Entry 4

The waiting was endless. Endless minutes melted into endless hours, and then days, which in turn crept into weeks. Yet still, there had been no talk of taking her to Voldemort. After a while, Ginny had given up on inquiring as to when she would meet with him. The answers were always the same. Either an irritated glare, a comment on how the person couldn't care less, or some remark about whenever the Dark Lord was ready.

Instead of dwelling on the fruitlessness of her situation, Ginny poured herself into her routine. Ever since Malfoy had gotten her out of the room, she was subjected to doing chores—the same chores that he was doing, she had found out. But sometimes it seemed like less work and sometimes more. She had also learned that Malfoy did duties as a Death Eater. However, since he had failed so miserably at the huge job that he had been given the year before, the jobs that he was assigned were even less than the ones new Death Eaters did; they were the dirt that was left behind.

She herself had been given more and more chores, to the point that she was now only contained in her prison during the night, when she slept and when most of the adults worked. The rest of the day was spent with meaningless chores that had to be performed only by hand. She sometimes thought that the wizards only gave them to her because they were far too lazy to do it themselves, though they were more than capable of doing so. There was a benefit to her routine though. Ginny got a chance to stretch her legs, go outside and enjoy the weather and best of all, to shower. The first time that she had been allowed to get all of the grit and sweat off of her body from being cooped up in the room all day, had been like paradise. She'd never wanted to come out of the steaming water.

"Weaslette!"

The voice punctuated one of her newest chores—mopping the floor—and Ginny groaned. Malfoy was really the only person who talked to her—if one called what conversations they had talking—the other adults being far too busy or thinking that they were far too old and important to want anything to do with her. A sudden image came up in Ginny's head of taking her mop and smacking Malfoy right across the face with it. It was satisfying and caused her to snicker as he drew closer to her.

"Thought you might be interested in this," he continued, smirking and holding something out in front of him for her to take.

Once she had grabbed it, he strode away from her, going about whatever business he had been doing before he had approached. Curious as to what she might be curious about, Ginny unfolded the rolled paper with interest. She found that it was copy of today's Daily Prophet, and on the front cover was a small story with a heading that read, "No Sign of Young Witch as of Yet." There were two haggard looking people on the front, her parents. Her mother was crying fiercely into her father's shoulder, the latter or who was looking very composed and collected. Nonetheless, his eyes were full of worry and concern. The two didn't look up and see her, but viewing their racked postures made Ginny want to comfort and assuage their fears, even if merely in a photograph.

"After 18 days of searching, there has still been no sign of Ginny Weasley, the child of Ministry official, Arthur Weasley. The sixteen year old vanished after sneaking out of her parents' house late that night. In the morning, her parents found that she had gone, and a short time afterwards she was presumed missing, possibly captured of killed by You-Know-Who.

Her mother, Molly Weasley, gave this statement, "She's always been the best behaved of all of our children, never causing trouble. I have no idea what came over her. Maybe she had been put under the Imperius Curse." The woman then collapsed in a state of tears, unable to say more.

Her father had this to add, "If anyone has taken my daughter, be warned that I will hunt you down and make you wish that you had never even heard of the Weasleys. And if You-Know-Who is behind this, your time will come to an end very soon."

Interestingly, Ginny would have been attending Hogwarts, the place where He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named´s followers were last spotted, this fall, starting her sixth year there. As she is the daughter of a ministry official as well as the former sweetheart of Harry Potter, she is a prime target for kidnap or murder by the darkest wizard of all time. Harry Potter was unavailable for comment at this time, but I can imagine that this would only spur the Boy-Who-Lived on further in his quest against the You-Know-Who.

If anyone has any information on the current whereabouts of Ginny Weasley of what might have happened to her, please contact the Ministry of Magic at—"

Ginny put the paper down. The first thought in her mind wasn't how long she had been gone, or how correct the journalist was in saying that she was in danger of being captured by Voldemort—while still unknowing that she had strayed into his pawns' midst intentionally. It wasn't on how much information the newspaper was giving out in case she hadn't been captured, making it easier to hold her for ransom or do some other malicious thing to her if she did in fact get kidnapped, because of her ties to influential wizards. Instead, the first thing that popped into her mind was her family.

Ginny thought about her six brothers, mother, father, and her many friends and associates, who were probably all sick with concern for her. The image of her mother's crying form and her father's flashed in her eyes again, as clear as if she were still holding the article to her face. A strong tug of homesickness came over her, laced with feelings of guilt and regret. What was she doing here? She wanted to run back into the warm house of her parents, retreating behind the safety of their walls in peace. There were second doubts in her mind, fueled on by the fact that sitting and waiting for something to happen, being trapped in a small and boring room, and being forced to do endless chores for Death Eaters wasn't a very exciting prospect at all.

Ginny caught herself before her min wandered too far away from reality, dwelling on comforting thoughts from the past. Why was she here? To prove herself and make a name for herself as a successful witch. She suddenly realized that she would never be able to do that if she kept going back to thoughts of her family or her friends or how life in the past was compared to her life now. After all, if one kept dwelling on what was left behind, then one could never move forward. And Ginny desperately needed to move forward to succeed in this new future.

She finished mopping the floor of the entrance hall and then walked around the house, venturing into the areas that she was allowed—the kitchen, the entrance hall where she had previously been, the stairs, and the long corridor of rooms that le to the suits of the Death Eaters who stayed there. However, it wasn't until she reached the last place—the only room that she was allowed to go in down the gloomy and depressing hallway where the adults held their business at, the dining room—that she found what she was looking for.

The former Hogwarts student was sitting at the long, empty table, drinking something from a cup in his hands. He looked up as she strode in and placed the Daily Prophet in front of him, smoothing its crumpled form out so that he could make out what it was.

"Though I'm sure that it wasn't what you were intending, this article actually helped fortify my resolve to stay here and become a Death Eater," she informed her companion bluntly and proudly. "So thank you, Draco."

Ginny thought that she saw a slight wince at her familiar use of his name and a smile played out on her lips, glad to make him feel any sort of discomfort. The boy showed no other signs of emotion, maintaining the same unfeeling mask that he always wore. However, it strangely wasn't accompanied by an air of superiority or by the curl of a lip, warning that a harsh comment was going to come her way soon. Instead, it was joined by only narrowed eyes and a thoughtful expression.

"Why do you want to become a Death Eater?" the grey eyed teen questioned her, his words coming out hard and serious. "You don't support the Dark Lord. You don't believe in what he has to offer. You're loyal to the Ministry and come from a family of blood traitors. You even dated Potter. What are you doing here?"

His eyes bore into her as his words got colder and quieter, hitting her with a chill that she had never experienced from him before. "This isn't the place for little girls who want a break from their good two shoes life. Go back home."

Ginny parted her lips in anger to respond to him, but was interrupted when he quickly stood up out of his chair, the close proximity of his presence pinning her to the table. For once, Ginny noticed how much taller he was than her, as his looming figure created a formidable intimidation on her part. She surreptitiously grabbed an empty candlestick on the table behind her, prepared should she have to fight back if he tried anything.

He lowered his head to look her in the eye and she narrowed her eyes back at him, her heart racing and her breath coming in smaller and faster portions. "If you thought that being a Death Eater is easy, you were wrong." The dangerous lit that had been in his voice before was gone, replaced by only a soft tone. However, Ginny didn't let down her guard, as he was still too close for comfort. The older boy paused for a split second and then added, almost mockingly, "Ginny."

Finally he walked past her, his shoulder colliding with hers in a hard brush as he swept out of the room.

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The bed was as hard and lumpy as ever, but Ginny didn't care about its uncomfortableness as she threw herself onto it, face forward and legs and arms spread-eagled. Though she was exhausted from a day of working, she let her mind drift onto the earlier conversation with Malfoy, not that there was much of one, as always.

If she hadn't sensed that he was completely serious, she would have written off the encounter as stemming from jealously, or as an underestimate of her abilities. But now she wondered what could be so bad about becoming a Death Eater, besides the fact that one would have to serve Lord Voldemort. Did he hate the job because he had failed at his mission and had been demoted to the same status as a house-elf? Or was it because of some other reason?

Murdering Dumbledore. She wondered if she could have done it herself. She had always assumed that she would if she had been ordered to, but that was theoretical of course. Now she faced the reality of the situation. While she hadn't been as close to him as some students were, it seemed that he and her family were always interacting with one another. He was a good wizard and she had loved him, just as most of the wizarding world had. What would she have done if she were in Malfoy's situation, his father in Azkaban, threatened with murder, unless he killed a weak old man, one of the greatest wizards of his time? Could she have done it? Or would she have stood there like him, hesitating to the point of doing nothing at all?

Ginny shook the thoughts from her head. She would never kill someone, Death Eater or not, ordered by Voldemort or not. She would make sure that she was never ordered to kill anyone, though she wasn't entirely sure how. She closed her eyes, preparing to cuddle onto the bed, wrapping its sheets over her head in exhausted relief to be done with the day, when the door burst open behind her.

"Why aren't you getting ready?" a woman's voice exclaimed behind her.

Fighting the very strong urge to submit to sleep and ignore the person entirely, the girl slowly rolled over to stare at the woman.

"Getting ready for what?"

"To meet the Dark Lord of course!"

Ginny blinked. "The Dark Lord?" Her mind was slow to grasp on the concept, but once the words punctuated her tiredness, she bolted straight up. "I'm finally meeting him?"

"Yes. And we can't have you looking like that. Now why aren't you dressed?"

Ginny looked down at herself and then up once more. "I am dressed."

The woman shook her head. It was becoming clear that she wasn't a Death Eater herself. Her robes were a dark forest green, her hair in flared ebony spirals and her entire appearance manicured to the point of perfection. Besides, Ginny was sure that a Death Eater would have jerked her unceremoniously out of bed and dragged her to the meeting place, not stopped and have a strange conversation about how she wasn't suited to see the Voldemort yet.

As if to further confirm her suspicions, the woman looked at something that she was carrying over her shoulder and let out a brief chuckle at herself.

"Well of course, your clothes are right here."

She dumped a fine dress robe on the bed. It was black, the same shade as the robes that the Death Eaters normally wore. However, unlike their dull robes, this one sparkled magnificently and was lined with a bright red border on the edges. The collar was popped up and cut into a v-shape, somehow managing to be masculine and feminine at the same time. Very stylish indeed.

The woman picked up the robe and held it out in front of her. "They said that you were about this size." She motioned for Ginny to stand up and she complied, wondering who were the "they" that would fit her with something like this, and even take mention of her size. The dress was held up to her. "It looks like it'll fit. Now put it on. I have to do your hair and makeup as well."

All modesty aside now that she had been presented with new clothes, the young witch threw off the pair of clothes that she had been wearing for weeks now and slid on the dress robes, enjoying the feel of soft material against her skin.

At the flick of a wand, a stool and a desk appeared in front of her, complete with a mirror. The image that met her eyes was a drawn, haggard, and drab looking thing, certainly no one who deserved to be wearing robe of this nature. She was pushed onto the stool, makeup cases and hair products popping up on the desk. Her hair was fussed with: pulled straight, pushed into a mass atop her head, pushed down to hang—the woman experimented with different styles to fit the occasion, dropping them and moving on to the next before they were even completed.

Next came the makeup. But it wasn't as bad as Ginny might have imagined. The woman didn't put a hideous amount of eyeshadow, mascara and who know what else to accent the "big brown eyes" that she had complimented her on. Her cheeks weren't flushed with color to rid them of their current pallor and her lips weren't covered in bright shades that were entirely wrong for her skin color to make them appear fuller and more "luscious", no matter how beautiful the shades looked in the case. Actually, she appeared rather normal.

In the end, her hair had been straightened and shined, hanging smartly around her shoulders with slight curls on the end. Her face was covered in flesh based tones, giving her a natural look, but covering up the signs of fatigue. And of course, there were the gorgeous dress robes. If it had been a fairytale, she would either have to assume that she had a fairy godmother or a secret hidden royal identity, or that she was being offered up as a sacrifice—perhaps even doomed to be roasted and eaten afterward. Ginny shivered at her mirrored reflection. Though none of the situations seemed likely, she desperately hoped that she weren't in fact about to walk into a room with the darkest wizard of all time, only to be murdered. Or worse, tortured until she became insane.

She hoped not.

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Authors Note:

In case you haven't noticed, this is a sort of filler chapter. Thus, I didn't concentrate as much on some of the personalities (like her parents, Draco, etc.). So sorry about any OoCness, but I really wasn't paying attention to that when I was writing the first half (the filler part). (I know that that's no excuse. I myself hate when I have to read OoCness in a story. :/) And I obviously included another scene in there that was unprecipitated, which was why the fourth chapter is far longer than I thought it would be.

Thanks for reading and commenting!

--Pazé