The Unbreakable Vow

by

Ash Darklighter

It all belongs to JK Rowling and I thank her for her inspiration – There are no galleons to be made from me. This little story is my first Harry Potter fic. It is AU and of course comments are welcome. My thanks to Tad and Mona for their help.

Part 5

5 years previously – The Burrow

The figure seemed so alone, a brooding stillness enveloping his slim frame. The weight of the wizarding world was on his shoulders and it appeared to observers that the burden was getting heavier.

"Harry?"

Harry Potter glanced up from where he'd been staring into the clear depths of the pond that the Weasley family used for swimming as if it would act like the crystal ball he'd used in divination and give him the answers he was desperately seeking. "Ginny," he said, trying not to show any emotion at the sight of the youngest member of the Weasley family. "I was just coming…"

"What's wrong?" She could see that he was locking up his feelings behind the blank face he'd adopted recently and in many ways this state of affairs wasn't surprising. For someone of barely eighteen years old, Harry had suffered far too much tragedy and ill-usage during his life. It had left its mark both visible and invisible and Ginny wondered if the sunny tempered boy she'd once known would ever return.

They'd dated for a brief period during Harry's sixth year and Ginny's fifth but had reluctantly broken it off. It hadn't been a decision that he'd ever wanted to take but in the aftermath of the deaths of Cedric Diggory and his godfather, Sirius Black, Harry had deliberately pushed everyone away. He couldn't help remembering those he had lost because of who he was and did not want to place Ginny into any more danger than she was currently in. She was far too precious to him. If he lost her, he might as well surrender immediately to the first Death Eater he saw and let him Avada Kedavra him on the spot.

He turned to face the petite redhead and sighed. "I can't keep things from you, can I?"

"No." She folded her arms across her chest

After they had split, the first few months had been understandably awkward but recently, they had begun unconsciously circling one another again in what sharp-eyed bystanders, like Remus Lupin, Nymphadora Tonks and Ginny's twin brothers, Fred and George, could sense, was the age-old dance of attraction. Harry and Ginny were drawn to one another no matter how hard they tried to fight their feelings.

"Ginny…"

"No," she said again. "Don't try and wriggle your way out of this. You can keep hiding your problems from everyone else but not from me. I know you too well."

"So do Ron and Hermione," he said, a challenging glint appearing in his dulled green eyes for the first time since she'd approached him.

Ginny gave a disdainful snort. "You've learned how to fool them. You can't do that with me any more." She moved closer and placed her hand on his shoulder. "Tom Riddle harmed me too. I have depths the others will never have."

Harry felt the touch and a shiver of something ran down his spine. "Don't be too sure. War has ways of evening things out. Your family has been hit too many times…" He swallowed, his expression cracking to reveal his anguish. "Your father…"

"My father knew the risks," Ginny said, her voice trembling. "And so do I. You and I both experienced the darkness first hand before the war was ever supposed to have started. The war never ended, did it?"

Harry grabbed his fraying composure and attempted to knit it back together. He wanted to reassure her that everything was alright but he couldn't. In any case, she wouldn't believe him. "No, the war didn't end. As long as Voldemort can cheat death, the fight will never be over."

"And can he?" she asked, wincing at the sound of the dark wizard's name.

"Yes," he said, staring at his feet. He wasn't sure what she would see in his eyes. He couldn't bring back her father for her. He hadn't been able to save any of them. He wasn't even sure that he could save himself.

"You're shutting us out again, Harry. Talk to Ron and Hermione or, if you can't talk to them, what about Remus?"

"I can't," he muttered. "I tried and I couldn't. Remus has enough to worry about with the Ministry of Magic further tightening the restrictions on werewolves."

"Then talk to me," she implored. "Please, Harry. You can't keep it all bottled up inside." She noted that he briefly met her eyes properly for the first time, the pain in the clear green depths clear to see. "I want to understand and you need to talk. It's for your own good.

"I suppose that I do need to talk to someone and I have no one else I would rather tell," his gaze skittered away for a second time. "But Ginny, I don't want to burden you with my problems yet again."

She moved closer, her sweet face earnest. "Talk Harry. I'll listen. I want to help even if I can't do anything to ease what you're going through. It's better to tell someone."

"But we should be getting ready for your birthday party." He tried to smile. "I don't want to be selfish."

"You're the least selfish person I know, Harry." Her bright brown eyes shone trustingly up into his. "My birthday is today and the party is tomorrow," she said. "Today is for the people I care about most."

"This is not the kind of gift you should be getting from me," he said, unable to hold out any longer.

"This is the gift that I want. I still have feelings for you," she whispered, her hand lifting to gently caress his cheek.

"You do?" his voice cracked, as the sensations of her gentle touch arrowed down to his heart. "I haven't killed them?"

"I never stopped having feelings." She moved even closer and slid into his arms. "I know why you distanced yourself from me. I didn't agree with you at the time but I respected you for your decision and I know that you were thinking of me when you made it. But I'd rather be in danger with you than safe without you. I need you in my life, Harry."

Almost unwillingly Harry's arms closed around her and it was only then that he felt some ease; gradually his stiff hands relaxed and began to gently caress her slim shoulders. She hadn't said that loved him but she still cared about him. It was more than he hoped for and deserved. "I tried not to think about you," he confessed. "But that was impossible. You're always there. You're my hope and my future, Ginny. You're my goblet of fire."

"Then…" she coaxed softly, her hand still curved around his cheek.

"I still have feelings for you, too." He swallowed. "They never went away but after what I said – what I did, I don't have the right to expect..."

"You do and we will deal with any problems together. I'm not allowing you to push me away this time. I'm not allowing life to separate us. We have to go on living it." She reached up and gently kissed him on the lips as if sealing a vow and it was as if a ripple of glowing gold magic shimmered through the air catching them unaware in its elusive mist. "Being without you isn't making me happy, Harry. To be honest it's not making me any safer either. I'm fighting for you. I'm not going away, nor am I giving up. This time I will win."

"How can I argue with that," he said trying to smile and failing. She still cared and it was far more than he deserved even though he doubted that they should be together. Carefully he tried to step away from her but she just moved with him. He had to be honest with her. "I'm sorry I couldn't save your father, Ginny. He should be here for your seventeenth birthday. I tried to get there in time but the death eaters…they were targeting him." He hesitated and then pressed on. "They targeted him because of me."

Ginny's eyes filled with tears at further mention of her father, killed in a random Death Eater attack on Diagon Alley seven months previously. The whole family missed Arthur Weasley's steadying influence but Ginny had been especially close to her father. "No, Harry, that's not true. We've always been considered blood traitors. We may not have the money but we have reputation. We're still considered to be one of the main pure-blood families on the side of the light. Magic is neither dark nor light - it is the choices we make on how to use it."

Harry nodded. Dumbledore had said something similar to him on more than one occasion.

"It wouldn't matter to them whether you were there or not," Ginny said softly. "My father wouldn't blame you."

"Your mother…" Harry began.

"Is devastated at his loss and has yet to recover fully. Her wounds are still causing her a lot of pain but we must go on with our lives and mum will see that eventually. I know she feels the same about you, Harry. She doesn't blame you for anything and she told me that herself when I visited her earlier on today. She sent you her love, Harry."

Molly Weasley had been with her husband at the time of the attack and had been lucky to escape with her life. However the loss of Arthur had hit her hard and in her depressed state, she had withdrawn from the family and was still receiving treatment in St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies. On the positive side, Molly Weasley, unlike Alice and Frank Longbottom, could be cured.

Harry's arm tightened around the slender girl in his embrace. It was still too dangerous for them to be together but this felt so right. "You are the one holding the family together right now Ginny and you shouldn't have to do that."

"I'm seventeen today. That's adulthood in the eyes of wizarding law. Still," she pressed closer to him enjoying the feeling of his arms around her. She'd noticed his attempt to put distance between them. She'd noticed it and dealt with it. This was the only wizard that she'd ever really wanted. It wasn't her fault that he was sometimes slow on the uptake. "There are times when I feel so much older."

"I know what you mean."

"I know you do." She glanced up at him. "So tell me what's worrying you. Something is, Harry. You're brooding more than even you normally do. That's not a good sign."

His teeth gnawed worriedly at his lower lip. "You've studied Occlumency?"

"Of course I have. You made us all do after…after Sirius," Ginny tailed off at the sudden frozen expression on Harry's face. The death of his beloved godfather was still raw after two years.

"You cannot tell anyone this yet," he said, his face white. "Not anyone - especially not Dumbledore or even your family. It's too dangerous. Can you put up some privacy wards?"

"Yes." Ginny slid her wand from the back pocket of her jeans. A couple of swishes and flicks later she was done. What was he worried about that was so important and why hadn't he done his own privacy charms? He had saved her life back in her first year at Hogwarts and because of that she owed him. But she suspected that most of her family owed him as well. "I swear on my magic that I will not tell anyone about this until you give me leave."

Harry took a deep breath. "Voldemort's gone," he said bluntly.

"What!" Ginny gasped, unable to comprehend what she was hearing. "He's gone. But how…where? Surely we'd know that he'd gone."

"Maybe. Maybe not."

She frowned. "The Daily Prophet hasn't said anything. There's been nothing new from the Ministry of Magic apart from their stupid safety guides."

"They denied he'd come back until he was standing right in front of the Minister, remember?" Harry spat bitterly. "They don't really know anything and they're still too busy saving their own skins to worry about the rest of us. Keep in mind that I'm the one most attuned to Lord Voldemort's moods. And believe me, if he was still in my head I'd know about it."

"Your scar?"

"Not a twinge for three weeks," he said. "And don't say that it's too short a time for me to know anything. That's not the case. For the past year, the ache in my scar has been a constant presence in my life. Constant, Ginny," he repeated. "Since the most recent battle in Hogsmeade three weeks ago, I haven't had a single twinge. There's been nothing - nothing at all." He pushed his fringe away from the famous lightening bolt scar. For the past year it had always been red and inflamed. Now, she could hardly see it.

Ginny's eyes narrowed in thought. If Voldemort had truly gone why wasn't Harry happy about this and broadcasting it to the entire wizarding world? She had to ask. "Then why aren't you happy about it?"

Harry took a deep breath, his expression grave. "I'm not happy because unfortunately, Voldemort's demise is not permanent."

"Not permanent? What do you mean it's not permanent?" Ginny's words quickened.

"There are ways that he can come back to life and this time his followers know it. Voldemort will have left instructions on how he can be raised." He walked away and sat down on an old tree stump. "There won't be nearly fifteen years of grace for the wizarding world this time. They won't have time to celebrate and ignore what could be occurring right under their noses." He kicked a loose pebble into the pond, where it landed with a light splash. "Sit down, Ginny. This could take a while."

She walked over, took out her wand again and conjured up a blanket, seating herself down beside him. Harry watched her with a strange look on his face – almost like envy. "Go ahead," she said. "I want to know."

"Do you know what a Horcrux is?"

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