Soon enough, Bill Weasley and Fleur Delacour’s wedding rolled around. Early in the morning, Harry, Ron, Bill, Fred and George (who had arrived by floo powder), Charlie (who had arrived from Romania), and Mr. Weasley were pulled into their suits first, before being shoved out of the house to head down to the church so that the girls could get ready in peace.
When Ginny came sleepily into the kitchen on Friday, the 25th of August, Mrs. Weasley was fussing around the wedding dress, sticking pins in it, and Fleur was arguing that Mrs. Weasley was doing it WRONG, and that she should just do it herself. Hermione was sitting next to Gabrielle Delacour, Fleur’s sister, holding her own dress and reading the newspaper, waiting for Mrs. Weasley to fit her.
“Morning, Ginny dear, your dress is over there, on the counter by the sink. I’ll do you after Hermione,” Mrs. Weasley said awkwardly, mouth full of pins.
Ginny nodded, and sat next to Hermione. “Where’s everyone else?”
“Oh,” Hermione answered. “They’ve gone.”
“GONE?” Ginny asked, positively alarmed.
“-To the church,” Hermione finished, flicking past the Quidditch section of the paper.
Ginny glanced over to her mother, and Fleur. Fleur’s wedding dress was traditional white, with a satin corset and long, fitted sleeves which flared at the cuff. There were small, very pale pink rosebuds around the hem and neck line. Her hair was down, one thick strand of it from the front pinned back with a large, glittery, pink-rose-covered clip. Just behind the hair clip was the start of a long, plain, white veil. She had decided that Ginny and Gabrielle were to wear thick, cream-coloured dresses, with thin straps, no sleeves. They were to have their hair up, but have matching hair clips as Fleur. The difference was that Ginny and Gabrielle’s were blue, to match their eyes.
When Fleur had decided that the dress was ready, Mrs. Weasley told her to go and wait outside in the warm sun for the car to arrive. There was no way that they were travelling to the church by floo powder; Fleur’s dress would be black with soot when they arrived. Broomsticks were out of the question; Bill had said so, and, strangely enough, the broom had gone missing from the house anyway.
Hermione’s dress was now being fixed up. She had chosen to wear a dark pink, thin dress. It had lighter pink flowers on it, and cascaded to her knees in delicate swirls of material. Mrs. Weasley had insisted that Hermione’s brown, shoulder-length, naturally wavy hair was beautiful untouched, and wouldn’t let her straighten it like she had for the Yule ball in fourth year. Instead, the front of her hair was to be scraped back, and held in place with a small pink bow. Seen as Hermione’s dress only needed to be adjusted at the hem, Mrs. Weasley was finished in seconds.
“Come on, Ginny dear, I’ve done Hermione’s adjustments, your turn.”
She adjusted Ginny and Gabrielle’s dresses together; they were almost perfect anyway. After fixing the girls’ hair and getting her maroon, frilly dress ready and on, Mrs. Weasley hustled the girls outside to Fleur. They waited a few moments, before, to the unsuspecting passengers’ delight, a stretch limo trundled down the muddy road.
“A limo?” Mrs. Weasley breathed. “But Arthur said…”
She was cut off as Gabrielle and Fleur rushed forwards to the car at the same time, colliding and nearly ripping their dresses. Eventually, they were untangled and the five were on their way to the church.
_____________________________________________________________________
A few hours later, everyone was busy chatting, dancing, and “ in Ron's case “ eating cake in the church hall, which was beautifully decorated. The wedding had gone perfectly; save for some awkwardness at the start, as Percy had been invited and had actually come. This was cue for more crying from Mrs. Weasley, and some major hugging.
Now, the priest was ushering everyone outside, where Bill stood on the grass, holding a broomstick. Fleur rushed over, asking him what he was doing and he began to make her get on. Suddenly they took off, the long, white material of Fleur’s dress flying behind them. Fred whispered something to George and George took something out of his pocket, and threw it in the air. It was small, gold, and you could only see it in the shine from the garden lights. It suddenly sprouted a pair of silver wings, and it reminded Harry strongly of the Golden Snitch. It flew over the flying couple before exploding into words over their heads: Just Married. The words were surrounded by little, mini Golden Snitches, flying in between them and zooming around like shooting stars.
The crowd of wedding guests on the ground burst into applause, and Harry could hear Ron saying excitedly to Fred,
“Whoa, how’d you make them, are they for sale at the shop? Wicked!”
“Yeah, little bro, it’s the ‘Weasley’s Wicked Weddings’ range. Developed ‘em just yesterday,” Fred was heard to reply.
Everyone was slowly drifting back in again, and music had started to play. Harry slowly walked over to the food table, taking one of the little, triangles shaped sandwiches and taking bite out of it, sitting at a nearby table. Hermione, who had previously been chatting away to George, came and sat next to him.
“Hi, Harry. Have you seen Ginny or Ron around?”
“Yeah, Ron’s over there,” Harry replied, pointing. “With Gabrielle Delacour and Charlie.”
Hermione glanced over, frowning slightly. “Harry, do you want to dance?” she asked, standing up and still staring at Ron.
Harry gave her a funny look. “Er… Okay.”
They stood, walking over to the wooden dance floor. Hermione placed her hands on Harry’s shoulders and they began to sway to the music. There was a thought at the back of Harry's mind that Hermione was closer than she should be, and noticed that she was turning slightly to still see Ron, who was now staring straight back, a sort of outraged look on his face. He stood, and came out onto the dance floor too, where he asked anxiously,
“Can- Can I take over? Dancing, I mean?”
Harry grinned and pushed Hermione slightly so that she was dancing with Ron instead. Wondering where the bathroom was, Harry drifted in the general direction of the food table again, where he bumped into Gabrielle, who was helping herself to some cake.
“’Arry Potter!” she exclaimed. “Ginny Weasley ees looking for you!”
“Where is she?” he asked, all thoughts of the bathroom gone from his mind.
“I zink I saw her outside still, Charlie went outside and I zink she will bee with him, waiting for Fleur to come back with Viktor.”
“Viktor?” Harry asked, surprised. “As in… Viktor Krum?”
“Yes, he got an invitation but he ees a bit late, so they are going to see where he ees. Also, they are going to find out eef Hagrid and Madame Maxime received zere invitation.”
“Oh, okay, I’ll go and speak to Ginny then, see you later,” Harry headed towards the large wooden door that led out onto the lawn. Ginny was sitting on a metal bench, on the patio tile at the back of the church, alone. Charlie was nowhere to be seen.
Harry moved forward and sat down next to her. She looked up and smiled.
“Gabrielle told me that you were looking for me…”
“Yeah. How… Are you? After everything, I mean?” Ginny asked.
“I suppose that I’m as good as I can be, considering the, you know, events of last year…” Harry answered.
“Oh- Oh, Harry. I’m so sorry,” Ginny murmured, laying a hand on his arm comfortingly. “I… I wish that you didn’t have to go through this. That none of us did. That…” Tears sprung to her eyes. “I didn’t have to go through it alone.”
Harry’s face changed. “What do you mean, ‘alone’?”
“Well you’re leaving me, aren’t you? You, Hermione, Ron. Everyone is. They’re packing me off to Hogwarts again, when it’s no safer there than it is here! You “ all of you “ are leaving me to face Hogwarts alone. ALONE, Harry.”
“I- No you’ll be with- Ginny, stop it!”
A small tear had slid from Ginny’s eye. Harry couldn’t take it. He leaned forward and pulled her into a hug. Her head was against his shoulder and more tears crept out. “Please, Harry, please don’t leave me… I l- We-,” Ginny stopped talking, and pulled out of the hug slightly, staring at Harry, studying his face. They were so close… Noses touching… Almost… Lips touching, now… Kissing… Ginny’s arms wrapping themselves around Harry’s neck… His hands on her waist… Tongues entwining… All of a sudden, his hands were on her arms, pushing her away, shaking his head. Her eyes showed confusion, anger, hurt.
“No… Ginny, stop it… We can’t!”
Ginny let out a small groan. “Wh-hy?” She hated how whiney she sounded.
“You know why. The same reason we broke up at the end of the term,” Harry answered.
“Look, Harry, I will do whatever I can to persuade you, you know I will! You just tell me reasons we can’t be together and I’ll tell you why we can!”
“Voldemort,” Harry was surprised that Ginny didn’t flinch at the name, but continued. “Will use our relationship to get to me!”
“For Gods sake, Harry, get it through your thick head! I DON'T CARE! He’ll use me anyway! He’s not stupid, he knows what we feel for each other, even just as friends and he used me before! I’ve got as much a chance of being hurt as Ron and Hermione, and everyone else who knows you, has! Merlin Harry, just listen to me,” Ginny paused, before finishing, barely audibly, with, “Let me love you… Please.”
Harry stared into her eyes, and for once, had nothing to argue back about. However much he wanted to protect her, she was right. Everyone he knew was in as much danger as her, but for some reason he hadn’t been able to realise that. Ginny leaned forward again, searching his green eyes for any sign of anger or resentment. She found none. Her eyes flicked to his lips once before she kissed his again, more forcefully than last time. The two wrapped their arms around each other tightly, deepening the kiss. After a couple of minutes of frantic, rather lustful kissing, “ as if they were never going to see each other again “ Harry pulled away, whispering, “I’ll never leave you, I promise…”
Harry suddenly saw something moving in the far corner of his eye; it was rather large, and seemed to be coming closer. He untangled himself from Ginny and peered into the dark sky.
“What in good Merlin’s name is that?”
Ginny looked up, and stared at the object for a while, before muttering, “Is that-? No, it can’t be… Oh my God, it is!”
Harry looked at her blankly. “What?”
“Look at closer, really look, it has wings!”
And it had. He was sure that he had seen something similar to this before, in their fourth year. His thoughts were confirmed as it got even closer, and he could hear the steady beat of around six large pairs of wings. It was Madame Maxime’s six giant, winged horses, pulling the huge carriage which, Harry supposed, was carrying her and Hagrid. The carriage, which had been descending a little more every second, eventually landed on the ground. There was a small silence, before the doors were opened, and out strode Madame Maxime, Hagrid, Fleur, Bill “ holding a broomstick “ and finally, last of all, Viktor Krum.