Ugg...I actually wanted to get all the way to the trips to Diagon Alley in this chapter, but I've had no time at all. So you'll have to wait until next chapter. Sorry! Oh, and just a quick note, in the last chapter, I said 10 degrees. That was in Fahrenheit, not Celcius. Yup, I live in the States. Not metric standard for us. Anyway, 10 degrees F figures out to about negitive 12 degrees C. Just thought I'd clarify that.

Disclaimer: Harry Potter is the property of J.K. Rowling. No money is being made from this fanfiction.

"Weasley, I don't know how you talked me into this, but if it didn't involve a lot of chocolate sauce and some sort of exotic dance I must have been out of my mind." He said, as he pulled up into position opposite her. They were well above the other players so he didn't have to worry about one of her brothers hearing.

She smiled sweetly. "Of course it did. It took Crabbe a lot of convincing- he said you weren't his type- but he'll be here in an hour with the chocolate and strawberries."

He gagged. "Oh that's just not fair. I'll never be able to watch the snitch for all my throwing up."

She shrugged. "Just thought I'd spare you the embarrassment of being beaten by a Weasley."

"Awfully confident, aren't we?"

"Well," She said with a grin, "when you're perfect, it is awfully hard to stay modest about it."

"Finally, someone understands." He answered smiling back. Was it just the cold making her cheeks so pink or was she blushing? He decided for his ego's sake he decided she was blushing.

"Are you two ready up there?" Someone redheaded called.

Ginny looked down at whichever of her brothers had spoken and gave him a thumbs up sign, her indication that they were indeed ready. With a shrill whistle the boy (Charlie he was pretty sure) released the snitch and the bludger and the game began.

Ginny took off immediately, circling what passed for the pitch lazily, searching for a golden glint. Draco, taking a more leisurely approach, surveyed from his spot well above the rest of the action.

They'd made him a seeker simply because he refused to play any other position. The twins idea to warp the game by switching around positions had lead to a rather laughable discussion of who should play on what team and what part they would play. Harry, it was immediately decided, could not be allowed to be a seeker. Instead, they stuck him in front of one of the goals (three old tires hanging from a tree on either end of the field). Fred and George also, quite reluctantly gave away their bats and were forced to separate to make the teams more even. Their only consolation being that as chasers, they would be able to try and beam each other with the quaffle. Ron and Charlie were made beaters (Charlie, quite purposefully in Draco's opinion, made sure not only that Ron stayed a safe distance away from Draco before the game, but also that they were on the same team so that Ron would have no excuse to 'accidentally' knock him off his broom). Bill (that was the name of the one with the earring, right?) was the other keeper, the position they had tried to talk Draco into playing. He had refused outright because while he was a superb seeker, he was somewhat lacking when it came to catching and throwing. A fact that he felt no need to advertise. Ginny was the only one who got put in a familiar position, a fact that she was only mildly put out by.

He could tell as he watched her now that she was at least a fair seeker. Though she continued almost sluggishly drifting above the pitch, he could see that she was actually keeping a sharp eye on everything around her. She was a good flier too. The way she sat surely on the broom and rose and fell casually with the air currents demonstrated a level of familiarity that came only with practice and skill. She was, however, nowhere near as good as him and he intended to prove it.

The only problem with was that it was snowing, making it impossible to see the snitch. Ginny seemed to be having the same problem. She would dive down several feet in search of the ball only to pull quickly out of her descent with a baffled look on her face. She was still having better luck than him however; he hadn't caught sight of the snitch at all. Finally, he resigned himself to following after her, flying lazy circles around her hoping that she would be able to pick it out. Ginny made absolutely no response to him, except to occasionally look up from her search and smile. Several times, on purpose he suspected, she would plunge down in pursuit of something, only to pull up. When he followed, he inevitably found himself in Ron's path.

"Heads up, Malfoy." Fred jeered on one such occasion. "Wouldn't want any accidents, would we?"

Draco had responded with a rude hand gesture, which only made the twins taunt more. Ginny flew right in front of him, a mocking grin on her face.

He returned her smile. Before breaking into a dive of his own, which she, startled, imitated. He pulled up and she followed just in time to impact with the quaffle that George had thrown.

The boys all paused to watch as she shook herself. When they were assured she was unharmed, Harry retrieved the fallen quaffle and they resumed play. Once she was level with him, she smiled, this one a smile of true amusement.

"Now that wasn't very nice." She admonished playfully. "I could have been seriously injured. Then where would you have been?"

"An unmarked grave somewhere, I'm guessing." He called.

"I just hope you realize what you've done." She said somewhat more seriously. "I'm a horror when I want to win."

"Which differs from you normally, how?"

She smiled again, and pushed off to circle the pitch again. True to her word, Ginny made things very difficult for him after that. There were no more feigned dives, or smiles, and he took that as a sign to mean that the real game had begun. Her movements were no longer languid, but instead sharp and meaningful. Taking her example, he followed, circling the pitch watching for any hint of the snitch. The events below had little meaning. It was something completely detached from where he was. It was no longer simply a competition between his team and hers. Instead he it had become a contest exclusively between the two of them, the ultimate outcome irrelevant.

"Hey!" Someone from below called, startling Ginny. She paused and looked down, then automatically checked to make sure that Draco too had stopped his search. One she was assured he had also paused, she looked back down at the redhead addressing her. "Are you two ready to head in? We're freezing our bums off!"

Draco and Ginny locked eyes for a moment. She quirked an eyebrow and smirked, daring him to give up.

"Give up?" He asked, not breaking eye contact with her. "Never."

"Have it your way." Charlie called up laughingly. "Just don't expect us to save any hot chocolate for you."

"Keep you're knickers on, we'll be finished soon!" Ginny called, before taking off again in search of her golden adversary.

"Hey 'Mione." Ron said, successfully shoving a whole pastry in his mouth as he plopped down on the couch. Once he had swallowed he leaned over to kiss the girl.

"Don't you dare, Ron Weasley." She said batting him away with her book. "You're all gross and sweaty."

"How can I be sweaty? I was outside in the snow."

"Snow or no snow you smell like a boys locker room."

Ron frowned at her before looking at her book. "Isn't that the book I got you for your birthday?"

She nodded. It was a massive volume entitled, Advanced Arithmancy as it Relates to the Basic Functions of Time Travel.

"Fine then," He said, and snatched it out of her hands. "No kiss, no book."

"Ron, honestly…don't be ridiculous…give me…" She made another attempt to snatch the book back from him and he planted a lopsided kiss on her lips.

"Oh, that's enough, Ron! Your nose is freezing."

Harry smiled as his best friends' antics. "Get a room, you two."

Hermione blushed.

"You know, I had that exact idea myself."

"Ronald!" Hermione snapped, still bright red. "Honestly… boys."

They sat in comfortable silence for a moment before Hermione said, "You were out there for ages. I'd thought you'd all frozen to death."

"Nope." Harry answered. "Though Malfoy seems dead set on it." Hermione gave him a questioning look and he nodded towards the window, from which the field they had been using as a pitch only moments before was barely visible.

"The little twit's still out there with Ginny." Ron said.

Hermione looked alarmed. "Why?"

"Dunno. The two of them were battling it out like crazy. Had me half convince it was a reenactment of the Goblin Wars. Would've said it was some type of struggle for male dominance or something, except that doesn't really apply to Ginny." Harry answered.

"Oh Harry, you know that we didn't use brooms in the Goblin wars. Charms…" She trailed off at the expressions on the two boys faces.

"Malfoy refused to come in until he'd caught the little bugger." Ron said. "Guess he really wanted to beat her."

"Or impress her." Hermione said frowning.

"WHAT?" Both boys asked.

"It's just…I saw him looking at her earlier. And it didn't seem like he had any sort of painful revenge plan in mind."

"Are you saying that Gin and Malfoy are….involved?" Ron asked, sounding shocked and disgusted.

"Well…not necessarily. Just that maybe he wishes they were."

Harry and Ron burst out laughing. "Really, Hermione, the day a Malfoy pines over a Weasley I'll eat my broom. He was probably just picturing something really nasty. Like beating her over the head with a candle stick." Ron said.

"I don't think so."
Ron looked just a little less sure of himself. "Well, if he does try anything, I'll kill him."

"Now, I didn't mean to get you to go and bash his head open. I was probably just imagining things." She said, biting her lip.

"Yeah, Ron, I'm sure that's it." Harry said. But still, all three were quite for a moment as they watched the two figures in the air through the window. Just then, there was a streak of green diving straight toward the ground. Their eyes followed it downward until it was just meters off the ground and dropped out of view.

Ginny heard the dive rather than saw it. She felt the rush of moving air behind her and the sound of wind and responded long before she even thought about what it was. Draco, in his quidditch robes and wrapped in a huge, warm cloak, dropped through the air in front of her with reckless speed. His lunge resembled a freefall; he spiraled with the currents, looking for all the world like a leaf being carried down to the ground with the wind. She paused just long enough to assure herself that he really wasn't falling. But then, after only a second, she saw it, the golden snitch, glistening just inches away from his outstretched hand. She leaned down and urged her broom straight down, allowing gravity to assist her. But even as she approached him, she knew that he would catch it before she even came close. Just as she finished that thought, his hand closed around the small ball and he pulled up just in time to keep himself from colliding with the ground.

She slowed her descent and waited until she was even with him before pulling out. He was smirking as he held the snitch up for her to see.

"I told you I always win."

"Get stuffed." She said, glaring.

"Really, Weasley, I don't blame you." He said. "Not many people even last that long against me."

"Harry seems to do a bang up job of it

Draco's expression soured. "Yeah, well, we can't all be like Potty, now can we?"

Suddenly she grinned. "You're jealous."

"Of Pot-head? Why would I possibly be jealous of him? I've got money, brains, women and…and…I'm…blond!"

"But you've never beaten him have you?"

He was fuming silently.

"And you've never had a pillow fight or a homemade Christmas gift?" She said, looking at him with keen interest.

"I never understood what was so great about those things. Who wants to get hit in the face with a pillow?"

Ginny examined him for a moment. "Snowball fights?"

"No. And personally-"

Just then, in one stupendous bound, Ginny leapt from her broom on to his, knocking them both to the snow covered ground.

"Ahh…" He groaned pathetically, "Weasley. What was that for?"

She didn't respond. Instead, she stood up and gathered as much snow in her arms as she could and dumped it on him.

He sat up, glaring. "What the bloody-"

"It called a snowball fight and I hate to tell you, but you're losing." She dashed out of his reach, gathered up another pile of snow and began packing it into a tight ball.

"Are you crazy, Weasley. I'm not having a sno-"

He broke off to wipe the snow from his face. Ginny was grinning, brandishing another snowball menacingly.

"Okay, that's it. This is ridiculous. I'm not going inside. You can stay out here acting like a two year old, but I've had enough, thanks." He stood, brushed himself off, and stomped past her.

Ginny sighed. For a moment she forgot she who she had been talking to. She'd been hanging out with a normal guy and then bang he was back to being Draco I'm-way-too-good-to-even-look-in-your-general-direction Malfoy. She growled and went over to the two abandoned brooms. She bent down, hand closing on the handle of her Comet 166 and-

Thawmp.

"Oaah!" She shrieked, turning to face her assailant. Draco was standing behind her grinning like a madman.

"Hey!" She cried, outraged, wiping snow from her cold and now rather wet backside.

"When are you ever going to learn Weasley? Malfoys don't lose."

"My bum's cold." She said reproachfully.

"I just aimed for the biggest target," He said innocently. "If you'd been facing me it would have been your-"

She glared.

"-mouth. I just had to settle for second best."

"That's it, you're dead."

Something strange was going on. Molly Weasley couldn't quite figure out what, but she hadn't raised six sons without being able to perceive when something was wrong. She'd gone to visit Arthur at the office that morning with some cake (he deserved at least something a little special what with the bloody ministry making him work through most of the holidays) and she was quite sure she'd heard someone following her. She had gone straight to Kingsley Shaklebolt's desk and chatted politely for a few minutes and offered him a bit of cake. Seeming to realize something was wrong (which he almost always did, clever man Kingsley) he offered to show her up to Arthur's office. But by the time she'd been safely escorted to her husband without she or Kingsley hearing anything at all suspicious, she was feeling rather foolish.

"Molly? Everything alright, love?" He had asked when she arrived.

"I thought I heard someone following me. Nerves, I'm sure. Everything's been so stressful lately."

He had become very wary, as he always did when she was worried, and made her promise to apparate straight home. That was why she loved him so much, even if he did collect plugs and had a tendency to charm things (particularly muggle things) that weren't meant to be charmed; he was the single kindest and most caring person she had ever known.

She had kept her promise, apparating home right in front of him not only to appease him, but also because she was having a horrid time not being there to watch over the children. True, Tonks and Sirius and Lupin were there, but the former two were just as likely to get in trouble as any of her children and she wasn't sure if Lupin could handle all of them. There were probably at least a half dozen other Order members there at any given moment, but still. There was no such thing as too careful.

She felt even more foolish when she arrived home and everyone was safe and sound. The kids were out playing a game of Quidditch. Hermione was reading in the living room. The two remaining marauders were with Tonks and Moody, discussing safety precautions.

Reassured, she had settled down with a good book (she hardly ever got to read when the kids were around) but soon found that with everyone outside the house was far too quite for her liking. Besides, the cupboard was looking rather bare, so she gather up her cloak and shopping list and went out for supplies.

The second indication that something was wrong was the fact that Moody insisted upon coming with her.

"Aww, right then, Molly." He'd said gruffly, grabbing his own cloak. "I'll just be coming along with you then."

She had tried to explain that she really didn't need a guard, which of course, seeing as it was Moody, got her nowhere. She then explicated that she would feel much better if he stayed at home protecting the children, but he remained adamant.

"Near the whole bloody Order's here. If Voldemort tries anything, the kids'll be fine."

So finally she'd resigned and let him come along. But the whole time he had periodically rolled his magical eye back in his head and swiveled it around behind them as if he was keeping watch for something. It was quite unnerving.

As soon as they'd arrived home, Moody had shuffled back to his meeting with Lupin. She put away the groceries and went to lie down. She had learned long ago from the twins that when something was up, the best way to find out what, was to simply wait it out. She could do that. She had always been an extremely patient person. With seven kids, she had to be.

This was always exactly how he'd pictured Gryffindors spending all their free time; frolicking in the snow. Except he couldn't remember at that vary moment what about it had seemed so unappealing. Ginny and he had been tossing snowballs at each other for nearly twenty minutes. She had built up a tiny wall, behind which she could safely hide while she bombarded him. He, likewise, had found a place behind a tree where even her best-aimed attacks couldn't reach him. He knew, however, that his shelter was only temporary; large spots of brown grass surrounded him where he'd used up all the snow on the ground around him. Ginny seemed to be having the exact same difficulty, because at that exact moment, he saw her roll out from behind her shelter. Like any good soldier at war she was down on her knees, pulling herself with her elbows. She was headed towards a hedge, behind which not only would she be safe, but there would be a fresh supply of ammunition.

Feeling greatly annoyed at the prospect of being pelted by any more of her rather vindictive attacks, he jumped from behind his tree and charged. Seeing him, she jumped to her feet, running for the shelter of the bushes, but he was too quick for her. He tackled her, knocking her clear into the snow. She squealed, and he smirked down at her.

"Ha! I win!" He said triumphantly. He found he was panting and out of breath. He couldn't remember why exactly he should be. She looked up at him, and he smiled, noticing delicate snowflakes lacing her eyelashes. Her hair spilled around her like a red bloom fallen on the snow.

"That's what you think!" She was smiling, grinning raucously. She then rolled over so she was pinning him onto the snowy ground.

It was the second time in as many days that he had found Ginny Weasley sitting on his chest. The only problem with that it was getting him nothing. Well, he could fix that easily enough.

"So, looks like Malfoys don't always win, no doesn't it?" She asked.

"Who says I didn't?" He said, moving his face just a little closer to hers.

She blushed suddenly, looking for the first time as though she realized what she was doing. She was sitting on Draco Malfoy. She was sitting on Draco Malfoy.

Ginny jumped to her feet.

"Right then, I'd better go see if the boys left us any hot chocolate." She said, and then hurried off at a near run.

Draco sighed. Every time he got close something got in the way. He sighed, standing up. If he were anyone else, he would have just resigned himself to the fact that he was just going to have to be bored this holiday. But he was a Malfoy, and as he'd reminded her enough times, Malfoys didn't lose. Or give up. At least not when it was something they really wanted…or couldn't get someone else to do for them.

He made the quick walk back to the house (house being a word used quite generously in his opinion) he stomped his snow-covered shoes before entering.

"What do you mean?" Ron's voice greeted him from the next room over. He could always tell when it was Ron talking. He was just so bloody whiney all the time.

Draco froze immediately and listened. He didn't know what the trio was discussing, but he had learned it was never wise to pass up a good opportunity to eavesdrop. Especially with those three; they were just so careless about what they said.

"Now don't go biting my head off, Ronald."

"You knew. I can't believe Seamus was dating my baby sister. Bloody wanker. Never even had the balls to tell a bloke about it."

"Ron!" Hermione admonished shrilly. Draco smirked; he couldn't see her but he was fairly sure she was blushing. "Stop being crude. Besides, they never officially went out."

"Still, he sholda at least told me about it."

"Because he knew you'd take it so well." Harry deadpanned.

"Aww shut up, Harry. This is serious. I just find out that not only did Seamus date my sister, he broke her heart. I'll kill him when I see him!"

"Oh, quit being so dramatic. I didn't say he broke her heart. I just said she was a little upset about it. Besides, I could be completely wrong. Maybe she was just tired…"

"Merlin, hold on a minute. Why's she still going to Diagon Alley with him? He doesn't think he'll get her back does he?"

"Well I rather hope not considering she's just going to help him pick out a Christmas present for Hannah-"

"Hannah?" Ron cried. "Hannah Abbot? He wants her to pick out a present for his girlfriend?"

Draco could understand Ron's outrage. Every guy in the world, except apparently Seamus, knew that you didn't ask your ex to help you shop for your current fling if you wanted to keep all of your body parts. He heard even Harry wince. Harry. Who, at least according to Draco, knew less about wooing women then a big, furry, spider. Draco felt himself go cold for a reason he couldn't quite place. It probably had to do with all the snow that had somehow made it down his shirt outside.

"Yes, I admit, it does seem a bit inconsiderate of him, but Ginny could have said no."

"Ginny doesn't say no to anyone, Hermione, you know that." Harry said.

Except of course me, Draco couldn't help but think somewhat bitterly.

"Just don't go and make Ginny out to be the damsel in distress. She wouldn't take very well with that."

Ron snorted.

"I'm serious, Ron. Promise me you won't do anything stupid."

"You know me, 'Mione."

"That is exactly why I'm worried."

Okay, hope I didn't confuse you all too much with the back-and-forthness, which I just made a word, so THERE! Anyway, thanks all for reading. I'll try and have another chapter out soon, but swim season makes things crazy. School gets out in exactly a month for us, and I PROMISE I'll update again beofre then, but assoon as class ends, I'll be able to update more often.

Review! Please? Pretty please? With sugar on top? Please?I luuuuurrrrrrrrvvvvvvvvveeeeee you!