♥ black_alnair wrote "Prelude to a Journey East" for derryere 1/4 ♥
Title: Prelude to a Journey East 1/4
Rating: R (for brief language)
Possible Spoilers/Warnings: Fully compliant except epilogue
Summary: “The riddle is simple enough. Seek the grey-eyed king where he was born.” But Ginny soon learns that nothing involving Draco Malfoy is simple.
Prelude to a Journey East 1/4
Prologue - The Grey-Eyed King
The riddle is simple enough. Seek the grey-eyed king where he was born. It takes Ginny less than two hours to figure out that the grey-eyed king refers to a poem by the Russian poet Anna Akhmatova. Then she is off with a flourish - her exit from Hermione Granger’s personal library as sudden as a late spring gale. “Well,” Hermione says, getting up from her kneeled position by the stacks. She knows how eager Ginny is to prove herself but it wouldn’t have hurt if she set the book down instead of letting it drop from her Apparating hands.
***
The sound of water caressing the shoreline greets Ginny on her arrival. She has never been to Odessa before - the birth place of the Acmeist poet. It is a beautiful city on the Black Sea, its limestone buildings built on terraced hills, its unsavory history romanticized by the grandness of the Potemkin Steps. But Ginny has neither time nor patience to contemplate the Italian baroque façade of the theatre nor the infamous steps leading down to the warm blue sea. She is on a mission.
Well, she thinks, frowning, it’s not an official mission. Not yet. She is still in training but once she passes her tracking test - this tracking test - she will be on her way to becoming a full-fledged Auror. Ron had doubted her - still doubts her if his furrowed brow this morning was any indication. And Harry had tried to stop her from even signing up for Auror Training in the first place. As though he had any right when they were dating; he certainly has none now that they are not.
Ginny shakes her head. She needs to focus on the task at hand. She hurries along, only slowing down when she sees crooked old men, bent over like broken cattails, shuffling pass her. She tries to peer discretely at their eyes. None of them are grey.
Her classmate, Anabelle, has chastised her for her methodology - or rather, lack of methodology. “You come up with this idea and then you’re convinced that you’re right. You need to focus on the steps more.”
“Why do I need to consider all the remote possibilities when I know I’m right? It’s magical intuition.” Words are always leaving her mouth before she has time to stop them.
Anabelle usually frowns at her for her rashness in both words and acts. She did not bother to frown that time. Instead, the petite brunette, who had been lacing her trainers, paused before straightening up and looking Ginny coolly in the eye. “And what do I have? Air between my ears?”
“I don’t mean it like that.” And she didn’t. Ginny greatly admires Anabelle - a Squib, forced to learn her lessons at home, questioned and laughed at when her handicap was revealed on the first day of training. But she refused to give up - she is smart and talented, just not magically talented. “You just know…” Ginny finished lamely.
“No, you don’t know. You know Harry and Ron, who are the architects of this program. You understand them, you know how they work. Why do you think Kingsley sends us off for our field exams?” Anabelle sighed, bending down to finish her lacing. “I’m just suggesting that you open your mind more. I would tell you to be less stubborn but we know that will never happen.”
She thinks of this conversation as a man snaps at her in what she supposes is Ukrainian. Just in the cuff of her sleeve is her wand but there are too many people yet not enough for her to discreetly pull it out and cast a language charm on herself. She considers Anabelle’s advice - she can’t look at every man’s eyes in the city. Perhaps she is meant to go to Anna Akhmatova’s childhood home or the place where she wrote the poem. But no, no, none of that feels right. It has to be the eyes.
Ginny stops for a moment and in pausing, she really sees the city for the first time. She sees its history, its beauty and its mystery. There seems to be an endless sea of places where a grey-eyed king might hide. However, she has learned that what one seeks is often found in the most unlikely of places and in a situation like this, that might mean that her grey-eyed target is in plain sight. As she casts her eyes around, she notices that there are statutes everywhere. They are not all grey but many of them are. Perhaps there is one of a king immortalized with grey eyes.
But then what? It seems too simple. But that’s probably the trick of it.
Ginny likes this feeling - of all the puzzle pieces falling into place. Ginny thinks her classmates, that Hermione, and even the great but oblivious Harry Potter understand this but she still holds her pleasure close to her. She enjoys it here now before it propels her to stride forward purposely.
She needs to find someone who can speak English - a tourist perhaps, that can help direct her to the right statute faster. On the wide steps that connect the open sea and the heart of the city is a couple in matching bold floral button-up jumpers. They must be Americans. They compliment her on her accent and the Muggle clothing Hermione helped her choose. Ginny smiles politely but is impatient to get going once she extracts the information she needs. The woman calls them friends now but Ginny has no interest in any of this and she tells them “I really must go,” but gives no explanation before dashing away.
She climbs the stairs, higher and higher, weaving in and out of the slow-moving crowd and her focus is narrowed to what she will find at the top of the steps. The Duc de Richelieu had accomplished many things in his life as an advisor, a diplomat and a soldier. But in his role as Governor-General of a once miserable village, the city that rose to prominence under his administration found a king worthy of crowning the top of their steps. And Ginny is finally there - and she sees him, decorated like a great scholar, his hand held out to the people.
She walks closer but her focus is distracted by a man standing in front of the statute, as still as the Duc himself. He seems undisturbed by the loud talking tourists around him, snapping pictures with their Muggle devices, some of them - adolescent girls and women - peering at him and giggling. He has striking silver hair that looks oddly familiar and she feels drawn to him as though he were an ever-burning flame. It seems to lure her away for the satisfaction of victory and she feels annoyed at him.
She notices he is pulling out a golden pocket watch from the inner pocket of his jacket. She watches him finger the watch though he does not flip the cover open or look at it. She doesn’t know why but she wants to see the watch. But then, a drawling voice startles her from her observation, breaking into her thoughts. “It took you long enough, Weasley.” And a smirking grey-eyed Draco Malfoy looks up at her.
***
Chapter 1 - A Sleight of Hand
Her wand light is weak and wobbly in the oppressive darkness of the catacombs. She has already fallen half a dozen times in the stank stagnant water running along the tunnels - however, Draco does not slow down, forcing her to stumble after him, her feet clumsy and awkward on this unfamiliar turf. She takes another fall and her wand slips from her grip.
She curses as colourfully as a girl with six older brothers would. But she’s not with her brothers now and her voice does not dissipate into open air amongst deep laughs - it echoes, in the dark; it sounds like a stranger coming back lonely.
“For Merlin’s sake, Weasley,” Draco groans. She hears his footsteps splash through the water and in what must be one of his more generous moments, he hauls her up.
“I need to find my wand,” she grumbles, looking down though she can’t actually see the water. A second later her wand hits her face.
“Forgot you’re a witch, did you?” Draco snickers as he turns away. He must’ve Accio’d it wordlessly.
Ginny is glad that the dark covers her embarrassment. It does not make her any less angry though that she is now underground, trudging through dirty water, with Draco Malfoy. The image of him laughing at her, his white teeth gleaming, is branded hot and searing in her mind.
Only an hour before, he had explained to her that finding him was not the end of her journey - it was the start. “Surely you didn’t think that was it, did you, Weasley? Your brother gave you such an easy riddle too.”
Her talk with Kingsley did nothing for her mood - she had demanded he reassign her to someone else. He had been adamant that Draco was the right person to administer her tracking exam. “Are you going to ask for a reassignment every time you don’t like something?” he barked before turning off the Floo. Draco had stood by and laughed. She wished he had waited outside. “You better get used to it, Weasley. It seems like we will be spending a lot of time together at this rate.”
“I don’t like you and I don’t trust you,” she said unnecessarily.
“Oh, you wound me, Weasley.” He brought his hands up and formed odd crescent shapes with his fingers. “And here I was thinking, you and me, together, forever,” he smirked as he brought his hands together to make a heart shape.
“We’re almost here,” he says now. “Finally - you were starting to stink.”
“Me? It’s this water!”
“Do you always blame others, Weasley?”
She is ready with a sharp reply but is distracted by the light at the end of the tunnel. This is her real test. She sets her lip in a straight line - she’ll show Malfoy.
***
They live amongst rats and the old water running along these dark tunnels. Some of them are mere children though their faces are serious and lined and they barely glance at the pair as they walk by.
“What is this?” Ginny asks as she stares at their dirty rags and faces.
“It’s not a circus show,” Draco frowns, pulling her deeper into the knot of dark people shuffling in the underground. “Shouldn’t you know what the poor look like? Isn’t this how you grew up?”
“That’s not funny.”
“No, I suppose it isn’t.”
His reply is too mild to warrant anything more than an annoyed look. She continues to follow him along the dripping tunnel, now lined with poor ragged figures and low flickering torch lights. She notices that he still walks with a swagger but it does not look silly as it did when he was an angular ferret-faced teenager. Now, he looks a lot like his mother - tall, regal and very blond. His hair catches the light now and again and it looks like the moon moving in and out of shadow.
A goat bleats. At least, she thinks it is a goat. “Was that a goat?”
“Does it sound like a goat?” Draco asks, pausing to turn and look at her.
“Well, how would I know?”
“Then why did you ask if it was a goat?” he replies, his lips turned up in amusement.
Though it is useless to glare in the low light, she does it anyway. “Aren’t we supposed to get my assignment from the Oracle already? Or do you like to hang out in smelly underground tunnels for fun?”
“Who said anything about an Oracle, Weasley?”
“Kingsley…”
“Never said anything about an Oracle. We’re going to see -”
“A Gypsy!”
A dark-skinned woman with gold eyes has emerged from the just around the tunnel bend. She walks towards them with her heavily braceleted wrists holding up the skirt of a heavy patchwork dress. Her steps are soundless but the gold she wears is not - it makes an uneven melody as she glides over to them, her narrow almond-shaped eyes flashing in the torchlight.
“Are you fond of pejorative terms or are you just ignorant?” The woman asks in a high-pitched voice that strikes a sharp contrast with her serious, strong features and angry eyes. “The political correct term is Roma but here in Ukraine, you should at least refer to us as Tsyhany.”
She turns sharply away from an astonished Ginny and grimaces at Draco. “You always bring the smart ones, don’t you?”
“I bring the ones that need to learn,” Draco corrects.
They turn away from Ginny without a word. She is left alone in the dark but after a moment, Ginny shakes herself. The surprise is wearing off, allowing the anger to rise. How dare they talk about her as though she is not there nor capable of whatever task they have for her. She follows them in loud and angry strides but when she turns the bend all she sees is a blank wall.
“What?”
Before she can think of where they could’ve possibly gone, a hand reaches out from the wall and pulls her in. She tumbles out on the other side and her training instincts kick in. She immediately lowers her head and rams forward. She has Draco Malfoy down on the ground in a matter of seconds.
“Weasley, your tactics for attracting a person of the opposite sex did not work when you were an ickle firstie and they don’t work now!”
“What the hell, Malfoy? You could’ve warned me instead of pulling me through stone walls!”
“Why should I? You’re the one being tested!”
“Well - because…” Ginny moves off Malfoy and sits on the stone floor. Because it would’ve been nice. It would’ve been nice if Draco would’ve given her at least a moment to adjust to the discovery that she might not be as brilliant of an Auror as she thought she was.
“Are you done pouting or do you want more time?” The Tsyhany woman says as she shuffles an elaborate deck of cards.
“I’m done,” Ginny replies sullenly, standing up.
“Baaaaahh.”
A goat is standing in the corner. Its head is tilted to the side and it seems to regard them all with great solemnity.
“Hey, I was right - it was a goat!” Ginny says triumphantly to Draco.
“It is a goat but did you figure it out by deduction or did you make a wild guess earlier?” The Tsyahany woman asks while she continues to shuffle the cards. Ginny can almost hear Anabelle’s voice reminding her that the steps matter.
Ginny does not response. Instead, she peers at the blue detail on the back of the cards - they look oddly familiar. “Is that a Bicycle deck?” she asks incredulously. She had expected Tarot cards or some other mystical object - not Muggle cards like the ones Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnegan played with in the Gryffindor common room. “How is that supposed to tell me what I have to track?”
“The cards possess a greater magic than you’ll ever know,” the woman replies sharply. Her high-pitch voice makes her sound like an irritable child though. She tosses her dark locks over her shoulder and looks over at Malfoy who has now picked himself off the floor and approached the table. “Does she always ask a lot of questions?”
Malfoy shrugs. “Yes but that’s my problem. Here, let me cut.”
He takes part of the deck from the top and places it at the bottom. The Tsyhany woman is chanting in a language Ginny does not understand. She shuffles, shuffles, shuffles, and it makes Ginny even more anxious. When the Tsyhany woman finally opens her gold eyes, she looks up at Ginny and it is like a tiger looking at her prey. Ginny is watching her eyes and not the cards as they lay out her destiny.
“There.” Her high voice breaks the trance and Ginny looks down at a card that has been flipped over. “This is what you have to find Ginny Weasley.”
Ginny leans forward eagerly and looks at the detailed card. It does not have the face of a regular Bicycle deck. This is detailed, bursting with colour and movement. This is her task, her test, her destiny. The elaborate face is of a tree growing in a forever blue water, its roots reaching into the far deep, its branches reaching up to a cerulean sky. There is something else there and Ginny must look even more closely. Her nose is nearly touching the card when she makes out the round yellow dots scattered throughout the leaves of the tree. “Are those…smiley faces?”
***
| One | Two | Three | Four |
ORIGINAL REQUEST:
What would you like to receive? An adventure would be very awesome. Something unexpected -- can be crazy, can be an action fest, emo-rollercoaster, I'll take it all! As long as there's some excitement :D
The tone/mood of the fic: Gimme some mystery!
An element/line of dialogue/object you would like in your fic: I'd like to see Draco make a heart-shape with his fingers <- that counts, right?
Preferred rating of the the fic you want: Any
Canon or AU? Either!
Deal Breakers (what don't you want?): No pre-existing relationship. Gonna make you sweat for this one!
Rating: R (for brief language)
Possible Spoilers/Warnings: Fully compliant except epilogue
Summary: “The riddle is simple enough. Seek the grey-eyed king where he was born.” But Ginny soon learns that nothing involving Draco Malfoy is simple.
Prelude to a Journey East 1/4
Prologue - The Grey-Eyed King
The riddle is simple enough. Seek the grey-eyed king where he was born. It takes Ginny less than two hours to figure out that the grey-eyed king refers to a poem by the Russian poet Anna Akhmatova. Then she is off with a flourish - her exit from Hermione Granger’s personal library as sudden as a late spring gale. “Well,” Hermione says, getting up from her kneeled position by the stacks. She knows how eager Ginny is to prove herself but it wouldn’t have hurt if she set the book down instead of letting it drop from her Apparating hands.
***
The sound of water caressing the shoreline greets Ginny on her arrival. She has never been to Odessa before - the birth place of the Acmeist poet. It is a beautiful city on the Black Sea, its limestone buildings built on terraced hills, its unsavory history romanticized by the grandness of the Potemkin Steps. But Ginny has neither time nor patience to contemplate the Italian baroque façade of the theatre nor the infamous steps leading down to the warm blue sea. She is on a mission.
Well, she thinks, frowning, it’s not an official mission. Not yet. She is still in training but once she passes her tracking test - this tracking test - she will be on her way to becoming a full-fledged Auror. Ron had doubted her - still doubts her if his furrowed brow this morning was any indication. And Harry had tried to stop her from even signing up for Auror Training in the first place. As though he had any right when they were dating; he certainly has none now that they are not.
Ginny shakes her head. She needs to focus on the task at hand. She hurries along, only slowing down when she sees crooked old men, bent over like broken cattails, shuffling pass her. She tries to peer discretely at their eyes. None of them are grey.
Her classmate, Anabelle, has chastised her for her methodology - or rather, lack of methodology. “You come up with this idea and then you’re convinced that you’re right. You need to focus on the steps more.”
“Why do I need to consider all the remote possibilities when I know I’m right? It’s magical intuition.” Words are always leaving her mouth before she has time to stop them.
Anabelle usually frowns at her for her rashness in both words and acts. She did not bother to frown that time. Instead, the petite brunette, who had been lacing her trainers, paused before straightening up and looking Ginny coolly in the eye. “And what do I have? Air between my ears?”
“I don’t mean it like that.” And she didn’t. Ginny greatly admires Anabelle - a Squib, forced to learn her lessons at home, questioned and laughed at when her handicap was revealed on the first day of training. But she refused to give up - she is smart and talented, just not magically talented. “You just know…” Ginny finished lamely.
“No, you don’t know. You know Harry and Ron, who are the architects of this program. You understand them, you know how they work. Why do you think Kingsley sends us off for our field exams?” Anabelle sighed, bending down to finish her lacing. “I’m just suggesting that you open your mind more. I would tell you to be less stubborn but we know that will never happen.”
She thinks of this conversation as a man snaps at her in what she supposes is Ukrainian. Just in the cuff of her sleeve is her wand but there are too many people yet not enough for her to discreetly pull it out and cast a language charm on herself. She considers Anabelle’s advice - she can’t look at every man’s eyes in the city. Perhaps she is meant to go to Anna Akhmatova’s childhood home or the place where she wrote the poem. But no, no, none of that feels right. It has to be the eyes.
Ginny stops for a moment and in pausing, she really sees the city for the first time. She sees its history, its beauty and its mystery. There seems to be an endless sea of places where a grey-eyed king might hide. However, she has learned that what one seeks is often found in the most unlikely of places and in a situation like this, that might mean that her grey-eyed target is in plain sight. As she casts her eyes around, she notices that there are statutes everywhere. They are not all grey but many of them are. Perhaps there is one of a king immortalized with grey eyes.
But then what? It seems too simple. But that’s probably the trick of it.
Ginny likes this feeling - of all the puzzle pieces falling into place. Ginny thinks her classmates, that Hermione, and even the great but oblivious Harry Potter understand this but she still holds her pleasure close to her. She enjoys it here now before it propels her to stride forward purposely.
She needs to find someone who can speak English - a tourist perhaps, that can help direct her to the right statute faster. On the wide steps that connect the open sea and the heart of the city is a couple in matching bold floral button-up jumpers. They must be Americans. They compliment her on her accent and the Muggle clothing Hermione helped her choose. Ginny smiles politely but is impatient to get going once she extracts the information she needs. The woman calls them friends now but Ginny has no interest in any of this and she tells them “I really must go,” but gives no explanation before dashing away.
She climbs the stairs, higher and higher, weaving in and out of the slow-moving crowd and her focus is narrowed to what she will find at the top of the steps. The Duc de Richelieu had accomplished many things in his life as an advisor, a diplomat and a soldier. But in his role as Governor-General of a once miserable village, the city that rose to prominence under his administration found a king worthy of crowning the top of their steps. And Ginny is finally there - and she sees him, decorated like a great scholar, his hand held out to the people.
She walks closer but her focus is distracted by a man standing in front of the statute, as still as the Duc himself. He seems undisturbed by the loud talking tourists around him, snapping pictures with their Muggle devices, some of them - adolescent girls and women - peering at him and giggling. He has striking silver hair that looks oddly familiar and she feels drawn to him as though he were an ever-burning flame. It seems to lure her away for the satisfaction of victory and she feels annoyed at him.
She notices he is pulling out a golden pocket watch from the inner pocket of his jacket. She watches him finger the watch though he does not flip the cover open or look at it. She doesn’t know why but she wants to see the watch. But then, a drawling voice startles her from her observation, breaking into her thoughts. “It took you long enough, Weasley.” And a smirking grey-eyed Draco Malfoy looks up at her.
***
Chapter 1 - A Sleight of Hand
Her wand light is weak and wobbly in the oppressive darkness of the catacombs. She has already fallen half a dozen times in the stank stagnant water running along the tunnels - however, Draco does not slow down, forcing her to stumble after him, her feet clumsy and awkward on this unfamiliar turf. She takes another fall and her wand slips from her grip.
She curses as colourfully as a girl with six older brothers would. But she’s not with her brothers now and her voice does not dissipate into open air amongst deep laughs - it echoes, in the dark; it sounds like a stranger coming back lonely.
“For Merlin’s sake, Weasley,” Draco groans. She hears his footsteps splash through the water and in what must be one of his more generous moments, he hauls her up.
“I need to find my wand,” she grumbles, looking down though she can’t actually see the water. A second later her wand hits her face.
“Forgot you’re a witch, did you?” Draco snickers as he turns away. He must’ve Accio’d it wordlessly.
Ginny is glad that the dark covers her embarrassment. It does not make her any less angry though that she is now underground, trudging through dirty water, with Draco Malfoy. The image of him laughing at her, his white teeth gleaming, is branded hot and searing in her mind.
Only an hour before, he had explained to her that finding him was not the end of her journey - it was the start. “Surely you didn’t think that was it, did you, Weasley? Your brother gave you such an easy riddle too.”
Her talk with Kingsley did nothing for her mood - she had demanded he reassign her to someone else. He had been adamant that Draco was the right person to administer her tracking exam. “Are you going to ask for a reassignment every time you don’t like something?” he barked before turning off the Floo. Draco had stood by and laughed. She wished he had waited outside. “You better get used to it, Weasley. It seems like we will be spending a lot of time together at this rate.”
“I don’t like you and I don’t trust you,” she said unnecessarily.
“Oh, you wound me, Weasley.” He brought his hands up and formed odd crescent shapes with his fingers. “And here I was thinking, you and me, together, forever,” he smirked as he brought his hands together to make a heart shape.
“We’re almost here,” he says now. “Finally - you were starting to stink.”
“Me? It’s this water!”
“Do you always blame others, Weasley?”
She is ready with a sharp reply but is distracted by the light at the end of the tunnel. This is her real test. She sets her lip in a straight line - she’ll show Malfoy.
***
They live amongst rats and the old water running along these dark tunnels. Some of them are mere children though their faces are serious and lined and they barely glance at the pair as they walk by.
“What is this?” Ginny asks as she stares at their dirty rags and faces.
“It’s not a circus show,” Draco frowns, pulling her deeper into the knot of dark people shuffling in the underground. “Shouldn’t you know what the poor look like? Isn’t this how you grew up?”
“That’s not funny.”
“No, I suppose it isn’t.”
His reply is too mild to warrant anything more than an annoyed look. She continues to follow him along the dripping tunnel, now lined with poor ragged figures and low flickering torch lights. She notices that he still walks with a swagger but it does not look silly as it did when he was an angular ferret-faced teenager. Now, he looks a lot like his mother - tall, regal and very blond. His hair catches the light now and again and it looks like the moon moving in and out of shadow.
A goat bleats. At least, she thinks it is a goat. “Was that a goat?”
“Does it sound like a goat?” Draco asks, pausing to turn and look at her.
“Well, how would I know?”
“Then why did you ask if it was a goat?” he replies, his lips turned up in amusement.
Though it is useless to glare in the low light, she does it anyway. “Aren’t we supposed to get my assignment from the Oracle already? Or do you like to hang out in smelly underground tunnels for fun?”
“Who said anything about an Oracle, Weasley?”
“Kingsley…”
“Never said anything about an Oracle. We’re going to see -”
“A Gypsy!”
A dark-skinned woman with gold eyes has emerged from the just around the tunnel bend. She walks towards them with her heavily braceleted wrists holding up the skirt of a heavy patchwork dress. Her steps are soundless but the gold she wears is not - it makes an uneven melody as she glides over to them, her narrow almond-shaped eyes flashing in the torchlight.
“Are you fond of pejorative terms or are you just ignorant?” The woman asks in a high-pitched voice that strikes a sharp contrast with her serious, strong features and angry eyes. “The political correct term is Roma but here in Ukraine, you should at least refer to us as Tsyhany.”
She turns sharply away from an astonished Ginny and grimaces at Draco. “You always bring the smart ones, don’t you?”
“I bring the ones that need to learn,” Draco corrects.
They turn away from Ginny without a word. She is left alone in the dark but after a moment, Ginny shakes herself. The surprise is wearing off, allowing the anger to rise. How dare they talk about her as though she is not there nor capable of whatever task they have for her. She follows them in loud and angry strides but when she turns the bend all she sees is a blank wall.
“What?”
Before she can think of where they could’ve possibly gone, a hand reaches out from the wall and pulls her in. She tumbles out on the other side and her training instincts kick in. She immediately lowers her head and rams forward. She has Draco Malfoy down on the ground in a matter of seconds.
“Weasley, your tactics for attracting a person of the opposite sex did not work when you were an ickle firstie and they don’t work now!”
“What the hell, Malfoy? You could’ve warned me instead of pulling me through stone walls!”
“Why should I? You’re the one being tested!”
“Well - because…” Ginny moves off Malfoy and sits on the stone floor. Because it would’ve been nice. It would’ve been nice if Draco would’ve given her at least a moment to adjust to the discovery that she might not be as brilliant of an Auror as she thought she was.
“Are you done pouting or do you want more time?” The Tsyhany woman says as she shuffles an elaborate deck of cards.
“I’m done,” Ginny replies sullenly, standing up.
“Baaaaahh.”
A goat is standing in the corner. Its head is tilted to the side and it seems to regard them all with great solemnity.
“Hey, I was right - it was a goat!” Ginny says triumphantly to Draco.
“It is a goat but did you figure it out by deduction or did you make a wild guess earlier?” The Tsyahany woman asks while she continues to shuffle the cards. Ginny can almost hear Anabelle’s voice reminding her that the steps matter.
Ginny does not response. Instead, she peers at the blue detail on the back of the cards - they look oddly familiar. “Is that a Bicycle deck?” she asks incredulously. She had expected Tarot cards or some other mystical object - not Muggle cards like the ones Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnegan played with in the Gryffindor common room. “How is that supposed to tell me what I have to track?”
“The cards possess a greater magic than you’ll ever know,” the woman replies sharply. Her high-pitch voice makes her sound like an irritable child though. She tosses her dark locks over her shoulder and looks over at Malfoy who has now picked himself off the floor and approached the table. “Does she always ask a lot of questions?”
Malfoy shrugs. “Yes but that’s my problem. Here, let me cut.”
He takes part of the deck from the top and places it at the bottom. The Tsyhany woman is chanting in a language Ginny does not understand. She shuffles, shuffles, shuffles, and it makes Ginny even more anxious. When the Tsyhany woman finally opens her gold eyes, she looks up at Ginny and it is like a tiger looking at her prey. Ginny is watching her eyes and not the cards as they lay out her destiny.
“There.” Her high voice breaks the trance and Ginny looks down at a card that has been flipped over. “This is what you have to find Ginny Weasley.”
Ginny leans forward eagerly and looks at the detailed card. It does not have the face of a regular Bicycle deck. This is detailed, bursting with colour and movement. This is her task, her test, her destiny. The elaborate face is of a tree growing in a forever blue water, its roots reaching into the far deep, its branches reaching up to a cerulean sky. There is something else there and Ginny must look even more closely. Her nose is nearly touching the card when she makes out the round yellow dots scattered throughout the leaves of the tree. “Are those…smiley faces?”
***
| One | Two | Three | Four |
ORIGINAL REQUEST:
What would you like to receive? An adventure would be very awesome. Something unexpected -- can be crazy, can be an action fest, emo-rollercoaster, I'll take it all! As long as there's some excitement :D
The tone/mood of the fic: Gimme some mystery!
An element/line of dialogue/object you would like in your fic: I'd like to see Draco make a heart-shape with his fingers <- that counts, right?
Preferred rating of the the fic you want: Any
Canon or AU? Either!
Deal Breakers (what don't you want?): No pre-existing relationship. Gonna make you sweat for this one!