Chapter 5 Walking Alone
It was cold. Ginny did not dare do any magic right now, but if she didn’t cast a warming charm on herself, or get inside to a warm place soon then she would freeze to death – or get herself caught. She forced herself to focus on the conversation on the other side of the door without thinking of warming charms, or extendable ears, or any of the other things that would be useful to her right now. This was the closest she had come to a Death Eater since she left Blaise and Theo and she was determined to overhear something important about their battle plans.
“The Dark Lord is unbeatable, and don’t forget we have that clever boy planning this battle,” the Death Eater’s voice came like an angry growl, “We’ll win over Cambridge soon and I’m in the right place to take charge now. Oh, if the Dark Lord would give me that honor…”
She almost spat in disgust, thinking of all the horrible things the Death Eaters ‘in charge’ had done to previous towns. She hadn’t been able to find a single battle to fight yet, but in the last two weeks, moving from city to city and from hiding place to hiding place she had come to realize that there was more than one way to fight. Sometimes people just needed help in their fight to simply live.
Loud laughter from inside brought her out of her painful memories and she finally had enough sense to leave. The walk back to her small home was long and she realized that she did not like the snow at all when she did not have someone to share it with. She stopped in a Muggle shop because a deep agonizing chill had begun to settle over her heart and she was having a hard time getting her feet to actually move. She ordered a warm coffee and sat down to wait. Looking out the window at the snow, with the promise of something hot to warm her insides was very satisfying.
But Ginny never got to drink the coffee or plan for the upcoming battle at Cambridge. She heard a loud rumbling noise and some Muggle contraption that was meant as a warning signal went off making a horrible noise that pulled her out of her stupor. She shook the chill from her heart forcefully, recognizing it now as the effect of Dementors.
The walk down to the source of the commotion was horrible. She was going against the tide, one Muggle man even tried to force her to run, and she kept trying to rehearse all the useful spells she knew.
That noise, like a gigantic secrecy sensor gone mad, was sending thrills of fear up her back. It was especially frightening in the darkest areas where you couldn’t see anything and the only thing interrupting it was the screaming of a terrorized Muggle.
The darkness was soon broken by the flashing lights of many spells being shot back and forth. She had to duck into a safe alcove when she realized the order was here.
Mumbling and pulling out her wand to perform a charm on her hair she found herself face to face with a colored Muggle portrait of Harry’s sworn enemy at school: Draco Malfoy. It did not say he was wanted by the police men like most of the other posters; instead, this one ordered the Muggles not to come in his path and to avoid him at all costs.
She clenched her fists. If Draco Malfoy, the air-headed cowardly bully, could become so dangerous then so could she.
Finally, sure that her hair was now unrecognizable as a Weasley’s and that her freckles were hidden behind a make-up charm, she emerged from the alcove and into the fight.
The key, Theo had taught her, was to be always moving. Powerful spells needed a stable foothold sometimes, but if you didn’t want to get killed with thousands of hexes and killing curses flying around then you had to be fast and leave the powerful “fancy” spells for only the most desperate circumstances.
“Come on, dear, get moving!” a middle aged woman tapped her on the arm and pointed ahead of her and slightly to the left. Muggles were making their escape from a small alleyway between two large buildings and, with a pang in her heart, she recognized the two young men that were standing there covering the escape.
“This is for the twins!” she said viciously sending three stunners at a large Death Eater in quick succession.
She found herself cornered twice during the battle. Once by a werewolf that was almost as crazy as Greyback and once by two masked Death Eaters that were almost unrecognizable. She used one of Blaise’s spells on the werewolf and managed a crazy combination of stunners and levitation to escape from the two masked men.
But something about the taller Death Eater, the one that was left standing as if the stunner hadn’t even hit him in the first place, was very disconcerting. She got injured three times because she was distracted by the feeling that he was watching her.
“Twenty five!” she finally hissed as she watched her last opponent drop and then she turned to leave before the Order could notice her and begin to question her.
A chill crept up her back, but she refused to look behind her again. She would have to do something about her cuts and wounds, but it was nothing a Muggle couldn’t deal with so she followed the crowds of Muggles and blended in with them, lending a hand where she could and finally going home with a group of families who had recently been made homeless and who had found an abandoned office building to sleep in.
She slept fitfully that night and dreamed about Fred and George and poor mum. Mother was always afraid for everyone’s lives, worrying, telling her about uncles Gideon and Fabian and murmuring to her that no mother should have to lose her children.
“And I went and did it to her again, Ginny, I made her lose another child when I left with your father.”
There was a long drawn out silence.
“Promise to tell me everything, love,” Ginny dropped her eyes like she always did when mum was being like this, “I won’t keep you from the person you love no matter who they are, I promise, just tell me everything and I will understand.”
She sat up in the hard makeshift bed and abandoned the idea of sleep completely. Mum hadn’t really understood after all. Eleven year old Ginny might have done anything to be with a hero that she loved and admired, but after Tom everything had changed and her passion had turned into something else. Her thoughts turned to beautiful Blaise as she covered an old grandmother with the blanket she had been using and left the shelter. They were very much alike, she and Blaise… and he was good-looking. Ginny admired him and Theo for what they’d done, for leaving the Death Eaters and making their own way, but their opinions differed on the one thing most important to her. Ginny needed to fight. She could not sit there and plan for the rebuilding after the war while the world fell apart around her. She had lost too much to Tom to be content while others fought him for her.
She winced. The wound on her left arm was not healing properly and it burned her. Maybe a little break wouldn’t hurt. She needed to be in her full health before making her way to Cambridge to the battle that was coming up there.
***
“Here,” Theo handed her a warm bowl of soup and sat down opposite her, watching Blaise work on her wound, “It’s a good thing you decided to drop by, we were beginning to get very worried about you.”
“I’m alright,” she insisted, “I just need a little rest before I go after those two Death Eaters I heard talking yesterday.”
“Who’s following you, Ginny?” Blaise sealed the bandages magically and looked up at her.
“Wh-what?”
“Just be honest,” Theo said calmly, “There’s no use denying how jumpy you were when you came in.”
“I-it’s nothing, I just feel a little jumpy because of the battle, my first one…”
Blaise raised and eyebrow and settled back in his chair as if waiting for her to crack eventually and tell him what he wanted. She frowned and refused to look straight at him or Theo.
“Why are Death Eaters on Muggle wanted signs?” she asked trying to change the subject.
“Who did you see on a wanted sign?” Blaise asked.
“Well, Malfoy for one, but it seems a little strange.”
Theo shook his head. “It was the same when Sirius Black escaped,” he said, “The Ministry warns the Muggle Minister so he pretends it’s a normal criminal and they tell the Muggles to watch out for him.”
“Did you see him at the battle?” Blaise asked a little too eagerly for Ginny’s liking.
“He’s a bloody murderer, the Muggle signs say to stay away from him and avoid confrontation at all costs.”
“Of course they do.” Theo said in a half whisper.
Blaise got up and walked over to the window, “He’s crazy.”
There was a long silence and Ginny watched Theo’s face, the face of someone grieving for the dead, until she couldn’t handle it. “What’s the matter with you, Theo? You look like you feel sorry for him.”
“How many times do we have to tell you we’re not you, Ginny, and we’re not Harry Bleeding Potter either!” Blaise turned on her angrily, “Every evening when we finished our work beside the dying Common Room fire Draco was the one we would talk to and complain about essays with and-”
“Voldemort killed his parents,” Theo interrupted, “He doesn’t even have a cause to live for anymore, Ginny. Every stupid thing he ever did he was trying to make his father proud, trying to make his icy mother show him that she loved him like every other mother does, and now he has nothing left, I can never hate him if that’s what you want.”
“But…if Voldemort killed his parents shouldn’t he have a reason to fight-”
Blaise grabbed her shoulders and shook her a little. “Aren’t you even listening?” he asked, “He doesn’t have reason anymore, he lost his mind!”
“D-do you think he might be Imperiused?”
“I don’t care!” Blaise said, “The Imperius isn’t the only way to compel someone to do what you want, you should know that!”
She sighed. “If you met him in battle,” Ginny asked slowly, “And you knew you had to kill him or he’d just keep killing people for Voldemort… would you kill him?”
Theo shook his head, but did not look up at her. “I wouldn’t be able to…friend?”
The question tore at her heart. She could not find it in her to answer because she was so confused inside. She did understand about being compelled to do things you didn’t want to, of course, and she wanted to understand the deep bond between her friends and the crazy mass murderer out there, but it was too much to take in at once.
“He’s as much my brother as Blaise is, Ginny.” Theo said more seriously.
Ginny left.
***
It was surprising how much determination and power her inner turmoil seemed to give her. She felt like she was in a different world, one in which she didn’t need to worry about being hurt or being killed. All she needed to do was prove to herself that killing the Death Eaters had to be done because they couldn’t all be like Blaise and Theo and because they had to be stopped. All she needed to do was work out her thoughts and make up her mind about what they’d just told her.
Could she really call people friends who wouldn’t fight to save thousands of Muggle lives? If she couldn’t then did that make her the bloodthirsty killer? Were Blaise and Theo in the right, sitting back and not lifting a finger except to work out complex formulas and improve healing spells?
If she had felt cold and alone before it was nothing compared to the utter abandonment she felt in the next month. Every time she took refuge in one of the safe zones from her map she remembered that it was Blaise and Theo that had drawn it up for her. Every time she walked the streets with the feeling of being watched she wondered if it was just her conscience and her guilt. Every time she helped feed orphan children or secretly mended a broken window or a cracked roof for some Muggles she wondered if the Death Eaters she injured and sent to Azkhaban and almost killed had children like Draco who would go crazy when their parents did not come home.
And everyday her longing for her own family increased and she hated herself more and more for the agony she had put her mother through. The only thing convincing her not to go home was that she knew her reappearance would mean Tom would start trying to get at her and her family again. Blaise and Theo seemed to think that he took it as a personal insult that a little first year had escaped him; they said Voldemort needed for his followers to have no shadow of doubt that he was unbeatable.
But she was beginning to weaken and thoughts of joining Theo and Blaise in that comfortable little hideaway were becoming more and more tempting. She had even made up her mind to go back. She was headed for the orphanage to say goodbye to her new friends there and then abandoned her stubborn fight and go see the boys when the first gift arrived.
It wasn’t wrapped in colored paper and tied with a bow and it wasn’t even for her, but Ginny had never received a better present in her life. The usually pale face of Martha was red when she met her at the door. There were fires in the hearth and wood piled up beside them that could keep the children warm for weeks. Most importantly there was food; a glorious feast that smelled absolutely delicious and one that Martha had no way of acquiring no matter how much she tried – the orphanage just didn’t have the money.
“What…?”
Martha took her hand and pulled her in. “Come in and have something to eat, there’s plenty! I woke up in the middle of the night because I’d heard something, you know how dangerous the times are, and I went straight for the door. It was cracked a little and just inside there was a whole bag full of money, almost a thousand pounds in there…And I don’t know how anyone could have come in to put it there because the door was locked when I checked it. It was like Magic!”
Ginny did not go back to Theo and Blaise. The look in the eyes of her first and only Muggle friend as they discussed the war over dinner was what she had needed to convince her that what she was doing was right. She made up her mind, as she was saying goodbye to Martha a couple of hours later that she might not be so eager to kill Malfoy – or any Death Eater, but she still had to fight to stop them from the cruel things they did and she didn’t have to like it.
So she stayed in the Muggle world, trying her best to do more and more good things to make the lives of the Muggle children, especially the Orphans, tolerable. And everyday she grieved for more victims of Tom’s cruel war. Everyday she wanted to go back home, or at least see her friends Theo and Blaise – if they’d still have her friendship after such a long time away, that is. But the smiles on the many faces kept her going from day to day. The knowledge that she, Ginny Weasley, was doing something useful, something important, it was worth every single moment of struggle in the perpetual darkness and every moment of doubt in battle.
One day, around two months after she’d left Theo and Blaise, she stopped by Jill’s and found another surprise. It was her favorite place to eat, not because it was particularly special, or particularly cheap, but because every night before closing shop Jill would send thirty plates of fresh, hot food out to the Orphanages and those who had been made homeless.
“Evening,” Ginny said closing the door behind her tightly against the cold, “Wh-”
The entire restaurant seemed to be filled with heaps of food. She stepped further in and took off one of her gloves, lifting the cover off one of the large dishes to see inside. This was a bit much, considering the woman wasn’t doing so well herself with the war.
Jill came out of the back and stared at Ginny thoughtfully upon noticing her presence. “Sorry,” Ginny said, “Did I step in on a private party or something?”
“Party?” the plump woman asked, “No, no, child. This is all going out tonight.”
“But Ma’am don’t you think it’s a bit much? I mean if you have to close up because of this you won’t be able to help anyone anymore…”
“It’s not mine, silly girl,” Jill beamed, “Haven’t you been coming here long enough to be able to recognize my cooking? Just stepped to the back for less than five minutes and when I came back all this was just sitting here. And I never even heard the bell!”
Ginny raised her eyebrows and went over to inspect the food. “Are you sure it’s alright to eat, then?”
“Yes, yes, of course I checked, what do you think I am? I know how evil the times are, but sometimes, miracles really do happen.”
Ginny was not convinced. This sort of thing just didn’t happen. From her experience in the Muggle World she had gathered that the rich tended to flee for their lives or put up excessive security around their own homes and just leave everyone else to suffer. She could not help it, the war made a witch extra-suspicious. She slipped her hand into her pocket and slid her wand up her sleeve. “Specialis Revelio!”
She blinked at the result.
A heating charm. She had been expecting to find some sort of poison or maybe a dark spell, but a heating charm? She shook her head and picked up one of the larger containers, helping the woman and her sons load it into the waiting car with miracles and mysterious gift-givers on her mind. As she exited the door she felt that thrill crawl up her back once more. Someone was watching her - again.
