The house was unusually quiet for the middle of the night. Lucius typically held his Death Eater meetings well after hours and Ginny preferred to stay upstairs and avoid the crowd. They made her skin crawl. Occasionally she was asked to attend and Draco made polite excuses, but it didn’t always work. They made her attend the night after Harry died, after he killed him. Lucius and his cohorts made a spectacle of kicking and hexing Harry’s corpse while he sat in a chair in the corner and laughed. Ginny stared into his eyes, still a startlingly vibrant green even in death. When MacNair’s boot stomped on Harry’s face and crushed his skull, Ginny lost her composure and vomited on the floor. Unnoticed by the other Death Eaters, Draco led her out and to their room. He helped her wash her face in between her bouts of retching and crying. When she was calm enough to sleep, he gave her a dreamless sleep draught and went back downstairs. Her last memory was the opening and closing of the bedroom door.

Draco wasn’t home yet and Ginny couldn’t sleep. After peeking her head out their door and hearing silence, she decided it was safe to wander the Manor. For all the horror the place held, it was beautiful as well. Ginny had loved history at Hogwarts and Malfoy Manor was not lacking, and the portraits did love to talk. Not only did they tell the stories of who they were, but also of what they had witnessed in the Manor. A portrait of a Black ancestor that hung in the library loved to tell stories of Draco as a child. Ginny came to her most often since she had the happiest tales. One night Ginny had teased Draco to no end about running around the house starkers at three, changing books into stuffed animals. She thought it was adorable until Draco told her it was because he wasn’t allowed to have any. After that she kept the stories to herself and quietly thanked her parents for being parents.

On her way to the library, a loud crashing in Lucius’ study distracted her. Ginny wrapped her arms around herself and pulled the white nightshift taunt across her back. Silently cursing herself for not bringing her wand, Ginny made her steps as quiet as she could. Years of living with brothers made her a professional eavesdropper, as blackmail was always a useful thing in the Weasley house.

Bending to look in the keyhole of the door, Ginny could not make out much. Lucius was pacing the floor and there was a body slumped in the corner that moved every now and again. The light from the fireplace illuminated most of the room, but the man was cast in the shadow of one of the chairs. Lucius leaned down and brought his face eye level with the man’s.

“We’re still looking for Ms. Granger, and I have it on good authority you know of her whereabouts. Now, you and your filthy blood traitor family are close to her, so where is she?”

Ginny saw the man shake his head and then spit in Lucius’ face. Lucius wiped it off with the back of his sleeve and then whispered an incantation as he ran his wand from the man’s armpit to shoulder. The arm fell to the ground and the man threw his head back and screamed. Ginny clasped her hands to her mouth to muffle her own scream as she saw the man’s face. She didn’t even notice that Lucius had Apparated from the room until she felt the hand on her shoulder.

“Ginevra, what a pleasure to find you outside my door. I have a guest this evening. Do come in and say hello. As a Malfoy lady it is your duty to make sure our guest is as comfortable as possible.”

Lucius opened the door and pushed Ginny into the room. Her eyes went straight to the man in the corner and to the arm at his side. His brown eyes connected with hers and she could read his emotions. The pain etched on his face ripped her heart open, but the betrayal in his eyes was burned on her soul. Ginny broke the eye contact and looked to the ground.

“Now, dear, let me show you how Malfoys make their guests comfortable.”

Lucius raised his wand.

Draco was taking his shoes off when his wife walked in the room. Used to her late night wanderings, he didn’t think to look up until he heard glass break directly to the side of his head.

Ginny’s nightgown had smears of blood at the bottom and there were some on her face and arms. Her hands were shaking. Draco calmly walked to her and pulled her slowly in his arms.

“What happened?”

After a few minutes Ginny answered, “Your father has a guest.”

“Who is his guest?”

Draco knew the perversions of the men in his father’s company like Dolohov and Nott. He inwardly cringed as he imagined what Ginny had witnessed. Draco never once worried that the blood might be her own; as his wife, she was safe from their lechery.

“Charlie.”

Draco scrapped his mind for a face to match the name but came up blank.

“I don’t know a Charlie. What is his surname?”

Ginny looked up and pushed the stray hairs from in front of his face. Draco closed his eyes and let his face rest in the comfort of her soft hand.

“Same as mine used to be… Weasley.”

The air left his lungs and a heavy pain settled in his chest. He wrapped his arms around Ginny tighter. Her words came out in a rush.

“He severed his arm from his body. The fingers, they were still twitching on the hand, like they were trying to wave to me. After that Charlie tried so hard not to scream that he bit his lip until it bleed. Not just a few drops, but a stream. Your father made me stay there and watch. He said I needed to learn how a true Malfoy treats their guests. He used Crucio on him, but Charlie refused to talk. It all had something to do with Hermione, but Charlie just wouldn’t talk. He kept looking at me. I couldn’t look at him. I couldn’t even face my own brother! I kept begging your father to stop, to let me leave, he just kept saying, ‘Ginevra, this is something you have to learn as a Malfoy.’”

Draco released her when her hands pushed against his chest. Ginny began to pace the room, her bare feet leaving imprints of her toes and heels in the plush carpet.

“Do you know what your father did to him when he wouldn’t speak? Do you know the Malfoy way to handle a guest who won’t speak?”

He knew the question was rhetorical, but Draco answered her anyway by shaking his head.

“He removed his tongue.”

Ginny began to cry. Draco went to hold her again but she ran from him like he was poison.

“He didn’t just remove his tongue Draco, he cut it out. He had some sort of metal clamp thing and he pulled Charlie’s tongue out his mouth and cut it off with a knife. And then he threw it at me!”

Ginny pointed down to the smear of blood on the bottom of her gown. The tears had nearly washed all the blood off her face by now.

“When I tried to hold Charlie, to do something, anything, to help him, he jerked away from me. Your father is right, I am a blood traitor. I betrayed my own family! For you! For your peace of mind I became what you wanted me to be.”

Ginny pointed to the Dark Mark on her inner arm. “I sold my family for this, and now it’s imprinted on my soul that I am marked as someone else’s property. How do you like it that another man has a mark on your wife that is more lasting than the one you put on my hand? Look, I can take this one off.”

Draco flinched as the gold ring hit him on the cheek. Ginny began to shake again and muttered words under her breath that he couldn’t hear. It wasn’t until he saw her pick up the broken glass from the vase that he caught that she was saying I’ve got to get it off in repetition. Ginny began to scrape at the Dark Mark on her arm. By the time Draco reached her to hit the glass out of her hand, she was already bloody, but the mark stayed black as ever on her pale skin.

Draco closed his arms around her and watched as Ginny’s blood slowly began turning parts of his shirt red.