Unhappily Ever After

Once upon a time, there lived a king and a queen. Their names were Molly and Arthur, and they had many children. Of course, all their sons had gone to live in the forest, outside their borders. They suspected the boys didn't want anyone nagging them to clean their room, but could never be sure.

Now, as all fair and just rulers do, this king had an evil magician. And this magician was even more eccentric than most. He was a cross-dressing, but brilliant boy named Tom. And he was only seven.

One day, his plan to take over the kingdom finally worked. Or rather, he decided to kill off the king and queen because he was bored, and he got the kingdom as part of the deal. He slipped some poison into their picnic lunch - they were trusting people who never suspected a thing - and they never returned to the castle. He sent his pet snake Nagini to clean up the mess.

Once they were out of the way, he decided to redecorate the castle. The royal decorators had had absolutely atrocious taste, and they had draped the entire place in purple tapestries. Some of which could stay, but the rest would have to go. With a wave of his arm, he covered the halls in green and black.

As he was inspecting the rooms, he remembered that the royal couple had a daughter. He sighed dramatically. Why did people have to go and leave children around?

He found her quietly playing in her room.

"Hello," he said uncertainly. As he had never had to deal with a child before, he wasn’t quite sure what to say.

"Hi!" the redheaded two-year-old giggled. "Who’re you?"

"Er…the magician," replied Tom. "I’m Tom. What’s your name?"

"Ginny!" she gurgled, toddling towards him. "Are you a girl?"

"ER, no," said Tom, who was rather disturbed that she could add excitement to everything she said. "I’m a boy."

"But you’re wearing one of Mummy’s dresses! Boys don’t wear dresses!" She fell down at his feet, still laughing.

"Of course they do. At least, I do, and I’m a boy.I’m merely getting in touch with my feminine side," he said. And then he remembered why he was there. "Oh right. Your parents are dead."

"Dead?" Even at two, Ginny had been read many fairy tales, most of which ended up with the evil witch being dead. Which meant she wouldn’t ever come back again. She started to cry. "I don’t want them to be dead!"

"ER…." Now Tom was even more distressed. He knelt down and awkwardly patted her on the back. "Don’t cry…it’ll all be okay."

She wrapped her rather pudgy arms around his neck and climbed onto his lap, still sobbing. "No it won’t!" she wailed. "They’re gone!"

He hugged her closer, an instinctive move, and kissed her gently on the forehead. Ginny, with loving parents, had been kissed many times before. Tom, however, had never given such an action. He was rather surprised at himself.

"Will you be my Mummy?" she asked, staring at him hopefully with tear-filled eyes.

Later on, as he thought back to that moment, he knew it was the eyes that had done him in. And the puppy dog look that she was giving him.

"Yes," he decided, as he was dressed like her mother anyway. "I will."

"Good," she said, yawning. "I like you."

"I like you too," he whispered back. "You’re cute. For a baby."

She giggled, squirming in his arms, then promptly fell asleep.

And so Ginny and Tom became the best of friends. They wandered the halls together, had picnics in the yard, tried on her mother’s clothing and makeup…Tom even let her play in his secret laboratory and taught her how to make a potion or two.

But then they grew up.

And while they were growing up, they also grew apart. Ginny turned out as playful and carefree as ever, laughing in the garden, singing with the birds, and dancing with the frogs. She had a passion for nature and the outdoors.

Tom, on the other hand, shut himself up in his secret laboratory, concocting potions of all sorts, some deadly, some not. And made lots of messes when his tonics exploded. All of which he made Ginny clean up.

And soon, they got to hating each other…

~

"Mummy!" called a six-year-old Ginny, running down the stairs. "Are you there?"

Tom looked up from his mixtures, an annoyed expression on his face. "What is it now?"

"I want to play!"

Tom sighed. "Again? But we just played an hour ago."

Ginny’s lower lip trembled. "I want to play now!"

"Can’t you go off and play with your frogs and birds or something?"

"But you used them all for your experiments! And you never gave them back! Where are they?"

Tom thought of the mountain of animal corpses hidden in the back and decided he would rather play with her than explain why she wouldn’t ever see her friends again. "Fine, I"ll play."

"Yay!" cheered Ginny, taking his hand and spinning around in circles. "Play play play play plaaaaay!!!"

She half-dragged him up the stairs, and out into the garden. "Boat!"

"We don’t have a boat," said Tom. "Whatever are you talking about?"

"Boat!!" she whined. "I want a boat! Mummy get boat!"

Tom clenched his teeth, mentally reminding himself that hitting little girls was wrong. Not that anything like that had really stopped him before. Had she always been this annoying?

"Boooaaattt!" she complained. "Get boat!"

Tom sighed. "Fine, I’ll get you your stupid boat." He waved his arm, turning a rock into a boat. "Happy, now?"

"Boat!" squealed Ginny happily. "Fun!"

Tom left her with the boat. "You know, I’m going to have to teach you some proper English," he said, half to himself. "It’s not right for you to keep using such horrible grammar. Maybe reading a dictionary will help."

~

Two years had passed and Ginny was eight. Tom’s plan had worked very well. Almost too well, in fact. She still talked in exclamations, she just used really big words along with them. Which made speaking to her even more annoying, if that was even possible.

And she still called him "Mummy."

He was beginning to regret ever letting her do that.

"Look Mummy! It’s an organism inflated with soft down!"

"A what?" asked Tom.

Ginny frowned at him. "A stuffed animal, of course, to say in simpler terms." She shook her head at him. "Really, you uneducated people. I can’t believe your level of tutelage. It’s appalling how little you know."

Tom groaned. "Will you just shut up?"

~

And so it went on. Each year, Ginny managed to find some new way to annoy Tom, until finally, he just couldn’t stand it any longer. He blew up at her.

"Don’t you ever call me Mummy again! My name is Tom! T-O-M, Tom! So please, address me as that!"

Ginny’s lower lip quivered. "I’m sorry."

"No you’re not! If you were, you wouldn’t be so bloody annoying! I don’t want to see you ever again! From now on, you’re going to eat and sleep and work with the hired help! And not approach me unless I send for you!"

A tear appeared in her eye. "Does this mean we’re not friends anymore?"

"Does this mean we’re not friends anymore?" he mocked. "Of course it means we’re not friends anymore! Shouldn’t your overly large vocabulary allow you to know that?"

He sneered at her. "From now on, you’re going to be cleaning up my messes."

Ginny whimpered and ran from the room.

Tom almost felt a little sorry for her. But then he assured himself that she deserved it. She really wouldn’t have been so annoying if she didn’t want to. That was something you could control…wasn’t it?

~

"Ginny!" yelled a voice from the basement.

Ginny sighed and looked up from her doodling. "What is it?" she asked dejectedly as she trudged down the stairs.

Tom, in a blue taffeta dress and spike heels of the same shade, glared at her and pointed to a puddle of purple on the dungeon floor. "You didn’t clean this up!"

"But you said I wasn’t allowed down here-" she began.

"Clean it up!" he shrieked, even louder. "You know how I get when there’s puddles of such an atrocious colour on my perfect black floor!"

"Yes…erm…" She wasn’t sure whether to call him ‘sir’ or ‘ma’am’.

"Just do it already," he muttered, turning back to his work. "How do you expect me to kill people if I can’t ever get around to making the right potion?" He got a glimpse of her surprised face. "Oh, did I say that out loud? I didn’t mean kill. I meant…cure…"

So Ginny cleaned up the mess. And the hundred other messes he made after that. She tried not to look at the situation too pessimistically. After all, she was practically like all the princesses in the fairy tales she had been read, and they had all gotten out all right. One day, she was sure to meet her knight in shining armour.

~

A few days after his little incident, Tom strode around his sitting room, wearing a royal purple dress and a black cloak, a shiny crown perched on his tangled curls (which he had just curled that morning), and peering into a mirror.

And of course, the mirror wasn’t any normal mirror. That wouldn’t have been appropriate. It was a magic mirror.

He admired his reflection. Quite frankly, he detested the colour, but Ginny hadn’t gotten around to doing the laundry yet, and he hadn’t anything else clean to wear.

"Mirror mirror, on the wall. Who's the prettiest one of all?" He silently applauded himself on his poetry.

The mirror went all murky. Then it began to grow clearer, showing him an image that was not his own.

"That servant girl of mine? The one who used to call me Mummy? Hmm. She is rather pretty. I didn't know her hair was that shade of red.... but how can she be prettier than I? She's all ragged and dirty. But she's so cute...."

The mirror never lied. Tom knew this well. And it sickened him to think that a scrawny little girl could be prettier than he. The thought that they would be prettiest together entered his mind for a second, but he didn't want to share with anyone. He was a bit of a spoiled brat. So he decided he would kill her, and become the prettiest of all.

He called his loyal huntsman in.

The huntsman was a sarcastic blonde named Draco Malfoy. In actuality, he wasn’t so loyal, and the only reason Tom kept him on the staff was because his snide comments to everyone but him were rather amusing.

"Yes, my lord?" said Draco, kneeling on the floor in front of the throne.

"Where’s my purple eyeshadow?"

"ER…I have no idea, my lord."

"Oh."

"Is that all, my lord?"

"No. Change your clothes," ordered Tom.

"Into what, my lord?"

Tom mused for a moment. "The dark green shirt that goes with it. And the grassy green cotton belt. And…yes, I think that will work…the little green hat too. Actually, just put on that entire outfit. You know, the one that you complain makes you look like Robin Hood? With the tights, of course."

Draco groaned. "Does it have to be tights, my lord?"

Tom frowned at him. "Of course. You wouldn’t look proper without them."

"And what shall I carry for my weaponry, my lord?"

"The bow and arrow, of course. You know that’s the only thing that goes with the Robin Hood outfit."

Draco groaned even louder. "I was afraid you’d say that, my lord."

"Well, what are you waiting for? Go change."

"You still haven’t told me what I’m supposed to do after I change, my lord."

"Oh. Right. That." Tom racked his memory. "I want you to bring Ginny in."

"Why, my lord?" asked Draco, confused.

"Because I want to kill her, of course. Now, hurry on."

Draco was horrified. He was rather fond of Ginny. In fact, he was more than fond. He was rather in love with her. Which was why the thought of turning her over to Tom so he could kill her rather horrified him.

By the time he had finished changing into the Robin Hood outfit, his mind had thought up a plan. He would take her away, deep into the woods, where Tom would never find her. Whatever his punishment was, he could deal with it.

He found her by the well, pulling up a bucket of water and singing to the birds.

"We’ve got to go, and now!" he said hurriedly, pulling at her arm.

The next thing he knew, he was on the ground, with a bucket on his head and the Robin Hood outfit soaking wet. He didn’t mind at all about the second part.

"Oh, I’m so sorry!" uttered Ginny apologetically. "I thought you were an attacker of some sort!"

Draco pulled himself off the ground and attempted to dust himself off. "Like I said, we’ve got to go," he repeated, pulling at her hand and dragging her off in the direction of the woods.

"Why?" asked Ginny, rather bewildered.

"Tom."

"Tom?" she asked. "What about him?"

"He wants to kill you."

"He does?" Although she was rather appalled, she couldn’t help but feel a tiny bit flattered. He wouldn’t just kill any person. He had told her that back when they had been friends. The person he chose to kill had to be special. They had to deserve to be killed by him.

"His mirror told him to," explained Draco.

"And all this time, I thought he was just talking to himself," she muttered.

"What?"

"Nothing. Never mind."

By now, they had travelled quite deep into the woods. Draco let go of her arm, somewhat disappointed to do so. He had liked the feel of her warm skin against his hand.

"I’m going to leave you now," he said. "I have to get back." He turned around and ran from her, nearly stumbling over his own feet. "I’m sorry!"

"But what am I going to do?" she called after him. It was no use. He had already gone.

Instead of being sensible and running after him, like she could have done, she did what every other fairy tale princess would have done in her situation.

She sank down to her knees and cried.

~

"YOU WHAT????!!!!" screamed Tom.

"I…erm…let her go, my lord," said Draco sheepishly. He hung his head.

"But why?" Tom paced the floor on his hot pink pleather boots, looking very distraught. "That was such a stupid thing to do!"

"I couldn’t let you kill her, my lord."

"Don’t be stupid! Of course you could!"

By then, Draco was incredibly tired of being called stupid. "First of all," he said icily, "don’t you know any other ways to insult people? Or is your vocabulary not large enough? And secondly, I’m bloody tired of you always getting me to bloody fetch the people you plan to bloody kill! Do your own dirty work!"

"You’re going to be punished for this!" yelled Tom.

Draco sneered. "What are you going to do?" he asked scornfully. "Be sarcastic at me? Hah!"

Tom smirked right back. "Of course not," he said. He pressed a button and watched Draco’s face with an amused expression as a wall opened to reveal a secret chamber. He pointed.

"I have whips. And axes. And guillotines. And of course, weapons of all other sorts, as you can probably see. It’s my torture chamber. Isn’t it pretty? Just like me. I think you’ll enjoy the experience. Not many people get to, you know."

"You know what they say about men who like big weapons…" Draco managed to squeak, his smirk pasted permanently on his face. Perhaps it wasn’t the right thing to say at such a moment, but it was the first thought that came to his mind.

Tom stopped. "What do they say?" he asked, the picture of innocence.

Draco shook his head. "Never mind," he muttered. "You wouldn’t understand."

As the sun plunged towards the horizon, Draco’s screams rang out throughout the kingdom.

~

It was getting light again, and Ginny had stopped crying hours, since she had figured out it wouldn’t solve any of her problems. Now, she was huddled in a heap on the grass, dozing peacefully. A sharp twitter woke her up.

"What are you doing?!" she yelled crankily, throwing a pebble in the direction of the noise. Then she remembered she was supposed to be kind to animals. "Sorry!" she called after it. She wasn’t a morning person.

There wasn’t any response.

She pulled herself up, brushing clumps of dirt and grass off her dress. There was the tantalizing smell of bacon in the air, and she let her nose lead her to a little cottage.

The door had been left ajar, so she let herself in. In front of her, on a table, lay seven platefuls of bacon, eggs and toast. She was so hungry that she ate it all.

After her little meal, she found herself quite sleepy, so she wandered around the cottage until she found a bedroom, with seven beds. She chose the comfiest one, and in minutes, she was fast asleep.

She woke up to seven faces looming over her.

She screamed.

They screamed.

"Who are you?" she asked, staring at the seven faces. They all had red hair, and were all male, except for one bushy brown haired female.

"Bill."

"Charlie."

"Percy."

"Fred."

"George."

"Ron."

"Hermione."

She shook her head and laughed. "No no no," she said, "those can’t be your names. You’re the seven dwarves!"

"The what?" asked one, a perplexed expression on his face.

"The seven dwarves," she explained slowly. Once again, the fairy tales had scrambled her mind. "You’ve got to be! You live all together in a little cottage, and you go off mining in the day!"

"But we’re not-" said another, but Ginny interrupted him.

"Your name is now Doc," she said to Bill. "You’re Happy. And you’re Bashful," she said, pointing to Fred and George, who grinned and high-fived each other. "You’re Sneezy," she said to Charlie, who was blowing his nose.

"No I’m not!" he protested. "I’ve just got a-"

She didn’t let him finish. "You’re Sneezy," she said, glaring.

Charlie gave in. "Fine, fine, I’m Sneezy."

"Good," she smiled. "And you’re Grumpy," she said to Percy, who was glaring at her. "You’re Sleepy," she said to Ron, who was in the middle of a yawn. "And you," she said, finally coming around to Hermione, "are Dopey."

"But-"

Ginny glared. "Dopey is not allowed to talk."

Hermione shut up.

Ginny smiled. "Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to bed." She walked off to the bedroom, closing the door behind her.

Hermione turned to Ron. "I don’t like her," she complained.

"I heard that!" called Ginny’s voice from inside.

~

Tom was upset. And because he was upset, he was dressed in his sulking outfit (basically lots of black leather, fishnet stockings, and steel-toed boots).

"I can’t believe he did that!" he whined to the mirror.

The mirror nodded.

"What can I do now?"

The mirror nodded again.

"I know!" said Tom. "I’ll go after her myself! And kill her! That will work!"

The mirror produced a picture. Of a rather chubby little boy with wings and a bow and arrow. He wasn’t wearing any clothing.

Tom frowned and put his hands on his hips. "Go away and don’t come back until you’re dressed decently. I’m the only one allowed to dress like that in my castle."

The image of the boy projected outside of the mirror and solidified slowly. He frowned back at Tom. "You can’t tell Cupid what to do!"

"And just why not?" asked Tom.

"I’m Cupid!"

"And I’m Tom. You should really listen to me, you know. The walls of my torture chamber are already spattered with blood. Do you really want to join that unfortunate person?"

Cupid grinned smugly. "I’m immortal. I can’t die."

"Wanna bet?" muttered Tom under his breath.

"What was that?"

"Oh. Nothing…nothing at all." Tom coughed. "So why exactly are you here?"

Cupid cleared his throat importantly. "You can’t kill the girl."

"And just why not?" asked Tom indignantly. "I can kill anyone I want! I’ve done it before. I bet I could even kill you."

Cupid ignored that last comment. "Because you love her."

Tom rolled his eyes. "You silly gods and your notions of everyone loving everyone else. You don’t even realize that that’s impossible. I do not love her. That’s stupid. I don’t love anyone."

Cupid smiled knowingly, and strung an arrow into his bow. "Really?"

"Of course," continued Tom, "I’m always right. I can even prove it to you if you want. Then you’ll see exactly how wrong you are. In fact, let’s make it interesting. If I’m right, I kill you-"

Cupid shot the arrow.

Tom staggered about a bit dizzily, then crumpled into a heap on the floor. "Oh," he said, "I suppose I do love her. How astonishing."

Cupid smiled.

And Tom came back to his senses. "But that doesn’t mean I’m not going to not kill you," he smirked. "I will be doing that. After all, what kind of evil magician would I be if I didn’t?"

~

Hours later, he emerged from the torture chamber, wiping a butcher knife with a rag. "And he said he couldn’t die," he muttered. "How wrong he was. I can make anyone die."

Then he frowned. "But now I’m in love with that Ginny girl. Very troublesome, that is."

He stared at the mirror.

The mirror stared right back.

"I suppose I’ll have to make her fall in love with me now," he mused. "Which is perfect really. I mean, why shouldn’t she love me? I’m gorgeous. Drop-dead gorgeous, as someone once told me. She should consider herself lucky that someone as wonderful as me has fallen in love with her. So I’ll just have to make a love potion. Just to make sure that she will. There’s no point taking any chances. I’ve heard tales of people dying of heartbreak."

He frowned. "Whatever that is. People are so silly. They should just let me kill them. Instead of dying of something stupid like old age and disease. I suppose I’ll go make that potion now."

He smiled at the mirror. "You’re so helpful."

He rushed out of the room.

Then he rushed back.

"Erm… could you possibly show me where she is?"

The mirror did just that.

~

The ones who Ginny now called the seven dwarves were incredibly mad at her. Every morning, she pushed them out the door, so they could "work in the mines" without even letting them eat their breakfast.

And they didn’t even work in mines, in fact, they didn’t really work at all, they were farmers, but Ginny wouldn’t let them within fifty meters of the house. So there wasn’t really any way to take care of their crops.

They wanted her out of their lives.

So every morning, before they left the house, they gave her the same advice. "Be sure to take candy from strangers, and let them in the house - it’s impolite not to - and eat whatever food they offer you, and never be suspicious of anyone."

Unfortunately, they lived so deeply in the woods that no strangers ever went by.

Except for Tom, that is.

~

An old lady in a black cloak hunched over a basket of rosy red apples as she travelled through the maze of trees. She stopped at one, rubbed her head wearily, and lifted up the hem of her robes to reveal…

…a pair of neon orange pumps.

The old lady was, of course, Tom.

In disguise. It wasn’t his favourite way to do things, but it was a rule in the Evil Magician’s Handbook. Whenever you went to commit an evil deed, you had dress up as an ugly old hag.

But Tom just couldn’t bear to make himself ugly, so he just settled for being an old lady.

Naturally, he didn’t think seducing someonewas much of an evil deed, but it was listed in the Index of Evil Deeds, so it was required that he transform himself. And since he did have to be in such a horrid disguise, he figured he might as well make it worthwhile.

Only one of the apples in his basket was injected with the love potion. The rest were covered in poison.

After all, if you were going to commit an evil deed, you might as well do it phenomenally.

~

Ginny peered out the window listlessly. She was bored. Incredibly bored. So bored, in fact, that she had done all the dishes and made all the beds, and even swept and mopped the floors. And straightened the chairs, and unblocked the chimney, and basically cleaned the entire cottage.

Which was why she was absolutely ecstatic when she heard the doorbell ring.

She flung open the door with much excitement and dragged a rather bewildered Tom into the house. He fell down onto the couch as she ran off into the kitchen.

"Can I get you anything?" she asked. "Whipped cream…chocolate sauce…an ice cream sundae, perhaps?"

"Erm, no, I’m fine," replied Tom, who wasn’t used to having anyone be this hospitable towards him. He cleared his throat. "In fact, I came to sell you something."

She bounded back, a large grin on her face. "Really?! That’s so wonderful! I’ve never had anyone want to sell me things before! I love you!"

And then she flung her arms around him, which made him even more disconcerted.

"Erm…yes…" he said, prying her arms off him. He lifted the checkered tablecloth off of the basket. "In fact, I came to sell you these apples."

Ginny clapped her hands together. "You’re so perfect! You must have read my mind! I love apples! They’re my absolute favourite-est fruit in the entire world! And I love apple pies, and apple tarts, and apple cider, and apple juice, and roasted apples, and-"

She would have continued on further except that Tom cut her off.

"I knew I came to the right place," he said firmly. "Here, why don’t you have one?"

"Thank you!" she exclaimed and took one out of the basket. Tom watched with bated breath as she bit into it, knowing that within seconds, she would fall madly in love with him. And his plan would be complete.

Instead, she fell down.

"Hmmmmm," mused Tom. "That must have been one of the poisoned ones. I suppose I’ll have to go create an antidote. I can’t exactly seduce a dead person."

So he picked up his bags and left.

~

Actually, Ginny hadn’t been poisoned at all. The bite of apple she had taken had gotten lodged in her throat halfway down, and the poison hadn’t ever even made it into her system. She had fallen down because it had gotten caught in her windpipe, and was blocking her supply of oxygen, but Tom hadn’t even considered trying the Hemlich Maneuver.

The seven dwarves - who, of course, if you had paid any attention at all to the story weren’t really dwarves and hated being called that - were overjoyed. They tossed her back into the woods, glad to never have to deal with her again. And since they too knew their fairy tales well, they put up a sign reading Do Not Kiss against her body, as an extra precaution.

Unfortunately, whenever you tell someone not to do something, they immediately do it, just to see what happens. It was one of the laws concerning human nature.

They knew that, however, they figured that they were so deep into the forest that no one would ever come across her.

Yet one day, a week later, someone did.

And that someone was the handsome-but-stupid prince named Harry Potter.

He rode into the forest, on a horse that wasn’t quite so white anymore, on account of all the mud it had gathered. He had entered the woods with his hunting troop, except that he had lost them a few hours ago.

When he saw Ginny, lying on the ground, the first thought that entered his mind was, "Why isn’t she lying a glass coffin?" He too, had been reading far too many fairy tales.

After a few moments’ thought, he decided it didn’t matter much, and he leant down and kissed her, very gently, on the lips. Ginny awoke with a confused look on her face.

Even while she was in deep slumber, she had been dreaming about the moment when she would be awakened by a handsome prince’s kiss. She had been expecting someone of medium build, with black curls and a charming smile.

Instead, she got Harry, who was rather scrawny, with Stellotaped glasses, tangled hair, and needed braces, in her opinion.

But she supposed a princess couldn’t have everything, and sat up rather excitedly.

"Are you my prince in shining armour?" she asked. She frowned. He didn’t have much armour either. In fact, he wasn’t even carrying a sword.

"ER, I suppose," said Harry.

"You’re not really what I expected," said Ginny. "I kind of thought you would be…erm…bigger…"

"Well, size isn’t everything."

Ginny choked.

"What’s wrong?" asked Harry.

"Erm…nothing…don’t mind me…"

"If you say so," said Harry. "You know, you sure look like my beautiful princess."

Ginny grinned. Finally, something was going the way that it was supposed to. "Now, you’re supposed to lift me up onto your white horse." Her gaze rested on the muddy horse, and she sighed. "Well…I suppose that will have to do."

Harry did so, rather absent-mindedly, she thought. She cleared her throat.

"And now you have to take me to your castle in the clouds where we’ll live happily ever after."

Harry felt his stomach rumble. He hadn’t eaten in an awfully long time.

"Hello?" said Ginny, rather exasperated by then. "Happily ever after…?"

Harry’s eyes fell on the once bitten apple on the ground. He picked it up.

"Ooooh! Food!"

Ginny winced. "No, don’t eat the-" she started, but it was too late. Harry was lying on the floor, rather dead.

"-apple," she finished dejectedly. She was close to tears. How come all those other girls got to live happily ever after and she didn’t?

It was at that moment when Tom rushed in, a beaker of midnight blue liquid in his hand. "I’ve got it! I’ve got the antidote!" he cried. Then he saw that Ginny was no longer lying on the ground, and that Harry had taken her place.

"Oh," he said, "I’m not going to waste a perfectly good antidote on him." And he dumped the liquid onto the trees. Thus, the trees that stand there can't ever be killed.

Ginny slumped down onto the ground. Tom perched himself beside her.

"What’s wrong?" he asked.

A tear made its way down her cheek, and soon turned into a full-blown bawl-fest. "I just want to live happily ever after!" she sobbed. "Is that really too much for a girl to ask?"

Her wails pulled at Tom’s heartstrings, and he found himself awkwardly patting her on the back, muttering, "There, there, don’t cry now, everything will be just fine."

She looked up at him with tear-filled eyes, just as she had done so many years before. "Will you come live happily ever after with me?"

He didn’t even have to think about the answer. "Yes." He paused, and thought. "But it will have to be my kind of happily ever after."

Ginny didn’t care anymore. "All right," she replied, "as long as it’s someone’s happily ever after."

As he helped her onto Harry’s muddy horse, her thoughts turned to her friends in the cottage. "What about the seven dwarves?" she asked, making herself comfortable.

He shrugged. "They ate the apples. Naïve little things, they are. I expect they’re all dead now."

And so they rode back to the castle, Ron - or perhaps it was Sleepy - chasing after them all the way. For Tom had forgotten about the one apple that he had injected with the love potion, and it was he who had eaten that one.

It took him a while to make an antidote to it, and during those long weeks, Ron followed him around all day, much to the annoyance of a jealous Ginny.

But they did get rid of her eventually, and began to work on Tom’s happily ever after.

They stole the world from the rule of Justin Finch-Fletchley - who had taken it over with his loyal Pudding Eaters by brainwashing everyone into thinking they were shrubs - and Tom proclaimed himself as the new ruler of the world, and Ginny as his princess of darkness.

And so, together, they made sure the rest of the world lived unhappily ever after.

THE END