Along Came A Wizard

Warning: The usual potty mouth warnings apply to all male characters in this story, not just Draco. If this type of language offends, then please slow down and turn around. Thanks.

Author's Note: Okay, here's something new. It's got a snarky sense of humor, a psychologically intact Draco, and a pinch of angst. I'm going to post several chapters and see what readers think.

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Chapter 1

Leave Me The Fuck Alone

He put his cool hands on her exposed shoulders, clad only in a thin spaghetti strap or two, startling her. She let out a whimper before scrambling away and taking the majority of the bed sheets with her. It was dark. Too dark to see anything except his imposing figure outlined against the light in the hallway.

“Ginny. Shhh… it's okay. It's me.” No, her heartbeat didn't slow down nor did her breathing come back from wherever it had fled, but she forced her body to relax as she nodded her head. A second panic hit her, and she glanced over at the small clock on her bedside table. “No, it's not time to get up yet.”

She could hear him kneeling down beside her bed.

“Listen, I've got to go out of town for a couple of days. I want you to come with me.”

Her glassy, wide and dilated eyes were on him, sheets still clutched against her chest, breathing erratic. When she saw him looking at her expectantly, she nodded.

“Good. Why don't you go ahead and get dressed. I'll send the elves in to pack your things. We need to leave within the hour.”

An hour later, dressed in her warmest Muggle woolen coat. She stood beside him as a portkey began that odd, familiar tugging behind her bellybutton. Moments later they were exiting a darkened alleyway and entering the lobby of an enormous hotel, bustling with visitors despite the early morning hour. No, she didn't know where they were or what they were doing there. She followed him through their check-in and up the modern lift to the top floor of the hotel and his suite.

He situated her in his enormous bedroom, instructing her to get some sleep before closing the door. She could hear him speaking to the guard who came with them, the one who would be by her side every moment of the day.

Some time later, after she had unpacked both of their suitcases, Ginny climbed into his bed, laid her head on one of the pillows, and closed her eyes, attempting to sleep as instructed.

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When he returned in the early evening, he threw off his Muggle jacket and his shoes and kept on walking, flinging open the bedroom door without notice. She startled, dropping the book she was reading onto the floor. He yanked off his tie, picked up her book, and tossed it to her before heading into the bathroom.

Her eyes were on him when he emerged minutes later and collapsed on the bed, running an exhausted hand over his face and closing his silver greys. He heard the soft rustling of her robes.

“No, don't go.”

She stopped. He opened his eyes and saw her standing at the foot of his bed. He sighed.

“I'm exhausted. Let's order room service. What do you think?” When she nodded, he closed his eyes again. “Whatever you want.”

Ginny walked over to the desk, picked up the room service menu, and held it out for him. He opened his eyes and saw her holding out the menu for him. After a cursory glance, he summoned the Muggle telephone and spoke in rapid Italian, ordering their dinner and throwing aside the menu afterwards.

Then he flipped over on his stomach and propped his face up on one hand, staring at her standing by the bed. “Come here and sit down. I won't bite, at least not this time.”

Ginny sat down on the edge of the bed.

“Closer.”

She slid over next to him, feeling his penetrating gaze on her every movement. No, he didn't touch her. He stared at her.

“What did you do with your day?”

Ginny held out her book for him.

“All day?” She nodded. He shook his head. “You know you don't have to stay cooped up in here. You can go anywhere you like, as long as Sam accompanies you. I don't give a damn. Just leave a note letting me know where you've gone and when you'll be back. Alright?” She nodded. “Good. And Sam has money for anything you fancy. Don't hesitate.”

Later that night, he stuck his head into the bedroom and saw her sitting in the same chair, waiting and dressed for bed. He came inside and sat down on the bed beside her, his long legs stretched out in front of him, the tips of his socks touching the bottom of her chair, eyes not meeting hers.

“We're going to sleep together in here for this trip. Sam will be outside in the main room, but he needs to sleep, too. I'd feel safer with you in here.” His silver greys glanced up at her as he finished his last sentence. She was staring at him in the way that she always stared at him. “I would transfigure a second bed for you in here, but I think it'd be just as easy if we used this bed. We're in a Muggle hotel, after all.” When she didn't respond, he left for the bathroom.

She was lying in bed, her head on a pillow, staring straight ahead when he emerged, now dressed for bed in a pair of loose fitting pajama bottoms that he wore for her benefit. He turned off the lights and left the curtains open, letting the glow from the city lights stream into the room.

When he slid in between the cool sheets, he left ample space between himself and her. Then he turned over toward her, staring at her pale, porcelain skin and spun silk with a twist of moonlight. He knew she could feel him staring at her, and he knew why she didn't return his gaze.

“Good-night, Ginny.”

She took this as a signal to close her eyes and go to sleep. He sighed.

“Merlin, Weasley. Don't you ever say a damn thing?” Her eyes opened wide at the exasperated tone in his voice. She turned to him and spoke her first words in over six weeks.

“Good-night, Draco.”

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(6 weeks prior)

Draco slammed his infuriated hand down on the nightstand, grabbing his wand. He was going to Crucio the goddamn bastard. Rolling his miserable arse out of bed, he stomped across the room and swung open the badly fitting wooden door to his hotel room, wand at the ready.

“Malfoy - “

“I don't want it. I didn't order it. Now leave me the fuck alone.” He slammed the door closed. Only it didn't close due to the enormous boot wedged into the threshold. One loud grunt later and it flung back open, almost hitting him in the face. Draco reflexively leaned back, and that's when she was thrust into his unsuspecting arms.

“What the hell is this?” he asked, looking at the fully cloaked and hooded woman.

“She's yours.” Draco's eyes widened.

“What the hell are you talking about? I didn't order a bloody witch.” The wizard laughed, a deep, throaty noise that jiggled his oversized belly.

“Of course you didn't, you idiot. She's the result of your bet last night, the one you made on your last game of wizard's chess.” Draco scratched his head and plundered his worthless Firewhiskey damaged excuse for a memory. When he came up empty, he stared at the strange wizard, suspicious.

“I did?”

“Yes, you did. Here. Her papers.” Draco shook his head and shoved the papers back.

“Send her back. I don't want her.”

“You can't send her back. Nobody wants her. You lost, you arsehole.”

Draco shoved the wench aside and grabbed the documents, scrutinizing them over and over again. Yes, it was his unmistakable, if inebriated, signature on the wretched papers. Unbelievable. Unfuckingbelievable was what it was. He had come for a brief two-day stay in Bulgaria on business. The last thing he needed was to bring back some bloody hag that nobody wanted.

No wonder no one wanted her. She was a murderess who had killed a high-ranking member of the Dark Lord's elite Death Eating squad during the War. He was part of a wealthy and powerful pureblooded clan with a history of violence and dark magic. A wizard loyal to the Order had sheltered her, but when he was murdered two years ago, she vanished.

There was now a hefty price on her head as well as the head of whoever was harboring her. That unfortunate person was now Draco. He was bound by a magical contract to hold her safe until her sale to another owner or her marriage. The contract would be considered broken if she died by unnatural causes, and his death would ensue shortly thereafter.

Groaning, Draco nodded and shut the door, throwing every locking spell he knew on it. Then he looked at the hooded witch who was emitting an odor so foul and putrid he could hardly stand to be in the same room. Covering his nose with his hand, he grabbed her, turned on the shower, and shoved her in the bathroom. Then he locked that door, shutting the foul hag out of his presence.

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When he awoke on the last day of their trip, he was awash in red silk and honey. He nuzzled closer to her warmth, tightening his arms around her waist, and burying his face in the nape of her delicious neck. Good lord, she felt wonderful next to him.

A slow minute or two later, he reluctantly lifted his groggy, sleep filled head up and out of its bed of silk and saw her staring at him, eyes wide, body lying stiffly in his arms, not moving. Shit. He immediately withdrew his arms and untangled his body from hers before sitting up and raking an embarrassed hand through his tousled hair.

Then he groaned. Yes, he was accustomed to waking entangled in the company of various witches but not this witch, never this witch. He glanced over at her clutching the bed sheets to her chest.

“Ginny,” he said, “I apologize.” When she made no response, he threw off the bedcovers and left to start his day.

No, he never asked her, and because she never said a goddamn thing, he had no way of knowing what had befallen her during her incarceration and servitude over the past two years. He decided that he didn't want to know. Hell, even a bloody troll could take a fairly accurate guess. Yes, he was her new owner, but he wasn't a fucking animal, and he wouldn't treat her like one either.

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Author's Note: Thanks for reading. Please stay tuned for the next chapter!

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Author's Notes: Yes, the War is over. Yes, the “Dark Side” won. However, any assumptions about what that world would look like may not be wise as things are not always as they appear. I hope to elaborate on that later in the fic. Many thanks and much gratitude for all the lovely reviews readers left. Now, on with Chapter 2. I hope this doesn't disappoint. -fallenwitch

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Chapter 2

It's None Of Your Goddamn Business

He knocked lightly on her open bedroom door before stepping in. She walked out of her sitting room and stared at him. “Merlin, Weasley, put that book down. Care to watch a Quidditch match today?”

“Quidditch?”

“Quidditch.”

She nodded and rushed to get her cloak. “Take your time. We won't be leaving for another half an hour.”

Had he finally managed to light a fire under her arse? It was about bloody time. She had been ensconced in his flat for over two months, slowly coming around, but he couldn't get her to do a damn thing with him unless he ordered her to. Screw that.

Half an hour later, he laughed when he saw her eyes go wide. She was waiting, cloak on, in the main sitting room when he strolled in.

“What?” When she continued to stare, he looked down at his Quidditch outfit. Was something hanging out? Nope. Everything was zipped up and buckled down tight. “Well?”

“I didn't realize you were still playing.” His eyes narrowed, taking in her implicit message, which irritated the hell out of him.

“Why don't you tell me if you think I'm too old and slow for the game after you watch a match.” When she didn't respond, he summoned his broom. Well, it had been a month or two since his last game. Hell, she was the one who had put a cramp on his outings in the first place. “Come on,” he spat out. “Let's go.”

Ginny rushed over and into his waiting arm, thrown casually over her shoulders, broom in hand. A moment later, he Disapparated them to the Quidditch field.

“Oi, Malfoy, where the bloody hell have you been? And who is that beautiful thing you've got with you?”

They swung around at the booming voice and saw a burly wizard with dark, curly hair swaggering toward them. Draco laughed and stepped forward to shake the other wizard's hand.

“Tom Fitzgerald this is Ginny Weasley.”

“Ginny, is it? Pleased to meet you. So, you've come to watch Malfoy play, have you? Well, if you ever get tired of his nasty ways, give me a floo, would you?” Ginny stared at the wizard with a twinkle in his eye, giving him an awkward smile and taking a small step closer to Draco.

“Bugger off, Tom. She's not interested in a ruddy wizard like you.” Ginny swung around again. This time she met the laughing face of a handsome young wizard with dark hair and familiar features.

Draco leaned over and shook this wizard's hand while slapping him on the shoulder. “Blaise, you remember Ginny Weasley from Hogwarts.” The wizard raised an eyebrow at this, glancing back at Draco, who nodded.

“Yes, of course. Good to see you again, Ginny.” Ginny smiled before Draco took her aside.

“Ginny, why don't you go sit in the stands? I'll meet up with you after the game.” She nodded and left, walking across the field and into the stands, sitting alone.

“Merlin, Draco, how the hell did that happen? Ginny Weasley?”

“Sod off, Blaise. It's too long a bloody story to get into with you right now, not to mention the fact that it's none of your goddamn business.”

“A Weasley?” Draco let out an exasperated snort.

“Look, Zabini, I'm not dating her or shagging her or even fondling her nor do I have any intention of doing any of those things with her so bugger off.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really.”

Blaise looked up into the stands at the Gryffindor sitting alone. Then he looked back at Draco. Not shagging her my arse, he thought, hoisting his broom over his shoulder and heading out to the middle of the field with the thirteen other players.

When Draco's gloved hand caught the Snitch three hours later, ending the game with a whistle and a win, Ginny jumped up clapping and waving. He looked over at her, in the middle of those empty stands, amazed at the sudden burst of life the game had thrown into her. Yes, a fire had been lit somewhere in her.

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Was she dead? Draco looked at the pathetic, emaciated form lying motionless on the cold, tile floor of the hotel bathroom. He knelt down, wand at the ready, and touched the side of her face, draped in freshly washed crimson hair. She startled and drew the towel closer to her body.

“Get up. Let's go,” he barked, one hand firmly on her arm. “Do you speak any English?” Apparently not. Pulling her into the bedroom, he shoved a pile of his clothes into her arms. No, he had no intention of turning his back on the hag for a moment, not when it was his precious life on the line.

And so he stood there while she dropped the towel and, with shaking hands, pulled on one oversized piece of clothing at a time, until she was drowning in one of his fine wizarding robes. Draco stood there, staring at her bent head and her slumping shoulders.

He reached under her chin with one elegant hand and tipped her face up toward the light. His other hand brushed aside her tangled mess of red hair as his silver greys scanned her face and her downcast eyes. It took him several minutes to decipher her identity, but there was something so familiar about her that he couldn't take his eyes off the witch.

“Weasley?” Her glazed eyes looked up and locked briefly with his without the slightly evidence of recognition. “Good lord, what the hell have they done to you?”

Draco glanced around the room and summoned his overnight bag before throwing on his cloak. “Come on. Let's get the hell out of this place.” He threw his arms around her unsteady figure, drew her to him, and gratefully placed both their hands on the brass portkey, transporting the pair out of the inhospitable foreign soil.

As soon as their collective feet hit the floor of his flat, Draco began shouting orders faster than his house elves could follow them. All the while, he had his arm around her, escorting her to the dining room. She was emaciated and so weak she could barely stand. Was this what they thought it took to keep her under control? What the hell ever happened to a stiff set of wards?

Was starvation considered an unnatural cause of death? Draco wondered this as he watched her consume the enormous bowl of steaming hot stew and several slices of bread. He refilled her cup of pumpkin juice twice. A half an hour later, she stopped eating and looked up with wide eyes. When she began gagging, Draco yelled for his house elf who appeared and, just in time, conjured a large bucket by Ginny's side. She leaned over and began retching until everything that she had eaten turned topside again.

Another elf was cleaning her up and offering her a cup of tea to settle her stomach. She shook her head, held her abdomen, and laid down on the dining room floor, too ill to move. Draco picked up her featherweight figure and deposited it in the guest bedroom next to his.

“Well?” Draco asked an hour later, glowering down Healer Topman's throat.

“She's quite ill.”

“I bloody well know that. She's starving. Why can't she hold down her food?”

“Mr. Malfoy, there's something called a Refeeding Syndrome.” When he began a detailed explanation of that, Draco listened attentively, realizing he had inadvertently made the witch ill by feeding her too much too fast.

“What do we need to do to fix her?”

“We can `fix' her Refeeding Syndrome, but I can't guarantee you that she'll live.”

“What?” Hell, he'd only had her for a few hours. She couldn't die on him now. Was that why they had hoisted her off on him? So she could die and take him with her instead of the bastard who had been holding her for the past two years?

Healer Topman laid out a strict refeeding schedule, going from limited clear liquids to solids over a period of weeks. She was to take half a dozen potions around the clock to boost her strength and her immune system. She was chronically malnourished and on the brink of death. Even if she recovered, he cautioned, there was no guarantee she would ever be the same.

Draco didn't give a damn. He couldn't say that he cared for her much the first time around. He just needed her alive. As long as her arse was alive so was his.

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“Well?”

Ginny looked up after giving the house elf her cloak.

“Well what?” she asked.

“Don't give me that “well what” crap. Am I too old and slow for the game or not?” He watched as she tilted her head to the side and looked at him thoughtfully for a moment or two.

Then she shook her head. “No, I don't think so.”

“Is that it?” he yelled at her retreating figure. She stopped, turned around, and looked at him.

“When's your next game?”

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Author's Notes: Thanks for reading. Hope to see you at the posting of Chapter 3 in about a week.

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Author's Notes: Many thanks and much gratitude for the wonderful reviews everyone left! I'm sorry I wasn't able to respond to them all. In my holiday time crunch, I decided to finish this chapter instead. I hope that's okay.

And now our story continues … -fallenwitch

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Chapter 3

Hullo Up There, Beautiful

“Oi, Ginny. Hullo up there, beautiful!”

Ginny waved and smiled at Tom Fitzgerald from her seat in the stands. Tom beamed back, hopped on his broom, and took off for the pitch.

Two hours into the game, Draco's team lost their second Chaser of the game. This one from a well placed Bludger to the shoulder, knocking Otis McMillan off his broom and out of the game after he landed with a hard knock to the head. They were now down two players and called a time out to reassess their situation. Their last Chaser wasn't worth a damn. Should they turn one of their Beaters into a Chaser and take their lives into their own hands or forfeit the game? In the middle of their usual bickering and arguing and pigheaded behavior, Zabini spoke.

“Why the didn't I think of it before?” Blaise pointed at Ginny sitting in the stands. “Ginny Weasley is a hell of a Chaser. Let's get her to substitute.”

“No.” Draco put his foot down with such vehemence that Blaise turned a surprised eye at him.

“Why not?”

“Because she's in no shape to play, that's why.” He wasn't about to let Ginny take to the pitch in her weakened condition with a bunch of rowdy amateurs, knocking and bumping players off right and left.

“Bollocks! She looks great.” Blaise mounted his broom and took off for Ginny. All eyes, including Draco's, were focused on Blaise as he landed next to Ginny. She wouldn't be foolish enough to agree to play, would she?

Minutes later, to Draco's horror, Ginny hopped on the back of Blaise's broom, wrapped her arms around his waist and came flying down to the field.

“Yes!” Blaise announced triumphantly, with one fist in the air. They were greeted with a roaring cheer. Draco nearly fell out of his robes. Ginny jumped off Blaise's broom, smiling.

“No, absolutely not.” Draco stormed over to Ginny and grabbed her roughly by the arm. “No, Ginny. You're in no condition to take to the pitch.” He was furious, raging at her. She shrank back, visibly shaken.

Before she could speak, Blaise pulled Draco off of her. “Calm down, mate. She said she'd play. Let's give it a go. We can always call if off if it doesn't work out.” Blaise looked over at Ginny staring wide-eyed at Draco. Then he knocked Draco in the chest, pushing him back. “Come on Ginny. Let's get you to the locker room where we've got an extra set of gear and robes. Ignore that git.”

Blaise threw his arm around Ginny's shoulders and ushered her off the field while she looked back at Draco, staring at her every step of the way, incensed.

“Blaise, I don't think I should play.”

“Look, don't worry about Draco. I'll take care of him.” He stopped and took her face into both of his hands, forcing her to break eye contact with Draco. “Ginny, you're a fantastic Chaser. We've got nobody like you out there. Come on. It'll be a riot.”

As soon as Ginny walked out of the locker room, Blaise put her on his broom and sent her off. Then he took a second broom and followed her closely. He wasn't about to let Draco near her before play restarted.

“Don't look at him, Ginny. Trust me.” Blaise was right beside Ginny, urging her on. Then the whistle blew and thirteen brooms took off in all directions flying furiously over the pitch, including the thirteenth flyer with her eyes on the Quaffle and the goal posts.

An hour later, Draco's gloved hand captured that sadistic bint of a Snitch, ending the precarious play with a whistle and a narrow win. All the brooms collapsed onto the field in a flutter, players shaking hands and walking off the field. When Ginny's broom landed, Blaise rushed up to her, grabbed her, and flung her around.

“Bloody brilliant, Weasley! Brilliant!”

Draco came running across the field in a panic at the sight of Blaise manhandling Ginny. She was pounding on his back, trying to get him to put her aching body down.

“Goddamn it, Zabini, put the bloody witch down before she throws up.” Blaise stopped, threw Ginny on her feet, and gave her an enormous hug.

When he let go, she went deathly pale, wobbled a bit, and collapsed in a dead faint on the field. Draco shoved Blaise out of his way and dropped to his knees beside the fallen witch. Shit. No, he didn't have time to strangle Blaise. He'd take care of that later. Draco hoisted a pale and limp Ginny into his arms and Disapparated them home as a second, equally concerned wizard looked on.

Draco laid Ginny on her bed, pulled off her boots and restrictive gear, and sat his furious arse down by her bedside, waiting for her to wake up so he could kill her. What the hell was she thinking?

She was pale and fragile looking, almost drowning in the overly large gear Blaise had thrown on her. Draco took off his gloves and tapped his fingers impatiently on his arm guard, trying to decide which one he was going to murder first. Minutes later she stirred and opened her eyes, disoriented.

“Draco?” He could hear the panic in her voice.

“I'm here, Ginny. It's okay. We're home now. Just relax.” She turned at the sound of his voice, her dark eyes locking with his. He leaned over and brushed his hand reassuringly over her forehead and down the side of her face. She nodded and closed her eyes, her body relaxing, right down to the tips of her toes.

No, he didn't kill her. He wanted to throttle her, but he didn't do that either. Instead, he satisfied himself with the enormous relief that overwhelmed him when she looked at him, remarkably intact once again.

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“That's it for now, Weasley.” Draco took the empty bowl of broth out of her disappointed hands and placed it back on the table by her bedside. “And don't look at me like that, either.” He could feel her eyes boring a hole into the side of his face as he readied her potions. Hadn't they been over this a million times already? Merlin.

“Here.” He gave her the first of three potions, getting increasingly nasty as they went on. “Just drink it.” And she did. She did any goddamn thing he told her to do. She even drank that third potion, which seemed like it was killing her as it went down, making her gag and cough and almost retch with steam coming out of every orifice, but she took it without complaint.

Draco recorded everything on the parchment he kept by her bedside. Then he sat down, stretched his long legs out, and began formulating a plan to get rid of her. He would resuscitate whatever part of her still existed, dress her up, and marry her off to the first willing and able wizard. Goodbye and good riddance to the crimson ball and chain around his precious neck.

Minutes later when he looked up, she was asleep again. He reached over and touched her sunken face with its faded freckles before brushing aside a stray strand of crimson silk. She was dying and vulnerable beyond belief. All thoughts of banishing her from his life stopped. Screw that kind of thinking. He needed her.

Draco watched as she tenuously hung on and worried the hell out of him. If he wasn't careful, he might prematurely rid himself of her and end everything for both of them. There would be no more arsing around, trying to scheme his way out of the goddamn miserable situation. She had him by the balls, and he would do well to concentrate all of his energy on saving her pathetic life form.

He refused to leave her side for the next two weeks. Instead, he sat there like a fucking house elf on duty, fussing over her and tending to her every need, real or imagined. Yes, he needed her.

----- ----- -----

Draco was staring at Ginny from across the dining room table while he mauled his dinner, one jab at a time. Clouds of dark tension rolled in, filling the silent room to overflowing and stifling the pair. The occasional clinking of silverware on china and of glasses being put down grated on Draco's nerves. Why didn't they bloody well have it out and get it over with?

Of course she didn't look him in the eye. She didn't dare. Ginny could feel his unspoken fury blasting across the room. She had never displeased him before, not like this. It was a brief fainting spell, that's all, but he hadn't spoken a word to her since he left her room that afternoon. Merlin. An unexpected respite came in the form of loud banging on the front door.

“Supper? Don't bother. I know the way.”

Blaise flung open the dining room door and strolled in, taken aback to see Ginny eating dinner with Draco. He had Draco's broom in one hand and a bottle of Firewhiskey in the other.

“Ginny,” he said, pulling up a chair and throwing Draco's forgotten broom aside. It fell to the floor with a clatter. “How are you feeling?”

“I'm fine.”

“Are you sure?” She nodded. “You scared the hell out of us. I was sent to bring Draco this peace offering.” He plunked down the bottle of Firewhiskey in the middle of the table. “And also sent to see how you're doing. You played a bloody brilliant game. The boys want to know if you'll be up to playing again next weekend. You don't even have to bring the git along with you if you don't want to. I'll come and get you.”

Draco, who had been staring at this obnoxious scene from across the table, put down his knife, rather than stabbing Zabini in the neck with it, and cleared his throat. Ginny looked up. Blaise didn't take his eyes off of Ginny. Draco shook his head at Ginny.

Ginny looked back at Blaise and shook her head.

“What?” He swung around and glared at Draco. “Come on, Draco. The woman wants to play, has the ability, and can borrow my broom. I'll even get her a set of gear and robes. What's the problem?”

“No, Blaise. She's not up to it.” Blaise snorted at this.

“Bollocks, Draco. You saw her play today.” Then Blaise stopped and knocked himself in the head with his hand. “Why the hell am I talking to you?” He swung around and beseeched Ginny. “Why don't you let me floo you later in the week and see how you're feeling? We can go out to dinner and talk about it. What'd you say?”

Ginny looked up at Draco.

“Quit looking at that git. It's not like he owns you, does he?”

Ginny's eyes went wide.

“Blaise, that's enough.” Blaise rolled his eyes and threw up his hands.

“Fine. What's for supper?”

Blaise invited himself for dinner and enjoyed the affair immensely. Ginny watched Draco and Blaise talk and banter back and forth, laughing and joking and drinking themselves sick.

When the night was late and Blaise was leaving, he offered to Apparate Ginny home. Ginny looked up at Draco. Then Blaise looked over at Draco.

“I honestly don't know what it is with you two, but the witch doesn't seem to be able to have a thought on her own.” Draco put his arm around Blaise's intoxicated shoulder.

“Go home, Blaise.” Blaise leaned over and whispered into Draco's ear.

“I thought you said you weren't shagging her.”

“I'm not.”

“Then let me take her home. I promise I'll be on my best behavior. I have to get her on the team, Draco.”

“Blaise, she is home. She lives here.” This time Blaise not only fell out of his robes but also tripped over them on his way out.

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Author's Notes: Thanks for reading! I hope to have the next chapter posted sometime around the first of the year. It'll be sooner if I can manage it. -fallenwitch

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Author's Note: Sorry for the delay in posting this chapter, but the holidays threw me for a loop. I'm back on my feet and writing again. Thanks for reading and all the wonderful reviews!

- fallenwitch

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Chapter 4

The Fucking Team Mascot

What was she, the fucking team mascot? Three weeks later, Ginny stood in the stands yelling and hooting and howling, cheering on her team until her throat went hoarse. She was draped in Draco's long winter cloak with her hair in braids that ran along either side of her face and a Slytherin green scarf wrapped around her neck.

Yes, the boys loved her. They loved her for cheering them on and respected her for the one, glorious day she played as a Chaser for them, and they let Draco know that, refusing to give him one wretched moment of peace over it. But he was adamant, and more stubborn than any Muggle-born mule alive, in his refusal to let her play.

“Come on, Draco,” Blaise said, draping his arm over Draco's miserable shoulder, the one with his losing arm attached to it. Yes, he had lost the Snitch to the other Seeker, sealing the loss for their team. “Let's go get some supper.” Draco shook his head.

“You go ahead. I've got to work tonight.”

“Tonight? It's Saturday. Nobody works on a Saturday night, mate.” Draco sighed.

“I do. I'm drowning up to my neck in it.” Blaise nodded and looked up into the stands.

“What about Ginny? Do you think she wants to grab a bite to eat with us?” Draco's head shot up. “Oi, Ginny! What about supper with us?” Draco jabbed Blaise in the ribs with the handle of his broom.

“Knock if off, Zabini. She doesn't want to hang out with you animals.”

“We may be animals, but we're a hell of a lot more fun than you, especially tonight.” Draco shook his head and kept on walking. He didn't give a damn. Blaise could beg that witch on his hands and knees with his balls between his teeth, and she wouldn't go. She never went anywhere unless Draco ordered her arse to. Quidditch was the sole exception.

A half an hour later, when Draco walked out of the locker room, Ginny was standing with Blaise and an assortment of other players, milling around chatting.

“Ginny, let's go!” Draco called, motioning her to take her place by his side so they could Apparate home. Blaise looked up and threw his arm protectively around Ginny.

“Sorry, mate. She's coming with us tonight.” When Draco gave Ginny a startled look in the eyes, she wiggled out of Blaise's arm and came rushing over. Blaise was right on her heels.

“It's what you wanted, isn't it Draco? Blaise said you were working tonight, and that you wanted me go out to dinner with the boys.” Sighing, Draco shot Blaise a nasty glance.

“I am working, but I never said I wanted you to go out with that bunch of animals. It's up to you.” Draco knew perfectly well that she was going home with him, or he wouldn't have given her the choice.

“Well, alright then. I'll see you later. We'll be at the Three Broomsticks.”

What? Had Zabini thrown an Imperius on her? Draco reached out and grabbed Blaise by the collar of his robes. “You take care of her, you hear me? No funny stuff. I'm going to send Sam over to the Three Broomsticks to look after her.”

“Sam? Who the hell's Sam?”

“Sam looks after her, that's who he is.” Blaise was staring at Draco's fist on his robes.

“No problem. Look, she's going to be out with thirteen guys. What could possibly happen to her?”

“That's exactly my point.” Blaise nodded.

“Point taken.” Draco released his hold on Blaise, who promptly turned around and started yelling at their teammates.

“Oi, you animals over there! Listen up! Draco says we can take Ginny with us but only if we behave ourselves. Does anybody have a problem with that?” Silence. “Okay, let's go!” Blaise turned around and put a firm hand on Draco's shoulder. “I've got you covered, mate. Don't worry about her.”

Draco stood there watching as Blaise threw his arm around Ginny's shoulders and escorted her into the crowd of his teammates. Listening, he heard the multiple cracks of their Disapparations echo through the deserted field until everything went still and quiet. He was alone, and she was gone. Gone with thirteen rowdy Quidditch players. Merlin.

----- ----- -----

Passing her bedroom, Draco glanced inside to check on her before going to bed. The only thing he saw was her vacant bed with its covers in a tumble. Pushing the door fully open, he looked around. There was no sign of her. Where the hell was she? It was one o'clock in the morning.

“Weasley?”

Venturing further into her moonlit space, he spied a small figure in a puddle of white cotton on the floor, huddled in a corner. Her knees were drawn up against her chest and her face was buried in her arms on top of her knees. When he was a foot away, he dropped to his knees. It was only then that he heard her crying, a soft, almost kitten-like whimper.

He touched her shoulder with his cool hand. She startled and looked up while backing away until she hit the wall with a thud, ending her hasty retreat. Her tear-stained and blotchy, red face was half hidden in shadows, but her dark, wide eyes were fixed on his as she hastily wiped her face with the sleeve of her nightgown.

“What's wrong?”

She didn't speak. She only shook her head. He sighed and took off his robes, shaking his head when he saw the look in her eyes. “For warmth. You're freezing.” He threw it around her shivering form.

“You'll catch your death out of bed like this.” She nodded and began to stand up. He had his hand on her shoulder again, this time holding her in place. “That's not an order, Weasley. Merely an observation.” Turning, he lit her fireplace. “Incendio.”

“That's better. Now, come here.” When she remained frozen in place, he spoke again, this time in a gentle whisper. “Come here.” She gingerly crawled over, stiff and hesitant, into his unfamiliar open arms, which wrapped around her, enveloping her in Slytherin warmth. “I don't know what that sodding bastard did to you, but there'll be none of that crap around here. Do you understand?”

He heard the catch in her breath before her rigid body relaxed and melded into his comforting form, her wet cheek against the soft fabric of his shirt. He felt her nodding against him as she tightened her tentative hold on his waist. What a miserable fucking mess he had gotten himself into.

Running his hand over her crimson locks in a reassuring fashion, he attempted to soothe her ruffled soul. “Shhh…Ginny. It's okay. It'll all be okay again.” No, he wasn't particularly equipped for or adept at dealing with this kind of situation, but hell, he was the only thing she had, wasn't he?

----- ----- ------

Draco pushed the stack of parchment across his desk and threw down his quill. Where the hell was she? No, this wasn't a bloody dormitory in Hogwarts nor was he its Head of House. However, it was just shy of midnight, and she was nowhere in sight. How did she expect him to get any work done when she was cavorting around wizarding England with half his Quidditch team in tow?

Draco began tapping his fist on the desk in an anxious, absent-minded fashion. Six hours ago, he let her go with no real concerns. She had Sam with her, didn't she? He was more concerned about his teammates' roaming hands than any outside threat, especially as the night rolled on. Civilized company they were not. No, they were a rowdy bunch of wankers who played hard, drank too much, and talked out their arses about women. Draco expected her home hours ago.

Give an ungrateful witch an inch and watch her take a yard. Should he Apparate to the Three Broomsticks and drag her skiving arse home? Draco ran a hand over his worried face and sighed. He had asked himself the same damn question on the hour, every hour, for the past three hours. If she wasn't home by midnight, he decided he would throw her roaming bum in the Malfoy dungeon and chain her to the wall where she belonged. There would be no daily allotment of air or weekly trips to his Quidditch matches, and he would cancel her book account at Flourish and Blotts. He knew how to keep his piece of property safe and sound and in line.

Oh, fuck it. Draco grabbed his wand and Disapparated, tense and uneasy, to the Three Broomsticks. The late night crowd was thin as he stepped into the dimly lit pub, scanning the room for her presence.

“Draco!”

He looked up and spied Blaise and three of his teammates gathered around a rickety wooden table at the back of the deserted room, shooting glasses of Firewhiskey and beckoning him to join them. He shook his head. Where was she?

Draco strode over to Blaise, grabbed a fistful of the drunken Slytherin's robes, and yanked him around.

“Where is she?” Blaise looked up at him, confused. “Ginny, you bastard. Where the hell is she?”

“Calm down, mate. She's sitting right over there.” Draco shoved Blaise back onto his drunken arse and swung around. Ginny was lying on a bench in the back of the room, asleep, with her head on Tom Fitzgerald's lap. Tom was passed out with one drunken arm thrown protectively over her.

“She went out a couple of rounds ago, didn't she?” someone said.

Draco swung back around.

“What? Drinking games with Ginny?” he seethed.

“Yep, and goddamn that witch can drink. Wouldn't know it to look at her though, would you?” Hill said, glancing over at Ginny.

“She's bloody gorgeous is what she is, drinker or not,” McMillan mused.

“And a helluva Quidditch player as well. Think she'd fancy a round in the sack with me?” Bruin Smith asked.

While Draco's blood pressure rocketed through the ceiling and the hand holding his wand began to twitch, he became aware of Sam standing some feet away from Ginny, quietly watching the scene, wand in hand. Motioning to him, Draco stepped aside.

“No external threats, Mr. Malfoy. Just too much Firewhiskey.” Draco nodded, thanked Sam, and bid him goodnight.

Forget those drunken wankers, blowing hot air out their collective arses. Draco went to Ginny and gently pulled her sleeping and vulnerable form up and out of Tom's arm. The drunken Irishman grunted before scratching his balls and collapsing onto the bench, snoring.

“Ginny,” Draco said, attempting to rouse the unconscious witch. “Wake up. It's time to go home.” After giving her a firm shake or two, she stirred and opened her sleep-dazed eyes, confused.

“Blaise?” she said, rubbing her face with the back her hands and yawning. “Is it time to go home?”

“Ginny, it's Draco.”

“Draco? Are we home already?”

“No, you're still at the Three Broomsticks. I'm here to take you home. Let's go.” Nodding, Ginny stood with Draco's hand on her arm. Looking around, he grabbed her cloak and scarf.

When he did this, Blaise began shouting from the table. “Oi, Draco, are you taking Ginny home already? Don't bother. I'm leaving after this round. I told her I'd take her home.” When Draco didn't respond, when he began putting on Ginny's cloak and fussing with her scarf, Blaise stumbled over. “What the hell, I can go home now. Hill,” he yelled, “I'm out. I gotta take Ginny home.” Then Blaise reached out to take Ginny from Draco.

“Stay away from her, Blaise,” Draco hissed, shoving Blaise back with an infuriated hand to his chest. “You call this taking care of her? Don't touch her. Don't talk to her. Don't go near her. Do you hear me?”

“Whoa, mate, keep a lid on it. I promised Ginny I'd take her home, that's all.” Draco snorted at this.

“You also promised me you'd take care of her. Getting her shit-faced drunk and letting her pass out on a bloody public bench with Fitzgerald while you drink yourself sick isn't what I'd call taking care of her.” Draco finished buttoning Ginny's cloak while Blaise stood on his unsteady feet, staring wide-eyed at Draco in utter disbelief. Ginny watched the pair, her silent eyes going back and forth from one to the other.

“So what? Since when did you give a damn about how much a witch drank or if I took her drinking with me or even if I shagged her?”

“Since now, that's since when.” The two wizards were nose to nose. Blaise shrugged his shoulders.

“Well why the hell didn't you say something earlier?”

“Because I didn't think you were a goddamn troll, that's why.” Blaise shook his head and slapped Draco on the back.

“Fine. Take her home. I'm too damn drunk to give a shit about this. The next time you ask me to take her out don't get your skivvies in a wad about it.”

“You took her. I didn't ask. And there won't be a next time.” Draco withdrew his wand, grabbed Ginny, and Disapparated.

As soon as their boots hit the floor of his flat, Draco released Ginny, leaving one hand on her unsteady frame.

“Draco?”

“Yes?”

“Blaise didn't shag me.” Draco looked down at the wide-eyed, intoxicated witch staring at him, concerned. Putting a gentle hand on her cheek, he sighed.

“I know he didn't. That's just the way he talks when he's drunk.”

“Oh.” There was a pause. “Draco?”

“Yes?”

“Blaise took good care of me. He bought my dinner and drinks and made sure I wasn't left out of the drinking games. He even gave me two Galleons to play with the boys.” Draco pulled Ginny into his possessive arms, drew her delicate frame close to his heart, and closed his miserable eyes.

“You don't understand, do you?” He could feel her shaking her head against his chest. “You're not just any witch, Ginny. You belong to me. And that's no way to care for a woman who belongs to a Malfoy.”

Ginny sighed and laid her intoxicated head on Draco's chest, wrapped her drunken arms around his waist, and held on tight. “I belong to you.”

“Yes,” he murmured, kissing the top of her crimson locks, “you belong to me.”

__________________________________________________________________________________

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Author's Notes:

Okay, here's Chapter 5. I hope it doesn't choke anyone going down. Thanks for reading and for the many kind reviews. - fallenwitch

Chapter 5

Those Bastards Are Too Physical For Her

Draco looked up and over, startled by the sound of her laughter floating down the crowded table. He could count the number of times he had heard that delightful sound on one hand. Blaise was leaning over the table and into Ginny's face, talking up a storm, stopping only long enough to allow her to catch her breath between fits of giddy laughter.

The pair was ensconced at one end of a long table at The Leaky Cauldron where the Quidditch team had gathered for supper after their usual Saturday afternoon match. Draco watched them from the comfort of his luxury seat, squashed between McMillan and Hill, both talking trash, at the other end of the table.

A full month had passed since the fiasco at the Three Broomsticks. Draco and Blaise had reconciled with a truce, brokered by Ginny, who had an inexplicable affection for her one-time escort. Blaise agreed not to be an irresponsible, drunken arsehole around Ginny, and Draco agreed to allow the irascible Slytherin back into her life.

“Hey, Malfoy,” Hill said, knocking Draco in the shoulder, “you in or not?”

“Huh?” Draco turned around, staring dumbly.

“You in for a round or two?” Draco shook his head.

“No. I've got to take Ginny home.” Hill shrugged his shoulders.

“Looks like Zabini's all over that one.” Snorting, Draco stood and went to collect his piece of property, the one that Blaise was entertaining the hell out of.

“Draco!” Blaise called out as he approached.

“Come on, Ginny. It's time to go.” Ginny nodded and stood, gathering her cloak in a rush. Blaise had one hand on her arm.

“Ah, come on, Gin, stay awhile. I'll take you home later.” Blaise looked over at Draco. “I'll be on my best sober behavior, I promise.” Ginny looked up at Draco, who shook his head. Blaise rolled his eyes. “For Merlin's sake, Draco, cut the witch some slack.”

Draco held out his hand, and Ginny hurried to take it. “Not tonight, Blaise. I've got to work, and Sam's off.”

“What am I? A stinking piece of Muggle trash? I'll look after her.” When Draco shook his head, Blaise threw his hands up in the air. “Fine. Hold a bloody grudge for rest of your life, Draco.”

Sighing, Draco looked at Ginny. “Blaise,” she said with one hand on his shoulder, “I'm tired. I'll see you next week.” Blaise put his hand on hers.

“Alright, love,” then he turned his eyes to Draco, “and don't let that git push you around in the meantime.” Ginny looked over at Draco.

“He doesn't push me around, honestly.” Blaise snorted and let go of her hand. He doesn't push you around, my arse, Blaise thought, looking for the magical leash Draco had around her neck. If he yanked the damn thing any harder, he would strangle the bloody witch to death.

----- ----- ------

A week later, Draco followed his piece of property, the one he had taken out for a bit of night air, into the Zabini foyer and stood while the usual house elves descended on them, taking their cloaks. Ginny hung onto the bottle of wine they had brought for the Quidditch team dinner.

When Blaise owl'd the invitation, he addressed it to Ginny with a thoughtfully added postscript saying that Draco was welcome to accompany her; however, he didn't give a damn if the team Seeker showed up or not. Typical.

Draco made a mental note that afternoon to speak with Blaise about his shitty attitude, the one demanding equal rights and a liberated lifestyle for the crimson ball and chain around his Malfoy neck. Who the hell would have guessed that Blaise, of all the goddamn wizards in the universe, would be pounding at his floo, trying to knock the damn thing down to get to Ginny? She wasn't his type. Not even close. Blaise preferred hardheaded, independent types with buxom, knockout good looks and a desire to party and shag at least equal to his own, no easy task.

Why didn't he let Zabini have at her? Because Blaise wasn't the monogamous, marrying kind, that's why. When Draco let go of Ginny, he decided it would be to marry a wizard worthy of her. What about his original plan, the one involving any member of his Quidditch team? He had long ago abandoned that one. Why? Because it stank, that's why, so bugger off.

“Master Zabini is expecting you,” his butler said, before throwing open the double doors to the main sitting room on the first floor. Draco continued to follow his piece of property, right until the moment he crashed into her after she stopped abruptly in front of him. The room was dark. What the hell? A roaring flash of blinding lights came on.

“SURPRISE! HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DRACO!”

Draco looked up from behind Ginny's shoulder to see over two hundred of the wizarding world's finest, young elite, dressed to the hilt, smiling back at him. Fuck. No, fucked - totally, royally fucked. A forced smile came over his horrified face.

CRASH!

Merlin. Ginny didn't realize she had dropped the bottle of wine until she heard its shattering holler and the collective gasp. She looked down at the spoiled vintage splattered across the bottom of her dress robes and across the floor.

Blaise stepped forward, laughing and slapping Draco on the shoulder, before giving him a hearty handshake. “Happy Birthday, mate! Knew you wouldn't let her come alone.” Then he went for Ginny, kissing her on the cheek. “Don't worry about that, love. The elves will take care of it.”

Before Draco could blink or breathe or aspirate on his own fluids, Blaise whisked Ginny away. No, he didn't have time to grab a hold of her. Instead, he was left land locked in a sea of well-wishers. Unbelievable. Unfuckingbelievable. Would one of these well-wishing arseholes kindly step forward and Avada him from this godforsaken nightmare?

Ginny stood in the Zabini library, off the main hall, with a fleet of elves cleaning and repairing her soiled robes. Blaise stuck his head in the door before plopping down on the sofa and throwing his dress boots on top of the coffee table. He waited patiently for five minutes.

“Enough! Enough! Out!” Then he stood and held out his hand for Ginny. “Come on, love. You look ravishing. Why don't you give me the first dance?” Ginny shook her head and took two steps back, almost landing in the fireplace. Blaise grabbed her. “Careful.” He looked at her, tense and worried. “What's wrong?”

“Take me home, Blaise.”

“What?”

“Please, take me home. I can't stay here. I need to go home,” she pleaded. He shook his head.

“Absolutely not.” Ginny glanced around and noted no alternate exits. “Merlin, Ginny, it's not Draco you're worried about, is it?”

She nodded.

“Forget that git. Come on. Let's go kick up our heels a bit. When this night is over, you won't even remember his name.” Wrapping his arm around her waist, Blaise escorted Ginny's stiff and unwilling figure down the hall and back into the ballroom, where a wizarding band was softly floating music across the room. Blaise was chatting away, but Ginny heard nothing. Instead, in the middle of a crush of people, she deftly dislodged herself from his grasp and took off.

“Ginny. Ginny, no!” Blaise cried, watching her escape from his disappointed grasp. She paid him no heed, nimbly weaving her way through the crush of partygoers. Sighing, he watched her go.

Oh, bloody hell. By the time he realized her destination and took off after her, he was too late. She had already cleared the set of double French doors leading to the grounds, where she picked up the bottom of her robes and made a frantic dash through the gardens, dodging hedges and trees and dense foliage.

Shit. Blaise recklessly pushed and shoved his way through the crowded room before bursting out those damn garden doors. She was fast, but he was faster and familiar with the territory they were racing through.

“Ginny! Ginny, stop! Wait!” She was crazed, possessed. “Ginny, please!”

Rounding the outer edge of the gardens, Blaise was forced to make a spectacular running tackle to stop her. They came crashing down, robes ripping and skin scrapping as she continued to struggle against him, beating and kicking him. He didn't give a damn. No, Blaise locked his arms firmly around her, refusing to let go.

“Ginny. Ginny,” he said in a soothing voice, “don't. What's wrong, love?”

When she was too exhausted to fight him, she collapsed, and he held her in his arms, cradling her shaking form to his.

“Shhh… it's okay. We don't have to go back in if you don't want to, alright?” He felt her nodding against his chest as her rigid body went limp. “We'll stay right here.” She nodded again, attempting to stifle a relieved cry.

Blaise looked at the fragile, crying witch in his arms. What the hell did he do to bring this on? Good lord, they couldn't go back in now. Draco would bloody Crucio him. If not now, then when he found out, he would.

----- ----- -----

Where the hell was she? Draco scanned the miserable room a dozen times before he broke out of the claustrophobic crowd surrounding him and went in search of her awol arse.

“Oi, Malfoy, Happy Birthday to you!” Tom wrapped his arms around Draco in an enormous, drunken bear hug.

“Thanks, Tom. Have you seen Ginny?”

“'Course I saw her. How could I miss her?”

“Where is she?”

“Zabini ran her off. That's where she is,” Tom said in a huff.

“What?” Draco stared at the drunken Irishman.

“He ran off me Ginny. I saw him chase her right out those doors.” Tom pointed one thick finger at the double French doors across the room. Draco followed his line of sight right into the darkened gardens outside.

“Are you sure?” Draco grabbed Tom by the collar of his robes. “This isn't some kind of a bloody joke, is it? Did Zabini go out those doors with Ginny or not?”

“It's no ruddy joke. Do I look like I'm bloody laughing?” Tom pushed Draco's hands off of him. “I would have gone after him myself, but I'm in no shape for that tonight.” Feeling panic rising in his constricting throat, Draco scanned the packed room and saw no sign of Blaise or Ginny.

What the hell was going on? Blaise chasing Ginny anywhere, much less at this type of affair, was ludicrous. If Blaise wanted her, he wouldn't be stupid enough to stalk her in front of the entire wizarding world in such a vulgar fashion. Did she see someone? Did someone say something to her? Hell, did someone go after her?

Where the fuck was Sam when you needed him? The last goddamn thing he needed was Ginny out wandering the Zabini grounds, alone and vulnerable, with no protection. Taking an unsteady breath, Draco looked back at the crowded room and out into the darkened gardens again.

Oh, fuck it. If he wasn't mistaken, it was his arse on the line out there, wasn't it? If this turned out to be a glorified snogging session, there would be hell to pay. What did he have to do, put a goddamn leash on the witch to keep her by his side? Snatching his wand out from his robes and cursing mightily under his breath, Draco ran out into the gardens in search of Ginny. The crowd inside stared at him as he inexplicably plunged into the night, alone. The only evidence of his path was the tip of his wand lighting the way.

----- ----- -----

“Ginny, why don't you let me Apparate you up to one of the rooms. You can clean up there, and then I'll take you home.” Ginny nodded and felt Blaise's arms wrap around her again.

When her feet hit the floor, Ginny spied a crackling fireplace across the room and stepped over to warm her frozen appendages. Blaise stepped up beside her to do the same.

“Ginny, I never meant to upset you with Draco's party. I honestly thought you would enjoy yourself. You know how he never lets you out.” She glanced over at him, the fireplace throwing golden flecks into his remorseful dark eyes.

“I know, Blaise. But I don't think Draco would want me at a party like this. This isn't the place for someone like me.” Draco would bloody Crucio her if he found his piece of property exposed and mingling with the young elite of the wizarding world. Either that or something worse, he'd sell her or marry her off.

“What are you talking about? It's exactly the place for someone like you.” She shook her head and looked back into the fire.

“Draco's been very generous with me. I wouldn't want to abuse that or embarrass him in anyway.” Blaise let out a weary sigh.

“What is it with you two? He's overprotective, and you let him push you around.” When she didn't respond to this, he continued, “Ginny, you're a beautiful, funny, spirited witch and a helluva Quidditch player. Any wizard would be crazy not to want you on his arm.” No, he couldn't see her flushing pink in the shadows of the room, but he refused to let her ignore him. Blaise took Ginny's arm and forced her to look him in the eyes. “That includes Draco and me.”

BANG! BANG! BANG!

The doors to every room on the floor began to fly open, one after another, knocking loudly against the walls. Ginny and Blaise both looked up.

“What the hell's going on out there?” Ginny followed Blaise into the hallway where they met a panic-stricken Draco at the head of the grand spiral staircase.

Draco took one look at Ginny, at her torn and soiled robes, at her skinned knee and forearm, at her tear-streaked face and tousled hair, and all reason left his enraged body. Without waiting, he reached back and slammed his fist into Blaise, causing his teammate to double over, moaning.

“Draco, no!” Ginny screamed, rushing over to block Draco's follow-up punch. Her hands were on Draco's shoulders, attempting to hold him back, but he shoved her aside and took another swing.

Blaise deftly dodged the punch, and then reached back to slam an infuriated fist into Draco. Ginny threw herself at Draco to stop the fighting just as he stepped aside to avoid Blaise's fist. Instead of making contact with Draco's chest, her hands flailed out against nothing but air, and Ginny went tumbling, headfirst, down the two-story staircase. Her piercing scream turned eerily silent as her body crumpled into a still pool of green robes at the bottom of the staircase.

“Ginny!” they shouted in unison.

No, the two wizards didn't hear the horrified collective shudder or the shattering silence that fell over the partygoers who were watching the scene from below. They were too busy racing to the bottom of the staircase to notice anything other than the battered and motionless body of the witch who held the eyes of everyone in the grand foyer.

“Ginny, no,” Draco cried, dropping to his knees beside the fallen witch. Blaise transfigured a stretcher, and they lifted her broken body onto it, attempting to move her as little as possible. Then the two wizards, now moving as one, held the unconscious witch between them and Disapparated her to St. Mungos.

----- ----- -----

Hours later, Draco and Blaise were sitting across from each other in the small waiting room at St. Mungos. Neither had spoken while they waited to receive word on her condition and prognosis.

“It wasn't what it looked like, Draco,” Blaise said. Draco glanced up.

“Then you do know what it looked like.” Blaise sighed.

“Of course, I bloody well know what it looked like.” He shook his head. “I didn't lay a hand on Ginny, I swear.” Draco snorted.

“Really? Then how the hell did she get into that condition?”

“I tackled her.”

“You what?”

“I said `I tackled her' to the ground. That's how she got into that condition, alright?”

“You didn't lay a hand on her. You laid your whole fucking body on her.” Draco was glaring at Blaise, incensed. “What the hell did you do that for?”

“Because she was running away from your birthday party, that's why. I didn't want her to go beyond the gardens and into the forest. She could have gotten eaten alive in there with all the dangerous creatures my stepfather keeps in there.”

“Why was she running away in the first place?”

“Because I refused to take her home, and she didn't think you wanted her there, that's why. She said she didn't want to embarrass you. You tell me what that's all about. How could a witch like Ginny embarrass you, you arsehole?” Draco ran a tired hand over his face.

“She said that, did she?”

“Yes, she did,” Blaise said, staring at Draco.

Draco sighed. He knew exactly why she said that. “The only place she'll go with me is to those damn Quidditch matches.”

“Then why don't you let her play?” Draco shrugged his useless shoulders.

“I didn't want her to get hurt. Those bastards are too physical for her.” They both looked at each other and fell silent again.

“What is it with the two of you, Draco? Why is she so damn deferential to you? The Ginny Weasley I remember would have spit in your face first then asked questions later. What the hell happened to her?”

Draco shook his head. “It's a long story, Blaise, and none of your goddamn business. That's between Ginny and me. Period.”

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Author's Notes:

Many thanks for your indulgence with the crazy antics in the last chapter, as writing that type of thing really isn't my forte. And now for something a bit different... - fallenwitch

Chapter 6

What The Hell Took Them So Long?

(A Day Later)

Draco planted his weary arse where he always planted it, in the goddamn uncomfortable chair by the side of her bed, this time in St. Mungos. No, she wasn't dying, but she had sustained multiple broken bones, a punctured lung, and a severe concussion.

Draco buried his face in his hands and groaned. He was still reeling from the moment of impact. No, not that moment, the other moment, the moment he looked up and saw those faces looking back at him, the ones capable of destroying the tenuous world he had created with his lethal redheaded witch.

He wasn't a stinking troll. He knew it couldn't last, but he had this fantasy that he could choose the time and place of its ending. The illusion of control, it was a genetic vulnerability many Malfoys were fatally prone toward. Yes, he would choose the wizard she would marry, and he would let go when he was good and ready. Well, that fucking delusion was over.

Channels of communication, alliances, friendships, whatever the hell you wanted to call them, were created during the War and ran between the Death Eating communities, at the highest levels, all over Europe. Despite the Dark Lord's death and the shattering of his iron fist, remnants of those channels continued to exist, loosely linking the autonomous Death Eating fiefdoms scattered across Great Britain and the Continent.

A bunch of wankers playing pick-up games of Quidditch were a world away from the sophisticated group Draco and Ginny stumbled into. The children of the elite traveled in a tight social circle, and it was no small fact that Draco Malfoy was seen escorting a card-carrying member of the defunct Order and one of the infamous Weasley clan to his birthday party. Any questions about his actual attachment to her or her identity were answered when he got into an all out Muggle brawl over her. That was positively scandalous but not fatal. After all, the War was over, and pureblooded witches were all the rage.

However, it was only a matter of time until that tidbit of society gossip collided with the wounds of the War, igniting a disaster that could prove fatal.

Who the hell did Blaise shag to get that list of guests? The last time he checked, Blaise wasn't on the bloody A list. Draco ran an exhausted hand over his face and sighed. Sure, Blaise could charm and dazzle his Zabini arse into any group he had a mind to. But he had never shown the slightest interest in crashing that lethal and uptight group. None.

Yes, Blaise was a Slytherin, but he was no Death Eater. His resourceful mother had pulled the appropriate strings early on and whisked him away into hiding for the duration of the War. Both his current stepfather and his mother had never been major players, even before the War. They were wealthy society types, not ambitious, power-seeking people willing to stake their lives and fortunes on the Dark Lord. When the War ended, the Zabinis were on the out.

Blaise didn't give a shit. That perilous group wasn't the only party in wizarding England. On his return, he went out and found a new group of blokes to associate with. No, they didn't have his social standing or his wealth, but Blaise didn't give a rat's arse about that. Then, in a quirk of circumstances, the two former housemates landed on the same Quidditch team in one of the early pick-up games. It was love and annoyance at first sight.

Blaise's infectious love of life and his blatant disregard for the conventional were a fucking breath of fresh air for Draco, who was suffocating in the fall out from the War. The expectations, the claustrophobic obligations, and the smelly arse kissing were never ending chores. That all changed with the Dark Lord's death, but that's another story.

When Draco took Ginny to that first Quidditch match, hopeful he would be able to unload the pathetic Gryffindor onto one of his fellow players, he assumed he was in safe territory. His two worlds had never collided before, not even close. She was on display and up for grabs.

Draco slumped down into his chair and threw his aching head back, staring at the white plaster ceiling. It was his fault. Yes, the bloody fuck up of Hagrid proportions was his doing. When he reversed gears in the middle of the show and decided to hold onto Ginny for longer than planned, he left himself open and vulnerable to the kind of shit that went down at that party.

What was he doing? She had him turned around and upside down. Having successfully negotiated his way through the War and its aftermath, why was he stumbling over this trivial matter? Yes, their lives were connected to each other, but that could be remedied. He would simply cut her loose to fend for herself.

Looking down and over, he saw the ugly, swollen bruises marring her face and her exposed arms. Yes, all he had to do was cut her loose, if he and Blaise didn't kill her first. Merlin.

The door to Ginny's room swung open.

"Who the hell's that?" Blaise asked, walking in and staring backwards into the hall. Draco glanced up.

"That's Frank."

"Who's Frank?"

"Frank's a friend of Sam's."

"Oh," Blaise said, nodding. "Why the hell does Sam need a friend, isn't one enough?" Draco gave Blaise a stern look. "Right." Throwing a huge bouquet of flowers onto the table next to Ginny's bed, Blaise pulled over a chair, and sat down, staring at Draco.

"Mate, you look like shit. Why don't you go home, clean up, and get something to eat? Frank and I will look after Ginny." Draco shook his head. He wasn't leaving her side. "You know sitting here, castrating yourself, won't help her to get better any faster." Draco refused to respond to Blaise. "All you'll do is scare the shit out of her when she finally wakes up and sees you looking worse than she does." Draco put a tense hand to his forehead. "If you like, I'll floo Healer Topman and see if we can't get another bed brought in here because you're going to need one if you keep this shit up." Draco stared up at Blaise.

"Are you finished?" Blaise shrugged his shoulders.

"I think that about covers it."

"Good, now shut the hell up," Draco snapped.

Sighing, Blaise settled into his chair for the long haul, threw his boots up on the bottom of Ginny's bed, and contemplated taking out his Daily Prophet. "And get some goddamn manners," Draco hissed, knocking Blaise's boots off of Ginny's bed.

"Right, sorry." Blaise shifted his arse around the hard wooden chair trying to find a comfortable niche where one didn't exist.

One Daily Prophet, two Witch Weeklies, and four hours of tolerating Draco's foul disposition later, Blaise yawned, stood up, and stretched.

"Listen, Draco, why don't we go and get a bite to eat? I'm bloody famished, and I hear the cafeteria food here is fabulous." Draco shook his head. "Tell you what. I'm going to go get some of that marvelous food, for the both of us, and bring it back in here. Alright?" When Draco didn't respond, Blaise reached over and gave him a gentle squeeze on his shoulder. "Be back in a few."

"Blaise," Draco called out, "thanks."

"No problem, mate."

When Blaise kicked open the door a half an hour later, balancing two trays of culinary delights, he found Draco asleep in that arse numbing chair with the top half of his body draped protectively over Ginny. About bloody time, he thought, placing Draco's tray on the table next to Ginny's bed and casting a warming charm on it.

Then Blaise looked at his tray of food for a moment before throwing open the door to Ginny's room. "Oi, Frank, you hungry, mate?"

----- ----- -----

(Eight Days Later)

She had to go. She was a liability and a lethal hazard to him. He did what he needed to do. He resuscitated her from death's door and insured his own survival. That was as far as her intrusion into his life was supposed to go.

It was her predicament and her responsibility, not his. He happened to be the first unlucky wizard to come along when her previous owner decided to dump her toxic arse. Hell, he had done more than his share. If she was clumsy enough to get caught killing a powerful, high-ranking Death Eater, that was her problem. His bloody Malfoy arse had been on fire enough to light up half the wizarding world during the War. He didn't need this kind of shit right now.

Draco shoved his hands deeper into the pockets of his cloak, trying to shake the demons that plagued his world. The rustling of her robes in the wind caught his attention. When he looked up, she was leaning over nicking a wild flower or two, her cloak and robes swirling in a tempest of black around her. He stopped and waited.

It was her ritual walk he had imposed on, not his, the one Healer Topman recommended months ago as part of her original rehabilitation. The Slytherin was feeling claustrophobic and paranoid as hell in their flat. He needed some air, that's all, and a moment of undisturbed quiet to think. Yes, it was Saturday, but there would be no Quidditch for him today. When she asked him about it, twice, he told her, twice, that he wasn't feeling up to Quidditch.

Quidditch was the last goddamn thing on his mind.

She was the only thing on his mind.

The thought of marrying her off to some wizard turned his stomach raw. However, that was the preferred option. He had long ago vowed that he would never sell her, never. At least with wizarding marriages there were certain covenants and traditions that would afford her a measure of protection. If he sold her, she would have no rights and no protection. Any heinous mischief could befall her. Most likely she would vanish, and he would never know what had become of her.

He stood at the side of the lake, watching her throw a stone. It skipped and jumped and flew over the glassy top before sinking straight to the bottom like a lead weight. Draco turned his eyes away from her.

Minutes later, the crunching of her boots announced her presence as she walked up beside him. Glancing up, he saw her staring out at the lake, face flush and hair tousled, with a wild flower or two in hand. It didn't take much to entertain her, did it?

They stood side-by-side watching life on the Manor grounds in the luxury of their usual silence, the one he had grown to treasure. But that afternoon his piece of property spoke.

"Draco?"

"Hmmm?"

"Thank you." He turned and stared at her.

"For what?" She laughed, that rare and delightful sound, before turning her dark eyes on him.

"For everything," she announced while ambushing him. Yes, that crazy crimson ball and chain stepped right up and wrapped her arms around his waist, holding him tightly. "For everything," she whispered, burying her face in the fabric of his cloak.

He was sure it was something he had eaten for lunch that was causing the aching in his chest. Indigestion with a touch of reflux, perhaps? When she didn't let go, when she proceeded to lean against him, Draco sighed and threw his arms around her. Burdensome wench. That was the moment Draco lost his footing and felt himself slipping into her magical world of red silk and honey, the one he couldn't get enough of, the one that was breaking his Malfoy heart.

"Ginny," he murmured, closing his pained eyes and burying his tortured face in the nape of her delicious neck. The Slytherin held his precious witch close, wondering vaguely if an antidote for her powerful magic existed anywhere.

----- ----- -----

(Fifteen Days Later)

He gripped onto the edge his desk at work, fearing for his sanity. Was he was losing his ever-loving Slytherin mind? He pushed his tense arse firmly against his chair, least his head accidentally snuck up it, but that didn't stop the shit from flowing freely. Nope, it didn't stop a thing.

There it was again, that irrational, psychotic thinking, knocking around the inside of his skull, reeking havoc in the place previous occupied by his brain. What if he didn't get rid of her? What if he, heaven forbid, decided to keep her? What if he told the Bulgarians to fuck off? And how, exactly, would he keep them safe after uttering those eloquent, consoling words to the Bulgarian Ambassador? His irrational thinking hadn't traversed that far, yet. Draco groaned and slid his elegant Malfoy frame halfway under his desk. Wearing invisibility cloaks for the rest of their lives wasn't an option, at least not a viable one.

Goddamn it, was he a bloody Malfoy or not? If he wanted something, all he had to do was go after it. If he wanted this traitorous, murdering wench, and blatant supporter of the Order, he was going to have to step forward and claim her, publicly. He was going to have to lay his Malfoy life on the line. It was as simple and painful as that.

Draco put a weary hand to his aching head. If he could slip underneath his desk, without calling undue attention to himself, he would, but there was no hiding from the consequences of his disastrous trip to Bulgaria. Merlin. Wasn't this the kind of stress that turned lesser wizards into squibs?

Hauling his slippery arse back into his chair, Draco pulled out a worn piece of parchment from his cloak pocket, the one with the list of wizards he considered adequate and eligible for marriage to Ginny. It was a goddamn short list, too short. Hell, even Blaise was looking good right now. Yes, Blaise could use some work; however, he had the wealth and the resources to care for her in the manner she deserved. Draco wasn't blind. He knew Blaise was smitten with her, and she seemed taken with him as well. Draco picked up his quill and wrote Blaise's name on the piece of parchment before folding it up and tucking it back into his pocket.

----- ----- -----

(Twenty-two Days Later)

What the hell took them so long?

He knelt beside her bed and leaned over, gently rousing her with one hand on her exposed shoulder. The light from the hallway illuminated her sleeping form, entangled in a mess of sheets and blankets, right up to her chin.

"Ginny. Ginny, wake up," he whispered. The urgent tone in his voice was evident to his house elf, standing at the ready beside his master. The unconscious witch drowsily opened her eyes, squinting at the intrusive light outlining his familiar figure.

"Draco?" She sat up, dazed.

"Come on, Ginny. We've got to get going."

"What?" Draco motioned to his house elf, who scurried over, putting house slippers on the nightgown clad woman. With this accomplished, Ginny stood and felt Draco's winter cloak drape around her. "What's going on?"

"Shhh...." he said, pulling her warm, compliant figure to his. She leaned against him and buried her still groggy face in the soft fabric of his robes, shutting out the offending light. Draco withdrew his wand, nodded to his elf, and Disapparated them a moment later.

When their feet hit the ground, Ginny looked around but couldn't see much. It was dark. The curtains were drawn, and there was no seepage of moonlight to help orient her. Draco had his hands on her, helping her into an enormous bed and pulling off her house slippers.

"Go back to sleep."

She watched his retreating figure until it disappeared into the shadows and listened to the alternating sharp and muted echo of his boots as he crossed the wooden floor and rugs.

"Draco," the rhythmic sound stopped, "where are you going?"

"To sleep."

"What's going on?" She heard him sigh before those footsteps reversed course, landing him beside her again. The left side of the bed lowered when he sat down. She could see his concerned eyes on her.

"The Bulgarians are coming."

"What?"

"The Bulgarians are coming. I don't know anything more. I won't know anything more until tomorrow. Try and get some sleep." She nodded before her dark eyes fell from his and crash-landed on the crisp cotton sheets.

A long minute or two of silence hit the pair.

"Ginny," he said softly, reaching out for her. But she eluded his touch by turning over and away from him, shutting him out of her world. Then she pulled up the bedcovers and stared out into the void of night.

Draco reached over and put his hand on Ginny's shoulder - on her arm - on her back.

"Ginny - "

"Ginny, no - "

"Ginny, please -"

But she never responded to his overtures. Instead, she lay there, mute and staring.

Draco scrambled over to the other side of the bed and dropped to his knees in front of her. "Ginny," he whispered, panic edging his voice. "Ginny, it's Draco. I'm right here." He had one hand on the side of her face, stroking it in a futile attempt to comfort her, in the way that he always comforted her. But her eyes never wavered from their locked position, focused on some unknowable point. "Ginny... no... don't," Draco pleaded, pulling her limp figure to his.

But it was too late. She was already gone.

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Author's Note: Thanks for reading and for the wonderful reviews everyone left! This chapter was finished, edited, and posted from Vail, Colorado. I write best at home, but I wanted to get this posted as soon as possible after that last chapter. I hope this answers more questions than it creates. - fallenwitch

Chapter 7

A Good Wizard

"What the hell's wrong with her?" Draco stood with his arms crossed, staring at his mute and catatonic souvenir from Bulgaria, the one he couldn't return. She was having another one of her fits. "Why does she do this? I thought she was fixed." Healer Topman looked up at Draco from his vantage point, kneeling beside Ginny.

"Mr. Malfoy," he said, rising and crossing the room, "She is exhibiting symptoms of a Traumatic Stress Disorder. Right now she is experiencing a flashback."

"A flashback?"

"Her mind has taken her back to one or more of her traumatic experiences, and she is reliving them as we speak. They are as real to her as this conversation is to you and I." Draco looked over at her.

"Is she aware of us at all?"

"No, she is back at the scene of her trauma." Draco nodded.

"How do we get rid of this disorder?" Healer Topman shook his head.

"No magic can cure what ails her psyche."

"What?" Draco exclaimed, aghast. Was he going to have to put up with a mentally disturbed witch for the rest of his miserable life? How the hell did one get rid of a witch like this? No one would want to buy or marry such damaged goods. "There must be something you can do."

"There is nothing I can do. However, you can help a great deal."

"Me? I'm not a bloody Healer."

"Miss Weasley needs to be in a safe and nurturing environment, one in which there are no threats to her - emotional, psychological, or physical. And then, given time, she will heal herself to whatever point she is able."

"You mean she could have these fits for the rest of her life?"

"The mind is remarkably resilient organ, Mr. Malfoy."

After Healer Topman left, Draco walked around the disturbed witch several times before kneeling in front of her. He waved his hand slowly in her face - no response. Then he waved both hands in an all out flail - still no response. Fucked. Utterly fucked. Both of them.

----- ----- -----

She came to, sitting up and clutching the bedcovers to her chest while scanning the room, now bathed in a lethal silver sheen from the moonlight pouring in past the open curtains.

"I'm here, Ginny," Draco said, dragging his weary arse out of the chair in front of the fireplace. Was there a goddamn chair he hadn't been planted in? Merlin. If he wasn't careful, he would start growing bloody roots and never be able to move again.

She followed his voice and saw his familiar figure emerging out of the shadows. Then he was sitting on the edge of her bed, running his hand down the side of her pale face, sending relief through every terrified cell in her body, right down to her glorious toes.

"Are you okay?"

She nodded and reached for him. Draco wrapped his arms around her trembling form, enveloping her world in the comfort of his Slytherin warmth. "It's okay, Ginny. I'm here."

It had been months since her last episode. He thought she was over them. How, in Merlin's name, was he supposed to take care of the witch when she kept sprinting back to the scene of the crime without him?

"Draco?"

"Hmmm?"

"Where are we?"

"We're in Malfoy Manor. We'll be safe here."

Safe? Yes, safe because it was the last goddamn wizarding fortress in England. Lucius Malfoy had been many things in life, and one of them was paranoid about the wards and the security at the Manor. He believed his family's survival would depend on them one day. That day never came to pass, and both he and Narcissa met their fates elsewhere; however, he left Draco a safe haven in the midst of the wizarding chaos that erupted during the last dark days of the War, one that served his son well.

Once the War was over, Draco left his childhood home, never expecting he would need to return. But here he was, tucked behind its magnificent walls with his lethal crimson beauty.

"Draco," she whispered, leaning against him, "stay."

"What?"

"Stay." That's what he thought she said. It was then that he started untangling himself from her treacherous web, the one that was fucking with his tidy Malfoy world and his aching heart.

"No, Ginny," he whispered, kissing the top of her crimson locks, "not tonight." Then he excused himself and got the hell out of there while he could still walk. If she needed a security blanket, he would conjure one up for her. The days of their casual bed sharing on business trips were long over. There was nothing casual about what went through his body when she touched him, however platonic it felt to her.

----- ----- -----

The following morning Draco studied the owl sent by his Uncle.

Petar Romanov, the Bulgarian Ambassador, had been dispatched at the request of the Bulgarian Minister of Magic on behalf of Alexander Levski to obtain the escaped fugitive and murderess, Ginevra Weasley. Her presence in England was recently brought to the attention of the Bulgarian Ministry of Magic, and they were requesting her extradition back to Bulgaria. She was a known war criminal and murderer of Nikolay Levski, son of Alexander Levski and former General-in-Arms of the Dark Lord's Elite Squadron in Bulgaria. Draco Malfoy, nephew of the Assistant Minister of Magic, England and also nephew of the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement at the Ministry of Magic, England, was said to be inadvertently harboring the fugitive. Ambassador Romanov would be in England in three days time requesting answers and the wanted witch.

Well, he thought, throwing the parchment aside, that just about covered it, didn't it? Should he lend the honorable Ambassador a "Sonorus" charm so he could announce that fact to the whole fucking wizarding world?

Draco ran a nervous hand over his face. Of all the goddamn wizarding clans in Bulgaria, why did she have to pick that one to assassinate? Merlin. The Levskis were a ruthless, old and powerful clan and holders of some of the most potent Dark Magic known. He knew the Levskis. Nikolay was an only child and sole scion to their wizarding empire. They would stop at nothing to get their claws into Ginny.

Groaning, Draco slid down into his chair, until he was hanging on by the grace of his uptight bum. Why did shit like this always happen to him? Did he have a sign around his neck reading, "dump life-threatening shit here"?

Yes, his infamous Malfoy arse was on fire again. As that familiar heat made its way up his body, Draco stood. Fuck the Levskis and their bloody political muscle flexing. He didn't give a damn. He had dealt with worse during the War. If they wanted her, they were going to have to come and get her, all of them.

Withdrawing his wand, Draco checked his watch. He didn't have much time to put his plan into action. Of course he had a plan, you idiot. What do you think he had been working on for the past month? After all, he wasn't suicidal, just intoxicated out of his heart and his mind with a certain wanted witch, god help him.

----- ----- ----

When he Apparated home that evening, hours after missing supper, he threw off his cloak and saw a folded piece of parchment on his pillow. It was from Ginny.

Alexander Levski was upon them, and she knew decisions had to be made. She was asking him not to turn her over to the Bulgarian, and she also said she wasn't the marrying kind. Instead, she wanted to be sold, overseas if he could arrange it. If not, she wanted to be killed. It was the kinder fate. He could sell her to Blaise and then kill her with no ill consequences for either wizard. She offered to speak to Blaise if he thought it would help.

Merlin, he knew his plan was a bit dodgy, but her plan sucked.

"Ginny?" He knocked a time or two before swinging open the heavy wooden door to her bedroom. It was dark. The only light illuminating the cavernous place was a dying fire, casting odd, reaching shadows across the scene. Her slight figure was sitting on the floor in front of the fireplace. She was staring, transfixed, at the last glowing embers.

"Ginny," he said, dropping to the floor beside her. She looked up. "What's this?" He held out the parchment for her.

She glanced at it before turning away. "It's what I want for both of us." He sighed.

"No." She looked over. "I won't do it. I won't sell you, and I certainly won't kill you." Marrying her off was one thing, killing her was quite another.

She sighed before resting her tired eyes on his.

"What will you do with me? Turn me over to Levski?"

"Don't be ridiculous."

"Don't marry me off, Draco. To be owned by someone is one thing. To be married is an entirely different thing." He stayed his hand, the one that was aching to run down the side of her worried face, to ease her internal suffering.

"It's the only way to keep you safe. I have no choice." She shook her head. "I've spent the day making the appropriate arrangements." When she opened her mouth to argue, he put his finger to her lips, silencing her. "It's done, Ginny. I've made my decision."

"When?"

"Friday morning." That was the day after tomorrow. No, she never asked him the name of the wizard because he knew it didn't matter. They were all the same to her, objectionable. "He's a good wizard, Ginny. He'll care for you and keep you safe." She refused to look at him. "Perhaps in time you'll come to care for him as well."

He didn't give a damn if she preferred to be executed or sold into continuing slavery rather than be married. It was his decision, and he refused to let her die or suffer any more abuse. His Malfoy heart couldn't bear it. Yes, it was selfish, but altruistically selfish, at least that's what he told himself. Besides, he was the one making the decisions around here, not her. Look at where her decision making had landed her, in the goddamn disaster they were facing now.

"Ginny, I want you to have this." He reached into his cloak and took out a wand. She glanced over and then away without reaching for it.

"I thought I wasn't allowed to do magic. No wand. No potion making. Nothing." He sighed as she gave him a partial recitation of his Malfoy laws, the ones he laid down for her the moment she crashed into his life.

"Forget what I said. You need to be able to defend yourself. I can't have you walking around wandless with the Bulgarians on the march." When she didn't respond, he reached over and put it in her stubborn hand.

Ginny flung the wand out of her hand, inadvertently hitting Draco in the face with her fist, hard. His Death Eating reflexes seized her wrist in his hand with an iron lock. Her eyes went wide, and they both heard the wand hit the floor with a loud clatter.

What the hell was he supposed to do with a rebellious wanted witch, one who had forgotten that she was still his piece of property? Draco thought about this as he pressed his stinging red cheek against hers and whispered into her ear, "Don't be mad at me, Ginny. I couldn't bear it."

Who owned who?

She started shaking her furious head and trying to yank her angry wrist out of his hand. But he refused to let go. Instead, they struggled for a minute before her lips accidentally brushed against his, ending all movement on both sides. He slowly released her wrist, and she stopped pushing against his chest. Was it his imagination or had the room suddenly become stifling? Maybe that was the problem. His Ginny deprived body was now oxygen deprived as well.

Draco shouldn't have helped himself, but he did. He helped himself to her. He impaled her hot, moist lips with his, not giving a damn if she reached for that fallen wand and hexed the shit out of him. Only she didn't reach for anything. Instead, she let out an almost indecipherable moan and leaned into that stolen kiss, deepening it.

When he pulled her magnificent figure to his, she wrapped her arms around his neck and opened her lips for him, giving him complete access to her. When he ran his aching hands through her silken tresses and over her generous curves, the ones he had watched for months and months, she matched him movement for movement, urging him on until they tumbled to the floor in a heated mass of entangled arms and legs, desperately grabbing at one another.

There was no hesitation in her, none.

Draco was acutely aware of his overheated groin, the one she was pressing her pelvis against until he was afraid it would explode and end everything prematurely. Good lord, she was made for him. Yes, she was. He was dizzy with her like this and afraid he would pass out from the intensity of his own ridiculous desire, the one that had caused him endless nights of sleep deprivation.

In a fit of desperation and fearing for his own consciousness, Draco broke away from Ginny, allowing her to come up for air as well. Attempting to calm his trembling body, he glanced down and saw her modest cotton nightgown pushed up past her waist with his hand under it and on her breast. That was when his crazy fantasy shattered and something snapped in him, causing a Knut of sense to roll out of his pulsing groin and into his hormone dazed head. What the hell was he doing?

Goddamn it, he was doing exactly what he told himself he would never do. He was a Thestral's breath away from gloriously shagging her. Of course she would shag him. She did any wretched thing he told her to do, and he suspected she would do this as well because that was her job in life. But that wasn't what he wanted. Not even close. Draco pushed the flush and breathless witch away from him and ran an unsteady hand through his tousled hair.

"Ginny," he said in a hoarse voice, "I apologize." Then he grabbed his robes and his shirt and left her where he found her, in front of the fireplace, now staring at him.

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Author's Notes: Many thanks to everyone for reading and the wonderful reviews. This chapter was written while listening to too much Keith Urban. No, I don't listen to country music - just Keith. And no, this really doesn't have anything to do with anything. -fallenwitch

Chapter 8

Bewitched

When Draco opened his eyes, he refused to get out of bed and face his day. Instead, he threw his sheets over his head and shut out the reality of his increasingly dangerous existence, the one that harkened back to the War and days he would rather forget.

Where the hell was a Time Turner when you needed one? Yes, he would go back, all the way back to the day of his birthday party. He would forbid Ginny to go to that fiasco of a Quidditch dinner at Blaise's, and that would be that. On second thought, he would also Obliviate her out of Blaise's memory and abscond with her somewhere safe, away from her past and his present.

Groaning, he sank further behind his wall of sheets. No, he wasn't wizard enough to go all the way back to the night of that damned game of Wizard Chess with its drunken bet and magical contract. He wouldn't erase her out of his life altogether. Maybe in another two weeks or two months he would feel differently. Maybe then he would wish he could erase everything, but today wasn't that day.

An undetermined amount of tortured time later, Draco pulled those pseudoprotective sheets off his head and hauled his reluctant Malfoy arse out of bed to start to his day. No, he didn't have breakfast. Instead, he Apparated straight to the Ministry of Magic's Department of Magical Law Enforcement.

If he ate anything, he was afraid it would blow out during his meeting there. That was the effect she had on him, the other witch he was bound to, this one by blood and an Unbreakable Vow. She made him sick to his stomach. No, it wasn't his vow. It was hers, given in a fit of guilt to his mother before her unexpected death.

“Come, Draco,” she barked.

He silently fell in step behind her, walking down the long corridor in the Ministry of Magic's Department of Magical Law Enforcement. He was dressed in his finest black robes and boots with no evidence of the previous night's sleep deprivation. They turned a corner and entered her office. He closed the door.

“Sit,” she commanded.

He sat his irritated Malfoy arse down. What was he? A fucking dog? Bossy black-haired bint.

She glanced over at him and snapped her brittle fingers, signaling her assistant, who scurried in bearing a tray with tea and biscuits. He took the cup she held out for him and studied it. Was he nauseous? No, not yet.

“Thank you.”

“The Bulgarian Ambassador will be here tomorrow," she announced. "You have something they want and believe belongs to them." She set her cup down and continued, “You will bring the girl here, and I will supervise her return.”

“No,” he said softly, between sips of hot tea.

“Fine. You hand her over yourself, but I recommend considerable assistance. Alexandar Levski can't be trusted."

When he merely stared at her without responding, a tense silence fell between the two. He set his cup down, and her eyes narrowed as she studied him.

“I see,” she crooned softly. “You would have us shelter an assassin for the Order?” When he didn't react, she went on, “Whatever she may have led you to believe, she is an assassin trained by the Order to kill us. It's that simple, Draco.” She stood. “Hand her over, and this will all go away. It will be as though she never existed, and I will forget about your indiscretion.”

“I will not release her.” He stood. She looked up with the crook of her nose inches from his, scrutinizing him before laughing with contempt in his unflinching face.

“She's bewitched you, boy. Bewitched you by the oldest magic known to our kind.” Running her eyes up and down his calm figure in disgust, she shook her head. “That girl is nothing more than Muggle-sucking, pureblooded trash, Draco. She's not fit to lick your boots much less other parts of your anatomy. You shelter her, and she'll bite you. Do you hear me?”

“Yes.”

Letting out a sigh, she put her cool hand on Draco's cheek. “She's incapable of loving our kind, Draco. Watch yourself. Your Uncle and I will begin negotiations with the Bulgarians when they arrive tomorrow. That will give you an extra day or two to come to your senses. Have your fill of her and be done with it. I cannot have your blood on my hands. Your mother loved you. Taking up with this trash is a poor way to honor her memory.”

“I understand, Aunt Bella. Thank you.” Draco went to his Aunt and kissed her on both cheeks. Yes, now he was queasy and ready to blow the breakfast he didn't eat. Touching the foul hag did it every goddamn time.

“Go now,” she hissed, dismissing him and watching out of the corner of her eye as he walked out of the room. Did the boy share Cissy's weakness? Was he also prone to fatal attachments of the heart? No, she wasn't bound to save his life. She was only bound to protect him as best she could. If that meant the elimination of the unnecessary trash he had attached himself to, then so be it.

----- ----- -----

The next time he saw her, she was armed and dangerous and thoroughly unamused. Peering into her sitting room, he watched her stand on an oversized wooden block while one of his elves scampered around, altering the white gossamer silk wedding robes he had purchased for her. Her back was to him, and he saw her right hand wrapped tightly around the wand she had refused the night before. She was tapping it against her leg, emitting the occasional angry spark out of its tip.

He stepped inside and dismissed the elf with a wave of his hand. Ginny turned her head and saw Draco staring at her gown as he paced a slow, observant circle around her before stopping and holding out his hand for her. Refusing his outstretched hand, she stepped off the block.

Was she exquisite? Of course she was. Did he say anything to her about that? No, he did not.

"These are for you," he said, taking two boxes out of his robes. "It is traditional for the bride in the family you are marrying into to wear these." When she glared at him, he sighed. "Look, I'm not going to hold a wand to your head and make you wear these. Wear them or don't. It's up to you." He didn't give a damn what she wore. The whole charade was about saving her neck not decorating it.

To his surprise, she took the heavy wooden boxes from him and opened their brass-hinged lids. Then she stared at the treasured jewels for several minutes before closing the lids again.

"If you'd like something else, let me know, and I'll make sure you have whatever you want." When she glanced at the boxes again, he touched her hand. "Those are yours to keep either way."

"He's a wealthy wizard?"

"Yes."

"A pureblood?"

"Of course."

She paused and looked up at him.

"Is he a Death Eater?" Draco sighed.

"Does it matter?"

"Is he a Death Eater?"

"Yes, he's a bloody Death Eater."

That's when she walked out on him, taking her boxes with her.

----- ----- -----

Good lord, was she decompensating from the stress? That evening, he stared at his agitated house elf, talking too fast and pointing toward Ginny's bedroom. Draco raced down the hall with his alarmed house elf in tow, skidding to a halt just outside her door. Peering inside, he saw her on her knees, arguing with a stubborn Malfoy house elf, holding his terrified ground as trained. Shit. Not only had she lost it, but she was also over the edge raving mad. They were freckled nose to elf nose when he ripped them apart.

“Merlin, Ginny, what's wrong?” he asked, hauling the flush and angry witch to her feet while giving a dismissive nod to both skittish elves.

“My things, Draco,” she spat out, one hand on her hip. Then she pointed to the nonexistent house elf, the one who had already scampered out of the room. “He won't give me my things.”

“He doesn't have your things.”

“What?” she gasped. “He promised me I'd have them in hand by tonight.” Draco shook his head and put a steadying hand on her shoulder.

“We couldn't get your things. I sent Sam and Frank back to the flat, but the wards had been tampered with. It's too dangerous to go in there right now.” She threw both hands up in the air and let out an exasperated groan.

“What am I supposed to do? I need my winter cloak and my books and my THINGS!” Draco could hear the escalating panic in her raised voice.

“Calm down, Ginny. Make a list of everything you need, and I'll replace it all.” She shook her head, frustrated tears brimming her furious eyes.

“You don't understand. I need MY things, not just bloody things, Draco. Merlin, how can I leave tomorrow without them?” She paused a moment, looked up at him, and withdrew her wand. “Let me go in and get my things. It'll only take a few minutes.”

“Are you bloody nutters? Absolutely not.” If Frank and Sam weren't safe in there, he sure as hell wasn't sending her ruddy arse in alone. He didn't give a damn if the stress of her upcoming marriage was impairing her ability to think and behave in a rational fashion.

“I'll take Sam and Frank with me.”

“No,” he growled while attempting to stare the unstable witch down. “Go on, wave that wand all you want. You know you can't Apparate out of the Manor.”

Letting out an infuriated groan, Ginny threw her useless wand on the floor and sank, dejected bum first, down the side of her bed and onto the hard, wooden floor. Then she hung her miserable head in her hands. That's when Draco saw the empty, oversized knapsack on her bed with one or two of her personal items beside it. Sighing, he knelt in front of the frustrated witch.

“Look, Ginny,” he said gently to her hanging head, “after we're married, I'll send a squadron of Death Eaters in to get whatever you want but not now. It's too dangerous.” Her head rose, one slow crimson inch at a time, until she was looking him straight in the eyes.

“What?”

“I'll get your things after we're married, not now.” Her dark eyes began searching his face.

“Married?”

“As my wife, you'll have all the protection and resources that go with the Malfoy name. That's more than any other wizard can offer you.” Why the hell was she staring at him like that? Had he sprouted horns since he last looked in the mirror? A moment or two later, Ginny's face fell.

“Oh dear god.”

No, this wasn't the reaction Draco had hoped for nor the one he expected his future wife would give him one day, but he had just told the witch he was going to marry her, and there was no going back. He should have held his breath before diving in, but he didn't. Instead, he dove in, heart first, like the idiot he had never been before.

“I love you, Ginny, for whatever that's worth, and I know you're not without feelings for me. I'll do my best to make you happy. And I'll care for you and protect you until my last dying breath.”

Well?

He waited, and while he waited, his lungs filled up, drowning the Slytherin in his own stupidity. When she said nothing, when she continued to stare at him with her wide, dark eyes, his heart sank. No, he didn't expect her to love him. In fact, he knew all along that she didn't love him, but he had hoped. And despite setting his Malfoy expectations as low as they could go, her reaction - mute with horror - really wasn't what he had in mind when he declared his undying love for her.

What the hell? Since he was already up to his infamous neck in it, he decided to wade in all the way. Drown him. Choke him. Beat him. And watch him come back for more. Fumbling in his cloak pocket, Draco pulled out the box that had been burning a hole in his overpriced robes. What, exactly, was the etiquette in this situation? He decided there was no etiquette for ordering a witch to marry you. You simply ordered her arse to.

“This is for you. If you don't fancy it and want something different, I'll replace it with whatever you want. But I'd appreciate it if you'd wear it.” She watched as he took her hand and slipped the elegant engagement ring on her finger.

She was still staring at that ring when he leaned over and kissed her stunned lips. No, this wasn't one of the passionate kisses they had shared the night before. It wasn't even a distant cousin. This was Draco placing his lovesick lips against hers, hoping for the response that never came. When that glorious failure was over, he wrapped his aching arms around his reluctant bride-to-be and held her for a moment before bidding her goodnight.

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Author's Notes: Struggling with a bit of writer's block here. Sorry about that. I toyed with the idea of shelving the whole thing until my writing returns, but I thought I'd throw this one out there and see what readers think. If this chapter doesn't meet the grade (i.e. it sucks), let me know, and I'll hold off posting anything else until this semi-block clears. Otherwise, I might try and write my way through it. Don't worry. It's happened before, and that's how this fic was born. Thanks for reading and all the support you've given me. - fallenwitch

Chapter 9

Draco's Bad Day, His Very Bad Day

Draco groaned, pulled his pillow over his head, and refused to come out and play. No, he didn't sleep a wink. At least that's how it felt to him, but he must have fallen asleep at some point because he was irritated as hell when his alarm clock startled his slumbering consciousness. How did anyone expect him to sleep when the rock gnawing away at the pit of his stomach was actually his half-beating heart?

His heart. He rolled over, taking his pillow with him, and stared at the ceiling of his bedroom. Today was the day he made her his in the eyes of the law and of his Aunt and of Alexandar Levski. Today was the day he made her his in every way except for the way that mattered most.

He was no simpleton when it came to women. He was only a simpleton when it came to her. He had bedded and courted the most desirable witches in England. But she was different from the daughters of privilege he had known all his life. Were it not for that disaster in Bulgaria, he never would have granted her a second Malfoy look.

What the hell did it take to make a witch like her fall in love? It wasn't as simple as courting her and wooing her and spoiling her until she couldn't resist him. She had no material wants, only a few simple needs, which even the most modest of wizards could meet. She didn't give a damn about his wealth or his connections - political, business, or social. The only things she had ever been impressed by were his Quidditch skills and his broom, the one she handled when she thought he wasn't looking. What witch cared about those things?

Draco closed his eyes and indulged his half-beating heart with her, in all the ways he loved to think of her, including those sacred fantasies where she touched him and loved him in the way his body cried out to be loved by her. Sweet Salazar. Then he opened his eyes and watched as his external world came into sharp focus causing him to wince at the painful truth of their relationship. You could own a witch, but you couldn't order her to love you. Throwing his useless pillow halfway across the room, he rolled out of bed. He didn't want a bloody pillow. He wanted her, and he would take her in whatever form he could get her. Reluctant and horrified wasn't ideal, but it would do for now.

Forty-five minutes later, he was showered, dressed, and adjusting his dress robes. Double checking his pocket for their wedding rings, he looked in the mirror one last time and saw his own pale grey eyes looking back. He stared at those eyes. What did she see when she looked at him? He suspected she saw a privileged bastard of a Death Eater who owned her. What did he see? He saw a crazy, lovesick wizard. Crazy? Yes, crazy, because it was insanity of the highest order that was driving him to throw his Malfoy cloak of protection around her, endangering his life as well. Once they were married, he would bring her around. How? Hell, he'd figure that out later.

----- ----- -----

"Ginny?"

He knocked softly on her bedroom door, took a step back, and waited. He repeated this irritating sequence three times, each time knocking louder and longer. When she refused to open her door or acknowledge him, he tried the doorknob. It was unlocked.

"Ginny?"

The brazen mid-morning sun was pouring into her room at an alarming rate, damn near blinding him. As this excruciating assault waned and his sight returned, he saw her bed in its usual morning state of disarray with her bathrobe and nightgown tossed in the middle of the mess.

Where was she?

He glanced into her bathroom. He opened her sitting room door. He looked out onto her balcony. He checked their private dining room.

"Ginny?"

Peering into her empty closet, panic began filling his anxious lungs. He frantically scanned her closet, spying her wedding robes shoved against the back wall with a piece of parchment stabbed through the neck of the hanger. He tore the bloody thing off and began devouring her familiar handwriting. Somewhere in the middle of that fateful note, his heart dropped from the pit of his stomach to someplace much lower.

Gone.

She was gone.

She had taken her empty knapsack and hauled arse out of his life with no goodbye, only a terse warning not to follow her or try to find her. What the fuck? Since when he did take orders from his own piece of property?

Draco stormed out of her room, shouting orders faster than anyone, including Sam and Frank, could follow them. He had the Manor in a frenzy as every inch, inside and out, was searched for the awol witch and combed for evidence that might point to how she escaped and where she was headed.

Slamming closed the door to his bedroom, Draco ripped off his ridiculous wedding robes and dress boots, the ones that were suffocating him. Then he caught a glimpse of his wild reflection in the mirror. His miserable eyes were on fire. Fuck. Grabbing the nearest object, his dress boot, he threw it at the mirror and watched as his crazed reflection shattered into razor-sharp shards around his feet. A million crazed Dracos looked up at him. Double fuck.

"Reparo," he spat out, disgusted.

This arse backward magical maneuver allowed him to walk in his socks, unimpaled, across the floor and to his goddamn closet to get his other pair of boots and any robes but his wedding robes. On his way out, he slammed his closet door closed only to be jerked back by the hem of his robes caught in that closed door, nearly landing him on his elegant arse. Fine. He slammed the closet door open and walked out of his room, slamming that bloody door open as well. Then he pointed his wand and shouted an incantation, blasting open every door down two halls. Yes, he could blast open every door on every floor of the Manor, but that wouldn't bring her back nor would it ease the searing pain she had inflicted on his heart, the one that was now dragging against the bottom of his boots.

As the chaos continued, Draco stood in the middle of her room. Where the hell would she go with a wand, a change of clothes, and a bit of food? The Burrow? What for? That trash heap was long ago razed and gone. Her family? He supposed she could seek them out, but really, how much help could they be to her six feet under? Friends? What friends? There was Granger, but she was no help, buried in some godforsaken Muggle cemetery.

Money. She had no money. It was forbidden by his Malfoy laws, and the Dark Lord had long ago seized any Gringotts vault her family might once have owned. How far could she get without a Knut to her name? Not very. Where would she surface to try to obtain a few Sickles?

That's when his eyes locked onto the two wooden jewelry cases he had given her the previous day. Flinging open both lids at once, he found the jewelry intact and untouched. He tapped all four pieces with his wand, checking for authenticity. How Gryffindor of her. Feel free to screw the Death Eater over but have the decency to leave his family jewels. Jewels. Shit. Her engagement ring.

Draco tore her room apart searching for the damn thing only to find it was gone. So that was her plan. She was going to finance her escape by pawning the ring he had given her. Merlin. She could live the better part of her life off of what she would get for the bloody thing.

Draco collapsed against the cold, hard wall and slammed his fist against it. Give a freedom-starved witch a wand, hand her your heart, and watch her flee your fucking Manor. Could he have made it any easier for her? Sure, he could have held the door open for her skiving freckled arse.

But this was only the beginning of his bad day, his very bad day.

----- ----- -----

"Why didn't you tell me you stole her out from under Alexandar Levski's nose?" Bella hissed before Draco had the opportunity to place one elegant boot in the door of her office.

"What?"

"Alexandar Levski is accusing you of stealing the Weasley wench from his personal prison in Sofia. Did you?"

"Of course I didn't bloody well steal her. Why would I do something like that?" She was staring at him, questioning his sanity every inch of the way as he continued into her office. "No. Did you hear me? No, I didn't steal her. I obtained her in a bet over a game of Wizard Chess."

"For Salazar's sake, who was the wizard you won her from?"

"I don't know." He shrugged his shoulders and dropped into one of her uncomfortable chairs when she glared at him. "I was drunk. I couldn't tell you what he looked like. It could have been Levski himself for all I know."

She could shake her wand in his face and threaten and berate him all she pleased. It wouldn't change a thing. He was still tied to the awol witch in more than one unpleasant way.

"Let's go." Didn't he just sit down? Merlin. Get up. Sit down. Come here. Fetch, boy, fetch. Hauling his arse up again, Draco fell into step behind Bella. When she came to an abrupt halt a moment later, he almost ploughed into her, balancing on the tips of his boots to prevent himself from laying her flat. "And the next time you decide to take out a couple of Levski's people, clean up after yourself," she spat out before continuing on again.

Huh?

No, he didn't have time to respond because she was storming down the hall toward his Uncle's office. A minute later, he dropped his Malfoy arse into one of his Uncle's uncomfortable chairs. What the hell was going on? Had all the comfortable chairs in the wizarding universe disappeared or had his arse changed shape from all the stress?

As Rodolpus Lestrange spoke, bits and pieces of information fell into Draco's lap until he was leaning forward in his chair, attempting to pull together the ill-fitting pieces of her puzzle. No, he wasn't sure he wanted to know what the final picture looked like, but he was drawn so deep into it he had no choice. There was no blinking or looking away at this point.

After Ginny assassinated Nikolay Levski, the magical borders surrounding Bulgaria were closed, and she went into hiding. A powerful Bulgarian and member of the Order, Closimir Chervenko, sheltered her for over a year before her safe house was discovered and attacked. Closimir was killed, and Alexandar Levski took her prisoner. Levksi held Ginny captive for two years in his personal prison outside Sofia, until she was stolen during the last day of Draco's business trip to Bulgaria.

Prior to her escape, Levski's prison was labeled impenetrable. Whoever stole her managed to get through a complex series of wards, scores of Death Eating guards, an unbreachable cell, and a host of other undisclosed dangers. Not only did that take balls of an unbelievable dimension, it also took inside knowledge of the facility and a uniquely gifted witch or wizard.

Whoever stole her, then turned her over to Draco through the now infamous bet on that game of Wizard Chess. Groaning, Draco realized he didn't need to hear another goddamn word. He knew all he needed to know. If they would please excuse the Slytherin, he would go and blow off his head with a hex rather than live the rest of his life with this particular humiliation, thank you very much.

But he didn't leave. Instead he sat there, like the good Death Eater he had never been, and revealed the existence of the magical contract he signed, the one linking Ginny's survival to his. No, he didn't look at Bella. He didn't want to see it or hear it. Yes, all three of them were now attached at the hip. Draco to Ginny and Bella to Ginny through Draco. Now that Bella knew of this danger to Draco, she was bound to help protect him from it, and that meant protecting Ginny as well. Would any other family members like to sign up for possible death? Seats were still available.

Before Bella could speak or whip out her wand, Draco plunged ahead with the punch line of the joke he was now the butt of.

"She's gone. She escaped last night. I have no idea how she did it or where she went." What he did know was that she left him hanging with the most unbelievable noose around his neck that he had felt in quite awhile. Fuck. No, fucked. Utterly, totally fucked up the arse. No wonder there were no comfortable chairs left in the wizarding world.

"Call in the Romanians."

That was the last thing he heard his Uncle say before he stood and Apparated back to the Manor with his furious tail between his legs and Bella's raging eyes boring a hole into the place previously occupied by his half-beating heart.

Draco's very bad day just got worse.

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Author's Notes: Heartfelt thanks and much gratitude for the wonderful reviews everyone left after the last chapter. They helped keep me writing. - fallenwitch

Chapter 10

That Piece of Trash

"Well?"

Draco studied the pictures, one at a time, double-checking to make sure they were wizard and not Muggle because there was no movement. None. They were either unconscious or dead. In any case, these wizards were no friends of his. A minute later, he threw the stack back on Bella's desk and shook his head.

"Should I know them?" Bella raised an eyebrow and put down her quill.

"Those Bulgarian Death Eaters were found dead in your flat yesterday morning, all four of them."

"Really?"

"They were Avada'd, and the signature from those curses led back to Cissy's wand. Your flat. Your mother's wand. I thought you might know something about it."

Draco's eyes dropped from Bella's as he lowered himself into one of her uncomfortable chairs, groaning all the way down. Merlin, with the way his arse was feeling these days, maybe he would be better off standing for the rest of his life. He wasn't a troll, and, unfortunately, he knew she wasn't one either.

"Ginny."

"Yes, it seems your runaway trinket hasn't lost her lethal touch, has she?" Bella tapped her annoyed fingers on her desk until Draco glanced up at her furious face. "Why don't you tell me what she went back into your flat to retrieve? What was important enough to risk everybody's life over?" Draco sighed and ran his hand over his exhausted face. It wasn't even ten o'clock in the morning yet.

"I don't know."

Bella snorted at his calmly spoken answer and stood, slamming her infuriated fist down on the desk, rattling it from top to bottom and almost tipping over her inkpot.

"Of course you don't know because you don't seem to know a damn thing about anything that's been going on right under your bloody Malfoy nose, do you? Your idiocy and your prick are going to get us both killed." Charging at him from around her desk, Bella grabbed Draco by the collar of his robes and shook him while jerking him halfway out of his tender seat. "The next time an assassin from the Order falls into your lap, think twice before taking off your pants." She thrust him away with a grunt of disgust, landing him back on that sensitive spot. "She used you, boy, you and your foolish heart. Don't think I don't know that you fancy yourself in love with the tart. Well, she doesn't give a flying fuck about you. She used you and left you to roast in your own juices."

The boy might hold the Malfoy name, but he was Cissy's son, right down to his terminally weakened core. He had her defiance and her ridiculous attachments of the heart, the same lethal combination that led to her untimely death. If Bella wasn't careful, she would be looking at her own death as well. She might be bound to the boy, but she had no intention of being taken down by his genetic defect.

Deciding that it was getting a little too crowded for his taste, Draco leaned back in his chair and continued watching Bella rave an inch from his face. The group bondage situation really didn't seem to agree with her. In fact, it was making her down right cranky. He held back a sneer and the desire to laugh out loud.

What did you expect? That he would go and cower in a corner? He knew what he was getting into when he decided to protect Ginny, marriage or no marriage. He fully anticipated the fall out from his public declaration of his involuntary attachment to her and, hence, Bella's as well. She could rant all day, but it wouldn't change a thing, his heart or their mutual bond to Ginny.

So he sat there and watched as Bella attempted to chew out his half-beating heart and spit it out wretched bit by wretched bit. He didn't have a blessed thing to say. Nope. Instead, he shifted a bit in his uncomfortable chair and continued counting the growing wrinkles on her enraged face. She was frightening enough two feet away, but the whole thing was a true horror show two inches from his face. Good lord, couldn't someone do the wizarding world a favor and throw her arse back in Azkaban?

----- ----- -----

Veritaserum anyone? Draco schlepped over to the Romanian Ambassador's home for his scheduled Veritaserum test, to prove what he already knew - that he wasn't lying. No, he didn't steal her from Levski's prison. Yes, he obtained her a bet over a game of Wizard Chess in Sofia. No, he couldn't remember the name or the face of the wizard he obtained her from. Why? Well, he was too damn drunk at the time. No, he didn't have a hand in her "escape" from his custody. And, no he didn't kill the four Death Eaters found dead in his flat. However, it was his flat, and they had no bloody business there. They deserved to be Avada'd, and he would have done it himself had he been there. Yes, he suspected Ginny killed them on her way out. Not only did he support her right to protect herself in her own home, but he was also damned impressed as well.

Two hours later, the results of his Veritaserum test were ported over to Alexandar Levski, and, more importantly, the results of Levski's Veritaserum tests, given by the Romanian Ambassador to Bulgaria, were ported over to his Uncle. The finger pointing and accusations by both Levski and Draco could be expeditiously settled by two simple Veritaserum tests, given by a neutral third party - the Romanians.

"Have a seat, Draco," his Uncle said. Draco stared at that chair, knowing his arse wouldn't appreciate being impaled again, but he did it anyway. His sat his excruciatingly tender arse down and waited. His Uncle pushed the piece of parchment across his desk and into Draco's hands.

Draco studied that parchment as though he were preparing for the N.E.W.T.s of his life. Levski had no knowledge of Ginny's escape from the Manor nor did he have a hand in it. He also had no idea where she was now or where she was headed.

Draco looked up as the implications of those results sank in. In other words, England and Bulgaria were equally screwed where Ginny was concerned. Nothing like an equal opportunity screw over to make one feel better. Draco breathed a silent sigh of relief. He didn't give a damn if he didn't have her as long as that sodding bastard, Levski, didn't have her either. Hopefully she had the sense to hole up somewhere safe until the furor blew over before venturing out again.

----- ----- -----

Since when were detective skills a prerequisite to marriage? Was he mistaken or was it unusual for the groom to have to track down his bride's freckled arse before he could drag it down the aisle? Running a hand through his already tousled hair, Draco stared at his flat, the one he abandoned the moment the Bulgarians marched into town. He wasn't leaving the newly created dump until he had an inkling of what she was after. What was so damn important that she would risk both their lives in order to obtain it?

There were obvious signs of a scuffle. He pulled up tables and chairs and righted a sofa or two while walking around, taking in the disheartening sight. Merlin, what a bloody mess, in everyway. Some minutes later, he was staring at the remains of her door, bits and pieces attached to the hinges. The rest had been blasted, in one piece, halfway across her bedroom.

Stepping over her belongings scattered across the floor, he rolled up the sleeves of his robes. If he had to turn the bloody place over himself, he intended to find out something, anything that might help him find her.

He stopped mid-search and stood in her closet, staring at the damn thing over and over again. Where the hell did that ruddy thing come from? Reaching out, he lifted the hanger off the closet bar with one finger and held it up against the late afternoon sunlight streaming in her windows. Merlin, there was barely enough fabric there to cover the essentials, much less anything else. And he most certainly did not authorize the purchase of this scandalous outfit.

Searching the inside of the robes, he found the label of the maker as well as the size. He raised an eyebrow at this revelation. It was her size, but not his maker. It was from an exclusive witches' boutique, one that his mother frequented when she was alive, but not somewhere Ginny would shop and not without his expressed permission. It was the most expensive set of robes, per square inch of fabric, of any in her closet. Where the hell did that thing come from?

What else was going on behind his back that he didn't know about? Draco threw the blasted thing back into her closet and kept riffling through it, looking for the next unpleasant surprise. And he found it a minute later, when he stepped back and tripped over the uneven flooring, landing on his bum with his back scrapping against the wall of the closet. Shit.

The loose board in the wooden flooring pulled up with no resistance, as did the next one and the next one and the next one, until he was looking into a gaping hole in the floor.

"Lumos."

Now on his hands and knees, Draco peered inside. Yes, this was definitely what she had come back for because the goddamn thing was empty. Whatever she had hidden in there was gone and with it more of her secrets.

Draco stood and brushed off his robes, disgusted. And that's when he saw the broken picture frame on her bedroom floor.

"Reparo."

He bent down and picked it up. It was a windblown Ginny flanked by two broom-toting Quidditch players, both with one arm thrown around her waist, all three smiling. It was Draco and Ginny and Blaise. Blaise winked and leaned over, kissing Ginny on the top of her crimson locks. Draco snorted and almost put the picture back on Ginny's bedside table. Almost. That was before he stared at it a second time, grabbed those indecent robes from her closet, and Disapparated, furious.

----- ----- -----

"What the hell is this?" Draco asked, grabbing Blaise by the collar of his robes and shoving him against the nearest wall while holding up the indecent robes in the other hand.

"Good to see you too, mate," Blaise said, taking a look at the robes. "For Salazar's sake, Draco, calm down." Blaise pried Draco's hand from his robes, allowing him to breathe again. "That looks like a set of dress robes," he said simply.

"Did you give this piece of trash to Ginny?"

Blaise sighed. "Of course I gave those to her." Draco threw the trash on the floor and raced up the grand spiral staircase at the Zabini Estate, taking the stairs two and three at a time. Blaise watched him go. "Where the hell are you going, Draco? Draco! Bloody hell."

Rolling his eyes, Blaise took off after his insane, inane, over-possessive mate, taking those same stairs two and three at a time. By the time Blaise caught up with Draco, he was throwing open every door in Blaise's bedroom - the closet, the bathroom, the sitting room, the adjacent study. Blaise crossed his arms and leaned against the doorway. "Enjoying yourself? There're five dozen more doors out here, not to mention what's going on downstairs and up. Don't let me stop you."

"Where is she, Blaise?"

"Where's who?"

"Don't be an arse. Ginny. Where's Ginny?" Blaise's eyes went wide.

"Ginny? How the hell would I know where she is?" When Draco grabbed Blaise by the collar of his robes again, Blaise held both hands in the air in a sign of surrender. Draco was out of his paranoid mind.

"Don't fuck with me, Blaise."

"Draco, I don't know what's going on, but she's not here. She hasn't been here since your birthday party. Honestly, mate, I swear on the grave of my father and all six of my stepfathers." Draco thrust Blaise away from him. Shit.

"What is that piece of trash all about?"

"The dress robes?"

"Yes, that trash." Blaise sighed.

"It's a replacement gift for the robes I destroyed on the night of your birthday party. That's all." Draco's incredulous eyes went wide.

"That trash isn't even close to ones you destroyed."

"I know, but I thought I'd get her something nicer and a bit more... flattering."

"Flattering? By whose definition?"

"By any wizard's definition. Oh, come on, Draco, half the witches you date wear far less than that. It's downright modest by comparison. Let the witch have a little fun, would you?" Draco shook his head. Screw this noise.

"It doesn't matter. She's gone."

"Gone?"

"Gone. She left."

"What the hell happened?"

"It doesn't matter. She's gone. I thought she might have come here." Blaise looked surprised.

"Here? Whatever for?"

"You know." Blaise shook his head.

"I don't know what's going on between the two of you, but she's not here. Don't worry. She'll be back."

"No, she won't. You don't know her."

"I know her, and I know women. She'll be back." Draco laughed, a sick, gut-wrenching laugh. Blaise might know women, but not this woman. Hell, he didn't know her, and he had lived with her.

"Blaise - "

"What?"

"Did you ever see her in those robes?" Blaise laughed.

"Are you kidding? She said you'd kill her before you'd let her wear it. I told her to wear them anyway. So much the better to surprise you. Accio Ginny's robes." Blaise gave the trash back to Draco. "Here. She'll look great in this when she comes back." Draco took the robes, knowing full well that Blaise didn't know his arse from a hole in the ground when it came to her. Nobody did.

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Author's Notes:

1) Many of you are lamenting the lack of Draco and Ginny action right now. Don't worry. Ginny will be returning to the scene of the crime shortly, very shortly. Draco doesn't understand why nobody, besides me, wants him without Ginny. (I'll have to explain that to him in private.)

2) This chapter is a bit shorter than I usually like to post; however, I thought it best to end it where it should end, regardless of length.

3) Thanks for reading and all the wonderful reviews! -fallenwitch

Chapter 11

Where The Hell's Ginny?

"Oi, Malfoy, where the hell have you been? And where's my beautiful Ginny?"

Draco and Blaise walked across the Quidditch field toward Fitzgerald.

"Bugger off, Fitzgerald. Can't you give the witch a break from your ruddy arse?" Blaise yelled. As they closed the gap on Fitzgerald, Tom took Draco aside.

"Really, where is she? Hasn't taken sick, has she?" Draco could hear the concern in Tom's voice. The rabid witch never missed a Quidditch game. He shook his head and put a hand on the Tom's back

"She had some personal business to take care of. I don't know when or if she'll be back, Tom." The damn Irishman looked crestfallen.

"Do you think I could owl her?"

"Sorry, Tom, she didn't say where she was going." The big bloke nodded. "I'll let you know if I hear from her." Draco watched Tom lumber onto his broom and take off across the pitch, holding back a tear or two.

----

"About bloody time you showed up, Malfoy," Hill yelled, halfway across the field. "I would have replaced your sorry arse by now if I could find someone capable of catching a lousy Snitch. McMillan here sucks. Sucks."

"Hey," McMillan said, knocking Hill in the chest, "you know who sucks? You suck. It was your idea, Mr. Team Captain, to have me play Seeker so go find yourself another team, and while you're at it, go find your own goddamn Snitch next time." Draco laughed. That's what he loved about his team. They needed him.

Hill and McMillan, walking in tandem, raised their brooms high in the air, in their usual salute, and looked toward the empty stands - twice - before glaring at Draco. "Where the hell's Ginny?"

----

"Hey, Malfoy," Draco swung around at the angry growl, "where the hell's Ginny?"

----

"Malfoy," Bruin Smith said, putting his arm around Draco's shoulders, "let's face it. You're an arsehole when it comes to women. You always have been. So you're not shagging her anymore, so what? You didn't have to kick her off the team."

----

Three grueling hours and one mother-of-a-Snitch in hand later, Draco Disapparated back to the Manor in full Quidditch regalia, throwing his broom halfway across the foyer and storming upstairs to his bedroom. After slamming that door closed, he began ripping off his gear. What? No, he didn't feel like getting the fifth degree about her in the locker-room shower as well. Obnoxious wankers.

Ginny. Ginny. Ginny.

She broke his heart, he didn't break her heart, and he didn't know where the hell she was so everyone could piss off. Of course he had a goddamn heart. On the team? She wasn't even on the bloody team. He was on the team, in case those bastards had forgotten. And he had dragged his skiving arse out there so he could forget about her, not have her thrown in his face with every accusation under the wretched sun. Fuming, he walked starkers into the shower and blasted it on as hot as he could get it, hoping to burn her out of his aching body's memory.

When he stepped out of the shower twenty minutes later, he was burnt and limp and in a royal bad mood. No, he didn't want to eat with those arseholes. He had lost what little appetite he once had and would now like to be left alone. And that's what he was - alone.

----- ----- -----

Draco glanced at his latest involuntary acquisition from Flourish and Blotts, Dark Arts from the Dark Ages, courtesy of his runaway bride. How much did this one set him back? Fifty Galleons? Five Hundred Galleons?

In his usual arse backwards manner when it came to her, he discovered she had been pilfering Dark Arts books from the Manor library and supplementing her stash with special order books from Flourish and Blotts. He meant SPECIAL order books - out of print and rare volumes, costing hundreds of Galleons each.

When he gave her an unlimited account there, he didn't intend for her to bleed him dry. How much could one witch read? Well, he found out when he went to Flourish and Blotts to straighten out the mistake they had made by owling him a Dark Arts book from the thirteenth century. Apparently she could read to the tune of several thousand Galleons, all automatically deducted from his Gringotts vault and invisible to him because he never bothered to check on it.

Did he mention the potions paraphernalia she had been nicking during her daily walks on the Manor grounds? According to Sam and Frank, she insisted on walking through the forest and the wild meadows and even the occasional bog, collecting various specimens that struck her fancy. And, lord knows, there was every imaginable thing out there waiting to be plucked, dried, and tucked into a brewing cauldron. The only manifestation of this that Draco ever saw was the ever-present vase of wild flowers that she kept on her bureau.

Why are we discussing this? Well, putting two and two together, Draco reasoned this is what she went back to their flat for - potion ingredients, indispensable books, and perhaps a journal or notebook filled with culled Dark Arts information.

Anything else you should know? Yes, two days after she left, Draco uncovered the gaping hole that allowed her to escape. She had stolen his unrestricted, untraceable Portkey and hauled arse out of England, courtesy of him. There was no finding the witch unless she wanted to be found, and he suspected that wouldn't be anytime soon and perhaps not in his lifetime.

The logical conclusion from all this? She used him. From the moment she stumbled into his flat, more dead than alive, she started scheming and plotting how best to get what she needed from him before she escaped. When the time came, she didn't hesitate to flee his noxious company. She never gave a damn about him.

What had he lost in the transaction? Not much. His Portkey, his mother's wand, an engagement ring, and thousands of Galleons. Oh, and, yes, his goddamn heart, that useless piece of trash that he was better off without.

In case there was any question about it, let us remove all doubt. Love didn't only make Draco blind; it made him stupid as well.

----- ----- -----

Two weeks after she escaped, she was kind enough to drop him an owl. It came with his usual afternoon owls, looking like any other owl his secretary had ever dropped on his desk. At first he thought he might be having a visual hallucination, but no, that was his name in her familiar handwriting. He collected himself, waiting a moment for the lump in his throat to pass and for the air to rush back into his lungs, before opening it.

He started reading it and as he read it, something quite remarkable happened. The organ that no longer existed, the one replaced by that gaping hole in his chest - exploded - sending searing shrapnel everywhere and ending his life as he knew it.

What happened? Well, the damn thing was actually still in there, hiding and waiting and hoping. It was this last kick in the gut that sent his half-beating heart over the edge, committing suicide and gloriously ending all possibility of an emotional rescue, the one that wasn't coming anyway.

Draco called out to his secretary. He was going home for the day. No owls. No floos. Nothing. Reschedule everyone. He didn't give a damn if it was the Minister of Magic. Reschedule his arse. Then he threw on his cloak, calmly took out his wand, and Disapparated to the Manor.

An hour later, he was still staring at the vault in the library. He walked around, stopped, and stared at it some more. What difference did it make if he opened it now or a year from now? It wouldn't make a damn bit of difference. Denial? Yes, it was a beautiful thing, but he couldn't claim that protective, unconscious cover of darkness, could he? He knew. He knew right down to his caustic Slytherin core, the one that breaking even as he was standing there. No, he wasn't moving. The world was moving around him, and there wasn't a bloody thing he could do to stop it.

So he opened the vault and took out the magical contract he had signed, the one intertwining his life with Ginny's. As he held it in his hands, it vanished with a muffled pop and a whisper of feathery red smoke. He stood there, choking on that smoke, hoping it would kill him, but it didn't. Yes, until death or sale or marriage did they part. Well, they were now parted.

Ginny had gotten married.

----- ----- -----

Four days later, Blaise found him passed out drunk by the lake at the Manor, with his empty bottle of Firewhiskey still in hand.

"Up you go, mate. Come on, you've got two good legs, use 'um, would you? There you go." Blaise swung one of Draco's arms around his neck and grabbed onto his waist before Disapparating them back to the Manor.

Draco's secretary had come to Zabini Enterprises in a panic over her missing boss. She couldn't find him. He wasn't answering her owls. He had turned off his floo. And the last time she saw him, he told her to cancel all his appointments for the day and left abruptly. She expected him back at work days ago, but he never showed up. She was one step away from calling his Aunt, when she came knocking at Blaise's door.

When Blaise went to the Manor, every house elf within a fifty-mile radius pointed him to the unconscious figure by the lake. Merlin, they had even thrown a couple of blankets with warming charms over him, afraid he would catch his death out there. As far as Blaise could ascertain, Draco was alive, just very drunk.

Four hours and two sobering potions later, Draco was up and back at work. No, he never spoke to Blaise about what happened, and Blaise didn't ask. Sometimes there were things that even best mates didn't talk about.

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Author's Notes: After dodging many hexes and curses and rotten tomatoes for that last chapter, I am back with more of our story. Much appreciation to everyone who left a review and to all who continue to read this story. Your outrage and shock have brought me great pleasure. - fallenwitch

Chapter 12

Balls Of Steel

"ALEXANDAR LEVSKI AND WIFE BRUTALLY MURDERED"

Draco started coughing and choking on his half-swallowed crumpet when he opened The Daily Prophet. Several minutes and two large sips of tea later, he regained sufficient control of his airway to continue reading. What the hell had Bella done? Neither party had Ginny yet, so why kill Levski now?

According to the article, it wasn't Bella. It was Bulgarian rebel leader, Christo Chervenko, who was the chief suspect in the murder that was rocking Bulgaria. Chervenko? Wasn't he dead? Draco read on. Sources believe the murder was in retaliation for the death of his father, Closimir Chervenko, powerful clan leader and member of the Order in Bulgaria, who was killed by Levski's forces during the War. As Draco's slow moving neurons finally began making the appropriate connections, he muttered a swift, "Holy shit."

----- ----- -----

"EXTENDED LEVSKI FAMILY FOUND MURDERED, REBEL LEADER SUSPECTED AGAIN"

That damn Chervenko had balls of steel. While the entire Bulgarian Death Eating army was out scavenging the country for him, Chervenko pulls off a daring and well-executed massacre. Draco took another bite of his toast, a sip of tea, and kept reading. Ten Levski family members, six wizards and four witches, as well as two dozen elite Death Eating guards were found dead at the family compound outside Sofia, where they had gathered for security purposes after the death of Alexander Levski and his wife weeks earlier. Warrants for Chervenko and members of his rebel gang have been issued.

Who the hell was Christo Chervenko? According to the files Draco pilfered from Bella, he was a fast rising star in the underground Bulgarian rebel movement who came to prominence after the murder of his father. He was a charismatic, Durmstrang-educated wizard with intellect, cunning, and courage as well as an enormous personal fortune backing his activities. His innovative terrorist tactics and bold maneuvers had garnered a sizeable following, making him the number one target of the Bulgarian government, target for assassination - not arrest. His close scrapes with the authorities were already legend in a country ripe for a hero.

Bella's owl flew in, crotchety as ever, and dumped his packets before stealing Draco's last piece of bacon and flying off. Typical. No goddamn manners at all. Ruddy bird. Bella was informing Draco that she was happily washing her hands of the whole sordid Weasley affair. With the Levski family conveniently dead, there was no further danger to the Weasley wench. Besides, her informants had confirmed the tart's marriage, thus breaking all magical bonds.

Picking up the next packet, Bella's second note fell out with a picture.

I have enclosed a picture of Ginevra with her new husband, Christo Chervenko. Curious, isn't it? She couldn't have used you more if you were an arsewipe.

Love- A. Bella

A tall, chiseled lean and handsome wizard stood with his arms around Ginny. Draco watched as Ginny threw her head back laughing, and Chervenko drew her close, kissing her neck. God, she looked like a different woman, invigorated with life and... dare he say it?... happy in a way he had never known her to be. Looking at that wretched picture, he could almost hear her laughter, that rare and delightful sound he could never get enough of.

Draco found himself staring at that picture, unable tear his eyes away from it. Was he a masochist? Not the last time he checked, but he was beginning to wonder about that himself. Besides, he wasn't looking at her. He was looking at Chervenko. There was something about the ruddy bastard. It wasn't his filthy paws all over Ginny; or his annoying, too long rebel hair; or the fact that he could use a good shave. No, it was something much more disturbing.

Add a cloak... a hood... a beard... a touch of Firewhiskey... dim the lights...bingo! It all came together in an explosion. It was him. HIM. Chervenko was the son-of-a-bitch who gambled away Ginny's stolen life on that game of Wizard Chess.

Goddamn it. Draco slammed his infuriated fist down on the table, bringing half his breakfast down with it. What didn't come down with his fist, came down when he threw the entire table over and stormed out of the room, furious.

That son-of-a-bitch used him, used him to do the one thing he couldn't do but was desperate to do - to save Ginny's life. What wizard, other than Draco, had the means and the political connections to safeguard Ginny while she recovered from death's door? Draco ported in and ported out with her, leaving no trace of her departure. She simply vanished, and the magical contract ensured her safety. Draco played right along, making sure her Order-stamped arse didn't die. The Rebel Leader's witch was coddled back to health in the midst of the strongest Death Eating lair in Europe, protected by the strongest Death Eating family in England.

When he decided not to sell her, when he fell in love with her and planned to marry her, Draco disrupted the shit out of their game. Chervenko, who Draco suspected would have been the anonymous overseas buyer willing to pay top dollar for her on the slave market, was suddenly cut out of the deal. Ginny was now looking at a life sentence married to a filthy Death Eater, and she panicked. However, Draco, being the gentleman that he was, came to her rescue again by handing her the solution on a silver platter - a wand, money for the road in the form of an engagement ring, and an unrestricted, untraceable Portkey.

Draco Disapparated to his flat, now restored to its previous pristine condition. He was seething, so filled with rage he could barely contain himself. If it was possible to physically explode, he would have, sending bits and pieces of his furious flesh everywhere. She had taken everything else he owned. Did she have to take his last goddamn fantasy as well?

Where the hell was she?

Where was the skittish witch who craved his company and reached for him and melted under his reassuring touch? Where was the witch who gave him those glorious, passionate kisses and crawled into his comforting arms in the middle of the night? Where was the witch who loved his Quidditch playing and cheered for him and knocked him over with her embrace after each game, win or no win?

Who the fuck stole her when he wasn't looking?

Draco ached for that witch everyday of his life. But now he knew - she never existed at all. She was an illusion, a spectacular hoax. What the hell was he supposed to do with that fucking piece of information? He was hopelessly lost and dying without her, real or not.

Throwing open her bedroom door, he looked at her carefully preserved sanctuary before raising his wand and hexing and blasting and cursing his way through her room and all of her treasured belongings, until there was nothing left but a smoldering pile of rubble. Then he stormed out, slamming the door as he went.

This last revelation, her marriage to Chervenko and Chervenko's role in her escape, was too much for his broken heart to bear. Now that he could see, with perfect clarity, the path that had brought her to him, he realized what he was to her. He was nothing. No, he was less than nothing. He was a joke. His protection and his love and his life were a fucking joke.

Christo Chervenko is what it took for a witch like her to fall in love. You had to be the second savior-of-the-wizarding-world, right behind Potter. God, the witch had a penchant for that type of martyrdom, didn't she? When she said she wasn't the marrying kind, she meant that she wasn't the marrying kind when it came to anyone but Chervenko. She would prefer death than marriage to anyone else. The Rebel King had long ago stolen her heart and locked it away. Draco was nothing but road kill along the way.

No wonder she ran away in horror at the idea of living out her days with a lousy Death Eater. Saturday afternoon Quidditch games wouldn't be enough to sustain her. No, she needed to be able to take out noxious Death Eaters and their extended families at will. Now that her infamous husband was done with Levski, who was next? The Bulgarian Minister of Magic and his cabinet?

Draco's life and his modest ambitions would never capture the heart and soul of a witch like her. He had had enough death and war and political intrigue to last ten lifetimes. He didn't give a damn if corrupt and amoral Death Eaters ruled England for the next five hundred years - or the goddamn Order, for that matter. His only ambition was to live the rest of his life as far away from those cancers of society as possible and enjoy what he had while he had it. Life was fleeting and uncertain in the best of times. Why push it? Where did that leave him in her eyes? Nowhere, that's where.

Would someone please Avada him now and get it over with?

----- ----- -----

"BULGARIA ENGULFED IN CIVIL WAR"

Two weeks later, a bloody civil war erupted in Bulgaria sending shivers throughout Europe. During the next three months, scattered reports came out of the country, Chervenko and his rebel army were cursing and hexing their way across Bulgaria, leaving no Death Eaters alive in their wake and taking town by town. Bulgarian troops were putting up a fierce fight, taking back several towns. Scores were dead on both sides, including many of Chervenko's closest aides. Draco took a sip of tea and put down his Daily Prophet.

----- ----- -----

"BULGARIAN BORDERS SEALED, CONFLICT CONTINUES"

Six months into the War, the magical borders surrounding Bulgaria came crashing down, sealing off the country from the outside to prevent external rebel infiltration. At least that was the story according to government officials. Their borders hadn't been closed since the War. Other European countries look on, awaiting word, while the fighting continued.

"Draco, what are you doing?" She leaned over his shoulder and took a peek, sighing as she did so. "Honey, we're going to be late. Let's go." Giving him a kiss on the cheek, she grabbed the paper out of his hand and set it aside.

----- ----- -----

"FIGHTING IN BULGARIA CONTINUES"

Draco took a sip of tea and continued reading. Good lord, they'd been fighting for almost a year now. The borders were sealed tight. No information was going in or coming out. Bella had nothing. No one had anything.

Was she still alive in there? She was attached at the hip to the most wanted wizard in Bulgaria. Could she pick a more lethal location next time? He read the reports coming into Bella's office before the borders closed. Ginny was by his side, fighting every inch of the way. Chervenko was insane, crazed in his single-minded pursuit of "freedom" for Bulgaria. And he was going to drag her to her death, right beside him.

If Draco had known what she was going to be getting herself into, he would have chained her to the wall in the Malfoy dungeon, not letting her see the light of day until the damn civil war was over, one way or the other. If she wanted to run to Chervenko after the fighting was over, fine.

What was all of this doing to her fragile mental health? What kind of a wizard would rescue the woman he loved and then throw her in the middle of a goddamn civil war?

"Sweetheart, not again." She reached over and pulled the paper out of his hands. "There's no news coming out of Bulgaria." Leaning over, she kissed him and threw her arms around his neck. "Come back to bed, will you?" He sighed and gave her a hug and a gentle tap on her bum.

"I'll be there in a moment. Go on." He watched her leave the room before picking up his Prophet and taking another sip of tea.

----- ----- -----

"REBELS VICTORIOUS IN BULARIAN CIVIL WAR"

"CHERVENKO INSTALLED AS BULGARIAN MINISTER OF MAGIC"

What did that make her? The First Lady of Bulgaria? Draco pushed his teacup and his uneaten breakfast aside as he stared at the picture of a victorious Chervenko waving to the masses. Where was she? Didn't she deserve to be at his side at a time like this? You know what? He didn't give a damn. Shoving the paper aside, he stood, grabbed his cloak, and Disapparated to work.

Life in London continued uninterrupted. Yes, the civil war in Bulgaria had shaken the wizarding world to its foundation, as every Death Eating country warily watched the events unfolding in Bulgaria. Bella's anger at Ginny's escape and participation in the events in Bulgaria evaporated in the face of the sheer magnitude of the revolution there.

Could the same thing happen in England? Doubtful. There were no Christo Chervenkos here. Harry Potter was gone. The Order was crushed. Most surviving members in England were hunted down and killed at the end of the War by the Dark Lord. Those who escaped death were inconsequential and incapable carrying out anything close to the scope of what Chervenko had done. No, England was safe.

Chervenko had the attention and fear of the wizarding world, not that Draco gave a shit. However, Chervenko also had the one thing Draco would never have. He had the love and unfailing loyalty of Ginny. The witch had laid her life down for him, over and over again during his ridiculous civil war. Draco grudgingly supposed Chervenko might make a fitting husband for such a magnificent witch, on one of his good days.

She could have her savior-of-the-wizarding-world. With her new status as First-Lady-of-the-Free-Wizarding-World, their paths would never cross again. Not only was he too low on the food chain for her, he was also too deep into the Death Eating structure to be allowed within a hundred miles of her. Well, there was always his subscription to The Daily Prophet. He would continue to follow her life from afar as he carried on with his own. Now that the borders were open again, she and her husband would be great fodder for the tabloids and the Prophet.

"Mr. Malfoy?"

"Yes, Liz, what is it?" he asked, without looking up from his desk, cluttered with stacks of parchment and unanswered owls. Merlin, he was up to his neck in it already.

"This urgent owl arrived for you."

Draco nodded and stuck out his hand, while continuing to scribble away. His secretary put the owl in his hand but did not go away.

"Is there something else?"

"Sir - " He looked up. "It's from the Bulgarian Minister of Magic, the new one." Draco looked down at the parchment and nodded. That was fast work. The arsehole hadn't been in office twenty-four hours. What the hell did he want?

Mr. Malfoy,

Ginny was struck down during the final assault on Sofia. Our Healers give her a 30% chance of survival if I can get her to a country with top medical care. Her last request was to be sent home to England and, if needed, buried with her family. If you would be willing to guarantee her safety, the country of Bulgaria and I would be in your debt. If you are unable to assist us, I have Healers standing by in America. Please owl as soon as possible.

Christo Chervenko

Minister Of Magic, Bulgaria

Well, the wizard had balls of an unbelievable dimension. Draco had to give him that much. And he was out of his fucking rebel mind if he thought Draco would let that conniving, impostor of a dying witch within thirty miles of him and his belongings, forget saving her life. The world would be better off without the likes of her kind, whatever kind that was, because Draco still didn't know who the hell he had been living with all those months.

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Author's Notes:

After two months of wandering lost in D/G cyberspace trying to find my missing muse, I'm back with more of our story. Much appreciation to everyone who left a review and to all who have returned for more of this tale. A special thank you to Marcia for the beta as well as the much needed kick in the rear to get this thing posted! Now, on with our story... -fallenwitch

Chapter 13

The Minister's Wife

Five hours and thirty-seven minutes later, Draco stared at his Portkey. Yes, he was certifiable. He was over-the-edge, out-of-his mind nutters. He was also a masochist. Did he mention that one? It seemed to be the only rational explanation for the irrational, pathetic, troll-like behavior he was exhibiting, behavior that any self-respecting Malfoy would be duly ashamed of.

Of course he shouldn't help the devious, dying witch. He knew that. What was it in for him? Nothing. Not a goddamn thing except more torture and torment and the usual boatload of trouble that accompanied Her Rebel Highness.

But it was the masochist in him that couldn't seem to get enough of the irresistible torture she dished out, so he decided to Port on over for a second helping of the stuff, hoping to rid himself of his miserable affliction. Maybe after gorging himself on her foul presence and rotting from the inside out again, maybe - just maybe - that ridiculous, brain-dead excuse for an organ in the middle of his chest would learn a bloody lesson. Forget the noxious wench. If she screwed you over once, she'll do it again. How ruddy basic was that? Even a two-year-old Squib could magic that one. Merlin.

Was he angry? Of course he was angry. He was furious with the wily witch and contemplated killing her, right after he resurrected her dying, freckled arse for a second time.

Flipping the Portkey over and over again between his fingers in an anxious, absent-minded fashion, Draco paused. Was this another elaborate rouse by his least favorite pair? Perhaps. Was he worried? Not really.

Chervenko had proven himself to be many things over the past year of fighting, but simple-minded wasn't one of them. The Bulgarian wasn't daft enough to embroil his newly liberated country in a senseless and expensive war with England by doing something untoward to Draco upon his arrival.

Why screw Draco over a second time when there was no call for such blatant hostility? The illustrious Minister of Magic already had the girl and the country of his choice. What else could he want? As far as Draco was concerned, there was nothing more a wizard could want. No, he suspected Chervenko's call for help was the real thing.

Draco shut down his overactive mind, threw on his cloak, and activated his second unrestricted, untraceable Portkey, the one that had been a royal pain in his arse to obtain, considering he never surrendered or inactivated his first one. How many Portkeys did one wizard need? Well, he needed one for himself and one for Christo Chervenko's wife to steal, that's how many. Didn't everyone know that by now?

----- ----- -----

Christo closed his tortured eyes and collapsed against Ginny, burying his tormented face in her, unable to move for fear he would shatter. Then he wrapped his protective arms around what was left of her essence, knowing she never would have approved of what he was about to do, but she was his life and his world, and he refused to let her be denied, not if it was within his power to grab it for her.

A door swung open. "Sir?"

He nodded while holding her close.

Yes, it was a gamble and one he couldn't afford to lose, not with her life at stake, but Christo was nothing if not a well-seasoned and masterful gambler as well as a brilliant strategist. He had gambled their lives and the future of Bulgaria on the outcome of the civil war and won, hands down. But this one was for her. It was all for her now.

Minutes later, the young Minister of Magic stood flanked by his guards as he felt that familiar gusting whirlwind of motion churning the tense air in the vaulted room. A tall, elegantly dressed Death Eater dropped out of the air and into their midst, alone, his fine leather boots hitting the floor with a thud. He straightened and glanced around, cool and unflinching in the face of twenty-four Bulgarian wands aimed at him.

----- ----- -----

Draco stared down the barrel of two-dozen Bulgarian wands pointed at every orifice and essential anatomical part on his body. Despite the friendly welcome, he needed no reminder that the decision he was carrying out wasn't the smartest one he'd ever made. No matter how this adventure started out, he knew it would end badly. How could it not? She would either die, or if all went well, she would leave him for her terrorist husband again.

Draco looked the irritating bastards in the eyes, one at a time, until he found himself staring into a startling set of razor blue eyes that stared right back at him. The head terrorist attached to those eyes stepped forward.

"Mr. Malfoy, I apologize for my overzealous guards. Christo Chervenko. Thank you for responding so quickly." Draco looked at Chervenko's outstretched hand with disdain. The extended hand was withdrawn. "Please, this way."

Chervenko's guards warily eyed the infamous foreign Death Eater as he followed their newly anointed Minister of Magic down the long main corridor and into his office.

The two wizards stood shoulder-to-shoulder at her bedside in a room hastily crafted beside Christo's ministry office. Despite their obvious external contrasts, Christo and Draco could have been hatched from the same egg. Both were sons of privilege and wealth drawn into world changing events by their illustrious fathers; both had more than their share of intellect, cunning, and courage; and both instilled fear and hatred and admiration in others.

Yes, Christo was a member of the Order, but he was no Gryffindor. He had Slytherin-like blood, as pure and thick and rich as any Death Eater alive, coursing through his finely chiseled, Durmstrang-trained body. He and Draco were two sides of the same coin, brothers crafted of the same material, each looking opposite ways.

"Be warned," Christo said in a subdued tone, his eyes focused on his wife's still face. "Ginny is not the same witch she was before the war. Still, she is my heart and soul. I am indebted to you, Mr. Malfoy, and I do not forget my debts."

Indebted? Yes, that made it twice, arsehole, twice Draco's taken a dying Ginny off Chervenko's hands. And just because he returned her safely to him once before, didn't mean it would happen again. He wasn't a pickup-dropoff health care service for sick and dying witches. In case Chervenko hadn't noticed, Draco already had a day job, one that didn't involve being Chervenko's house-elf, thank you very much.

As for her being the terrorist's heart and soul, Draco didn't give a damn. The Minister of Magic could stand in the back of the line with the rest of them. This was a one-way trip only. And he wasn't doing it for anyone but her and his newly beating heart, so Chervenko could shove off. It was his savior-of-the-wizarding-world antics that had her dying in the first place. The selfish bastard could power his next revolution on his own.

After all important information concerning her condition and preliminary treatment exchanged hands, Draco took several steps back, allowing Christo to drop to Ginny's side and whisper a private goodbye in soft-spoken Bulgarian, his hand on her face, his heart in the pit of his stomach.

When Christo rose, the wizards exchanged places as Draco knelt to pick Ginny up, blanket and all. Merlin, she was thin, a mere shadow of the runaway bride he had held last, and her beautiful, porcelain skin had taken on that lethal silver sheen associated with certain Dark Magic spells.

Before leaving, Draco turned to Chervenko, who was eyeing the scene with obvious concern etched in his exhausted eyes. "She will have the best medical care and every comfort possible. Her safety in my home is guaranteed. I give you my word as a wizard."

Satisfied with this, Chervenko nodded but refused to let her out of his sight until she was ripped from him moments later when Draco activated his Portkey, getting the two of them the hell out of Bulgaria. That country was nothing if not deadly for her.

This time when Draco took a dying Ginny home, there were no shouted orders or barely controlled pandemonium. This time Healer Topman was waiting with his Dark Magic experts in tow. Within moments of her unconscious head hitting the pillow on her bed, Draco relinquished her to their skilled hands and backed out of the room, one lingering step at a time, until he found himself out in the hallway staring at a closed door.

----- ----- -----

Draco stood on the threshold of her newly created sanctuary with his heart in his throat. It was late. Healer Topman and his Dark Magic crew were gone. He hesitated, knowing his presence was an intrusion into her world, but he couldn't help himself, not where she was concerned.

Then he was by her side, staring at his long-lost witch, the one he never thought he would see again. The rosy light of the candles and torches gave her unconscious face a luminescent quality, masking the silver sheen of the Dark Magic curse that was tugging away at her fragile life force. He stared at her wasted body and her beautiful face with its familiar features. Although not petrified, she was as still as death and unnaturally cool to the touch.

What had happened to her during that damn civil war? Where was the gorgeous witch he had seen in the picture with Chervenko just before the start of the war, the one who couldn't run to her stinking rebel and his war fast enough?

Draco reached out and picked up her limp hand, staring at her engagement ring and wedding band, the trinkets Chervenko had placed on her finger signaling his possession of her heart. Sighing, Draco pulled up the sleeve of her rough flannel nightshirt, making a mental note to owl his clothier. She needed a proper wardrobe, not this revolutionary trash she came back in.

Unfastening the leather holster with his mother's wand sheathed in it, he set the weapon aside. Good lord, the witch was unconscious and dying, but Chervenko had her packing and ready for battle. What kind of ridiculous rebel bullshit was this? Did he intend to bury her in it as well?

----- ----- -----

(Four weeks later)

He knew it was dark, ancient, and lethal. He didn't need to pay 500 Galleons for a bunch of jerkoffs to tell him what he already knew. That was it - no more groping in the dark. No, not that kind of groping, you idiots, the other kind of groping. Draco vowed to stop his useless search for the nonexistent, sure-fire cure. There wasn't one.

It was one thing to wish her dead from across a continent. It was another thing to watch her slipping away before his horrified eyes. Draco ran a hand over his exhausted face. No one could give him what he so desperately searched for. No one could promise to keep her from slipping over to the other side of the veil anymore than they could promise him that she wouldn't awaken severely damaged in some horrid way. No one talked about it, but they all knew Dark Magic curses were prone to that sort of thing. Wasn't that the whole purpose of Dark Magic curses in the first place? To inflict pain and suffering and woe of the worst sort? Who knew what kind of a punch this ancient one packed.

Draco thought talking to those "experts" might help bind his anxiety, but it didn't, nor did it make a damn bit of difference in her treatment because he stuck to the odd, dark brew that Healer Topman and his Dark Arts magicians started her on a month ago, the one he sold half his soul to obtain the rare and potent ingredients for.

No one knew which ancient curse had struck her down, and with every Death Eater involved in the Sophia battle dead, no one would ever know. Ginny's survival came down to a calculated guessing game based on a backwards extrapolation from her symptoms to a dozen or so possible curses. Yes, a fucking guessing game. Can you believe that? Practicing tenth century healing in a twenty-first century world. It was bloody barbaric was what it was.

Draco had been in no mood for games, but he rolled up his sleeves and hedged his bets with the best of them. The complex brew Healer Topman and his team had concocted was as wide reaching and broad a shot in the dark as they could manage without killing her outright from either the ingredients or the unintended interactions between the ingredients. And Draco had placed the bet of his life, her life, on it.

What if he was wrong?

Draco stopped his pacing long enough to lean his forehead against the frigid window and stare out into the swirling madness that was engulfing the Manor. A late winter storm was pelting the enormous floor to ceiling windows with bursting sheets of rain. It was a black, moonless night, but the occasional hissing flash of lightening illuminated his broken silhouette in stark relief against the briefly visible elements followed by ground-shaking thunderous clapping.

When was that goddamn potion going to start working? Sinking into the nearest chair, he closed his miserable eyes and buried his worried face in his hands, as close to collapsing from the mounting strain of it as he had been since he brought her home a month ago. Chasing down that bloody curse was going to be the death of him.

"Christo?"

He stood and spun around at the sound of her voice, a kind of music he hadn't heard in over a year. She was staring at him, like a cat in the dark, perched precariously off the side of her bed.

"Ginny?" he whispered, unprepared for her conscious presence.

"Draco?" she breathed, confused and straining to see his features in the dark. Instead, she was flooded with glimpses of his silver hair and his unmistakable lanky frame outlined in stuttering black against the raging storm with its precarious lighting.

"Yes, Ginny, it's me."

Before he could stop her, she slid off the bed and went to him, taking a single shaky step. That's when her weakened legs buckled out from under her. She fell, crash-landing face first in an undignified sprawl on the floor, taking the bedside table with her when she reached out and latched onto the first available object to stop her fall. The table and its unforgiving contents rained down on her.

"Ginny!" Draco rushed across the room in a panic, threw the bloody table off of her, and reached out his hands to help her up. "Are you hurt?"

She looked up from amid the rubble, grabbed two fistfuls of his robes, and yanked the Slytherin to her before letting loose a spate of rapid, testy Bulgarian.

Huh?

Draco was on his knees, nose-to-nose with the furious witch. In the many times he had envisioned their reunion, this particular scenario wasn't a part of it. Shit.

"Ginny," he said, trying to pry loose her choking hold on his robes, "I don't speak Bulgarian. Try again."

"Then what the hell are you doing in Bulgaria?" she spat out in English, furious.

Draco jerked loose his robes and squatted in front of the angry witch. "I'm not in Bulgaria. You're in England."

Her eyes widened as she glanced around the spacious, darkened room. Draco charmed up the candles to a dull roar, allowing her visual access to her environment. "England," she breathed, before staring at him, bewildered. "England?"

"England," he said, extending a hand to help her up. When she continued to stare dumbly at him, Draco reached over, scooped her up out of the rubble, and deposited her stunned, convalescing bum back in bed where it belonged.

Her confused eyes searched his. "I don't understand. Did we lose the war?"

He shook his head. "No, you terrorists won the war."

"We did?"

"Yes, you did."

Her face lost what little color it never held as a sweeping panic hit her slow-to-wake mind. "Oh my god, Christo - "

Draco shook his head. "He's alive and busy running Bulgaria. When you're ready, you can read all about him in the Prophet like the rest of us."

"Then what am I doing here?" she whispered, her dark eyes locked on his.

"You were struck down by an ancient Dark Magic curse during the battle for Sophia, one that's very difficult to cast and even more difficult to treat. You were dying and Chervenko sent you here in search of a cure."

"He what?" she said, sitting bolt upright.

"Your husband sent you here for medical treatment."

"He didn't."

"He did."

"And you let him?"

"Obviously."

"How long have I been here?"

"A month, give or take a few days."

"A month?" she muttered, disbelieving, to herself before glancing up at Draco again. "A month?" When he nodded, the confusion on her face transfigured into unabashed, unadulterated horror. "Oh, shit."

That was the was the last thing he heard her say before she collapsed back into bed, taking the covers with her and pulling them over her mortified head.

Draco sighed. "It's good to see you again too, Ginny."

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Author's Notes:

Schlepping back with more of our story. Much appreciation to everyone who left a review and to all who continue to read this tale. A heartfelt thanks to Marcia, my beta, for not being afraid to call trash - well, trash! -fallenwitch

Chapter 14

His Kiss

When she didn't come to him, he went to her. Four hours after Healer Topman finished the longest post-resurrection check-up in the history of the wizarding world, Draco tracked his illustrious houseguest down in the library, surrounded by many old and expensive friends.

But she wasn't looking at the books on the shelves. She was staring, with one longing hand on the window, at her old haunts - the wild meadows, the black lake, the tip of the forest - tranquil and silent and bathed in the autumn of day's fading glory.

She heard the soft sound of his boots crossing the room and coming to a halt behind her, but she continued to stare at her irretrievably lost past, and her heart ached. She didn't want to turn around and face him. She dreaded facing him. She wanted to stand there until the floor opened up and swallowed her six feet under.

"You have a wonderful life here," she said, without turning around.

"It could have been your life as well."

She shook her head.

If she closed her eyes and let go, the beginning came into focus, sharp and undiluted - a naïve young woman with passionate beliefs, a world that turned on a single axis, and a bitter winter night when Nikolay Levski died. It was one misstep, one miscalculation, no more or less, but it gave birth to an explosion, a shrieking cascade of dominos.

"Was life here so horrible? Did I not treat you well enough? Or was the idea of spending the rest of your life with a filthy Death Eater too much?" He watched as she turned her head and stared up at him.

"Of course not. It had nothing to do with you. You were wonderful to me. You know that. But I had obligations in place, things I needed to do long before I came to you."

Wasn't that the problem? It was never about him. He was nothing more than a stinking pit stop along the way. He would rather she loath him than dismiss him. He wasn't the type of wizard one dismissed - until now.

"Marrying Chervenko, killing Levski, and taking over Bulgaria? Those kinds of things?"

She nodded.

"I see," he drawled, studying her, "so letting you play Quidditch and romp around in that ridiculous outfit Blaise bought you wouldn't have made a difference, would it?"

She laughed, a soft, bittersweet cry, while shaking her head, but there was no laughter in his eyes or boyish smile tugging at his lips. There was only darkness and pain and exhaustion sweeping through his deserted heart.

"I'm sorry, Draco."

"I couldn't give you what you needed, could I?"

She shook her head.

Did she hear him sucking up what was left of his nonexistent pride? She told him what he knew all along - what he couldn't bear to hear - that he wasn't wizard enough for her. If the situation weren't so dire for him, he would have burst out laughing at the idea of some witch telling him he wasn't wizard enough. But here he was, and there she was, and no one was laughing.

"You love your husband?"

"Yes, I love Christo."

"Does he give you everything you need? Is he everything you want? Are you happy, Ginny?"

"Yes."

Draco nodded. Hell, he was proud of himself for remaining upright at this point. It was one thing to hold these fears in the back of your heart. It was another to have the witch of your dreams whisper them into your miserable face, shattering your fucking world a second time around.

It was past time for Draco's foolish fantasy to end. There was nothing more to be done. Hell, it was over before it began. If he had to pry his goddamn heart away from her and beat it into submission, then so be it. But there would never be another for him like her. He was fatally afflicted with the witch. She lived under his skin, in his vision, and within the walls of his heart. Try as he might, he could not rid himself of her infestation.

"You're welcome to stay as long as needed. Healer Topman will tend to your medical needs. Sam and Frank and the elves are here for anything else. I'll be returning to my flat this afternoon."

Now that he had resurrected the witch, his usefulness in her life was over and he had no desire to hang around like an unwanted puppy dog, sniffing out fallen crumbs of her affection. He knew what he was signing up for when he took her dying arse home, but it was much too lovely an arse to let die, regardless of its political and emotional affiliations. He had no regrets.

Draco leaned over and kissed Ginny on the cheek, pausing a moment as her intoxicating scent washed over him. Then he took her hand and gently kissed it. As he left that last lingering kiss, an odd warmth skidded up his lips, followed by a slow, twisting fizzle. Draco glanced up at Ginny, who stared back at him in a moment of paralysis, before snatching her hand away from his. Draco snatched it back. They struggled a moment or two with Ginny furiously yanking and jerking her hand, trying to free it from Draco's grasp, but he held it firm, staring at the remarkable transformation that had taken place on her left hand.

Gone were her wedding band and engagement ring. In their place was the goddamn engagement ring he had placed on her reluctant finger over a year ago, the one he thought she had pawned in pursuit of her rebel husband. Had his kiss inadvertently broken the charm?

Draco looked up at Ginny's horrified, dark eyes. "Liar," he spat out, furious.

"So what?" she spat back, wrenching her hand away from his. "Christo couldn't get a proper ring for me before the war. There wasn't time."

"If your husband had time to procure the entire country of Bulgaria, he had time to get a bloody fucking ring for his wife," Draco glowered down her lying throat. If he had to strangle the truth out of the confabulating witch, he would.

"Get away from me," Ginny hissed, shoving Draco back with both of her hands to his chest and scrambling backwards - right up until she hit a wall, stopping her hasty retreat.

Draco went after her, one fuming step at a time, until the only thing between him and that wall of books was one anxious, lying witch. "Is there anything about you that isn't a lie?" he snarled, inches away and closing.

Ginny reached back and pulled a book off the shelf, holding it above his head in a threatening fashion. "Don't you dare - "

"Dare what?" he asked, slamming both of his hands on either side of her, trapping her against the shelf.

Her fearful, dark eyes darted back and forth, watching his arms encage her. "Touch me." When he raised an eyebrow at this, she hissed, "Don't you dare touch me, Draco."

"I wouldn't think of it, Mrs. Chervenko."

Ginny watched as Draco's scathing eyes tore through her, from the top of her crimson locks to tips of her terrified toes. Good god almighty, he was going to kill her. If he didn't kill her, he was going to maim her. If he didn't maim her, he was going to Crucio her. Ginny didn't close her eyes or try to flee the horrid situation. No, she stood there, prepared to take her punishment like the witch she was. And if she survived his thrashing, she was going to Port back to Bulgaria and kill Christo with her own two hands. Bulgaria could find itself another Minister of Magic because their current Minister was dead on her arrival. Dead.

"Goddamn it, Ginny," Draco cursed as he punched his fist into the wall of books half an inch away from Ginny's face, sending a shudder through the bookcase and down the spine of its female visitor. Collapsing against Ginny, Draco sandwiched her between his rage-rigid body and the books behind her, burying his miserable face in his fist on the shelf.

Ginny stood frozen under Draco's weight, listening to his erratic breathing and watching the pounding artery on his throat, aware of her own terrified heart matching its furious beat. When he didn't move, when he didn't speak, when he stood there without a sign of any kind, Ginny looked up. All she saw was the underside of his tense jaw. The book slipped from her hand and fell to the floor with a thud.

In a flash of movement, Draco had her upper arms in his fists, ripping her away from the bookcase and holding her inches from his livid face.

"Why did you do it, Ginny? Why? What did you need so badly that you married Chervenko to get it? I would have given you everything I owned. I would have laid down my life for you. What was it Ginny? What?" Draco shook the unfathomable witch until her teeth rattled. "No more lies. Do you hear me? Or so help me, I'll tear you apart where you stand."

Ginny swallowed her nonexistent saliva and nodded. "No lies."

Did he need to drag out the bloody Veritaserum and shove it down her throat? Because he wasn't beneath doing that, not where this witch was concerned.

"You won't need your Veritaserum."

Was she a Legilimens as well? Good lord, what next? Draco hesitated, weighing the pros and cons, before deciding against the Veritaserum. Hell, knowing her, she already had some ancient Dark countercurse hidden up the sleeve of her robes. She was going to tell him what she was going to tell him, and it was up to his sorry Slytherin arse to sift through her crap for the truth of the matter, wherever the fuck it was hiding this time.

"Well? What was so damn important?" he spat out, not loosening his bruising hold on her arms.

"You," she whispered, looking into his angry eyes. "I needed you."

"Me?" he said, incredulous. "You had me, Ginny."

"No, Draco, I needed you safe. From the moment I realized I was out of Levski's prison, I began plotting his assassination, waiting for my opportunity. Then you told me you loved me and intended to marry me and everything changed. I still needed to kill Levski but not for me. I needed to kill Levski for you, to keep you safe. But I couldn't kill Levski unless I married Christo and broke the magical bond between us, ensuring your safety in the event of my death."

Draco stared at the inane, insane, out-of-her-fucking-mind witch. "Were you out of your mind, Ginny? I could have protected both of us from Levski. You didn't need to go off and marry Chervenko and risk your life killing Levski."

She shook her head. "No, you couldn't. Why do you think I was never the marrying kind? Because I didn't want a husband or a family? Of course I wanted those things, but Levski swore to me that the day I crawled out of his prison alive was the day he began preparing for the sport of one day killing my husband and my children and everyone else I held close to my heart. I knew Levski and his ways. There was no protection from him. The only protection I could give you was killing him."

"Why didn't you come to me, Ginny? Why didn't you say something? We could have figured something out. Hell, I would have killed Levski for you."

"Wizards like Levski don't get killed without igniting a firestorm. If you killed Levski, England would have been embroiled in another war. No witch's life is worth a war. You were safest knowing nothing. It left you clean enough to pass a Veritaserum test and prevented you from coming after me. If you stepped foot in Bulgaria, Christo would have had you killed. No," she said sharply, silencing him with one hand in the air, "Christo's killed every invincible Death Eater in Bulgaria. He would have killed you, too. This was never your war, Draco. It was mine."

"And Chervenko?"

"It became Christo's war when Levski killed Christo's father, Closimir, during the War. Christo and I were either going to die together trying to assassinate Levski and his family or we were going to come out alive and free from him."

Draco shook his head in disbelief. "Now you're married to the most wanted wizard on the Continent. Every Death Eating country in Europe wants him dead. A slightly larger problem than Levski, wouldn't you say?"

"No, because my goal was to keep you safe, and now you're safe. I'm not afraid of the consequences of my actions. Christo and I are well suited. With the life he lives, having me by his side has been an asset. I willingly followed Christo into the Bulgarian war and will go wherever his path leads. We will live or die together, like we've been doing for the past year. For you, Draco, I'm a liability and an embarrassment."

Draco let go of Ginny and leaned against the bookcase, lest he fall down. "This marriage to Chervenko... "

"...is forever. I'm his wife, Draco, in every sense of the word."

"No, Ginny, no."

"He's a good wizard, Draco. He loves me and takes care of me. He sent me here to save my life. Isn't that what you wanted for me?"

Draco was too mute with shock to speak. No, that wasn't what he wanted. He wanted to be her good wizard. He wanted to love her and care for her, not some goddamn Bulgarian rebel trash who dragged her into a bloody war and pushed her to the edge of the fucking veil.

"You don't love him, Ginny," Draco said, as if that would make a difference.

"But I care for him, and it's enough."

Draco ran an unsteady hand down his face. That goddamn magical contract had been the death of them both. Chervenko had a leash around her neck the entire time, playing her like a fucking puppet, and Draco as well.

Draco looked over at Ginny. "Stay."

"What?"

"Don't go back to Bulgaria. Stay here with me."

Ginny turned to Draco and laid her hand on his chest. "I can't do that. You know that."

"Why not? I don't give a damn about Chervenko."

"Well, he gives a damn about you. The entire Continent gives a damn about all three of us, whether we like it or not. How would it look, the wife of the Minister of Magic of free Bulgaria shacking up with one of the most powerful Death Eaters in England? It would be a political nightmare for all of us, and I don't fancy being kidnapped or killed." When Draco opened his mouth to protest, Ginny reached up and put her finger over his mouth, silencing him. "No, Draco. I owe Christo a wizard's debt twice over. His father died saving my life. I can't repay him with that kind of political and emotional betrayal. Besides, Christo won't allow it. He'll come and take me back. It's his right."

"Ginny," Draco cried, reaching out and gathering his lost witch into his aching arms, "what have you done?" But he couldn't think or argue or debate the facts anymore. All he could do was cradle Ginny to his exploding heart and listen to that goddamn clock ticking.

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Author's Notes:

I'm back with more of our story. My apologies for the delay. It took much longer than expected to wrestle this chapter down. Much gratitude to everyone who left such wonderful reviews and to all who have returned for more of this tale. A special thank-you to Marcia, my beta, for the support and the encouragement and the awesome, awesome beta.

Chapter 15

Crazy

"Draco?"

Come on in, Ginny. I'll be right there," he called out, ducking into his closet in a scramble to finish dressing. He tucked in his shirt, pulled on his boots and threw on his robes, not bothering to fasten them closed.

What did Healer Topman say?" he asked, emerging from the closet with one hand running through his silky platinum locks. When he looked up, his heart lurched at what he saw before plummeting south, straight into the churning, acid-filled pit of his stomach. Ginny was staring at a small picture frame in her hands.

That's Rose," he said quietly.

Ginny turned around and looked up at him. "She's lovely."

"She's no one, Ginny."

Ginny nodded before tucking the forgotten picture back onto his bookshelf. "She's a lovely no one."

What could he say? Rose was his salve, the thing he put on his gaping wound to ease the excruciating pain, but that's where her magic ended. She was incapable of healing the festering thing. There was only one witch capable of healing the wound in his heart, and he suspected she had no intention of sticking around long enough to do so.

Lovely? No, Rose wasn't lovely. She was stunningly beautiful. She was the pureblooded witch who turned every wizard's head when she walked into a room, the ultimate trophy for his arm and his bed. If Draco couldn't have the witch he wanted, he would have the witch every other wizard wanted.

"Ginny… " Draco said, reaching out for her. But she evaded his touch and continued sauntering around his private space, studying it, memorizing the titles of the books on the shelves, the placement of his broom and the way the light filtered in through the windows splashing onto his tangle of empty sheets.

Her finger ran down one of the dark mahogany bedposts, tracing its intricate pattern. "Healer Topman says I'm fit to go home."

"What?"

"I'm fit to go home."

"No."

"He didn't say I was a hundred percent. He said I was fit to go home. I can finish recuperating there."

She was home. Didn't she realize that?

"No."

"This can't go on forever, Draco," Ginny whispered. "It isn't real."

Draco snatched Ginny's evasive hand off the bedpost and drew her to him. "Forever? Since when does one week constitute forever?" he snapped.

She looked up and he fell into her sad, colourless eyes. The damn things nearly paralyzed him.

Ginny," he sighed, "what are you doing?" She had the most screwed up decision-making process he had ever had the misfortune of being at the back end of. Crazy witch.

She didn't say a thing. She stood there staring at him, mute as the day she dropped into his life. If only he had known then what she would grow to mean to him, perhaps things could have turned out differently. But how could he have known?

She was beauty and fire and deadly desire, so close he could see the danger simmering in her dark eyes and feel the pulsing of her body. And he ached for her, this scintillating rebel and wife of another wizard.

What kind of love was this? It was an arse-backward, upside-down, inside-out one that left him hanging by his straining toes, scrambling for terra firma where none existed. Was there any other kind? Draco couldn't say. This tortured, fucked-up love was the only love he had ever known, and he sadly suspected he might never know another.

She slipped out of his grasp and turned away, wrapping her arms around her waist and staring out into the dreary winter day, the one with no sun and no sky, only an endless expanse of grey shuddering the world.

"I love you, you know that."

Her words were spoken quietly and without emotion, as though they might disappear without claiming an existence and the world would never know. No one would ever know. Hell, she wasn't even facing him when she said it.

"Ginny," he breathed, his heart soaring as he gently swung her around until he saw the look on her face. It slapped the silly, boyish grin off his mouth and shoved it into the pit of his stomach, where it landed in a stinking heap next to his heart. It was the most grief-riddled, godforsaken look of utter misery he had ever seen. Then he understood. He was as much an affliction to her as she was to him. If she could have ripped him from her heart, she would have. But she couldn't. He lived within the beating walls of her heart as she lived within his, entrenched, unyielding and kicking up a bloody racket loud enough to unveil the dead.

"Ginny," he whispered, his brilliant eyes touched by a softness and transparency she had never seen, "loving you could kill a lesser wizard. And it may be the death of me yet, but I cannot stop loving you, however life-threatening it maybe."

Draco held his miserable witch close and buried his face in the nape of her delicious neck, where he wanted to live out his days and die a contented wizard. Since that was too fucking much to ask of the world, he would simply love her, stolen moment by stolen moment, until there were no more moments to steal, and she was gone.

----- ----- -----

Late that the afternoon when he was alone, Draco took Rose's picture and shoved it into the back of his dresser drawer, bottom left, where it took its place of honour among all of the other infamous things he didn't want to be reminded of. Since his childhood, such things had lived there. Satisfied, he was closing the drawer when he caught sight of a pair of laughing, dark eyes.

Draco cautiously withdrew something he had forgotten about, something his heart and his mind couldn't tolerate remembering. It was the photograph of a deliriously happy, laughing Ginny in Chervenko's arms, his lips on her porcelain perfect skin. This was the Ginny Draco had never known or even glimpsed. Why? Because he wasn't capable of lighting up her world in such a breathtaking fashion, that's why. Draco's heart stopped beating and his fast-constricting throat collapsed upon itself.

Why hadn't he thrown the damn thing out? He couldn't say. He had destroyed everything else that reminded him of her, and when he was done with that, he had sold his flat and bought another, one with no vestiges of her or of their miserable, soiled life together.

But that didn't stop her haunting of him. On that point, he was mistaken. However, it did stop his recurrent episodes of utter humiliation. There was no physical possibility of waking up from a drunken stupor in her bed or rummaging around for the scarf she use to nick from his wardrobe, searching for her scent like a fucking dog.

With the physical gone, he had been left with an emotionally scarred psyche, one that played a certain Ginny-induced stress tune over and over. At night in his darkened, sweat-drenched bed, she screamed for him with terror in her dying voice as he frantically scoured every inch of Bulgaria for her, never finding her. He reached for her with morning's first rays, only to wake alone and shaken, convinced she had met her end on foreign soil without him. Her face was on every street corner and her voice in crowded places, until he'd felt he was losing his mind.

Then she was back, delightfully intact and spinning wondrous tales of her heroic love for him, rendering him amnestic to the bitter memory of her stinging rejection. Yes, he basked in the glory of her attention, believing the nightmare was over. Or was it?

Draco's trembling hand dropped the horrid picture back into the drawer and slammed it shut, but it was too late. Now he knew why he had kept the damn thing, to remind him of the blinding follies of the heart and to never fall prey to them again.

Good lord, what had he done? Draco glanced around his room in a panic. What the hell had he done? She had no undying love for him, only for her terrorist husband and their ridiculous campaign to free the wizarding world from the "horror" of the Death Eaters' reign. That photograph was proof of her treachery. She was in Chervenko's filthy arms, with that look on her face, less than two weeks after she fled the Manor. Draco was no relationship expert, but even a bloody troll could intuit that one.

She never loved him. He was still the same fucking joke she had laughed at once before, pliable and gullible to her winsome ways. No wonder she was in such a hurry to leave, to be rid of his company and his repulsive touch. He had given her a week of unsupervised freedom in his home to plant whatever magical mischief she pleased. Had he just given Chervenko an open invitation to England?

----- ----- -----

She gazed out one of the enormous floor-to-ceiling windows flanking the outer wall of her bedroom with a childlike hand pressed against the chilled windowpane. He stood there for too many minutes, drinking in his fill of her toxic presence until he felt his weakened heart would burst. Then he knocked sharply on the open door. She startled and swung around, holding her hands to her chest and letting out a winded laugh and a smile.

"Merlin, Draco, you scared me," she said, greeting him with relief, her sparkling, cinnamon eyes alight.

Really? Between the two of them, he considered her the scarier one, in every aspect. Without waiting for an invitation, he crossed the threshold and closed the door behind him, prepared to mount a wounded dismissal of the wily witch. Wounded? Yes, wounded, because, Salazar help him, he loved her too much to give her what she really deserved.

"Why?"

"Why what?" she asked, her smile fading at the cool tone in his voice.

"I did the best I could, Ginny. I treated you with respect and gave you as much of a life as I could under the circumstances. I never asked for ownership of you nor did I ask to be dragged into the political thunderstorm surrounding you. However, I was willing to go through all of that and more for you. I was even foolish enough to take you back into my home a second time." Draco paused as he grit his teeth and clenched his fists. "Why do you continue to lie to me and deceive me at every turn? What the hell have I ever done to you to deserve this?" Why didn't she whip out her wand and fucking Crucio him while she was at it? Wasn't that how she got her jollies? Torturing and killing Death Eaters? Well, he had certainly provided her with his share of entertainment. Ungrateful witch.

Ginny's face went pale. "What are you talking about?" she asked, grabbing onto the back of a chair for support.

He wanted to scream into her lying face, scream and scream until he couldn't scream anymore, until his voice was snatched from him, stopping the ridiculous flow of emotional garbage from spilling out of his lovesick mouth. Instead, he thrust the photograph into her hand.

"When were you going to tell me, Ginny? Or were you planning on owling me from your husband's bed?"

Did she flinch at his words? He couldn't tell. Her head was bent. Her deceiving eyes focused on the incriminating picture.

"Where did you get this photo?" she asked, her face rising.

"Does it matter?"

She reached out and grabbed the lapel of his robes, crushing the photo as she jerked him to her. "Where did you get this picture, Draco?"

Well, this unwanted disclosure certainly got a rise out of her, didn't it? What other nasty surprises did she have hidden up the sleeve of her robes? "Bella sent it to me from one of her operatives, confirming your marriage to Chervenko."

Her face was in his, anger hot in her voice, "It's not true, Draco. It's a lie."

Draco snorted at her protest and pushed her vile figure away, her filthy touch burned his vulnerable skin. "That picture's no lie, Ginny. I had it verified - twice."

She shook her head in frustration. "Not that kind of lie. It's true but it's a lie."

"Make up your mind, Ginny. Is it the truth or is it a lie? You do know the difference, don't you?"

"Of course, I bloody well know the difference," she hissed at the dripping sarcasm in his voice. "That picture was taken over four years ago. Yes, Christo and I were lovers. Yes, I fancied myself in love with him once. Yes, it was the truth - years ago, long before you, before Levski, before everything." Ginny heard the sound of her crippled world beginning to implode upon itself.

Draco stared at her. Was she speaking the truth or simply in tongues?

"It was Christo, Draco," she began, her voice weary beyond belief. "He put that picture into the hands of Bella's informant knowing it would end up here. He wanted to make you believe our marriage was more than real. He wanted you to see our relationship the way was. He wanted to... " Her exhausted tirade frittered to an unsteady end.

Draco took the crumpled photograph out of Ginny's clenched fist and stared at it, hearing her laughter, seeing the delight on her face, feeling Chervenko's arms around her, his lips on her skin. Every muscle in Draco's body exploded at the thought of that bastard with his Ginny, spinning her world upside down and inside out.

"… he wanted to drive you crazy."

Draco looked up at Ginny.

"He knows," she whispered, her shoulders sagging in defeat, straining under their invisible weight. "He knows I love you," Draco heard the resignation in her exhalation, "and it drives him crazy."

Crazy? That terrorist arsehole couldn't begin to fathom the definition of the word. Chervenko had her, had her in a way Draco would never have her. He woke up with his arms around her and went to bed with his arms around her and made love to her and cared for her and would do so until the day he expired in her glorious arms. What the hell was driving that bastard crazy? Chervenko wasn't the one in love's exile, that desolate place where Draco would live out the remainder of his days without her. No, Chervenko was too busy fucking her to be fucked by his love for her, to understand the true meaning of the word "crazy".

Did she love him?

"Draco," Ginny begged, wrapping her hands around his miserable face, pulling him out of his agony and into hers. "Don't… please." This time when she touched him, he didn't push her away. He couldn't. He wanted to believe her. He wanted her to tell him she loved him. He wanted to hear it over and over again. Worse yet, he didn't give a damn whether or not it was true.

His pained, uncertain eyes roamed hers, looking for some sign of something, but all he saw was his own confused reflection staring back. She had him by the balls, cornered and paralyzed, unwilling and unable to move from her touch but afraid to jump in with both feet.

Her unbearably soft cheek brushed his as she whispered into his ear, the heat of her words sending a distinct tingle down his back to the base of his weakened spine. "I love you, Draco." This was followed by a dastardly, outlandish nuzzle in the hollow of his neck, where her scent assaulted him on a second front. "I do."

This time there was no defeat in her voice or anguish on her face. There was only an urgency that spread from her words to her touch as she began kissing his neck. She kissed him and kissed him, tantalizing, unholy kisses, as wicked sweet as any confection he had ever tasted. Draco went weak in the knees, stumbling back a step or two and crash-landing them into the nearest wall.

His arms flew around her, steadying her, lest she fall. He couldn't have that, could he? He would sooner lay down his pathetic life than have anything happen to her. How ridiculous. How stupid. How utterly insane.

She loved him. She loved him not. She loved him. Draco repeated it over and over again like a fucking mantra. Here she was, in his arms, soul-to-soul, close enough to hear the wild beating of his heart and feel the surging heat she generated in him.

"I love you." "I love you." "I love you," she exclaimed, her breathless proclamations punctuated by her searing lips capturing his and holding them hostage for too short a time. Of course she loved him, he told himself as his aching lips touched down and melded into hers and his hands greedily, possessively roamed her much-changed figure with its muted but still glorious curves. With no hesitation, Ginny reached out to meet his wanton touch, pushing aside the terror and the pain and the misery of life without him. He welcomed her desperate, passion-filled kisses, kisses that allowed him to savour the long forgotten richness of her potent, overwhelming desire for him.

Draco would have marked her as his own if he could have. Yes, he would have seared her precious, freckled skin to let Chervenko know where her heart lay and to whom she truly belonged.

What the hell? There was an outburst of shouting and frantic running in the hallway outside Ginny's door, shattering the normal silence.

In one fluid movement, Draco pried himself out of Ginny's frenzied grasp and threw himself in front of her. He was shielding her, wand drawn, when the bedroom door flew open. Sam rushed into the room, speaking to Draco in hurried, hushed tones, his wand also drawn.

"I know she's hell with a wand in her hands, but keep an eye on her, Sam." Turning, Draco wrapped a protective arm around Ginny, kissed her on the cheek and whispered into her ear, "It looks like we have a visitor. I'll be right back.”

"No, Draco! No!" she called out, panic rising. She rushed to stop him, reaching the opened door as the back of his robes disappeared, but Sam put a firm, restraining hand on her, bringing her brief chase to an end. Ginny yanked her arm out of Sam's reach and spun around, furious. “What's going on?"

"We have an intruder, Mrs. Chervenko."

"An intruder?" Ginny's eyes widened. "One or more than one?”

"One, so far, but we're sweeping the Manor and the grounds a second time."

Ginny ran to the window and scanned the empty grounds. The Manor was a fortress. Everyone knew that. What force had managed to break through its ancient wards?

"Mrs. Chervenko, if it's all the same to you, I'd appreciate your cooperation. I know you don't need my protection, but I'll lose my job if you step out into the fray."

"You're mistaken, Sam," she said softly, turning around and staring at him with her dark, penetrating eyes, the ones that made him shift in his uncomfortable boots. "I need your protection now more than ever." With that announcement, the notorious assassin and wife of the most powerful terrorist in modern times took a seat away from the window and waited, her wand holstered.

-->

Author's Notes:

Schlepping back with another chapter for your consumption. I hope this one doesn't give anyone indigestion like the last one did. Sorry about that.

Much gratitude to everyone who left such wonderful reviews and to all who have returned for more of this tale, especially Cas121689, Sailor Universe, moogle, persephone33, akt5us, MarenKPotter, Crookshanksgranger, jabba, Pixie Devil, sevenofseven, Alexandria Malfoy, NicholePotter86, english-rose, bellas blanky, PrincessEmalia, HP Lover 01, and DracoObsessed17.

A special thanks and a big hug to Marcia, my beta, for whipping this one into shape.

Chapter 16

The Supreme Arsehole

The steady echo of his boots on the stone floor mixed with a maelstrom of tumultuous thoughts as Draco made his way through the dimly lit dungeon toward the holding cells that had not seen life since the final days of the War. The biting chill of the dank, stale air sank into the tender muscle of his newly revitalized heart, wrapping a sense of foreboding around it that he could not shake.

His boots came to a halt in front of a large wooden door. It wasn't his heart that stopped him short. It was his gut, screaming at him like a bloody Banshee in heat. He wanted to run, to flee, to grab Ginny and get the hell out of the wizarding world before one of them died.

Draco threw open the heavy wooden door, banging it against the stone wall and rattling its ancient iron handle. Storming inside the windowless room, he grabbed the seated intruder by the throat, pulled him up and shook him.

"Who the fuck are you?" he glowered, wand firm against the stranger's throbbing jugular. Given the situation, this welcome was as cordial a greeting as the intruder could hope for and preferable to the one Draco had in mind, a greeting that involved sticking his wand someplace else and firing without warning.

"Petk..." the grey-haired wizard squeaked out in a hoarse whisper as Draco's hand clamped down on his trachea, bringing the intruder to his knees. When he reached up to rip Draco's hand off his throat, half a dozen wands stopped him. Draco eased up enough to allow a minimal flow of oxygen into his captive's straining lungs. The furious wizard spat out, "Ilian Petkov, you pig!"

Draco raised an eyebrow at the notorious name. "Well, Mr. Petkov, what brings you breaking into my home?"

"The Bulgarian Minister of Magic, Christo Chervenko, sent me to deliver a message to his wife and to escort her home," Petkov announced through gritted teeth.

Draco stared at the abomination of wizarding filth stinking up his dungeon. If the Dark Lord was a sick fuck, than this monster was his incompetent twin, incapable of crafting a coherent strategy on his own, but when pointed in the "right" direction, was capable of reeking unimaginable human misery and death. The wand in Draco's hand began to twitch at the thought of the entire Death Eating population in Bulgaria tortured and annihilated under his command. The Commander in Chief of Chervenko's armed forces was on his knees waiting for justice to be served to him at the end of Draco's wand.

"Anything wrong with the front door, Mr. Petkov?" Draco hissed, thrusting aside the wily wizard, who tumbled onto the floor. "You Bulgarian rebels do know what a front door is for, don't you?"

The intruder let out half a snort and rose. "My orders didn't include a front door, Mr. Malfoy, just a Portkey."

Draco followed Petkov's line of sight to Frank, who stepped forward to place a distinctive brass paperweight in Draco's hand. It was the damn Portkey Ginny stole over a year ago to make her escape.

"Care to tell me the contents of your message, Mr. Petkov?" Draco asked, his hand in a tight fist around the Portkey.

Petkov shook his head. "My orders were to speak directly to Mrs. Chervenko."

"Very well." Draco nodded and withdrew, turning to Frank. "Show Mr. Petkov upstairs. I don't want Mrs. Chervenko seeing this pit." He never wanted her to see another place of imprisonment, especially not one in his home.

Turning on his heels, Draco left the Bulgarian where he wanted to leave every last one of them, in a stinking dungeon devoid of life. They had twice fucked him over and he suspected today would make it thrice.

----- ----- -----

"Your husband has come calling for you," Draco said softly, stepping inside and motioning to Sam, who left her bedroom and closed the door behind him.

"What?" Ginny exclaimed, rising to her feet. "Christo's here? In England?"

Draco shook his head. "No, he sent Ilian Petkov to fetch you."

"Ilian? How?" Throwing her hands up in the air in a sweeping gesture, she said, "I thought the Manor's wards were impenetrable. At least that's what we've always been led to believe."

"Petkov didn't brake the wards. He slipped in through the backdoor courtesy of your husband."

"Backdoor? What backdoor?"

Opening his hand, Draco revealed the brass Portkey she had stolen from him.

"Sweet Merlin," she muttered, her eyes fixed on the Portkey. "Draco," she drawled, her incredulous eyes slowly rising from the Portkey to his steady gaze, "don't tell me you never warded the Manor against it."

His eyes went south to avoid hers, but she followed him, bending over and looking up into his reluctant eyes.

What did she want from him, a written confession of the crime he committed? No, he never warded the Manor against it or reported it stolen. So what? It was his neck on the line, not hers. Why didn't he ward against it? Because he had this crazy notion that it might one day bring her back to him, or in lieu of that, that it might save her life on some insane foreign battlefield. It was his only remaining link to her. He never imagined it would take her away from him a second time.

"I couldn't," he said, shrugging his shoulders.

"That was a stupid, foolish thing to do. You can't save me, Draco. They don't let Death Eaters into my playground. They kill them. Lock the doors. I can take care of myself." Then she reached up and kissed him on the cheek.

She was the only person in the world who could reduce him to a pile of shit faster than a Blast-Ended Skrewt could fart.

"What did Ilian say?"

"He didn't."

----- ----- -----

"Ginny," Petkov called with outstretched arms. She went to him, and he wrapped his filthy, soiled Bulgarian arms around her, drawing her to him as though she were a child. He whispered in her ear and kissed both her cheeks before holding her at arm's length, admiring her newly resurrected form.

Since when did that monster morph into a fatherly figure? Bella would string Draco up by his balls if she knew Petkov was in Malfoy Manor being treated as a guest rather than down on his knees having the shit Crucio'd out of him. All of wizarding Europe would give a king's ransom to have the sadistic bastard captured and killed.

But Draco didn't need another fortune. The only thing he needed was that priceless object in Petkov's arms, the same one everyone else needed. Petkov was stroking Ginny's hair and peppering her with questions spoken in soft Bulgarian. She was nodding and answering.

Draco stood there staring at Ginny as she allowed herself to be fussed over by the wizened arsehole of a wizard. Why was she treating this incarnation of evil as some sort of gentle father figure? Why did she let him run his hands over her curves and look at her with concern in his dark eyes? Why was she soothing his worries?

Draco gathered his thoughts and turned around, closing the door as he left unnoticed.

----- ----- -----

"Mr. Malfoy!"

Draco looked up at Frank, who came rushing at him.

"She's fainted, sir!"

"What?"

Draco jumped up from his perch atop the grand spiral staircase, flew down the stairs and burst into the sitting room. Ginny was lying on the floor, her head in Petkov's hands.

"What the hell did you say to her?" Draco hissed, an inch from Petkov's protruding nose. Both wizards were hovering over the unconscious witch.

"I told her it was time to come home," Petkov answered evenly, concern in his rat's eyes.

"She's too goddamn sick to go back to Bulgaria now. Can't you bloody well see that?" Draco pushed Petkov aside, scooped Ginny up into his arms and Disapparated them to her bedroom, leaving the obnoxious Bulgarian behind where he belonged, where they all belonged.

Draco sat his furious arse down by the side of her bed, staring at her. She was unbelievably frail: pale, rail thin, and drowning in the fine wizarding robes he'd had made for her. She didn't need a week of convalescing. She needed months of it.

The close-up scene wasn't all that different from the day she'd crash-landed in his flat or the day she collapsed after her Quidditch match or the night she'd tumbled down Blaise's staircase. But the wide-angle view was a killer. It showed Chervenko in the wings, waiting to whisk her away to some foreign wasteland, away from her home and Draco and the life she was meant to lead.

Some minutes later, she opened her eyes, disoriented and squinting at the filtered sunlight streaming into the room, blinding her. They settled on his worried face, blank and staring.

"Ginny?"

But she couldn't hear him. She was drowning, drowning in a searing hot cauldron of fear and confusion and sinking despair. Her body arched forward as she stretched her flailing arms upward in a desperate attempt to reach the surface of the boiling mixture and the life saving world on the other side of its glass-like surface.

"Ginny, no -"

"Ginny, please - "

"Ginny, it's Draco. I'm right here," he begged, dropping to his knees beside her, panic in his voice.

There was no response. Instead, she lay there mute and staring.

Draco stood, rushed to her bedroom door, and threw it open, calling for Frank.

Her lungs were bursting, bloated with stale oxygen-deprived air, threatening to explode. As she writhed and clawed against the impenetrable surface, burning liquid seeped into her nose, scorching her throat as it trickled down into her hungry lungs.

"What the hell did he say to her?" Draco asked, furious and wondering what news would cause her to not only faint but to also sprint back to the scene of some previous crime, locked in the custom-made torture chamber in that fragile head of hers.

"He said Minister Chervenko was struck down in a failed assassination attempt early this afternoon. The Healers don't think he'll last the day, but he continues to ask for her. Petkov was sent to bring Mrs. Chervenko back to Bulgaria. He says she's needed there."

Draco nodded. Now that he thought about it, something did come to mind. The possibility of her heroic, martyrific husband dying and being torn from her might do the trick. Well, it was a horrible thing, wasn't it? To have the one you love taken from you - be it by death or by marriage to an arsehole - really, what was the difference?

Perhaps there was some justice in the wizarding world after all. As much as Draco would have liked to accept the congratulations for such a wondrous feat, the felling of that terrorist superstar, it wasn't his doing. He was too busy saving Chervenko's wife to be bothered killing the bastard.

The cauldron exploded, and Ginny rose to consciousness, sitting bolt upright and gasping for air, lungs exploding, hands clutching her chest.

"Ginny," he called, rushing to her side and placing a steadying hand on her pale, terror-tight face. Her wide and dilated eyes were fixed on his. "Are you alright?"

She nodded and he drew her to him. Ginny laid her head on Draco's shoulder and stared out, terrified for her life and watching the dripping sunlight spill in a scorching mess across the floor. She continued to lean against him, arms dangling at her side, while he held her close, wondering what demons ruled her world.

----- ----- ----

Twenty minutes later, he dismissed the house elf who'd led him to her. She was standing in his closet, shuffling through his things, calmly nicking one of his fine, winter cloaks followed by his Slytherin green scarf, the replacement scarf for the one he destroyed, the one that held her scent and his tortured memories.

"What are you doing?" he asked. "I've floo'd Healer Topman."

She turned around and shook her head. "I don't have time for Healer Topman." The cloak fell around her slim shoulders and tumbled to the ground, dragging. "You don't mind, do you?" she asked, tossing the excess material to the side.

The hem shortened with a wave of his wand. "I won't let you go, Ginny."

Her thieving hands methodically folded the scarf and tucked it into one of the many pockets in his cloak then smoothed the outer surface, leaving no trace of her contraband.

What the hell was he supposed to do? Let her go running back into that swirling cesspool of political intrigue and danger? For what? For some dying, two-bit terrorist husband and a shaky, fledging government with no allies in the wizarding world? It was as close to suicide as she could get without placing a wand to her own throat.

Draco pulled her tense figure into his arms and held her tightly, but she would not relax. He ran his hand over her silken tresses and buried his miserable face in the nape of her neck, surrounded by her scent. "Stay, Ginny. Don't go. It's suicide." When she didn't respond to his words or his touch, he continued. "If Chervenko dies, you'll be next. There's nothing more powerful than the widow of a martyr, Bulgarian or not."

He felt her weight shifting away from him. "Don't, Draco," she admonished softly, placing a hand on his chest and pulling away from his desperation. "Don't make this more difficult than it has to be."

"It doesn't have to be anything, Ginny. Don't you see that?" How many times would she make the wrong fucking decision? Until it killed her, it seemed. "I won't let you kill yourself." Not over that piece of crap, regardless of any questionable emotional affiliations.

Ginny stepped away from Draco. "I'm his wife, Draco. Closimir didn't abandon me when my safe house was attacked. Christo didn't forget about me while I was imprisoned; he risked his life rescuing me from Levski's prison. Christo needs me. I have no choice."

"He's not the only one who needs you, Ginny," Draco spat out. He could need her until he fell to the floor blue in the face, dying from a Basilisk bite in the arse, and she would still walk out that door.

If he had the power to magically bind her to him, would he? No, he would not. Look at what happened the last time she was "bound" to him. She ran off and married that Bulgarian jerkoff and landed them in the bundle of joy they were in now. Besides pissing her off, there was no telling what would happen if he attempted to force her to do something against her will. He imagined she would find another way out and back to Bulgaria, one far more dangerous, per her usual sneaky, underhanded ways.

He knew her days of being held prisoner and subject to another's wants and whims were long over, and he'd sworn to himself that he would allow her to be her own witch once she was married. Of course, when he'd made that altruistic statement, he assumed she would be married to him, not some terrorist with a bull's-eye attached to his ape-like forehead.

"This isn't about us, Draco."

When was it going to be about them? Or were they a perpetual non-entity? Yes, they were. More specifically, he was the non-entity. The world was tripping over itself to get to her.

Where the hell did her loyalties lie, not to mention her heart? Chervenko's father was dead. Hadn't Ginny repaid her debt to those arseholes a thousand times over by laying her life on the line every day of Chervenko's bloody revolution? Fighting and hacking her way through Bulgaria at his side for over a year? Hell, she'd been one breath away from dead when Draco took her home this last time.

And what about the wizard's debt she owed him for saving her dying arse twice? Why did that feat never come up or deserve mention? Why did Christo-bloody-Chervenko hold an unending trump card in his back pocket? Draco's head was spinning, driven by his illogical heart. It had only one goal in life, and she was walking out the door, again.

"Take this with you." Draco reached over and enclosed Ginny's throat in a simple silver chain with a small, nondescript medallion in a desperate attempt to hold onto whatever part of her he could. What did a wizard have to do? Slay a fucking nation and lay it at her feet?

She looked down at it, fingering the medallion. "What's this?"

"It's the Portkey. I've Transfigured it to be unrecognizable. It's set to bypass the wards and return you to the Manor, but you're free to do with it as you will. I'd prefer you back from your terrorist adventures in one piece, married or not."

Then he tapped the engagement ring he had given her, Transfiguring it back into the trinkets Chervenko had given her when they married. He felt as if he were placing shackles on her.

"Draco..."

"Don't say it, Ginny. Let a wizard have his fantasies, will you?"

"This isn't about love. If it were about love, it would be simple, wouldn't it?"

Draco sighed, "It is simple, Ginny."

----- ----- -----

Minutes later, Draco watched a pale and tense Ginny, now fully cloaked and hooded, take her place beside Petkov. She peered out from under her protective cover, watching Draco as Petkov withdrew his Portkey.

"Ginny?"

Ginny turned her head at the question and stayed Ilian's hand from activating his Portkey. Then she rushed to the infamous foreign Death Eater and threw her arms around his neck, holding him tightly, her terrified face buried in his neck.

Draco wrapped his arms around Ginny, and Petkov heard pained whispering, too quiet to decipher what was being said but their heartbreaking intensity was clear. Ginny placed her shaking hands on Draco's face, unable to tear her eyes and her heart away from him.

Screw Chervenko and Petkov and fuck every last arsehole in the wizarding world. Draco leaned into Ginny's hands, landing his aching lips on hers and plunging his hand into her sacred scarlet tresses in a final farewell.

As their reluctant lips parted, Ginny dropped her hands and picked up her leaden feet, taking her place at Petkov's side again. Draco's eyes followed Ginny and never left her, not until she was ripped from him when Petkov activated his Portkey, taking her out of his life and back to Bulgaria for the second and final time.

Yes, it was a horrible thing to have to the one you love irreversibly taken from you. Draco took a moment to stare at the place that no longer held his notorious witch and to wish her husband, the supreme arsehole, all the worse. That bastard couldn't die fast enough for Draco. Then he sighed, turned around and began shouting orders for the Manor to be searched for signs of magical mischief.

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Author's Notes:

Okay, I'm back with more of our story. I blame the dgficexchange and 50,000 words of NaNoWriMo for the shameless lack of updates.

Thank you to all who have returned for more of this tale and to everyone who left such wonderful reviews! In particular, I would like to thank Cas121689, Alexandria Malfoy, Pour Toujours, pcgrimmy, moogle, jchaser, MarenKPotter, NicolePotter86, Hermione's Shadow, Sailor Universe, Anonymous, miss understood, Persephone33, PrincessEmalia, passion fruit, fondlewand, and anonymous. This brings our review total to 333. Hmm... just half evil, I guess.

As always, much appreciation to marcia, my beta, for putting the polish on this one. Now, on with our story! - fallenwitch

Chapter 17

Fuck Off

The guard averted his eyes when she shed her bathrobe, revealing an oversized flannel nightgown, and began crawling into bed beside her fallen husband. When he looked up, she was lying flush against the unconscious wizard, caressing his face and whispering into his unhearing ear. The sagging left sleeve of her nightgown revealed a loaded holster. The guard looked away, scanning the room and glancing out the window. All was quiet on the Minister's front lines.

----- ----- -----

News of the failed assassination attempt on Chervenko hit the papers the following day, blasting the wizarding world wide open again. The ancient lady creaked on her once steady axis and listed a bit as Death Eating governments around Europe scrambled to deal with the latest Bulgarian crisis.

To Draco's horror, the English newspapers and weeklies had taken to the young Bulgarian Minister's handsome good looks and provocative statements. And that, in combination with Chervenko's most recent tragedy, had copies flying off the shelves. Wild speculation about the who and why behind the failed assassination attempt hung side by side with a detailed history of His Rebel Highness' previous spectacular close brushes with death. It seemed that more than one English witch had a penchant for wealthy foreign rebels with a martyr complex.

It was all bullshit and rubbish. Draco found the press' infatuation with the terrorist superstar particularly loathsome. But the English press would stoop to crawling on its collective belly and licking Chervenko's balls if it meant selling another Knut of a trash-filled copy. It was all Draco could do to keep from gagging and retching as he passed the newsstands on his way to work looking for hopeful signs of his rival's demise.

And what about the magical mischief the rebel king's loyal queen and confidante left behind during her most recent visit to Malfoy Manor? There was no mischief afoot at the Manor, not a whimper of it. Three days of scouring the place turned up a total of two missing kitchen knives. It seemed her current criminal behaviour was limited to a bit of petty theft. And unless she intended to fillet her husband and serve him up for supper, Draco had no idea what possible use two knives could have for her.

----- ----- -----

Bella stared over her reading glasses and down her considerable nose at Draco as he shuffled through her latest owls, hunted down files and spoke to her officers about the Bulgarian situation. He was a wizard possessed and as far as she knew, no exorcism could drive out the she-devil who had taken hold of his heart and his soul. All her admonishing and berating and lecturing of the foolish wizard had stopped a year ago. She was saving her breath for more important conversations.

Yes, he was Cissy's son to his fatally weakened core, hopelessly attached to that ridiculous Weasley girl. But what did it matter? She was married to Chervenko. If the Bulgarian Minister survived, she would remain married. If he died, she would be next. This was the kind of situation Bella favoured, neat and tidy, leaving her unbreakable vow with Draco intact.

Romania. Turkey. Greece. France. Italy. Armenia. Croatia. Draco flipped through operative report after operative report, scanning for some actual news. They already had a dozen or more independent confirmations of Chervenko's felling. What they didn't have was the "who" behind the splendid assassination attempt. That's where those critical floos and owls fell silent. Normally falling over themselves for such an honour, none of the Death Eating governments stepped up to claim responsibility for the spectacular feat. None. This unsettling silence fuelled the growing anxiety in Draco's chest.

----- ----- -----

Two weeks later, Draco stood in the middle of Diagon Alley collecting his thoughts. He read the latest owls from Bella's office and perused the Prophet and half a dozen other foreign dailies. The Bulgarian Minister of Magic would not die. Where was the expiration date on the rebel scumbag? Draco wanted the arsehole toe-tagged and bagged. After all, how long did it take to dive six feet under?

Then some uncoordinated arse of an oaf crashed into him, cutting his internal ruminations short and thrusting him back into the world around him. It was all Draco could do to keep from laying the five-year-old next to him flat on the ground. Looking up ready to clock the bastard, Draco's furious grey eyes met with the idiot's laughing dark eyes and an outstretched hand.

"Didn't realize you were still playing, you bastard," Blaise said, pulling Draco up and slapping him on the shoulder. Draco looked over Blaise's shoulder at the Quality Quidditch Supplies sign. "Where the hell have you been, mate?"

Draco laughed, brushed off his cloak and shrugged his noncommittal shoulders. "Away. On business."

Blaise raised a skeptical eye at this. "For over a month?"

"Some of us work for a living, Blaise," Draco growled, attempting to blow off the intrusive inquiry.

"Work? Right, mate. Tell me, what is the going rate for window shopping these days?" When Draco scowled, Blaise dropped a hand on Draco's back. "What do you say we catch up over lunch? We have plenty of time before the match this afternoon, for those of us who are going, that is."

As the two wizards strolled down Diagon Alley, Blaise leaned over and said, "I saw Rose looking miserable with Patrick Fitzsimmons at the Ministry Gala. Does that have anything to do with any of this?"

Draco snorted and laughed.

Blaise pulled out the latest edition of The Bulgarian Daily, fresh from the wizarding black market. "What about this?"

Draco glanced over and saw Ginny's picture splashed across the cover. No, he didn't speak Bulgarian nor could he decipher a single written world of the foul language, but he knew his witch when he saw her. He snatched the paper out of Blaise's hand and examined it closely. Merlin, she looked exhausted, but the sight of her alive was magic to his eyes. Magic. Was he hallucinating or did he see snatches of the Portkey still around her neck?

Blaise tugged gently at first, then ripped the paper from Draco's clenched fists. "That's what I thought, mate," he said softly, opening the door to The Leaky Cauldron.

----- ----- -----

"What?" Draco glowered down Healer Topman's throat a week later at the St. Mungo's Fundraising Gala, ready to throttle the old wizard.

Healer Topman paused and studied Draco's face. "Did she or did she not tell you about our conversation before she went back to Bulgaria?"

Draco glanced around the room before answering. "Of course she did. I told you that already. You told her she was fit to return to Bulgaria and finish her recuperation there." Healer Topman's eyes went wide with surprise and Draco groaned. A familiar sinking feeling of dread hit the bottom of his stomach. "Let me guess. You didn't tell her she was fit to go home."

"Of course, I never told her that. I recommended she stay for an additional month to see if we could come up with a cure or a partial cure."

"A cure for what?"

Healer Topman looked around. They were ensconced in a secluded corner of the room with no eavesdroppers around. "What I'm about to tell you is privileged information, Mr. Malfoy, but given the extenuating circumstances, if I have your word as a wizard not to divulge the contents of our conversation..."

"Yes, yes, I give you my word as a wizard," Draco spat out, staring into the Healer's worried eyes.

Healer Topman looked around again before speaking in a low tone, barely above a whisper, "We were able to save her life but not her magic. When she awoke from the ancient curse, she was bereft of all magic, a Squib."

Draco put an unsteady hand on the other wizard's shoulder, sure he had misheard what was said. "What did you say?"

"She's a Squib, Mr. Malfoy. And her condition is irreversible as far as I know."

Thank Merlin he was holding onto the old man. Draco closed his eyes, afraid he would pass out from the horror running through his mind and the fear rampaging through his veins and the ruthless shattering of his hope. "What the hell is she doing? She's out of her mind." Not realizing he had spoken aloud, he opened his eyes and saw Healer Topman nodding in agreement.

"I was surprised when you told me she left. With her husband dying and her magic gone, she's in grave danger."

"Why the hell didn't you say something earlier?" Draco hissed, furious.

"I gave her my word I would let her reveal her condition to you in her own time, which we both agreed would be prior to her return to Bulgaria. She gave me her word she would speak to you the morning she left. When I asked you, you said she had spoken to you. How was I to know?"

"She's a liar, Healer Topman. She's a liar and a thief and a murderess and half a dozen other unmentionable things that we haven't figured out yet." Draco ran a frustrated hand through his hair. "And I just let her Port away to her death."

Draco let go of Healer Topman and rushed to the Apparition point across the room, ignoring everyone who tried to stop him. Fuck their idle chatter and useless concerns. He had a witch to save.

----- ----- -----

A week later, Draco threw his head against the wall in defeat. There was no way in. None. Chervenko's bubble was sealed tighter than a vampire's coffin during midday and was absolutely impenetrable.

Every Death Eating country on the continent had been stalking Chervenko and staking out his country, waiting for the opportunity to lunge at the nascent country and rip the head off its brash young leader. Had their time arrived? The Ministry and Bella and even The Daily Prophet were taking bets and speculating with sharpened teeth. Would Chervenko die first or would Bulgaria be attacked from the outside, tumbling the fragile, embattled government while its back was turned and weakened?

Death Eating governments around Europe were poised on the edge of their seats, biding their time and tapping their wands against the tips of their ambition, hedging their bets and gearing up for a possible invasion of Bulgaria. What were they waiting for? Well, no one knew where His Rebel Highness was hiding or the state of his troops or the loyalty of his shaken followers. No outsider knew who was standing where or how vulnerable the Bulgarian defenses were.

But that didn't stop Death Eating countries from sending their elite squadrons in to circle the small, unstable country, pariahs waiting to feed at the first opportunity. And Ginny was in the middle of the madness, bereft of magic and hanging onto the precious lynch pin, the head bastard whose fate was inexplicably tied to hers. Chervenko's death would trigger a magical invasion the likes of which had not been seen, ever. Defenseless, she would be swept away and annihilated with the first strike.

No, Draco couldn't rescue a witch who didn't want to be rescued any more than he could marry a witch who didn't want to marry him or hold a witch who didn't want to be held. These basic tenants of free will irritated the shit out of him. What could he do? Not a goddamn thing, that's what, except stand impotently by and watch her saunter off to her death, ignoring the sound of his world imploding. What about his wants? His wants were beside the point. Yes, his life and his dreams and his ridiculous love for her were beside the point.

But he had given her the means to rescue herself. So why didn't she come back to the safety of the Manor? She had a fucking Portkey, his Portkey. Why didn't she use it? Why?

----- ----- -----

"BULGARIAN DEPUTY MINISTER OF MAGIC MURDERED"

Bulgarian Deputy Minister of Magic, Andrei Arnaut, was found murdered in his home Tuesday morning. According to anonymous sources, Arnaut died from a knife wound to the throat. The motive for his murder remains a mystery. Authorities are not ruling out the possibility of a failed burglary attempt, although the intact wards and lack of missing valuables go against this theory. There are no suspects at this time.

Draco put down The Daily Prophet and pushed his breakfast aside as his face drained of the what little colour it once possessed and his stomach went cold. The threat on Chervenko's life wasn't an external one. It was an internal one. Holy shit.

----- ----- -----

"BULGARIAN CHIEF OF MAGICAL LAW ENFORCEMENT SLAIN"

Two days later the Bulgarian Chief of Magical Law Enforcement, Georgi Genkov, was found murdered in his home, his throat slashed open in a manner identical to Andrei Arnaut. No valuables were taken and robbery was not considered a motive. Government officials refuse to discuss possible suspects or motives.

Draco pushed his cup of tea aside, slumped down in his chair and held a shaking hand to his forehead. His kitchen knives were running around Bulgaria killing people. She was going to get her convalescing, magic-less arse killed. Someone was going to Avada the shit out of her.

What the fuck did she think she was doing? And who anointed her the new savior of the free Bulgarian wizarding world? Since when was it her job to avenge her husband and overthrow the Bulgarian coup attempt, all with one swipe of his bloody kitchen knives? And by the way, was it one knife per murder or would she be washing and reusing? Did anyone else notice that she wasn't even Bulgarian? It was this type of typical Ginny crap that sent his blood pressure through the roof and gave him an ulcer in the pit of his raw stomach.

Minutes later, Draco began rummaging around for a tumbler and his bottle of Firewhiskey. He didn't give a damn if it was eight o'clock in the morning. He needed a drink to settle his tattered nerves. If he was going to be on a broom dive-bombing for the earth at a hundred and sixty miles an hour, he wanted to be the one driving. The last person he wanted driving his goddamn broom and determining his fate was Ginny, a witch with no magic and no sense of self-preservation. But Draco was neither driving nor riding. He was standing on the ground watching as Ginny hurdled toward the ground, and there wasn't a fucking thing he could do about it.

Maybe he needed two drinks. Draco reached for the bottle of Firewhiskey.

She knew. The day she pushed his love aside and nicked his knives and headed back to Bulgaria, she knew what kind of mission she was embarking on - an impossible, suicidal one. She knew Petkov wanted her by Chervenko's side to protect the dying rebel king and kill his would be assassins. She knew they were asking her to lay her life on the line for that ruddy piece of Bulgarian rebel trash, again.

She never expected to return. He didn't need to close his eyes to see her terrified eyes or feel her trembling body in his arms. Draco buried his face in his hands as he heard her frantic voice whispering in his ear and felt her aching lips on his.

----- ----- -----

"BULGARIAN MINISTER OF MAGIC REGAINS CONSCIOUSNESS"

"BULGARIAN TROOPS SECURE MAGICAL BORDERS"

It was over. One week later, Draco stared at the Prophet. Not only had she killed for him but she had also managed to resurrect the stinking bastard. The wily Bulgarian leader was back on his feet, defending their borders and squelching all attempts at an invasion. Draco groaned, put his teacup down and settled his eyes on the picture of Chervenko waving to the masses with one hand and holding Ginny's hand with the other.

It was Draco's first look at her in weeks. Didn't they have any food in the place? She looked horrible, exhausted and stressed and too thin. Where was it? Draco strained for a peek at the Portkey he had thrown around her neck, but all he could see was her scarf, some hideous grey thing and not the Slytherin green one she had nicked from him.

Goddamn it, was the ruddy Bulgarian part vampire? What did it take to kill him? A stake through the heart? The only one with a stake through his heart was Draco, who threw down the Prophet and Disapparated. She was safe but, unfortunately, so was her husband.

----- ----- -----

Three weeks later, Draco received an owl from Ginny. It arrived late one night as he was crawling into bed. "Lumos." By the brilliant light of his wand, he devoured her words again and again before collapsing into bed and draping the bedcovers over his motionless body and his aching head in a futile attempt to shut out the intrusive world he loathed.

Yes, wizarding marriages were forever. No, there was no divorce but arrangements were often made. There would be no such arrangement for Ginny. She had decided to remain in Bulgaria with her arsehole of a resurrected husband. She would not be returning to England, now or ever.

Yes, he was a Malfoy and a privileged Death Eater who sat atop the societal ladder in wizarding England. However, he understood what "fuck off" meant as well as the next wizard.

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Author's Notes:

Schlepping back with another chapter for your perusal. Many thanks to Marcia, my beta, for her help in restructuring this chapter. What a clever and insightful gem that woman is! A special thank you to all who have stuck with me, continuing to read and review this everlasting tale. In particular, Alexandria Malfoy, Hermione's Shadow, Alana, MarenKPotter, miss_understood, Anastasia_Mei, prue1912, NicolePotter86, CrookshanksGranger, pcgrimmy, moogle, jchaser, anonymous, anonymous, fondlewand, hermione278, anonymous, blissfulxsin and Jory. You've kept me going when the going got dark! Not to worry - the end of this bumpy ride will be upon us soon. - fallenwitch

Chapter 18

A True Pureblooded Witch

Three days later, Draco crawled out of his shite hole, showered and began sizing up the situation. He paused in front of the mirror and startled at the pathetic, ghost-like image staring back at him: the dishevelled platinum hair, the irritable bloodshot eyes and the miserable face swathed in days of neglected stubble. He looked like shite, felt like shite and, until few minutes ago, had smelled like shite as well. She had reduced him to a seething, worthless pile yet again.

He hauled his hungover arse up and walked down two doors to her bedroom. The door was ajar. He kicked it open, a bottle of Firewhiskey in one hand and a crystal tumbler in the other. The midday sunlight crashed into him, breaking over the top of his pounding head and landing in a golden puddle around his boots. He stared at the barren and desolate place bereft of her presence and her particular magic, Squib or not.

He crossed the lifeless room and collapsed into an overstuffed chair covered in rich, raw silk in varying shades of muted pink. Tucking the tumbler under his chin, he opened the bottle of Firewhiskey, poured a stiff dose of the heart-numbing, mind-dumbing toxin and stretched out his legs.

What was it this time? He didn't know, couldn't guess and wasn't sure he cared. Mrs. Ginevra Weasley Chervenko was not only the wife of an indestructible wizard but also a losing proposition. His current suffering was the culmination of two years of a disastrous emotional investment. Her stock had long ago crashed and burned. He'd known this when he took her in the second time, but his foolish, desperate heart could not be stopped.

Draco stared at her bed, the place of her second resurrection. He would have given her his life if she wanted it, but she didn't. Turns out she didn't want a damn thing from him, not his love or his life or his manor full of trinkets. She had gotten what she wanted from him - his invaluable Malfoy protection and his exclusive healthcare services. He had thrown in his ridiculous heart and soul for free. It didn't matter. She was done with him.

He could debate her feelings for him with his tail between his legs, but in the end, he decided it didn't matter if she loved him or not. Whatever her feelings for him, they were inconsequential in the context of her notorious, fucked-up life with its multiple hidden agendas, the life she had repeatedly chosen over him. So she could stroke her Bulgarian fetish and screw her fucking husband and live out the rest of her sodden life producing half-Bulgarian spawn for all he cared.

Draco took a large gulp of the burning amber liquid which chased his heartache straight to the pit of his bitter, acid-filled stomach where it dropped like a fiery stone. After another pint or two, he wouldn't remember his own name, much less hers.

That was the moment a sudden, distinctive whirlwind of motion took hold of the room. Draco sat up and stared. Other than his, there was only one Portkey to the Manor, and that Portkey lay around Ginny's neck and led directly to her bedroom. He put his tumbler of toxins down.

A tall, handsome wizard in fine black robes dropped out of the sky, hit the ground and froze. The tip of Draco's wand dug into his jugular. He looked over, only to encounter Draco's sneering face inches away and furious.

Why was it when you gave a witch a Portkey, everyone in the world used it except her? Was it some kind of open season? And what the hell did this message boy want anyway? "Don't you goddamn Bulgarians ever use a bloody front door?" Rude as hell arseholes.

Christo's razor-sharp blue eyes cut into Draco's. "I apologize for the unannounced visit, Mr. Malfoy. As you can see, I am alone and come with no ill intent. If you could spare a moment, I would appreciate a word with you."

Well, this obviously wasn't the Great Bulgarian Freedom Fighters' Invasion of England, not with an anaemic army of one. Draco's wand hand began to itch and ignited an unbearable desire to be scratched. One swift Avada and his worst fucking Bulgarian nightmare would be over. No matter how fast Chervenko was, he wasn't that fast. As this scenario percolated through the edgy neurons in his cerebral cortex, a dozen competing scenarios rattled through his brain, disrupting the shite out of his crazed heart and his Ginny-adulterated mind. Goddamn it.

"Has something happened to Ginny?" Draco growled, more worry than not creeping into his voice.

"Not exactly," Christo said, "but I've come on her behalf with a proposition of sorts."

Draco pressed his irritated wand further into Chervenko's neck, completely compressing his precious jugular and stared at the ruddy Bulgarian idiot. "Not exactly what? Has she been injured again, yes or no?" It was a bloody simple question. Even a terrorist troll like His Royal Arseness could answer it.

"No, she has not been injured again."

Several tense seconds later, Draco sharply withdrew his wand and motioned for Chervenko to take the seat across from his in front of the fireplace. Christo looked around the large, exquisitely furnished room, decorated for a woman. As he sat in the pink chair identical to Draco's, he spied the open bottle of Firewhiskey and the freshly filled tumbler belonging to his disheveled host.

"Care for a drink, Minister?" Draco picked up the bottle of Firewhiskey.

"No, thank you," Christo said, shaking his head and watching his potentially intoxicated host settle into the chair across from him, wand still in hand.

Chervenko began by sliding a nondescript metal coin onto the coffee table. "Mr. Malfoy, this is a Portkey to my home in Bulgaria. If Ginny wishes to leave with you, she is free to go. I will grant her an annulment."

"An annulment?"

"Yes, an annulment. However, if she decides to remain with me, or you choose not to come to Bulgaria for her, I will consummate our marriage, and you will never see her again. I am making this proposition on her behalf but without her knowledge."

Christo dropped his eyes, ran a frustrated hand through his tumble of shiny dark locks and let out a sigh. "I have done everything within my power to restore some semblance of her magic - scoured every ancient text, consulted with the best Dark Magic experts and raided every private vault in Bulgaria. There is no cure and no sign of the original curse. She will remain without magic for the rest of her life."

He looked up, defeat bound in his tired blue eyes as they locked onto Draco's. "I love my wife, Mr. Malfoy, but I'm not blind. Ginny's happiness is all that matters. It's the least I can do for her." Christo ran a tense hand over his face. "I think I will have that drink after all."

Draco transfigured a glass, filled it with Firewhiskey and handed it to Chervenko, who took it and swallowed half of the liquid in one stinging gulp.

"She's dying."

"What?" Draco said, leaning forward.

"She's dying, Mr. Malfoy, and there's not a damn thing either one of us can do to stop it."

"How can she be dying if she hasn't been injured again?"

"Ginny is a pureblooded witch, a true pureblooded witch. The moment the Dark curse took her magic she began to die. Her life force lies within her magic. Without it, she cannot survive. I have the best Dark Magic Healers in the world at my disposal in Bulgaria, and they have never seen a case like hers before."

"Are you sure?"

"Short of giving her her magic back, there is nothing we can do. And without the original curse, I know of no way to return her magic to her. Do you?"

"Does she know?"

Chervenko took another sip of Firewhiskey. "Of course she knows. She's known for almost two months. Unfortunately, she spent five weeks of that time saving my life."

"How long does she have left?"

"Extrapolating from the date of her curse and her current course, our Healers estimate two weeks give or take a week, but this is only a crude guess, Mr. Malfoy. No Healer I know of has any experience with this type of illness. The curse that took her magic was an ancient one indeed."

A tense silence overtook the room and the two wizards, bound by the love of the same woman, sat in the pink chairs in her room ingesting Firewhiskey and staring at one another. The fight of their lives was over. Ginny wasn't going to be spending the next one hundred years of her life with either of them. She was going to exit stage left and leave them grasping for their winsome leading lady.

Draco pocketed his wand. Chervenko had come to acknowledge Draco as Ginny's leading man, even if their act was to be a brief one. Chervenko had the balls and the heart to allow her to die in the arms of the man she loved, the one she gave her life for, the one who held her heart in his.

Many minutes later, Christo reached into his cloak and pulled out the Portkey Draco had given Ginny, the silver chain with medallion. He dropped it on the table before standing.

"The Portkey to my home expires in two days. With this offer, Mr. Malfoy, I consider my debt to you paid in full should we meet again in the future under different circumstances."

----- ----- -----

Hours later, Christo knelt at Ginny's bedside. "Ginny," he whispered, kissing her forehead, "you have a visitor." When she shook her head and buried her face in the pillow, Christo drew open the heavy silk drapes with his wand, letting the piercing late afternoon sunlight stream into the room and creep into every crack and crevice and pore, setting the enormous room afire. She groaned and attempted to pull the bedcovers over her head, but Christo held them firm.

"No, Christo," she whined, refusing to open her eyes. "No visitors, not today, please."

"I'm afraid this one won't be turned away. He's come a long way to speak with you. It won't do for him to see anyone else." He kissed her cheek. She opened her drowsy eyes and looked up at him, too tired to glare.

"My potion, Christo."

----- ----- -----

The guard glanced over at the tall, immaculately dressed foreign Death Eater who had stopped pacing long enough to glance outside the tall, cathedral style windows at one end of the sitting room. He stood there for some moments studying the formal gardens dressed in their splendid winter finery, the fingers on his wand hand drumming anxiously against his leg. Who was this wizard?

"Draco?"

He swung around at the sound of her voice, and the four guards stationed around the room came to attention, boots snapping, before exiting as previously instructed.

She paid them no heed but continued moving forward across the large room to him, her confused dark eyes transfixed.

"Hullo, Ginny," he said softly, eyes alight, as she came to him.

She stopped and studied his throbbing left jugular, watching its steady, life-giving rhythm before reaching out to touch the front of his fine robes with her fingertips, freezing the moment she felt his hardened chest beneath.

"What are you doing here?" she breathed, withdrawing her hand and looking up at him.

But he did not let her go. He caught her hand and held it in his. "I've come to take you home."

Her face fell and she dropped her eyes from his, the spell broken. "I'm afraid I can't do that."

"Don't be ridiculous, Ginny. Of course, you can."

"No, I can't and I won't." She began tugging on her hand, trying to release it from his grasp, but he refused to let go.

"I know," he whispered, his grey eyes fixed on her futile attempt to cast him aside again.

"You know what?"

"Everything. I know everything, Ginny."

"Do you know that you're bruising my hand?" she spat out, now jerking on her hand, still snug in his.

"Stop fighting me."

"I'm not fighting you." Her hand stilled.

"Then what are you doing?"

"I'm running away from you. There's a difference."

"Don't, Ginny," he admonished, staring at her, but she looked away, sticking her freckled chin up in the air, her shimmering crimson locks tumbling down her back. "Ginny," he beckoned, leaning forward to whisper into her ear, "I know that your marriage to Chervenko is an unconsummated sham. And I know that he'll annul it if you choose to defect and run off to England with me."

She didn't move or respond to his revelations

He placed a gentle kiss on her cheek and another on her throat and then another as he nuzzled into her still neck, alive with her scent. When he spoke, his hot breath sizzled on her cool skin. "Don't turn me away this time, Ginny. There won't be a second chance for us. We haven't much time left, not with that curse on our backs."

"You've been conspiring with Christo behind my back," she said, disdain in her voice.

"And you've been lying to me all along," he returned, not moving from her.

"You don't understand."

"Then make me understand." He released her hand from his and straightened. Only then did he see the aching misery etched on her face and the tears brimming in her eyes. She was staring at him with a look he did not recognize and could not decipher. It was as foreign as the thought of life without her.

"I am not who I was, but it is not death that I fear."

With unsteady hands, she methodically unfastened her brilliant blue robes and let them drop to the floor. When they fell, the beauty charms they held fell with them, and there was no place left to hide. She stood splayed open in all of her horror before him.

Draco was staring and he couldn't stop staring, even knowing his egregious breech in etiquette was devastating for her. She was gone. His beautiful Ginny was gone. In her place stood an emaciated figure, wretched and pale and without a sparkle. Good god.

"Don't ask me to watch your love for me destroyed. I have my pride and vanity as well. Go home, Draco." Ginny dropped to the floor and threw her robes around her shoulders, sheltering them both from the truth of her. Instead of rising like the Phoenix he had always known her to be, she crumpled into a motionless heap, her face hidden among the voluminous folds of her robes. She had neither the will nor the ability to rise again. Her wings had been clipped. She would never fly again.

Draco dropped to his knees beside Ginny and gently gathered his broken, flightless Phoenix into his consoling arms, afraid he would crush her under the weight of his breaking heart. "Ginny," he murmured, cradling her tragically limp form to his and kissing the top of her crimson locks, "you're many things, but a keen judge of character is not one of them."

When she looked up, he stared down at her with his clear grey eyes. "I am not the weak-hearted wizard you believe me to be. If you think this curse has affected my feelings for you or my wanting you, you are wrong." He leaned down and kissed her tearstained lips, a chaste, tender kiss. When he drew back, her big, dark eyes were staring at him. He raised an eyebrow at her. "What?"

She didn't speak. Instead, she reached out and kissed him back, a hungry, desperate kiss that left him wanting for more. "Ginny," he whispered, his lips on hers, his body against hers, "there's nothing I want more than to throw you to the ground and ravish you. However, I don't think your husband or the guards listening to this conversation outside that door would be amused by our adulterous antics, do you?"

Without taking her eyes off of him, she released her hold on him and shook her head.

Draco rose and held out his hand for her. "Come, it's time to go home."

Without another word and with no looking back, Ginny placed her hand in Draco's. He pulled her up and locked his arms around her. Surrounded by his love and his magnificent presence, Ginny laid her weary head on his chest. "I haven't the strength to port back to England."

"I have enough strength for the both of us." With that, Draco activated his Portkey, liberating her from the killing fields of Bulgaria.

After seven long years of battling, the War was finally over for Ginny. He was asking her to lay down her sword and come home. There would be no more wars or prisons or political assassinations. Instead, there would be Draco and only Draco until she slipped from his arms across the veil and was no more.

Author's Note: Nope, not over yet but soon. Thanks for reading. -fallenwitch

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