's just… silly!" He insisted, unsure why he was still arguing with her. She was going to win. He knew that, and so did she.

"That's the point! Come on Draco. Come out now, or you're going to be grounded." She warned. Draco thought for a moment, staring at her serious face. Could she really do that?

Yes, he decided. Yes she could.

"Oh fine." He took off his outer robe as to have something to wrap around Ginny when she began complaining of the cold. Then he took a cautious step out from under the overhang only to have her grab his hand and pulled him out several feet.

She giggled happily and jumped on him. Sure, it only succeeded in getting him wetter, but her closeness balanced out the negatives.

She pulled away and went in to kiss him. He let her for a moment before pulling away and looking around worriedly.

"Ginny, are you crazy? Someone could see!" He warned, though it probably would have been more convincing if he could wipe the grin off his face.

"So what! I don't care anymore! I want the world to know-" she held her arms out and started shouting "- that I love Draco Malfoy!" She spun around in giggles, but he grabbed her and ran them over to the side of the castle.

"Yes, and I love you too. What's gotten into you today?" He asked, making sure they were hidden from view.

"More like what got into me yesterday!" She teased, and he smacked her on the arm. "Ow!"

"Behave yourself!" He commanded, smiling all the same. He couldn't help it; she was adorable, and he knew he couldn't control her anymore than he could control his face.

She reached up to kiss him again, and this time he let her. She wrapped her arms tightly around his neck and pushed herself against him. It was only then that he remembered they were soaking wet with the rain still coming down around them.

He gently pulled away. "Let's go inside, hmm? Get some hot chocolate?" He asked.

She smiled. "Okay." She quickly kissed him again, and then they began heading back to the overhang.

He drapped his cloak around her like he had planned and she took it without protest.

"You want to go first or should I?" She asked, motioning to the door.

"You go ahead. I'll be up in a minute with the hot chocolates." He pushed her towards the door. She waved and went inside to go up to his head boy quarters.

He stood outside for a few more minutes, watching the rain…

A crash of thunder woke him up. He started, and only then did he realize that he was alone. He quickly put on his outer robes and went outside.

It was pouring rain.


Draco soon realized that married life, for now, was going to work to his advantage. He and Blaise got to share a tent, so at night, he could go to sleep while she meditated, and when she was done she would get up and write. Neither of them bothered the other, and they didn't get any unwanted interaction this way, either. It's wasn't paradise, but it was a gentle reprieve from the harshness around them.

Draco's mother and Blaise's family had left the day after the ceremony. Draco had only learned a bit more about Zeels in the time he'd seen them, but he'd learned they all had colors given to them at birth.

Blaise's color was purple, just like her father. But her mother's was red, and her younger sister blue. While they all had purple eyes, their colors designated their way of study, and helped determine their protective animal. Draco made a note to have Blaise fill him in on her religion some day.

After that, things were almost normal, despite the comments and innuendoes he would receive from others he worked with. Days passed quickly in this new routine, and it was easy just to blend with the flow.

It would be winter soon, and the days were growing shorter. The weight tied to his arm was growing heavier.


"And would you believe, little whelp tried to talk to me too! Started begging about his family." Flint tore into a piece of meat like an animal. Before chewing, "I said to him, you should have thought of them before, shouldn't you?" There was a chorus of applause from around the small fire.

Draco picked apart the roasted meat carefully and with severe concentration, as much as to delay eating it as to ignore the conversation.

"Bunch of slim anyways, the lot of them." Petri Gray piped up from across the fire. "Always gripin' and complainin' about a better world! What's any better about their world than ours, aye?" He asked, standing. A few cheers and muffled laughs echoed around. "This is our world too, ain't it? Why's we got to share it? It ain't our fault if a few of their do-gooders were in the wrong place at the wrong time. They think they're so high and mighty, sitting there in their pretty towns. But we'll show them! Each and every one of them! We'll kill 'em all, and then we'll bath our clothes in their blood and hang their heads-" He grabbed the person next to him by the hair "- on our doors!"

A round of drunken cheers echoes around. Petri Gray was an older man, probably in his late 50's. He had been a Death Eater since he was 18, but he'd never moved up in ranks. Some believed it was the fact that his spells always seemed to go awry, usually missing anyways because of his blind left eye. Others believed it was due to the long term stay at St Mungo's from the prolonged sufferance under the Crutiatus curse and the Imperius curses from the Dark Lord himself. Honestly, the only reasons the Dark Lord had allowed him to join again was because he was still living after that kind of sufferance.

Draco pushed some of the over dry meat into his mouth and chewed, smirking at the current conversation but not participating.

"Pipe down Gray!" Nott said from beside him. "What do you know about any of that anyways? When we do win this war, most of us will be dead and the few that are left can enjoy the spoils. Until the Dark Lord kills each and every one of us off, so that he can rule eternally, by himself, sitting of his great fat hinny!" Several people laughed, but Flint grabbed Nott's arm and pulled him close, hushing everyone in the process.

"Are you crazy? Get down." He forced him into a crouch. "He's up there you know, watchin'." He nodded to the high tower. "He doesn't take kindly to treasoner's. You know what happens. You best watch your mouth running off Nott, or you'll be next." He let go of Nott's arm and went back to his roasted meat. Nott glanced uneasily up at the high tower, as did many others. Draco glanced out of amusement, but was surprised to see an eerie fire light up in the tower for the first time in months. If you looked closely enough, you could see the shadow of a slim figure just to the side of the window, though Draco doubted it was really the dark lord. It had a woman's grace to it, and Draco had a feeling that the one doing the watching was his aunt, and not his soon-to-be uncle.

A hand on his arm startled him, and he turned to see Blaise next to him.

"Excuse me gentlemen, but you won't mind if I borrow my husband?" She said politely, with a hint of threat under her breath. Several sniggers and arm jabs chorused, but Draco paid little attention. This was the first time Blaise had really had something to tell him in a while and he could only wonder what it was.

She pulled him away into the shadows of their tent and drew him close.

"Draco, it's Ginny." Out of all the things he had expected to come out of her mouth, that had been the last.

"What!"

"She's in the dungeons. The new prisoners we got in today, she was with them." Blaise spoke hurriedly, in hushed tones. Draco could feel his mind begin to fog with emotion and his heart began to beat rapidly.

"Where is she?" He asked quickly.

"In one of the highest floors. The Dark Lord remembers her and he wants her tortured for fun after they get some information from her, on public display." Blaise warned, taking a step back in fear of his rage.

"No! I won't let him!" He shouted. Blaise pressed a finger to his lips.

"I know. And that's why I'm going to help you. I can take you to see her now, but you have to stay calm." She warned, handing him his mask. Draco nodded and began to follow her to the castle dungeons. "Follow my lead." She whispered as they approached the gate.

"We need another for night duty." She told the guard, who tonight was one of the initiates from the ceremony they had witnessed. The chubby boy nodded and let them in.

Once passed the gates, they walked towards the stairs and took them two at a time. Blaise signaled him to wait in a corner. He watched as she backtracked her steps and opened a cell door. There were guards farther down the corridors, patrolling, and one just ahead.

Blaise flicked her wand from inside her robes and the prisoner (who had at the last moment been completely calm and stone faced) started flailing about and screaming. Blaise looked at him and he understood. Distraction.

Several of the guards ahead were coming down the corridor now, and Blaise made no effort to spare the prisoners pain. They kicked and tried to subdue him, but to no avail. Draco made sure no one was looking and turned the corner.

He raced down the corridors, glancing in every cell. He was close to the end of the hallway when he glanced in a cell that appeared to be empty. But it wasn't. Draco skidded to a stop and peered in the corner of the cell where her bright red hair gave her away. Except for that, she was hidden in shadow. She glanced up at him fiercely and defiantly, just like she always had. She was pale and thin, and her red hair which had at one time been long and luxurious was now shortened to her ears in a sort of boy cut. But she was still beautiful.

"What do you want, Death Eater?" She spat the words, beginning to draw herself up and he remembered that she could not see him. He knew he needed to say something, but no words would come to his lips. Finally, the only thing he could think to say was a well memorized quote.

"For the memory of love… is sweet… though the love itself were in vain… And what I have lost of pleasure… assuage what I find of pain." He practically whispered the words but he knew she heard them. Her expression turned from stone cold to shocked and scared.

"Draco?" She breathed, coming closer to the bars of the cell which Draco was now pressed against. He brought his hand up and lifted his mask so that she could see his face. Before either could say a word she was crying and she lunged herself at the bars.

His lips met hers in a hungry, dream like kiss. It was through the bars of the cage, and thus hard to hold each other, but Ginny clutched and the front of his robes and he took her hands in his.

"Oh, you're alive!" She whispered happily. She reached out and pressed her hands to his face. He wasn't used to the touch of flesh anymore, and her warm hands brushing back and forth across his cold face made him shiver involuntarily.

"What are you doing here?" He whispered harshly, reaching up and grabbing her hands.

"We were out collecting our dead from a battle and we were ambushed. We thought it was over, but then they brought us here." Ginny explained in a rushed whisper. Other prisoners were beginning to stand and listen now, and Draco knew he had to hurry.

"Listen, I'll come back for you tonight, after the guard has decreased. Stay where you were until then. The less attention you draw to yourself, the better." He kissed her hands. They could hear footsteps by now from down the corridor, and Draco realized Blaise's distraction could only last so long. "I will come back." He promised. He stepped away and put on his mask and began to turn away.

"Draco!" She stopped him. "I love you."

He didn't answer and didn't look back. He just kept walking.