A Little Late But Right on Time

Disclaimer: I own nothing except the plot, everything else is JKR's.

A Little Late, But Right on Time

Chapter 1

A Face in the Prophet

Ginny Weasley sat at her breakfast bar, a cup of coffee in one hand, and the Daily Prophet in the other. It was a cool November day, and a bitter breeze blew in through an open window. The bare trees shook in the frosty air, and a few brave passerby bundled in cloaks, strolled down the narrow avenue. Ginny scanned the paper without much interest, pausing only when a picture caught her eye. A man she hadn't seen in over 4 years stared back at her from the snapshot. She smoothed out a crinkle and read:

Death Eater Convicted

Draco Malfoy, 26, appeared yesterday before the wizard high court to be tried as a death eater. He was convicted on accounts of passing information to Voldemort, and treason against the Ministry of Magic. He will be kissed today at 10 o'clock.

Ginny dropped the paper in shock, quickly glanced down at her wrist watch, and with a deafening crack, apparated away from her apartment overlooking Vertik Alley. She appeared before a set of large wood doors. They were stained from weather and a tarnished silver doorknocker hung by no visible means. A chilling flurry of sleet caught Ginny in the face, making her shiver. She grasped the metal snake's head and knocked. She heard the gong-like noise reverberate through the empty stone halls, followed by the pattering of footsteps. The large doors slowly creaked open to reveal a small house elf decked from head to toe in what appeared to be tinsel.

“Can Honky help the young miss with anything?” Asked the elf. She beckoned Ginny into the entrance, lit by a large candelabra. “Perhaps some tea or a spot of breakfast?” Honky asked as she used her wand to dry Ginny off. Gin smiled as she looked at the elf's wand. That Hermione and her spew, er sorry, S.P.E.W. had changed elf rights dramatically.

“Can you please tell me where Dra…Mr. Malfoy is?” She glanced around as if expecting to see him. The elf's eyebrows furrowed and she frowned. Ginny could see she was having trouble what to say. When she finally spoke, it was short, and explained little more than nothing.

“Mr. Malfoy is unavailable for an extended period of time. Thank you for visiting, I'm sure he will be most pleased. Good-day!” With those departing words, Ginny Weasley was practically thrown bodily out the door, shortly followed by her flying purse and coat. The bang of the door closing punctuated this most enlightening meeting. Although Draco's house elf said he was out, Ginny knew better. Draco really was going to receive the kiss.

Many miles away, in a small dark cell, in a smelly dank building, on a cold wet rock, in a rough stormy sea, sat a man that none could recognize as Draco Malfoy, save one. His normally flawless platinum hair was dirty and hung in limp strings to his chin. His expensive silk shirt hung in tatters from his gaunt shoulders, and his pants were shredded up to his knees. He was a worn man with a little less than 2 hours to live, and a little more than half a life's mistakes on which to reflect. Starting with his biggest, leaving the woman he loved.

What had he known? He was young, only 22 and having been recruited by Voldemort, he had little choice in the matter of when he left for the battlefield. When one entered the service of Lord Voldemort, they were in it for life. Until the last breath if that's what it took, and many times it did. He remembered the day he shipped out as if it were only yesterday.

It was the 25^th of October, the day that would change his future forever and the minute that he had made the biggest mistake of his life. The day was much like this one, cold and dark, with an irrepressible sense of foreboding lurking right around the corner. Draco woke on his back, staring at the bright white of his ceiling. He turned over and looked at the person next to him, and never had he seen something so lovely. Her hair rippled in light waves down her back, and her lips curled into a smile as she unconsciously tugged on the hem of Draco's old shirt she was wearing. He lay there enthralled by what he saw until she opened her eyes. She blinked once, twice, then sat up and looked at him.

“I thought you would be gone by now, it's almost 8 isn't it?” She asked, her voice cracking from disuse.

“I wanted to say goodbye.” Draco replied, also sitting up and rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

“We said goodbye last night didn't we? As I remember it was a very long goodbye too.” She smirked at him mischievously, but then her smile faded as she remembered the occasion. “You really are leaving, aren't you?”

“Yeah, I guess I am.” Draco confirmed as if it had only dawned on him that he really was. “I love you, you know that don't you?” He looked at her worriedly.

“I know, I, I love you too.” She choked out and then threw herself at Draco in an embrace. Draco held her until her sobs quieted, rocking her back and forth in a steady reassuring rhythm. He let go and looked into her tear filled eyes.

“I'll be back as soon as I can, and I'll write you whenever I have the chance. If…” he faltered. “If I don't make it, I want you to find someone else. If anyone deserves it, it's you. Take care of yourself, I want you in one piece when, if I come back.” He attempted a half-hearted grin, which turned into a grimace. Draco stood up and walked a little ways away from the bed. He twinkled his fingers in a wave and pulled his wand out of his coat pocket. Draco looked towards the person sitting on the bed, her feet hanging off the edge. “I love you.” He mouthed and he apparated away.

“I love you too…Draco.” Said Ginny Weasley to the empty room.

Author's Note: There you go folks. Just a little plot bunny I thought of. Tell me what you think, and if I should continue. Story inspired by “Hero” by Chad Kroeger. Please feel free to leave ideas for this story or others.

XOXO

SlaptheWhiteFerret

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Disclaimer: I own nothing except the plot, everything else is JKR's.

A Little Late, But Right on Time

Chapter 2

Smile

Draco was dragged away from his daydreams by the noise of two guards unlocking his cell door. They bent down to pull him to his feet, but Draco beat them to it, stood up, and brushed himself off. Appearance is important no matter the occasion, or so Narcissa had said. Draco allowed the two guards to escort him from the dank cell and down the corridor to the room where he would breathe his final breath. The guards roughly pushed him onto a wooden slatted bench and left the room, carefully locking it with their wands on the way out.

A feeble amount of gray light trickled into the room through a skylight, and Draco could smell the stinging scent of the salty sea. He looked around the small concrete room, and for the first time in 4 years, Draco Malfoy put his head in his hands and let the tears come.

Ginevra Weasley rushed around Harry and Hermione's apartment, trying to find Harry's invisibility cloak. How was she supposed to find the bloody thing if she couldn't even see it? She could ask Harry, but since she doubted he would let her use one of his most prized possessions to go and rescue a death eater, she hadn't exactly told him she was borrowing the cloak. `Ginevra Weasley! Shame on you for not being able to find a cloak! You're a witch not a baboon!' she thought to herself as she looked underneath the couch. “Accio invisibility cloak!” Ginny saw a faint shimmer of light come flying towards her, and raised her hand to catch it and tuck it into her purse. Hardly believing what she was about to do, Ginny focused on her destination with determination and deliberation and turned on the spot.

The sensation of being squeezed overcame her for a few seconds, but soon the salty smell of ocean air filled her nostrils. The gray sky offered poor light, but one could not miss the concrete building perched on top of the rocky island. Flinging the invisibility cloak over her head, Ginny carefully climbed up the hill, taking care to not make any unnecessary movements. After reaching the metal door, she checked to make sure no one was around before carefully opening it. There was no need for locks at Azkaban; only those with pure heart and good intentions could open the doors to hell. Walking down the cold hallway, Ginny could hear the moans and groans of prisoners reliving their worst nightmares over and over again. She paused a moment, dry heaved, and then continued on her way, the acidic taste of stomach acid burning the back of her throat. She paused at a tinted glass window and peered into a small dark room. A man was sitting on a small wooden bench with his hands in his filthy blond hair and his shoulders shaking with every breath he took. Ginny breathed in sharply as she recognized the man she had loved before he disappeared to prison.

Draco heard a sharp intake of breath to his left, and whirled around only to be confronted by a one-way window that evidently wasn't soundproof. He knew someone had been watching him and he disliked him for it. Draco turned away from the window and roughly wiped his tears away, streaking his dirty face. Only one person had ever seen him cry, and she held him in her arms rocking him back and forth with the tenderness of a mother and the intimacy of a lover. He had just learned that he was to leave for war in a week, and it scared the hell out of him. Death, he could handle, but being away from the person he loved and possibly never seeing her again, that he could not. A world of possibility had been laid before him, but all the money in the world couldn't have bought his soul back from Voldemort. He still loved her, he knew that much. He remembered the silkiness of her red hair and the softness of her creamy skin. He remembered kissing every freckle on her face and licking off a spare bit of ice cream off the corner of her mouth. But memories were only memories, and reality in Azkaban was not based on dreams, but on nightmares.

A cold waft of air crept underneath the door accompanied by a layer of frost on the metal rectangle. The time had arrived, the end was near; “it” was coming. “It” was a dementor. A black cloaked soul sucker who drained the life out of people like drinking the juice out of a juice box; all that was left in the end was a lifeless husk.

Ginny heard footsteps coming towards her and quickly shrank back against the wall. A man with a wand was leading a dementor towards the small room with the Imperius curse. The creature of death had only one thing on its mind: eliminate Draco Malfoy. The man opened the door to the room and stood back to allow the dementor to enter. Without being noticed, Ginny slid into the dimly lit space, almost getting clipped in the ankle by the guard's shoe. Ginny walked towards Draco, almost in a dreamlike state. She was so close that she could touch him, but she didn't dare for fear of the reaction he would have. Realization dawned on her. She was about to watch the love of her life die, and there wasn't anything she could do about it. If she attacked the guard, he would set the dementor on her, and then she'd be dead, Draco would be dead, end of story; she was as helpless as an infant. She was shocked. What had she come here for? She couldn't save him anymore than he could save himself? She must have had some purpose, what was it? Ginny let herself drift back 4 years, and fell into a memory she had blocked out after the war.

She was sitting on the edge of her bed, her feet dangling over the edge. Tears were silently falling from her eyes and she watched helplessly as her lover walked away from he. He wiggled his fingers at her in a half wave, and mouthed those three immortal words that that bring a woman to her knees. “I love you.” And with that, Draco Malfoy apparated out of her life.

“I love you too…Draco.” She had said to the empty spot where he had stood only seconds before.

Snapping back to reality, Ginny saw the dementor start to lean over Draco face and realized what she had to do. As quietly as she could, she ran to his side to whisper something in his ear. “I will always love you, Draco Malfoy.”

Draco knew that she was there. He could feel it in the cold air, a certain warmth from an invisible woman. She must have taken Pothead's invisibility cloak. The rotting smell of dead meat loomed closer as the dementor started leaning towards Draco. Suddenly he felt a warm body next to his and a sweet voice whispered, “I will always love you, Draco Malfoy.” Draco was shocked. She loved him? He was about to die? He felt a warm hand grasp his own cold one for reassurance, and he gave it a squeeze. “I love you too, Ginny Weasley.” The dementor swooped down on the young man, and “kissed” his icy lips, sucking the very life out of them. Ginny felt his body sag a little, and knew that he was gone for good this time. She looked down at his dirt-streaked face and the smile playing upon his lips, and the bittersweetness of the moment overtook her. She had been right on time.

Author's Note: Yay! I finally finished this story after almost a half year! I'm not totally happy with this, but it's good enough for me. Read and review!

XOXO

SlaptheWhiteFerret

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