Unofficial Portkey Archive

A/N. Happy new year!! It took me a long time to write this chapter and I am still a little unhappy with it but I hope you will enjoy it nonetheless.

Please do review, it makes the whole thing so much more worthwhile. Thanks so much to all of you who have reviewed so far.

Chapter 9.

When Ginny awoke a few hours later, she was in her own bed and it was dark outside. She began to sit up but her head throbbed so badly that she had to lay back down quickly to avoid losing consciousness again. The door to her room opened slowly, light erupting from the doorway sending a sharp pain through her already very painful head.

A figure entered and approached her, shutting the door behind them. It was Harry, carrying with him a tray of what looked like soup and a mug of pumpkin juice.

"Ginny," He whispered. "Are you awake?"

Ginny let out a grunt in the affirmative and slowly tried to sit up. Harry helped her and propped her up with a number of fluffy pillows. He passed her the glass and helped her to drink from it as her hands were shaking.

"You hit your head when you fell. Not hard but hard enough to leave a bump. You have been out for hours. One of the healers gave you a sleeping draught and Ron had been sitting with you the whole time, up until about half an hour ago when Hermione made him go to bed and asked me to take over. He is really worried about you, we all are. How are you feeling now?"

A wave of pain washed over her, not from her head this time but from inside. Harry noticed her apparent distress and took her hand in his.

"You mustn't get worked up again Ginny. The healer says you had a breakdown. Stress he said and lack of food and sleep."

He observed her concernedly and took a deep breath before continuing. "I need to tell you something and I want you to let me get it all out before you say anything. Can you let me do that?"

Ginny nodded gingerly, the pain in her head subsiding slightly.

"You mustn't blame Dumbledore for what happened today." Ginny shifted angrily but Harry continued. "He told us all that Malfoy was in there but we couldn't help fighting back. We held off as long as we could but they were holding us off too well for us to get close. He told us to only use stunning spells, and it worked for a while. He wasn't to know that one of them would blow themselves up. It was a big shock for all of us."

Ginny's eyes began to fill with tears. Harry was right, this wasn't anyone's fault. It was a tragedy. Nothing more, nothing less. But it didn't change the fact that Draco might be lost to her forever.

Ginny looked up at Harry, her eyes large and wet, "Is there anyway to tell if he survived?"

Harry winced and held his breath for a moment. "The thing is Ginny there wasn't… well that's to say you can't…It was a huge explosion you see and there was a lot of fire." Harry dropped off and hung his head. Ginny put a hand to her mouth.

"You mean they cant identify the bodies don't you?"

Harry nodded solemnly. "I'm so, so sorry Gin. Even if we could, no one seems to know any distinguishing features that Draco might have."

Ginny jumped out of her skin.

"I know one!"

Harry looked up again and frowned. "What?"

Ginny's face was alight with eagerness. "He has a tattoo of a Dragon. On the base of his back! Would you go and check it for me Harry?"

"Of course. Right away. I'll send Hermione in to stay with you for a while."

Ginny began to protest but Harry was suddenly stern. "You need to be watched. Healer's orders."

Harry left her, a new hope burning in her heart but before Hermione arrived, Ginny was fast asleep.

Molly Weasley insisted that her only daughter took a week off to recover and also that she take it at The Burrow for, as Mrs Weasley put it, "That God awful place is enough to make anyone feel ill and I wont have my daughter there for one moment longer than she is needed."

Ginny was reluctant to go for she knew that it would take even longer to hear from Harry. She knew that any information he had he would rather deliver in person and although he would not wish Ginny to suffer any longer than was absolutely necessary, his priority was and should be, the Order.

Her mother protested loudly at Ginny's insistence on bringing several dusty volumes full of research with her to The Burrow and would only allow it if Ginny promised to only study for two hours a day. Of course she had to relent, her mother had been in pieces over her breakdown and she decided that one breakdown in the family was quite enough.

Any fears Ginny might have had that she would be left alone to her thoughts too often were put to bed the minute she walked through the door and viewed the chaos within. Mrs Weasley had turned her kitchen into some kind of canteen for members of the Order, which for obvious reasons had swelled in numbers significantly over the previous months.

A second fireplace had been squashed in next to the original one for cooking as the first was being used so frequently to floo that the cauldron had to be moved permanently to prevent nasty accidents. The large table had been further engorged and chairs and stools conjured from all over the house. Some of the chairs looked suspiciously as if they had been make from scratch by someone who had barely the sketchiest idea of what one should look like.

A squeak from the corner roused Ginny from her thoughts and to her amazement she saw that her mother was conversing hurriedly with several house elves, who seemed to be trying to remove their own ears. She recognised the house elf that was trying to prise a ladle out of another elves tiny fingers. It was Dobby, the Malfoy's old house elf. She felt a pang of sadness at this unexpected reminder of Draco but brushed it aside. She would not upset herself until she had heard from Harry. Until then, she could be strong.

Her mother bustled over to her looking harassed. She pulled Ginny to her in a tight hug then stepped back, observing her critically. "Have you been eating dear?" Mrs Weasley asked, her eyes narrowed slightly. "I daresay you haven't, poor darling. Never mind, sit down and I will fix you something. We will have you back to normal in no time."

Ginny glanced over at the house elves who were stood together in a corner, beating themselves with various kitchen utensils. "Are they alright mum?" Mrs Weasley's face adopted a pained expression. "Dumbledore sent me these elves from the kitchens at Hogwarts to help me with the cooking as its been far too busy for me to cope alone." She lowered her voice and drew closer to Ginny. "I'm not sure if they are much help though to be honest, every time I try to correct them or tell them to do something a different way they start hitting themselves. It is most bothersome. Spend most of my time trying to calm them down. Poor little things."

Ginny smiled broadly, feeling suddenly buoyant. It felt good to be out of that dingy old house and back into the vibrant, cosy atmosphere of her family home. Her mother was right, if she was going to feel at all better then this was the only place it was going to happen. She looked over at her mother who was peering out of the kitchen window. She stepped away and dried her hands on a cloth as she said,

"Harry is here."