A/N: Hufflepuffs are good. They are loyal, friendly and easy to talk to. They are like a faithful dog, just sitting at your feet looking at you with puppy eyes and waiting for a Scooby snack. Everyone needs a loving, loyal Hufflepuff in their life. If Cedric had lived he would have kicked Harry's- um, anyway...

Sit. Beg. Roll over. Fetch me my wand. Good Puffle.

I disclaim. Don't really want to own Harry Potter. Draco is a different story.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Ginny's body became rigid, and she screamed incoherently from the pain shooting through her mind. Her screams brought the other three from their trance, and Draco pulled her into his lap.

After a few moments the screams stopped, and she fell limp in Draco's arms, unconscious.

"Uncle Severus! What is wrong with Ginny? What's happening? Is she okay?" Draco's fear was evident, and Snape couldn't help but smile at him.

Deep in the cockles of his heart he felt a warm glow. He had never seen his godson expressing positive emotions towards another person.

The three students looked at him in shock. Was that an actual smile? What had happened in the now hazy and smelly room?

"Is that essence of farvenswaggle I smell?" Luna's question to the Potions Master brought everyone back to focus.

The intense silence immediately following the bizarre question was interrupted by Ginny's giggle.

Draco clutched Ginny to his chest tightly, until she couldn't breathe. "Need. Air." she wheezed.

Draco loosened his grip but spoke in mock severity, "You have some explaining to do."

"Oi. Leave off mate; give her a bit of rest. What I want to know is why Trelawney is polyjuiced up as our Head of House?" Blaise flashed his winning grin at Snape, and quirked his eyebrow in the typical Slytherin 'What do you have to say for yourself?' look.

Draco, now distracted from questioning Ginny on all that had just happened, seemed to take an interest in interrogating his godfather instead. "Yes Uncle Severus, it might appear to someone who didn't know you so well, that your inner Hufflepuff was coming out."

Snape refused to rise to the boys baiting. Giving them a glare, he instead chose to explain what he had done.

He glanced to Ginny to see how she was doing, and was satisfied to see her sitting relaxed and curled up in Draco's lap like a lazy kitten. He thought he could hear a bit of a purr from his place by the fire.

"Tom Riddle, even as a young man, was a master of Unforgivable curse. He phased the Imperius curse with a spell that would activate it based on a specified situation coming about."

The students were stupefied to learn that Ginny had been under the influence of an Unforgivable for over five years.

"When young Voldemort possessed Ginny in her first year, he left a small piece of that memory in her. He tied that piece to the Imperius, and used this connection to convince Ginny's mind that she was unworthy of giving or receiving love from anyone other than himself.

I used a powdered derivative of a potion I custom brewed with the ability to cause a state of hypnosis to allow me to enter Ginevra's mind without alerting the spell. Her mind was fooled into thinking I was merely talking to her as I was weakening the spells' links."

"But Professor Snape, I've had boyfriends before Draco. What was different that caused this spell to activate?" Ginny wasn't sure if she should have asked that in front of Draco.

What if he took it the wrong way?

"It seems rather obvious, even a Gryffindor might grasp the significant difference between your relationship with Draco and say, Mr. Potter." His words were condescending but held no malice.

Ginny realised this was Snape being sarcastic; his humour was dry enough to soak up even the deepest ocean.

Ginny found she enjoyed his wit quite a bit. The House of Slytherin was a complicated and intriguing species altogether, and she was glad she had been welcomed into the fold.

"I think it was habit after a while to be infatuated with Harry. It's easy not to be rejected by many when you choose to be infatuated and oblivious with just one. It really wasn't until last year that I realised I did not romantically love Harry."

Her openly speaking of her feelings for the Boy-Who-Lived sparked bitterness in Draco, but he refused to show it to the group.

Ginny gave an outwardly imperceptible squeeze to Draco's hand at her admission. She knew he would feel resentment at the mention of Harry, but would definitely not wish for open reassurance from her. He could not allow himself to appear weak or needy, but would allow Ginny to share her support in subtle ways.

Draco found himself contemplating the many small things that endeared him to Ginny so much. She seemed to understand his needs and moods without question. She didn't get emotional over the fact that he was not overly affectionate in public. She accepted his façade, and did not try to force him to alter it to suit her desires. Ginny knew what he needed and how to give it without damage to his ego.

Ginny's next words were the ones to confirm his greatest fear that also turned out to be his greatest desire.

"So you mean that my finding true love activated the spell?" Ginny was blushing and the heat radiating from her face was warming Draco's shoulder where she was still laying against him. Draco saw Blaise twitch and try to hide his impish grin at her words.

Draco shot him a look promising great pain if Blaise chose to tease the two new lovers.

"Yes, Miss Weasley. Unfortunately for Tom Riddle, he did not understand the nature of love." There was almost a sound of pity in Snape's words. "While your falling in love activated his altered Imperius and caused it to increase its intensity of manipulating your mind, it did not take into account the fact that your strength of heart and mind was one of his reasons for wanting your soul in the first place."

"So how did this manifest into the physical world? The three of us saw the snake form that day in the corridor." Draco was confused as to why and how this was done to Ginny for the sake of stopping her love.

"I believe Tom Riddle underestimated two things in his spell casting on Ginevra," Snape answered thoughtfully. "He did not take into account that her great strength of mind would cause her fear to escalate to such a level that she was creating a semi-corporeal form of her greatest fear. When this happened it pushed the experience into the open. It exposed him to others and was freed from the confines of her mind."

"So you're deathly afraid of snakes Ginny?" Blaise did not seem convinced by this explanation.

She didn't seem like the squeamish type to him. Though most would deny that a Slytherin quality was bravery, he knew they had their own sort of bravery; there were certain things that they were able to face up to without flinching. Blaise felt Ginny was really more of a Slytherin than a Gryffindor on most days.

"No," Ginny said simply. "It was Tom."

It seemed blatantly obvious to the students that they should have realised this at once; Ginny's demon snake spirit had been Voldemort.

Having been friends with Ginny for many years Luna knew how the girl felt about her time in the Chamber and all the things that had happened. Sympathising with how Ginny must be feeling she felt her heart going out to her best friend. "What was the second mistake he made, sir?"

"He underestimated the power of his activation key. The same force that brought his spell to the forefront was the same force that destroyed it," the Potions Master explained. "Tom Riddle didn't understand that his spell manipulated and controlled two aspects of Ginevra's inner being. He had possessed the mind of an eleven year old girl, but could not overtake the purity of heart within the young woman sitting here now."

"Well, no offence to our lovely Gryffindor Princess," Blaise made sure to keep his tone humorous so as not to anger the redhead, "but what is this magical force that outsmarted the Darkest Wizard of our time?"

Draco leaned down and whispered into Ginny's ear while subtly pulling her closer against him, "True love."