As the rain seeped through the cracks into a hidden barrel, a girl's cramped figure sat in it as she waited for something, anything to happen. Being a stowaway isn't easy, especially when it's on your uncle's ship.
Wondering when her barrel would finally be put back upright, and shivering at the cold oncoming deluge, the rebel still stayed hidden. Suddenly, the barrel top slipped, leaving the girl half exposed. She quickly snatched the lid and shoved it back on, but not without catching a glimpse of another girl clad in an array of variegated scraps of clothing that somehow made a dress. The brown-eyed girl stared at her, willing her to come out of the barrel. The secret passenger stayed put and resisted the urge to jump out of the barrel and run to the girl staring at her as fast as humanly possible.
Skipping dinner, or the scraps that would have served as her dinner that night, the girl stayed hidden in her barrel once more, trembling with fear. She tried not to breathe as she heard approaching voices, but when the barrel was placed upright, she groaned.
"What was 'at?" whispered a sailor. "Sound' like stowaway to me."
Sensing the sailor's arms reaching towards the lid to the barrel, the girl pushed open the top, jumped out, and sprinted away. She did not know the ship, as she had spent the past two weeks in a barrel, only sneaking out to search for food by night. However, in her excursions to the outside world, the girl had noticed a few loose floorboards next to a door that seemed to be a cabin's. Whipping down the hallways and attracting more than a few confused looks, she arrived at the cabin. She tore off the floorboards, leaped into the hole and, with just her toes touching the ground, returned the floorboards to their spot, just in time. Shuffling footsteps could be heard as the perplexed sailor looked around.
Sighing with relief in the absolute darkness, the intruder once again felt hands reaching for her. Jumping back in surprise, she was caught by two rough hands owned by a person who smelled like they hadn't showered in weeks. Then again, who was she to judge?
"Hermione, there's been a mutiny aboard the Angel's Curse." whispered a man.
"How do you know my name?!"
"It's me, Rolf. Your uncle."
"Uncle? How can this be? You are the most beloved captain of all, and this ship has been afloat but 2 weeks!"
"You must learn, my sweet Hermione. The natural man is greedy, possessive and gluttonous. People want power, and it doesn't take long for them to unite against the person above them in the hierarchy."
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Rain strong enough to knock down trees fell outside Ginny's window. The harsh storm rattled her windows and woke her up while it stampeded throughout the small town of which her father was head.
What a strange dream she had dreamed! A girl named Hermione was on a ship that her uncle owned but the sailors had rebelled for no reason! She had been a stowaway on the ship. Why? Well, that was a good thing to think about when she was falling asleep that night. Maybe she would have the same dream again.
Ginny sat up in her pink goose-feather bed as the maid came to light the fire in Jane's fireplace.
"No need," said Ginny, "I'm just going down to breakfast." The maid looked pallid, as if she had seen a ghost. When would these servants learn that she meant them no harm? Would they ever? Ginny highly doubted that.
Later, when Ginny was eating breakfast with her family in their great dining hall with gold plates and silverware, she talked about her dream.
"... out of the barrel and found her uncle, but he told her there had been mutiny on the ship, Devil's Curse. Angel's Curse? I don't remember."
"That's the thing," said her mother, "We don't always remember our dreams."
"That is not true," said Ginny, boiling with anger. I will remember this one forever. It was Angel's curse, I tell you. Angel's Curse."
Ginny's grandma leaned over and whispered to Ginny that she needed Ginny to meet her in 15 minutes on the balcony for something very important. Ginny assumed that someone she had met as a baby had died and that she was supposed to act all sad and jaded. But something she didn't expect happened.
"Ginny, your dream. It was not a dream at all. It was a gift, a revelation… a vision."
Ginny laughed out loud before looking at her grandmother's face and realizing that she was dead serious.
"No way, grandma! Visions are a thing of magicians and prophets. I could not have such a thing as that!"
"You will learn, Ginny. I know you don't believe me now, but let me tell you this: When you are having dreams about a girl that you've never met every night, come find me. You will wish you never doubted me again!"
Ginny slowly backed away until her back hit the door. Slowly creeping her hand towards the handle, Ginny found it and quickly left her grandma to her crazy rage. Ginny was so ecstatic to not be aging in this moment. Her grandmother's sanity was running thin.