A/N: Redsbury here. Welcome to the first story by the Forgotten Souls of Hogwarts! This story has been a long time in the making (entirely my fault), but hopefully it'll be worth it. Just to let you know, ronsfavfan18 and I will be alternating the authorship of each chapter; this chapter is by me, so the next one will be by ronsfavfan18. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: You must have been living under a rock for a very long time if you think anyone besides J.K. Rowling owns Harry Potter. That's not to say we wouldn't like to…

Thorns of Remembrance

"Mr. Weasley! Wake up. You must wake up, Mr. Weasley. Ronald Weasley!" The woman's voice was firm, yet Ron slept on, slumped over one of the tables in the Great Hall. His red hair gleamed in the ring of candles that had been lit around him. Deep within him, something refused to yield to the unknown woman.

"We must hurry," another voice--a man's, it sounded like--urged. He sounded very impatient.

The woman sighed in frustration. "I'm doing the best I can here. You're not much of a help, you know."

"But I--"

"Shh. Just be quiet, will you? I have an idea." She paused. "Ronald Weasley, if you do not wake up this minute I shall be forced to contact your mother!"

That did it--it was definitely time to leave his slumbering peace behind. Before fully opening his eyes, Ron raised his head slowly from the wooden table. The smoke from the candles blurred his vision. Was that their purpose? To prevent him from seeing the two people he had heard? It certainly seemed so, he thought dumbly as a pair of hands forced his head back roughly and the tip of a wand was placed against his forehead. He didn't even have time to recognize the spell that was said before a white explosion seemed to jar his very soul.

"Ronald Weasley!"

"I'm 'wake," came the mumbled reply.

"You've said that three times now."

Ron's eyes shot open. "Mum?" he asked incredulously. "But what're you doing here?" He looked around at the room he was in…it was familiar, but different at the same time. It certainly felt like his room, except that it seemed both bigger and nicer than he ever remembered it being. Could he be dreaming?

Mrs. Weasley swung open the bedroom door. She was definitely angry, Ron noticed with a grimace. "I should be the one asking you what you're doing here!" she yelled. "If you don't come downstairs right now, you're not going to have time for breakfast before school. And I'll not have you fainting just because you haven't eaten all day."

"I wouldn't faint, Mum," Ron said, blushing slightly. "I'm not a girl."

"Yes you are," someone said from the doorway. Ron looked just in time to see Ginny's retreating back.

He scrambled out of bed and pushed past his mother, despite her protests. "Wait!" he called to his sister. She stopped at the top of the stairs and turned around. "Ginny, what are we doing here? This isn't the Burrow."

"The what?"

"The Burrow…you know, our house? Where we've always lived?"

Ginny's face remained expressionless. "I don't know what you're talking about." Ron could tell from her eyes that she really meant it.

"Then what about Pig?" She raised her eyebrows. "Pigwidgeon?"

"Are you feeling okay? You're not making any sense today, Ron."

"Pig the owl!"

"A pig's an owl?"

"No! Pig was our owl! And Hermes and Errol, too. And there was Scabbers, but he turned out to be a man instead of a rat."

Ginny stared at him in disbelief. "What on earth are you talking about, Ron?"

This had to be a joke of some sort. Well, it wasn't funny. Ron walked past her and down the stairs. He seemed to know his way to the kitchen, even though he wasn't certain that he had ever been in the house before. What he saw there made him stop dead in his tracks. A boy a few years older than him was sitting at the table, eating cereal. He was dressed completely in black, and his hair was dyed to match; he had piercings in his ears, eyebrow, and lip. No, it couldn't be… "Bloody hell. Percy?"

The boy looked up, milk dribbling down his chin. He wiped it off with the back of his hand. "Yeah?" he said. He was even wearing eyeliner! Ron sat down in the chair directly across from him, not knowing what to say. Luckily, he didn't have to say anything.

As if Percy wasn't enough, Fred and George entered the kitchen, wearing matching business suits and carrying briefcases. "We're leaving for work now," George said. He glanced over at Ron. "Hadn't you better be leaving, too? You don't want to be late." That was a good idea; Ron didn't know how much more of this he could take. He dashed up the stairs and back into his bedroom.

The biggest indication that something was horribly amiss was when Ron opened his dresser drawer to find it crammed full with t-shirts, all of them decorated…with spiders. The poor boy almost started to cry. What was going on?

A/N: Please let us know what you think! It's up to ronsfavfan18 to continue…