A/N: Yes everyone, I'm back to torture you with another one of my stories. Well, you have to decide if that is a good thing or not, cause I have no idea. Anyway, back to the story. Hope you all enjoy it amazingly, and please let me know what you think by reviewing loads and loads!

Summary: It is the Golden Trio's seventh year, and things are looking dark. The war looms over everything and the prospects are not good. Although Harry appears to have dealt with the death of his godfather, Sirius, well enough, it seems that he is now seeking comfort in his longstanding friend Hermione. Ron also seems to have finally found that he has feelings for 'Mione, and this sparks a rivalry between him and Harry. On the sidelines, Ginny finds herself falling for Draco Malfoy, but is he truly in love with her or only using her? Love is in the air…but so is hate.

Rating: R for some language, possibly a bit of violence and some sexually explicit scenes later on. (Come on, we all know that that's the only reason you people read these stories joke)

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, Hogwarts or any of the characters/places/animals/plants/minerals ect that you recognize in this story. If I did, I would be the richest woman in the world, and guess what, I'm not. So, before you try and sue me, I might also add that I do not make ANY money out of this story whatsoever (darn!). Yep, that's about it. Don't own it, don't benefit from it.

Tarnished Gold

Chapter 1:

Ginny reveals all

I sigh and flop down on my bed, feeling the mattress give way slightly beneath my body. As much as I love summer holidays, I am very relieved to be back at Hogwarts. After everything that happened the last two years, life is just not quite what it used to be.

My parents try to hide the fact that they are worried from me, but they seem to have missed the fact that I am not deaf or blind. I see the lines of worry that are permanently etched in my mother's face; I see the fatigue in my father's eyes, and many nights I have hear them snapping at each other without meaning to. Some nights I can swear that my mom cries more than once – over different reasons.

Bill and Charlie are also worried, although they share just as little of it with me as my parents do. Things are not looking good for the Order, after Sirius's death and all, with most people feeling so gloomy that it is hard for them to get out of bed.

The last year has seen a dramatic rise in Death Eater activity, although no more sightings of Voldemort (yes, I do say his name without flinching. Harry and 'Mione have rubbed off on me) have been confirmed, and he even seemed to give up on his favorite hobby of trying to kill Harry at the end of the year. Given, the public is now very aware of the situation - much more so, we are assured – than they had been during the First War.

Amazingly enough though, many idiots still flock to his banner, as our inside sources have revealed to us that as many as four witches and wizards join the ranks of the Death Eaters each month, and then it is still only a rough estimation.

The Order, however, does not have such luck. Although no-one who isn't completely evil wants to allow Voldemort too much power, there seems to be certain reluctance amongst the wizarding community to join the Order and take the risk of drawing the Death Eater's ire.

Yet all is not lost, we have had several successes during the years, the most note-worthy of these being our treaty with the goblins. It took some time, but we finally convinced them that it would be worse for them to ally with Voldemort than with us. They are still somewhat uncertain – I mean, they have been abused by the wizards for how long, of course they are going to have doubts – but Dumbledore seems convinced that the treaty will hold.

Lucius Malfoy and his cronies had managed to break out of Azkaban shortly after they were imprisoned, but thanks to a phenomenal effort from all the members of the Order, Malfoy and his cronies Crabbe, Goyle, Rookwood and Macnair were recapture and moved to a 'safer' compound, wherever that may be. As small a dent as it may be, it is these tiny pinpricks of light that keep our spirits up.

Besides, being able to give Malfoy Junior a hard time about the fact was is just one of the small pleasures that I derive from my association with the Order of the Phoenix, and this is a pleasure I fully intend to use. He's been spitting empty threats at us ever since his father was first captured, but it was only after his father escaped in the middle of last year that he became really nasty. Now the tables are turned again, and it will be very interesting to see how Malfoy behaves now that daddy dearest has been in jail for the past two weeks.

I know, I'm being evil, but really, Malfoy is such an unbelievable ingrate. I still find it very hard to believe that he became Head Boy, I mean, his father is in jail for being a Death Eater, for Merlin's sake! But, I will content myself with the fact that Dumbledore has some grand scheme behind it all. Who am I to question the Headmaster?

School hasn't even really begun and Malfoy and Ron are already at each other's throats again. Although, now that I think on it, the encounter they had today was actually very amusing. I don't mean that it is side-splitting funny that Malfoy throws empty threats, but what made the encounter worth-while, was the fact that rivalry between Harry and Ron became apparent again. They were almost falling over each other trying to impress Hermione by thinking up the worst insults. I swear they were about a fingernail's breath from cursing our Death Eater Head Boy into next week Friday.

It was during summer break when it first began. For some unexplainable reason my brother and his best friend started noticing that there is more to Hermione Granger than just brains. Of course, it is not that she has changed so much; her hair is still fizzy and apart from the normal changes that come to all teenage girls, nothing has changed in her. There were no amazing over-night change into a sex-goddess, no miracle make-overs, and no attitude changes to warrant the sudden infatuation that my dearest brother and Harry displays for Hermione.

Not that she is in any way aware of the fact that she has two Gryffindor guys panting after her, quite frankly I don't think she's thought of anything except how she is going to change and improve Hogwarts now that she is Head Girl. And not to mention trying to take this ridiculous SPEW thing further. She seems to have taken the treaty with the goblins as a sure-fire guarantee that people would be more open to liberating house-elves.

I snort at the thought. As much as I love Hermione, I can't see why she wastes her time – and her energy – on such a useless little endeavor. Perhaps she should rather turn her thoughts to the thinly veiled hostility between her two best friends.

Perhaps if the two started sticking body parts into food for her she might notice, although that is a rather long shot. The fact that Hermione and Malfoy will be sharing dormitory for the entire year can't be easy on them. Shame, poor deluded little mongrels. Serves them right for taking so long to figure out that our little 'Mione is a girl, and a very nice one at that.

Ron wants me to help him 'get her' but I refuse to. I'm on Hermione's side in this one, let her decide what she wants to do. I refuse to get in the middle of this.