When Darkness Falls

Chapter One

I loved Fred Weasley with all my heart once upon a time. I still remember the first time we met. It was on the Hogwarts Express our first year. He was tall with bright red hair and a spitting image of his twin, George. But I could always tell the difference between the two. George always seemed a tad more serious, while Fred was a little more playful. I was attracted to Fred from the minute we met, even though I was only eleven. And truth be told, I really don't know why. I've never really liked practical jokers in that sort of way.

But Fred was different. He could play the worst sort of joke on you and five minutes later cuddle up to you like nothing had happened. It was sweet, really. An endearing quality.

I never would have thought I'd be Fred's type though. But apparently, he was in love with me for six long years before ever doing anything about it. And all he did was give a quick kiss on the lips when we reached King's Cross after graduation.

It wasn't my first kiss and it sure wasn't anything special, but it was by far the best. It left tingling from head to toe for days after that. I daydreamed about for hours while my mother would yell at me to clean my room.

I love Fred, but he can be a bit daft at times. It took him five weeks to actually come by my house and ask me out. He told me later that he was afraid I'd turn him down, and that his family finally forced him out of the house to see me because they were sick to death of his moping. I smacked him on the head and told him he was really dim. How could he have not noticed that I liked him? Everyone else did.

It all started then. A quiet date here, a quick snog there, always touching in some way. We became inseparable. Almost as bad as Fred's brother Ron and Hermione Granger. Only we weren't glued to each other's faces. We did that in private, trying not to make people sick to their stomachs. Ron and Hermione didn't care who saw them.

Fred proposed to me on my nineteenth birthday and presented me with a beautiful white gold ring. He'd been saving his money from his portion of the joke shop to make sure I got the best. I cried for hours over this. Go ahead and call me a baby. I'm a girl, even if I was a tomboy for years, I could still cry when the guy I'd been in love with for nine years decides he wants to spend the rest of his life with you.

We married a year and a half later and not more than six months later I found out I was pregnant with our daughter, Samantha. Life was perfect. We were both happy, deliriously happy when Sammie was born. Fred spoiled her so much. He bought her her first joke set when she was a day old. Everything was just as it should be. But everything's different now. Sammie just turned four a month ago. She doesn't remember her father at all, except what she sees in our photo album.

You see, Fred's dead. Well, not in the literal sense of the word, but he might as well be. About a year and a half ago, George was killed by You-Know-Who. Percy was next. And then Bill. Then Alicia. It seemed every time we opened the daily and evening prophet, someone else we knew was dead.

This was around the time Fred became unapproachable. He wouldn't talk to me about anything. And if he did, all he would do was yell at me about something I wasn't doing to his satisfaction. It came to a point where he wouldn't even play with our little girl. It was as if he hated us for something we had no control over.

Fred left us both a year ago. I woke up one morning and he was gone. There was no note, but I can't say I was surprised. I was expecting it sooner. I was surprised, however, when I found out months later Fred had become one of Voldemort's most loyal followers. My husband, a Death Eater? What could have possibly gone through his mind to do that? To turn on the people who loved him the most? What did I do?

I try not to dwell on that these days. I'm in the process of moving. Yet again. Apparently the Death Eater's are after me and little Sammie. Voldemort wants us dead, so of course they must do their master's bidding. I wonder if Fred's behind this? Or maybe he's the one who's been tipping off the Ministry every time the Death Eater's are close?

It makes me cry, the fact that my husband has turned traitor. I had to go back to my maiden of Johnson because realized I was married to the Fred Weasley, certified traitor.

I'll be leaving in the middle of night for a small city in Italy. Far away from the British Isles. Far away from my horrid past where no one knows us. I don't think I'll sleep. I rarely do anymore. I know one night I'll wake up with Lucius Malfoy, or even possibly my former love, standing over me with a knife held to my throat.

I sit back in the comfortable chair that's nice a fluffy. Sammie's upstairs sleeping soundly. I found a bunch of letters Fred had sent me years ago when we were apart. It still leaves me feeling warm all over.

A sound of heavy footsteps outside shakes me from a brief happy moment. My heart pounds loudly in my chest as I spring to my feet. The door opens slowly and I know it's the end. I couldn't even protect my own daughter from the likes of people like her father.

I hold my wand tightly in my hand as a dark hooded figure comes into the room. The person's tall, and that's all I can tell. I have a heavy sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach.

A pale hand reaches up and pulls the hood off. I close my eyes in a mixture of fear and disbelief and disappointment. I swallow a lump forming in my throat and slowly open my eyes. I'm hoping above all hopes that the sight has changed.

"Hello, Fred," I say softly. "It's been a little while, hasn't it?"