Whimsically Ginny

Chapter Six: Intertwine

19^th June 1941

The faery-girl, Ginny, was by his side, and they were lying beneath a cherry tree, except the fruits on the cherry tree were not sweet, red cherries; they were sour, black sloes, and their thick fragrance permeated the heavy summer air.

The faery-girl was singing. "Under the spreading chestnut tree - I sold you and you sold me."

It was a pretty tune; Tom glanced to the ground on his right; amongst the bright green grass was a sloe; the fruit was overripe and had burst, and now there were little insects, agents of decay and decomposition, around it. They scurried around the fruit, rallying around it, digging and excavating the juicy rotten flesh.

The faery-girl was repeating the line in her clear, pretty voice, and the pretty tune rose into the air:

"Under the spreading chestnut tree -

I sold you and you sold me."

Tom spied two boys coming towards their direction - one was taller and more slender, his white-blonde hair falling neatly over his silver eyes. The other was black-haired, like Tom, but he was shorter, and his eyes were green, greener than the bright green grass. Both boys sat themselves next to the faery-girl, and the faery-girl kissed the blonde-haired boy's cheek. Fresh soft red lips on sharp white bone. The black-haired boy watched the faery-girl, and then a single tear of red blood fell from his brilliant green eyes; a vampire's tear from emeralds.

"Under the spreading chestnut tree -

I sold you and you sold me."

It was the voice of the blond boy, his silver eyes sliding past the faery-girl's to meet Tom's - and then the boy smiled, at Tom, before his beautiful pale lips leaned towards the faery-girl, the sharp white teeth apparent from beneath them.

I sold you and you sold me.

~

28^th August 1995

She was lying against him; her body frigid from the cold of the Quidditch pitch during a December night like it was tonight, and Draco watched her pull his cloak closer around herself, an act that passed almost unconsciously, on reflex.

Mine.

Her shoulders pinched inwards, hunched, Draco could see the sweet curve of her cheekbone, sharp and soft and beckoning and forbidding at the same time in its somehow imperfect perfection. His fingers ached to stroke it, his lips ached to kiss it, to slide his tongue and his blood and her blood and their tears down it, and he felt a painful lump in his throat as he forced himself to remain motionless, his body hard and excitably warm against hers.

Mine.

In the moonlight her hair was curling, blood red, as if the strands had been individually dipped into blood and the heaven-given ink that coloured the petals of roses. It was smooth and soft, licking at Draco's skin, and Draco breathed in their scent, wanting very much to die in it - it was sweet, oh Merlin it was sweet, and he wanted it, he was so close and he wanted to reach over and hold her and pull her under him and have her beautiful red hair and beautiful gold eyes and beautiful white body under him, yielding or unyielding, he could not care. And he wanted to kiss her, to run each kiss down her skin, down her cheekbones and her neck and her collarbone, tracing each sacred inch.

Mine.

In the moonlight, in her deep sleep, she gave a small, almost indistinguishable low moan, a sound that came from the base of her throat, and Draco grappled with breathing, the blood gushing within himself, rushing to his eyelids till it made him almost intoxicated, and her and everything seemed to swim before him in a kind of painful beauty.

It hurt, because she was too painfully beautiful.

Draco could not move.

Ginny Weasley, against him, did not stir.

When Draco Malfoy awoke, another five hours later, in the dark dawn of a new day in the Zabini fortress, he would not remember her. He would not remember his want, his need. His inability. His helplessness. His mind would not remember.

But his body, somehow, preserved the memory. His fingers somewhat tingling, numb, Draco Malfoy stepped into the shower, and as the cold water plunged into the angles of his body, somewhere, deep within, his body remembered.

~

1^st September 1995

"You requested to see me, Severus?" His clear, detached voice was exactly the same as it had been from their school days twenty years ago.

Severus Snape glanced away from the window, to face his oldest acquaintance. Yong Xia Dracognius-Normandy always looked the epitome of immaculate - he was not an especially tall man, but his slim stature somehow belied his years; his rigid posture and well-cultivated elegance, contrasting against his perennially smooth, fine features made him ageless. Snape had personally always found it hard to believe that Yong Xia was a year his senior.

"Yong Xia. I'll have to thank you for providing the information regarding the Veritaserum trials," began Snape, "And - "

"Have you been questioned yet?" asked Yong, interrupting. His sharp black eyes seemed to convey polite interest, but Snape knew better.

"No, not yet," he replied, "And I expect - "

"I have made the necessary arrangements to protect you and your Order, Severus." Yong's voice was still calmly detached, but there was a significance in his eyes that made Snape immediately realise what he had done. Snape nodded, slightly - the gold exchanged must have been plentiful - in a motion of thanks.

"It cannot be of any benefit, Severus, to participate in this war."

"I know that, Yong Xia."

"Then why engage in it? The choice is still yours."

"It was a choice through actions I took long ago."

"You can still run."

"It will never leave, and I can never hide." Snape's voice was flinty.

There was a pause.

"You are less like you were when I first met you, Severus."

There was an emotion - something that looked like a mixture of wryness, disappointment, knowing, sardonic amusement - in Yong's eyes. Snape looked away, as Yong turned, silently, abruptly.

"I have briefed Stillingfleet on his post; he will be here in a few moments. I expect he will settle in well."

"I trust your choice," murmured Snape, somewhat unnerved by Yong's sudden change of topic.

Yong nodded curtly, and again, something in his eyes betrayed that he knew more of what was going through Snape's mind than he was letting on - or likely, he just preferred to make Snape even more shaken. Then he turned, moving swiftly out of Snape's office.

"Should you require my services again, Severus, you know where to find me."

~

For Draco the rest of the journey to Hogwarts was uneventful: he had returned from a round telling off from Stimpson (which Stebbins himself appeared obscenely nonchalant about) to find Blaise apparently absorbed in a leather-bound book.

" 'Romance of the Three Kingdoms'," read Draco off the spine, tilting it slightly from Blaise's grasp so he could see better. "An ancient Chinese classic. How quaint. Shu Han's?"

"Mine," came the nondescript reply.

Draco glanced at Blaise, whose head was bent downwards. The bruise on his left collarbone was still visible under his collar: Blaise had not bothered to attend to it.

Otherwise, he had chosen to leave it. For remembrance's sake? Draco wouldn't know - it was impossible for him to fathom what Blaise thought.

Draco remembered how they had fought. It had been entirely without the romanticism of swordplay, the inventiveness of wand duelling - it had been so utterly primal, instinctual, base, that it had felt like it was not Blaise he was fighting.

It was cold off the Irish mainland: the rain was falling in drizzled sheets.

Draco had had to act entirely on what reflex told him to do, the moment Blaise's fist had hit his side, the pain pulsating through his body.

Azkaban was not a place for the living - the caked earth was bare, save for the thorns and weeds that spawned the island.

There had been a strange, masochistic pleasure to it. There was some sort of warped beauty in the entire fiasco, watching Blaise bleed, bruise...watching his own skin do the same. For a moment there - Draco, for all his misunderstanding and non-comprehension, it had felt alive, as if the pain had re-awakened something in him.

'Not too safe a place for two young 'uns like you, ain't it, Masters?'

And at the end of it, in the rain and the sweat and the blood, the tears had come, and then Blaise had returned, and brought Draco back to the Zabini fortress, and had personally healed him, his cold hard fingers gentle across Draco's skin.

'The Dementors are gone, Young Masters, but the prisoners are the same...they and their little black hearts...'

"The meeting went well." Blaise's remark was an observation, not a question. Draco nodded, still gazing at him, still reliving the fast-slipping moments in his mind.

'Aye, here we are, #21947; Malfoy, Lucius.'

"Yes, of course it did."

~

"Ginny, there you are! Éamonn and I were right anxious when we couldn't find you, lassie..." A familiar voice with a strong Irish accent came from beind Ginny just as she made her way through the crowd to where Harry was standing, awhile off from Neville and Seamus Finnegan and Dean Thomas with Hedwig looking a tad overly dignified as a group of second-years cooed over her, whilst Crookshanks skulked around Harry's legs. Pig, as always, was fluttering madly over Harry's head, and Harry was too flustered between trying not to trip over Crookshanks and deterring inquisitive younger schoolmates to take much notice of him. He was also craning his neck, most likely wondering whether there were any empty horseless carriages left.

Horseless carriages - no, Thestral-drawn carriages, thought Ginny absently, as she turned around, only to be met with a hearty embrace from Siobhán Belvedere, a tall, black-haired Ravenclaw, and one of Ginny's closest friends.

"Siobhán!" Ginny grinned, returning the hug. Behind Siobhán was Éamonn, Siobhán's twin, who, like Ginny, was a fifth-year Gryffindor. He gave her a crooked smile, looking, as usual, a bit too windblown, with his black hair messed up and flopping about in all directions, in a way that reminded Ginny too much rry.

Harry - where was he again?

"It's great seeing you again - only, er, I've got to find Harry, you know - " Ginny lowered her voice, so only Siobhán could hear her, "Ron would kill me if he thought I'd left him alone...you know what Ron's like...he's at his matchmaking tendencies again," finished Ginny, rolling her eyes. Siobhán's bright blue eyes twinkled mischievously in understanding, and after exchanging a few more words with her and Eamonn, who was by then trying to tackle Parthalán, the Belvederes' pet owl, Ginny turned away, scanning the crowd for Harry, Hedwig and Crookshanks.

"Ginny!" Yet another familiar voice came from her side. Hy was moving towards her, carrying Hedwig's cage in one hand and Pig, who was chirping loudly, in his other hand. Crookshanks slinked behind him, sniffing at the ground. "We've got to find a carriage - where're Ron and Hermione?"

"Patricia Stimpson just caught them - told them to go help with the first-years or something, apparently there's been a mix-up," Ginny looked around before continuing, just to make sure no one was listening in on them, "Hagrid's not around again this year, Harry...d'you reckon...?"

"I've no idea," said Harry, and a brief frown seemed to mar his features, before he turned back to Ginny. "Oh well, we'd better hurry up then, Gin. Can't wait here forever. I think I saw an empty carriage somewhere..."

Ginny grabbed Pig from Harry, who had almost struggled free from Harry's grasp, and the both of them, followed by Crookshanks, walked to the last of the carriages, until they finally found an empty, though smaller carriage. They let themselves in, and soon the carriage was off with a start. Ginny looked out of the window on her right, soaking in the sight and sounds of the Scottish countryside as they rode out of Hogsmeade and towards Hogwarts.

It was not long before Ginny noticed out of the corner of her eye that Harry, who was seated opposite her, was staring at her in a rather odd manner, almost as if he were studying her.

"What?" asked Ginny almost automatically, snapping around, her tone defensive.

"No, nothing..." Harry's voice trailed off, and then he looked down briefly before looking up again. "I was just wondering, Gin...about that night..."

Ginny coloured, and she opened her mouth to apologise, to confess that it was all in the heat of the moment, that she had been tired, and emotional, and wasn't thinking straight, and that she was sorry he had had to see her in such a state...

"Thank you." Harry's eyes were sincere, and for a moment it completely broke Ginny's train of thought.

Ginny blinked.

"Hunh?" Ginny gurgled.

Harry's lips twitched into a smile, and then he repeated, "Thank you."

Ginny stared at him non-comprehendingly, before sputtering, "Why?"

"Well, because..." Harry reached for her hand tentatively, and Ginny let him take it, feeling the rough, sandpapery texture of the skin beneath his knuckles, and how gently his long fingers played over her skin. She felt the heat beneath her collar intensify; uncomfortably, Ginny reached her free hand around her neck, tugging a little at her collar, before letting it drop back to her side. A bubble of emotion escaped in her, but she couldn't tell what it was - very likely, she also did not want to. "Because it was good for me. I mean - " he looked rather as if he himself were blushing, but he still did not let go of Ginny's hand: in fact, his fingers had started to reach for her other hand, as well, "I don't know about you, but it meant a lot to me." Harry's gaze was now almost too intense.

Ginny just stared, both hands in Harry's now, her brain a few beats behind Harry, somewhat amazed that she had actually lived to see the day that the famous Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, actually looking at her with such sincerity and intensity.

Not to mention actually holding her hands.

If it were a few years ago -

"I've thought about it, and I've never actually managed to talk to anyone like the way I had spoken to you that day." Harry was smiling at her again, and Ginny was forced out of her reverie. This particular jerk into reality brought back her senses, and Ginny quickly returned the smile.

Did that just happen?

It was almost unreal. Harry Potter actually being grateful to her, Ginny Weasley. Somehow it seemed a tad too ironically amusing.

"Well, it's nothing, Harry," Ginny replied, not quite knowing what to say. She glanced down - Harry was still holding her hands, and somehow the intimacy, whilst thrilling her secretly (her face was still bright red, she was sure) also seemed to offend her. It was as if, somehow, a part of her seemed repelled by the idea that Harry would actually take it upon himself to hold her hands like that, as if they were close friends, or more than that even.

Really, if only it were a few years ago...

"No, Ginny, it mattered a lot...and I was wondering," Harry paused, and finally he released her hands as his hands fluttered unconsciously to his messy hair, only to mess it up even more - Ginny had observed, in her second year, that this was his singular act of nervousness, "whether you would mind if I could have the pleasure of talking to you, I mean, that doesn't mean we'll end up blubbering like the last time again - you know, if Ron and Hermione ever finally get together..."

Harry rolled his eyes, and he started to grin, an action which Ginny reflected, though strangely she found herself uncomfortable with his choice of words.

Blubbering?

It was very much as if he were just going to appreciate her for the fact that she would keep him company whilst Ron and Hermione went off to finally start snogging each other.

But Ginny only nodded, still grinning stupidly, and the grin only slid off her face when Harry reached across to squeeze her hand, just as the carriage stopped in front of the gates of Hogwarts.

~

22^nd July 1943

"A bold young farmer courted me
He gained my heart and my liberty
He gained my heart with a free good will
And I must confess that I love him still."

The tall boy who stood staring over the three dead occupants of the Riddle House was slender and pale, his black hair over his eyes, which were black from over-exhaustion; in his ears he could hear the soft lullaby that he would always remember, the words whispered into his ear, slipping and sifting within his memories. Watching his father, his blood and flesh, the identical black hair and dark blue eyes of a forgotten midnight sky, of a time when there had been no light, the words caressed his skin, and returned to him.

"I wish, I wish, but it's all in vain
I wish I was a maid again
But a maid again, that never can be
Since that young farmer lay still with me."

The tall boy reached his black-gloved hands over his father's skin, pale like his, and his fingers felt the smoothness of his face, his wasted, wretched youth. The dark blue irises stared back at him, blank and unblinking, and the tall boy wondered what he would have said, could he have seen him before he had died.

"I wish my baby little was born
And smiling on his daddy's knee
And I poor girl was in my grave
With the long green grass a-growing all over me"

He would have thought that he would felt a deeper, greater emotion, but now as he watched his last flesh and blood, not breathing before him, he could feel nothing. The man in front of him was almost a boy; the tall boy knew that he looked everything like him. And into the gaping hole of years past, where he had never seen him, it was almost a frightening discovery, if he could be frightened. Instead he was just cold, and the words kissed the remnants of his heart.

"There is a house in yonder town,
Where my love goes and sits him down,
And takes some strange girl on his knee,
And tells her things he won't tell me."

He had seen the young lady whom his father was fond of: she was nothing his mother had been, though she would have been considered beautiful: there was an artificiality in her blonde hair, swept carefully, her sky blue eyes the colour of a summer's day which had been dyed too blue. He could hear her voice in his ear too, now: breathless and teary, but no one else would cry with her, the fool.

"There is a bird in yonder tree,
Some say he's blind and cannot see,
And I wish it had been the same with me,
When first I met your company."

My dear father, the tall boy thought, you are nothing. A curving smile touched his lips, and the boy kissed his father's pale skin, mockingly, before slowly walking out of the Riddle House, the satin touch beneath his lips still apparent. And then he saw the bright blue sky above him, beautiful and azure and deeply hued, and the yellow-touched summer grass around him.

"I wish, I wish, but it's all in vain
I wish I was a sweet maid again
But a maid again I never shall be
Till apples grow on an orange tree"

Before him was a pretty tree, and for a while the tall boy thought it was a cherry tree. Then its fruits glistened in the sun; and he realized it was a sloe tree -

"Dig me my grave long wide and deep
Put a marble stone on my head and feet
And on my breast place a white snow dove
For to let the world know that I died for love"

And just beyond the sloe tree, dancing across the pebbles of the tiny braided streams was a young girl.

She waved at him, her pretty red hair a resplendent flag in the wind. The tall boy watched her, watching her slim young ankles skip along the water, fair and sun-kissed, the picture of life. And he wondered who the pretty red-haired girl was, wondered what she had seen, wondered how long she had been standing there.

"Dig me my grave long wide and deep
Put a marble stone on my head and feet
And on my breast place a white snow dove
For to let the world know that I died for love"

The girl's voice was clear and pretty, just like her countenance, and the tall boy wondered, suddenly, how long she had sung the song, and the words flooded his ears.

And finally, a warm tear slid down the steep-planed cheek of Tom Riddle, the picture of unlife, the boy who had killed his own father.

~

1^st September 1995

"Moon?"

"I want more information, Leighswift."

"And I want more of you, Moon. Giving, or not? A fair exchange, your exact words," Dermot Leighswift's quiet breath brushed against Claire's skin, too giddily tempting, his fingers long and slipping around her body.

Claire grappled internally to regain in control, but her fast breath betrayed her.

"Information first, Leighswift. I'll give what you want when you give me what I want. How do I achieve an audience with the Dark Lord?"

"My, my...you are a one, aren't you?" Claire sensed the corners of Dermot's mouth curl into a condescending smile. It was cramped in the corner that they were in; Dermot's body was pressed against hers, and Claire felt his lips against her collarbone, his face coming around her own -

Oh heavens oh heavens oh heavens...

Then Dermot abruptly pulled back - or as much as one could, within the foot of space that they had between them. He studied Claire for a while, intensely, and Claire shivered unconsciously under the older boy's scrutiny. "October 31^st, Moon. You can meet me then, at the East Tower. We make for Hogsmeade together from there. There will be a Portkey prepared for us at...a corner in Hogsmeade where most would not usually venture to. As for my reward..." Dermot trailed off, eyelids lowered as if in a private joke, "I'll collect it in due time."

And then, without another word, Dermot Leighswift, seventh-year Slytherin, had slipped out of the tiny inlaid corner behind the portrait beyond the Slytherin Common Room, working in the general direction of the Great Hall, where already Claire knew the rest of the school was gathering. Claire smiled, adjusting her robes, believing that the first phase of her plans were underway.

She had always known that Dermot Leighswift was mercenary, and that he was useful. She was also fully aware that she herself had by no means the capital to buy him. But she had never thought that it would have been so easy to exchange his knowledge and trust - with herself.

Exactly twenty metres down from where Claire Moon stood, Dermot Leighswift turned a corner and nodded at Yong Shu Han, who nodded back to him in return. Then, both pupils, one short and petite with pretty Asian features and dark brown hair and dark brown eyes, one tall and lanky with silver-blonde hair and blue eyes, proceeded down the next corridor together, making sure to keep a distance of five metres between them.

~

"Well, now that we are all digesting yet another magnificent feast, I beg a few moments of your attention for the usual start-of-term notices, said Dumbledore. "First-years ought to be informed that the Forest in the grounds is out-of-bounds to all students - and, as I have tried very much to remind them, a few of our older students ought to know by now, too." His bright blue eyes twinkled in the general direction of Harry, Hermione and Ron, but Ginny noticed, that Harry's smile was rather tight, and far from as expansive as it once used to be with Dumbledore.

"Mr Filch, the caretaker, has asked me, for what he informs me to be the four-hundred-and-sixty-third time, to remind you all that magic is not allowed in the corridors between classes, nor are a number of other things, all of which can be confirmed upon on the extensive list now fastened to Mr Filch's door.

"Along with this, we have again two changes in staffing this year. We are delighted to have with us, again, Professor Grubbly-Plank, who will be undertaking Professor Hagrid's class until he returns to us; also, I am pleased to welcome our new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Stillingfleet."

There was a flurry of movement at this, as everyone craned their necks to get a better view of the High Table, only to find that there was the usual line-up of teachers, with no stranger amongst them who could possibly have been Stillingfleet. Dumbledore had his usual half-smile, and he nodded knowingly towards the doors of the Great Hall. One by one, almost, the students turned their gaze towards the end of the Hall, only to be met with a tall, slender, rather Eurasian-looking young man, who could not have been a day over eighteen: his face was impossibly narrow and sharply defined, and although his black hair was cut to a crisp short length and his robes were impeccably straight and well-styled, it took a while for one to register his sex - his features were too exotically effeminate, almost exaggeratedly exquisite, and Ginny was sure he would be what Bill would have called, especially in his Muggle-obsessive days when he was seventeen, a "Vandyke-rock star equivalent".

"Bloody hell," murmured Alexis Cannon, Ginny's fellow fifth-year dorm-mate, who was seated next to her.

"Definite improvement from Umbridge," agreed Julia Stuart, who was seated across from Ginny.

"He's definitely a bishounen," grinned Victoria Blois, who was seated to Ginny's right, and who was utterly head-over-heels in love with all things Japanese, throwing a few random words in and out of every other conversation.

"Ah, Professor Stillingfleet. I see you've arrived here safely. Would you like some dinner perhaps? I'm sorry to say that we're just finished," came Dumbledore's voice, cutting into the soft, growing murmur amongst the tables. Ginny noticed, grinning to herself, that from the appearances on their faces, most of the girls from the other tables had had conversations similar to the one Lex, Jules and Tori had started.

The boy shook his head slightly, not speaking, as he walked towards the Table. Ginny noticed, fleetingly, that a pretty Chinese girl from the Slytherin Table had glanced rather sharply at Stillingfleet, and would have sworn that the corner of Stillingfleet's lips had curled upwards for a hundredth of a second, but the exchange - if it could be called that - happened so quickly Ginny could have imagined it. No one else seemed to have noticed it, anyway, and so Ginny kept her silence.

"I wonder where that bloke's from?" came Ron's voice, from a few seats ahead of Ginny. Ginny cringed slightly - Ron's voice was always loud, but somehow it seemed amplified every time they were at the Great Hall: Ginny suspected that it had something to do with the height of the ceiling, but there were times when she felt as if the laws of physics were purposely trying to do her in with Ron's resonating volume.

"Stillingfleet - Stillingfleet!" exclaimed Hermione suddenly, from next to Ron. "He's - why, he's a teenage prodigy: he was born in Shanghai, and educated in the most prestigious private magic schools in Shantung and Harbin in China, and then he was invited to attend the Wizarding Conservatorium of Europe when he was fifteen, which would be three years ago...I've read his thesis, it was featured in Advanced Wizarding Journal, it was a fantastic essay on the ethics and historical impacts of being acquainted in the defence against the Dark Arts..."

"What's the Wizarding Conservatorium of Europe?" interrupted Harry, just as Hermione was getting excited, her brown hair almost bushier than usual, and her eyes shining. Ginny grinned, then noticed the look on her brother's face and grinned wider - the boy was never one who was remotely self-aware: anyone else who had caught his expression would have been able to see from ten miles off that he adored Hermione.

"Entry into the Wizarding Conservatorium of Europe is the highest honour the Wizarding academia could possibly bestow upon any student throughout the wizarding world. It's superbly exclusive: I hear only one or two get selected each year to join. The last time a Hogwarts student was asked to join was in 1977 - a Yong Xia Dracognius-Normandy, actually...his daughter is in Slytherin, in our year, though I don't really know her..."

"But Dad was saying that that Conservatorium is kind of shadowy...something about it having quite a few professors that were suspected to have been involved during You-Know-Who's rise to power..." Ron's voice was apparent in his suspicion; it was so palpable that Ginny had almost to stifle a laugh. His next words only proved to make her efforts even more difficult. "You know," Ron said darkly, "I'll bet he's a spy. They always look like that - dark-haired and tall and suspicious-looking..."

A rather peculiar sound coming from Harry's direction told Ginny that Harry was very likely thinking along the same lines as herself.

"Ron," expostulated Hermione, "The Conservatorium just happens to be severely exclusive. It's an honour even to be associated with it. And everyone knows how practically everyone smart or remotely reclusive was suspected during the First War - and anyway, how many spies do you know? And if he were even possibly a spy I doubt Dumbledore would employ him - "

"Yeah, well, I bet that's 'cos no one wanted the DADA job and Dumbledore probably just took whoever popped by and wanted it - "

"Ron, he's Stillingfleet! He's a prodigy! A genius! I've read his thesis, it's definitely not anything of a madman's work - "

"Yeah, 'cos he's not loony, he's just a spy!"

"Ron!"

"Well, he has to be, only spies look that exotic - "

"Ron, that's the flimsiest thing I've heard from you, and considering how flimsy you can be, it's amazing how that statement even managed to seem logical, even to you."

"You just like him 'cos he went to some stupid Conservatorium, and wrote some magnificent, long-winded testimony."

"Thesis, Ron. And who says that I like him?"

Harry gave a loud cough. "Erm, Hermione, Ron, I think Dumbledore's speaking again..."

And indeed he was. Dumbledore's countenance had become serious, and as Stillingfleet silently settled himself in at the end of the High Table, facing the Slytherins, Dumbledore said, "Well. I am sure that all of us here do realise the current situation our community is facing, and are aware of the implications it has on us. As some of us might already see, quite a number have departed from our midst - "

There were some terse nods throughout the room - Ginny saw the lack of Mandy Brocklehurst and Lisa Turpin and the Quirke siblings at the Ravenclaw table; and the many missing places at the Slytherin table, including that of Crabbe and Goyle. Somehow their lack made the boy next to Draco Malfoy - the boy she had seen with Malfoy on the Hogwarts Express, whom she was almost sure whose clothes Malfoy had worn - even more obvious to Ginny, and it disturbed her, somewhat, that she had never noticed him before, and it was strangely uncomfortable because she had never managed to think of Malfoy without his fellow goons, and she somehow could not see him with that boy, even if she knew nothing of him.

But there's always more to people than you know of, a voice in her head suddenly said, and Ginny, startled by this sudden intrusion, made a mental sift through her mind, but the voice had gone as quickly as it had come.

Funny, she thought, that it should have seemed so elusive, yet so familiar...she distinctly felt discomfited now, and she turned towards Dumbledore, trying her best to shake off what was likely just a case of thinking too much after having ate too much. But it was not before her eyes caught Malfoy's spying the Gryffindor Table - the silver eyes were hooded, and although they were not outright in any form of antagonism, Ginny could almost taste the intense hate coming from them; shivering unconsciously, Ginny could not help but be reminded of the strangeness in his behaviour throughout the Prefect Meeting held earlier, and how she had spied his nonchalant attitude throughout the course of Patricia Stimpson's dressing down of him, and had somehow knew that it was all just on the surface.

His behaviour - in short - was just wrong.

Uncharacteristic.

"But we will have to hold on together through this difficult time. For surely," the twinkle had returned to Dumbledore's eyes again, "surely you would agree, we must all hang together, or we shall surely hang separately."

There was a sprinkle of laughter at this point, and the tension seemed to break. But somehow, as Ginny tuned in half-heartedly to the animated chattering of Tori, Jules and Lex, as well as the on-going debate on Stillingfleet between Ron and Hermione, Harry's ill-disguised snorts of amusement apparent, Ginny could not help feeling that Dumbledore's words carried a meaning that was less laughable than not.

~

"My father never told me that Stillingfleet was to come." Shu Han did not turn around as Blaise slipped into the threshold of the East Tower, but Blaise knew fully that she was addressing him.

"You know him?" asked Blaise, leaning against the parapet next to Shu Han, the harsh September night wind blowing into his face, forcing him to turn his head to a side, closing his eyes slightly to prevent them from smarting. Shu Han's hair was down; she was wearing her spectacles, and they sat delicately on the bridge of her nose, thin and wire-framed, somehow making her even prettier, though Blaise could never have explained why.

"Know him?" There was a certain palpable bitterness in Shu Han's voice that surprised Blaise. "Of course I know him. Stillingfleet's the son my father never had. His protégé. His little bright light in the dark."

"Tell me." Blaise knew his request was incongruous to her remark, but he also knew that she knew what he meant.

"Stillingfleet was born Damien Stillingfleet on 26^th January, 1977, in Shanghai, to two rather young and unwedded parents: Charles Stillingfleet, irresponsible renegade British wizard, and Dong Yi, a Chinese Muggle girl who was the daughter of an important Chinese Communist Party official. Obviously, Dong Yi's father went berserk with Stillingfleet's birth - imagine the shame, having his one and only daughter, his xin gan bao bei, have an affair with a foreigner, a yang gui zi, and even so far as to having the foreigner's illegitimate son. He was terrifically angry, and threatened to drown Stillingfleet and execute Charles Stillingfleet - if not for the British Wizarding Foreign Service having intervened, both Stillingfleets would have died that cold winter night in Shanghai with their bodies thrown into the Putong River. Well, Stillingfleet was put under the temporary care of the Wizarding orphanage by my father - it had been his first case - whilst Charles Stillingfleet was deported and warned never to put even a toe into China again. My father went to visit Stillingfleet time to time - and gradually, when Stillingfleet was old enough, my father saw in him potential. Lots of potential," Shu Han's voice was still strangely tinged with an emotion which Blaise was starting to suspect was jealousy, "And he sent him everywhere. Stillingfleet did not disappoint him, of course. He was better than a son. He was an asset. My father always wanted a son. I would say it disappointed him when I turned out to be a girl."

Blaise studied Shu Han's face, wondering if he could see anything else behind the content of the long narrative. But whilst Shu Han's voice could have betrayed her, her face was serene, or, rather, expressionless, and the clear planes of it were soft and gentle in the moonlight.

"What is he here for?" Blaise hazarded to ask.

"To watch me," replied Shu Han, her expression still inscrutable.

"Anyway, Moon has been asking for information from Dermot again." Shu Han's abrupt change in topic was unsurprising to Blaise: still, he kept his eyes trained on her face. "Silly girl's serious about this - she has made arrangements with Dermot, and will be meeting Voldemort on Halloween."

"Fool."

Shu Han nodded, and continued, "She always craved power. Family couldn't give that to her. She always wanted money, riches. Family couldn't give that to her, either. The best thing that family of hers has ever gotten her was an engagement to Theodore Nott, and even then the poor unremarkable boy's family is nothing but that of the nouveau riche, and their heritage would account for nothing." Shu Han paused for a while, as if in consideration. "And I never liked her."

Blaise knew that the connecting implication would have been that, since Shu Han never liked her, and never showed approval of her, it was likely that even the other fool, Pansy Parkinson, would not have picked her up, which would likely have meant that Claire Moon's social life in the Slytherin House was less than zero. It never existed.

"Would she and Nott pose a threat to us?"

Shu Han hesitated - the first time Blaise had seen her do so, and he shifted uncomfortably. "She would want to - but she will not be able to. I will make sure of that."

"Can you trust Leighswift?" asked Blaise.

Shu Han smiled, a sideways smile which was something Blaise was more accustomed to on her. "I can."

And Blaise, eyes still on the pretty dark-haired girl before him, trusted that answer enough to decide not to further question it.

~