Ginny had Draco's wrist gripped firmly as she went to lead him through the wards of the Manor when he suddenly pulled his wrist away.
"NO!" he quickly shouted, as he growled again in pain and tried to rub his eyes.
"What do you mean no? You need an antidote or something for your eyes; you have no idea what kind of damage that curse can do to you, NOW COME ON!" she said firmly, grabbing his shirt sleeve roughly and tried pulling him through.
"STOP FOR A DAMN SECOND, WEASLEY!" he yelled once more.
She turned to look at him, he had a pained look on his face and his eyes were red and swollen from the spell that hit him. She knew he couldn't see a damn thing since he kept tightly closing his eyes and desperately tried to readjust them to get some sort of sight back.
"My...UGH, BLOODY HELL THIS BURNS!" he growled once more in pain. "My parents can't know about this. They will-"
"Pfft, yeah ok, Harry is going to be here anytime now and you'll have no choice but to let them know, besides, I don't even know a counter-curse or anything for this spell, we need your mum's help," she argued; attempting to drag him once more.
"WEASLEY, I'M SERIOUS!" he yelled a bit louder than he intended as another wave of burning and stinging filled his eyes.
Ginny just stared at him for a moment with an angry look on her face; again she knew he couldn't see her, but she knew there was no way around this. She quickly grabbed his arm and with as much force as she could muster up, she pulled him so roughly through the ward with her that he almost fell to the ground. She knew as soon as someone entered the wards the Malfoys would be alerted and be before her in a matter of moments. She knew Draco was livid, but he didn't say anything to her once she pulled him through, she was sure the pain in his eyes was overtaking any anger he had towards her right now.
Just as Ginny had opened the front doors, she was immediately met by Lucius and Narcissa's shocked expressions as she dragged him inside past them.
"WHAT THE BLOODY HELL HAPPENED TO YOU, DRACO?" Narcissa shouted, a worried look covering her face as she quickly grabbed his face and examined it.
"I'm fine, Mother- I-UGH! CAN SOMEBODY PLEASE MAKE THIS FUCKIN STINGING GO AWAY!" he yelled as he brought his hands up to his eyes once more.
"STOP RUBBING THEM!" Narcissa and Ginny shouted out in unison.
Tilly came over with a wet rag and some water that Narcissa had gestured for her to grab as soon as she saw the state Draco was in.
"Draco, what happened? Who did this to you?" Lucius demanded.
Draco didn't answer, he just squeezed his eyes tightly shut again as the pain continued. Narcissa quickly raised her wand and put a charm on his eyes that quickly made most of the pain and stinging subside.
"There is no counter-curse, you just need to wait for the effects to wear off," Narcissa explained. "It will take about an hour before your vision comes back fully, but the charm I used will make it more bearable." she finished, as she went to grab the wet rag for his eyes but saw Ginny had already grabbed it.
Ginny grabbed Draco's face roughly and started rinsing his eyes for him. "Why the hell were you running after someone who attacked us?" she asked angrily.
"WHO ATTACKED YOU?" Lucius and Narcissa both yelled.
"It was nobody," Draco mumbled with a sneer before grabbing the rag from Ginny's hands and continued rinsing his eyes himself.
Before Narcissa and Lucius could question him further it was Ginny, who went off on him.
"NOBODY? THAT'S NOT WHAT IT LOOKED LIKE TO ME, YOU KNEW WHO THAT WAS, AND YOU RAN LIKE A BLOODY FOOL AFTER THEM, EVEN WHEN YOU KNEW WE WERE OUTNUMBERED!" she shouted, looking at him fiercely even though she knew he couldn't see her.
"They were there.......it was them," Draco said so quietly it was almost inaudible.
Ginny looked confused, but Lucius and Narcissa seemed to completely understand what Draco meant. Narcissa walked over to Draco and softly ran her hand through his hair and cupped his face lightly before turning to Ginny.
"Miss Weasley, I think it's best you don't come back here or include Draco in any more of your "outings" because it has become apparent that you're nothing but trouble," she said with a sneering, yet firm, tone.
"What the hell does that mean?" Ginny said defensively, her anger rising.
"It means that this playing pretend to get along with one another will never work, so quit while you're ahead and let's do ourselves the favor and leave things be." Lucius cut in.
Ginny just stood there shaking her head in annoyance with a slight sneer. "You two can go ahead and think whatever it is you want, but I'll have you know that if I hadn't run after your precious little boy......he'd be dead right now.....so you're welcome," she said before turning on her heel and walking away into a different room to wait until Harry arrived.
Narcissa and Lucius just exchanged a look and then glanced at their son. They understood why Draco ran after these people and knew it very well to be Draco, who initiated the chase; why they wanted to flip it onto the Weasley girl was just an excuse to not have to associate with them any further.
"I'm sorry," Draco suddenly whispered. His parents were beside him in a moment. "I know what you're going to say and I know everything that has happened to us because of these people, but I didn't care.......I just wanted them dead," he finished, hanging his head so his parents couldn't see the emotion on his face.
"Draco-"
"Stop.....just go check on Weasley or something," he cut his mother off before bringing the wet rag back up to his eyes.
Narcissa looked at her husband and he gave a stiff nod before she started walking away.
____________________________________
Ginny was looking her injuries over in a nearby mirror in the small living room area she wandered into. She was surprised at how scratched and bruised up she was from the earlier events and then gave a small wince as she suddenly remembered the fall she took in that stairwell. She lifted her shirt enough to take a look at her ribs and saw they were badly bruised and she gave a small hiss as she realized just how much pain she was in.
"They look like they could be broken," came a voice from the doorway.
Ginny didn't bother turning around to look at the woman and just shrugged and put her shirt down. "I've had worse......you know from playing such a "barbaric" sport and all," Ginny mocked Narcissa as she took a seat on a nearby chair.
Narcissa cleared her throat to avoid any kind of comeback from escaping her mouth and walked over to Ginny and pulled out her wand. "Let me take a look," she said coldly.
"No thanks, I'm fine, I'll handle it myself," Ginny spat back, her anger rising at how purposely oblivious Lucius and Narcissa acted about the situation.
"Oh, don't be ridiculous, now let me have a look," she demanded.
"Me, ridiculous? You-"
She was cut off when Narcissa swiftly flicked her wand and performed a quick charm on Ginny. She gave a quick, loud gasp as she felt a small pop in her side and then dropped her head in pain as the healing charm started to take effect. Ginny didn't say anything after that, instead, she just sat there in silence as Narcissa took it upon herself to look at the rest of her injuries.
It was quiet for a while before Ginny decided to finally speak.
"Who were those people? Why was Draco so desperate to catch them that he would risk being killed?" she asked, looking up at the blonde before her.
Narcissa looked at her for a moment and then continued healing the burn on Ginny's hand. She was quiet for a while as she thought about what Ginny was asking. "It's not my place to tell you that," was all she said.
Ginny wanted to argue against that, but she knew she wouldn't get any further answers from her. Narcissa suddenly got up and started to walk out of the room when she stopped to look at the redhead for a moment.
"Miss Weasley...... if you truly did save my son's life then.......I'm very grateful for that," she said quickly and then left in a hurry.
Ginny just stared at the spot where she had been standing and thought about the way Narcissa attempted to thank her for saving Draco. She brought her hand up to where there was a large cut on her cheek and thought about how Narcissa said it wasn't her place to explain things to her. She just shook her head in annoyance and walked back towards the foyer where Draco last was. She saw he was having a very heated argument with his father that she definitely wanted to stay clear of and decided to just wander into the dining room. She looked around the room with an amused smirk as she thought back to the obscene dinner her parents had here just a short time ago. Her head quickly snapped up when there was a loud, hard knock on the front door that she knew must have been Harry.
Before she could get to the door to see if it was indeed him, she watched him push past Lucius and look around for someone.
"GINNY!" he called out, hoping to get a glimpse of her.
"I'm right here, Harry," she said, walking over to him.
She was taken aback when he tightly grabbed her to him and hugged her; his hands latching onto her as he let out a sigh of relief.
"Harry, I'm fine," she mumbled against his chest.
He pulled back and then gently grabbed her shoulders and looked her over with a worried look covering his face.
"Are you sure you're ok?" he asked again, gently cupping her face in his hands and looking at the cut on her cheek.
"Y-Yeah......I am," she said, surprised at how concerned and scared he looked that something might've happened to her. She stared into his eyes for a moment as he gave her a small smile.
His facial expression suddenly became angry and then he turned back to Lucius and Narcissa and looked straight past them and right at Draco, whose vision was almost completely back to normal. He walked over to them followed by Ginny and stopped in front of Draco.
"I want to have a word with Draco," he said firmly.
"Very well, we can all talk in the-"
"Alone," Harry quickly said, cutting Lucius off.
Lucius' lip curled into a sneer at this comment. "Of course.......Mr. Potter."
"Harry, don't you want to talk to me too?" Ginny asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Of course, this will just take a moment," he said, grabbing Draco roughly by the arm and leading him to a nearby room for some privacy.
Draco was barely in the room when he felt himself being slammed against the wall hard.
"WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING, MALFOY? AND TO GET GINNY INVOLVED, I SWEAR I COULD KILL YOU!" he yelled loudly in his face, his wand pushed against Draco's throat.
Draco couldn't make out his complete facial expression, but from what he could tell, he was one pissed off Gryffindor. "Relax, Potter, she's just a nosy twit that got mixed up into it. She's the one who followed me, I didn't force her."
"RELAX? DO YOU HEAR YOURSELF? YOU OF ALL PEOPLE KNOW WHAT THESE PEOPLE ARE CAPABLE OF AND YET YOU JUST DIDN'T CARE ABOUT PUTTING HER IN DANGER OR YOURSELF!"
"SHE'S NOT MY PROBLEM, I'M NOT HER DAMN BABYSITTER, POTTER!" he yelled back.
Harry punched Draco hard in the face, making him stumble to the floor and to Harry's surprise, he didn't swing back, instead, he just sat there on the floor holding his jaw and shaking his head. He walked over to him and held his hand out for Draco to take, but he scoffed at it.
"Just get out of here, Potter, as you've reminded me many times before.....there's nothing left to do when it comes to these people," he said, making Harry go stiff at his comment. "Isn't that right? Or is it more that you refuse to further look into-"
"FURTHER LOOK INTO WHAT? THE CASE IS CLOSED AND WILL REMAIN THAT WAY!"
Draco quickly stood up and walked over to the raven-haired man standing in front of him.
"Closed? More like covered up."
"Stop trying to take matters into your own hands, Malfoy...... every time.......EVERY TIME anything with this case is looked into...... people die.......or worse..." he said the last part looking away from the Slytherin.
"Then just get the fuck out of here, what else do you want? You want to arrest me? Go ahead, I don't give a shit," he said before ripping the door open and walking back out to the hall.
Ginny saw Draco walking back towards them and she quickly walked up to him. "What happened? Who were those people, why were-"
"DO ME A DAMN FAVOR, WEASLEY, AND FUCK OFF!" he suddenly turned around and yelled at her.
He turned back towards his parents and started walking up to his room.
Ginny's blood was boiling, she wanted to hex him into oblivion and was trying with everything in her not to. She went to attempt to run after him to give her a piece of her mind when it was Lucius, who grabbed her arm firmly to stop her. He didn't say anything, she just glared at him for a moment before he let her go and she saw Harry walk over to her.
"Let's go, Gin," he said quickly and then turned to Lucius and Narcissa. "I think its best that-"
"I think we know full well what would be best for us at this time, Mr. Potter," Narcissa said stiffly.
Harry gave them a stiff nod and then gestured for Ginny to follow him. They were barely outside of the Manor before Ginny started berating him with questions; she was just attacked and could have been killed and nobody was giving her any answers. Harry continued to ignore her questions until they Apparated back to the Burrow where she finally had enough and roughly turned him around to face her.
"Before you think about walking into that house you better give me some damn answers, Harry Potter," she demanded.
He stared at her for a moment before letting out a heavy sigh and then ran his hand through his messy hair. "I don't know too much, Ginny, all I can tell you is that Draco has a history with these people."
"What kind of history?" she pressed on.
"Not a good history, I can tell you that much," he said, turning back around and getting ready to go inside.
"Wait, that's it? What happened? Why were they even there to begin with? How did they know Draco was there?" she asked, pressing on as she quickly caught up with him.
"GINNY, JUST STOP IT!" He suddenly turned and shouted at her, making her stop in her tracks. "Why do you need to know so much? Just know it's nothing you need to worry about or get involved in, ok?"
She just stared blankly at him and then roughly opened the front door and slammed it shut behind her before he could follow her inside.
_________________________________________________
It had been about a week since the incident in Hogsmeade happened and Ginny heard the same lecture from Harry and her parents that Draco heard from his and yet she still never got any answers. She hadn't seen or heard from Draco at all since and no dinner invitations were sent out to either family. It was almost like the last few weeks of trying to make nice with the Malfoys had never happened. She stopped asking questions after the second day and then had kept her mind busy by helping George and Percy fix up the shop. Her and George's relationship had been rocky ever since Fred had passed and Ginny knew it was more her than him.....in fact, it was probably all of her fault why their relationship suffered at all. She just couldn't bear to be close to him when every time she looked his way she would see Fred and then the emotions that came with that was something she could never let herself feel, so she kept pushing them away.....along with her brother.
Things had become awkward between them since the shop was destroyed and soon Ginny stopped going altogether. It was the weekend and she decided she would pop in on Harry in an attempt at a lunch date, so she made her way to the ministry. She gave a quick knock on his office door and then opened it a bit and peeked her head in.
"Harry?" she called out.
She gave a sigh and walked inside and gently closed the door and took a seat on his desk like she normally did every weekend. She always would find the same knick-knacks on his desk, but they were always charmed to do something different every time she saw them which brought a small smile to her face. She noticed the massive pile of paperwork on his desk and she shook her head at how he could desperately use someone to give him a hand. She thought back to what her Mum suggested about asking Harry for a position here, but she wasn't sure if she wanted to be around Harry that much, especially if Cho was going to be around all the time.
She went to go slide herself off the desk when her eye caught a file sticking out from under a pile of papers. Her attention was drawn to the name on the file....."Malfoy". She quickly got up and walked around the desk and grabbed the file and opened it up. The file was a lot thicker than she thought it would be and she started skimming through it. She was surprised to see that the file wasn't about the Malfoy family, but rather just on Draco Malfoy, and it wasn't necessarily a file on him, it was a case file. Ginny was sure some of the answers she was hoping for were in here and continued looking through it. She stopped on a picture that read "Malfoy Estate" but it was definitely not the Malfoy Manor she knew; it was still a big beautiful house but much smaller. She soon learned the house belonged to Draco himself and soon the answers she was looking for just turned into more questions. She felt something hard laying in the file and she was trying to flip through to find what it was when she suddenly heard the doorknob start to turn. She quickly closed the file and slipped it under a few papers and grabbed one of the knick-knacks and pretended to be fixated on it as she spun around in Harry's desk chair.
"Well, finally," she said sarcastically, getting up and walking back around his desk.
"Oh, Ginny, I didn't realize you were going to be stopping by," He said, quickly making his way to his desk. "Sorry, I was just buried in paperwork all week," he explained, grabbing a few files and putting them away.
"Oh, it's fine, I just thought maybe we could grab lunch," she casually suggested, watching him grab Malfoy's file and putting it in a separate file cabinet.
"Oh, uh, yeah....yes, lunch sounds great," he said, having her lead the way out of his office.
___________________________________________
Harry and Ginny soon found a place to eat and made some light conversation. It had honestly been a while since they had gone out for lunch together since Harry was always canceling them. She wasn't really sure what to talk about, she really wanted to ask him questions about that file she found, but she knew better than to bring it up. It had also been bothering her that these people that Draco had a history with knew who she was and she wanted to know how.
"So, how's work been......besides all the paperwork?"
Ginny teased, giving a light giggle. "Crack any cases?"
"Nah, just a lot of researching this week," he said, waving his hand.
Ginny was quiet for a moment. "So how are things...uh.... with Cho?" she asked, not looking him directly in the eye.
He looked at her with an amused smirk. "Do you really want to know how things with me and Cho are?" he lightly laughed.
"Not really, but it would be rude if I didn't ask," she laughed.
"And when exactly have you cared about being rude?" he teased.
Ginny tossed the straw wrapper she had been playing with at Harry as she gave a small giggle at his comment. She missed having Harry be a friend to her, he was never around anymore and when he was, it was always about work or canceling plans due to Cho.
"So, I guess I should ask since mum's been on me about it," Ginny started.
"Alright, what's up?"
"You think you could hook me up with a job.....maybe your own personal assistant?"
"You mean a chance to boss you around? Absolutely!" he joked.
"Yeah, we'll see who's doing the bossing around," she shot back.
"Yes, we will, you can start on Monday," he said with a bright smile.
"Perfect," she responded, her mind already set on getting her hands on Malfoy's case file.
______________________________________________
She knocked for the third time now and was still not receiving an answer from within. She thought about just turning and leaving him be, but her motherly instinct wouldn't let her. She quietly turned the knob and opened the door to the dark room.
"Draco? I brought you up some dinner," she said quietly, stepping into his room.
"I don't want anything," he mumbled from his bed.
She walked around the bed to see his face, but could barely make it out in the darkness that filled the room. She placed the tray down and turned on a small lamp. Draco immediately turned over away from her.
"Please leave me alone, Mother," he said, a bit of anger growing in his voice.
"I will if you eat something, you're barely eating and your father and I haven't seen you out of your room in over a week. Something has to change, Draco, why don't you come over to the Zabinis' with us tomorrow?"
"FOR THE LAST BLOODY TIME, I DON'T WANT TO BE BOTHERED, NOW GET THE HELL OUT!"
She grew angry but tried to calm herself before pressing on. "Draco, dear, I.....I don't even know anymore what to say," she said with some emotion and then quickly left his bedroom.
He watched her leave, slamming the door behind her; he felt bad for making her upset, but he didn't care right now. Ever since he saw the people again that were responsible for all the pain and suffering he and his family had gone through, all he wanted was revenge and the fact that he couldn't have it was hard to let go off. He quickly ripped the blankets off himself and sat up in frustration. He looked at the tray of food his mother had brought up and just hung his head in defeat as he grabbed a small piece of a dinner roll and stuffed it in his mouth before turning back over and letting himself drift off into a restless sleep.
_______________________________________________
"Knock, Knock!" Ginny called out as she opened the door to Harry's office and walked inside.
"Well, well look at you, all dressed up," he teased her about her outfit.
"Yeah, I was going to go with my ripped jeans, but then I thought, eh, I'll save that for casual Friday," she joked, smoothing out the black skirt and ivory blouse she was wearing.
He gave a light laugh and then got up and patted his seat for her to take his place behind the desk. "Since you seem so eager, why not dive right in," he said, grabbing a pile of papers and files off a nearby table and plopping them down on the desk in front of her.
"Yippee," she mumbled sarcastically. She let out a heavy sigh. "Isn't there some cases to crack or something, you know I would make a great detective," she suggested, picking up one of the files and flipping through it.
He gave a small laugh and shook his head. "Sorry, Gin, nothing too exciting right now. I actually have to be at a meeting so just file that stuff until I get back."
"I'm so excited I can hardly wait to start," she said, giving him an exaggerated smile.
He gave a small chuckle and then left the office.
She started filing the files until she knew for certain he wouldn't be returning for any last minute papers he had forgotten to grab. A few files later and then she quickly went over to the file cabinet that she had seen him put Malfoy's file in and went to open the draw and realized it was locked.
"Dammit," she mumbled. She quickly pulled her wand out and aimed it at the draw. "Alohomora," she whispered.
She gave a frustrated growl when nothing happened and started pulling hard on the drawer. She went over to the desk and started rummaging through the drawers in hopes of finding some kind of special key. She started growing angry when she wasn't finding anything and eventually gave up. She sat back in the chair and slouched down in defeat; she needed to find that key, or learn a more powerful unlocking spell. Her mind went to Hermione, she would definitely know something, but Ginny knew she would probably question her as to why she needed to know something like that.
Deciding that she would continue searching in even the most unlikely of spots for the key, her eyes fell on a box in the corner behind his desk that was covered in a massive pile of paperwork. She tried to lift the lid of the box without having to move the entire pile but it was no use. She waved her wand and levitated the massive pile up a bit and then opened the box. It was just more papers unfortunately, mostly medical records it looked like. She growled in frustration and went to close the box when her name caught her eye. She moved a few stacks on top of it and saw it was indeed a medical record on her.
"Why the hell would Harry have this?" she whispered to herself.
She was just about to open the file when she heard the doorknob turn and she quickly threw the papers back in the box and released the levitating spell. She was thankful when she saw Harry was too distracted with another pile of paperwork to have noticed she was snooping around.
"Back so soon? Wow, more paperwork too, I see, no wonder you can never catch up," she said, walking over and grabbing half the pile from him.
"Ha, yeah, it was just a quick meeting, normal routine stuff and yes, more paperwork, which is why I need you.....too...... Uh, I see you barely touched your work," he said with a smirk.
"Oh....yeah, I just had to familiarize myself with the filing system and all. Plus, you know it's hard to get excited about such boring work."
"Haha," he said sarcastically, placing the new paperwork down on his desk.
"Uh, Harry, would there happen to be a library in this place?" she asked suddenly.
He looked at her with a raised eyebrow, "A library? You want to go to a library?" he chuckled.
"Shut up," she said, slapping him hard on the arm. "I'm just trying to keep my mind busy......outside of my new awesome job that is."
"If you say so, anyway, yeah, there's one downstairs all the way down towards the back. It's actually pretty big. You should find something in there to hopefully keep that mind of yours busy, but fair warning, it's mostly Ministry related stuff."
"Perfect," she said with a bright smile.
She took a seat across from Harry and continued working on the files before her and watched him out of the corner of her eye. He looked like he had something heavy weighing on his mind and she wondered if she should ask him, but instead, she decided to try and squeeze some info out of him.
"Hey, Harry?" she asked, clearing her throat.
"Yeah, what's up?" he answered, not looking up from the letter he was writing.
"Listen.....I know you refuse to tell me anything more about what happened in Hogsmeade, but I just want to know-"
He let out a long sigh that made her stop and she was sure he was going to go off on her for prying again, but instead he just ran his hand through his hair and looked at her.
"Gin, the only thing that I'm able to tell is what I have already."
"But, why did you have to talk to Draco alone, why was he so angry afterward?"
"Because I told you, there was just some bad history with these guys and the case was closed and Malfoy is insistent on me reopening it when there is nothing to reopen. It's done," he explained, picking his quill back up and continued to write his letter.
"But......it didn't seem done the other day, that person knew where Draco was and there were people already waiting for him....it was a trap, how is that over with if-"
"GINNY!" he suddenly yelled, slamming his hands on the desk making her jump. "LISTEN TO ME, THE MALFOYS WILL ALWAYS HAVE ENEMIES NO MATTER WHAT THEY DO AND NO MATTER WHERE THEY GO. SO STOP TRYING TO MAKE SOMETHING OUT OF NOTHING!"
She just stared at him in anger, the way he was talking to her made her want to punch him out, but she couldn't help but think if maybe he was right. She was so bored with her own life she was begging for some kind of adrenaline rush and she had recently found it with this unsettled feud Draco had. She so desperately wanted to know what was in Malfoy's file that she never thought about it possibly being nothing more than just a few files based on the stuff Harry already told her.
They were both quiet for a while, she saw the guilty look Harry had on his face.
"I'm sorry, Gin...I didn't mean to get so angry, I just don't want you to think you need to get involved in something that is nothing......I know how you are," he finished with a small smirk. "Why don't you go take a small break and visit that library," he suggested.
Ginny didn't say anything, she just gave a stiff nod and quickly got up and went to walk away when Harry gently grabbed her wrist and turned her to face him.
"I really am sorry, Ginny, I didn't mean it," he said quietly, obviously ashamed at his sudden outburst.
She finally gave in and gave him a small smile. "I guess I'll forgive you since you gave me this adventurous, rewarding and fulfilling job," she teased, as he pulled her into a tight hug.
Ginny couldn't help but notice the way he held her close to him, his touch was gentle yet firm. She pulled away from him slightly and locked eyes with him for a moment and she suddenly bit her lip at the sudden awkwardness of it all. He quickly cleared his throat and then released her and walked back to his desk to continue his letter.
"See you in a bit," she said before slipping out of the office and letting out a long sigh.
______________________________________________
Ginny wasted no time going through every shelf in the library until she finally came to the section she was looking for. She found a book on advanced magic and soon found the spell she needed. She quickly waved her wand and made a replica of the incantation and then stuck it in her bra and went to make her way back to Harry's office. She saw her father walking a little bit ahead of her and ran to catch up with him.
"Well, hello there," she said casually beside him.
"Ah, Ginbug, my new co-worker," he smiled brightly, grabbing her into a one-armed hug. "So how's your first day?"
"So amazing, my mind is just completely blown away at how awesome shuffling papers is," she said sarcastically rolling her eyes.
Arthur just laughed and then waved his hand at her. "It's just something to keep you busy for now, you'll find something that I eventually just know you will definitely be amazed by."
"Thanks, Dad," she said, giving him a quick departing peck on the cheek before she continued back to Harry.
By the time Ginny had gotten back to Harry's office, he was getting ready to leave for his lunch break, which was perfect timing for her to unlock that drawer.
"Hey, how was the library?" he teased.
"Oh, you know, I wouldn't say I got as hot and bothered as Hermione would have," she said, taking a seat at his desk once more.
Harry gave a quick snicker. "So do you want to grab lunch?"
"Oh, you're not going out with Cho?" Ginny asked, surprised that he was asking her.
"Well, I didn't ask her yet, I figured I'd ask you first since I'm always canceling our plans."
She smiled at him for a moment and then remembered the task at hand. "Actually, I'm going to try and get some work done and I'm not that hungry, so go on with Cho," she casually said, turning back to the files on his desk.
"Ok, see you later then."
As soon as he left the room, she pulled out the paper with the incantation on it and went over to the cabinet. She waved her wand and to her surprise, it worked on the first try and then she heard a quick click.
"Yes," she mumbled a small victory as she pulled the drawer open.
There it was, Malfoy's case file and she wasted no time reaching down to grab it. She was suddenly met with some sort of barrier around all the files that was keeping her from taking any of them. She quickly pulled her hand away when she felt it start to burn.
"Are you kidding me right now?" she growled in anger.
There was what seemed to be something that replicated a mini ward around the files in the cabinet that she could tell was going to require some advanced magic to penetrate through. She ran her fingers through her hair in frustration and then looked back into the drawer. Her eyes grew wide when she saw her name on one of them, followed by a few other names, some of which she recognized and others she didn't.
"What the hell?" she said quietly.
She suddenly remembered the hospital files from earlier with her name on it in the box she found and quickly levitated the pile of papers again. Her heart sank when she saw they were now all gone, every single piece of paper. She felt completely lost right now, what was going on? Why did Harry have a file on her locked up in a file cabinet and an advanced protection charm around it? Why was that file cabinet filled with the same files related to Malfoy's case? She had so many questions but knew she would never get any answers to them.
She quickly put everything back the way she found it and stormed out of Harry's office and went off in search to find the answers herself.
"NO!" he quickly shouted, as he growled again in pain and tried to rub his eyes.
"What do you mean no? You need an antidote or something for your eyes; you have no idea what kind of damage that curse can do to you, NOW COME ON!" she said firmly, grabbing his shirt sleeve roughly and tried pulling him through.
"STOP FOR A DAMN SECOND, WEASLEY!" he yelled once more.
She turned to look at him, he had a pained look on his face and his eyes were red and swollen from the spell that hit him. She knew he couldn't see a damn thing since he kept tightly closing his eyes and desperately tried to readjust them to get some sort of sight back.
"My...UGH, BLOODY HELL THIS BURNS!" he growled once more in pain. "My parents can't know about this. They will-"
"Pfft, yeah ok, Harry is going to be here anytime now and you'll have no choice but to let them know, besides, I don't even know a counter-curse or anything for this spell, we need your mum's help," she argued; attempting to drag him once more.
"WEASLEY, I'M SERIOUS!" he yelled a bit louder than he intended as another wave of burning and stinging filled his eyes.
Ginny just stared at him for a moment with an angry look on her face; again she knew he couldn't see her, but she knew there was no way around this. She quickly grabbed his arm and with as much force as she could muster up, she pulled him so roughly through the ward with her that he almost fell to the ground. She knew as soon as someone entered the wards the Malfoys would be alerted and be before her in a matter of moments. She knew Draco was livid, but he didn't say anything to her once she pulled him through, she was sure the pain in his eyes was overtaking any anger he had towards her right now.
Just as Ginny had opened the front doors, she was immediately met by Lucius and Narcissa's shocked expressions as she dragged him inside past them.
"WHAT THE BLOODY HELL HAPPENED TO YOU, DRACO?" Narcissa shouted, a worried look covering her face as she quickly grabbed his face and examined it.
"I'm fine, Mother- I-UGH! CAN SOMEBODY PLEASE MAKE THIS FUCKIN STINGING GO AWAY!" he yelled as he brought his hands up to his eyes once more.
"STOP RUBBING THEM!" Narcissa and Ginny shouted out in unison.
Tilly came over with a wet rag and some water that Narcissa had gestured for her to grab as soon as she saw the state Draco was in.
"Draco, what happened? Who did this to you?" Lucius demanded.
Draco didn't answer, he just squeezed his eyes tightly shut again as the pain continued. Narcissa quickly raised her wand and put a charm on his eyes that quickly made most of the pain and stinging subside.
"There is no counter-curse, you just need to wait for the effects to wear off," Narcissa explained. "It will take about an hour before your vision comes back fully, but the charm I used will make it more bearable." she finished, as she went to grab the wet rag for his eyes but saw Ginny had already grabbed it.
Ginny grabbed Draco's face roughly and started rinsing his eyes for him. "Why the hell were you running after someone who attacked us?" she asked angrily.
"WHO ATTACKED YOU?" Lucius and Narcissa both yelled.
"It was nobody," Draco mumbled with a sneer before grabbing the rag from Ginny's hands and continued rinsing his eyes himself.
Before Narcissa and Lucius could question him further it was Ginny, who went off on him.
"NOBODY? THAT'S NOT WHAT IT LOOKED LIKE TO ME, YOU KNEW WHO THAT WAS, AND YOU RAN LIKE A BLOODY FOOL AFTER THEM, EVEN WHEN YOU KNEW WE WERE OUTNUMBERED!" she shouted, looking at him fiercely even though she knew he couldn't see her.
"They were there.......it was them," Draco said so quietly it was almost inaudible.
Ginny looked confused, but Lucius and Narcissa seemed to completely understand what Draco meant. Narcissa walked over to Draco and softly ran her hand through his hair and cupped his face lightly before turning to Ginny.
"Miss Weasley, I think it's best you don't come back here or include Draco in any more of your "outings" because it has become apparent that you're nothing but trouble," she said with a sneering, yet firm, tone.
"What the hell does that mean?" Ginny said defensively, her anger rising.
"It means that this playing pretend to get along with one another will never work, so quit while you're ahead and let's do ourselves the favor and leave things be." Lucius cut in.
Ginny just stood there shaking her head in annoyance with a slight sneer. "You two can go ahead and think whatever it is you want, but I'll have you know that if I hadn't run after your precious little boy......he'd be dead right now.....so you're welcome," she said before turning on her heel and walking away into a different room to wait until Harry arrived.
Narcissa and Lucius just exchanged a look and then glanced at their son. They understood why Draco ran after these people and knew it very well to be Draco, who initiated the chase; why they wanted to flip it onto the Weasley girl was just an excuse to not have to associate with them any further.
"I'm sorry," Draco suddenly whispered. His parents were beside him in a moment. "I know what you're going to say and I know everything that has happened to us because of these people, but I didn't care.......I just wanted them dead," he finished, hanging his head so his parents couldn't see the emotion on his face.
"Draco-"
"Stop.....just go check on Weasley or something," he cut his mother off before bringing the wet rag back up to his eyes.
Narcissa looked at her husband and he gave a stiff nod before she started walking away.
____________________________________
Ginny was looking her injuries over in a nearby mirror in the small living room area she wandered into. She was surprised at how scratched and bruised up she was from the earlier events and then gave a small wince as she suddenly remembered the fall she took in that stairwell. She lifted her shirt enough to take a look at her ribs and saw they were badly bruised and she gave a small hiss as she realized just how much pain she was in.
"They look like they could be broken," came a voice from the doorway.
Ginny didn't bother turning around to look at the woman and just shrugged and put her shirt down. "I've had worse......you know from playing such a "barbaric" sport and all," Ginny mocked Narcissa as she took a seat on a nearby chair.
Narcissa cleared her throat to avoid any kind of comeback from escaping her mouth and walked over to Ginny and pulled out her wand. "Let me take a look," she said coldly.
"No thanks, I'm fine, I'll handle it myself," Ginny spat back, her anger rising at how purposely oblivious Lucius and Narcissa acted about the situation.
"Oh, don't be ridiculous, now let me have a look," she demanded.
"Me, ridiculous? You-"
She was cut off when Narcissa swiftly flicked her wand and performed a quick charm on Ginny. She gave a quick, loud gasp as she felt a small pop in her side and then dropped her head in pain as the healing charm started to take effect. Ginny didn't say anything after that, instead, she just sat there in silence as Narcissa took it upon herself to look at the rest of her injuries.
It was quiet for a while before Ginny decided to finally speak.
"Who were those people? Why was Draco so desperate to catch them that he would risk being killed?" she asked, looking up at the blonde before her.
Narcissa looked at her for a moment and then continued healing the burn on Ginny's hand. She was quiet for a while as she thought about what Ginny was asking. "It's not my place to tell you that," was all she said.
Ginny wanted to argue against that, but she knew she wouldn't get any further answers from her. Narcissa suddenly got up and started to walk out of the room when she stopped to look at the redhead for a moment.
"Miss Weasley...... if you truly did save my son's life then.......I'm very grateful for that," she said quickly and then left in a hurry.
Ginny just stared at the spot where she had been standing and thought about the way Narcissa attempted to thank her for saving Draco. She brought her hand up to where there was a large cut on her cheek and thought about how Narcissa said it wasn't her place to explain things to her. She just shook her head in annoyance and walked back towards the foyer where Draco last was. She saw he was having a very heated argument with his father that she definitely wanted to stay clear of and decided to just wander into the dining room. She looked around the room with an amused smirk as she thought back to the obscene dinner her parents had here just a short time ago. Her head quickly snapped up when there was a loud, hard knock on the front door that she knew must have been Harry.
Before she could get to the door to see if it was indeed him, she watched him push past Lucius and look around for someone.
"GINNY!" he called out, hoping to get a glimpse of her.
"I'm right here, Harry," she said, walking over to him.
She was taken aback when he tightly grabbed her to him and hugged her; his hands latching onto her as he let out a sigh of relief.
"Harry, I'm fine," she mumbled against his chest.
He pulled back and then gently grabbed her shoulders and looked her over with a worried look covering his face.
"Are you sure you're ok?" he asked again, gently cupping her face in his hands and looking at the cut on her cheek.
"Y-Yeah......I am," she said, surprised at how concerned and scared he looked that something might've happened to her. She stared into his eyes for a moment as he gave her a small smile.
His facial expression suddenly became angry and then he turned back to Lucius and Narcissa and looked straight past them and right at Draco, whose vision was almost completely back to normal. He walked over to them followed by Ginny and stopped in front of Draco.
"I want to have a word with Draco," he said firmly.
"Very well, we can all talk in the-"
"Alone," Harry quickly said, cutting Lucius off.
Lucius' lip curled into a sneer at this comment. "Of course.......Mr. Potter."
"Harry, don't you want to talk to me too?" Ginny asked with a raised eyebrow.
"Of course, this will just take a moment," he said, grabbing Draco roughly by the arm and leading him to a nearby room for some privacy.
Draco was barely in the room when he felt himself being slammed against the wall hard.
"WHAT THE HELL WERE YOU THINKING, MALFOY? AND TO GET GINNY INVOLVED, I SWEAR I COULD KILL YOU!" he yelled loudly in his face, his wand pushed against Draco's throat.
Draco couldn't make out his complete facial expression, but from what he could tell, he was one pissed off Gryffindor. "Relax, Potter, she's just a nosy twit that got mixed up into it. She's the one who followed me, I didn't force her."
"RELAX? DO YOU HEAR YOURSELF? YOU OF ALL PEOPLE KNOW WHAT THESE PEOPLE ARE CAPABLE OF AND YET YOU JUST DIDN'T CARE ABOUT PUTTING HER IN DANGER OR YOURSELF!"
"SHE'S NOT MY PROBLEM, I'M NOT HER DAMN BABYSITTER, POTTER!" he yelled back.
Harry punched Draco hard in the face, making him stumble to the floor and to Harry's surprise, he didn't swing back, instead, he just sat there on the floor holding his jaw and shaking his head. He walked over to him and held his hand out for Draco to take, but he scoffed at it.
"Just get out of here, Potter, as you've reminded me many times before.....there's nothing left to do when it comes to these people," he said, making Harry go stiff at his comment. "Isn't that right? Or is it more that you refuse to further look into-"
"FURTHER LOOK INTO WHAT? THE CASE IS CLOSED AND WILL REMAIN THAT WAY!"
Draco quickly stood up and walked over to the raven-haired man standing in front of him.
"Closed? More like covered up."
"Stop trying to take matters into your own hands, Malfoy...... every time.......EVERY TIME anything with this case is looked into...... people die.......or worse..." he said the last part looking away from the Slytherin.
"Then just get the fuck out of here, what else do you want? You want to arrest me? Go ahead, I don't give a shit," he said before ripping the door open and walking back out to the hall.
Ginny saw Draco walking back towards them and she quickly walked up to him. "What happened? Who were those people, why were-"
"DO ME A DAMN FAVOR, WEASLEY, AND FUCK OFF!" he suddenly turned around and yelled at her.
He turned back towards his parents and started walking up to his room.
Ginny's blood was boiling, she wanted to hex him into oblivion and was trying with everything in her not to. She went to attempt to run after him to give her a piece of her mind when it was Lucius, who grabbed her arm firmly to stop her. He didn't say anything, she just glared at him for a moment before he let her go and she saw Harry walk over to her.
"Let's go, Gin," he said quickly and then turned to Lucius and Narcissa. "I think its best that-"
"I think we know full well what would be best for us at this time, Mr. Potter," Narcissa said stiffly.
Harry gave them a stiff nod and then gestured for Ginny to follow him. They were barely outside of the Manor before Ginny started berating him with questions; she was just attacked and could have been killed and nobody was giving her any answers. Harry continued to ignore her questions until they Apparated back to the Burrow where she finally had enough and roughly turned him around to face her.
"Before you think about walking into that house you better give me some damn answers, Harry Potter," she demanded.
He stared at her for a moment before letting out a heavy sigh and then ran his hand through his messy hair. "I don't know too much, Ginny, all I can tell you is that Draco has a history with these people."
"What kind of history?" she pressed on.
"Not a good history, I can tell you that much," he said, turning back around and getting ready to go inside.
"Wait, that's it? What happened? Why were they even there to begin with? How did they know Draco was there?" she asked, pressing on as she quickly caught up with him.
"GINNY, JUST STOP IT!" He suddenly turned and shouted at her, making her stop in her tracks. "Why do you need to know so much? Just know it's nothing you need to worry about or get involved in, ok?"
She just stared blankly at him and then roughly opened the front door and slammed it shut behind her before he could follow her inside.
_________________________________________________
It had been about a week since the incident in Hogsmeade happened and Ginny heard the same lecture from Harry and her parents that Draco heard from his and yet she still never got any answers. She hadn't seen or heard from Draco at all since and no dinner invitations were sent out to either family. It was almost like the last few weeks of trying to make nice with the Malfoys had never happened. She stopped asking questions after the second day and then had kept her mind busy by helping George and Percy fix up the shop. Her and George's relationship had been rocky ever since Fred had passed and Ginny knew it was more her than him.....in fact, it was probably all of her fault why their relationship suffered at all. She just couldn't bear to be close to him when every time she looked his way she would see Fred and then the emotions that came with that was something she could never let herself feel, so she kept pushing them away.....along with her brother.
Things had become awkward between them since the shop was destroyed and soon Ginny stopped going altogether. It was the weekend and she decided she would pop in on Harry in an attempt at a lunch date, so she made her way to the ministry. She gave a quick knock on his office door and then opened it a bit and peeked her head in.
"Harry?" she called out.
She gave a sigh and walked inside and gently closed the door and took a seat on his desk like she normally did every weekend. She always would find the same knick-knacks on his desk, but they were always charmed to do something different every time she saw them which brought a small smile to her face. She noticed the massive pile of paperwork on his desk and she shook her head at how he could desperately use someone to give him a hand. She thought back to what her Mum suggested about asking Harry for a position here, but she wasn't sure if she wanted to be around Harry that much, especially if Cho was going to be around all the time.
She went to go slide herself off the desk when her eye caught a file sticking out from under a pile of papers. Her attention was drawn to the name on the file....."Malfoy". She quickly got up and walked around the desk and grabbed the file and opened it up. The file was a lot thicker than she thought it would be and she started skimming through it. She was surprised to see that the file wasn't about the Malfoy family, but rather just on Draco Malfoy, and it wasn't necessarily a file on him, it was a case file. Ginny was sure some of the answers she was hoping for were in here and continued looking through it. She stopped on a picture that read "Malfoy Estate" but it was definitely not the Malfoy Manor she knew; it was still a big beautiful house but much smaller. She soon learned the house belonged to Draco himself and soon the answers she was looking for just turned into more questions. She felt something hard laying in the file and she was trying to flip through to find what it was when she suddenly heard the doorknob start to turn. She quickly closed the file and slipped it under a few papers and grabbed one of the knick-knacks and pretended to be fixated on it as she spun around in Harry's desk chair.
"Well, finally," she said sarcastically, getting up and walking back around his desk.
"Oh, Ginny, I didn't realize you were going to be stopping by," He said, quickly making his way to his desk. "Sorry, I was just buried in paperwork all week," he explained, grabbing a few files and putting them away.
"Oh, it's fine, I just thought maybe we could grab lunch," she casually suggested, watching him grab Malfoy's file and putting it in a separate file cabinet.
"Oh, uh, yeah....yes, lunch sounds great," he said, having her lead the way out of his office.
___________________________________________
Harry and Ginny soon found a place to eat and made some light conversation. It had honestly been a while since they had gone out for lunch together since Harry was always canceling them. She wasn't really sure what to talk about, she really wanted to ask him questions about that file she found, but she knew better than to bring it up. It had also been bothering her that these people that Draco had a history with knew who she was and she wanted to know how.
"So, how's work been......besides all the paperwork?"
Ginny teased, giving a light giggle. "Crack any cases?"
"Nah, just a lot of researching this week," he said, waving his hand.
Ginny was quiet for a moment. "So how are things...uh.... with Cho?" she asked, not looking him directly in the eye.
He looked at her with an amused smirk. "Do you really want to know how things with me and Cho are?" he lightly laughed.
"Not really, but it would be rude if I didn't ask," she laughed.
"And when exactly have you cared about being rude?" he teased.
Ginny tossed the straw wrapper she had been playing with at Harry as she gave a small giggle at his comment. She missed having Harry be a friend to her, he was never around anymore and when he was, it was always about work or canceling plans due to Cho.
"So, I guess I should ask since mum's been on me about it," Ginny started.
"Alright, what's up?"
"You think you could hook me up with a job.....maybe your own personal assistant?"
"You mean a chance to boss you around? Absolutely!" he joked.
"Yeah, we'll see who's doing the bossing around," she shot back.
"Yes, we will, you can start on Monday," he said with a bright smile.
"Perfect," she responded, her mind already set on getting her hands on Malfoy's case file.
______________________________________________
She knocked for the third time now and was still not receiving an answer from within. She thought about just turning and leaving him be, but her motherly instinct wouldn't let her. She quietly turned the knob and opened the door to the dark room.
"Draco? I brought you up some dinner," she said quietly, stepping into his room.
"I don't want anything," he mumbled from his bed.
She walked around the bed to see his face, but could barely make it out in the darkness that filled the room. She placed the tray down and turned on a small lamp. Draco immediately turned over away from her.
"Please leave me alone, Mother," he said, a bit of anger growing in his voice.
"I will if you eat something, you're barely eating and your father and I haven't seen you out of your room in over a week. Something has to change, Draco, why don't you come over to the Zabinis' with us tomorrow?"
"FOR THE LAST BLOODY TIME, I DON'T WANT TO BE BOTHERED, NOW GET THE HELL OUT!"
She grew angry but tried to calm herself before pressing on. "Draco, dear, I.....I don't even know anymore what to say," she said with some emotion and then quickly left his bedroom.
He watched her leave, slamming the door behind her; he felt bad for making her upset, but he didn't care right now. Ever since he saw the people again that were responsible for all the pain and suffering he and his family had gone through, all he wanted was revenge and the fact that he couldn't have it was hard to let go off. He quickly ripped the blankets off himself and sat up in frustration. He looked at the tray of food his mother had brought up and just hung his head in defeat as he grabbed a small piece of a dinner roll and stuffed it in his mouth before turning back over and letting himself drift off into a restless sleep.
_______________________________________________
"Knock, Knock!" Ginny called out as she opened the door to Harry's office and walked inside.
"Well, well look at you, all dressed up," he teased her about her outfit.
"Yeah, I was going to go with my ripped jeans, but then I thought, eh, I'll save that for casual Friday," she joked, smoothing out the black skirt and ivory blouse she was wearing.
He gave a light laugh and then got up and patted his seat for her to take his place behind the desk. "Since you seem so eager, why not dive right in," he said, grabbing a pile of papers and files off a nearby table and plopping them down on the desk in front of her.
"Yippee," she mumbled sarcastically. She let out a heavy sigh. "Isn't there some cases to crack or something, you know I would make a great detective," she suggested, picking up one of the files and flipping through it.
He gave a small laugh and shook his head. "Sorry, Gin, nothing too exciting right now. I actually have to be at a meeting so just file that stuff until I get back."
"I'm so excited I can hardly wait to start," she said, giving him an exaggerated smile.
He gave a small chuckle and then left the office.
She started filing the files until she knew for certain he wouldn't be returning for any last minute papers he had forgotten to grab. A few files later and then she quickly went over to the file cabinet that she had seen him put Malfoy's file in and went to open the draw and realized it was locked.
"Dammit," she mumbled. She quickly pulled her wand out and aimed it at the draw. "Alohomora," she whispered.
She gave a frustrated growl when nothing happened and started pulling hard on the drawer. She went over to the desk and started rummaging through the drawers in hopes of finding some kind of special key. She started growing angry when she wasn't finding anything and eventually gave up. She sat back in the chair and slouched down in defeat; she needed to find that key, or learn a more powerful unlocking spell. Her mind went to Hermione, she would definitely know something, but Ginny knew she would probably question her as to why she needed to know something like that.
Deciding that she would continue searching in even the most unlikely of spots for the key, her eyes fell on a box in the corner behind his desk that was covered in a massive pile of paperwork. She tried to lift the lid of the box without having to move the entire pile but it was no use. She waved her wand and levitated the massive pile up a bit and then opened the box. It was just more papers unfortunately, mostly medical records it looked like. She growled in frustration and went to close the box when her name caught her eye. She moved a few stacks on top of it and saw it was indeed a medical record on her.
"Why the hell would Harry have this?" she whispered to herself.
She was just about to open the file when she heard the doorknob turn and she quickly threw the papers back in the box and released the levitating spell. She was thankful when she saw Harry was too distracted with another pile of paperwork to have noticed she was snooping around.
"Back so soon? Wow, more paperwork too, I see, no wonder you can never catch up," she said, walking over and grabbing half the pile from him.
"Ha, yeah, it was just a quick meeting, normal routine stuff and yes, more paperwork, which is why I need you.....too...... Uh, I see you barely touched your work," he said with a smirk.
"Oh....yeah, I just had to familiarize myself with the filing system and all. Plus, you know it's hard to get excited about such boring work."
"Haha," he said sarcastically, placing the new paperwork down on his desk.
"Uh, Harry, would there happen to be a library in this place?" she asked suddenly.
He looked at her with a raised eyebrow, "A library? You want to go to a library?" he chuckled.
"Shut up," she said, slapping him hard on the arm. "I'm just trying to keep my mind busy......outside of my new awesome job that is."
"If you say so, anyway, yeah, there's one downstairs all the way down towards the back. It's actually pretty big. You should find something in there to hopefully keep that mind of yours busy, but fair warning, it's mostly Ministry related stuff."
"Perfect," she said with a bright smile.
She took a seat across from Harry and continued working on the files before her and watched him out of the corner of her eye. He looked like he had something heavy weighing on his mind and she wondered if she should ask him, but instead, she decided to try and squeeze some info out of him.
"Hey, Harry?" she asked, clearing her throat.
"Yeah, what's up?" he answered, not looking up from the letter he was writing.
"Listen.....I know you refuse to tell me anything more about what happened in Hogsmeade, but I just want to know-"
He let out a long sigh that made her stop and she was sure he was going to go off on her for prying again, but instead he just ran his hand through his hair and looked at her.
"Gin, the only thing that I'm able to tell is what I have already."
"But, why did you have to talk to Draco alone, why was he so angry afterward?"
"Because I told you, there was just some bad history with these guys and the case was closed and Malfoy is insistent on me reopening it when there is nothing to reopen. It's done," he explained, picking his quill back up and continued to write his letter.
"But......it didn't seem done the other day, that person knew where Draco was and there were people already waiting for him....it was a trap, how is that over with if-"
"GINNY!" he suddenly yelled, slamming his hands on the desk making her jump. "LISTEN TO ME, THE MALFOYS WILL ALWAYS HAVE ENEMIES NO MATTER WHAT THEY DO AND NO MATTER WHERE THEY GO. SO STOP TRYING TO MAKE SOMETHING OUT OF NOTHING!"
She just stared at him in anger, the way he was talking to her made her want to punch him out, but she couldn't help but think if maybe he was right. She was so bored with her own life she was begging for some kind of adrenaline rush and she had recently found it with this unsettled feud Draco had. She so desperately wanted to know what was in Malfoy's file that she never thought about it possibly being nothing more than just a few files based on the stuff Harry already told her.
They were both quiet for a while, she saw the guilty look Harry had on his face.
"I'm sorry, Gin...I didn't mean to get so angry, I just don't want you to think you need to get involved in something that is nothing......I know how you are," he finished with a small smirk. "Why don't you go take a small break and visit that library," he suggested.
Ginny didn't say anything, she just gave a stiff nod and quickly got up and went to walk away when Harry gently grabbed her wrist and turned her to face him.
"I really am sorry, Ginny, I didn't mean it," he said quietly, obviously ashamed at his sudden outburst.
She finally gave in and gave him a small smile. "I guess I'll forgive you since you gave me this adventurous, rewarding and fulfilling job," she teased, as he pulled her into a tight hug.
Ginny couldn't help but notice the way he held her close to him, his touch was gentle yet firm. She pulled away from him slightly and locked eyes with him for a moment and she suddenly bit her lip at the sudden awkwardness of it all. He quickly cleared his throat and then released her and walked back to his desk to continue his letter.
"See you in a bit," she said before slipping out of the office and letting out a long sigh.
______________________________________________
Ginny wasted no time going through every shelf in the library until she finally came to the section she was looking for. She found a book on advanced magic and soon found the spell she needed. She quickly waved her wand and made a replica of the incantation and then stuck it in her bra and went to make her way back to Harry's office. She saw her father walking a little bit ahead of her and ran to catch up with him.
"Well, hello there," she said casually beside him.
"Ah, Ginbug, my new co-worker," he smiled brightly, grabbing her into a one-armed hug. "So how's your first day?"
"So amazing, my mind is just completely blown away at how awesome shuffling papers is," she said sarcastically rolling her eyes.
Arthur just laughed and then waved his hand at her. "It's just something to keep you busy for now, you'll find something that I eventually just know you will definitely be amazed by."
"Thanks, Dad," she said, giving him a quick departing peck on the cheek before she continued back to Harry.
By the time Ginny had gotten back to Harry's office, he was getting ready to leave for his lunch break, which was perfect timing for her to unlock that drawer.
"Hey, how was the library?" he teased.
"Oh, you know, I wouldn't say I got as hot and bothered as Hermione would have," she said, taking a seat at his desk once more.
Harry gave a quick snicker. "So do you want to grab lunch?"
"Oh, you're not going out with Cho?" Ginny asked, surprised that he was asking her.
"Well, I didn't ask her yet, I figured I'd ask you first since I'm always canceling our plans."
She smiled at him for a moment and then remembered the task at hand. "Actually, I'm going to try and get some work done and I'm not that hungry, so go on with Cho," she casually said, turning back to the files on his desk.
"Ok, see you later then."
As soon as he left the room, she pulled out the paper with the incantation on it and went over to the cabinet. She waved her wand and to her surprise, it worked on the first try and then she heard a quick click.
"Yes," she mumbled a small victory as she pulled the drawer open.
There it was, Malfoy's case file and she wasted no time reaching down to grab it. She was suddenly met with some sort of barrier around all the files that was keeping her from taking any of them. She quickly pulled her hand away when she felt it start to burn.
"Are you kidding me right now?" she growled in anger.
There was what seemed to be something that replicated a mini ward around the files in the cabinet that she could tell was going to require some advanced magic to penetrate through. She ran her fingers through her hair in frustration and then looked back into the drawer. Her eyes grew wide when she saw her name on one of them, followed by a few other names, some of which she recognized and others she didn't.
"What the hell?" she said quietly.
She suddenly remembered the hospital files from earlier with her name on it in the box she found and quickly levitated the pile of papers again. Her heart sank when she saw they were now all gone, every single piece of paper. She felt completely lost right now, what was going on? Why did Harry have a file on her locked up in a file cabinet and an advanced protection charm around it? Why was that file cabinet filled with the same files related to Malfoy's case? She had so many questions but knew she would never get any answers to them.
She quickly put everything back the way she found it and stormed out of Harry's office and went off in search to find the answers herself.
Author notes: Okkk sooo, yes, I know more questions, you are all probably just as lost as Ginny right now, lol. PLEASE REVIEW!!!
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