Disclaimer: Scientists calculate that, at present rates of consumption, we will have exhausted all possible ideas for clever Harry Potter disclaimers by 2049. In the interest, then, of averting Peak Wittiness, let's just leave it at "I don't own Harry Potter", shall we?
The wall between King's Cross platforms 9 and 10 stood bare and forbidding in the station lighting, and Ginny Weasley swallowed and pressed her tail tight against her back. She had known all summer that this moment was coming – the moment when she would finally have to leave the Burrow's secure comfort behind and venture out into a dark parody of Hogwarts headed by a psychopath's murderous vassal. But knowing it was coming was one thing, and actually having it happen was something else entirely.
Still, however strong Snape's hold on her school seemed, in reality it was only as lasting as his master's sway – and, so long as Harry was still out there pursuing whatever secret weapon Dumbledore had revealed to him, Voldemort's whole regime was built on the most powdery of sand. And Harry was still out there: the two and a half feet of soft fur that caressed her dorsal skin, blanketing the length of her spine in fleecy warmth and brushing feather-like against the very base of her neck, told her that as surely as if he'd stood before her.
Thus heartened, Ginny stiffened her jaw, gripped her trolley, and strode through the barrier with her head held high. As she did so, she thought with a quiet smile of the conversation she'd had with Harry the morning after Dumbledore's funeral, when, having spent half the night brooding on the prospect of being left forsaken and isolated for the duration of the war, she had met him in the courtyard and laid down an ultimatum of her own.
"A squirrel's tail?" said Harry with a frown. "On a chain, you mean? Like a rabbit's foot?"
"No," said Ginny. "I mean that, if you're going to go off and hunt You-Know-Who without me, then first you have to cast a spell on me so that my body will have the kind of tail that a squirrel's has. Like the noble wizard knights in olden times."
Harry stared at her. "The knights in olden times had tails like squirrels?"
"No, no," said Ginny impatiently. "Their ladies. Not squirrels' tails specifically, I mean; it was other kinds of spells usually, of course – but those kinds won't do the job in the circumstances I'll be dealing with. And besides," she confessed with a shy little grin, "I've always fancied that it would be fun to be a squirrel for a little while, ever since I was a little girl looking at the pictures in Hinny Prepares for Winter. Did you ever read that when you were little? –No, of course you wouldn't have. I always forget you were raised by Muggles. So anyway, if you have to enchant me somehow, and making me part squirrel would serve our turn as well as anything, why shouldn't you indulge my childhood daydreams? That's not much to ask, surely."
It seemed reasonable enough to her, but Harry only continued to gape vacantly at her for a moment or two, and then shook his head. "Ginny, I think I'm missing a step here somewhere," he said. "Why do I need to cast any kind of spell on you at all? And what do knights and their ladies have to do with anything?"
Ginny cocked her head, and arched an eyebrow. "So Hermione's been telling the truth, all this time," she said. "You really don't listen in History of Magic, do you?"
Harry shuffled his feet, and grinned self-consciously. "All right, so my secret's out," he said. "So why don't you tell me about it? You're nicer to listen to than Binns any day of the week."
Ginny tried to keep from beaming, but didn't have much success. "Well, it's pretty obvious when you think of it," she said. "Imagine you're a wizard knight in the Middle Ages, and you're going off to war against a rival lord or whatever. You have to leave your sweetheart behind, and for all she knows you may never…"
"Witches didn't fight in wizarding wars?" said Harry.
Ginny frowned. "No, of course not," she said. "Why would they?"
"Well, why wouldn't they?" said Harry. "I suppose they had wands, and could learn the spells…"
"Yes, but don't you see, Harry," said Ginny, "if everyone in a country goes to war, and the war lasts long enough, sooner or later all the brave people in the country will get selectively killed off, and the only people left will be the ones who preferred saving their skins to serving the cause. And then, even if you win, you're left with a country that will sell out the thing you were fighting for at the first hint of trouble, and won't even see anything wrong with it because nobody's left to shame them into being better. So the only way to keep war from destroying your country's soul is to make sure that half your populace is arbitrarily kept clear of it, no matter how brave or strong they are – in fact, the braver and stronger they are, the more they should be kept clear of it, so they can keep bravery and strength alive among you. And don't take this the wrong way, Harry, but your half of humanity just isn't as good at moral ostracism as mine."
Harry pondered this for a moment. "Huh," he said at length. "I never thought about it that way."
"Well, now you have," said Ginny.
"Yes, I have," Harry agreed. "All right, so the knight leaves his lady, maybe never to return…"
"Maybe never even to be found," said Ginny. "That's the real nightmare, you know. It's one thing to lose someone and know you've lost him, but if you can't be sure – if he just vanishes from the battlefield one day, and you're left to spend the rest of your life taunted by mocking hopes and yet defenceless against the most horrid apprehensions of his fate…" With difficulty, she swallowed back a resurgence of the shuddering prostration that such thoughts had wrought upon her throughout the previous night.
Harry nodded gravely. "Sure," he said. "And then if you assume he is dead and marry someone else, you're in a pickle if he shows up alive again after all. I saw an old Muggle movie about that once."
"Right," said Ginny, grateful for the descent into more practical considerations. "Muggles probably have all sorts of stories about that sort of thing, because they don't have any way of knowing for certain whether a missing person is alive or dead. But we do," she said emphatically. "Mors Jaculatoris: when the caster of a spell dies, the spell automatically breaks. Cast a spell on someone, and she never has to wonder whether you're alive or dead, because the spell itself will tell her just by whether or not it's still there."
Harry's eyes widened in understanding. "A-ha," he said. "And that's what the mediæval wizard knights did for their ladies?"
"Exactly," said Ginny. "Just a little mark on the wrist, usually, in the shape of the knight's arms, or his monogram if he fancied himself a real scholar. And that's all very well if you're in your own family's castle surrounded by friends and loyal servants – but I'm going to be here." She waved her arms expansively to indicate the whole of Hogwarts. "With Dumbledore dead, and the Board of Governors being what it is, I'll be shocked if Hogwarts hasn't folded completely to You-Know-Who by 1 September; anyway, we're sure to have at least one open or concealed Death Eater on the faculty. And if he catches me stealing glimpses at my wrist to see if Harry Potter is still alive… I mean, it isn't as though the Death Eaters don't know about this trick; where do you think You-Know-Who got the idea of the Dark Mark from?" She shook her head. "No, what I need is something I can hide underneath school robes, and never need to check on because I can always feel it without looking. And I suppose the squirrel thing isn't the only possibility that leaves, but I'm quite sure it's the nicest."
"Yeah, I reckon so," said Harry. "But the thing is, Ginny…"
"Of course, there's still Bill's wedding," Ginny mused. "If I'm tapped as a bridesmaid, I'll have to hide it under my dress, and that might take some doing. Still, I think I could manage it, with a high enough waist and a full enough skirt – and, knowing Fleur, a neckline that'll keep everyone from paying my bum much attention anyway." She smirked. "Well, at least Auntie Muriel will have something to complain about. –I'm sorry, Harry, you were saying?"
"Well…" Harry hesitated. "First of all, this sounds like a pretty complicated spell. I know I'm in N.E.W.T.-level Transfiguration now, and doing pretty well, but if I messed this up… I mean, I'm just not sure I'd want to risk it."
"Oh, that's all right," said Ginny. "We'll get Professor McGonagall to supervise and walk you through it. Someone like that would have to be there anyway; you didn't suppose I was planning to have you point a wand at my bare backside unchaperoned, did you?"
Harry coloured. "To be honest, I hadn't given it any thought," he muttered.
Ginny grinned. "Well, you'd better start, then," she said. "Don't want your carnal impulses catching you off guard in the middle of a complex spell. Not that you'll actually see anything so very risqué – I picture you putting the base of my tail just above the line of my hips, so all the really juicy bits will still be covered – but, even so…"
Harry groaned, and buried his face in his hands. "Oh, Ginny, don't," he said. "Don't, please."
Ginny, who hadn't been expecting this reaction to her banter at all, was startled enough to take a physical step backward. "Harry, what's the matter?" she said. "Did I make you uncomfortable, being so… lively?" She should have realised, she chid herself; she knew perfectly well that the household Harry had been raised in was vastly less earthy than her own…
"Uncomfortable?" Harry laughed hollowly. "Ginny, you're wonderful. That's the whole trouble."
At Ginny's questioning look, he elaborated. "Didn't you hear what I told you yesterday? So long as Voldemort's out there, everyone I care about is a target. The only way I can keep anyone safe is by doing my best not to care about them – and if you're going to be so sweet and loyal and playful and all-around perfect, how am I possibly supposed to keep from caring about you?"
Ginny's eyes widened, and grew soft with sympathy as it dawned on her just what a poor, lonely little boy lay beneath her beau's mythic exterior. To have such a warm and loving nature, and yet to be so utterly ignorant of how love worked in practice… it was enough to break the youngest Weasley's heart, if her faith in the power of her own love for him hadn't made that organ so gaily resilient.
"Oh, Harry," she said, and stepped forward and stroked his cheek. "Did those Muggles really teach you so little? Love isn't some luxury feature of your soul that you can deactivate like a warding charm if it interferes with what you ought to do; it's what gives you the power to do what you ought in the first place. Maybe you do have to hide it sometimes, from people who aren't worthy anymore of that truth or any other, but, if you smother it out of yourself entirely, you won't make yourself stronger or anyone else safer; all you'll do is put out the light that your soul sees by, and turn yourself into the very thing you're trying to fight."
Harry smiled shakily. "That sounds like something Dumbledore would have said to me."
"Good for him," said Ginny. "I always did think he was a wise man."
And maybe it was the matter-of-fact way she said it, or maybe it was the spectacle of a sixteen-year-old girl pronouncing approval on the greatest wizard in three centuries, or maybe it was the realisation that, after all, she wasn't wrong. Whatever the cause, a laugh burst from Harry that was like the ocean crashing through a dike of iron, and a warm glow filled Ginny's heart as she recognised the sound of health and common sense triumphing over the blindness of conscientious folly.
"All right, Ginny," said Harry. "You win. I suppose it should be a red squirrel's tail, to match your hair?"
Ginny beamed. "A red squirrel's tail would be wonderful, Harry."
And a red squirrel's tail it was – though with a few special modifications to meet the particular circumstances. For one thing, instead of extending up past Ginny's head, it only reached about to the top of her shoulders when fully vertical – and since, as fluffy as it was, even that left a rather conspicuous bulge under her robes, Professor McGonagall had helped Harry add a spell that allowed Ginny to lay each hair perfectly flat by a simple act of will. ("Heaven knows why you couldn't just have had Mr Potter cast a mild Tickling Charm on your toes," she had remarked. "Still, I suppose I was no less impractical at your age.")
But none of these tweaks in any way diminished Ginny's delight in her enchanted appendage. It wasn't a delight she could properly explain, even to the few people who knew about the spell; it wasn't just the softness of the fur, or the pleasure of moving it about, or the fulfillment of a childish daydream, though all that was delectable enough. All those joys she had foreseen, but what she hadn't expected was that the thing would cast a special glow over the whole of her everyday life simply by being there – that the mere act of ascending a staircase, or helping her mother in the kitchen, or even just waiting in the queue at the Ottery St Catchpole butcher's shop, would be completely different and immeasurably sweeter just because there was an extra bit of her tucked away beneath her robes, and that bit a token of her hero's love and a pledge of his continued well-being. If it wasn't yet a wedding ring, she was sure it was the next best thing.
Though it did make her worry, now and then, what she would do if Harry did somehow get killed during his quest. To feel the newfound companion of her days and nights, her own private reification of love and faithfulness and security, suddenly vanish into thin air at some catastrophically unexpected moment, and to know that it meant that the boy to whom she had given her heart and her future had likewise been torn from her forever… how could she endure it? How, even if she braced herself for months beforehand, could she keep from collapsing in howling desolation if ever such a day should come? And, in Severus Snape's Hogwarts, what would become of her if she couldn't?
But none of these thoughts were with her as she arrived on the platform beside which the Hogwarts Express stood waiting. The caress of her engrafted fur against her back, the assurance of her love's unextinguished life that it gave her mind, and the mood of buoyant defiance of his enemies with which this in turn filled her spirit, were at that moment her sole concerns, and together they put so broad a smile on her face that even Luna Lovegood, passing by her en route to one of the few carriages still available, paused and cocked her head in visible surprise. "Well, somebody looks happy," she said, and smiled in her own turn. "You must have gotten up on the right side of the bed this morning."
Ginny was momentarily taken aback, but she rallied almost instantly. "Yes, I guess I did," she said. "Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, as my mum would say." And she held her breath.
"Would she say that?" said Luna. "Fancy. I do hope I get to be a mother someday; it must be such fun to toss out odd sayings and watch your children's reactions. Anyway, would you like to share a compartment? I think we can find one to ourselves if we hurry."
"Love to," said Ginny, with a soft exhalation of relief. She had been watching Luna's face keenly, and had seen no hint of recognition that her choice of idioms was in any way unusually apposite – and, for all Luna's eccentricity, she had the keenest eye for secrets that Ginny had ever known. If she hadn't spotted Ginny's tail in five seconds, there was every reason to suppose that Snape and the Carrows wouldn't spot it in nine months – assuming, of course, that she remembered to draw the bed-curtains every night before changing out of her robes – and that she could keep anyone from catching a glimpse of her when she bathed – and that she didn't betray herself to any ghost old enough to have been under a lover's enchantment herself – and…
All right, Ginny, that's enough, she told herself. Don't waste your strength fretting about things before you can do anything about them. Right now, you just need to get on the train, stow your bags, and let the future look after itself.
"By the way, Luna," Ginny remarked a few minutes later, as the two of them settled into facing seats in their compartment, "speaking of odd phrases, do you have any idea why someone would put a rabbit's foot on a chain?"
Luna considered that for a moment. "So it wouldn't run away, I suppose," she said.
It wasn't quite the answer Ginny had been looking for, but, upon mature reflection, she nodded judiciously. "Can't argue with that, I guess."
"Why?" said Luna. "Where did you hear about it?"
Ginny shrugged. "Something Harry said, a while back," she murmured.
Luna cocked her head, and gave her friend a piercing look. "Yes, of course it would be," she said. "You must be thinking about him a lot right now, mustn't you?"
Ginny took a deep breath. "How can I not be?" she said. "God knows how long it'll be before I know where he is again, or what he's doing; all I know is that he's risking his life and sanity to fix a world he never broke. If I weren't so proud of him, it would be infuriating; as it is, all I can do is wait, and hope, and…" She swallowed, and didn't trust herself to continue.
Luna stared unreadably at her for a long moment; then, before Ginny knew what was happening, she rose from her seat, leant forward, and enfolded her friend in a tight hug. Ginny stiffened as she felt the rain-small palms press against her back, and cursed herself for a short-sighted fool – if she couldn't even get out of King's Cross without running into a danger she hadn't thought of, what chance did she have of making it to the holidays uncompromised? – but then the tender compassion in Luna's grip overwhelmed all other thoughts, and she laid her head on the little Ravenclaw's shoulder and poured out all her summer fears and tensions in one great deluge of tears.
The two girls remained thus entwined until they felt the train begin to move; then Luna loosened her arms and returned to her seat, and Ginny sat back with a shuddering breath and dabbed at her eyes with her sleeve. "Thanks, Luna," she said hoarsely. "I guess I needed that."
"That's all right," said Luna. "It's what friends do, that's all." She paused, and then added, mildly, "Not Death Eaters, though, so you needn't worry about that."
Ginny took a moment to process that, and then laughed aloud. "No, I guess not," she said. "You can't imagine Snape giving out hugs, can you?"
"No," said Luna gravely. "Not unless a Wimzee were controlling him. And I've never heard of one of those at Hogwarts."
Ginny laughed again, even harder than before. "Oh, Luna, you're a wonder," she said. "I don't know why I'm worrying so much. How can things go wrong, when I have friends like you?"
Luna smiled. "Well, you never know," she said. "But I'll do what I can." She cast a speculative glance toward the corridor. "Meanwhile, do you want something off the trolley? Quibbler circulation's been climbing like a rocket lately, so I actually have some spare pocket money for a change."
Ginny considered. "Yes, all right," she said. "Nothing fancy, though; just a pumpkin pasty or something."
Luna nodded, and got up and left the compartment to go look for the trolley. Ginny sighed, and snuggled back in her seat; as her tail snuggled back, she reflected anew just how lucky she was to be surrounded by so many good and loving people – not just Harry and Luna, but her parents, her brothers, the rest of her D.A. friends, and all the thousands of people whom she'd never even met, but who, by wishing Harry success in his struggle with Voldemort, were also bidding her own story end happily and well.
"'And as the first snow began to fall outside the tree,'" she whispered to herself, staring out the compartment window at the Hertfordshire countryside flying past, "'Hinny curled up on her pile of acorns, and smiled sleepily. Let winter come, she said.
"'Now, I'm prepared.'"
