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"The heart has reasons that reason does not understand."
-Jacques Benigne Bossuel

CHAPTER TWO
(protective instinct)

A weekend, and Draco was in Hogsmeade - fortunately, due to a simple lie on his part, without Pansy Parksinson by his side. He had simply pretended he was sick, and now, he ducked into the nearest shop everytime he heard her familiar whiny voice drawing near. A small price to pay, to be spared her attentions.

The wind was chilly. Draco walked down the street, past a line of curious little shops, Crabbe and Goyle by his side. All three of them were carrying bottles of butterbeer for warmth.

(Purchasing the butterbeers had been a nuisance - a horde of Gryffindors were huddled around one table, playing some foolish game that involved the spinning of a bottle and stupid dares. When they entered, it seemed that the most recent dare had been for some Gryffindor to kiss the next person to walk through that door, and since that person was Goyle, the Gryffindors had prudently decided to tone down the dare. A flying kiss would do. The look on Goyle's face when a mousy-looking girl had tentatively blown him a kiss was priceless.)

Recalling the experience, Draco scowled. Ginny Weasley had been in the group, and despite himself, he had found himself thinking of her after that quidditch game last week. Not often, but randomly: while eating a meal, walking down a corridor, or listening to a lecture. It bothered him, but only a little, because he knew nothing was going to happen anyway. She was a Weasley, and he was a Malfoy.

A particularly strong gust of wind swept past them, but Draco ignored the cold. He, Crabbe, and Goyle were headed for the Shrieking Shack.

A rumour had been floating around that an escaped Death Eater was hiding out there. But as far as Draco could tell, very few people (all of them students) were aware of the rumour - the Slytherins could be eerily secretive when they wanted to be. Many of their own parents being Death Eaters, ex-Death Eaters, or at least sympathetic to Voldemort and his followers, it was in the Slytherins' interest to keep this particular rumour to themselves.

Draco wanted to see for himself if it was true. He didn't question why he felt it necessary. Perhaps he wanted to remind himself of the fate he had escaped by defying his father. Perhaps he saw his father in this vagabond Death Eater, and a twisted loyalty made him feel as though he should help the wretched man escape. Perhaps he wanted to hear what the Death Eater had to say about the path he had chosen to take. He didn't know, and he didn't care.

He just wanted to see.

Cautiously, Draco proceeded towards the Shrieking Shack. Crabbe and Goyle lumbered after him. Draco glanced at them with a hint of affection: what they lacked in brains, they made up for in loyalty. His quest to search for the Death Eater was pointless and reckless, but they stayed with him anyway.

The wind howled around them. Draco looked around. For a moment he thought he saw a flash of red behind one of the trees, but the glimpse was so fleeting that he dismissed it as a figment of his imagination.

He strode forward swiftly, until he was close enough to touch the dilapidated wooden walls of the Shrieking Shack.

Draco hesitated. Then he peered into the dark depths of an open window.

What happened next was so sudden and surprising that none of them had time to react. A bony hand shot out, gripping Draco by the throat, and even as he reached up to try and free himself, a wand appeared in his rapidly blurring vision. The hand was terrifyingly strong - Crabbe and Goyle were taking too long to react - already Draco felt the pain in his throat, saw black dots swirling before his eyes -

A voice rasped out. A female voice. It sounded like a spell.

Draco felt himself go rigid, and the hand loosened. In the first sweet moments of release, Draco thought of nothing but the welcome air flowing into his lungs, everything else blurring into the background. By the time he recovered, he realized that he couldn't move, and that Crabbe and Goyle were also still and unmoving. A Freezing Charm?

His eyes flew to the face that had appeared in the window.

She looked like someone who had been pretty once, who would have held a hint of that prettiness as she aged, if not for the bitterness etched onto her features. Her hair was grimy. She glared at them, hatred in her eyes, and her voice was croaky from lack of use when she spoke. "You! You're Lucius Malfoy's son!"

Draco couldn't respond. He didn't want to. Whatever he had expected, it wasn't this.

"You look just like him," she sneered. "He was furious when you refused to get the Dark Mark. Ranted and raved about it to the rest of us for days."

She kept her wand pointed at him. Crabbe and Goyle had paled into insignificance. "I don't know how you found me here, but I'll let you know that I'm leaving. I can see I'm not safe here." She paused. As if to herself she murmured, "I could use one of the Unforgivable curses... but for what? More trouble for me... more chance of getting caught..."

She coughed, and for an instant, Draco almost felt sorry for her. Then she spoke again.

"You're worse than I am, Malfoy," she wheezed. "I could never betray my own father - they say that in Azkaban, he still screams about you at night - how you put him there -"

Draco's eyes darkened at that, but he was helpless.

Finally, the Death Eater retreated into the darkness. A few minutes passed. The Slytherins were tense, waiting. But she didn't come out again.

Draco tested his limbs, but he still couldn't move. How long would it take for the spell to wear off? His eyes darted around, assessing the scene.

Three bottles lay abandoned on the ground, spilling butterbeer out into the soil. Crabbe and Goyle were frozen, panic in their eyes. No one knew they were there. The wind was blowing stronger now, colder.

Draco inhaled. He was going to stay calm.

A familiar redhead chose that moment to emerge from the trees, her wand held out in front of her.

-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-

Ginny was aghast at the scene she had witnessed.

She had only been taking up a dare. She and a bunch of other Gryffindors had been passing time by playing a harmless little game with simple rules: they formed a circle around a spinning bottle, and whoever it pointed to had to pick between Truth or Dare.

When the bottle had stopped on Ginny, she chose to do a dare before Ron could ask her something about Harry. Lately, it seemed, he was really keen on getting the two of them together.

Harry always laughed when Ron tried to matchmake him with his sister. "Just because you're dating Hermione doesn't mean I have to date Ginny," he would say, with his easy, charming grin. "Why do couples always want other people to be part of couples?" And Ron would back off, but never for long...

A dare it was, then. Some idiot - was it Dennis Creevey? - had come up with the notion of making Ginny go inside the Shrieking Shack, alone. And she was to come back with something to prove that she had been there.

So Ginny had smiled to show that she wasn't scared, put on her coat, and slipped out into the windy afternoon.

She should have chosen truth. "Who here do you see yourself dating?" "Harry, but only because he's slightly better than everyone else in this group." Which was, actually, the truth. The guys in Gryffindor were such weenies. Ravenclaw had all the good-looking males. (A good-looking Slytherin popped into her mind, but she quickly banished the thought. No point wasting time fantasizing about the vicious attractiveness of a Malfoy.)

And when she was within sight of the Shrieking Shack, she saw that three people were already there. Crabbe, Goyle - and Draco. Instinctively, not wanting to go through an encounter with older Slytherins when she was so obviously outnumbered, she ducked behind a tree. She thought for a moment that Draco had seen her, but since he didn't react, she decided he hadn't.

There was no time limit on her dare. And no point in getting into a scuffle. She'd wait them out.

Then that witch had emerged out of nowhere, putting the Freezing Charm on all three Slytherins before Ginny could blink. It seemed she had even attempted to strangle Draco. Ginny's first instinct had been to rush out and help them, but then the witch had poked her head out of the window and started talking, and Ginny realized she would be better off observing for awhile. After all, she was virtually invisible in her hiding place. If she jumped out now, the witch would put a Freezing Charm on her, and the situation would only end up worse.

Finally the Death Eater - by then Ginny had gathered what she was - stopped talking. And vanished. Ginny waited for a few moments, making sure she was really gone, then she stepped out.

Three pairs of eyes flew to her immediately.

She knelt in front of the nearest person, who happened to be Draco. And she tried to remember a spell she could use to undo the Freezing Charm.

Nothing came to her. Frowning, she ignored the murderous glint in the Slytherins' eyes as they rotted while she racked her brains.

Then a memory came to her: the D.A. Dumbledore's Army. Harry teaching them a new spell...

Ginny tested it out on Draco. Nothing happened. She changed the "d" in the spell to a "t,' and tried again.

Draco groaned and sat up.

"Yes!" Ginny cheered. She stood up, turning away to remove the freezing charm from the other Slytherins.

"Took you long enough," Draco muttered. But his retort was uttered in such a low, lifeless tone that Ginny quickly looked at him.

He sat with his back straight, directly facing the dark window from which the witch had emerged. His face was clouded, and Ginny, recalling the things the witch had said, realized how much they had hurt him.

She hesitated. Then she went to Draco, kneeling in front of him. Her brown eyes were warm and direct, meeting his pale gray eyes without flinching.

"Forget her," she said softly. "Unless you regret anything you've done."

A silence. Ginny watched the conflicting emotions on Draco's features, and she had to restrain the urge to touch him. She had never seen the supremely confident Slytherin looking so vulnerable before.

Then all the emotions on his face coalesced into one: shock. Before Ginny could turnto see what had stunned him, he had lunged forward, pulling her into his arms. The word Crucio registered faintly on her senses as his arms tightened around her, his body twisting so she landed beneath him. Crushed between the ground and Draco's hard, unyielding body, Ginny could barely breathe.

Then she saw the Death Eater in the window. Ginny gasped. Thanks to Draco, the Cruciatus Curse had hit the ground harmlessly. But now the Death Eater was rallying nicely, swinging her arm to point her wand at them, her mouth opening to shout out another spell -

Ginny felt Draco wrench her wand out of her grasp. Until that moment, she hadn't realized she was still holding it. In one lithe motion, Draco whirled, keeping her body protected with his, her wand extended in front of him. "Stupefy!" he shouted, just as the bright flash of another Cruciatus Curse sliced into his chest.

For an instant - for an eternity - Draco emitted a terrible sound, writhing. Clearly, he was in agony. Then, stupefied, the Death Eater dropped her wand, and Draco collapsed onto Ginny, panting. Sweat stood out on his brow.

Ginny was having difficulty breathing under Draco's weight, but at that moment, feeling gratitude and an intense protective instinct towards him, she would have died rather than pushed him off her. Instead, she put her arms around him. Tenderly. She stroked his back and made soothing sounds.

Then Draco stiffened and shot up. He said nothing, but their gazes met and held. His was hard and closed.

He turned away. Quietly, coolly, he said, "Call someone for the Death Eater. I'll see to Crabbe and Goyle."

Ginny reeled back at the change in him. But she recovered quickly. She lifted her chin. Without another word, she turned and walked away from the Shrieking Shack.

A/N: Thanks to whoever bothered to review the first chapter… so, what do you think about this next one?

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