Allstar

Ron lay stomach-down on his bed and lazily flipped through his copy of Flying With the Cannons, feet waving in the air. The dorm was empty; the other boys were probably horsing around outside somewhere but Ron was enjoying the rare feeling of solitude. Hearing the door click open, Ron glanced up. It was Harry and he looked a right mess: his face was bruised, his clothes torn and dirty and his shoulders were hunched as if expecting a blow. It was not until Harry joined Ron on his bed and ran a hand through his hair that Ron noticed the streaks of blood on his wrist.

"Christ, Harry, what happened to you? You look awful." Harry sighed.

"Had a run-in Ginny..." he trailed off.

"Ah," said Ron, as if that explained everything. On second thought, it probably did. "So...You want to tell me what happened?" Harry sighed again.

"Not much to tell. Ran into Malfoy. Got in a fight. Ginny got mad. That's all, really." Ron blinked.

"I see," he said, and hesitated. "What made Ginny so angry?"

"Me. Fighting with Malfoy. You know how she is."

"Ah." Ron did.

"Ron...You haven't noticed Malfoy acting any differently lately, have you?" Ron rolled over and sat up.

"Differently how? He's still the same despicable git he always was, if that's what you mean."

"Mmm...That's what I thought." Harry paused, then continued in a rush. "I mean, we've always known he was a git. He's always been a git. He hasn't done anything decent in the last six years that I've noticed, anyhow. So there's no reason to think he's changed. No reason to...to socialise with him, or anything. Nothing...Nothing...Fuck." Ron's eyes widened. Harry rarely swore.

"Um...Harry?" Harry glanced up. The emptiness in his eyes sent shivers up Ron's spine. "Who's socialising with Malfoy, Harry?"

* * *

Ginny entered the library cautiously and glanced around for Hermione. She was still on parole with Madame Pince, but she was fairly sure the stern librarian wouldn't bother her if she was with Hermione. Spotting her friend by the historical non-fiction section, she hurried over. Explaining her actions of the afternoon wasn't high on Ginny's list of Things to Do for Kicks, but she knew she'd have to eventually in any case. Better to get it over with now, before Hermione started speculating on it herself.

Ginny seated herself at the low table and took a deep breath. She sneezed. Hermione looked up from her book, which was dusty and falling apart and looked several hundred years old.

"Oh, hello Ginny. Hang on a moment, will you? I'm at a really good bit." Ginny rolled her eyes but settled willingly enough into her chair. At least she'd get a chance to organise her thoughts.

* * *

Draco paced through the dungeons, not shivering. Not shivering was an act in itself, one he'd learned early in life in the drafty halls of Malfoy Manor. Draco never admitted to being cold, or hungry, or any other such signs of weakness. So, even though there was no one to witness him, he walked the labyrinthian passages of Hogwarts' dungeons without holding his arms against his body, or clutching his cloak around himself, or shaking his hair back and exclaiming in falsely cheery tones, my that's a chill wind today.

Rather, Draco stalked with a cultivated grace and wondered how much longer he'd have to wander until he was too lost for anyone to find him.

Draco had a wealth of lonely places stored in his head: certain clearings in the Forbidden Forest, disused classrooms, the smaller Astronomy Tower (not to be confused with the larger, which housed the greater part of the soap opera which was the love-lives of Hogwarts students), his dormitory in the hour after dinner. Draco had sat or stood alone in each of them and thought, as was his wont. He found, however, that the only place to be truly secluded from the buzzing of several hundred lives was the dungeons. Dank, deserted, below even the Slytherin quarters, not even Peeves ventured into their dark embrace. The Bloody Baron was known to haunt them, but only on Tuesdays and alternate Thursdays. It being Friday, Draco felt himself secure.

Secure...Secure to deliberate over the events of the afternoon. Secure to study his reactions to certain, unexpected events. Secure to muse over a certain red-haired vixen of a Gryffindor and the very unwanted responses she provoked in him.

"Oh, bloody hell," Draco swore softly. There was no escaping it. His supposedly iron self-control simply melted at the sight of the youngest Weasley. He knew there was a logical explanation; he wished there wasn't. From all that he had read and heard and seen, Draco Malfoy could come to no other conclusion than that he was falling in love.

"Shit," he swore again, sinking down to the cold stone floor. Perhaps he could just stay where he was for a while. Twenty years ought to do.

* * *

"Ginny!?" Ron shouted, "My sister? My sister Ginny?" Harry nodded cautiously from across the room.

"That's not possible, Potter! You've got it wrong! My little sister has not been talking to Malfoy. She isn't interested in him at all. She certainly has never called him by his first name. You must have misunderstood." He set his jaw stubbornly.

"Now Ron," Harry said placatingly, "I'm not saying she wants to--to marry the git or anything. But she has been talking to him, and if you'll calm down a bit, we can figure out what to do about it."

"I say we kill the git," Ron anwered prompty, causing his friend to smile thinly.

"Much as I like that idea, I'd rather not get expelled."

"Hmm." Ron sighed moodily. "We could make sure one of us was always with Ginny."

"She'd kill me, Ron."

"You got any better ideas?"

"We could lock her in her dorm."

"We could lock Malfoy in his dorm." They snickered at the thought.

"We could turn Malfoy back into a ferret!" Harry suggested, grinning. Ron laughed.

"I thought you didn't want to get expelled?" Harry's grin subsided.

"What can we do, then?" Neither of the boys spoke for several minutes. Finally, Harry broke the silence.

"Maybe we can't do anything."

"But Harry! Malfoy could be up to anything. He could be acting all nice to Ginny so she'll trust him, and then he'll--he'll--"

"Turn her to the dark side?" Harry suggested dryly. "I don't like it any more than you do, Ron. But whatever he's up to, she'll have to figure it out eventually." Ron nodded slowly.

"You think it's better if she finds out herself?"

"I think so. Then she won't be able to blame anyone else." Ron noticed that Harry was surreptitiously rubbing his injured wrist.

"I get it. Then we'll be ready to take him out, and she won't mind!"

"That too," Harry agreed. Ron lay back down on his stomach and grinned at his friend.

"You know what you need?" Harry looked at him distrustfully.

"Do I want to?" Ron laughed.

"Of course you do! You need a transition girl."

"A what?"

"A transition girl! Someone you date to get over your last girlfriend." Harry raised an eyebrow.

"Right...And how would you know about this?"

"The twins told me," Ron admitted sheepishly. "But listen, Harry, I think it's a really good idea. You just date someone, or a few people, nothing really serious, but it helps you remember what it's like to be back in the world again!"

"I didn't think I'd ever left it."

"Come on, Harry, you know what I mean. The dating world! The partying world!"

"Right." Harry didn't look convinced. "And exactly who are you planning to set me up with anyhow?"

"Oh, I don't know...Someone quiet, maybe."

"That might be a nice change," Harry mused.

"Exactly! Well...hmm. Have you got anyone in mind?"

"Not really. I remember...oh."

"What?" Harry sighed.

"Well, when Gi--when your sister broke up with me, she said something about the sort of people I should date...Said she wasn't one of them."

"Ouch."

"Yeah."

"Well...what did she say about the sort of people you can date, then?"

"Ron!"

"Lighten up, Harry. She might have been right, there's no harm thinking about it anyway. What did she say?" Harry's forehead creased in concentration, which made his scar look almost like a straight line. This always made Ron laugh, but he bit it back, not wanting to interrupt his friend's thoughts. Finally, Harry spoke.

"I think she said there were two sorts of people I could date."

"And? What are they?"

"Someone I could take care of, I think. That's what she said she wasn't."

"Right..." Ron took a moment to process that thought. "And the other?"

"Someone I could share everything with. I guess that would be Hermione. I can't think of anyone else, anyhow."

"Oh." Ron avoided his friend's gaze. "I guess we'll have to go with the other group then."

"Yeah, I can't really see myself dating Hermione either." Ron let out a tiny sigh of relief and Harry, noticing, grinned. "Ron! Do you like Hermione?" The taller boy blushed but didn't answer. "You do!" Harry insisted. "Why didn't you tell me?"

"Dunno," Ron muttered, blushing even more deeply. "Didn't seem important." Harry just shook his head and laughed.

"Sure it is! Talking about setting me up with someone...We'll just have to see what we can do for you!" Ron developed a sudden urge to see if he could sink through his bed and into the floor. It looked to be a long week.

* * *

...thusly leading to the moste Juste and imminent End of the twenty-Third goblin Rebellion. Though the remaining Goblins protested muchly, their human Foes, that is to say, Ourselves, were unstoppable. The goblins were cleansed from the Streets and there was much Rejoicing. Why, the evening of the eighth day of Celebrations, the eleventh son of Gren the Cobbler was engaged In lighting a paltry barn on Fire when...

Hermione finally tore herself away from her book (Goblin Rebellions: A Loude and Bloody Historey) and turned to her friend.

"So, Ginny," she greeted the other girl, "feel like telling me what this afternoon was all about? The fight, and pretending to see Hagrid, and--what happened to Malfoy anyway? I didn't see him leave." Ginny played with the loose sleeves of her robe and avoided Hermione's gaze.

"Right...well, after you set Harry's robes on fire, I thought it would be best if we could keep the two of them, Harry and - and Malfoy, away from each other. So they wouldn't start fighting again, after you just got them to stop. I figured Harry wouldn't want to be explaining why he was fighting to someone like Hagrid, so I just pretended to see him." Hermione's mouth twitched.

"I see. And how did the two of them come to be fighting in the first place?" Ginny shifted in her seat. At Hermione's raised eyebrow, she smiled weakly.

"I hate these library chairs," she offered. Hermione rolled her eyes. She had reason to know that they were, in fact, very comfortable.

"Well," Hermione encouraged, "didn't you see how the fight started?"

"Um...Yes, actually." Ginny licked her lips and began speaking very quickly. "I was talking to Malfoy and hegrabbedmyshoulderand then Harry just attacked him!"

"Malfoy what?"

"He...fought with Harry?" Hermione sighed.

"Ginny, you aren't being very cooperative here." Ginny blushed. "Now, what did you say Malfoy did just before Harry ‘attacked' him?"

"He...grabbed my shoulder. Sort of aggressively, I guess. I mean, it might have looked that way. To someone watching. Like Harry. Not that he should have been watching private conversations in the first place!"

"So you and Malfoy were talking before he grabbed you shoulder, sort of aggressively, and Harry attacked him." Hermione reinstated. Ginny nodded.

"More or less, yeah."

"Ginny...there wouldn't be, oh, something going on with you and Malfoy, would there?"

"What-what do you mean by that?"

"Oh, you know. A casual acquaintance. Loaded conversations. Secret snogs in the Astronomy Tower. The usual."

"Don't I wish," Ginny muttered. Hermione hid a smile.

"You know I'm not going to go running to Ron and Harry, Gin. If you tell me anything you want kept secret, I'll respect that." Ginny tilted her head to the side and regarded her friend a moment, then hugged her knees to her chest.

"Hmm. Well...He just started talking to me, I suppose. Back in September he used to tease me about dating Harry. And then he got me in trouble with Madame Pince...But then he apologised!" Hermione's eyes widened. "And then after I broke up with Harry, he gave me a chocolate frog."

"And you ate it?"

"Of course. He isn't like the twins, I don't think he carries around hexed candy, just waiting for an unsuspecting victim. He couldn't if he wanted to, everyone suspects him of everything."

"True," Hermione concurred.

"And then today, he was being really funny."

"Malfoy was being funny?"

"Yes! And I was laughing, and he started laughing too. But then he got all strange."

"And that's when he grabbed your shoulder."

"Right. He was--I think he was angry, but I don't know why. It was so sudden, and then Harry came along before I had a chance to find out."

"I see," Hermione said slowly. "So you think he's changed?"

"Changed? I don't know...Maybe he's always been like this, but no one ever had a civil enough conversation with him to find out. Or...Maybe he has changed." Ginny laughed. Hermione smiled absently, but she was thinking along other lines.

"Ginny, can I see your shoulder?"

"What?"

"Your shoulder. Where Malfoy grabbed you."

"Oh, sure." Ginny pulled her robe down off her shoulder and stared. There was a deep purple mark just underneath her collarbone. Hermione pressed her lips together.

"Can I see the other side too?" In answer, Ginny twisted in her seat so that Hermione could see the back of her shoulder. Hermione breathed in sharply. There were four more bruises, one for each of Draco's fingers where he'd grabbed the slight redhead. Ginny craned her neck to see the marks.

"Yikes," she breathed.

"No kidding," Hermione said brusquely. "So. What are you going to do about this?"

"The bruises? They'll fade on their own. I can hardly feel them."

"I meant Draco Malfoy."

"Oh."

"What do you think of him?" Hermione pressed. "Do you still think he's a decent human being after all? I'm telling you, you'd better not let any of your brothers see those bruises!" Ginny shrugged.

"I want to find out why he got so angry all of a sudden. I don't think I can make that sort of decision yet, not without more information. But yes." She met Hermione's gaze levelly. "My instinct is that he's a decent person." Hermione nodded.

"He's cuter than Harry too."

"Hermione!"

"He is! Not that I'm interested in him myself," she added hastily. "He's all yours."

"Well that's good to know," Ginny said sarcastically. "You like someone else, then? You're welcome to Harry, though I can't say I'd recommend him. Or my brother." Hermione coloured slightly. Ginny smirked.

"So, uh, Ginny, have you ever read about the Goblin Rebellion of 1464?" Hermione asked, fumbling through her book. "They're really fascinating...Here, read this." Ginny just laughed.

end of fic