Of Binding Spells and Chartreuse

December 24^th, 1997

Diagon Alley

Weasley's Wizard Wheezes

It was Christmas Eve. All the merchants had closed up shop, leaving bright wreaths of holly and ivy and pine on their doors. Only a few last-minute travelers could be seen in the streets, hurrying on their last errands before going home for Christmas, woolen balaclavas wrapped tight around their heads to shut out the cold. Snow fell softly, blanketing the street in white. A witchlight still burned in the back window of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes. Fred had gone home already, but George was still bent over a ledger, adding up columns of figures that certainly could have waited until after the holidays were over.

He was there for her, Ginny knew.

She looked out the window, hands folded in her lap. The streets were empty, and the snow fell silently. She could not go home yet. Fred had left the radio on when he went home, and neither she nor George had turned it off.

A candy-colored clown they call the sandman
Tiptoes to my room every night
Just to sprinkle stardust and to whisper
Go to sleep, everything is all right.

I close my eyes, then I drift away
Into the magic night. I softly say
A silent prayer like dreamers do.
Then I fall asleep to dream my dreams of you.

In dreams I walk with you. in dreams I talk to you.
In dreams you're mine. All of the time we're together
In dreams, in dreams...

"Ginny, it's five o'clock," George said softly.

She did not reply, nor turn her head.

"I know what you're waiting for--who you're waiting for. But how long are you going to wait?"

"You can go home anytime you like," said Ginny. "I've got the key. I'll close up."

George snorted. "Mum would skin me alive. We don't have any Portkeys, and remember the last time you tried to Apparate? Did we ever find all your fingernails?"

"Just a bit longer, then," said Ginny.

"Why don't you make yourself useful and put away that shipment of Mexican Trampoline Beans. They go on the Skiving Snackboxes Shelf," said George.

Ginny gave a long, deep sigh, and rose from her perch by the window. She started to stack the rows of vibrating boxes neatly on a shelf. They look like something that ought to go in the Amazing Annex. The thought made her smile. She'd been so eager to get in there once, but now she thought that she didn't much care anymore. The whole world of bodily pleasure felt closed off from her, like a room that was forever sealed. What a sad, sad, thought... She felt ridiculous tears rise to her eyes, and swiped at her nose impatiently with the back of her sleeve, and wondered where the box of tissues had gone. They were right around here somewhere! Down here, I think... oops, I can't quite reach... Her head was stuck behind a stack of extra ledgers on a bottom shelf when she heard the faint, faint tinkle of the back door bell.

Ginny straightened up and whacked her head on the shelf. Nursing the pain in her temple, she sternly admonished herself not to be stupid. It was probably Colin, coming to see her with some last Christmas wishes. Or maybe it was Luna. She had said that she might stop by the shop, but she hadn't yet. Fleetingly, she remembered that she had planned to send Luna an owl. I forgot all about it. Well, maybe later. I'd still like to know what on earth she was doing with Pansy Parkinson. Or--oh dear God, please, no!--Harry. He can't see me or hear me yet. He'll never know I'm here. But - wait, what if George finally gets fed up with me not making a decision? Ginny thought nervously. What if he just goes ahead and takes that last bite out of the Secret-Keeper chocolate bar? What if--

When she hurried to the counter at the back of the shop and peered around it, she fully expected to see the worst. For a moment, all she could do was to stare at what she did see.

George had swung the door open partway. He stood in the entry, one hand propped on the doorjamb. "Yes?" he said in a voice that might best have been described as guarded. But he wasn't talking to Harry.

A tall figure stood in the doorway, wrapped in an expensive-looking black wool cloak and a long black wool scarf. Slender hands went up to undo the scarf and shake it free of snow. Its head was white with snow, and in a few more shakes all the snow slid off, white becoming pale ashy silver. Draco Malfoy was standing in the doorway of the shop. He stared at George, obviously taken aback. Ginny guessed that he had expected to find her here by herself.

"Weasley," he said, inclining his head in a short nod.

"Malfoy," said George. His voice was utterly neutral.

If she hadn't been hidden by the spell, Draco would certainly have seen her. But she was, and so he couldn't. She looked her fill. His face and neck and hands were whiter than ever from the cold, resembling carved marble with two spots of colour in his cheeks. He stood as still as a statue.

"Come in," said George. "We're not heating the outdoors, you know."

Draco let the door fall shut behind him. He moved warily forward a few steps. "Nice shop," he said.

Ginny choked. George dropped the slightest wink in her direction. "It's even nicer when it's actually open," he said. "But it's not, and I want to go home. What do you want, Malfoy?"

Draco twisted his scarf between his hands. It was perhaps the first uncertain gesture that Ginny had ever seen him make. "I'm..." He stopped, bit his lip, and started again.

"Yes?"

"I'm looking for Ginny," he said. "And I think that you know where she is."

"Oh?" George closed the ledger. "And what makes you think that?"

"Because I've looked for her, and I can't find her."

George raised an eyebrow. "Have you?"

Draco leaned forward tensely, one hand at his belt. "Are you going to hex me if I answer that question, Weasley?"

George sighed. "Malfoy, I've had you covered by an automatic Hexweb from the moment you came in the door. If I'd wanted to trigger it, rest assured that those hexes we all hit you with on the train at the end of fifth year would look like a first year's attempt at a Tickle jinx."

"And that's supposed to be reassuring?" Draco asked. But he did relax slightly, Ginny saw, and his hand fell from the wand holster that she knew he had at his belt.

"It's the best you're going to get. Where'd you look, anyway?"

"Everywhere," said Draco.

"Why didn't you think of coming here first?" George interrupted. "You certainly know that she works here over the holidays."

"Why would you think I knew that?" Draco looked at George narrowly.

"I saw you with her in front of the shop earlier this week."

Draco blinked. "Well, if I came here, there was such a high possibility that I'd have to speak to either you or your brother, Weasley."

"Desperation isn't pretty, is it?" George asked out of the corner of his mouth, in Ginny's direction.

"What?" Draco asked.

"Never mind," said George. "Didn't you go to the Leaky Cauldron?"

"Of course I did. But I could never seem to find her room, and Tom wouldn't tell me anything. I'm not entirely sure he can talk. But I did get to sneak a look at the guest ledgers by bribing a maid, and I saw something odd. She'd never checked out." Draco looked at George appraisingly. "I don't think she's left Diagon Alley at all. I think she's under some sort of Concealment spell. And I think she trusted you--and only you--with the secret of how to find her."

George leaned back in his chair, steepling his fingers together. "Very interesting theory, Malfoy."

"Am I right, Weasley?" Draco asked. His tone was positively polite, thought Ginny. That certainly added to the unreality of the entire situation. Certainly, she would have thought that Lord Voldemort dropping by for tea was more likely than one of her brothers having a civil conversation with a Malfoy.

"Maybe you are," said George, "and maybe you're not."

"What are you, Weasley, a sphinx?" Draco snapped. Clearly, his unnatural patience was wearing thin.

"To you, perhaps I am," said George, his brown eyes bright. "I'm going to put a question to you, Malfoy, and if you expect to get anything more out of me, you'll have to answer it right."

"Fine."

"Who am I?" asked George.

I always knew the Weasleys were thick, but this is ridiculous. Ginny could almost hear the words forming in Draco's mind, but all he said was "I don't understand what you mean."

"You know I'm one of the Weasley twins. But which one?"

"George," Draco said without a moment's hesitation.

"But how can you be so sure? Identical twins, and all that."

"You're joking, right?"

"Nope. Tell me how you know--or think you know."

Draco shrugged. "All the Weasleys look alike, if it comes to that. But how could anyone be thick enough to mistake you for Fred? The way you sit and stand and walk, tilt your head, put your hands in your pockets, lean back in that chair, that little mannerism of steepling your fingers together--any one of those would be enough. And the tone of your voice is different as well, the sort of words you choose, and the way you put them together, that habit you've got of hesitating just a fraction of a second before you say something. There's too much to list, really. But anyway I knew the moment I saw you from outside the shop"

"Oh? Why's that?"

"Fred Weasley would never be going over ledgers on Christmas Eve, for one thing. If he were stuck here at a time like that, he'd be moving around the room restlessly, like he was looking for a Bludger to hit--never sitting in a chair. But mostly it's because he would've hexed me into a slug before I ever got in the door."

George grinned broadly, as if acknowledging a point scored.

"So will you tell me where she is?" Draco asked.

"The decision's not up to me, I'm afraid."

A glowering look spread over Draco's face, making it seem paler and pointier than ever. He took a deep, deep breath. "Please," he said through clenched teeth.

"I wish I had a Muggle video recorder. Nobody will ever believe you said that to a Weasley."

"If you ever tell anyone---"

"Dry up, Malfoy." George rummaged under the front desk and pulled out the half-eaten chocolate bar. He turned towards Ginny and held it out, looking at her questioningly. She nodded. He handed it to her, and she took a bite. The bittersweetness spread across her tongue and into her throat, and she could never have said if the taste was good or bad. George finished the chocolate bar in a single bite, and then turned back to the ledgers.

Ginny watched Draco's eyes widen in astonishment. He took a step forward, towards her, and then stopped. George jerked a thumb towards the door.

"Out," he said. "Before I change my mind. And if I have to look at the two of you in the same room for one more second, I will."

***

Ginny gave Draco a sidelong glance as their feet made crunching noises in the snow. She wanted to ask him if he had really looked for her everywhere the way he'd told her brother he had done, but she did not. When they reached a little alcove next to the Leaky Cauldron, Draco beckoned for her to stand next to him, where they were protected from the wind.

"There's something I didn't tell you before," he said.

Ginny waited.

"You told me that there'd been a Binding spell placed on you and Harry." He looked at her soberly. She had never seen or imagined his face so utterly serious, so devoid of mockery. "There's one on me as well."

"One on you?" echoed Ginny.

"Yes. On me, and on Pansy Parkinson."

The pieces fell into place. "I should have known," Ginny said softly. "I should have guessed."

Draco put his hands into his pockets. "The thing is, when Pansy and I found out about the bond, we'd already... well, I'm sure you can guess what we'd already done. That part of it was all but over, to tell you the truth."

"All but over?" asked Ginny.

"I--we--only once, after I knew. And that was because I didn't have any choice. I'd long since grown sick of her. And I was angry when I found out. Angrier than I've ever been, or ever thought I could be. I thought anger was sniping at Potter and your brothers, you know? But this... All I could think was that I was leg-shackled to Pansy for all eternity now, and all because of something I never would have chosen to do, if I'd had any choice. So I did some research in the Malfoy library, and I thought that maybe the bond could be broken before it was too late, because she wasn't a virgin when we first... I won't say any more about that."

"That's why you slept with all those girls," Ginny said slowly. "You were trying to see if you could break the bond."

"And it didn't work." The snow was blowing in upon them and starting to collect in Draco's hair again, making him look impossibly remote, a thing of stone, not of flesh. "None of it worked."

"So you thought that it might, with me? Because you hadn't yet tried sleeping with a virgin?" Even as Ginny said the words, she knew that they weren't fair or kind, and that they didn't take into account the startling fact that he had actually come to her brothers' shop in search of her. But she had to ask him. She had to ferret out his every motive, clearing away all possible deceptions until there was nothing left but the truth.

His face closed itself even further. "You could think of it as a business proposition if you liked, Weasley," he said. "It would prove to our mutual benefit. You're certainly a physical, mental, and moral contrast to Pansy Parkinson. And Merlin knows, I'm Potter's polar opposite. We could likely free each other from our respective Binding spells... if you want to be freed from Potter badly enough to give your virginity to me. Because there's no other choice, I'm afraid."

He sounded as cold and sarcastic and forbidding as ever. His face betrayed no human emotion. But his hands... She looked down at them, looked closely. He had taken them out of his pockets and they lay on his robe. All his fingers were trembling, torturing the wool, rubbing it, worrying it, then letting go again, as if seized by a silent, pleading desperation.

"A business proposition," said Ginny.

"Yes."

She stepped closer to him, her golden eyes very bright as they looked into his silvery ones. She put her hand on his chest, beneath his woolen cloak. "You might go so far as to say you want to," she said.

Draco opened his mouth, and then shut it again. No sound came out.

"Do you want to?"

Still nothing.

"Because if you don't..." She shrugged. "I thought that perhaps you did... a bit... since you were willing to talk to one of my brothers in order to find me. But if not, then I don't quite understand. Why did you go to all that trouble? Could you explain it to me?" Her hand went under the folds of the winter underrobe and smoothed along his sweater, feeling warm muscles beneath.

"Eep," said Draco.

"Eep?" Ginny cocked her head to one side. "That's not a very informative comment, Malfoy." She pushed herself back from him, and made as if to go.

Draco grabbed her hands with a suddenness that made her gasp, and began speaking in a high, panicky voice. "Don't go. Don't go. I looked for you everywhere, everywhere and I've finally found you and if you disappear on me again I don't know what I'll do, I've hardly eaten, I haven't slept, I've just looked and looked and looked--"

.

"Does this mean--?" Ginny fumbled with the end of the sentence and finally let it drop. She was not even sure, herself, how she would have finished it.

"It means that I don't care about dark or light, Death Eaters or Dumbledore or Dark Lords or anyone else. No, not even my father... not even about him, not anymore." Draco spoke to her very fast, urgently, as if terrified that someone would overhear him. His voice sounded defiant as well, although Ginny sensed that the defiance was not directed at her.

"What do you care about?" she asked.

"I care about myself. I don't want to go down with them. With him." Ginny knew who he meant without being told, and thought of Lucius Malfoy, still locked in Azkaban. "And they're going to go down," Draco continued. "They can't win. So I want to save my own skin, just like Phineas Nigellus said. And..."

"And what?"

"And I care about you, Ginny." His eyes burned an intense grey, the colour of ash at the very heart of a fire. "There. I've said it. I care about you. So if you want revenge on me for all the evil my father's done to you and yours, and for the way I've always treated you and the people you love, you can have it. You could destroy me now, Ginny, if you wanted to, with just a word."

Ginny stopped. She stood on tiptoe, and she took Draco's head in her two hands and drew it down to hers. She could hear that his breathing was very light and fast, like a frightened animal. She kissed him. The same sweetness she remembered from the first time she had done this raced through her veins, and her heart leapt with joy.

They walked to the Leaky Cauldron and stood on the back doorstep, under the black iron sculpture of a witch that swayed in the winter wind. She opened the door and pulled him through. They walked up a flight of stairs and down a corridor to her room. She slid her key into the lock and swung that door wide, moving in and holding out her hands.

"Come to me," she said.

He hesitated, and then stepped into the circle her arms made. His own arms went around her, holding her so tightly that it was almost painful, and he bent his head and buried his face in the curve where her shoulder met her neck. They stood that way for a long time. Very, very faintly, the sound of the radio in the taproom below drifted up to Ginny's ears.

Now here I go again, I see the crystal visions
I keep my visions to myself
It's only me
Who wants to wrap around your dreams and...
Have you any dreams you'd like to sell?
Dreams of loneliness...
Like a heartbeat... drives you mad...
In the stillness of remembering what you had...
And what you lost...
And what you had...
And what you lost...