Birth of a Name Challenge by selenehekate.

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.

Violets

Ginny wandered around the Chamber, looking around for anything that could possibly relieve her boredom. She had been here for around two or three years now, trapped inside of Tom's world. There really wasn't much to do, but she had managed to make friends with the basilisk after finding a translating charm in the library. She was starting to turn into a Ravenclaw with how often she was in there, looking for some sort of way out, or anything to do, really. However, it seemed that only the heir could know the alternate routes out, since as soon as Ginny thought she found something, it was gone. But, she had managed to become quite good at magic, much more advanced than she would have been if she was still attending Hogwarts.

As she mused, she noticed that her feet were leading her to the library's direction again. Time to see what else she could find. Ginny looked around and found a shelf that she hadn't looked through yet. She pulled out one of the books on it and saw that it was a combination of transfiguration and charms. She hadn't updated herself on those for about a week, so might as well go through it and see if there was anything useful.

Conjuring a clock. That would only show her how slowly time was passing, but she would probably try it for the heck of it later. Conjuring a book. A fiction book would be absolutely amazing, since there were virtually none in the library. Ginny attempted the spell, coming up with a few pages, but not much. She tried again, and got more pages. When she attempted for the third time, she got a leather cover, but with nothing on the inside. She stuck her extra pages in there. Ginny decided to try the spell two more times before giving up and she was rewarded with a book.

She eagerly opened the cover, only to find the pages inside blank. Well, maybe it would be good to have a diary that didn't try to take your soul. Ginny set the diary aside, and returned to the spell book.

Conjuring soap. Yes please! Tom might have managed to find showers in the Chamber, but that didn't mean he was going to give her soap or any of the like, or even tell her what the spell was.

Ginny excitedly tried the spell and found herself with a little chip of rock. Definitely not what she was wanting. She reread the spell and wand motion and tried it again and ended up with a chip of soap this time. The third try was the charm (very punny, Ginny remarked to herself) and she ended up with a normal sized bar of soap. She set it aside next to the diary and other stuff.

After doing this for quite a few other objects, Ginny got bored and flipped to the charms section.

Very powerful cheering charm. Ha! No. Change your voice to animal sounds. That was pointless, but could be entertaining at some point. Change the color of something. Ridiculously simple…

She quickly got bored of doing that and flipped to a random page. Pregnancy test charm. Why not?

She performed the spell, and received a ….positive. Shaking her head, she told herself it must have been a mistake in the charm. So, she performed it again and was shocked to see it end up positive again. Just to make sure she wasn't having a dream, she pinched herself hard. Ouch. She definitely wasn't in a dream. Ginny tried the spell one last time in desperation and still came up pregnant.

This could present a problem. It was time to find Tom and inform him.

She walked out of the library, calling out as loudly as she could, "TOM! TOOOOM! WHERE ARE YOU? TOM!"

When Ginny received no response, she stormed furiously into his bedroom, "TOM! WAKE UP!"

He slowly stirred, opening his eyes and stretching out his arms, "Is something the matter, Ginny?"

"Yes, something is bloody the matter! I found a charm that tested pregnancy and I tried it three times and all three times it told me I was bloody pregnant!"

Tom frowned for a second, "I'm sorry, I don't think I heard you right. Did you just say you were pregnant?"

"Yes! I am pregnant!" Ginny's shout was starting to be a little less loud.

"Give me your wand," Tom commanded.

Ginny glared in response, "No."

"Ginny, give me your wand," he started using his silky voice and manipulation skills.

Quickly recognizing it, Ginny handed her wand over, "Be quick about it, I want my wand back."

Tom didn't reply to her, instead casting a spell that was nearly the same as the one Ginny had used earlier, but was still slightly different. His eyes widened as he received his results, "You really are pregnant. Shit."

"Tom! There is no reason to be using language like that!" Ginny scolded.

"Hypocritical much?" Tom asked with an eyebrow raised.

Ginny mumbled, "Shut up."

Tom used another spell, "It appears that the child is a girl."

Ginny was about to retort but decided to stop and think for a second. She was going to have a baby girl. She was a teen mom going to have a little girl, "Um can you find out when it's- I mean she's- due?"

Tom nodded, and used yet another spell. Where had he found all of those anyways? Oh well.

"You are two months into the pregnancy. How did you not notice you were pregnant sooner? Especially considering you have what I believe is called a 'baby bump'."

Ginny shrugged, "I thought that it was me putting on weight."

"You were putting on weight when you only have three meals a day?" Tom asked skeptically.

"It was the only logical solution!" Ginny defended herself.

"Well, anyhow, you are two months pregnant, which means that you'll have the baby in seven months."

"I KNOW, Tom, I'm not stupid!"

"It seems that way quite often."

Ginny ignored him, "Where and with whom am I going to have the baby?"

"Here and with me, naturally."

"What? No! I need a mediwitch! Or a healer! Or something of the sort, I don't want my baby to die before it has the chance to live!"

"You really think I would kill my own heir?" Tom asked her, a little softly.

"Well, ye-" But when Ginny actually stopped to think about it, he really wouldn't, "No. I guess you wouldn't. But could you please bring a mediwitch in when I actually do give birth?"

"We'll see," Tom replied, slightly amused.

~*VIOLETS*~

Two months later, Ginny was as bored as ever, even with her baby to sing to and rub her tummy. She wondered when her daughter would start to kick, surely it would be soon. But, for now, it was time to relieve her boredom.

"Tooooom! I'm booooored!" Ginny called as she started looking for him.

When there was, again, no answer, she went to his room and started talking loudly, "Hey Tom you should wake up now!" Tom showed no change, still sleeping, "Tooooooooom I'm booooooooooored…." He rolled over, but otherwise nothing happened.

Ginny decided to try a different approach. She walked up to him and started whispering in his ear, "Tom, Ginny thinks you should wake up. Tom, Ginny wants something to do," Shockingly enough, he started to stir, "Ginny wants something to eat. Ginny wants steak. Nice juicy steak."

"Ask the basilisk to get you something…" Tom muttered, still clearly asleep.

"She said it was your turn to do the hunting," Ginny continued to whisper, "Ginny wants a nice big juicy steak with lettuce garnishes on the side. And some fruit juice."

Tom slowly started to sit up. He noticed Ginny next to him. Her wand had fallen out of her pocket, so he picked it up and performed a quick tempus spell.

"Ginny, why'd you wake me up, it's three in the morning…" he muttered groggily.

"I was bored."

"Why are you even up at three in the morning?"

"Little baby here woke me up."

"And now you want steak and Gratia is refusing to go out and hunt something?"

"Yup, pretty much!"

Tom shook his head in disbelief, "You do realize that at three in the morning it isn't likely that a restaurant that serves steak will be open?"

"It doesn't matter, get me one from a store! Muggle stores should be open right now!"

"I am NOT going to anything muggle. Besides, I don't have any muggle money…"

"Convert it at Gringotts! Pleeeeease Tom?" Ginny tried making puppy eyes at him.

Tom rolled his eyes, but finally consented, "Fine. Let me change and I'll be back in probably half an hour."

"Yaaaay!" Ginny tried to skip out of the room, but failed after a couple steps so walked out instead, "You hear that, baby? We're getting steak!"

~*VIOLETS*~

Another two months later, Ginny was still bored. She could feel her baby kicking now, and it sent shivers down her spine. It was amazing and her little baby was amazing too. But, that didn't change the fact that she was bored and right now Tom was away.

She decided to get the book and do the animal noises spell.

The first one that she ended up sounding like was a lion, roaring loudly. This had the unfortunate effect of bringing Gratia out of her nest and hissing loudly. Ginny quickly used the translating spell and told her not to worry. The basilisk didn't seem happy about it.

She had gone through several more animals, amusing herself, the baby, and even Gratia with a few when Tom finally returned.

"Tommy!" Ginny cried happily, "It's so great that you're home!"

"My name is not Tommy. You really are bored, aren't you?"

"Yes! I am very bored. But listen to this for a second!"

Ginny performed the spell and this time sounded like a platypus, making some weird noise.

Tom shook his head in amusement, before handing her a few coloring books and a pack of markers.

"Oh my God you are the best Tom!" Ginny stood up and quickly hugged Tom before he got away.

"I also had got you some steak if you are going to get off me…" Tom said cautiously, trying to pry Ginny away.

"You have steak? Where, where, where?" Ginny looked around eagerly, and Tom handed her a box with a still warm steak dinner from a fine restaurant in it.

"I love you!"

Tom stiffened, "What?"

"Oh, come on Tom, surely you're used to people giving you declarations of love?" Ginny said through a bite of steak.

"Normally when that happened, it wasn't in a situation like this."

"Well, I still love you."

~*VIOLETS*~

Ginny was eight months pregnant, and huge. She finally had an idea of how to alleviate her boredom for now.

"Hey Tooom?"

Tom looked up, exasperated, from where he had been sitting, reading a book on pregnancy, "Yes, Ginny?"

"You know, I'm eight months pregnant and we still haven't talked about names yet."

Tom groaned quietly, but got up and conjured a comfy chair to sit next to Ginny in, "What ideas for names did you have?"

"I wasn't really sure, that's why I was asking you…" Ginny reversed it back to him.

"I suppose I would like to name her after some sort of flower. They are very beautiful, yet easily destroyed."

Ginny stared at him in shock, "Did I really just here Tom Riddle call something beautiful?"

Tom sighed, "Yes, you did. Now, do you agree to the flower name? Good."

Ginny couldn't help but let out a little laugh, "Okay, let's brainstorm some flower names! Rose, Lily-"

"No. From what you told me, that's Harry's mother's name and I don't want to be constantly reminded of him."

Ginny continued as if she hadn't heard, "Zinnia, Poppy, Tulip, Lilac, Iris, Blossom, Marigold, Juniper, and Laurel."

Tom blinked, "That's quite a list already. Were you looking up names earlier?"

"Hey, I got bored, okay? There isn't much left to do in a chamber after you've been here for years and the only thing remotely entertaining is the library, which happens to have a book with a list of flowers."

"Did you like ALL of those names?"

"Well, my favorites are Rose, Laurel, and Iris."

"Rose Laurel. Rose Iris. Laurel Rose. Laurel Iris. Iris Rose. Iris Laurel," Tom tried out the combinations of names, "I rather like Iris Rose and Rose Laurel."

"Well, I like all combinations of the names so we can decide between one of those two once she's born. You hear that little child? Your name's either going to be Iris Rose or Rose Laurel!" Ginny told her belly, rubbing it gently.

For the first time, Tom asked, "May I feel her?"

Ginny looked up, startled at first, but then beamed at him, "Of course!"

She took his hand and guided it onto her tummy. Just then, the little girl decided to kick.

"She kicked for you, Tom! She must recognize that you're her dad."

"She must," Tom echoed softly, rubbing his hand ever so slightly against her belly.

~*VIOLETS*~

One month later and it was finally time for Ginny to give birth.

She felt something wet slide down her leg, and she realized her water had broke.

"Tom? Tom? I think I'm going into labor! Will you PLEASE get a mediwitch now?"

Tom rushed out of the study, "Just sit down for now, and I'll be back."

Ginny rolled her eyes, "Yes, Tom, I know, just go!"

Without another word, he apparated off. Ginny stared incredulously at the place he had been, "You can get out by apparating? Seriously? No wonder he never told me..."

After only a couple of minutes of playing with her seat, Tom was back with a mediwitch who immediately got to work.

After several antagonizing hours of Ginny crushing Tom's hand nearly to death, they could finally see a head and at last her complete body emerged.

Once she was finally out, the first thing that Ginny noticed was a clump of violets growing in the corner of the room. Somehow she had never noticed them and they were the first plants she had seen in a very long time.

Ginny took her child again, and with a smile turned to Tom, "I've decided her name. Hey where'd the mediwitch go?"

Tom mumbled something that sounded suspiciously like "I obliviated her and sent her on her way out."

"Figures," Ginny rolled her eyes, "Well, do you want to know what our child's name is?"

"Of course."

"Violet Laurel Riddle."

"It's perfect."

AN: It took me forever figuring out whether this should be in the past of present. XP I think you can figure out what I decided though. ^^ This was written for The Birth of a Name Challenge by selenehekate on the HPFC forum.

I'm curious for your guy's opinions…which of the four main flower names that I mentioned (Violet, Laurel, Iris and Rose) is your favorite? Mine's Laurel. XD

Thanks for reading, and please review! :D