I'm really late with this, I l know… I have no other excuse then a lot of work, and hope that things are going to improve. So, here is the remainder of second year; and perhaps even the beginning of third year. Not much has changed from Canon yet, but that will come when it'll come. For now, enjoy!
Silence rung in their ears after Riddle disappeared. Harry breathed a sigh of relief, releasing the tension in his shoulder. It had been quite the year, and this conclusion had been quite… unnerving. He picked up his wand from where Riddle had stood, and noticed that Jane was already looking over Ginny. He quickly joined them.
"I'd expect she would wake as soon as he had disappeared, but she didn't.", Jane hastily explained, kneeling beside the still unconscious eleven-years-old. Harry knelt beside them. "Her pulse is weak but steady; her breathing too low to my liking. All in all-", she interrupted herself, looking alarmed at Ginny. He saw her stiffen, and felt for a pulse himself – nothing. Jane looked dazed for a moment, but training kicked in and she sprang into action.
"Go get my bag! It's after the second pillar on the left. Now!", she said forcefully, starting CPR. Harry got back onto his feet and quickly collected the bag.
"Give her the injection.", she continued, not looking over. Harry did as she said.
"Okay, watch what I do because you are going to take over. You put your hands together, put them on the chest and press for five centimetres, okay?" Harry nodded. "Taking over in three, two, one, now!", she stopped and stepped back. Harry quickly took over. "Push harder. You need to compress the hart.", she said tonelessly.
"I can't, her ribs-"
"Right now, that doesn't matter. Break them if you must. Push five centimetres." Harry pushed harder, and flinched when he felt ribs break. He continued nonetheless, and watched as Jane gave more injections and some potions. She might never have done it before, except on some kind of doll, but she did it nonetheless. He watched her as she searched through her bag. "Count every time you push, okay? You need to get 60 beats per minute. That's quite fast."
"Harry, how long until the Hospital wing?", she asked quietly.
"At the very best twenty minutes.", he responded, feeling panic bubbling again.
She nodded. "We don't have time…", she said, frowning to herself.
"And St.-Mungo's?", Harry asked.
She shook her head. "By the time we arrive at my place, floo there, explain the situation… They'll just declare her death."
"Isn't she?"
"There's still hope. But not much.", she responded sincerely. "Let me think."
She stayed silent for a while. "My healing powers – maybe I can get her stable enough for travelling. It's the only thing I can think of."
Harry nodded. She placed her hands on Ginny's head. She followed energy levels, smiling to herself. When she hid herself, she placed something between her energy and theirs. Healing was like reshaping deformed energy, and she could see Ginny's was heavily malformed. She closed her eyes and started working, closing everything else off.
Harry watched Jane, having her eyes closed. He took in a sharp breath when a minute or two later, he felt Ginny's heart come back to life, and leaned back. Jane was still pouring energy out to her. He watched her work, looking from Ginny to her, dimly relieved. He felt guilty because he was not more relieved, because he did care, but it was just too much today.
At first, he didn't notice. But then, he saw blood near his right knee. He frowned – he hadn't seen an injury on Ginny, and his injury had been healed. The basilisk blood probably had dried up entirely. That left-
Looking up, he saw that Jane was having a nosebleed. What a strange coincidence, he thought grimly. "Jane?", he tried. No response.
Five minutes later, blood came out of Jane's eyes. "Jane, you need to stop. You are going too far!" Still no response, and Harry cursed under his breath. Taking her arm and shaking it hard, he yelled: "Jane! Stop!". She opened her eyes, and slowly lifted her head. Her eyes were uncomprehending. At that moment, Ginny stirred. They both looked at her in surprise, then Jane fainted dead.
"Jane!", he exclaimed, leaning over to check on her. Now it was her pulse that was weak – but at least stronger then Ginny's had been. Cursing under his breath, he mumbled: "I'm sorry.", before activating her emergency Portkey. She would be so angry for this later... He and Ginny where alone now, in the Chamber. He sighed, leaning to a pillar, feeling completely devoid of energy.
Then, Ginny's eyelashes flustered and she opened her eyes. "Harry?", she asked softly.
"Yes, I'm here. Riddle is dead. It's okay, we're safe now.", he said, giving her a hug and rocking her– a bit awkwardly – back and forth. He felt like crying, but just couldn't. After a while, she calmed down. Harry quickly retrieved the sword and the Sorting hat, and they went on their way back. He stayed a bit behind, looking to the place where he'd seen Jane for the last time.
"I hope you're all right", he mumbled to the now empty room.
They walked on and on, while Harry was thinking about how to get up the pipe again. They could, of course, levitate someone… And that someone would better be him, because Ginny was too distraught to explain anything, and he didn't want to separate her from Ron. Lockheart had probably no memory of anything, and he didn't trust the bumbling fool anyway. He didn't look forward to all the explaining that was bound to come. And who to ask to levitate him, that was another though question… Luckily, it proved unnecessary. Fawkes carried them all up, and based on the way he flew to McGonagall's office, Harry thought he knew who was in there. Lovely, he thought dimly. He gestured for Ron to knock, and they went in.
"Ginny?!", Mrs Weasley asked incredulously, hugging her daughter. Mister Weasley followed suit, while McGonagall had gone starry-eyed and Dumbledore was smiling near the fire, with Fawkes on his shoulder. Before he could say anything else, Mrs. Weasley launched herself on them, thanking them. Harry nearly fell because of her enthusiasm, though he certainly could sympathise. Professor McGonagall seemed to have regained her composure. "What happened?", she said. Then, blinking, she said, sounding alarmed: "Mister Potter, are you injured?!"
"No, this is not my blood, it's the basilisk", Harry quickly and quietly reassured her. But not quite enough, it seemed. "Basilisk?", mister Weasley asked faintly.
"Ah, yes there used to be one in the Chamber.", Harry said vaguely. "Look, I really think madame Pomfrey should take a look at Ginny. It's been horrible for her. I promise I'll explain later on.", Harry said decidedly.
Both Weasley parents nodded, and took their daughter to the infirmary. Harry went on to explain what had happened.
It seemed to have taken hours, but finally Harry had finished. Despite braking so many rules, neither he nor Ron where expelled. There was a feast, Lockheart went to St.-Mungo's and the victims would be revived. After a talk with Dumbledore – it had taken all of Harry's concentration to pretend he was still interested in this – and then a final confrontation with Malfoy, he went on to the feast, meeting Ron on the way.
"How is Ginny?", he asked when he saw his friend.
"Calmed down a bit, glad she isn't expelled, of course. Mum and dad wanted to take her home, but she wanted to wait until the term has finished.", Ron answered. He still looked concerned, and after looking around, he pulled Harry aside in a corner. "You know, madame Pomfrey said she was surprised."
"Oh?", Harry asked with a sense of foreboding.
"With being possessed so long, she had expected that Ginny had weakened considerably. But she was just fine. In fact, she said she had never seen such a healthy patient.", Ron said.
"Well, that's good news.", Harry said, trying to sound pleased. The alarm bells in his head where ringing again.
Ron looked at him for a while. "I don't know how it happened, I don't know how she did it. But thank her for me." Seeing Harry's look of surprise, he added: "It's obvious, isn't it? You don't know enough healing for this, so it must be her. We both know who I mean. Trust me, her secret is safe with me, but she needs to be more careful. If my parents where less distraught, if madame Pomfrey had been less distraught, there would've been a lot of questions. Not that I'm not glad she did it, but she needs to lay low for a while. My parents will connect the dots and so will madame Pomfrey if this happens too often." Harry nodded, then made a split decision.
"I need you to tell the rest that I've gone to see Ginny, okay? I need to do something." Ron looked at him for a while.
"Then why are you still standing here? Move it. You can't stay away to long, Harry."
Harry nodded, and broke off into a run.
He was still out of breath when he reached her house in Hogsmeade. Walking quickly to the fire and flooing to Jane's house in London, where he moved to the Hospital Wing in the basement. He broke off into a run again, running towards Henry's office – she had to be alive, after all she has been through she must be alive, this could not be the end… Then, he spotted Henry, who clearly heard him coming. To Harry's relief, he was smiling brightly.
"How is she?", he asked quickly.
"She just woke up, she's just exhausted; by the time she got here it was nothing a good night's rest won't cure.", Henry replied reassuringly.
"That's good", Harry said, breathing a sigh of relief. "Hang on, what do you mean with 'by the time she got here'? I brought her as fast as I could –"
"And yet, something strange showed up on the readings."
"Being?", Harry asked anxiously.
"She had magical exhaustion a couple of weeks ago."
Harry stayed silent. How could he have missed that? He knew all to well how that felt…
"But it didn't happen then, did it? I think she cured herself."
"Is that even possible?", Harry asked surprised.
"Who is to say? There are no cases prior with her history. No infant has been placed under the Cruciatus for so long…"
"And the effect of that on adults?", Harry pressed on. He knew Henry would have thought of that, but he needed to understand.
"Not comparable.", Henry answered, some grim undertone in his voice. Harry decided against asking. "She wants to see you; she was worried about you. Something about a basilisk?"
"Oh, yes…", Harry said vaguely. He hesitated, he knew if he said something now, Henry would examine him – but he had caused so many problems already… He decided against it. "That was the monster, but it's dead now… I need to go see her now, I need to head back then I'm missing the party for defeating the monster, and it won't go unnoticed, I came up with an excuse but-"
Henry nodded before he even finished. "Go, then. We'll talk later."
Groaning inwardly – for it had taken him quite some effort to convince everyone he did not need a healer, that it was not his blood… Well, not all of it anyway, he thought grimly. He knocked on the door and walked in. Jane was sitting up on a hospital bed, pale but looking decidedly better. He smiled.
"You know, we need to work on our plans", Harry said casually.
"True. Do you still want to learn how to defend yourself?", she asked.
"Yes, it seems my DADA teacher have a knack for trying to kill me – you would think it stood in their service agreement or something…" The look on Jane's face told him she was not amused.
"I'll arrange something.", she said.
"Glad to hear that. Join us?", Harry asked.
"Well… yes, I think it's foolish to think I'll keep being anonymous."
Harry nodded.
"Are you going to start, or should I?", she asked quietly.
"You should never have gone that far, Jane. I get you don't want a little girl to die, and neither do I but it's not worth you're life… You need to be more careful-"
"Henry and I talked about it. What happened, in hindsight… I had used my powers to heal minor things, but this was so much bigger. I just couldn't control my powers. And for that, I need to stop denying. I need to acknowledge that I have powers, and I'll have to learn to control them. That's different from now, now I'm learning how to suppress them and to hide them. But that's not right. I've suffered for those powers. I associated them with that, and refused to use them. But… I can do something good with them, I've seen that now. I'm going to train – oh, don't look like that, I'm not going to maim myself so I can cure myself. It'll be just if I get hurt, like a bruise or a scrape, that I can heal that. And we'll move on when I'm ready to bigger things."
Harry nodded, relieved. "What do you have to say to me?"
"You took just as big of a risk today, Harry. Taking on Lockheart? –"
"It's not like I can't have him!", Harry said offended.
"That's not the issue. You should've alerted someone. Also before you went in the Chamber. I made a mistake there, too. We should never have gone on our own, Harry. We are only twelve; we can't take on the world on our own."
"They would never have let us come, we would've lost to much time. Ginny could've died-"
"You could've send Ron."
"He has as much right to rescue his sister as I do, if not more."
"It was too much of a risk, Harry."
"It had to be done."
"But should we have done it?"
"I don't see any other Parseltongues –"
"Should we have gone alone? What if there had been something else that killed us. They still couldn't have saved Ginny then. You need to realise your life has it's value, too. You, no WE need to be more careful."
"You're right. I wasn't thinking straight.", Harry admitted, looking down.
"I know. It's natural. But next time, do alert someone, okay?"
Harry nodded. He saw her eyes drop, and not much later she fell asleep. Looking at his watch, he sprinted back to Hogwarts. He came at the feast without anyone noticing, thank Merlin. He celebrated with the others as the petrified people joined them, as exams where cancelled and when it became clear Lockheart would not come back.
Ah, this is been way to long. Apologies, dear readers. Hopefully year three will be slightly faster.
