Heavenly Creatures

August 5^th, 1995

The basement kitchen is a dreary grey. Only a little light filters in from the window set into the back door, since today, at last, is cloudy. Ginny can't think why nobody has thought to turn the witchlights on. But she herself feels too dull to do it, and so the last stragglers sit at the kitchen table, eating late breakfast in the dimness.

Tonks sits across from her, as usual. She looks very subdued.

"Tonks," she says suddenly.

"Yeah?" The older woman raises her head. Even her hair looks flat and lifeless, and her eyes droop.

"Remember when you used to do noses for us?"

"I suppose so..." Tonks rubs her own small nose blearily.

"When was that? Only I can't quite remember."

"Not long ago," Tonks sighs. "But don't ask me to do it today."

"What's wrong with everyone today?" asks Hermione, listlessly spooning oatmeal into her mouth.

"Tired... just tired, I think," says Tonks.

A tremor of unease goes through Ginny, but she cannot put any kind of name to it. Yes, she thinks. Just tired. That's all it is...

"We're all a bit off, I think," says Ron, pushing his eggs around on his plate with a fork. "Hope it's a lot happier around here by tomorrow!"

"It's finally going to rain today, I heard," says Hermione. "People's moods often change when the weather finally breaks."

"I'm sure that's it," says Tonks vaguely.

The door to the hall opens, and Arthur Weasley puts his head in. "Are you ready yet, Tonks? We really ought to go. Everybody else is already on their way."

Tonks scrapes her chair back from the table, leaving her oatmeal half-finished. "Yeah, I suppose we should. " She turns to Ron, Hermione, and Ginny. ""I'll see you later. Have to go to the Ministry now. Everybody will be gone all day--well, except for Sirius and Remus, of course, and Remus isn't going to do anything but sleep, I should think. But you'll be all right on your own, won't you?"

"Of course we will," says Hermione. "I suppose you have to go and check in after having been gone for so long. When all of you went to..." Her words trail off, and she frowns.

Yes, thinks Ginny. The Aurors were gone for ever so long, some of them anyway. But I can't think where. And it certainly doesn't seem worth thinking about.

"Tell Fred and George we're all at the Ministry, if they ask," says Arthur Weasley. "We likely won't get back until very late."

"Yeah, Dad. Sure," says Ron, still making odd patterns with his eggs.

"Ah. Never mind. There's George now," says Arthur, turning back towards the hall. Ginny catches a glimpse of her brother's tousled brick-red hair through the crack in the door. He rubs his eyes sleepily as his father talks to him in a low voice.

"Take it easy today," says Tonks, preparing to leave. "Relax, all right? Wish I could. Maybe I can get more of a lie-in tomorrow."

"All right," says Hermione, still stirring her oatmeal.

George walks into the kitchen, his feet making a slapping noise on the flagstones of the floor. He collapses into a seat and starts chewing on a piece of toast.

"That must be awfully cold by now," says Hermione.

"It is," says George without inflection.

"Where's Fred?" asks Ron.

"Asleep."

"What did Dad say?"

George puts down the toast, as if holding it and talking at the same time just takes too much energy to continue.

"An owl came from St. Mungo's early this morning with news about Bill," he says. "He's all right. He pulled through."

"Oh! I am glad," exclaims Hermione.

Ron gives a great sigh of relief. "I knew Bill could do it. When's he coming back?"

"They don't know yet. They'll send another owl when they do. But I certainly hope it's before tomorrow, because..." George's words trail off awkwardly.

"They don't want Harry to know, do they?" Hermione asks quietly. And Ginny feels her heart sink at those words, falling past the bright bubble of happiness that had risen in her when she'd heard that Bill was all right.

George smiles grimly. "There are a lot of things the Aurors don't want Harry to know."

"I knew that." Hermione looks down at her hands. "Otherwise, we could've said a lot more in our letters. But how are we supposed to know what we're not allowed to say to him?"

"I'm not sure." George yawns tremendously. "Sorry--anyway, I'm sure they'll have a big conference at the kitchen table or something before the Aurors go off to get Harry, and we'll be filled in on everything then."

"Hardly everything," says Ginny resentfully. "Just on what they want us to know."

"You're right about that." George pushes himself back from the table. "I reckon Fred's the smartest one of us all. I'm going to take a page from his book and go back to bed myself."

"Why didn't your father tell us?" Hermione asks as soon as George has left the room.

"Because we're not supposed to know anything about it, remember? Or at least, about how serious it was," says Ron, a trace of bitterness in his voice.

So you do know how it feels when people won't tell you anything, Ginny thinks without rancour.

Ron pushes his chair back from the table. "George had the right idea," he says. "I'm going to bed."

"You just got up," Hermione points out.

"Well, back to bed then. Whatever."

"I'm horribly tired, too," Hermione admits. "The funny thing is that I don't know why. All the strain, I suppose..." Her words trail off vaguely, and she follows Ron out of the kitchen. Ginny sits at the table alone. They've left me again, she thinks.

"Are you coming?" Hermione calls back.

A little shamefacedly, she gets up.

"Won't you come and stay in my room today?" Hermione asks as they climb the stairs. "You know there's an extra bed."

"Maybe later," says Ginny.

"You said you would last night."

"Maybe tonight I will." Ginny turns and walks down the hallway to her room. She wonders if Hermione's feelings are hurt. Let her feel what I felt... The thought passes across her mind, but there is no emotional content to it. Ginny realizes that her anger with Hermione has passed, but she is too exhausted to think more about it. She flops into her bed and falls instantly into a deep, dreamless sleep.

A scratching, shuffling noise awakens her. She sits up, blinking into the grey half-darkness. A bit of overcast sky peeps through a crack between the curtains in her room. The air has a curiously tight, oppressive feeling, and the heat hangs as heavy as lead. A storm's coming, she thinks.

Shuffle-thump. Shuffle-thump. The sound is coming from outside her room.

Ginny gets out of bed as quietly as she can and tiptoes out into the hall, stopping and listening a couple of times to sort out exactly where the sound is located in the house. She creeps to the second landing at the other end of the corridor and crouches down, peering at the entrance foyer. None of them come over here very much; if there's anything worth spying on, it almost always takes place in the basement kitchen, which can be seen from the other landing if the door is open. But now, she can see Kreacher shuffling towards the enormous portrait of Hestia Black in the downstairs hall. He twitches aside a corner of the black cloth that covers it, and brings his head close.

The portrait begins to talk in a very low, muffled voice. Kreacher nods and says something in reply from time to time, but it is impossible to hear any actual words from where Ginny sits. Finally, he turns away and walks down the hall in his lumbering, hunched gait.

"Kreacher is the last, the very last faithful one, oh yes, yes, my lady knows," he mutters. "And Kreacher shall obey her wishes, she who is lady and mistress, where there is no true master..." He disappears around the corner, and Ginny realizes that he is headed for the basement kitchen. She tiptoes to the other landing as quietly as she can, and gets there just in time to see him closing the door to the kitchen behind him. A chill goes through her. I can't even begin to imagine what he was talking about, she thinks, but it can't be good. Just the sight of Kreacher disturbs her, and she does not know quite why. It is as if some memory teases at the very edge of her mind, and she cannot bring it into focus. Then she shakes herself, and even that ghost of memory is gone.

The house is utterly, oppressively silent. With the door downstairs closed, she can hear nothing of what Kreacher might be doing in the kitchen, and everyone else is either gone or asleep. Ginny might be the only living thing left at Twelve Grimmauld Place. The thought makes her very nervous, and she wonders briefly if she ought to go and wake up Hermione. No. Let her sleep, if she can... Restlessly, she walks down the hall again, tracing shadows on the wall with one finger.

But, wait... everyone isn't gone. And maybe everyone isn't asleep. Professor Lupin is here, and Sirius. The thought makes her stop. Yes. I could go and talk to them... to him. But she isn't quite sure where either of them might be, as she doesn't know where Sirius's room is, and doesn't have the slightest idea where in the house Remus Lupin is staying. She glances down at the door to the basement kitchen when she passes the landing, but decides not to try it. The last thing in the world I want to do is to run into Kreacher!

She tiptoes up the stairs to the fourth floor, since it seems the most likely place, and tries doors all up and down the corridor. They are all locked. The shadows in the hall are very deep and dark, and this part of the house seems particularly unwelcoming just now. Hurriedly, she rattles the doorknob to the last door, and it opens into a small, rather shabby room with drawn curtains. In the bed lies Remus Lupin, turned on his side and fast asleep. Even in the dim light, she can see that there is more grey in his hair than when he taught her Defense Against in the Dark Arts at Hogwarts during her second year. But in sleep, his face is relaxed, with all its lines of tension smoothed away. The contrast between his youthful face and the streaks of grey in his hair is a strange one. He turns a little, and she sees that he is wearing light blue cotton pyjamas. They seem very large on his thin frame.

I should leave. He needs to sleep, I'm sure, Ginny thinks. But then, I would as well, if I'd been... The thought dissolves into nothingness. She turns to go, but at that precise moment, he sits up, rubbing his eyes.

"Siri?" he yawns. "What is it?"

"No, it's Ginny," she says softly. "Ginny Weasley. But I'll go now. I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to wake you, Professor--"

He squints at the clock. "Three o'clock! I should get up. And I wish you'd leave off calling me 'Professor,' Ginny. I haven't been that for a few years, by now." His usually gentle voice sounds almost snappish, nothing like usual.

She lingers by the doorframe, unsure of what he wants her to do. He doesn't sound as if he wants company, she thinks. And he really does look as if he could use a bit more sleep. He beckons to her. "Come in, Ginny, please. We've hardly had a chance to talk all summer."

"That's true," says Ginny, sitting awkwardly on the edge of the bed. There is no chair in the room. "Uh--what should I call you, then? Mr. Lupin?"

"No." He sits cross-legged, the sheets falling around him. "Remus will do very well."

"All right... Remus."

"How are you, Ginny?" he asks.

It is a question she has heard a million times, and it is never meant in anything more than the most casual way. But although his voice has lost its peevishness, it does not quite sound casual. She thinks before answering.

"Well, I've been awfully tired all day, and I'm not sure why. So has everyone else. And almost everybody's gone today, out of the Order, I mean. There's only you, and Sirius."

"Where's everyone else? Your brothers, and Hermione?"

"Still asleep."

"Ah. So... You came looking for Sirius?" He watches her guardedly.

Ginny thought before replying. "I came looking for both of you, I suppose. But I'm glad I found you, Remus." To her faint surprise, she means it quite honestly. Her feelings for Sirius are so complicated that she cannot begin to understand them. Her feelings for Remus Lupin are simple. She likes him, and she respects him, and she is not afraid to let either emotion show through the friendly smile she gives him now. He gives her a faint, tired smile in return.

"And I'm glad you found me," he says, his sentence ending in a yawn. "Sorry--it's not the company, Ginny." His face is creased in a slight frown.

"You still look like you could use some more sleep, Remus," she says shyly.

"I'll sleep some more this afternoon, I should imagine. Once Harry comes back, things will get very busy, and I'll need all my strength." His words sound rather absent, as if he using only a small part of his mind to talk about Harry, and thinking of something else all the while.

"What's going to happen to him?" Ginny asks. "I mean, in the letters he sent, he said he might be expelled."

"Oh, I can't believe it would actually come to that--"

Ginny grits her teeth. "That's the sort of thing all of the adults have been telling us all summer long," she says, her voice trembling. "They only want us to hear nice things, pleasant things, even if they're not true. But is it true, Remus? Is it?"

He looks straight at her, and lays his hand over hers. She can feel his bones beneath his fragile skin, and his pulse beats fast. "I won't lie to you," he says quietly, and she feels all his attention trained on her now. "I'll never lie to you, Ginny. I despise pretty lies. The truth is always better, you know, no matter how ugly it is. But in this case I don't know what the truth might be. Harry will have a ministry hearing for illegal use of magic, that much I know."

"But he only conjured the Patronus to drive away the Dementors," says Ginny. "That's what Ron and Hermione say. It was self-defence."

Remus nods. "It was. And so the hearing might be only be a formality, or--"

"Or what?"

Remus seems to consider his answer carefully before replying.

"I don't know, Ginny. We need to all hope for the best. But, well, one never knows what may happen, and what with Lucius Malfoy's influence at the Ministry just now..."

"Lucius Malfoy?" Ginny whispers. She shivers.

"Are you cold, Ginny? I don't see how on earth you could be, it's still so hot. "

"No, no--I'm not cold. Go on with what you were saying, Remus."

"Well, all I was saying was that I don't like what I've heard about the way things have been going, down there. Too much under-the-table dealing." His voice grows bitter. "And I know better than most people what the Ministry can be, when they choose."

"You mean--oh," saiys Ginny awkwardly. Of course! Because he's a werewolf, the Ministry doesn't permit him to hold most sorts of jobs, and they keep him on a registry, and loads of other dreadful things, I'm sure... oh, poor Remus... but he'd hate it if he knew I pitied him... And the very existence of that emotion does seem horribly presumptuous. She clears her throat, extremely aware of the fact that she is a not-quite fourteen-year-old girl, and that he is an adult who had been her teacher, and who shouldn't need her pity. And who definitely doesn't want it. The silence drags on longer than is natural.

The door opened. Sirius walks in, carrying a plate of sandwiches. "I brought you cheddar cheese on wheat, Remy; that's all we have. I was hoping for potted meat or turkey, but--" He stops short when he saw Ginny. "Oh." He looks at her blankly. "I thought everyone else was asleep."

She looks up at him, and he looks down at her, and Remus's glance flickers between both of them, as if hoping to intercept something so incorporeal that Ginny herself does not even know it is there.

"Didn't you bring anything to drink?" Remus asks Sirius.

"Sorry, no. Didn't think of it. I'll go downstairs again if you want."

"No, you stay here. Ginny, why don't you go? Get me some water in that green glass goblet, and make sure it's good and cold," says Remus. "And if you don't mind, could you see if Kreacher is anywhere about? It makes me a bit nervous when I don't know where that house-elf is."

"All right." Ginny feels strangely reluctant to go. But she hurries downstairs, and fills the glass hastily at the tap. She doesn't look for Kreacher. As silently as she can, she creeps back up to the corridor that ends in Remus's room. The door is open a crack. Holding her breath, hating herself, she crouches down next to it. I have to do this, she argues with her own mind. Nobody will tell me anything. The only way to learn anything that's going on is to sneak, and spy, and listen at doors. Soon, I won't have to do this anymore. But just now...

They are clearly in the middle of a heated conversation.

"I know that Harry's coming tomorrow," says Sirius, running an agitated hand through his hair. "I don't need you to tell me that Harry's coming tomorrow, Remus. Merlin knows, I've been waiting for him to come, hoping for him to come--"

"And when he does come," Remus says doggedly, "there are a lot of things he can't know about."

"I know that as well. I don't need lectures from you, or anybody else. I've been hearing enough about that from Molly. Let's see, shall we?" Sirius starts to count on his fingers in an exaggerated way. "One, he mustn't know that the Aurors were on that mission. Best not to tell him they were ever gone at all. Two, he mustn't know about Bill's mission. Best not even to tell Harry he was ever ill, since he'll be all right now. Three--"

"That's not the sort of thing I mean," says Remus, his voice quiet but intense. "This may be my last chance to speak to you alone, without any fear of anybody overhearing us, so will you listen!"

Sirius stopped short in his pacing. "I'm listening."

Remus leans forward, stabbing a forefinger in the air for emphasis. "I don't know what's been going on between you and Ginny Weasley," he says. "But whatever it is--however innocent it is--it has to stop now."

"What!" exclaims Sirius. "How can you think--"

"Shh! She'll be back up here any minute. I don't think, and I don't know. I don't even want to guess. That's why I said it was innocent--"

"And it is," mutters Sirius. "I like that girl. I like to be with her, and to talk to her, to listen to her, and to see her smile.... She has such lovely smiles. I feel as I need to store the sight of them up against the dark days, when everyone will be gone, when I'll be alone in this horrible house. I can see the sort of woman she's going to be, and it's like--" He turns towards his friend, and his face is full of pain. "It's like brushing my hand across a closed flower in bud, about to bloom. I can see the beauty of the rose to come. Everyone else passes her by. But I see her. And that's all. That's all there is to it. I'd never do more than that, not with such an innocent girl, such a young girl. Can't I even have that?"

"You know you can't, Siri," says Remus quietly, and at the sound of the pet name, the other man's handsome, ravaged face crumples.

Ginny shrinks back into the shadows of the corridor as Sirius pushes past her. She's fairly sure that he didn't notice her, but she waits a few moments nonetheless, and then brings Remus his water.

She goes back down the basement kitchen, walking very slowly, not at all sure why she is headed there. She supposes that he has some sort of confused idea of finding Sirius there. What she'd do with him, or him with her, she really doesn't know. But perhaps they'd talk. That had always been the best part of whatever it is that lies between them, the talks. Her mind spins with what Remus said. She cannot begin to take in the meaning of it all, but she keeps trying, snatching at remembered scraps of words.

Ginny is so deep in thought that she does not hear several sets of footsteps leaving the house, nor the soft voices.

She jerks her head up when she hears the front door creak open. Then she scampers to the front hall as fast as she can go, afraid that she is already too late.

Ron and Hermione stand half in and half out of the open door, and Ron is arguing with someone who must be standing just outside it, on the front step. "The Portkey's leaving in three minutes, Molly," says her father's tired voice from outside the house.

"Then we're coming as well!" says Ron.

"Oh, all right," says Molly Weasley's voice in exasperated tones. "We haven't time to argue anymore."

Ginny skids to a halt in the front of the door, panting. An awful sinking feeling runs through her when she sees that Fred and George are standing next to her parents. "You're going to get Bill at St. Mungo's, aren't you?" she demands.

"Thought you were still asleep, Ginny," says Ron. "You ought to go back to bed."

"No! I'm coming with you too."

"You're not," Molly says flatly. "You're to stay in this house. I don't want you leaving it until all of you leave for Hogwarts on the first of September." There are purple shadows under her mother's eyes, Ginny sees, and new little lines around her pursed mouth.

"But--but I want to go!"

"You'll see Bill tomorrow morning. We won't be back until long after you're asleep." And with that, Molly turns away. They all cluster round the automobile tyre that is serving as a Portkey. Only Hermione turns back, her arm almost slipping out of Ron's grasp.

"But, Mrs. Weasley," she says, "maybe Ginny ought to come with us. Maybe--"

"No," says Molly, and it is her last word before disappearing. Hermione's troubled face seems to linger in the air for an extra moment, and then they are all gone. The tyre falls to the ground and rolls up against the front step. Ginny gives it a savage kick, and it bounces against the door.

The heat has still not broken, but the thunderclouds mass sullenly outside the window of Ginny's room. She slept a bit more, restlessly, trying to will the hours away, but the awful heat kept waking her. The sheets are damp with perspiration when she finally sits up, pushing a strand of hair back from her forehead. She brings up her knees and crosses her arms over them, staring into the darkness of the room. The familiar feeling of resentment is still simmering in her. They went off and left me--the whole family, all of them. They went to get Bill without me, and all Mum said was that I wasn't to leave the house until September. September! I'll go mad. But one thing's different... Her brow puckers with the thought. I think Hermione really wanted me to come with them.

But there is more than enough anger left for everyone else. She gets out of bed and begins to pace the room. Harry is coming back tomorrow, and the thought should make her happy. But strangely enough, it does not. She feels as if she has been on the verge of figuring out the mysteries swirling around this house. Harry's arrival will cut off any chance of learning more as thoroughly as a knife slammed down on a chopping board. She doesn't know why she is so sure of this, but she is.

And there are so many things that they won't want even mentioned after he gets here, she thinks resentfully. We'll all start behaving so differently; I just know it. Ron and Hermione will never talk to me now. The Golden Trio will be complete again, and what do they need me around for? It'll be even worse than it's been all summer. And Sirius... Sirius... he loves Harry so much. Something in her chest twitched painfully. Sirius won't have any time at all for me. It'll all be given to Harry, his precious godson. We've had the very last of our late-night talks; those will be all over now.

She stops in the middle of her pacing as a thought strikes her. Or will they?

Ginny smooths her hair in the mirror over her dresser, looking into her reflected eyes. They seem very large and dark. She creeps quietly downstairs. The silence of the house seems to have weight that it has never carried before. I'm alone here for the very first time, she thinks. Except for Remus, and I'll bet he's still asleep. And Sirius. Her heart beats a rapid, guilty tattoo at that thought, even though there is nothing to feel guilty about, as she firmly tells herself. She simply wants to see Sirius by herself one more time before everybody returns.

She pushes open the door of the basement kitchen, and at first glance, her courage evaporates. He isn't here. I'm such a fool! I didn't even think of that. I could go upstairs to his room again, and ask... no, no, I couldn't. Her mouth droops sadly. This was their last chance, and now it has slipped from her grasp.

But as she turns to leave, a movement by the cupboard catches her eye.

Kreacher is carefully replacing goblets in the glass-fronted bureau, standing on tiptoe to reach the first shelf. Something very like a smile creases his face, and he seems to be muttering to himself. Ginny shrinks back into the shadows. Everything that the house-elf does always seems furtive and creepy, but surely there can't be anything wrong with putting away dishes. It's what house-elves are supposed to do, after all. Still, she watches him, trying not to breathe too loudly, unwilling to let him know that she is there.

Behind her, the door opens, so suddenly that she does not quite have time to get out of the way. It bangs into her leg and she whimpers, clutching her thigh. Sirius strides in, his face as dark as the thunderclouds massing overhead.

"What the hell are you doing?" he asks Kreacher without any preamble.

"Helping with the housework, yes, yes," Kreacher says softly. "Master always says that Kreacher does not do enough, but Kreacher always tries to help..."

Sirius snorts. "You'd sooner set yourself on fire than try to help anyone in this house."

"Kreacher knows his duty..."

"Well, now your master's telling you to get out of here, so that's your duty. Do it." He turns away carelessly.

"Yes. I will go. No reason to stay, none at all. For Kreacher always obeys the true master," says the house-elf, and he shuffles out the door, an odd smile creasing his gnarled face. Ginny shrinks back as he passes by her, and stumbles against a chair. Sirius turns at the noise.

"Ginny!" he says, sounding surprised. "What are you doing here? You ought to get a bit more sleep."

She looks at him, trying to guess his mood. She can't read anything in his face beyond a tired tension. But he doesn't seem unhappy to see her.

"I've slept enough," says Ginny.

"So have I," says Sirius, dropping into a chair. "Sit down, Ginny."

She does, her heart beginning to beat faster with excitement. He asked me to sit down. He wants to speak with me. He must. "I mean, it's not exactly that I couldn't sleep a bit more," she said. "I feel sort of groggy, actually. Almost like I couldn't sleep long enough, no matter what. But I can't bear to stay in bed any longer." She wonders if she sounds like she's starting to babble, and if she ought to be quiet. But Sirius simply nods.

"That's how I feel as well, actually. Tired. Completely fagged out. But I don't want to sleep any more just now."

"Why do you suppose we're all so tired? Hermione and Ron were the same way all day long, right up until--until they left." Her throat tightens with a mixture of anger and hurt.

"They've all left you again, haven't they?" asks Sirius.

Ginny nods. "Mum and Dad went to go and get Bill from St. Mungo's. And they brought Fred and George, and Ron, and even Hermione, but they didn't bring me. Why didn't they bring me?" She winces a little at the whine in her own voice.

"They--we--don't feel that it's safe..." Sirius speaks haltingly, as if trying to recall a reason that is just beyond his grasp.

"But why isn't it safe?"

He puts his hand over hers. She almost jumps. "If I knew more, I would tell you," he says. "Believe me, Ginny, I would. But I haven't been told very much myself, and nothing at all until last night, or I wouldn't have taken you out of the house the way I did. Albus has some sort of suspicions about Lucius Malfoy, but they're very vague."

A horrible shiver goes up Ginny's spine. "You mean that since he used me once for the Chamber of Secrets, he'll want to do it again?"

"I honestly don't know. But there's nothing to worry about, Ginny; you're perfectly safe here, and nobody can touch you once you reach Hogwarts. But don't tell any of this to anyone else, please."

"Of course I won't." She feels the separate warmth of each of his fingers, and clings to the human contact against the icy dread seeping through her chest.

"Perhaps I shouldn't have told you." Sirius scrutinizes her face. "Perhaps it's better not to frighten you."

Ginny shook her head vehemently. "I'd rather know."

"Well, I'm sorry I can't tell you more." He caresses the back of her hand absently. Ginny holds her breath, not daring to make the slightest sound or movement in case he realizes what he is doing. "Only I felt that I had to tell you something," he continued. "I know what it is to be left in the dark. I couldn't do that to you."

"Thank you," she whispers. He keeps looking at her intently, and she is suddenly very aware that they are two of the only three people left in the house. "Where's Remus?" she asks.

"Asleep." His gaze does not waver. He smiles slightly. "This is our last chance, isn't it?"

"To do what?" Ginny croaks.

"To have the last of our late-night talks, I mean," Sirius says.

"Oh." I ought to have known that's what he meant. "Really? Do you think so?"

He shrugs. "I'm afraid so, most likely anyway. You have no idea how busy we're all going to be once Harry gets here tomorrow. Arthur will surely want to hold briefings all day, and we'll start laying out plans in earnest, now that everybody's back. We'll have to prepare Harry for that hearing. And then before you know it, you'll all be going back to Hogwarts. This night--this moment--is really the calm before the storm."

"There's going to be a storm, isn't there?" asks Ginny in a small voice.

"Yes--I suppose there will be." He laughs, a short, sharp sound. "I didn't think of that. An actual storm, I mean. Maybe the heat will break then."

"I hate storms," whispers Ginny, wrapping her arms around herself.

"Do they make you afraid?"

"I suppose they do," she admits.

"Get me my silver goblet, would you, Ginny? It's on the top shelf. Fill it halfway or so with water," he says, seemingly changing the subject. A thought flashes across her mind, no more than a brief, vague image. There's something I ought to tell him... But then just before he lets go her hand so that she can get up, he runs his fingers along her palm for an instant. The sensation takes her breath away, and wipes everything from her brain. She brings him the cup, stopping at the sink first.

Sirius pulls a flask from his pocket and pours a stream of some clear liquid into the cup. He takes a long drink from it. It smells sharp and aromatic, and Ginny thinks she recognizes Firewhisky. His face is set and sullen, almost angry, but she somehow knows that the anger is not directed at her. They didn't bring him, either, she realizes. She waits for him to speak again.

The stillness of the house presses in upon her in a way it has never done before. But she is not frightened. There's no-one here but us, she thinks. It always did feel that way when we had one of our talks, but this time, it's true. Except for Remus, and he's asleep. We might be the only two people left in the world...

"For some reason, it's the thunderstorms I remember the best," said Sirius, "from all the time I spent in Azkaban."

She holds her breath, not daring to remind him that her mother doesn't want him talking about Azkaban in front of her.

"It disturbed some of the prisoners. Those who hadn't gone completely mad, and could still feel some sort of disturbance, I mean." He takes another drink. "So it excited the Dementors. And yet... and yet I didn't mind the storms. I almost liked them, especially towards the end. They were some sort of reminder than an outside world still existed. And then again..." He turned the goblet round in his hand. "They resonated with something in me as well. Their fury matched mine, and their rage. I learned not to transform before a thunderstorm, because when I was in dog form, I did some mad things. Once I charged into a wall, I remember. I woke up on the cold floor after the storm was over and found that I'd broken my arm. A trapped wild thing always hurls itself against the bars of its cage." His face becomes inexpressibly bitter. "I was trapped there, and now I'm trapped here. Sometimes I think that nothing worse could have happened to me. That anything would be better, anything at all, even--"

"No!" Ginny knows she should stay silent, but she interrupts him anyway, unable to bear hearing whatever he is about to say. She takes his hand in hers again with a gesture so instinctive that she doesn't realize what she is doing until after she's done it. He looks down at their joined hands with a crooked smile.

"What did you think I was going to say, Ginny?" he asks in a low voice.

"I--I don't know." She looks down into her lap.

He sighs, and does not let go her hand. "I wish you were older." Her heart leaps in a violent sideways sort of motion, both pleased and wildly afraid. "What I need tonight," he continued, "is to get really drunk. Just one last time, before Harry gets here. I wish you could drink with me, Ginny."

Everything in her chest subsides slightly. He did not say the thing she had hoped to hear, or feared to hear, and since she had not defined even to herself what she both hoped for and feared from Sirius Black, Ginny was left feeling confused.

"Er--maybe I could," she says. He makes an impatient movement with the hand that is not holding hers. "Mum and the rest won't be back for ages," she insists.

"What a little witch you are," he says, the crooked not-quite-smile still on his lips. "You're trying to get me in trouble, aren't you?"

"I could have a bit. Surely just a little bit wouldn't hurt."

"You really shouldn't," says Sirius. "Remember what happened last time, when you drank from my goblet by mistake?"

"That was just the heat," Ginny insists. "And anyway, it's not as if I'm not going to have loads of chances to drink once I get back to Hogwarts. You ought to see what goes on the Gryffindor common room after hours."

"If it's anything like it was when I went there," says Sirius dryly, "I've seen it."

"Come on, then," coaxes Ginny. "Just a bit. Just let me taste it."

"Your mum would kill me, if she knew I'd permitted this." Sirius grins, but the grin does not quite reach his eyes. "Still, I suppose you're going to try drinking again anyway, no matter what I might say to you. Merlin knows, I certainly did. If you try to pull in a spirited horse on a short rein, he'll just bolt... he or she, that is.... Better that you should have a sip from my cup, if you want, when you're safe in this house and can't go anywhere or get into any trouble. It'll be a secret--just between us--all right?"

Ginny nods.

He lifts the lip of the silver goblet to her mouth, and she drinks, tingling with happiness. Then he drinks after her, a longer, harder swig, and their eyes meet in shared complicity.

Ginny is never sure, afterwards, exactly how long they both sat in the basement kitchen, nor what they talked about. She has hardly eaten a bite of food all day, and the strong liquor goes to her head at once. He talks about his past in this house, and his early teenage years.

"The last time I sat at this table and shared whisky with a girl, I was fifteen years old," he says. "She was your age. No, a few months older. Everyone else was gone on that night as well, and we drank from the same cup..."

After a time, Ginny realizes that Sirius is talking to himself far more than to her. She isn't even sure he realizes that she is still there. But one of his hands holds onto hers still, and never lets go. She drinks more whisky and water from the cup when he isn't looking, and surreptitiously replenishes it from the flask on the table. He does not notice, and he drinks far more than she does. He continues talking about the other girl, although he never mentions her by name, and the details grow hazier and hazier in Ginny's mind.

The hall clock strikes eleven. Sirius falls silent, and they can both hear the howling of the wind. "The storm's coming," he murmurs. "You ought to go to bed, Ginny."

She gets up, and only then does she realize how much whisky she's actually drunk that night. The floor wavers unsteadily beneath her feet.

"I'll help you up to your room," says Sirius, offering her his arm, none too steady himself. "I shouldn't have let you drink so much, Ginny."

"Doesn't matter," she says. In some corner of her mind, she wonders at the fact that her speech still sounds so precise when the entire room is beginning to spin lazily around her. Her thought processes seem clearer than ever, as well. But she does not know, then or ever, if a plan is forming in her mind, or if she is only acting on instinct, like birds flying south when winter approaches.

Between them, they manage to make it upstairs. Sirius turns as if to go when they reach her door, but a clap of thunder strikes at that very moment, and she turns to him, hiding her face in his shirt. She feels the play of the muscles in his chest as his arms go around her. "Sshh," he said. "S'allright. It's only a storm." His words are only slightly slurred.

She breaks apart from him, reluctantly, and gets into bed, burrowing beneath the covers. "Please stay," she says. "I don't want to be alone. The thunder frightens me so much." It has finally begun to rain as well, and the strangest thing is that the rain has not yet broken the heat; she can almost hear the sizzling as the drops hit the pavement outside the house.

"Ginny, Ginny. I should leave." But the bed creaks under his weight as he sits down beside her.

"Just for a bit. The others won't be back for hours. Mum said so. Don't leave me alone. Please."

Sirius hesitates. "I shouldn't be here. Shouldn't be in your room. Not like this. Remus told me..." He breaks off.

"There can't be anything wrong about it. Please. Don't leave me." She speaks very softly, and he moves closer and closer to her, just as she had hoped he would do. He looks at her, intently yet hazily.

"There could be something wrong, all right," he murmurs so softly that she can barely hear him, and is not at all sure that she was meant to do. "I wonder if you really don't realize..."

Ginny's heart is thumping so fast that she can barely hear what he says to her, a loud, guilty drumbeat. She is sober enough to realize just how drunk she really is, but the alcohol also seems to have affected her enough so that she doesn't care, so that the secret, shameful desires of her heart are laid bare. She has maneuvered a man into her bedroom, a man old enough to be her father, a man who is tall and dark and brooding and mysterious, and the house is empty except for the two of them and a sleeping Remus Lupin. It will be for a good long time. Until morning, perhaps. She makes her eyes very wide.

"Why would there be anything wrong with your being in my room?" she asks.

"You're so innocent, Ginny," says Sirius, smoothing a lock of hair behind her ear where it has fallen over her face.

She smiles in answer, hoping the expression doesn't look as false as it feels. She has not felt innocent since the night she lay dying in the Chamber of Secrets, knowing that she had betrayed her family and all her friends. In some ways, she still is, of course. But her spirit is not as untouched as her body. After Tom Riddle's rape of her mind, it can never be that way again. She is certainly not so innocent that she does not understand what her actions mean, and where they may lead her. She feels exactly as if she is dangling one foot over the edge of an abyss, but she cannot stop; some part of herself that she doesn't understand is driving her on.

"I'm not so innocent as all that," she says.

"Oh?" His voice is gently mocking. He turns to lift the goblet from the side table where he placed it, and swirls the contents around. "There's only the dregs left now," he says, and takes a long sip. She leans forward, tips up the cup, and drains the last mouthful.

"You shouldn't have done that," Sirius whispers, leaning close to her. "I shouldn't have let you do that."

"Too late now." She whispers as well. The two of them are caught in a tight little circle of light from the one sconce on the wall above them.

The seconds tick by. Ginny feels a strange, bitter, tingling taste in her mouth, and wonders if Sirius does too. They have been drinking from the same cup all night, after all. They are still very close to each other; he has not moved away.

"Aren't you an innocent still, Ginny?" he finally asks, a strange little smile touching the corners of his lips.

"I've dated some boys," she says. Her head feels strangely dizzy and light. "Neville Longbottom, and, uh, Michael Corner." She doesn't mention that she only had one date with Neville, if that was what you could even call the Yule Ball six months before when he had stepped on her feet so relentlessly and sweated all over her second-hand blue gown. Nor does she add the fact that she and Michael have only exchanged owls, as of yet. After a moment's thought, she decides not to add Colin Creevey to the list. She's always thought that his crush on her last year was rather creepy.

"Ah, I see." There was definitely a smile on Sirius's face now. "You're vastly experienced."

"Well, what about you?" she retorted. "I suppose you had lots of girlfriends by the time you were in my year?" Too late, she wonders if this was a wise thing to say. It can only remind him of how young she actually is. But he only laughs.

"Yes, Ginny. I did. I started working my way through the girls in fourth and fifth year Gryffindor House, that year. James as well. We were a right pair."

Ginny looks at him uncertainly for just a second, a little startled, almost afraid. She had expected him to say something about how he hoped she didn't follow his pattern, or some vague platitude about saving herself for true love. Some version of the advice that adults normally give to children. But he didn't, she thinks. I've never had anyone talk that way to me before. I've overheard Bill and Charlie talking like that when they didn't know I was there, but that's all. A sensation of perilous excitement steals through her, as if she is inching her way out onto a limb over a precipice. She isn't sure how far she should go, or if it is wise to even try. But the strange dizziness rushes through her again, and she says the first thing that comes into her mind.

"Did you love any of them? Those Gryffindor girls, the ones that you... did things with?"

Sirius blinks at her, and she is sure that he is going to say that this time, she has gone too far. He replaces the goblet on the side table. His movements are very precise, but his hand trembles. She wonders if he feels this dizzy sensation as well. "No," he says. "I didn't."

Ginny leans back so that her shoulders are resting on the pillows, her hair streaming across them. "I need to lie down," she says softly.

"I'd like to as well," he says.

"Then why don't you?" she asks.

"Maybe I will."

She holds her breath in anticipation, not really expecting him to do it. But the bed creaks as he lies down next to her, on the other side. She props herself up on one elbow and looks down at him.

"Have you loved anyone like that, ever?" she asks.

"There are many different sorts of love," he answers.

"I don't mean the way you love Harry, or Remus Lupin. I mean--well, you know what I mean."

Sirius is silent for such a long time that she doesn't think he is going to answer at all. But at last, he does.

"Long ago," he says, "I loved a girl, I think. Only one girl, ever."

"Was she that girl you were talking about before?"

"Yes."

Was she at school?"

"Yes."

"But you said you didn't love any of the Gryffindor girls."

" She wasn't in Gryffindor. And anyway I think I loved her when we were both children, before either of us ever went to Hogwarts."

"How did you know her as a child?" asks Ginny.

"She came to this house as a child all the time, and I went to hers. I already told you that, Ginny."

"Oh. Who was she?"

Sirius does not quite answer her question. "She was afraid of storms, like you," he says in a musing voice. "I used to comfort her during thunderstorms. I would take her in my arms when we were both children, before we were old enough to know where that might lead us, or what it might mean. I would stroke her long blonde hair and look into her blue eyes, and I would tell her that everything was going to be all right, that I was here for her, and that I would never go away. But," he added, "I did. Finally, I did. I had no choice... and then I lost her anyway. She was taken from me..."

"Oh," whispered Ginny. "That's so sad, Sirius. So very sad. When you loved her."

"I did. Or I thought I did. I don't know if there's a difference, really."

"Did she love you?"

"I have never been sure. But if she did, she loved someone else as well."

"What--what happened to her?" ventured Ginny.

"I told you, Ginny. I lost her."

"She ended up with the someone else, you mean? The other boy who loved her?"

"No." He gave a short, bitter bark of a laugh. "She never had the opportunity to choose between us, because someone else took her from me, someone I could not fight, someone no human being could fight. And then she was given to another man. One she didn't like, or love, or want. All of her choices were taken away from her. All except one. She did choose me, once... but never again..."

A crack of thunder rends the air. Ginny does not think or plan out what she does next; thinking the entire thing over later, she is quite sure of this. She rolls towards Sirius until his arms are around her, and she shudders with terror.

His arms stiffen for a moment, as if he does not quite know what to do with a female body so suddenly in them. Or perhaps, Ginny thinks later on, as if he knows all too well, and has tried to forget.

"The storm," she whimpers. "The storm."

"It's all right. Shh, shh! It's all right, Ginny." He strokes her hair and whispers soothing words in her ear. Ginny lifts her face, and her eyes are very bright. His mouth comes down on hers. And Sirius Black kisses her.

She has wished for this. Dreamed of this. Perhaps she has even engineered this night and this kiss, although she is never sure about that. Yet she is so shocked by this moment brought to fruition that she does not know how to respond. He waits, holding her close, not moving for a moment. Then he coaxes her lips apart with his own and his tongue touches the tip of hers. A violent shudder goes through her, and she clutches him close, feeling herself going limp and pliant. Madness is swirling all around them, dark and thick and hot, somehow tied up with the violence of the storm and the silence of the house and the darkness of the room as the sconce flickers low. Ginny feels it carrying them both like a wildly rushing stream, and she has no desire to fight the current.

The coverlet wrinkles under her. Ginny feels her shoulders being pressed into the bed. She isn't at all sure how this has happened, but somehow Sirius has pushed her back onto the bed so that she is lying flat, his big hands on her shoulders. An image flashes into her mind of what happened between them a few days before, after the joyous afternoon in the little park near the house. He had romped with her in his dog form in the basement kitchen, and they had ended up in exactly the same position. His paws had been on her shoulders as she lay on the floor on her back, giggling, and he had been licking her neck. It had all seemed so innocent then. She had not understood why Remus was so upset when he saw it. Now, she does understand. But it doesn't matter; nothing matters now but this moment and these sensations.

His lips move down to her neck. He knows exactly how to nibble at her skin with just the right mixture of savageness and gentleness; there is a polish to everything he is doing even through his hunger, a finesse that Ginny supposes can only come with experience. Nothing like Neville's clumsy kisses, or the one peck Michael gave her in the spring, just before end of term. She moans and her head falls to one side, allowing him easier access.

The sconce flickers and then dies down almost entirely. A flash of lightning illuminates the bed for a split second, and Ginny squeezes her eyes tightly shut. But she can feel that he is beginning to pull down the top of her nightdress. What are you doing to me, Sirius? Ginny almost asks the question aloud. But she shuts her mouth tightly before the words can get out. He is like a man moving in a dream, and a single sound from her will wake him, she knows. The thin material slides down her shoulders, baring the upper part of her breasts.

He wants to see me naked! Oh God. Nobody's ever seen me naked except the mediwizards at St. Mungo's--and now Sirius Black is going to look at me without any clothes on and --

"We--you--I should stop this," he says, his voice as hoarse and desperate as a man pleading hopelessly with his own obsessions. "I should stop it now. Aren't you afraid, doesn't this make you afraid?" Ginny says nothing. He is kissing the curve of her neck now where it meets her collarbone, not waiting for her response. "It's been so long, so long," he whispers. He holds himself back from her, and she feels the trembling of all his muscles, as if some unimaginable effort is required to keep himself in check.

"You should stop me," he says, his voice sounding hopeless. "I could stop, if you'd only ask me."

She doesn't ask. She doesn't say a word, because a word from her will break this spell.

"Ask me to stop," Sirius says. "For God's sake, Ginny, make me stop." But his words sound as if he has given up hope, and having lost that, there is no more to fear. And Ginny stays silent. She hears his shaky groan. His hands fumble with the buttons on her nightdress. But he is pulling at them too hard, and they pop free, clattering to the floor. A growl comes from his throat, and he yanks the fragile lawn material down, ripping it slightly, baring her nearly to the waist. This ought to make me afraid, Ginny thinks. But she isn't afraid. She arches her back and offers her body up to him. His hands go around her upper back and pull her close, even further up towards him, and then his mouth closes over one of her nipples and his tongue is laving her with fire.

"Sweet," he says, between suckling and kissing. "Ah, you taste so sweet, Ginny."

She moans, unable to answer coherently.

His mouth moves down her chest. She thinks she hears the mumbled words taste you everywhere, Ginny but she can't be sure. "I'll make you happy," Sirius says, and she does hear that. "So happy. You'll love this, my love, my little love..."

One hand holds her up towards him, her shoulders lifted slightly off the bed. His other hand pushes up the remnants of her nightgown and then moves up her thigh, warm and firm and sure. And then, for the first time, Ginny does feel fear.

Oh, God! He's going to touch me where Tom Riddle did, in the Chamber of Secrets. When I was only eleven years old, and I knew that I had betrayed everyone I loved. When I lay tranced and dying, and he touched me. Unripe fruit, little Ginevra, he said. But all things ripen, in time...

"So beautiful," Sirius whispers reverently. One of his fingers hooks into the waistband of her cotton knickers and begins to pull them down.

But this isn't Tom Riddle. This is Sirius. He touches me so tenderly. He touches me as if he loves me. It isn't the same at all. It isn't!

"Ginny, my Ginny." His mouth moves against her torso, her belly, the tops of her thighs. She struggles with herself and her fear.

The words of the mediwitch come back to her then, those horrible words from the Lughnasa when she had just turned thirteen. The ones she has so nearly succeeded in forgetting. She fights desperately against remembering them now.

We don't know what the consequences might be when... and if... it is completed. With someone else.

No, no, I won't remember...

What the consequences might be...

"I'll be so gentle, Ginny," Sirius whispers. "So tender. So sweet. I'll make you feel things you've never felt. Things I haven't felt in so long, so very, very long..."

If it is completed...

Far away, as if on the other side of the house, she hears Kreacher cackling. The thunder rolls.

With someone else...

"No!" Ginny gasps. She squirms back from Sirius, and her hands move up to push him away. She doesn't mean to do it, but by the time she realizes what she is doing, it is too late to take the action back. Sirius looks down at her fingers shoving against his chest. He blinks for a few moments as if not quite sure what he sees, then sits up, moving away from her, looking down at her with bewilderment in his dark grey eyes.

"What am I doing?" he whispers.

"Don't stop," she says rapidly. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean--"

"How did we even get up here? Weren't we in the kitchen?" he asks. He runs a hand through his hair. "No, I remember that. I brought you here. I don't even know what I'm saying, Ginny. I don't know what I'm doing. I--" He blinks at her as if he is seeing her clearly for the first time that night. "What happened to your nightgown?"

"You tore it," says Ginny. "I don't mind. I have others. It doesn't matter."

"I tore it," he whispers to himself, looking down at his hands. "I remember now. I kissed you--and then I touched you--and then you pushed me away."

"I was afraid, that's all," she says. "I'll try to be calmer. I--"

Sirius sits up, suddenly. His face is very stern. "Exactly how old are you, Ginny?"

She tells him.

His face twists and he turns away violently. For a moment, she is sure that he is going to be sick. "Oh gods," he says raggedly. "I didn't know. I swear I didn't know. I thought you were a bit older than that. Fifteen at least. I don't know why I thought that. I wasn't paying attention, I suppose. But I never thought you were so very young, somehow."

"It doesn't matter," Ginny insists, moving over onto the other side of the bed, towards Sirius. He moves away from her.

"You've never done this before. Have you, Ginny." It is not exactly a question.

"I--I have," insists Ginny. "I told you."

"I don't mean a few kisses. I mean that you're not--experienced. Are you?"

Ginny wishes in a panicky way that she could lie convincingly about this point. But she knows she can't. "No," she says. "But it doesn't matter." Her voice rises. "It doesn't matter at all! It's not as if I was planning on dying a virgin."

"You don't know what you're saying," Sirius says. "You don't know what you're asking me for."

"I do know. And I want this. I tell you I do. And--if it isn't you, it'll be someone else, and soon, too," she lies. "Nobody stays innocent forever."

"Yes. I know that." He turns back towards her. "You'd let me do anything I wanted, wouldn't you?" he murmurs. But there is something almost clinical about the question. .

She nods. The small motion of her head sends a savage wave of dizziness through her, and she reels back towards the bed, catching herself with one hand. .

"Ginny," says Sirius, his voice alert. "What is it, what's wrong?"

"I don't know," she says faintly. "But I'm not afraid. I'm not, I'm not." He is leaning very close to her. She reaches for his shoulders, and tries to pull him down to her again. Her breasts are still bare and she presses their soft firm weight against his chest. Her legs have slipped apart and somehow his hips are between them. For the first time, she feels the hardness of a man's desire pressed against the tender untouched bit of her, through her knickers pulled halfway down her hips and his unbuttoned trousers. She knows what she feels, even without ever having felt it before. And she knows that no matter what he says, he does want her. He groans, closing his eyes, but she can already feel that his body is stiffening with resolve.

"I won't do this." Sirius pushes her away. His long black hair has come loose from its leather thong and falls tangled to his shoulders, and there is something savage about his eyes. But his face is very stern. "I tell you I won't do it!"

Ginny cowers back, sobbing. "Don't cry," he whispers. "Oh gods, Ginny, don't cry! It's not your fault, none of this is your fault."

She cries harder. The dizziness is racing through her entire body now. He reaches for her, and she flinches back. Much later, she realizes that Sirius was only trying to pull the torn halves of her nightgown together, to cover her naked body

"Shh, shh. I'm not going to do anything more to you. Here, Ginny, put on something else. Where are your other nightgowns?"

"Hung up in the closet," Ginny whispers.

He rummages through her clothing and throws her a plain cotton nightrobe with a high neck, standing on the other side of the room, his back turned.

"Put it on," he says.

She pulls it over her head.

"Are you dressed?" he asks, not moving.

"Yes."

He comes back to the bed, sitting carefully on its edge. She breathes heavily in little pants, feeling as if she has just run a race. When she reaches up to her forehead, she feels a thin film of sweat, even though the heat has finally broken now.

"I am not a good man," Sirius says, articulating his words carefully. "I haven't been good, or led a noble and moral life. I've done things that I won't tell you, little Ginny, with your innocent golden eyes looking at me so trustingly. But I've tried--I have tried not to be a bad man, when I could. I really have. There are things I just won't do. So I am not going to do this thing to you, Ginny Weasley."

The bed seems to be spinning first one way, then the other. Ginny closes her eyes, but it makes no difference. He leaves the room. She lies on her side, crying quietly. The door opens again. "Drink this," Sirius says, lifting a vial of something dark and nasty-tasting to her lips.

"What is it?"

"A Sobering potion."

Ginny drinks. "You don't want me," she says dully.

Sirius puts the little vial down by the side of the bed. "Listen to me," he says, "and listen very hard. You are going to grow into an extraordinary woman, Ginny Weasley." He passes a hand over her face and then her body, not quite touching her. "Beautiful. Exceptional. Rare. A pearl of great price." The words are like music on his lips. "Don't throw yourself away like this."

"I wasn't--" she protests

He ignores her. "You'll look back on this one day, Ginny, and you'll thank your lucky stars that we didn't go through with it."

She shrugs her shoulders, feeling incredibly weary.

"What I don't understand," he adds after a brief pause, "is how I ever let it get this far. I never thought it would. Never thought it could." He gave his brief, bitter laugh. "I think we've both been a bit mad tonight, Ginny. But the madness stops here, and in the morning, you'll be glad of it."

"I suppose so," she says. Then she almost jumps in surprise, because Sirius has put his hand over hers.

"I can't be your lover," he says softly, "but I am, as I always will be, your friend."

"I am yours as well," she says, fighting down tears. "Always."

He sighs deeply. "I want to tell you something then, as a friend. I wouldn't say this in front of anybody in the Order, Ginny, because it sounds a bit like sacrilege, but--as purebloods, we do have something unique, something that Muggleborns do not have. But it's not blood. We carry the last remnant of the memories of the ancient lost days, and of the world as it once was. We still remember the Goddess, and the ancient laws of the mother-right. The gift of yourself is yours to give, Ginny. But is a precious gift for all that, and the ancients believed that the first time was special, for girl or boy. Sacred. Don't throw yourself at the first person who pays a bit of attention to you."

"You weren't the first who ever did," she says, in an injured voice. "There was, um, Neville." Dismally, she realizes that she isn't making a good case for her irresistible qualities. "Colin Creevey." She decides to throw him in after all. "And Michael Corner!" But they are boys, and he is a man. It is not the same at all. He continues as if he hasn't heard her.

"Especially not at me--sweet Merlin, Ginny, why me? I should think Remus would have been a more suitable object for a schoolgirl crush, if you had to pick someone in this house."

Ginny blushes. "Well, to tell you the truth--I suppose I did crush on him once, a bit. Oh, all right. More than a bit. It was back when he taught Defense Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts. I wasn't the only one either. But--it had to be you."

He is silent for a moment, playing with a thread on the bedspread. "Will you tell me why, Ginny?"

"I will," she says, "if you'll tell me why. Why me, I mean."

"You have to ask?" Sirius snorts. "Well, yes. I suppose you do. You're an innocent still, Ginny, no matter what you may think..." He lapses into silence. "I don't know," he finally says, "and then again, I know all too well. You're beautiful, Ginny. I told you that. You're desirable. You're like a flower about to open. And I--" He swallowed convulsively. "I've lived a long time without the touch of any woman, or any girl. I'm only a man. No better than most, and worse than many, I suppose. You don't know much about men's natures yet, Ginny, for all that you have five brothers. But when you're a bit older, you'll know that that's enough of a reason."

"Oh. Well-- I don't know why, either," admitted Ginny. "Only- you've been my friend, Sirius."

"And you've been mine. But I hope you don't do this with all your friends," he says dryly.

"No, of course not." She swallows. "It's because--you are you. You understand me, Sirius. Does it sound strange, to say that? We didn't know each other at all until less than a month ago. But you do."

"Yes. I suppose I do. And you, in turn, understand things about me that nobody else has ever understood, fourteen-year-old girl that you are--no, not even fourteen until next week. I can't explain such a strange fact, but there it is."

Yet that is not quite all, and Ginny cannot offer him anything less than complete honesty. "But it's something else as well. You--you remind me of someone, Sirius. It's strange, and I'm still not sure exactly why, but you do."

"Someone at Hogwarts?"

"I suppose so. I'm not sure. I always think I'm right on the verge of figuring out whoever it is, but I never do."

He nods, and asks no more. "Well, whoever it is, if he hasn't noticed you yet--he's not good enough to lick your broomstick. Don't wait around for someone like that. Believe in yourself more than that. If I could give you one gift, it would be that. Belief in yourself."

Out in the hall, the clock whirred the hour and then struck one, a single, deep toll. The rain fell with a soft pattering sound. The worst of the storm had passed at last. Ginny mind was clearing now. And she looked at him, this dark, gaunt, sad-eyed man, and suddenly he was her friend above all, the friend who had listened to her when no-one else would, and spoken to her when no-one else would speak.

"I would give you that, too, Sirius," she said earnestly.

He smiled. "It's too late for that. Too late for me."

"Oh, don't say that! It's never too late!"

"You are so innocent. But maybe--maybe you're right. Maybe even for me, it's not too late."

The storm has blown over completely now, and the rain falls lightly on the rooftops and sidewalks outside the house. They sit for what feels like a very long time, talking in the near-darkness. Somewhere in the midst of their speech, the last traces of madness slip away. Around two o'clock, Ginny says she is hungry, and Sirius goes down to the kitchen, bringing back a tray of bread and cheese and sausage. They eat together, companionably.

"I'm sorry about what happened, you know," says Sirius suddenly, slicing sausage.

"Oh. Er-"

"Would you rather that I didn't mention it? I never will again, if you don't like. That would be the wisest thing, I suppose."

Ginny thinks about that for a moment. She feels instinctively that tonight will be the last time they ever speak in quite this way to each other. Although she doesn't yet know if she wants to speak about the past hours or not, she doesn't want to let this chance go by, either. Finally, she shrugs. "Well, it's not as if anything really did happen. You didn't--I mean, we didn't--" She looks down.

Sirius toys with an apple on the tray. "I wish I could explain why I did what I did, though. I can't. I'm sorry for that."

"How could I expect you to? When I don't quite know what happened to me, either," Ginny admitted. "I went a little mad, I think. I suppose, though, that even though I would have let you do whatever you liked--" she blushed. "And I wouldn't have blamed you afterwards, or hated you. But I suppose, still, you were wiser than I was. Can I ask you one thing, though, Sirius?"

"Ask me anything you like."

"If--if we had done it--"

"But we weren't going to, Ginny. And we won't. Not ever." His face becomes stern.

"I know that! I'm just saying, that's all. If I was older, maybe. If you were younger. If things were all different. If the world was different, and we weren't fighting V--He Who Must Not Be Named. I just want to know." She lifts her face to his. "Would it have been good, Sirius? Would you have made it good and sweet and beautiful for me, my first time?"

He sighs deeply. "Yes," he says, as if the word is a painful admission. "And that is all I will ever say to you on the subject."

"Oh, I know it is. And I know you did the right thing. The good thing."

"And so shines a good deed in a naughty world." He passes a hand over her face, closing her eyes. "Sleep now, Ginny. Sleep."

She lies back, keeping her eyes tight shut. She hears him pick up the tray and walk around to the other side of the bed. Then she feels him lean down and kiss her lightly on the forehead. A ghost of a kiss, no more. His footsteps move away.

Ginny floats away into sleep, but a part of her mind seems to follow Sirius as he tiptoes down to the basement kitchen. She sees him as clearly as if her spirit has drifted down into the room with him. He puts the tray on the sideboard, and the dishes into the sink. He sits in one of the chairs at the table. Then he gives a long, long sigh, and sits looking into the unlit fireplace for a very long time.