Harry startled awake as someone banged on the front door of Grimmauld Place. He sat up and fumbled for his wand as Ginny awoke next to him, sitting up with her bright red hair spilling over her bare shoulders.
"Harry?" she asked. "Is that…"
"I'll get it," he muttered, grabbing for his robe. "You can stay here, I'll go see who it is."
Ginny was already going for her robe and her wand, however, and they snuck carefully down the stairs – not that they needed to; the one-way silencing wards on James Sirius' nursery were quite effective – to the front door. Harry peered through the keyhole and froze, trying desperately to come up with a reason for Draco Malfoy to be standing on his doorstep, looking utterly terrified and more than a little mad.
"Malfoy?" he called through the door. "What do you want?"
The look of utter relief on Malfoy's face was almost terrifying in its intensity.
"Potter," the blond man breathed. "Thank Merlin. Let me in before I'm seen!"
"Well you've almost certainly been heard," Ginny muttered as Harry opened the door. She reached out and yanked Malfoy inside, allowing Harry to slam the door behind him. "Draco, what's wrong?"
Ginny worked with Malfoy at St. Mungo's as a trainee Healer, and they had a decent working relationship, but not the kind of friendship that lends itself to midnight wake-ups. Still, she'd seen Draco Malfoy elbow-deep in viscera and he'd been less pale than he was now, so she poked Harry in the ribs as a gentle wifely hint.
"I think we should go to the library," Harry said, and led the way while Ginny called for Kreacher and tea.
A few minutes later they had Malfoy settled in an armchair with a mug containing rather more brandy than tea, and he was starting to look marginally better.
"Now, what's this about, Malfoy?" Harry asked, settling on the couch next to Ginny.
Draco took a deep breath and set the mug down, rising to pace in front of the unlit fireplace.
"Before I tell you…before I say anything…Potter, has Granger been acting strange lately?"
Ginny folded her arms.
"Strange how? And sit down, Draco, we're not at a tennis match."
Malfoy sat down and ran his hands over his face. They were shaking.
"I'm not sure. Not remembering things, things from your past that she should know? Acting out of character? I just…Ginny, I need to know."
Ginny leaned her elbows on her knees, focussing on their guest. Harry would have to let her take the lead on this; his relationship with Malfoy had always been…volatile. At best.
"I think we're all still a bit shell-shocked. I think that a few out of character moments are to be expected."
"The other day she didn't remember who Fluffy was," Harry abruptly offered. "We were talking, me and her and Ron, and he mentioned Fluffy, and…she covered it up really well, but you could tell she didn't know. And her marks at uni are…"
"Not what anyone was expecting," Ginny said. "But that's just the stress from the war, and she's having trouble focussing because of the nerve damage, she said…Draco, I really need to tell you what's going on."
Draco nodded as if to himself and drew a tiny Pensieve from his pocket, hardly larger than his hand.
"I think it would be easier if I showed you."
He set the little bowl down and, after exchanging a brief glance, Harry and Ginny both stuck their fingers into the silvery liquid.
They found themselves in a long, dark corridor lit with flickering torches, the only sound the constant dripping of water. A moment later they saw Malfoy drop into the memory, just as memory-Malfoy came into view, glancing from side to side with curiosity totally at odds with real Malfoy's expression.
"Follow him," the real Malfoy said hoarsely, and they set off after his memory.
"Where are we?" Ginny asked quietly.
"Basement Level Six, St. Mungo's," Draco said.
Ginny didn't bother to protest that there was no Level Six. Draco wasn't going to change his story, and if they weren't where he said they were, what harm could it do?
The passage seemed to go on for miles, but eventually they came across a door, and Malfoy stopped. The heavy steel door was set flush against the corridor wall, completely featureless except for a small viewing window, into which memory Draco peered.
They watched him stagger back, white-faced, and a moment later Harry had walked straight through the door, his shoulders set as though he was expecting something horrible.
"I'm not going in there again," the real Draco said. "Once was enough."
Ginny cast him a glance and stepped through the insubstantial memory door. She came through into a room with white walls, white floor and a glaring white ceiling that cast a harsh light on the room's occupant.
It was a woman, skeletally thin, the only lifelike thing about her a tangle of golden brown hair that reached to her waist. She was wearing white as well – white scrubs, white skin against the white, white walls, the wild curls and tangles the only colour against the glaring whiteness of the room. Even her small pale feet didn't break the featureless room's monotony as she walked from one end of the room to another.
"My God," Harry breathed, and Ginny inched closer to him as she watched the woman turn, muttering under her breath. "Gin, can you make out what she's saying?"
The both jumped as the door opened with a clunk and memory Draco stepped through, white-faced. The woman whirled away from him and knelt in a corner, her hands over her ears. Ginny found herself crossing the room to kneel beside the apparition, but there was no comfort to give the woman as she whispered endlessly to herself.
"I sent him to my parents, he's dead he's dead he's dead leave me alone, he's with my parents and he's dead and please leave me alone," she said, her voice nothing more than a hoarse whisper. She didn't stop when the memory of Draco reached out and turned her slightly so that he could see her pale, thin face and her terribly familiar amber eyes.
"Merciful Merlin preserve us," Draco said. "Granger?"