AN : Didn’t take that long this time, did it? =) Chapter Ten will be out as soon as I correct a bunch of stuff my beta reader pointed out that made me blush in shame. (Read : OVERWORKED beta reader who I thank from the very bottom of my very frazzled little heart) THIS SERIES WILL BE FINISHED THIS WEEK! I have declared it! Or... maybe not. *growls and turns back to the keyboard*
PS : Don’t forget to check out the Draco/Ginny Archive if you like d/g and my stuff.I’ve got a new series there about D/G/R/Hr/H after Hogwarts. =)
Anthend
Chapter Nine : Things Start Happening. More.
Harry couldn't believe what he was seeing.
It didn't matter that he had been looking for Ginny. It didn't matter that he had already realized that he and Cho weren't meant to be.
All that mattered was that she was kissing Neville.
Harry spoke. He couldn't help it. His voice came out, disbelieving, loud, "Cho?"
They broke apart instantly. Neville's face went a bright red, but Cho didn't even have the grace to blush. "Harry!" She said, and he couldn't help thinking that it was amazing that she didn't sound in the least bit contrite. She just sounded surprised, and slightly concerned.
"What are you doing?"
Neville started backing away, looking awkward. "Look, Harry -"
"At what?" Harry snapped. "The person who I thought was my girlfriend? Or maybe the person I thought was my friend?"
Neville stopped. "Harry -"
"Keep quiet." Harry said, his face burning. "I get what's going on, don't worry. I'll even spare you the customary mumbling and apologies." It was Harry's turn to back away, his hands outstretched. "Go back to what you were doing. Don't mind me."
He left.
Anger. No, not really anger. Humiliation, yes. Annoyance and a bit of anger that Neville could actually do that to him. It crossed his mind that he didn't really blame Cho. Cho was just doing what Cho did.
But beneath the humiliation, a sheepish, almost ashamed thought was that he wouldn't have to tell Cho that he was breaking up with her.
_____
Ginny looked at Draco, looked at his pale, handsome white face. "I don't know." She said simply. She wanted to reach for him, but held herself back. She hugged herself. "I just-" she broke off and said haltingly, "I just know that I need you..."
Draco was suppressing some very strong emotion - she could see it in the eyes that, just then, weren't icy or cold, simply confused and trying desperately to re-erect barriers she didn't want between them. She could almost see his internal struggle.
An unbidden thought went through her. Has anyone ever said that they needed him?
She started to push it away. She didn't want to get too close to this boy -
Just as he didn't want to get too close to her.
So she just looked at him. Simply looked at him. Searchingly, at the features she had seen so often and never really looked at. Saw the clever gray eyes, the proud, haughty set of the strong jaw. The way his hands were clenched then, the way his feet were slightly braced apart like Harry's, who was always waiting for some new calamity, but tenser at the moment.
"Stop looking at me like that." Draco gritted out. He sounded strained, as if he was about to break.
They stood in silence, just looking at each other. No, Ginny realized. She was looking at Draco. Draco was simply holding himself in, his eyes glazed, struggling -
She knew, quite suddenly, that he was struggling not to come to her -
Malfoy pride, Ginny thought vaguely, Malfoy pride and Malfoy pride and Malfoy pride -
It's always pride.
She wanted him so badly.
She needed him.
She'd never needed Harry.
She'd longed for Harry, she'd wanted Harry with everything good and brave in her, but she'd never needed him.
Not the way she needed this boy who stood so close to her and was trying so hard to be far away in mind -
She needed him with everything in her, everything bad and mean and good and nice - everything that made her who she was -
She couldn't let him leave.
So she held him.
She simply stepped forward and wrapped her arms tightly around his waist, her head against his chest, holding him tightly, so tightly -
Willing him not to leave.
And when his body softened against hers, and his head rested on the top of hers as if he was tired and weary, and his arms tightened around her like he wouldn't let go, ever, she knew she had won.
_____
Colin followed Professor Snape and Professor McGonagall down the corridor and up the stairs through to the Headmaster's room. His heart was beating oddly fast, his cheeks flushed and his eyes overbright. "Is that the truth potion?" he asked Professor Snape.
The man slanted him an odd look and grunted. Colin took that as a yes and he eyed the potion curiously. It looked almost like a glass of water, transparent and clear. How strange, Colin thought, that such a simple, innocent-looking thing could cause such a marvelous thing as truth to emerge. The photographer in him studied it well.
What was that quote, that quote from that Muggle book - What is essential is invisible to the eye. Something like that. What book had it been - oh yes, The Little Prince, by Antoine de Saint-Exupery.
How wonderful, to be able to hide your true essence behind a simple outer covering, behind innocence -
Colin thought, suddenly, of Hannah and almost laughed at the irony of it.
His heart beat faster.
The door to Dumbledore's room swung open.
_____
Ginny tightened her hand in Draco's. Draco glanced down at her.
They stood outside the gargoyle entrance, simply together.
"I have to go up." Ginny said, turning her face up to look at him. His face was still a mask - but his eyes were different. They were uncertain and vulnerable, no cool ice to cover and distort. She reached up to kiss him and tried to lighten the moment, smiling against his lips teasingly.
He didn't smile back, and his hands tightened on her waist before they let go.
"I have to go." Ginny repeated, a crooked smile at him. "Draco -" she said hesitatingly, as he turned to leave, hands in robe pockets.
The coolness in his eyes almost made her cry. He was pushing her away again. "Yes?" he inquired coolly.
"When will I see you again?" She wanted to slap herself for the inanity of the words.
He had already turned away. "You'll know when you see me."
Ginny watched him as he moved away. He was trying to regain control, trying to anger her.
It was working.
Her hands balled into fists and she had a sudden urge to hit out at his retreating back, that straight, proud back.
How could you dislike someone you needed so much?
Ginny moved up the stairs, anger pouring through her, coursing down her veins and making her feet warm. Ugh was the only word to describe it. UGH.
Was it love? She didn't know. It was need, sheer heart-pounding need. It was something stronger than love, and twice as compelling.
Love or not, something was drawing her to Draco.
Maybe it was another kind of curse.
_____
Harry watched Hannah.
He had to admire her courage. The girl sat, back erect, face -
All right. The face was ravaged.
"Drink it, Miss Smirten." Professor McGonagall said briskly. "All of it."
Miss Smirten drank.
Harry glanced at Ginny, wondering how she was taking the fact that one of her best friends had used an Unforgivable Curse. Two Unfogivable Curses.
Hannah jerked and her eyes glazed over. Dumbledore leaned forward, his eyes glittering queerly. "Miss Smirten?"
Hannah nodded. "I am Hannah Smirten."
"Good." Dumbledore crooked his head at Professor Snape. "Miss Smirten, was it you who performed the curses on Ronald and Virginia Weasley?"
Hannah jerked again. Harry found himself leaning forward.
"Yes."
A sigh. From Ginny. Harry wanted to go over and hug her, but he restrained himself. Ginny was standing with Colin, and they were holding hands, so tightly that their knuckles were white. Ginny's face was pale and she looked like she was going to burst into tears.
He couldn’t do anything.
Helplessness.
Dumbledore’s next question shocked him, even though it must have been inevitable. "Was it under Voldemort’s command?"
The answer was swift but stilted. "No."
Ginny’s face tightened. Harry didn’t know if that was worse or not. To have her friend willingly place an Unforgivable curse on her must be far worse than if she was under another’s command...
Dumbledore’s next question took them all by surprise. "Were you under the Imperius Curse yourself Miss Smirten?"
A sort of relief came over Hannah’s face. "Yes."
_____
Draco sat in a dark corridor.
He was completely alone, and that was good. He couldn’t hear any signs of any sort of life nearby - no shouts of students, no heavy gropings of couples, not even the faint scuffle mice made.
He was completely alone.
He welcomed the sensation.
He was tired. So tired.
Ginny Weasley drained him.
She took and took and took from him, until there was nothing left.
Except her.
Even now, in the simple, blessed solitude provided by the dark and the lack of contact with anything in the world, even now when he could pretend everyone was gone and he was the only one left in the whole world, even now he could feel the touch of her warm lips and the caress of her gentle hands and smell her.
That was the worst of it.
He could smell her.
There was no other sense so impossible to fool as the sense of smell.
She was there, with him.
He wanted to bang his head against the wall. He hated this. He was Draco Malfoy. He controlled everything in his world, his world didn’t control him. He was Draco Malfoy.
He would not let her -
Let her do what? Draco asked himself bitterly. She couldn’t do more than she had done.
He hated this feeling of -
Never underestimate your enemies.
He’d underestimated Ginny Weasley and his response to her. He’d thought it was only hormones, he hadn’t counted on this feeling -
This feeling -
This feeling of unease in his stomach, this restlessness.
This feeling of need.
He hated it.
He would not let her -
He would not let himself -
Damage control, Draco thought, with only slight irony. Yes, damage control was what was needed here -
He’d let the situation get out of hand.
That stopped now.
And it would never happen again.
_____
More shock.
"Hannah was under the Imperius Curse." Harry said out loud, his eyes meeting Dumbledore’s for a brief moment. He watched as Dumbledore looked gravely at Snape and McGonagall. He looked at Ginny and Colin. If possible, they had both gone even whiter. Their hands were still clenched together, Harry noticed with an unreasonable irritation at the fact. He wondered if it stemmed from the fact that Ron and Hermione weren’t there to lend him strength as the two over there were sharing strength.
"Yes." Dumbledore said finally. He looked at Hannah, and with infinite weariness he sat on a chair, bending slowly, carefully.
"Do you know who placed the curse on you?"
Hannah jerked. "No."
Harry let out his breath.
The room seemed to relax.
There wasn’t anything else to say.
_____
"They know about the curse."
The Death Eater looked at Voldemort steadily. "They were bound to find out." A shrug, a careless flick of the hand. "It was not meant to be a secret, and Dumbledore is no fool."
"And how is he going to begin the search for you?"
The eyes lowered briefly, then flashed up again. "I was not told."
A pause, drawn-out, tense.
"Your play has gone on long enough." Voldemort lifted his hand and drank deeply from a goblet. The Death Eater did not flinch as he knew Voldemort expected him to at the contents of the goblet. "I want it ended. I want Harry Potter brought to me."
"Soon."
"I am not -" Voldemort drank again, "- pleased with your insolence. You will bring him to me."
"It is not time."
Anger. "You will not defy me."
"It is not time."
Voldemort lifted his hand in sudden fury. "You will bring him to me!"
"It is not time."
A dissipation of the fury. "It is not time." Voldemort repeated silkily. "And can you tell me why?"
"It is too soon. The boy is too closely looked after by Dumbledore, especially after the curses on his friends. It will have to wait a while."
"And you want to continue your play during that time."
A smile. "Yes."
"I am not pleased with you." Voldemort trailed a finger over the carvings on the goblet. A carving of a man, kneeling. Of exquisite quality. "If you are wise, you will not do anything to invite suspicion before the boy is mine."
"Or your anger?"
Insolence. Voldemort’s anger flashed again and faded. He enjoyed these flashes of impudence. It was a fine wine to be savoured - a novelty -
And when the attraction paled, measures could be taken.
"Or my anger." He agreed.
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