The Fool

"Hello, Professor." Harry greeted cordially. He had nothing against Professor McGonagall, aside from the fact that she remained in close contact with Dumbledore, who's judgement and goals had become dubious at best. Nevertheless, when he'd received a letter from her the day after his birthday, asking to meet with he and Ginny, he had no issue with it.

They'd needed to pick up Pansy anyway, so meeting at the Burrow worked well enough, so long as they kept the possible Death Eater mole out of their conversation.

"Happy Birthday Mr. Potter, it is very good to see the two of you."

"You wanted to talk with us, Professor?"

"Yes, though not on my own behalf. I have a letter, from your brother, Ms. Weasley."

"From Bill?" Ginny's voice cracked.

McGonagall held up a hand "I've heard about his atrocious behavior, I'm not going to defend his actions, but he seems like he deeply regrets it. He asked me to give this to you." She slid an envelope across the table to them.

"Did he really seem like he was sorry? What did he say?" Ginny shot off.

"He said… he was ashamed." McGonagall said heavily "Though he didn't seem to want to go into detail, he said that everything you needed to know was in the letter. For what it's worth, I feel that he was being genuine."

"Wait." Harry jumped in "Did Dum- Professor Dumbledore say anything to you about this?"

"As far as I'm aware, he has no idea. I haven't seen him and Bill together in some time."

Harry let out a heavy breath and Ginny nodded. "I- thank you professor."

-----

Pansy's purgatory ended suddenly, after Harry's birthday. No longer was she trapped at the Burrow, forced to tolerate the blood traitors. No longer would she have to pine for Harry, only seeing him when he occasionally visited. No longer would she have to worry about 'disappointing' Bellatrix and the Dark Lord with her lack of progress.

Two days after his birthday party, Harry returned to the Burrow. If Pansy had been expecting him, she might have tried to make herself look presentable. Not that she had much to work with, the Order had given her the essentials but not much in the way of luxuries- no skin potions, no jewelry, no hair care products.

Harry hadn't remarked on her appearance, and neither had Ginny Weasley, who accompanied him. "Gin." He said, and the redhead jolted, before retrieving a scrap of parchment from her pocket and handing it to her. Pansy blinked unknowingly at the scrap of parchment in her hands, it read 'Harry Potter lives at Bones Manor'. "I don't get it."

Harry shook his head and wordlessly vanished the parchment. "Fidelius charm."

The implications settled in for Pansy. Harry was protected by the Fidelius. It was unbreakable unless you could get your hands on the secret keeper. Her eyes flicked to Ginny, who had been the one to hand her the parchment… it had to be her. It made sense; she was his first girlfriend after all. The only other one Pansy thought he might give it to was Granger.

"Does that mean I can stay with you guys?"

"Doesn't miss a tick, does she?" Ginny quipped, and Pansy smiled internally. No, she didn't.

-----

Pansy suppressed the urge to scoff. Calling Bones' house a 'manor' was being generous in her opinion, it had nothing on the Parkinson or Malfoy estates. Still, it must have been decadent for a Weasley, or a mudblood.

Pansy continued to mentally compare the manor to her own, up until the point that they met the others. Pansy knew that Harry had 'collected' a number of girls, but it was an entirely different thing seeing it in person. Pansy's train of thought was completely derailed when the Lovegood girl walked up and kissed him, cutting him off mid-sentence. It wasn't even a normal greeting kiss, no, she was clearly using tongue, not giving one jot about their audience.

Luna was followed by Katie Bell, and then the Veela woman- Delecour?- until everyone had greeted him with some expression of affection. Even the little Veela, who'd just given him a blushing hug. She wondered if this display was meant for her- marking their territory. It made Pansy want to show them up and rub it in all their faces.

They all talked for the next hour or so. Pansy could sense some tension towards her, like they didn't fully trust her, or there was something they were keeping from her. She supposed she should have expected this, after all she'd been nothing but hostile towards many of them their entire time at school. Still, she was here, right? That had to mean something.

Or maybe they were jealous. Maybe the didn't want her there, but Harry did. The idea tickled her, his girlfriends may not like her, but if she got through to Harry it might not matter.

Eventually, though, they went their separate ways, and Harry went to show her to her room. For its faults, Bones' place had more than enough spare rooms- the legacy of a family that had nearly died out.

"You got me a wand?"

"It's an old one from Susan's family. The girls didn't like the idea, but I insisted that you have a way to protect yourself. You aren't a prisoner here, Pansy." Harry said, with a slight smile that set of butterflies.

"Thank you." Pansy smiled back.

She almost stepped forward to hug him, but before she could commit to herself, Harry stepped back. "No problem. Anyway, I'll let you get settled in."

Immediately Pansy regretted not being a little more forward, but she shook herself. She was being ridiculous. She wasn't here to romance Harry… unless she could use it to her advantage.

Once she was alone, she sighed, not allowing herself to relax. She'd been out of contact for too long, far too long. Feeling a little paranoid, she held out her new wand. She knew immediately that it wasn't going to cooperate with her, but it was better than nothing. "Homenum revelo."

The spell revealed nothing, she was alone. Pansy then turned to the room's desk, shuffling through the drawers for parchment, a quill and ink. She tapped the parchment with her wand and murmured under her breath words that Bellatrix had taught her.

I'm in. She wrote carefully, feeling a small amount of triumph at finally being able to put down those words. After a moment, the ink disappeared, seemingly sinking into the parchment.

Good, tell me more.

-----

The letter had burned a hole in Ginny's mind the entire day. She was torn between a half dozen different emotions, each one overrunning the last until it her mind felt like a hopeless vortex. Pansy's presence meant they couldn't just talk about it, or even read it until she was somewhere private. Having a suspected Death Eater in the house with them was enough to put them all on edge.

Ginny had ended up distracting herself by pointing out every sign of Pansy's… crush on Harry over the course of the day. It had left Harry feeling even more uncomfortable with her presence, but it was better for him to be uncomfortable but aware than blissfully ignorant, Ginny reasoned. They all knew that it was something they could use to their advantage. Susan had pointed out as much to Harry, but he wasn't quite comfortable with the idea. He did his best to appear friendly and feed into the perceptions they were trying to build, but the idea of actually flirting with her was nearly revolting to him.

Ginny was rather pleased with that, to be honest, and so was everyone else in the building. Even Susan, who hadn't tried really hard to convince him otherwise, was rather happy with Harry's sense of loyalty towards them.

It was with no small amount of relief that they left Pansy to her own devices. Ginny had immediately opened the letter and read through it several times, before handing it off blindly to Susan while she processed the words.

Ginny,

I know that I'm probably the last person you want to hear from right now. So I figured I should just open with the obvious- I was an idiot, and a prat. I'm sorry.

You're my family, and I've said and did some hurtful things to you. I can't bear the fact that I've hurt you, and I'm ashamed that it took me so long to realize what was happening.

I fear that I've been influenced by dark magic. I'm struggling to figure out how it happened, but it seems to have cleared after spending this past week mostly alone. Even now, I can feel it, lurking in the back of my mind, but this is the first time in a while that I've even felt like myself. I'm afraid that it might be too late for me, but god, I hope it isn't.

I hope that we can meet, talk things out. I'm living at Shell Cottage right now- its where Fleur and I were supposed to live after we got married. I guess it's just mine now, its lovely, I suppose, but lonely. Maybe we could get a bite? There are some nice restaurants at a nearby town. You could bring Fleur and Harry, if they agree. I certainly owe them both an apology as well, and I hope that I can give it in person.

Love,

Bill

Ginny blinked back the stinging in her eyes, she didn't want to cry. She felt a hand on her shoulder, and looked up to see Fleur, her eyes held nothing but sympathy and understanding. Harry too had sensed her reaction to the letter, and had promptly excused himself from his conversation with Pansy. Ginny gratefully allowed her to sink into Harry's arms.

She could handle her brother being an asshole. But the possibility that he'd fallen victim to dark magic, or even a horcrux, chilled her to the bone.

Hermione looked resigned as she turned to Harry and Ginny. "I'm not sure if this is a good idea." She offered.

"I know, but…" Ginny shook her head

"It could be a trap. Like with Sirius." Hermione cautioned.

"Or with Ginny." Harry returned, addressing what had gone unspoken. If Bill (or Dumbledore, for that matter) were acting under the influence of dark magic, could they really leave them to their fates? To Harry, the answer couldn't be yes. Ginny had once been in that very same situation, taken over by dark magic and set up as a trap for him, and he hadn't hesitated to save her.

"Hermione. I have too." Ginny said softly. "You know why."

"I'd like to go as well." Fleur put in "What happened with him, it never sat right with me."

"It could be a trap." Susan mused "But if it's not… well, he could give us insight into Dumbledore. And it couldn't hurt to have a curse breaker on our side."

Hermione nodded, admitting defeat. "Well, it being an obvious trap has never once stopped us before, but let's try to be smart about this."

Harry let out a wry chuckle "That's the spirit, Hermione." He tilted his head slightly "Hm, did you know invisibility cloaks bypass 'Homenum revelo'?"

"Er, they don't." Hermione responded "Or they shouldn't be able to. They just make you invisible, not completely undetectable."

"Well, Pansy seems to have no idea that Demelza's spying on her right now. Maybe because she has a crap wand?"

"She is?" Hermione startled "But that's so risky!"

Susan, however, looked impressed. "Not really. We're trying to make it seem like Harry likes her while the rest of us are jealous. If she got caught it'd just play into that."

"Anyway" Harry continued "It does look like Pansy's a Death Eater, or at least talking to them. She's using some sort of charmed parchment to write to them, looks like what we used to use to coordinate back at school."

"I have to say, I didn't expect Demelza to take the initiative like that." Fleur mused.

"Well, it's personal for her." After all, Pansy had lied to her first, pretended to be her friend when she was captured when she was really in on it. "She's easy to underestimate because she's small and submissive with me, but you might want to ask Rudolphus Lestrange how that worked out for him. Its why I wanted her as secret keeper."

When he had told Demelza about his decision, he'd been half expecting her to try to talk him out of it, but Demelza had just nodded solemnly, and said 'I won't let you down.' Her voice had held the same fervent intensity that she used when following his orders, and Harry knew that he'd made the right choice. He knew that no matter what punishment she took, no matter how she was tested, she'd go mad before giving their location.

"Damn straight." Demelza crowed, sashaying a bit as she whipped off her invisibility cloak. "Yeah, she's a mole." Her voice turned dark "I think she's falling for it hook line and sinker."

"Do tell." Susan said with interest.

"Well, she thinks Ginny's the secret keeper, for one." Demelza offered. "She's waiting for an opportunity, for Ginny to leave unprotected so that they can ambush her."

Harry bristled. He'd never liked this part of the plan. The thought of using anyone (other than himself) as bait didn't sit well with him. Unfortunately, he really couldn't use himself as bait. Not only did he have to admit it was too big of a risk to the war effort, but him going out in the open undefended would be an open invitation to Voldemort himself. If it were just Ginny, he doubted Voldemort would deign to attend to it personally, it'd be below him.

"We obviously can't have this happen too soon." Hermione said "If Ginny leaves tomorrow it'd be too suspicious. We need to give it at least a week."

"Honestly..." Harry put in "I don't want to deal with her ogling me any more than I have to." He got some snickers in response

"And the longer she stays, the more likely we are to slip up." Susan concurred "She may be arrogant and in over her head, but she isn't an idiot. We can't underestimate her or get lazy. Where is she now, Demelza?"

"Bathroom, but Luna's going to 'run into her' once she's done."

Susan grinned mischievously "Good. Harry, tell her to lead Pansy by this room in a bit."

Harry raised his eyebrows "What do you have planned?"

Susan stepped towards him "Well I bet Pansy, and the people she's talking to, all think we're just hormone addled teenagers having tons of sex."

"Well…" Ginny tilted her head as if acceding a point "To be fair…"

"The point is, we should be reinforcing that as much as possible." Susan smiled grew wider as she sidled nearer "It'll make them underestimate us. If Pansy thinks all our private time is spent fucking, she won't suspect that we're planning anything. Which means…" Her lips met Harry's briefly.

When they parted, Harry shot her his own teasing grin "Well, if its for the greater good..." He lifted Susan up and plopped her onto a nearby table "We can suffer through it." Susan giggled, but was cut off as Harry's lips descended on hers. From then on, the only noises she made were moans.