Stockholm Syndrome: Draco and Ginny
A/N: So here we are, second chapter. Wow. This one's on the first day of the hostage week. Apologies to all who expected a review within…a month. I'm sorry, and I'll try to update more consistently soon. Thank you!
Enjoy,
Misao
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Stockholm Syndrome: Draco and Ginny
Day 1: Pain and Panic
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In Ginny's mind, she could still hear the sound of Ron's voice calling after her as she left with Luna for their Hogsmeade shopping trip.
"Be careful, Gin." Ron, ever the overprotective brother, had spent a good ten minutes lecturing her and Luna on the importance of staying together. "If something should happen - "
"Relax, Ron!" She'd laughed. "We're just going to Hogsmeade. It's a village full of wizards and witches. We're not even going off the main street."
Luna had drifted in then, in her mystifying little way. At nineteen years of age, she was no longer the Loony Lovegood of Hogwarts derision, but still retained a faint air of detachedness. Regardless, she was one of Ginny's best friends and one of her dear flatmates. "She's right, Ronald," she'd said. "It's all almost over. The chances are slim at best."
Slim at best. Ginny felt like kicking herself in the backside. Somehow, something had gone wrong. The Death Eaters had found her and Luna, unleashing a pretty good distraction and another onslaught of fear only days after Harry and the Order had finally managed to incapacitate Bellatrix Lestrange. Luna had been hit with a Cruciatus not five paces from Fred and George's shop. Worse, Draco Malfoy had somehow come back from dead obscurity and -
Oh, shit. Draco Malfoy.
How Draco had managed to stay alive after Dumbledore had taken Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy down would be something Hermione was sure to puzzle over for days. Even worse, Draco and the Death Eaters had obviously only been in Hogsmeade solely to kidnap her, which meant that they had been observing her for months.
The initial panic had worn off ages ago. Now Ginny was lying facedown on the bed, trying to go over her situation and figure out the best course of action like a regular Hermione or Harry. She had never been kidnapped before. She had never even been without her wand since second year. She had assisted Harry in retrieving Dobby the house-elf once, but that was it. Ron hadn't let her do any formal training, damn his brotherly intentions. Now look where that had gotten her.
Ginny scrunched her eyes even tighter than they had been, trying to stave off the moment she had to open her eyes and look around what was obviously a cell of some sort. Draco Malfoy. Oh, she'd had quite a history with him.
Ginny squeezed her eyes dead shut and turned her head deeper into the soft, cloud-like pillow. Draco probably didn't even care about what he'd done. He probably didn't even remember. Just another conquest. Just another entry in his book.
Ginny didn't know what to feel. She didn't know what to think. Draco Malfoy was among the more evil beings to walk the Earth, she knew. His father was a Death Eater. He was definitely one himself, one who had just kidnapped her for Merlin's sake. Death Eaters were cold, ruthless beings capable of anything. Death Eaters didn't feel.
There was no use hiding anymore. Ginny steeled herself against the worst and slowly, carefully opened her eyes, blinking several times to clear her vision. What she saw briefly astonished her.
She wasn't in a dark, dingy prison cell with rats running around and a single hole through which a pinprick of light shone through. Rather, this cell was more guest room than hellhole. She was lying on a relatively comfortable four-poster bed, soft and smooth between the sheets and nicely air conditioned. There was a bedside table with a large antique lamp and glowing wizard clock on her right side.
To her left, in front of a large glassy window, was a small parlor-like area with three or four comfortable-looking armchairs situated around an ornate coffee table. The dresser directly across from the bed was large and pricey-looking, with mahogany everything and a large, flawless mirror. The carpet was soft and plush beneath her feet as she swung her legs over the side of the bed. The walls were painted a pleasant, light violet - how had he known that her favorite color was violet?
Ginny looked around, bewildered. The room looked more like a penthouse than a dungeon.
Bollocks. Being kidnapped in broad daylight was enough. Now she wouldn't even get to give graphic descriptions of her horrid living conditions to the legions of adoring, caring well-wishers at her homecoming. Some hero she was.
She stood and walked to the clearer-than-crystal window, feet making soft noises on the carpet. Malfoy Manor was situated on a hill overlooking what seemed to be the entirety of the British Isles. On the gentle slope of the hill beneath her was an obviously Wizarding village that seemed to be thriving. The area was decidedly lush and green, surrounded by rolling hills and acres of forest.
So this was where Malfoy had grown up. What insidious element was she missing? What vile secret of the happy little village below her had produced such a cruel, taunting, sneering boy?
Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door opening behind her. She whirled around, hand instinctively reaching for her wand in her jacket pocket, cursing as she remembered that it was gone.
A pair of huge eyes widened well below her eye level. "Miss is awake!"
"What?" Ginny barely had time to eke out the breathy question before the Dobby replica had placed a silver tray on the bedside table and whisked her back into bed.
"Noddy is happy that Miss is awake," the house-elf told her as the tray reappeared inches from her nose, loaded with a delicious-looking lunch. "Noddy has been waiting. Sir told Noddy to wait for Miss to wake before serving him his dinner."
"Malfoy?" Ginny asked as Noddy pushed a polished silver fork into her hand.
The elf nodded. "The junior, Miss. Sir is the only one left. Master and Mistress went away for bad things they did. Eat, Miss."
Ginny apprehensively glanced at the delicious-looking feast at her fingertips. The elf caught her glance and smiled warmly. "Do not worry, Miss. Noddy has not poisoned Miss's food. Sir wishes that you stay alive. Master and Mistress would have wished you gone."
"Narcissa and Lucius Malfoy." Ginny nodded, uncertainly taking a bite of the beef laid out in front of her. Her eyes shot up. "Wow, Noddy, thank you! This is delicious!"
"It is nothing to Noddy, Miss," he said, even as his cheeks reddened. "Noddy is used to cooking for Sir. Miss is eating just like Sir. Oh - " his eyes burst wide open - " - Noddy has forgotten! Sir wishes to eat only after Miss has begun. Noddy must give Sir his food."
Ginny nodded, still furiously chewing the delicious beef. Noddy rushed out of the room with a parting squeal and left her alone to her thoughts and her food.
So this is what it's like to be kidnapped. Ginny turned and surveyed the area. There were no visible exits. The room was a good fifty feet from the ground. If she tried to jump, she'd die. She didn't have her wand. Malfoy would have had enough sense to place anti-Apparition charms around the room and probably around the manor as well.
The door opened again. Ginny instinctively crouched low in the bed, pushed the tray aside, and clutched the silver fork. It was her only weapon, and she intended to use it wisely.
In walked Draco Malfoy.
He stood in the doorway and looked at her for a moment. Her eyes darted back and forth in between the window and him. He would probably torture her. Rape her, even. If she burst through the window she could, with enough momentum, jump far enough to reach the tree halfway down, but he would come after her. Did she have enough time?
"Have you been eating?" His voice was deeper than she remembered.
"Yes." Ginny tried to keep the fear from her voice as he walked over to her bed. "It's very good, thank you."
She made her break. She grabbed the edge of the cover and threw it in his face, broke out sprinting toward the window, and crashed through shoulder-first -
Ow.
Somehow, the move always looked cooler when Harry and Ron did it.
For a brief second, she was falling through the air. She was faintly aware of the glass shards and blood falling around her, and the throbbing pain in her right shoulder - she couldn't see anything, everything was flying past - there was an odd whooshing in her ears, not quite like the sound of the wind flying past when she was on her broom - and a second later she landed with a painful thump in the bushes.
Missed the tree, she thought with a grin, and then she blacked out.
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"Stupid, stupid, stupid!"
Ow. Someone was slapping her lightly on the cheek. Somehow, it stung horribly with every smack.
"Sir, Miss is awake!"
"Stupid, stupid, STUPID!"
More slapping. Ginny groaned weakly and tried to lift her hand, but something cold and wet was pressing hard on it. A terrific weight was pressing down on her chest and stomach and it was becoming a little hard to breathe.
"Miss is awake!" Noddy's high-pitched squeal shot through her aching head like a lightning bolt. "Miss is awake! Sir must stop!"
The slapping stopped. The pressure on her chest lifted. A rough thumb forced her eyelids open and a piercing light was shone into her eyes.
"For Chrissakes…" a low voice muttered. "What the devil were you doing, jumping out of the window like that…could've been seriously hurt…"
The wet something pressing on her hand lifted. She turned her head from the sharp light and looked down to see Noddy applying some sort of salve to her bloodied hand.
Her head flopped back down. She'd failed in escaping. The dull, throbbing pain she felt all over body and the sharper piercing in her shoulder were all she had. Damn.
"I suppose you're going to beat me now," she said dully. "And torture me with knives and corkscrews. And possibly rape me."
"No," Malfoy muttered. He was bent over her shoulder, doing something with a pair of tweezers. She couldn't see anything but the dark red canopy of her bed. "I'm not going to do anything."
"Oh, please," she said bitterly. "You don't expect me to believe that. Likely, you're going to - "
Malfoy stood up and threw something onto a tray by her bed. "Shut up," he grunted, and leaned down again.
"What's that?" Ginny asked. "What's on the tray?"
"Bloody glass," he said, with just a hint of mockery. "From your shoulder. Congratulations, Weasley, your little escapade earned you about seven pieces of glass in your shoulder, not counting the little bits that Noddy took care of."
Ginny paled and tried to move her head, but Noddy's hand flew up and trapped it in place. "Hold still, please! Miss' hand is bloody, and Noddy wishes to take care of it."
An hour later, Malfoy triumphantly raised the bloody tweezers in front of her face, in which was held a sliver of blood-stained glass. "That's the last one, Weasley." He cast it off into the tray and turned back to her shoulder with a fresh gauze. "I would use magic to fix this, but I'm not supposed to."
"Not supposed to?" Ginny shrieked. "I could be dying, and you aren't supposed to - ?"
"Relax and shut up, Weasley." Malfoy's wand, clenched in his fist, appeared in her field of vision. "I can shut you up for you, if you'd like."
Ginny clamped her mouth shut. She had to get out of this mess somehow. Maybe if she moved her hand a little, she could reach the tweezers -
"Don't even think about moving," Malfoy muttered.
Ginny froze.
Malfoy was chuckling darkly. "Don't think for a moment that only Potter can read minds."
Harry could read minds? Harry could read minds. Harry could read minds, and nobody had ever told her.
"Why would they tell you?" Malfoy wasn't chuckling anymore. His hands worked quickly and deftly as he taped the gauze to her shoulder and fixed an elastic band onto it so that she could move her arm. She noticed with a jolt that Noddy had left the room.
"Why wouldn't they?" Ginny asked defiantly. "I'm a member of the Order, just like everyone else. I deserve to know."
Malfoy switched off the surgical lamp that had been hovering over her shoulder and reached over to examine her other hand. He stood up and carted the tray away. Just before he entered the doorway, he turned and looked directly at Ginny. Somehow, his gaze made Ginny want to crawl under her blanket for the rest of her life.
"Don't kid yourself."
Then he was gone.
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