Chapter One Hundred and Sixteen: Back to the Burrow
Daphne woke up to find Ginny already up. She was staring out of the window, idly petting Nyx.
"Morning," she said, sounding a bit awkward.
"Morning. Sleep well?" Daphne asked.
Ginny shrugged. "I guess. At least I was with you. Er, d'you think I can borrow some clothes, by the way? I…didn't exactly bring anything with me when I snuck out," she said.
Daphne laughed. "Help yourself. We don't really have the same size though, do we?"
Ginny grinned. "Harry's worn clothes that were too big for him for years. I can manage for a short while, I think."
Not much later, the two of them headed down for breakfast.
"Edmund's talking to your parents right now," Mum said when she spotted Ginny. Then she noticed Ginny was wearing Daphne's robes and laughed. "Oh God, that looks hilarious," she said.
"It's only a bit too long," Daphne said in Ginny's defense.
"A bit? I'm amazed she made it down the stairs without breaking her neck," Mum said. "Finny?"
Finny appeared with a crack. "Yes, Mistress Amaranth?"
"Get the camera, please. I need to take a picture of this…"
"Mum!" Daphne said, horrified. She could see Ginny turning red in embarrassment.
Mum waved her away. "Oh, come on, as if you wouldn't do exactly the same thing."
Finny returned with the camera and Mum gestured at Ginny to step a bit away from the table. Daphne sighed and hung her head, while Ginny sheepishly allowed Mum to take a few pictures.
"I'm sure Molly will get a laugh out of these as well," Mum said, putting away the camera.
Dad Apparated into the kitchen. When he spotted Ginny, he masked his chuckle as a cough, and Ginny gave Daphne a resigned look.
"I took pictures," Mum said.
Dad grinned at her. "I knew I could count on you."
He turned back to Ginny. "Molly isn't particularly happy with you," he said, growing serious again. "She'll allow you to stay here for the rest of the week — mostly so she can cool down a bit — but she expects you back afterward. Daphne can go with you, and Hermione will arrive by then as well. Harry, of course, will come a bit later. The matter of his security is still being arranged, and until that's done he'll be safest with his Muggle relatives under the blood bond."
He smirked again. "And we'll ask Finny to pick up some of your own clothes. As much as Amaranth and I think it's funny to see you walking around in robes that are just a bit too long for you, I can imagine you'd prefer something your actual size."
Ginny nodded slowly. "Thanks," she said.
Dad waved it away. "Don't worry about it. So what will you be doing over the next week? I doubt you'll be focusing on school work much."
Daphne and Ginny exchanged a look. "No, probably not," Daphne said. "I think it'll mostly be focusing on dueling practice. There really isn't much else we can do for the time being."
Just like she'd said, Daphne and Ginny spent most of their time dueling each other. It was clear to Daphne that Ginny was taking things far more seriously than she'd done in their practice duels in the Room of Requirement, and Daphne responded in kind.
At times, their fights were almost vicious, not because they wanted to hurt each other, but because they wanted to prevent the other from getting hurt for real. Dad was often away for Order business, but when he had time, he helped them refine their techniques and tactics, even allowing Daphne and Ginny to both fight him at the same time, going all out. While he was still able to defeat the two of them, he did admit he had to get properly serious to pull it off, and he said that in a real situation, using the element of surprise would likely allow them to win quite a few fights, even against stronger opponents.
Daphne and Ginny now stood facing each other, both panting and sweating. They were on their seventh consecutive duel now, and Daphne could feel all of her muscles burning from all the running and dodging, and the mental effort of constantly casting spells was beginning to give her a mild headache. From Ginny's strained expression, Daphne assumed she was feeling the same way. Both of them had won three duels, and this was to be the decisive one.
Daphne twitched her arm and immediately felt Ginny flicking a silent Flipendo against it to deflect whatever spell she was about to use. It would take her a moment to ready an attack of her own after this, so Daphne, who'd kept her arm relaxed, simply swung back her wand and sent an Expelliarmus at Ginny, but Ginny still had most of her speed and dodged the attack easily, firing back with a Stunner, which Daphne likewise dodged, returning fire with yet another Disarming Charm.
She could fire Stunners, but Disarming Charms were much easier to do now that she was getting tired. Ginny dodged again, and this time Daphne was in time to parry her Stunner, rather than dodging it.
She slowly began to move forward behind careful Disarming Charms, keeping Ginny busy enough that she couldn't easily launch a forceful counterattack.
Ginny, however, seemed to realize what Daphne was trying, and suddenly lunged forward, reaching out for Daphne's wand with her bare hands.
Daphne twisted to her side, blocking Ginny with her shoulder and preventing her from grabbing the wand, but now she was so close she couldn't cast spells of her own anymore.
Making a decision in a split second, she pulled her wand back into its holster, allowing her to use both hands freely. Ginny was still trying to reach for Daphne's wand, having committed to her unorthodox attack, so Daphne stepped to her left, around Ginny, and pinned her arms to her side just below her elbows with a kind of bear hug from behind.
Ginny, however, wasn't distressed by this at all. Instead, she dropped her wand and forcefully yanked her right arm upward, freeing it from Daphne's grasp. In the same motion, she swung it behind her, quickly but carefully controlled so she didn't elbow Daphne in the head, hooking her hand behind Daphne's neck as she twisted her body and scooped up Daphne's right arm with her own left, pulling it tightly to her body as she pushed Daphne down using the hand in her neck.
Daphne tried to pull herself away, but because her arm was pinned so close to Ginny's chest and her neck was being tightly controlled she couldn't easily break free.
Ginny slowly raised her right knee and lightly tapped Daphne's nose with it.
"If this were a real fight, I wouldn't be this gentle," she said.
Then she forcefully shoved Daphne away from her, picked up her wand again, and pointed it at Daphne.
"I win," she said with a smirk.
Daphne was too stunned about what had just happened and just blinked stupidly. "How did you even do that?" she asked.
Ginny grinned. "It's something Charlie taught me," she said. "Growing up with six brothers, two of whom are Fred and George, obviously they'd try to prank me from time to time by pinning my arms just like you did, usually followed by picking me up and putting me down somewhere else, like on a cabinet. Charlie taught me this trick to get out of it.
"It only really worked once because they didn't expect me to do it; they're so much taller than me that it's pretty difficult to get control…but you're only a bit taller, so I figured I'd give it a try.
"Of course, against a Death Eater I wouldn't bother. Even if I could get control and break their nose, or something, they'd be able to break free and beat me. You were surprised, and that's what I meant to do."
"Well, it certainly worked…" Daphne muttered, a bit annoyed she'd lost the decisive duel. If she'd only been able to see it coming with movement shadow…but apparently, without Felix Felicis she simply couldn't use it.
Ginny laughed at Daphne's annoyed expression. "Come on, even you couldn't have seen that coming. I think I would even have beaten Harry with that," she said.
Daphne grinned back a bit unwillingly. "Yeah, you probably would have," she conceded. "Well, better go and take a shower…Mum and Dad are both out…we could go together," she said suggestively.
Ginny smirked. "Want me to teach you that technique, while we're at it?"
"Y'know, that would probably be fun…"
It felt like no time at all had passed when Daphne and Ginny headed to the Burrow together, and Ginny wasn't really looking forward to it.
"Mum's going to give me the lecture of all lectures," she said as she took out a pinch of Floo powder.
"I'm sure it'll be fine," Daphne said. "They're all busy with the security for when Harry comes, right? I mean, the spells will be going up after we're there…she won't have time to lecture you."
"You clearly haven't been around my mum enough…" Ginny said.
She threw the Floo powder into the fireplace and said, "The Burrow!" With a rush of green flames, she vanished.
Daphne followed suit, and once she stepped out into the Burrow's kitchen, it turned out that Ginny had been right. Mrs. Weasley was already in the middle of a very stern rant, while Ginny determinedly stared at the kitchen sink.
Mrs. Weasley momentarily paused her rant to greet Daphne. "Oh, hello Daphne, dear. Why don't you go upstairs for a moment…Hermione's already here, too. I just need to talk to Ginny for a moment."
Ginny shot Daphne a resigned look, and then Mrs. Weasley resumed her sermon.
Feeling slightly bad for Ginny, Daphne went upstairs, where Hermione and Ron were already waiting for her.
"Don't expect Ginny back before midnight," Ron said by way of greeting. "Once Mum gets going, she doesn't stop until she's said everything she wanted to say. And since Ginny was gone for a week…it'll be a lot."
"How's she been to you?" Daphne asked.
Ron shrugged. "Well…she wasn't very happy and is convinced we misunderstood Dumbledore — she'll surely try and convince you of that as well before long — but otherwise she hasn't really said much about it because she was so angry with Ginny."
"How did your parents react?" Hermione asked.
"They said they agreed with Mrs. Weasley that it might be better if Ginny doesn't come," Daphne said a bit unwillingly. "But they also said it was ultimately her choice, and they didn't go on about it."
"They didn't know a way to break the Trace, then?" Ron asked.
Daphne shook her head. "Nope. Did Sirius know anything?"
"No. He spoke to Harry through the mirror, but he said he had nothing to go on. He'd look into it, though, but he wasn't hopeful. Since he's always lived among wizards, the Trace was never a problem for him," Ron said.
"I haven't been able to find out anything, either," Hermione said sadly. "None of the books I've read explain how the Trace works, probably to prevent anyone from trying to break it on their own. If we can't find anything…maybe Ginny will have to stay here. We don't have a chance if we can't use magic."
"We'll find a way," Daphne said, a bit more impatiently than she'd intended. "I'm not leaving her behind."
"I know you don't want to," Ron said. "I don't think Harry will like it much either, really, but we have to face the facts. If we can't break the Trace, we can't bring Ginny with us."
Seeing that Daphne was about to protest, Hermione quickly said, "Look, we've still got some time. We'll try and find out what we can before the wedding, and we'll make the final call after that, okay?"
Daphne sighed. "Yeah, I suppose," she said.
Even during dinner, Mrs. Weasley was still not done berating Ginny, which made for a very awkward meal. Mr. Weasley didn't seem inclined to step in, and Ron wore a sort of mournful expression that would've been hilarious if Daphne had dared to laugh. Hermione looked like she was suffering from secondhand embarrassment, while Ginny tried to ignore her mother's torrent of accusations. The way her knuckles were white from gripping her cutlery so tightly made it plain she wasn't happy, though.
"Mrs. Weasley, don't you think Ginny gets the point by now?" Daphne asked once Mrs. Weasley had reached the next act of her recital.
A ringing silence fell, and everyone gaped at Daphne, who knew she'd broken some kind of unwritten rule, but she didn't care.
"I will decide when I've finished making my point, thank you very much," Mrs. Weasley said. "Now, your parents might have their own way of raising children, but I have mine, and I will not have that authority undermined by–"
"That 'authority' made Ginny come to us in the middle of the night," Daphne interrupted. "Justified or not, I doubt that was your intention, was it?"
"Now you listen to me, young lady, you are not the boss of–"
"No, I'm not," Daphne interrupted again. "I am, however, Ginny's girlfriend, and you've been raging at her for hours on end, and I'm insolent enough to say something about it. Punish me, if you want. I'll happily do everyone's chores on my own, no problem. Hell, have Ginny and me both do everyone's chores. But please, stop the rant. Ginny's feeling terrible already. Please don't make it worse."
"I have half a mind of sending you back home, if you're going to argue with me in my own home," Mrs. Weasley said.
"And it would be your full right to do so," Daphne said, feeling her heartrate spike at that possibility but keeping her expression carefully neutral, "but it's not going to stop me from arguing with you. Either dish out a punishment, or don't, but it's been four hours since we got here. Enough's enough. Unless, of course, the rant itself is the punishment, but I think cruel and unusual punishment is against human rights, or something."
"You know what? Fine! You and Ginny get to do all the chores around here, and I do mean all of them, at least until the wedding, and you will not be using any magic to do so!" Mrs. Weasley said.
"Happily. Can we continue dinner without the next volume of 'Everything Ginny Did Wrong Since She Was Three', then?" Daphne asked, feeling a bit calmer now she was reasonably certain she wouldn't get kicked out.
Mrs. Weasley pursed her lips angrily, but said nothing and angrily began eating the food on her plate, which had lain untouched as she'd been too busy talking.
"Good, thank you," Daphne said, getting far more pleasure than she should out of seeing a nerve twitch in Mrs. Weasley's eyebrow.
After dinner, Daphne and Ginny, as promised, washed the dishes and cleaned the kitchen and then fed the chickens and did a variety of other small chores, before finally going to bed.
"Thanks for that," Ginny said once they'd lain down. "She'd probably still be going on if you hadn't stepped in…"
Daphne grinned at her. "Don't worry about it. For a second, I was afraid she'd really send me home, though…"
Ginny shook her head. "She wouldn't have. Don't get me wrong, she's angry with you for sure, but it's too dangerous to travel around a lot at the moment, and she wouldn't risk anyone's health."
"That's why she's so angry with you as well, isn't it?" Hermione asked. "Because she thinks it's too dangerous for you — and any of us, really — to do what we're going to do?"
Ginny nodded. "It is. And in a weird way, I'm glad she worries that much about us. But…I'm not letting you go alone. I want to help, too, I know I can," she said.
Hermione and Daphne exchanged a short look. Hermione's expression was sad, Daphne's defiant.
"And you will," she said firmly.
Ginny smiled faintly. "Yeah…"
If only anyone in the room had really believed that…
I intended to have Harry's arrival in this chapter as well, but this just worked out better and I'm already a bit late as it is.