As soon as they appeared outside Malfoy Manor, Draco crumbled to the ground. Hermione was at his side in a second, wand at the ready, but he reached out to stop her, sitting up slowly.
"I'm fine," he said, "It's just apparating so soon, and that squeezing sensation, that made me a bit dizzy."
Hermione backed off as Draco stood and looked into the eyes staring back at him.
"let's go."
The approached the wards cautiously, all but Draco, who strode purposefully and strongly to the gates. Once there, he turned and again addressed the team looking at him expectantly.
"There is a high possibility that my father set the wards to alert him when I pass through, so we need to move quickly once inside. Just follow me and you'll be fine." He began to turn, but halted and said, "And don't pay attention to the things that you see: either they are conjured images or traps, or more likely both." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a blade, toying with it as he asked, "Got it?"
Everyone nodded, excepting moody.
"No. You forgot to mention -- CONSTANT VIGILANCE!"
Everyone laughed at the lightened mood and took up their stances, wands at the ready. Draco took the knife in his hand and slit a clean line in his wrist for what he promised himself would be the last time. He moved around the group of nearly twenty, smearing a bit of his blood ion each of their wand tips as they watched on in fascination, their faces set into grimaces. Moments later, Draco strode through the seemingly empty archway guarding the manor and immediately set off at a quick pace.
Turning to the right, the team followed him closely. Hermione shrieked as, on the right, a wall with Ron's body impaled on long rusty spikes came into view. She grabbed desperately for his hand, which he gratefully took.
Ahead they saw Tonks stop in her tracks, staring at the same wall with a look of horror on her face, tears in her eyes and Remus' name on her lips. Hermione grabbed her hand as she and Ron moved passed, pulling her along with some difficulty as she quickly spoke.
"It's not real, Tonks, honey. I saw Ron and he's standing right next to me. It's a conjured image like Draco said."
Tonks removed her hand from Hermione's with a sheepish look on her face as they kept moving along the path, following Draco as he dodged off into unseen walkways hidden by shrubberies. They passed more images, like an endless Muggle horror film; loved ones and strangers alike were brutalized by Death Eaters and monsters of every constitution, terror and pain etched into every line of their bodies. Still they pressed on, trying best they could to ignore the screams and pleas for help emitting brokenly from the victims' mouths.
Eventually they saw less and less of the horrifying images as the packed dirt morphed into solid marble and the knarled trunks because astute armored soldiers and stodgy oil portraits.
The trek through the mansion was longer than the voyage through the terrorizing forest, and was strangely deserted.
There were no close calls, no run-ins with Lucius, no booby traps or sirens. Draco looked at their wary faces and snorted a bit as they kept walking.
"Really, we have to live here you know. My-" he said the word with great distaste "-father threw a bit of a fit about having the 'piggish brutes', as he called them, running about, so that got rid of that, and as long as you have my blood on your wands, the house will see you as friends and guests. The only worry we have is my father."
As he spoke they were still moving, constantly moving, swift and mostly silent through the manor.
There was a bit of a fright when Ron accidentally ran into a suit of armor holding a torch, both causing it to come crashing noisily to the ground and lighting Ron's hem on fire.
"RONALD!!"
Hermione, exasperated, put the armor back together with a muttered spell and a flick of her wand, than put out the fire that was inching up a panicked Ron's robes. He stod up sheepishly and muttered reparo to mend his charred robes.
The two of them ran to catch up to the group who had kept walking past the mishap, keeping to the code and trusting Hermione to resolve the situation. there were no more mishaps, and they strode in silence until they reached what both Draco and the map confirmed as the entrance to the dungeons.
Ginny was lying on the floor and counting stretch marks in the dim light. The sparse lines were layered underneath the hand-shaped bruises on her hips. She kept track with ones on her left hand and tens on her rights. Over and over and over again she counted.
One, two three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, then, eleven. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven. One, two, three, four, on and on and on, ten, eleven.
One for each finger, with one left over, like her. The one left over. Eleven divided by ten. Numbers, rape, darkness, filth.
Her mind reeled with the ache Malfoy left in his wake, and the mindless drivel kept it away. She flopped over bonelessly, her hand flung out to the right and landed on something cold and smooth.
She lifted up her necklace by its amulet, and fingered the beads and the coin with a detached countenance on her face before she lifted it into view. The coin spun freely in the air, first in one direction until it could no longer, and then in the other.
Her mind remembered emotion. It remembered Draco, who was so wonderful at times, so loving and protecting; and so broken at others, weak and vulnerable. It remembered pride in the ability to make him strong again. Her mind remembered hurt and anguish, shame, revulsion, and guilt.
But her soul, her spirit felt love and warmth and comfort, when she thought of Draco. She could almost feel his arms around her, barricading the pain and the humiliation she was currently feeling.
Feeling? NO!
Ginny threw the necklace off into the dark corner opposite her and desperately tried to shut her mind.
Sunshine daisies butter mellow turn this stupid fat rat yellow and turn my mind to pools of Jello leave me be, emotions, trials, I can't exist in pain this great just be nothing, nothing, nothing, one two three for five six eleven nineteen twenty twenty-one, eleven; two times five plus one, one for each finger…
Ginny could almost see her mind closing like the doors to one of those muggle elevators her father had tried replicating, but in an almost tangible way, the Void flared up and stopped her barricade of drivel.
"UGH!"
She pushed herself up then winced at the pain the sudden movement caused her. The dull ache in her body became a sharp pain, but still she pushed herself slowly up and forced herself to walk smoothly to where she heard the necklace hit, suppressing the urge to limp. She sat with a flump and picked up the chain, examining it closely for any damage.
Ginny sighed as she noticed that one of the emeralds was missing from the delicately writhing silver chain. Looking around carefully, she saw glinting in the nearly non-existent light a few feet away. She closed her hand around it and after fastening the necklace around her throat, rolled it around in her hand slowly.
As she sat alone, Ginny couldn't help but feel a tiny bubble of hope begin to swell up and overtake her.