The fire began to dwindle, after hours of burning strong it was finally beginning to grow weaker and softer. It crackled and spit as the flames died and the logs broke down. Soon enough, the moon began to hide itself away, and the Sun peeked over the edge. As the Sun finally crested the horizon, the fire sputtered out its last breath, leaving only embers and ash behind.
Ginny had made sure they brought bowls from the kitchens, one for each of them, specifically for this part of the ritual. She handed out an empty bowl to each witch before moving towards the embers.
Each girl took up their regular position around the ashes of their ritual fire, silent and solemn. They all reached in with their wands, bowls held in the opposite hand, so the points were touching at the center of the piles. They drew back in a straight line, creating three distinct piles of ash. They each took the pile to their right and gathered up all the ash into their bowl.
Without a word, they each walked to Hagrid's garden, which they had spent some time clearing of snow earlier in the night after their second rite and settled themselves into a triangle.
As the Sun fully came into view, spreading more light into the world, they began.
Ash was laid out behind them, trailing them, as they walked deosil around the garden, point to point in a curve, creating a circle of ash. Embers still glittered in the ash, the soot still warm to the touch, but not burning them.
They finished the circle and made eye contact. It felt like they were cut off from the world, in their own magical circle. The problems of the outside world melted away. No worries about fracturing friendships, no concerns for safety, no judgement from those who didn't understand. The only thing of importance was the here and now, that exact moment, as the potential and pressure built up before them.
Hermione started their final rite.
"The Sun now rises, the Dawn has begun
And with its return, the Spring shall be spun
Into existence, to beat back the cold
We'll string out new visions of green and of gold
As the Spring is born, and it's first breath is drawn
We drive back the Winter, and invite the Sun's Dawn."
She started off quietly, almost unsure of herself, but by the last word Hermione's voice rang strong and true, confident and proud. Her voice echoed into Ginny's chest, and as her voice rose so too did the pressure filling the circle between them.
On Hermione's last utterance, she reached into her bowl and tossed out a handful of the ash. More ash than should have fit in her hand sprinkled down, falling like a deep fog twinkling with angry red sparks.
Once more, their resolve was tested. If their ritual was working as intended, they'd be able to breath normally in the ash, as though it was simple air. Otherwise they were going to be coughing and hacking and interrupting the ritual. Everything Ginny had ever read on that, said it would be a very bad thing.
So with a thundering in her ears and sweat dripping down her back, the feeling of heat and pressure pushing down on her, she opened her mouth wide and drew in a long, deep breath.
Air, as sweet and fresh as any Spring breeze filled her lungs, and she smiled as she exhaled.
Luna and Hermione spoke next, equal sized grins adorning their faces as well.
""The Sun now rises, the Dawn has begun
And with its return, the Spring shall be spun
Into existence, to beat back the cold
We'll string out new visions of green and of gold
As the Spring is born, and it's first breath is drawn
We drive back the Winter, and invite the Sun's Dawn."
Once again, they both reached into their bowls of soot, and threw their ashes into the air. It drifted down, blanketing the ground within their circle, but never touching even a spot outside of it. Ashes filled the air and the ground, becoming even darker as it twirled and glittered with cinders. A light breeze passed by, and all it managed to do was send the ash swirling faster.
Ginny could feel the tension in her limbs as they all watched, enraptured with their workings, as her turn to add her power and intent to the ritual came closer.
Each girl tried to peer through the cloud before them, through the soot that now almost thoroughly covered the ground and completely filled the air. And though she couldn't see them, Ginny was sure they made eye contact with each other, and in unison they chanted once more.
"The Sun now rises, the Dawn has begun
And with its return, the Spring shall be spun
Into existence, to beat back the cold
We'll string out new visions of green and of gold
As the Spring is born, and it's first breath is drawn
We drive back the Winter, and invite the Sun's Dawn."
None of them bothered with reaching into their bowls for a handful. They all shoved their bowls in the air, the soot escaping and flying before them. The cloud darkened, and they all breathed in deeply.
Heat and pressure and tension filled Ginny, and it was all she could do to hold her breath as they waited for the dust to settle. Finally, after an agony of waiting, the soot settled completely. As one, the witches let out their breath and shouted their chant for the last time, wands pointed down towards the center of the circle.
"We call upon you! Arise! Become! Cleanse! Crescentum Herbivicus!"
The ash seemed to dissolve into the soil of Hagrid's garden. There was a flash of golden light, blinding in its intensity, the same color as the approaching Sun peeking through the mountains. The soil looked richer, fuller, less ravaged by the snow in the aftermath of the light. Sprouting up all around the edge of their ash circle were rushes, growing at an unnaturally fast pace. After a few short moments the rushes reached about knee height and stopped growing abruptly.
Ginny stepped back from the ash circle, and for the last time closed her eyes. She let her mind wander, floating from thought to thought, images flickering through her mind. Luna's slightly flushed face, Hermione's visage lit up by the glow of the fire, the whirlwind of ash and ember during their last rite. Emotions and thoughts, she let them ebb and flow within her mind. She let them come and let them go as easy as she could.
A low thrumming, pounding in the back of Ginny's head, in time with her heart beat, slowly bled out of her body and mind until it was little more than the whisper of a memory. It had been subtle, and she only noticed it for its absence. Once it slipped away though, she noticed how it had been a constant companion throughout the night, urging her on through the entirety of the ritual.
As wonderful as the long night had been, it was at that moment that Ginny realized she hadn't ever truly relaxed throughout the night. She was more relaxed during the 'down time' between rites than she was during the rites themselves, but she hadn't realized how amped up and tense she had been throughout the night as a whole.
She opened her eyes to see Hermione and Luna also taking a few moments to re-center. She smiled as she waited for them, and began packing up their blankets and left-over food. On a whim, she also pulled bundles of the rushes that had grown around the edge of Hagrid's garden.
Hermione and Luna came over to help her pull up the rushes, the three working silently together.
Hagrid came out at some point, heralding his approach with a loud yawn. He noticed them and gave them a strange look.
"Didn' think yeh'd be out here still. Are yeh mad!? Yeh mus' be freezin'! Come in, I'll warm yeh up."
The witches shared a smile as they went inside the hut; terrible though his rock cakes may be, Hagrid made a mean cup of tea. They sat in a companionable silence, drinking in the tea and its steam to warm up, until suddenly Hagrid spoke up.
"I'll tell yeh what, had the best night o' sleep I've had in a long while last night, I did. Slep' like a babe in a cradle, all warm and cozy like."
He gave the three girls another side-eyed glance. "Yeh wouldn' happen t'know anythin' 'bout that, would yeh?"
They shared a look, but only managed to offer him a sheepish smile.
"Well, I know when I shouldn' be askin' questions." He tapped his finger against his nose and gave them a wink. "Head on back up to the castle now, or yeh'll miss breakfast."
Hermione looked at her watch, and gave out a muttered "Oh, bugger. I was hoping I'd have time for a quick nap."
"Wouldn't it be convenient if you could be in two places at once, then? You could take a nap and make it to your classes. You could probably even work it so you got breakfast twice! I'd love to learn a spell like that." Luna said this all airily, but Hermione stiffened.
"Yes, a spell like that would be quite useful. Do Duplication Charms work on live subjects?"
"Oh, I wouldn't know. Just an interesting thought I had, was all."
Hagrid leaned in to Ginny and whispered "Yeh know what they're on about?"
Ginny just sighed. "Not a clue. But this is nothing; you should see them when they really get going. I get more lost than a niffler with fool's gold."
"That's pretty lost." Hagrid was trying and failing to hide his huge grin. Ginny just gave him as bright a smile as she could.
"You're telling me."
"Yes, well, ah. I, uh. Are you two coming to breakfast?" Hermione stuttered.
Luna and Ginny shared a quick glance. "No, actually. We still have some food left over, and some more things we wanted to do today. Really experience the whole 'holiday' part of it, you know? Cultural experiences, broadening horizons, all that rot."
Hermione scowled at them. "You're not just trying to skip class, are you?"
"Well, we will be skipping class, but it's for important cultural research and experience! Totally a valid reason. Also, we're going to help Hagrid clean his hut, so it's not like it'll be all fun and games."
"Yeh're gonna what now?" Apparently, they'd forgotten to tell Hagrid about that part. Ginny gave him a sheepish look.
"Uh, if that's alright? Only, it's Spring now, according to the religion we're learning about, and today's traditionally a day for Spring cleaning? We're celebrating a holiday, see, and we're trying to do it right."
Hagrid looked at his tea and scrunched up his face, deep in thought.
"Well, wouldn' wan' anyone to think I was stepping on other people's holidays. That's jus' bad manners, that is." He perked up once he'd settled on a valid reason. "And I could always use more help tidyin' up. Sure, then. I'd be happy for the help! An' seein' as how I'm a Perfessor now, I can write yeh a note to excuse yeh' from class."
Hagrid, being the friendly sort that he was, wasn't the type to often have a mischievous look about him. But the glint in his eye as he thanked them for their help caused a shiver of worry to run its way down Ginny's back. He looked far too pleased to be having help for it to be as simple as a bit of dusting.
"Well, I'll be off then. Have fun cleaning, you two. I'll see you in the dormitories tonight, I suppose. If you're not back by dinner, I'll likely come check on you." Damn Hermione, and her smug smile. Ginny stuck her tongue out at her as she walked away.
"One more cuppa tea, I think, then we'll get goin'. Sound like a plan, girls?" Once again, Ginny couldn't help but shudder at the glee in Hagrid's voice. It was a far cry from his normally innocent and guileless smile.
Torture. Pure, agonizing, honest-to-Merlin torture. That's what cleaning Hagrid's hut had been like. Ginny was covered in grime, muck, and some substances which would not be considered for her fear of naming them. It was a matter of sanity that led Ginny and Luna to mutually agree to never discuss again what some of the things they had scraped off of the underside of Hagrid's dresser, near where Fang slept, might be.
It was unsurprising, given how deep the dirt was embedded into Hagrid's hut, that the task took more than just the morning. They'd stopped for a lunch break, to the girl's delight, before continuing on well into the afternoon. The three friends sat on Hagrid's newly clean and gleaming stoop, ignoring the portion of the inside of the hut that was still a mess. They sipped on hot chocolate and munched on biscuits as they relaxed.
"I know it's bad for yeh, but sometimes yeh deserve a treat, don'tcha?" The girls heartily agreed with their large friend.
The three spent their break looking at the clouds, watching them float by. They were just as dark as they had been all year, but Ginny couldn't help but feel they were less oppressive somehow. They didn't loom, they didn't tower, they merely roiled off in the distance. Even still, Ginny didn't pull out the book on divinations, which was quickly becoming her favorite book, to look up if it had anything on clouds. Even though it was a traditional Imbolc holiday pastime, something that the Druids of old were supposed to do to divine the future, Ginny had a feeling that she already knew what those clouds would portent.
Nothing good, that's what she grumbled to herself.
All too soon their lunch was over, and they had continued their cleaning.
When they finally finished, it was one large, smiling half-giant and two glowering girls that marched back to the castle. It was dark out, their holiday officially over, and Hagrid was kind enough to offer to walk them back to the castle.
"That" Ginny announced "was a dirty trick you played. And now that we've cleaned your hut, top to bottom, you better keep it clean!" She wagged a finger at him. His smile didn't waver in the slightest.
"I'll do my righ' best, you know that. And it weren't a trick! You jus' forgot ter ask when the last time I'd cleaned up was. Think of it as punishment for not tellin' me yeh was gunna Charm me hut. Not that I don' appreciate it, mind, I jus' woulda liked to know, yeh know? A Cheering Charm is just the ticket fer me, I think." He left them with a wink and a wave, and the girls gave him a wave back to go with their sheepish grins. Obviously he would notice, it was where he lived! They wouldn't bother correcting him about what Charm they'd used, exactly, or how they'd placed it. Hagrid was understanding, but he wasn't perfect. He had a few hang ups about certain kinds of magic, and his understanding of the difference between Dark Magic and regular rituals wasn't something they trusted.
The two girls were knackered, though, and so began the long slog back up to their towers. They wouldn't have to part ways until the fifth floor, and thankfully knew a shortcut on the first floor, above the ground floor where the entrance hall was, that took them to the fourth floor in only one flight of stairs.
The tapestry hiding their shortcut was home to Zelma "Mutiny" Hammond, a witch who'd ran away to be a pirate. Luna had asked her about her life story on one of their weekend exploration adventures, and they'd learned her nickname was Mutiny because on every ship she'd ever been on, there had always at some point been a mutiny, whether she was the cause of it or not (the pirate vehemently insisted she was never the cause of it). The painting showed her final voyage, where she had at last been promoted to captain, but the mutiny against her had been so ferocious that they had sunken their own ship. She was always frantic, trying to keep her ship just barely afloat, always out of breath.
Luna loved her determination and perseverance. Ginny almost considered being a pirate, Mutiny's stories were so good.
When Zelma had learned that they were a Ravenclaw and a Gryffindor, Zelma had squealed (either in delight, or because her ship had lost another large piece of important-looking wood, Ginny would never know) and told them how she was a Gryffindor herself, and her First Mate, may she rest in peace, had been a Ravenclaw! The only two witches to ever run their own pirate crew!
Mutiny had shared with them her secret passage then, after one more long-winded story about the shortcuts she used to take across dangerous waters to smuggle goods for the crown.
The two girls had been baffled when they'd first found it, but it had proved to be invaluable. It left them at the exact perfect location on the Fifth floor to split up for their Common Rooms, and it covered four floors in what felt like one floors worth of stairs.
"'Lo, Mutiny! How's she sailing today?" Ginny yawned as they approached, already reaching for the unassuming stone that would change the plain wall behind the tapestry into a staircase.
"Ahoy, lass! Choppy weather out there, and she's on her last legs, but the Deloraine will last at least another day!"
The Deloraine would always last at least another day.
"I, eh, well. Bad news, lass! The stairway is, eh, closed at the moment! Can't be getting in, no ma'am, sorry to say!" Mutiny looked a bit more nervous than normal, larger sweat droplets running down her oil-painted face. It was over exaggerated, but the artist must not have been particularly talented. And Mutiny was far too worried for how calm her waters looked.
"Closed? Whatever for, oh Dread Pirate of the Seven Seas, Captain Mutiny?" Luna fluttered her eyelashes innocently and looked up at the pirate. Neither girl was above a bit of flattery and guile to get what they wanted. What they wanted more than anything else, in that moment, was to not have to walk up four or five more flights of stairs. Luna, being a Ravenclaw, would have to walk up four stories and then one more up the Ravenclaw Tower.
"Repair?" Mutiny put forward, hesitantly.
"Are you telling me, or asking me?" Luna had an almost affronted look as she crossed her arms and pouted. Ginny loved it when Luna got sassy; very few people could keep up with her. Mutiny wasn't one of them. Ginny just took a step back and hid her smile.
"Telling you?"
"That sounds like another question to me. What kind of repairs does a secret magical stairway need?"
"There was a cave in?" Mutiny was beginning to pull at her frilly collar, and adjust her side-holstered wand.
"A cave in that can't just be fixed with a simple Repairing Charm? Or where a Levitation Charm won't just move the rubble out of the way?"
"A cave in of Rock Beetles?"
"Well, their shells are magic resistant…" Luna hummed and bit on her thumb as she thought.
Ginny just rolled her eyes. "Yeah, and they don't live anywhere near Scotland. They burrow through the stone of hot and humid climates. You wrote about them in Defense Against the Dark Arts last month, remember? We were dealing with household pests, and I said it wasn't worth it to mention because they don't live near us."
"And if you'll recall, I said that maybe there could be Migrating Rock Beetles who come up north in the summer and go South in the winter! This could be it!"
"Luna. It's winter right now."
"Oh. I forgot." Ginny just gave her a smile and a clap on the shoulder, and then they turned to glare at Mutiny together.
"Zelma. Clementine. 'Mutiny.' Hammond. The Third. Why did you lie about the Rock Beetles?" Luna glared at the tapestry, and Ginny wasn't convinced she wouldn't spontaneously learn how to wandlessly summon fire at that very moment.
Mutiny gulped. "Well, you see, I, ah." She wiped the sweat off her face and muttered "I can't believe I told you my full name. Stupid. Stupid! Fine! I'll tell you! There's a stowaway! A little'un, came running out of nowhere, crying her head off! Was headed to run right into me, so I opened up the passageway for her."
Mutiny paused, gripped the wheel of the Deloraine tighter, and whispered "She cried like I did after me first mutiny gone wrong. I'd organized it, see? Wasn't my own fault, o'course, the captain at the time was damn near begging for it. Only, no one turned up but me an' Abigail, my First Mate later on, rest her soul. The whole crew, every one of the landlubbing, rapscallion, lying bastards, they all laughed at me for trying to start a mutiny, even after they'd all agreed to help! Abby and I, we never lived down the shame. Figured I'd have liked a good place to cry, and I figured I'd give one to a girl in need. So, much as I like the two of you, I won't let you in! I won't have nobody laughing at her!"
The girls gave each other a sidelong glance, and with a nod firmly turned back to Mutiny.
"We would never make fun of her."
"Yeah. We've been on the other end of that. We wouldn't do that to someone else. If she's in there all alone, it might help if she had a shoulder to cry on." By now, exhaustion had left both girls, gone in the face of a younger student in need. There were so many reasons someone could be crying, but if Mutiny was right, and they were being mocked, well. Ginny and Luna both knew what that was like, first hand.
The single secret stone next to the tapestry depressed slightly, Mutiny's work no doubt. They'd long ago stopped wondering how she affected the outside world at all. They lifted her tapestry up and peered inside.
Huddled in the steps, crying in the dark, was a girl maybe their age. She had green and silver trim on her robes, and tears running down her cheeks. She looked up at them as they peered in and gave a slight "Eep!" The girl rubbed at her eyes furiously with a balled-up fist, then wiped tears away from her cheeks with her palm.
"Sorry," she started. "Didn't mean to be in the way."
Ginny was ashamed to say that her first reaction was to just let go of the tapestry and ignore the crying girl. She'd heard enough about Slytherin's and their bullying antics from her older brothers over the years. But as she looked down at the small brunette girl and decided to look past the trim of her second-hand robes, she saw Luna from all those months ago laying on the floor with tears in her eyes as three older Ravenclaws looked down at her.
She also saw another Slytherin, a boy with a Muggle last name, high cheekbones, and a charming smile, who was ridiculed for his lack of knowledge of traditional Pureblood customs. She couldn't help but wonder if a Gryffindor or Ravenclaw had ever found him crying alone in a corridor, and if they'd ignored him as well.
She doubted it; Tom had never been one to cry. But she couldn't take the chance; if reaching out to the little snake now kept her from biting Ginny later, Ginny would gladly extend a hand in friendship.
"Alright?" She ventured, slowly, as though the girl was little more than a wounded animal.
With a gulp and a leer the girl sneered "What's it to you?"
"Well," Luna added "Ginny has a thing of protecting crying girls. I think she secretly wants to be a knight in shining armor. Are you a damsel in distress?"
As always, Luna's unique way of wording things had a tendency to cut through people's defenses. This girl was no different. She stared up at Luna, tears almost forgotten, with a bewildered expression on her face.
"Girl's aren't knights. She can't be a knight in shining armor."
"Why not?"
"Because that isn't how it works."
"Oh? Are you sure? I was quite sure I'd seen Ginny heroically defend the poor and downtrodden. Isn't that what a knight in shining armor does?"
"Well, yes, if they're a boy. Not if they're a girl. Besides, young ladies should be seen and not heard. They definitely shouldn't be getting into fights defending anybody." Her head tilted up as she said that, an imperial air about her. It was undercut, somewhat, by her age and the tear tracks still on her face.
"Oh. Ginny, were you aware that you're a boy? Why didn't you tell me?"
"I'm not a boy, Luna. Though I wouldn't say I'm a lady, either." She gave a small smile in Luna's direction.
"Well then, now I'm thoroughly confused."
"What's your name?" Ginny ignored Luna in favor of the crying Slytherin.
The girl gathered herself up off the steps and stood with her back as straight as a rod. She let out a little curtsey, and a strained smile graced her face. Ginny got her first real look at the girl as she made a polite and distinctly feminine bow to them.
"I'm Veronica Fawley. Pleased to make your acquaintance."
Ginny stared at her, stunned, as a long-buried memory tickled at the back of her mind. She remembered being very young and going to meet her Great-Aunt Muriel for the first time. Her Mum had been beside herself, worried about a million things.
Her Mum had drilled her for what had felt like an eternity on the proper way to curtsey. Ginny had never gotten it quite right. The girl in front of her had just performed it exactly the way Ginny had seen so many other distant family members do it that night; effortlessly and flawlessly. Her Mum had also hammered into her the exact words she was supposed to say when she'd first met her Great-Aunt, and although at the time Ginny had misremembered them, she was sure the way they'd left the girl's mouth just now had been exactly what her Mum had been hoping for.
Well, at least she knew the girl was a pureblood. Probably one of, in her own Aunt Muriel's enlightened words, "impeccable breeding."
Ginny changed her opinion of the girl's age as she took a closer look at her; definitely younger than Luna and herself. The girl was of average height for a firstie. Her hair was a warm brown, which fell in waves upon her back. It was messy in its current state, but Ginny could see the trappings of having been styled recently. She assumed it had been tasteful, if the girl's curtsey was anything to go by. She had deep green eyes, the color of forest foliage, rimmed with red at the moment. Her posture was stiff as she came out of the curtsey. Her chin belied her true feelings; it wouldn't matter how tall she stood, so long as she ducked her chin and hid her face, she'd look unconfident and demure. Although maybe that was the point?
"Nice to meet you, too, firstie. What's got you hiding in a secret stairway?"
"I didn't know it was secret, and I wasn't hiding! Ladies don't hide."
"Well it's tucked away behind a tapestry, so it's not like it's advertised, is it? But it's alright, we just wanted to make sure you're okay. Not hurt or nothing, are you?"
The girl wrinkled her nose at Ginny's, admittedly on purpose, poor grammar. Riling up the stuck-up Slytherin's was always good for a laugh, or so Fred and George always said.
"No, I'm fine. Thank you kindly. I should really be heading back to my Common Room. It's probably almost curfew." The girl didn't look very enthused at the idea of heading back to her dorms, but who was Ginny to tell her where to go? She certainly wasn't a prefect.
"It's just barely dusk. You've at least two hours until curfew." Apparently, Luna thought she was a Prefect.
"Yes, well." Was all the girl said before she scurried off, leaving Ginny and Luna in her wake. They stared at each other for a moment.
"What an odd girl." Luna commented as they trekked up the staircase.
"I suppose."
"I wonder why she was crying."
"She's a firstie. Probably homesickness."
"So far away from her Common Room?"
"Well, she is a Slytherin. They might have rules about how a proper little lady is supposed to act. Have you ever seen a Slytherin cry?"
"No, but I've never seen a Gryffindor cry either."
"That doesn't count."
"We should help her!"
"Luna, it's not our problem. We have enough things to worry about on our own. We don't need to also keep track of some firstie! Luna, if you keep doing that, your face will get stuck like that. If you raise your eyebrows any higher, they'll shoot right off your face. Luna!"
"So we'll keep an eye out for her. Glad it's decided." The grin that split Luna's face shone bright in the torchlight of the hallway, and Ginny was tempted to just give in. She knew it would be easier. But she wouldn't give up!
"Nothing's been decided, Luna! Luna! Come back here, we're still-!"
"Goodnight, Ginny, I shall see you in the morning." Luna's dreamy voice floated towards her from around the corner as she made the turn up to the Ravenclaw tower, leaving Ginny standing in the hallway by herself.
"That girl will be the death of me, I swear it."
The next morning, Ginny was pleased to see Hermione sitting next to Ron and Harry, the three of them laughing together as though they'd never fought. Hermione beamed at her as she walked down from her dorm, and Ginny gave her a wink. She wasn't sure how Hermione had mended the rift between them, but she was glad of it. She just hoped Hermione had gotten a proper apology out of those two prats.
The day after that, Ginny was pleasantly surprised to find that even after Professor McGonagall returned Harry's Firebolt saying it was free of tampering, Ron was willing to admit that it had been a good idea to get it checked.
"Well, with as fast as the Firebolt is supposed to go, if it had been tampered with, it would've been right scary if something went wrong. Might've been too fast to be able to stop! Harry doesn't have the best track record with Quidditch, truth be told. Brilliant seeker, he is, but he's got problems with brooms and bludgers, we've all seen that. It wouldn't surprise me if the Firebolt had been a bit wonky. Just let my excitement get the best of me, I think."
But the day after that, Ginny had to hold in a groan as she approached the Common Room to the worst screaming match of the year so far. Normally, putting a bunch of teenagers into a single communal living space resulted in at least a few fights and hurtful words thrown about. None of that even came close to the shouting match between Hermione and Ron.
"I'm telling you, your evil cat ate my rat! Scabbers has been missing for days now, and I can't find him anywhere!"
"Ron, it's not my fault you can't find Scabbers. It isn't Crookshanks fault either! You lost Scabbers for a MONTH in our first year, and it didn't bother you! Why do you suddenly care about him missing for a week!?"
"Well you didn't have a demon-cat hybrid our first year, did you?!"
"Filch had Mrs. Norris! Loads of other students had cats with them. What makes Crookshanks so special?!"
"I SAW your devil-cat try and eat Scabbers! We all saw it happen! That's why!"
Ginny winced as she looked around, and saw she was the only one listening. The whole Common Room was mostly deserted by this point, headed down to breakfast. The few people who hadn't left were either her family members or a few firsties with a bit of leftover cotton stuck in their ears. They probably had snorers in their dorm and hadn't thought to ask a Prefect Silencing Charm yet; or they were keeping it in to avoid the shouting match. Ginny wasn't sure.
Ginny walked down to breakfast and sat next to Percy for the first time all school year.
"Morning, Perce. Did Scabbers ever go missing while you had him at Hogwarts?"
"Oh, yes, often. He's a very precocious rat. He doesn't seem especially intelligent, but I saw flashes of it now and again. I was never worried about when he went off on one of his little adventures. I'll admit, the first time it happened I was fraught with worry, but soon after I came to trust him. Scabbers is a reliable rat; he knows I'll feed him and take care of him, so he always comes back to me."
"You might want to tell Ron that. He and Hermione are screeching at each other like a pair of married banshees, about Hermione's cat killing Scabbers."
Percy went white in the face. "If there's one thing Scabbers was good at, it was avoiding cats. No cat ever got close to him; did you know I saw him taunt a cat once? I also saw him get away from a full blooded Kneazle at one point. He was quite proficient at escape. I had better go calm Ron down, before he makes a fool of himself even worse than before. I wonder if he could handle the Summoning Charm? It's what I used every time I needed to find the little rascal but didn't know where he was."
Ginny was tempted to head up to see the resolution of the drama, but Luna caught her eye first. In the commotion, Ginny had almost forgotten. They weren't done yet, the two of them had work to do. There was only a month and a half left. They had another ritual to prepare.