A/N: Sorry for the SERIOUSLY long wait, my friends! I'm sure some of you wondered if this story was dead from time to time, and I'm not gonna lie…I wondered that myself occasionally. But it was always my intention to finish it, come hell or high water (or, as the case may be, an English degree and new fandoms), and finished it is!! Some of you may not like the ending. I'm prepared for that, and I have been all along, because this was always the end I had planned. Bittersweet, just like I like 'em. :D Hope this is angsty enough for ya, Moony my (best) friend.

. . .

Epilogue

Lucius and Ginny were married in a discreet ceremony at the end of the summer. It was a glorious summer; full of shimmering sunlight and striking sunsets, bright green foliage and misty mornings, with less rain than usual.

Ginny's happiness at becoming the legitimate mistress of Malfoy Manor was eclipsed by her family's reactions, however. Hermione still loved her, and Fleur, who didn't understand the Weasley hatred of all things Malfoy, promised to bring Bill around, but Ron and the twins were angry, and Mr. Weasley couldn't even look at his daughter. She had broken his heart.

Ginny didn't want to know what Harry thought. He was mercifully absent from the proceedings.

News traveled fast around the wizarding world. It didn't take a month before Ginny was addressed as "Mrs. Malfoy" without prompting by attending shop assistants and old acquaintances in Diagon Alley. Yet, as much pleasure as her new title gave her, Ginny noticed something strange about the way people treated her.

There was a reserve between her and everyone she met, something she was not used to with her usually friendly and outgoing personality. She had not expected people to react positively to her marriage to Lucius Malfoy, but the reality was far worse than her expectations. She was considered a traitor by many. Sometimes she heard whispers before she entered a room, whispers of what she had "done" to Harry Potter, the savior of the wizarding world…

It was too much to bear. So she ignored it. It didn't take the new Mrs. Malfoy long to learn to hold her head up high, ignore the talk and turn up her nose at anyone who dared to accuse her of anything. Some people began saying there was really no difference between Ginny and the old Mrs. Malfoy.

The marriage was pleasant enough for Lucius, however. He was more accepted in polite society than he had been in years, and he had long ago learned to tune out the whispers and gossip of others and sneer in the face of open contempt. People said he had done something to the Weasley girl, something horrible perhaps, to make her marry him. At the very least, they assumed he had somehow slipped her a love potion. How else could the strange union have happened?

. . .

Lucius and Ginny had two sons; Septimius, the elder, who was tall and blond and very much like his father, and Alonso, the younger one, who had strawberry blond hair and mostly reminded Ginny of her brother Percy, but had rare moments when she almost saw Fred and George in him.

Septimius was predictably in Slytherin, and he did well winning friends and comrades. Ginny loved him of course, but he belonged to his father. Alonso, however, was placed in Ravenclaw, and Ginny loved him with a fierce pride that eclipsed everything else in the life she had made for herself.

Alonso was accepted into the Weasley home in a way Septimius, Lucius, and even Ginny herself would never be. Perhaps this made up for the difficulty in which Alonso carved a niche for himself in Ravenclaw. Even though the war with Voldemort was long over, it was still difficult for anyone bearing the Malfoy name to make friends outside of Slytherin house. When he reached fourteen, Alonso tried out for the Ravenclaw Quidditch team and scored the position of seeker, which did much to advance his social status among his housemates. When he graduated from Hogwarts and began a career at the ministry, Ginny cried tears of joy and pride.

. . .

A little over twenty years from Lucius's proposal, Ginny admitted him to St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies. His heart was weak – the years in Azkaban coupled with intensive torture by the cruciatus curse at the hands of Voldemort had weakened Lucius's heart beyond even the craft of the St. Mungo's healers.

"He doesn't have long," a sympathetic nurse told Ginny. There were long hours spent in the quiet hospital room, listening to the sound of rain on the windows mixed with Lucius' slow breathing. Sometimes Ginny held his hand, sometimes she read to him and sometimes she just sat and watched him, but she was always with him, afraid she would miss his last breath.

"You were so beautiful," he whispered one evening, "The day you came to me." She gently stroked his hand, smiling down at him.

"You teased me about being at the mercy of a strange man," she recalled.

"I never expected to keep you all these years," said the wizard. "But I am certainly not sorry I did."

Ginny leaned in closer, lowering her voice. "You did though, didn't you? You did want to keep me that first day." She continued stroking his hand. "Over the years I have realized my coming to you wasn't an accident. You always had some plan. What was it? To get even with my father? I don't know. I don't even care anymore. But…it was a plan, wasn't it?"

Lucius was silent for a moment.

"Yes," he said hoarsely. "But what of it? We have two sons. We spent more than twenty years together. Does it matter anymore?"

Ginny sighed, and smiled a bitter smile. "No my dear, it doesn't matter at all." She stroked his hand until he fell asleep.

. . .

A few days later Lucius passed away. The day of his funeral dawned cold and grey, a light rain falling like slow tears from the clouds overhead. Only a few people attended; Ginny, Alonso, Septimius, Hermione, Bill and Fleur, Severus Snape, and a few wizards from the ministry. One by one, each guest hugged Ginny or shook her hand and told her how sorry they were for her loss.

She met their gazes through wet eyelashes and thanked them quietly.

As they she left the graveyard, Ginny looked back at Lucius' grave one last time.

For the first time in twenty years, she was free.

THE END

Closing note: Thank you, everyone, who read and reviewed this fic!! You rock! Now that it's finally finished, I will be editing it and cleaning it up to my satisfaction, but it will stay more or less the same. Thanks for sticking with me. 