Chapter 21- Home
*****Ginny*****
Ginny had been impressive in most of her OWL practicals, and she didn't try to hide it. She had been doing most of her spellwork silently since the incident with Snape, and she was better for it. Confusing, conflicting Snape making her a better witch. She still shouted her patronus, but it was more than impressive enough.
She'd done well enough in her written portions to doubtless take any of the classes at NEWT level that she wished to take, and some that she would have no interest in. History, she didn't even revise for. Why bother? Better to be efficient on ones she actually cared about. Astronomy, everyone hardly remembered existed. She probably passed Runes, but would drop it anyway. She didn't think she was likely to have a future relating to Herbology or Potions, it wasn't for her. Sprout was kind, and Slughorn was well connected, but she would still be in Slug Club, assuming Slughorn didn't go on the run again disguising himself as furniture.
They'd have some new Defence teacher, how Dumbledore had always found someone was a mystery, and now he wasn't around to do the convincing, so could she really sign for that without a spare class? The minimum number was only three- which the twins had opted for, but most students kept about five classes. Charms and Transfiguration were stable choices. Creatures… maybe. Or maybe she should have just failed almost everything like the twins had. If quidditch had a real chance of being her future… and she had Malfoy money cushioning her… Charms, Transfiguration, Defence, and a fourth so she could drop Defence if needed... Draco had kept Potions and Herbology, and the three Ginny had already decided on. Neither of those were too bad, she supposed...
Albus Dumbledore was dead. That would interrupt her thoughts occasionally.
Bill was getting married, that was a happy thing. In another year, it would be her. And she still wouldn't have graduated from Hogwarts.
Albus Dumbledore was dead. No one in probably three generations remembered Hogwarts before Dumbledore. Even if he probably didn't feel like the whole school when he was just one teacher. But maybe he always felt like that if Tom had feared him.
Cowardly Tom forcing a child to kill his rival, because Dumbledore wouldn't kill a child. Ginny tried not to fall into the hero-worship of anyone (like she had of Harry for those years), but it was a struggle not to with Albus Dumbledore. She had seen his faults sometimes, in dealings with Harry and with Slytherins especially. But he was- had been- Albus Dumbledore. He could have been the Minister of Magic for decades if he'd wanted it. And she owed him personally for her not being married when she was barely fourteen, when she definitely wouldn't have been ready for it. Would they have done as well getting to know each other if they had been married for it? Would they have had sex that young?
"Are the wrackspurts bothering you?" Luna asked her. "They usually leave you alone."
"I'm fine," Ginny said.
They were on the train, even Draco was with them. And Harry Ron and Hermione, though they'd arrived late in the compartment. Draco was uncomfortable after they arrived, and he had disappeared for a while, and probably would again , but he was there now, and Ginny appreciated their time together, even when she was lost in thought. She squeezed Draco's hand.
*****Draco****
Aunt Andromeda, Uncle Ted, and Dora had all asked him if or how he needed help getting home from Hogwarts. They'd called it "home" too. They hadn't asked if he was coming, just how he wanted to get there.
No one at the castle had mentioned it. Snape was gone, Dumbledore was dead, McGonagall had too many things to do, and even if they had some strange respect, he wasn't one of her students in the way the Gryffindors were. And she just had more to do as acting Headmistress. Slughorn was acting as the Head of Slytherin, but he wasn't really doing much. The man was afraid. As any reasonable human would be.
Draco would apparate there from the station, not even leaving the train. His auror cousin and her parents didn't question the legality of this, even though they all knew his birthday. He would have just left from the station in Hogsmeade, but he would see Ginny little enough that summer that he said he'd stay for the train ride.
Potter and his friends settled in their compartment. Everyone of their training group except Lovegood looked at him expectantly when the three traipsed in.
But they'd tolerated each other well enough for that one session in the Room of Requirement. Draco wouldn't make a scene.
Potter would have been more affected than almost anyone by Dumbledore's death, because Potter had seemed closer to Dumbledore than any student and many of the staff, Draco thought. Which just showed that the boy really was the "Chosen One." Or maybe that was just public image. Draco didn't know Potter's schedule that well, and would have never asked Ginny about it, but he had heard recent whisperings that Potter had met with the Headmaster regularly. Teaching him secret things, passing on the legacy of the great defender of the Light, whatever it was. Draco didn't say anything to him, and Potter returned the favour, as did Weasley, and miraculously Granger as well.
When Draco couldn't stand Lovegood's ramblings, Longbottoms attempts at conversations, the Hufflepuffs' and Creevy boys' chatter, Weasley's exploding snap, or the… the… not talking about anything that mattered, he got up and roamed the corridors. Neutral faced, nodding at everyone he knew. He didn't want to talk, he didn't want to not talk, he didn't want to sit. Walking didn't really help. When people met his eyes, and surprisingly most of them did, from any house, that helped a bit, but not much.
He returned to the compartment, and most of them were in muggle clothes that they had probably worn under their robes that morning. Longbottom hadn't changed, but he was like a Malfoy in that way. His grandmother would avoid muggle London. He was Sacred Twenty-Eight, though so were the Weasleys in their bright jumpers. It was a cold June. From what Draco had heard, Susan was going home with Hannah. The girl could probably use some cheerful chatter. They were all doing as well as they could.
"Hey, glad you're back. Are you leaving the train?" Ginny asked as he grabbed his trunk, and the empty owl cage that he'd rarely ever used.
"No reason to, and less attention here," he shrugged.
"You can't- apparate," Granger protested, because naturally, the girl had listened and understood. He stared at her.
"We took the same class. I was better at it than you in fact. Not a normal experience for you, I know," Draco said. It was almost nice to Granger by their standards. Apparition was instinct, almost like flying, the only thing Granger had ever been terrible at in school.
"You're not licensed, you're not even seventeen," Granger objected.
"Granger, I hate to- no, I enjoy telling you that you've broken far more laws than I have. And you'll continue to do so. I would think that eventually you'd learn that the 'crimes' where no one gets hurt- they don't matter." It sounded… cool.
"I'll see you soon Ginny. Love you," he said so that Granger wouldn't be the last person he talked to in the compartment. Especially if he did splinch himself- even though he wouldn't. He always needed to be aware of the risk. He didn't say 'love' much, had certainly not planned on saying it where Potter, Granger, or Ron Weasley could hear it.
"Love you too," Ginny answered easily.
Draco apparated right into his bedroom. He had access through the wards, and it was the part of the house he knew the best.
"Ted!" Aunt Andromeda shouted as her face appeared in Draco's doorway. He was in one piece and fine, and all of his things were there. It was wise that he'd let Eagle, his eagle owl, fly home on his own, but Draco could have done that too, he felt. But Eagle hadn't ridden the train since Draco was a first year, because there wasn't any point it doing that to him.
"Draco, I'm so glad you're home," his aunt told him, wrapping him in a hug. "I was worried over you apparating alone. And Hogwarts! A... battle inside Hogwarts grounds? That school felt safer when we were there. When Dora was there, even, and that's just been a few years."
"Can I get in on the hug?" Ted asked, and waited until Draco nodded. His arms were stronger than his wife's, around both of them.
Draco had never thought of hugs as a manly activity. Maybe to a girlfriend or wife, maybe. His mother had hugged him often, but not his father. Mr. Weasley hugged Ginny, Draco thought, but those were the Weasleys. Though Uncle Ted was a Hufflepuff. And a muggleborn, if that mattered. But it probably didn't.
Draco didn't know he was going to cry until he was. The hug just got tighter. It felt really good.
"Let it out," Ted, Uncle Ted, advised.
"Oh, Draco what's wrong?" Aunt Andromeda asked.
"I asked Ginny to marry me. Got a ring. She said yes," which he hadn't known he was going to say. He had planned on telling them, of course, but not while crying two minutes after he arrived.
"That's wonderful, dear," Andromeda said.
"Okay to cry happy tears," Ted added.
"My dad-" it felt wrong calling the man something so familiar. It was weird that he said it. 'Dad' was a work that Dora and Ginny used. "My father was at Hogwarts, I'm almost certain. Ginny said she heard Bellatrix's voice. Ginny chased after them."
Bellatrix was his aunt's sister. That might hurt her. Andromeda didn't seem to be thinking about that when she spoke, "Just like Dora. Ginny is a brave girl, and we're glad that she's safe. You don't have to do something like that. It would be good to have one who doesn't worry us so often." Dora had been hurt. One what?
"One what?" Draco asked, when he'd meant to say something else entirely.
"A... child," Andromeda answered.
"I'm not a child," Draco protested. But he still didn't struggle away. He was getting hugged like a frantic, crying child. He couldn't remember ever crying this hard or long.
"Ted?" his aunt sniffed. She was crying too, mostly silently.
"Dora is," Ted explained. "Always will be. We're not trying to presume anything, Draco, or fill any role you don't want filled. And I do believe in second chances. And- and- seventy-seventh chances, sometimes. And I hope your mother and father prove worthy of it one day, because I know they love you very much. But Andromda is trying to say that we don't think of you as a child, but as our child."
That was too much. And yet he didn't push away, couldn't. They didn't know him well enough for that. They didn't know the real him.
"Theo- Theodore Nott killed Dumbledore. He had been my best friend when we were young. Could've- would've- been me."
Andromeda cried audibly then, hugging him tighter.
"That would never have been you, Draco," Ted assured him. "You might have been given the- mission, but you wouldn't have done it."
"You didn't know me until I'd known Ginny almost a year," Draco protested. "If I didn't have her, and- the two of you, and this house. If they'd made me, if they'd threatened..." If they'd threatened his mother's life. And his father's too. His whole life would have been different. These two people would have been strangers to him.
"A person threatened enough is just as controlled as someone under the Imperius Curse, but you would have done anything you could to avoid it," Uncle Ted maintained.
"Thank you," Draco sniffed. He wanted to put his head on his uncle's shoulder, so he did, just like that. Ted was family because he'd let Draco into his life and his home. The man's wife's sister's son, even though Andromeda's family had ignored and denied her existence for over two decades. "For everything, for a place to stay."
"This is your home. You can have many homes. And if we move again, you will have a home there too," Ted promised. "Okay? It's been a heavy day already. We just- want you to know that we love you, Draco, and we're proud of you, and we don't expect anything in return."
Draco closed his eyes. It was easier that way. They'd hardly known him for any time at all, and hadn't spent that much of that time with him. Just the previous summer and some letters. But maybe they'd known him for most of the... important time, when he was already who he was now, becoming whoever he was becoming.
"I told Ginny I loved her," he whispered. "I haven't said that except to my mother. And to my father when I was very young."
"That's really great, Draco," Ted said. He was better at talking about this than Andromeda. She was born in Draco's family after all. But she held onto him tightly too. She'd chosen to be in Ted's family.
"Dinner?" Draco asked, raising his head, but not dropping his own arms. It was possibly cowardly to escape the emotion, but he wasn't a Gryffindor- or a Hufflepuff.
Andromeda dropped one hand, but Ted didn't let go. "Is that your polite teenager way of wanting to be free?" the man asked. "Because I never stop a hug first."
"Yeah," Draco said, letting his arms fall, and then Ted did as well. Andromeda backed up, wiping her eyes.
"Ted made a roast," she said. "I do miss having a house elf sometimes."
"If we can make potions, I figure I could learn to make soup," Draco shrugged.
Andromeda smiled. "It isn't so hard. We could practice together this summer. Ted has an instinct for it though, so we're lucky to have him."
"Yeah," Draco agreed. Lucky for lots of reasons.
"Well, let's eat it, and you can start telling us all of the best parts of the year. Of course you can tell us the bad parts any time," he added.
"How did you propose?" Andromeda jumped in.
They were a very good audience. And Draco always had liked to talk. He hadn't felt comfortable talking often to his parents at home, and Ginny- already knew all of the happiest stories about him, because she was there for them. He told the full story.
"I bought the ring after- I knew I wanted to after- a really good day. I had cast my first patronus and thought of her. And she took me to meet-" how would he explain that?- "This hippogriff that hurt me as a third year, and it was my fault, though also partially the instructor's," Draco said. His aunt and uncle nodded in understanding. "And my father was going to get the creature killed, and I supported it- but it didn't happen obviously or I wouldn't have been re-meeting the creature. It was a- growth moment I guess, Ginny trusting me with another secret. And then I told her I loved her, and she said it back."
"That sounds perfect, Draco. What's your patronus? Very impressive magic," Ted said.
"A- unicorn," Draco admitted.
"Very impressive," Ted said again solemnly. "And don't let us stop you from eating."
"What does the ring look like?" Andromeda asked immediately.
"A ruby set in white gold, surrounded by small diamonds," Draco described. Not fully Gryffindor or Slytherin colors.
"Well done," Andromeda observed.
"And your classes went well enough?" Ted asked. They wanted to hear everything about his year.
"They did," Draco answered. "It was a relief to drop a few of them, I admit."
"Oh, yes. My favourite thing about sixth year was stopping taking Astronomy. I had actually been looking forward to the class as a first year, a class I could understand, you know? But Muggles have made much more accurate observations of the stars, and far distant planets, and you could study those models at a reasonable hour instead of keeping us up at midnight. In my childhood, men sent satellites up, sent pictures home, sent a man to orbit the earth- in under two hours, a Russian man. Americans first claimed the moon. They hadn't liked being beaten into space. And I had to use a telescope no more powerful than Galileo's even though it was three hundred fifty years later."
"Dropping Astronomy was your favourite thing about sixth year?" Andromeda drawled.
"No, of course not, darling. Every moment spent with you was the best and most important. But, fewer classes gave me more time with you, didn't it?" he smoothed.
He enjoyed watching his aunt and uncle's playful interactions. They fit well together, in serious moments and light ones, and were obviously very much in love.
Ted and Andromeda talked about their day, and a few highlights from the year. They had visited Ted's younger brother for Christmas, and the youngest boy saw Andromeda use magic to clean a spill off her dress, but three year olds are pretty easy to handle, no obliviating needed. Ted's brother knew of magic, but the man hadn't told his family, from what Draco understood. "Of course, muggleborns do crop up twice in a family sometimes. Wouldn't be surprised if Eric had one. He thinks they're done having kids, and doesn't think any of his are magical, but I wouldn't be surprised," he said.
"Thank you for dinner," Draco said when the conversation and meal seemed over.
*****Ginny*****
"No bits of him left behind," Ron said, breaking the silence.
"Ron," Ginny complained.
"Hey, I didn't say I wanted to deal with any part of Malfoy left. I'm glad he made it out okay, yeah?"
"Let's just go," Ginny said.
"That was some pretty deep stuff there though, yeah? All smartass comeback exit and then saying he loved you?" It sounded like a question at the end.
"Yeah, we're engaged, remember? And not just because we have to get married. I love him and he loves me."
"Not wearing your ring," Ron observed. Everyone else still in the compartment of the stopped train seemed in no hurry to leave or to interrupt the family conversation, looking between the two Weasleys. "Are you going to tell Mum and Dad?" he asked.
"Draco and I agreed that I could whenever I wanted, but I haven't decided when yet," Ginny said.
"Whatever," Ron said, grabbing his own trunk.
They'd have a whole summer to- something. To talk about it or not talk about it. Maybe. They'd have at least until after Bill's wedding. Ron wouldn't go on a crazy something with Harry until at least after the wedding. And Harry was still going to his awful relatives' house- which made less and less sense each year.
Probably nothing would happen, just a boring summer. The whole world wasn't- different. It would be annoying that she was the last Weasley who was too young to legally use magic at home, and her parents were law-abiding on those things. She'd see Hermione fairly soon into the summer, and Luna was coming at least to the wedding. But she'd see Luna more if she could. They would be back at the Burrow, with Headquarters not having a secret keeper. Of course, her parents probably wouldn't want her to leave the wards, but maybe Luna could floo over, after her father had seen her enough. If a parent could ever see their child enough.
The station was more somber than most years, like the rest of the world. It wasn't going to be a normal summer. The world was different.
Her parents put a brave face on it, and it felt right to be going back to the Burrow. Home. Surely they would have had Bill's wedding there anyway? They couldn't have had the wedding at Grimmauld Place, or they could have only invited Order Members, and the place was grim.
Ginny wondered where her wedding would be. Not at Malfoy Manor.
And speaking of Fleur, Ginny would be sharing her room with the woman that summer, she'd learned. Which would probably make it harder for Hermione to stay too. Ginny was very used to having her own room, one of the perks of being the only girl. And the Burrow having a lot of rooms, even if it achieved that… non-traditionally.
*****Draco*****
"Good night, Draco," Ted called that evening.
"Good night," Draco answered.
"Love you," Ted called back. It sounded like a nightly ritual, though he hadn't heard it shouted last summer, even to Dora.
"Yeah, you too," Draco answered as loudly as he dared.
"I heard that," Ted called again.
*****Ginny*****
Coming home always had an excess of everything, so it never felt like they were poor- only when they went to Diagon Alley did it feel like that. There was excess food, love, hugs. When there were fewer of them in the house, there was excess attention too. And she didn't mind it as much as she did as a child. And Bill was there, and he was the one getting married in a few weeks, so even though Ginny and Ron were the ones newly returned home, Bill took enough of the attention that it was bearable.
Still, Ginny wasn't sad to retire to her room early for the evening, even if she wasn't alone.
"If you want to spend the nights in Bill's room, I wouldn't tell anyone," Ginny said. At least for now Bill still had his own room, though he was working on what would be their house together. On a beach, very romantic.
"I can't tink of you as a leetle girl like Gabrielle, can I?" Fleur said. Fleur was inhumanly gorgeous.
"Isn't Gabrielle-" Ginny remembered the tiny girl Harry had saved. She wouldn't have been more than nine or ten, and that was only a little more than two years ago. Ginny had still been watching everything Harry did then, of course everyone was watching then. Two years could feel like such a long time sometimes, and other times not. "Eleven or twelve?" Ginny asked.
"Eleven," Fleur confirmed. "I know you are much older, but I can forget when Bill tells stories of you. You seem so much like Gabrielle in tem."
"I'm sure she's a sweet girl. But I'm fifteen, almost sixteen, and I've been betrothed for two years. I assume you and your sister don't have to worry about that, or you wouldn't be marrying Bill," Ginny said.
"No, we do not," Fleur confirmed. "But you like dis boy now, yes?" Fleur asked.
"I love him," Ginny said. It was fun to say.
"Tell me about 'im?" the older witch asked.
"We've had a rough time, and have had to grow up a lot together. His- father is a Death Eater, you've probably heard?" Ginny checked. Fleur nodded. "He didn't even know that when we were first forced together. But he'd repeated his family's pureblood supremacist ideas for all his life, and now he doesn't believe them. We- tried to make the best of it, you know? Get along as well as we could… and the snogging has always been good."
Fleur laughed, but not obnoxiously or unkindly.
"We had some fights, one big one because- I didn't trust him enough to let him in on a big secret- but we were still pretty early, you know? But he showed that he really cared about me. And we've just gotten closer and better since then. If Dum- if someone found a way out of the contract now..." Ginny stumbled a bit. Dumbledore was dead. She'd said for two years now that he would be the one to get her out of that contract if anyone could. Except maybe she hadn't talked about it much like that in the last year. "I'd still want to marry him, and maybe even just as quickly. It feels like... why wait? I know that sounds crazy," Ginny shrugged. She wanted to tell about their real engagement, but didn't. Did that make it less real? Draco had probably told Andromeda and Ted hours ago, and didn't her parents deserve that?
"It sounds like love," Fleur corrected.
"I told Mum as a kid that I would never have many children, maybe none at all. She told me I just had to meet the person I wanted to have them with. Now, I'm not saying I want to rush into that- we can be married and childless for a lot of years…"
Fleur laughed again, "Our children will be friends," she said.
"I told Mum on my fourteenth birthday- before the letter arrived- that I wouldn't be the one to make her a grandmother."
"I can be first. T'in she will 'ave to like me," Fleur said. And Ginny tried not to laugh too much. Her mother had been pleasant to the French witch at dinner, Ginny figured they had come to an agreement, or she was accepting the inevitable, and would want to see her grandchildren. It was hard not to be jealous of Fleur, or to believe that Bill saw anything in her besides her beauty, because she was just so beautiful. But Bill was a better man than that, Ginny knew.
"So… you're not worried about ruining your body with babies? I'm seen pictures, Mum was actually thin before she had Bill."
Fleur had a beautiful laugh, "I am not worried. I 'ave always been beautiful. I prefer being loved, and Bill will always tink I am most beautiful woman in ze room."
"I imagine you always will be," Ginny shrugged.
"When I am wit my veela cousins, I am not. But Bill still loves me most. I will… welcome ze… stretch marks and ze scars. And eef I change my mind, magic can 'fix' lots of tings."
"Do you want a lot of kids?" Ginny asked.
"Two ou three leetle girls I tink. I do not know eef I can... 'ave boy. Bill understands dat eet does not matter boy or girl, but I tink he would care eef he did not know you."
It was a flattering thing to say, but Ginny's mind was processing that there would almost certainly be some little one-eigth-veela Weasley girls in a few years. If she hadn't been born... if Draco didn't get married in the next… sixteen or so years… Except he almost certainly would have been. He would have had his own son with someone else- probably Astoria Greengrass- and that boy would have married Bill's daughter.
"Thank you," Ginny answered. "And like I said, if you want to go spend time with Bill… not that I'm trying to kick you out, because I'm not," Ginny said. And she really wasn't… anymore.
"We are not... having sex right now, so I would rather be 'ere," Fleur said.
"Right now?" Ginny asked, even though she really shouldn't have.
"We are so close to wedding, yes. But before…" Yes, she definitely shouldn't have asked. Ginny Weasley wasn't a prude. Not really. But that was her brother. Spoiled the girl talk. "Do you know how to take care before sex- to not make your mother grandmother?" the older girl checked.
"Yes I'm fine," Ginny said.
"Oh?"
"Yeah, I'm fine," Ginny repeated.
"Any more you want to say?" the witch said, conspiratorially. "I will not tell Bill eef you 'ave 'ad need of potion. Potion ees much better zan spells," she instructed.
"Would you tell him if I hadn't have need of potion?" Ginny checked. "Yet. Theoretically."
"It would make eem like your boyfriend more," Fleur laughed.
"I don't think that would happen regardless," Ginny said.
"No one good enough for 'ees leetle sister?"
"Probably not. Maybe Harry," she shrugged.
"'Arry Potter is good man. But not ze only good man. You know potion last only year without taking? You need new supply?" Fleur checked.
"I know. The ingredients themselves last much longer. I haven't actually brewed it before," she admitted.
Fleur smiled. "I will not tell," she said. "Goodnight, friend," she said.
"We're friends now?" Ginny asked.
"We will be sisters soon, yes? But sisters have older and younger. Friends are equal. You will be in wedding, yes?" she asked. "I will make sure your dress is more… womanly than Gabrielle's. Make boyfriend make crazy eyes."
"I'm honoured, thank you," Ginny said.
"Purple, I tink. Will look good on both."
"Not worried about the bridesmaids outshining the bride?" Ginny joked.
"No, I am not," she said plainly. "And I only care for Bill. To eem there is sister and eleven year old girl. I will wear white, with some black."
"Why?" Ginny asked.
"I could say... symbol, but I wear because I like."
"Goodnight, friend," Ginny echoed.