Blaise and Draco were momentarily caught off guard at Ginny's comments; they had been discussing what to do about her if she didn't wake soon—and it looked to them like she wasn't going to.
Ginny saw them both visibly jump when she spoke and couldn't help but smile.
"We couldn't break the Charm on the Restricted Section—"
"Yeah, what spell d'you use on that door, anyway?" interrupted Blaise.
"Never mind that, now. You, young lady, are going to eat." Stated Draco sternly.
Ginny giggled. "You sound like my parents!"
Blaise was also sniggering.
Ginny was still vaguely tuned into Draco's feelings; she now discovered that she was also understanding Blaise better as well.
Draco opened his mouth to tell her that stalling wasn't going to help her, but she held up her hands and said, "I'm famished, any pot roast in there?"
The boys sat and marveled as they watched Ginny gobble down every last crumb on the plate in record time.
How could someone so small eat so much? They wondered.
"What?"
The boys shook their heads.
"Growing up with six older brothers with their friends around all the time you've gotta pick up a few less than desirable habits." Ginny stated, rolling her eyes.
Blaise held up his hands in mock surrender, "Hey, I didn't say a word!"
To this Ginny just rolled her eyes again and said, "Is there any dessert?"
After polishing off a few sweets that Draco and Blaise had conjured for her Ginny sat back content and a little sleepy. It seemed that her perpetual cross mood was wearing off and she was having a right nice little chat with the boys about quidditch.
The conversation settled into a companionable silence and Blaise glanced at his watch.
"Yowza!" he exclaimed—this, understandably, drew incredulous looks from Ginny and Draco.
"It's almost midnight." He said a bit sheepishly.
Ginny arched a brow.
"What?! I learned from you!"
"I didn't think that you took that much notice of my speech patterns prior to this afternoon."
"It is a bit of an unusual word." Commented Draco.
"I suppose so; I never much thought it over."
"Where did you happen to pick it up, anyway?" asked Blaise.
"Comic books." She replied.
"Pardon?" coughed Draco, rather politely, he thought.
"Comic books," Ginny repeated. "Vintage Superman, Batman, Bazooka Joe, X-Men, Spiderman…?"
Blaise and Draco looked even more confused.
Ginny sighed attempting to rise to the challenge of explaining comic books to the obviously misinformed boys.
A brainwave struck her, shifting the covers and getting of the bed she jerked her head and said, "Follow me."
She led them to the Restricted Section.
As Blaise and Draco followed Ginny inside the first thing they noticed was that it was bigger than they remembered it; the second thing was that it was turned into a bedroom, of sorts.
Ginny led them to a small bookshelf that they had not previously noticed, but looked right at home with all the wrought-iron and mahogany bookshelves originally in the Restricted Section.
Draco looked inquiringly at her, "Was that here before?"
Ginny smiled, a little mischievously it must be said, but nothing that someone who didn't know her extremely well would ever be able to detect, "No. It was not."
She pulled a few thin volumes from the shelf and began explaining the finer points between Graphic Novels and Comic books, and instilling in them a secret history of the materials.
Sometime later Ginny was curled up on her bed floating between sleep and wakefulness. She heard it begin to rain gently. And thunder grumbled in the distance, followed in quick succession by lightning, driving winds, and the rain beating more violently against the windows.
Then she drifted closer to sleep; the storm outside lulling her.
The dream room didn't look quite the same. Its whole ambiance had changed; it was more dangerous, somehow, than before. Maybe the moon and stars didn't shine quite as brightly in the night sky as before and now had a distinct red cast to them. Or maybe it was that the light breeze always present before had become angrier. Or maybe it was that the shadows were darker and more sinister. Maybe it was all of these things, she didn't know, but things were definitely more ominous.
The cold, angry breeze picked up more and became a wind. Her hair streaming behind her she gazed out the window and tried to figure out why things had changed and what was going on, in general, in her life. She knew that the prophecy that she'd heard when she'd been reliving critical moments from her life (even if she was still in the womb she was still alive) had something to do with what was going on now. At least, she thought it did.
She suddenly became aware of hard breathing on her neck, hot and moist, making her shiver.
Anger—no, fury, she could sense fury it filled the room with stifling heat. For a moment she was caught off guard and allowed herself to be afraid, but the moment soon passed and she was again in control.
Ginny turned to gaze at Tom. "I," he said very carefully controlling his fury, "was, not, fin-ish-ed earlier."
She arched an eyebrow at him, waiting for him to elaborate, he did not.
Producing the ruby chalice he proffered it to her, rather forcefully, she thought.
When she did not instantly grab it he stepped closer to her and brought the edge of the glass to her lips, pressing hard, forcing her to drink.
A.N. I know it's been forever since I've updated and this chapter doesn't at all reflect the time spent writing it, but look on the bright side: At least I finally updated! Maybe more will follow soon.