Osiris Curse

Ginny sat at the Gryffindor table facing the Slytherin table. Draco, on the other hand, sat at the Slytherin table facing the Gryffindor table. At first, Ginny noticed that neither of them looked at each other. She found herself staring at the ceiling counting clouds or observing the knots in the wood of the table. When Ginny realized what she was doing she mentally scolded herself,

"Why on earth can't I look at him? Last time you saw him you were laughing in his face, which is hard to do to a Malfoy."

Deep down in her subconscious she knew it was because of the necklace. She know felt self conscious about wearing something he'd gotten her that had probably cost more than her house. Sub-consciously, she tucked the necklace into her robes, out of sight. Maybe he'd think she didn't accept it or something. Somehow Ginny didn't feel like sharing the necklace, even with the person who'd gotten it. Then, she tucked away her white lock of hair behind her ear and it was hidden underneath the red. Ginny still hadn't shown anyone the necklace or that streak of white and she intended for it to stay that way.

Suddenly, Ginny was aware of Draco making his way to the Gryffindor table. She watched as he strode over to the table where she sat. Once, he'd reached the table he plopped down in front of her.

"Well you can't call it plopping, Malfoy's don't plop," she thought to herself. "He would probably say that he sat quickly and with confidence," she joked in her mind, chuckling.

"What's so funny?" Draco asked, in a tone somewhere between an innocent question and a taunt.

Ginny realized she had actually laughed out loud. She blushed like mad, her light freckles blending in with the shade of red on her cheeks.

"Damn! Why must I blush at the drop of a hat?" she thought to herself.

Draco laughed and said, "Cat got your tongue, Weasley?"

Ginny decided not to take that as an insult and said, "Anything I could help you with, Malfoy? If not, you'd best be on your way."

"Please, don't get cute with me Weasley," he drawled as a retort.

"Whatever," she muttered half to him, half to herself.

"Anyway, it's not like I'm here because I want to spend 'quality time' getting to know the youngest, female Weasley," he sneered.

"Really? Then why are you here?" she asked with contempt.

"You know," he drawled.

"Actually I don't think I do. Enlighten me," she said sarcastically.

"I wanted to make sure you were keeping up your end of the deal," he hissed.

"Don't worry, your secret is safe with me, though I don't know whether to take everything you've said in this conversation as you not keeping up your end of the deal," she told him.

"Please, I've hardly insulted you in any way," he exclaimed.

"Whatever, don't worry I haven't told anyone," she uttered tonelessly.

"I figured you hadn't," he smirked.

"Oh really? How did you figure that?" she asked.

"You're the classic Gryffindor, you know brave, courageous, loyal....."

She ignored the last part and said, "You do know that brave and courageous is redundant."

"Now you're starting to sound like a Ravenclaw," he said.

"At least not Hufflepuff," she mused.

"Couldn't agree with you more," he said almost with a small smile on his lips. "Though," he continued, "I'm surprised you think of Hufflepuffs that way. Gryffindors tend to like all the houses except Slytherin"

"Well, I didn't think of them like that until I met Hannah Abbott. Honestly, that girl is quite a dunderhead," she said smiling. (A/N: No offense to Hannah fans! I just needed some material!)

Draco laughed a small little laugh and then at the same time it hit them that they were actually getting along. That of course is practically a sin for anyone in the two families to get along with someone from the other family. Both smiles immediately dissolved from their faces. There was an awkward silence and then Draco stood up suddenly.

"Remember, not a word," he choked out.

Ginny shook her head violently in a silent agreement. Then, the noise of students headed for breakfast reached their ears. Draco sprinted to the Slytherin table and sat down just as many students began to trickle in through the Great Doors.

As the trio spoke spiritedly beside her, Ginny stared at the food still not believing she had for a moment, gotten along with Draco Malfoy. She still hadn't eaten and made sure to avoid looking at Draco at all costs.

"Ginny, everything ok?" Ron asked, pulling Ginny out of her reverie. Ginny looked up and smiled to her brother and said,

"Yea, I'm fine just a bit distracted, that's all."

"If you ever want to talk about anything, I'm here," Hermione whispered to her. Ginny smiled at the older girl's words.

"Remember, Gin we need you at Quidditch! Without out we might as well forfeit the Cup now," Harry piped up.

Ginny found herself quite pleased with the trio's concern for her.

Ron spoke up, "Hey Harry when do we begin practice?"

Ginny knew how excited Ron was to be apart of the team. She remembered his birthday on August 11^th, how his face lit up when he unwrapped his Firebolt along with attached note asking him to be apart of the team. Ginny was amazed he didn't literally die of happiness on the spot. He had been a bit irritated that Ginny had gotten her broom before him and that she didn't say anything. Harry told him it was because her birthday came first and to stop being such a baby.

"We start next week," Harry responded.

"Who's the other Chaser and Keeper for our team?" Ginny asked.

"Well we're having try-outs in 2 days, so we'll find out then," he answered.

Hermione getting bored with the subject changed it to discuss the schedule of classes for the first day.

Ginny was now left in the dust for this conversation, seeing as she wasn't in any of their classes. Today she had Potions, Divination (Ginny mentally faked vomiting, then mentally laughed. She found herself quite funny.), Charms, Transfiguration, Arithmancy, and Muggle Studies. Ginny smiled to herself.

"Ending the day on a good note," she thought happily.

She was a bit disappointed however because she wouldn't have Defense Against Dark Arts until tomorrow and she was quite curious as to how her new teacher would teach the class.

"Hopefully not another Lockhart experience," she thought to herself. "Can't believe I ever liked him," she thought in disgust. Though she sincerely doubted this new teacher would be anything like the man who taught the class in her first year. And whatever it was that Harry knew about Mrs. Figg, he hadn't told anyone yet, judging by Ron and Hermione's constant badgering.

The mail was delivered and Ginny received letters from her parents, Bill, Charly, and Percy. Ginny was amazed Percy had taken the time to write to her considering working for the Ministry was a "lot of hard, yet satisfying work." (His words not hers.)

They all said basically the same thing. They missed her, hoped she enjoyed the new school year, to be careful, yatta, yatta, yatta. It was nice how they cared for her. Ginny folded up all her letters and tucked them into her bag. All the students began to make their way out of the Great hall and started heading to their first classes. She gathered her things and began to head to the dungeons where her first class, Potions, would be. Very un-Gryffindor like of her, she actually enjoyed Potions. Sure Snape was a jerk, but Ginny did like making different potions and concoctions. She actually got good marks in that class considering Snape tried to fail every Gryffindor. She shared Potions with the fourth year Slytherins. She would probably be thrown out of the Gryffindor common room if she voiced this out loud, but despite Snape's obvious favoring of them, most Slytherins were quite skilled at potions. They'd probably still pass with flying colors if any other teacher taught it.

"What a funny saying, flying colors..." Ginny mused to herself. As she reached the Potions room she was pondering all different life observations which had nothing to do with Potions at all.

Potions passed as did Divination, Charms, Transfiguration, and Arithmancy. The classes were all basically the same as she remembered, just harder material covered. Ginny now skipped happily to the class she'd been looking forward to all day, Muggle Studies. Ginny found Muggles fascinating, their fashions, jobs, literature and arts, etc. Ginny wondered who'd be in the class since all four houses tended to be mixed in the classes. Well last year it'd been more like three houses since Slytherins had no interest in Muggles and practically despised them. This year, however, because of Dumbledore's announcement of the mandatory class, she expected all sorts of grouchy, ill-tempered Slytherins to be sulking in the class.

Ginny stepped into the class and looked around at the other students already seated. She recognized Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs, and Ravenclaws of all years.

"So far no Slytherins," Ginny contemplated.

Ginny took an empty seat and after a few minutes the first few Slytherins sauntered in, quite surly. Ginny didn't know any of them, though most of them were second and third years with a few seventh years thrown in the group. Professor Hammond strode in and began the class. Ginny listened intently to her teacher until suddenly a late comer interrupted the class. A tall, pale blond boy strode into the class with an evil smirk on his lips. Ginny recognized him immediately, it was Draco Malfoy. Ever since the 'incident' over the summer, it seemed she'd been running into him a lot. Her first instinct feeling was disgust at him being in her class, but then it was shoved out of her mind by a different emotion, contentment. Ginny was now disgusted with herself for actually having the slightest bit of happiness at seeing him in her class. She looked at him and for a brief second their eyes locked and he then sat in the only empty seat left, which happened to be right next to her.

"Great..." Ginny muttered sarcastically.

He heard her, and hissed so only she could hear, "If you think I'm happy about the seating arrangements or the bloody class in general you've gone daft."

Ginny elbowed him in the stomach and he made a soft 'oomph' he was about to say something when Ginny began to hum the tune to one of Celestina Warbeck's hit songs. His mouth abruptly shut and he glowered at her before turning to listen to Professor Hammond. Ginny smiled victoriously and then too looked at the her teacher who was now discussing a project she'd be assigning from now until the end of the year.

"I've randomly paired people up in the class to research Muggle religions from ancient times to now and how magic influenced it," Professor Hammond began. She then began to read the names of the students paired together and their subject. Ginny listened intently for her name.

Finally Hammond reached her name,

"Miss Virginia Weasley and ......... oh yes Mr. Draco Malfoy. You two will be covering Egyptian worship."

Ginny's mouth dropped. She turned to face Draco. His face showed no hint of any kind of emotions but his gray eyes seemed to drip with an emotion Ginny couldn't quite put her finger on.

"Virginia is it? I'd been wondering what your name was," he said.

Ginny quite annoyed and hurt that he didn't know her name snapped, "It's Ginny, you prick."

Draco eyed her for a second then sneered, "Aw... is little 'Ginny' hurt that I didn't know her name? Well you can't blame me can you? Think of it, if I wasn't as legendary as I was," he said looking quite smug, "would you know my name? Plus, I've never had to 'get to know' you have I? You were the littlest Weasley who followed Potter around shamelessly. The little annoying sister to that git of a brother you've got. The --"

"OK, I get it! Would you please shut up? Hearing your voice is irritating me," Ginny said now quite embarrassed considering what he'd said was pretty much true. She began to maliciously flip through her muggle religion classbook to find a section dealing with their project subject. She pulled a page so hard she accidentally tore it out of the book.

"Damn!" she said grumpily under her breath.

She heard Draco laugh next to her, then mutter a few words and suddenly the ripped part of the page was magically fixed. She grunted her thanks and then found the page she'd been looking for.

Dipping her quill into her inkpot, she began to take notes from the text. She could sense Draco watching her. She tilted her head to the side and eyed him warily. He just smirked then leaned back in his chair and put his feet up on the table.

"Excuse you!" Ginny exclaimed, pushing his feet to the floor. "If you think I'm going to work on this whole project myself you are sadly mistaken!"

"Well I shouldn't be subjected to do this sort of work for an idiotic subject! The only reason I just don't fail the class is because I need good marks to be Head Boy," he sneered.

"Oh, but I'm lower than you so I can work my butt off for you to get good marks, is that it?" Ginny said vehemently. She thought to herself that no way in hell would he ever be Head Boy.

"You said it, not me," Draco drawled.

She kicked him in the shins and said, "You will work with me on this project! I'm not one of your little brain-dead servants, you don't control me!"

"Yes, well, that could always change," he muttered. He said to her, "We can't work on this in class though, according to this hag here we must do this on our own time. I don't exactly fancy being seen working together, which I'm sure you feel the same way."

"We can work in the mornings in the library, before anyone wakes up, it seems both of us tend to be up early in the morning," she responded, referring to that morning.

"Fine," he growled.

They both realized that the class was over and students were starting to leave. They both stood up and went their separate ways.

As Ginny was walking through the halls she was still a bit upset about the class she'd just gone through. Muggle Studies was supposed to be her favorite class and it ended up being a class she at the moment despised. She was so angry she didn't see where she was walking and walked straight into someone. The impact sent her sprawling to the floor, her things flying down with her.

"I'm so sorry Ginny! Are you okay?" she heard a male voice say. Ginny saw a hand outstretched in front of her face. She looked at the owner of the hand and voice and found it to be Harry Potter. She looked up at his face and saw concern etched in his face and in his emerald eyes. She blushed and took his hand shyly. He pulled her up effortlessly, as if she weighed less than a feather.

"Probably results of Quidditch training," Ginny thought to herself.

"Thanks..." She croaked out. Her throat seemed to have closed up.

"Where were you headed?" he asked. "The Gryffindor tower is that way," he said motioning from the direction she'd been heading from. She groaned.

"Oh, it was all that ruddy Malfoy's fault he got me so upset in my Muggle Studies class that he got me all disoriented and angry..." she said and continued to tell the story of her class that'd been ruined by Malfoy. She didn't say anything of breakfast this morning or their plan to meet in the mornings, though. She also conveniently left out his comment about her following around Harry shamelessly.

Harry listened sympathetically and when she finished he grabbed her shoulders gently and told her, "Don't let a prick like that get to you! You'll just be letting him succeed in what he wanted to do. C'mon, I'll walk with you back to the tower." He started picking up her things that had fallen on the floor. Ginny bent down and started picking up random pieces of paper that had flown out of her bag.

"Thanks Harry," she said.

"No problem," and he grabbed her bag from her and said, "Here let me carry your stuff, you've had a stressful day as it is." With that he smiled.

Ginny almost melted on the spot. She weakly smiled back and began to walk with him towards the Gryffindor tower. Ginny felt like this was the happiest moment of her life. When they reached the Common room, he brought all her stuff to her bed.

"There you are," he said cheerfully. "Seems like everyone else is eating now. Walk you to dinner, milady?" He said extended his arm as if he was escorting her to a fancy party.

She hooked her arm in his, smiled and said, "Why thank you, kind sir."

They talked and laughed all the way to the Great Hall and Ginny felt as if she was in Seventh Heaven. All thoughts of Draco Malfoy had escaped her mind. She didn't even notice the pair of gray eyes that looked at her in complete loathing.

When Ginny crawled into bed that night she was vaguely aware of a white light emitted from her necklace. Ginny felt herself in a gray place and she suddenly felt extreme pain. It was to her as if she was under the Cruciatis curse. She felt her life energy sucked out of her and she saw her lifeless body crumple to the floor. Right before she woke up she saw a pair of eyes. She couldn't tell the color, but they scared her beyond comprehension. They seemed to have this evil look about them. She sat up suddenly, drenched in sweat. She couldn't remember the dream, only the intense pain and fear.

She dismissed it as a common nightmare and quickly showered and dressed to run to the library. When she got there she could see Draco already sitting in the furthest table looking quite sullen. He had already gotten books dealing with their topic. Ginny felt her anger from yesterday surge through her blood. He looked up at her and growled,

"Let's get this over with."

Ginny sat across from him and they both began to pour into the books in front of them.