Dark Before the Rising Sun

Chapter Three

"Good afternoon, Grandmother."

"Hmph! Good afternoon, indeed."

Draco looked at her coldly and sat down by her bed. She was playing solitaire, and, as Draco well knew, cheating. She had never before lost a game of solitaire.

"I thought you might like to know, Grandmother," he said, acidly, "I've decided to get married."

Sabrina Malfoy arched a single delicate brow. "Oh?" She looked up from her game and fixed her piercing gaze on him. "And who might the lucky lady be?"

"First," drawled Draco insolently, "I want you to tell me what sort of qualities you expect her to have."

The old woman stared. Then she threw back her head and gave a cackling laugh. "You never were a fool, were you, Draco?" she asked. "You're my boy in every way. Chip off the old block."

She laughed again, and then gazed squarely at him. "Pureblood," she said, ticking them off on her gnarled fingers. "I would not have the Malfoy line tainted. Of a good family. A decent girl. I won't have any of your little whores." She thought for a minute more. "That's all, I suppose. There's no need to ask for a large dowry, as you've all the money you need."

Pureblood. Good family. Decent girl. Ginny fit all three descriptions.

"Very well, Grandmother," said Draco calmly. "The girl in question fulfills all three requirements." He paused a minute before dropping his bombshell. "Virginia Weasley."

For a minute the room was utterly silent. Then, Sabrina Malfoy threw back her head.

And laughed.

Draco was stunned. Of all the reactions he'd expected - a tantrum, shouting, screaming, weeping, cajoling him to change his mind - none of them had involved his grandmother being amused by the situation.

His grandmother, still chuckling, wiped a few tears from her eyes. "Oh, my dear boy," she said, shaking, "Oh my dear boy."

Draco waited patiently until her mirth subsided. "I could not," the old woman chortled, "I could not have chosen you a more appropriate bride."

"Then you are not against the match?" Draco tried not to goggle at her.

"Oh no, my boy. I am very much in favor for it." She gave another chuckle. "Oh, how my father would turn over in his grave if he knew!"

"Grandmother, I fail to see what you find so amusing."

"My darling, darling boy," she said, looking straight at him. "Did you not know?"

"Did I not know what?" demanded Draco, feeling certain that he had stumbled upon a family skeleton.

"Sixty years ago," said Sabrina Malfoy, her brilliant eyes snapping, "sixty years ago William Weasley, Arthur Weasley's father, asked me to elope with him. I was born a Marlowe, you know. However, father discovered it and put an end to it. He wouldn't hear of me marrying a penniless scholar. I've always repented not running away with Will. He was very handsome, you know. But I suppose if I had run away with him, I would have repented that too."

***

Ginny was sitting by the window, her pencil moving idly over her paper. In the painfully clean private hospital room her mother had been moved into that morning, all was silent save for Molly Weasley's painful, shallow breathing. The operation was to be performed in three days, and for the time being Mrs. Weasley was forbidden to eat anything. She was sleeping now, and Ginny was glad.

Her art kept her from going mad. She had neither the time nor resources to work with oils or pastels, but simple drawing required little more than a pencil and some paper. All those long, hard years, she had always found time for a sketch.

Time slid past as it always did when she was immersed in her drawings. Her fingers began to ache and a cramp dug into her back. When she had finally finished the sketch, she checked the time on the little clock hanging on the wall. It was four.

There was a soft knock on the door, and slowly, it slid open. She looked up to see Draco poke his head into the room.

"Weasley?"

She put a finger to her lips, indicating her mother. "Wait a second," she mouthed. He nodded and the door closed again. Winding a deep green scarf around her neck, she stood, sketchbook in hand, and exited the room, careful not to wake her mother.

When the door closed behind her, she gave him a tentative smile, remembering yesterday's kiss and trying not to blush. "Hey."

"Hey yourself." He ruffled her hair in an oddly affectionate gesture. Like Bill or Charlie used to do. Ginny swallowed carefully. "How's your mother doing?" he asked.

Ginny drew away from him, not trusting herself. "I'm - I'm worried about her. But" - she looked up at him again and smiled uncertainly - "you probably don't want to hear about it."

"Tell me," he said, softly, taking her arm in hers. "We'll walk down to the park."

Ginny bit her lip, but the words came out in a rush anyway. It was so pleasant to be able to confide in someone. "The doctors are fairly certain the operation will succeed, but there's always that chance, and she's so weak. But - thank you - so much - for the money. You - you can't understand what - what it means to me," she faltered.

"It's nothing," he said, briefly.

The wind was blowing, very hard, as they stepped outside. Ginny pulled her coat tighter around herself, but as she did so, she dropped the leather portfolio she was carrying under her arm. The papers scattered in the fierce gales.

"Blast," she said, "oh, blast." She fumbled in her pockets for her wand, but Draco was quicker. "Accio," he said, and the sheets came flying towards him. He caught them easily.

Looking down at the top drawing, he couldn't resist a grin. It was a picture of Ron, in his favorite, if not most flattering, position, sprawled on his back on a sofa with his feet in the air.

"Hey!" exclaimed Ginny, making a swipe at them and missing.

"These are wonderful," said Draco, smiling as he came to a picture of a little girl. He recognized the tilt of her chin and the wide smile. "Granger's girl?"

Ginny grinned back reluctantly. "Isn't she a darling?"

"Yes. Looks like her old four-eyed dad, though, doesn't she?"

Ginny nodded, her smile bright. For a single moment, she could be carefree and happy. The man at her side was charming and solicitous, the bright December day was sparkling and beautiful, her mother was prepared to have an operation that surely, that had to succeed, and she was about to get married. While this marriage was definitely something she would never in her wildest dreams have expected, she found herself drawn to the man who was to be her husband - his strange moods, his laugh, his charm.

He flipped to the next sketch, and paused, frowning. Ginny's gaze followed his and the breath froze in her lungs. The blood drained from her face.

"What's this?" Draco studied the thick black lines slashing violently across the page. Heavy dark clouds roiled on the horizon, gray and leaden with moisture; lightening flashed, the turbulence in the air seemed almost tangible. A torrent of rain brutally sliced toward the earth, where a dense garden grew in wild abandon. Above the scene, a pair of cold, unfeeling eyes stared down with malevolent force.

"Ginny?"

She wanted to yank it away from him, to tear it into tiny pieces and make it disappear. It conjured unwanted memories of another man she had been drawn to, distant memories of an innocent young girl who had foolishly believed in love and happy endings, painful memories she refused to let surface. She buried them as she always did, but the page blurred before her eyes.

"It's - it's nothing. Just . . . just something I was playing with." After we met Luke Clearwater at the restaurant.

After Clearwater's appearance had dredged up all the old painful memories, the awful self-loathing.

The drawing had been a cleansing, a means of helping her to forget.

"I have to say it isn't my favorite," Draco stated dryly. "It seems awfully violent, or am I reading it wrong?"

She snatched it away from him, along with the rest of the sketches. "I told you, it's just a bit of doodling, nothing of any importance." She shoved the drawings hastily back into her portfolio. "Tell - tell me about the plans for our - our wedding." She seemed to have difficulties getting the words out.

Draco was not an idiot. He knew, of course, that something was wrong, but if she wasn't going to tell him, well, then, he wasn't going to ask.

"Since the wedding is on such short notice," he began, "I don't know if we can get a really big party. But if you want - "

"No - no - a small wedding would be fine."

"Are you sure? After all, this is your wedding day. You're the princess."

She froze. You're the princess. How many times had her father called her his little princess? Memories of the man she had loved so much flooded her mind, making her reel.

"Ginny?"

"I'm sorry. I was wool-gathering." She managed a weak smile. "No, honestly, a small wedding is fine. Just my family. And yours."

He nodded. "Whatever you like. Who's going to break it to your brother, you or me?"

She thought about that one. "Let's tell them together."

Draco nodded thoughtfully. "That's a good idea. How about I throw a small dinner party up at my townhouse in London? We'll invite everyone and make our announcement."

Her eyes sparkled with interest. "Would you really?"

"I would. Your mother's having the operation in three days, right? Do you think she can make it by next Saturday? Just a little gathering with Potter and your brother and their families. And we'll get married the week after that."

"That sounds good. But what about your family?"

His eyes were deliberately dispassionate. "Apart from my grandmother, there is no one I call family."

Ginny flushed, remembering that his father had been killed during the war and that his mother had died a few years ago. "And your grandmother - she is not opposed to the match? She - she does not mind that I am a Weasley? Isn't she afraid I will taint your purely evil Malfoy blood?"

Draco grinned at this. "Taint? The Weasley blood is every bit as old as the Malfoys. And my renegade grandmother is delighted. In a way, I think she, er, sees in us the fulfillment of her own unfulfilled romance."

"Pardon me?" Ginny was not sure that she had heard correctly.

Draco repeated the story his grandmother had told him. "And so," he concluded, "she thinks there is nothing more appropriate than me, her grandson, marrying a Weasley."

"It's a very sad story, Malfoy, and I don't see why you persist in laughing about it," chided Ginny severely.

Draco shrugged philosophically. "Oh, it didn't break her heart. My grandmother's a strong woman. I don't think she's ever cried in her life before. She married my grandfather, and they had a grand old time. They fought like two wild cats, but in between spats they were as loving as ever. My grandmother used to tell me how once Grandfather swore at her. She swore right back. He was so horrified that he never set such a bad example again."

Even Ginny had to grin. "What a woman!"

"Yes. She's quite a woman."

"Will she be at the, erm, engagement party?"

"I doubt it. She's not well enough to leave St. Mungo's. However, get gussied up tomorrow afternoon and I'll take you to meet her."

Ginny nodded. "I'll be ready."

***

Terence Higgs stood by his bedroom window and cursed, violently. He had not thought that his cousin could conjure a bride so quickly and easily. Only one day, and he had gotten himself a pretty little fiancée. Damn him! Damn Sabrina Malfoy! Damn Virginia Weasley!

Having damned heaven and earth and everyone in it to hell, he sat down to come up with a plan. He was going to get Malfoy Manor. He was going to get the Malfoy inheritance. And no one - not Draco, not the Weasley slut, not his own bitch of a grandmother - was going to stand in his way.