Disclaimer: Blah, blah, blah, these characters are not mine.

Chapter Two- A portentous dream, a forgetful potion and a conversation in Azkaban

The next morning Ginny barely managed to drag herself down to breakfast. Every inch of her body had screamed in protest as she got up, had her shower and dressed herself. She imagined that if her body could speak, it would be saying, No! It's not time yet! I'm not done sleeping! Just a few minutes more... That pretty much summed up how she felt, but the sixth year Gryffindors had Potions that morning with the Ravenclaws. She might have considered skiving off had her professor been anyone but Severus Snape, but alas, he was one of the few Order members not confined to the bowels of Azkaban. Ginny felt momentarily guilty for wishing Professor Snape ill- he had done a great deal in service of the Order and didn't really diverse to be regarded so poorly, but he was so unpleasant that it was hard not to dislike him. That being the case, Ginny's feelings of guilt were quickly banished.

Upon arriving in the Great Hall, Ginny assumed her customary place at the table, across from Luna and Neville. Luna had her nose in an issue of the Quibbler and Neville was toying with his breakfast of porridge and eggs as he flipped dispiritedly through his Herbology textbook.

Neville was the fist to make note of Ginny's presence, "Hullo Ginny," he said, "how did you sleep last night?"

Ginny sighed, "Dreadfully. I only managed maybe four hours of sleep and I kept on having horrible nightmares."

Neville nodded soberly, "I suppose that's to be expected. Do you want to talk about it?"

"I suppose it might help," Ginny reluctantly agreed, "although I don't know that my dreams really relate to anything- I think that my subconscious is just as upset and confused as the rest of me," she paused for a moment looking quite glum. Luna chose that moment to look up and start paying attention, "Well," Ginny finally continued, "I was on a boat in my dream, but it was an odd sort of boat- with posts, platforms and stairways all over its surface. There were also two tangled up slides leading off one side. I couldn't see where they ended. The water was bubbling angrily. That's because it wasn't really water at all. It was acid. It was trying to eat away at the boat, but it couldn't because every bit of the boat's surface was covered in mirrors. Harry was there and so were Ron and Hermione. Lupin was there too. And Tonks and Kingsley Shacklebolt- everyone was there. Well, everyone that was sent to Azkaban anyway. It was the strangest thing. I could see two of everyone because they all were reflected in the mirrors on the ship. But the reflections were all distorted- twisted and misshapen except for Harry's. He looked just as he always does and there was a silvery glow around him," she stopped and took a breath, "And that's not the strangest part. Even though I know I was there- I was talking with everyone- I couldn't see my own reflection anywhere. It was like I didn't exist. When I asked Harry about it, in the dream, he said, 'You don't belong here. Your place is where you may walk outside walls and under stars. Be gone from this place before the one who sees within the dark places takes notice of your presence,' and that was all. I woke up immediately after he'd finished talking and I haven't the foggiest idea what he meant. I don't even know that it means anything at all. Like I said, I've been very upset. It's probably just my mind playing tricks on me."

Neville, frowned, "I don't know. I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss it. I know that professor Trelawney's rampant incompetence tend to put people off the idea of dreams having divinatory meanings, but it dies happen sometimes and your dream sounds like if might mean something more than that you're just worried about everyone."

"I agree," Luna stated firmly. She hauled her overlarge school bag up onto the table and dug through it until she found what she was looking for. What emerged from the bag when she had finished her search was, unsurprisingly, yet another issue of her father's magazine, the Quibbler, "In this issue, the world renown seeress and interpreter of dreams, Madame Karthena, outlines common dream symbolism so that you can interpret your dreams at home," she beamed at Ginny, "We can look up the elements of your dream and Madame Karthena will tell us of their significance."

Parvati Patil and Lavender Brown, hearing Luna preparing to analyze Ginny's dream moved closer to hear better.

"What did you dream about?" Lavender asked with interest evident in her eyes, "Are you analyzing your dream for Trelawney's class? Can I help? Divination's my best class. Did I hear that you dreamed about water? Somnander's Guide to Interpreting dreams says that a dream of water signifies an awakening, which is usually sexual in nature. Either that or you're going to go on a long trip- I'm not sure which. Could you tell me a little bi more about the context?"

Ginny's answering smile was wide and fake, "If I want your... help, then I will ask for it. I'm not asking. Just in case you were wondering. And no, I did not dream about water. I was on a boat, but we were sailing on a sea of acid. Have a nice day. Have your nice day far away from me."

Lavender's jaw dropped at Ginny's blatant rudeness. She turned to Parvati, "Did she just say that? Did you hear her just say that?"

Ginny interrupted Lavender's outraged exclamation, "I don't know about everyone else, but I just heard that. Lavender, if I can still hear you talking, then you haven't gone far enough away yet."

"Come on Lavender," said Parvati as she took Lavender's hand an led her away, "we don't need to be here. All of this toxic hostility in the air is bad for our auras. Let's go visit professor Trelawney," the two girls departed in matching snits.

"I have to go too," Ginny sighed, "I have to be down in the potions dungeon. Are you coming Luna?" the two girls gathered up their school bags and got ready to leave.

"I'll see you two at lunch," Neville called after them. His charms class ended just before noon.

---

In the potions dungeon, Professor Snape was just finishing copying the instructions to create Lethe's Draught onto the board as Ginny and Luna walked into class.

Ginny wrinkled her nose. She didn't like the idea of a potion of forgetfulness. For that matter, she didn't like the idea of any type of memory magic- it brought back too many memories from her first year at Hogwarts. Gilderoy Lockhart, the Defense Against the Dark Arts Professor at the time had been completely inept at all types of magic not related to memory. He had, throughout his career, used his memory magic to steal the adventures of other witches and wizards. He would learn from them everything about their exploits before obliviating their memories and writing about the adventures as though they were his own. Eventually, one of his spells backfired on him and now he was a permanent resident at St. Mungo's. The spell that backfired had been directed at Ron and Harry. It was only the fact that Lockhart had attempted to use Ron's broken wand to cast the spell that saved them from forgetting everything about themselves.

"Lethe's Draught," Luna sing-songed as she read Snape's notations on the board, "I've read about that..."

As Snape was within hearing, Ginny nudged Luna with her elbow and shushed her. The last thing Luna needed was to cause a scene in Snape's class yet again. He had no patience for her recitations from Quibbler back issues and penalized her more strongly each time she brought up the magazine.

Ginny had not acted quickly enough. As the two girls sat down in their usual places, Snape's lips curled into a malignant little smile.

"Do continue, Miss Lovegood," his voice dripped with false sugar, "I'm sure the rest of the class is sitting on the edge of their seats waiting to hear just what it is that you have read about Lethe's Draught."

The entire class held their breath and waited for Luna to dig her own grave by quoting some ludicrous passage from the Quibbler.

"Well," she began, "I was reading last night, from my textbook, and I came across the passage about Lethe's Draught. It causes forgetfulness in varying degrees depending upon the dosage ingested. One drop causes the last few minutes of memory to be lost, whereas to drink the entire potion can cause a person to forget their entire life," She continued to the astonishment of the rest of the class, "There are also several variants on the Draught which may cause it to effect only certain memories. Lethe's Drought is very closely related to Mnemosyne's Drought, a memory restorative. In fact, even the slightest error when creating either one of these potions may result in the accidental brewing of the other. For that reason they are both considered to be very dangerous potions and should only be attempted by very advanced wizards," having finished her little speech, Luna folded her hands neatly in her lap and waited for Snape's response.

Ginny was suppressing a smile, you wouldn't always know it, but behind her abstracted behaviour and eccentric personality Luna actually had quite a sharp mind. On very rare occasions, some of that secret intelligence would burst out of her to the surprise of those who didn't know her as well as Ginny did.

The rest of the class was not as adept as Ginny at hiding their laughter, though they did try. The general effect was of a classroom suddenly stuck all at the same time by uncontrollable fits of coughing.

Professor Snape was clearly not amused.

Ginny found that she greatly enjoyed the rest of potions class. Sometimes it just felt really good to have someone get the best of a professor- especially one so universally disliked.

---

Ron was puzzled by something. He had been at Azkaban now for over twenty-four hours and he had yet to see even a trace of a Dementor. He couldn't imagine why that would be. He had always assumed from the stories he had been told, that the dementors were constantly tormenting the prisoners, making their lives miserable simply just by being there. Ron, however, didn't feel any different now than he had before arriving at Azkaban. He still had good thoughts and bad thoughts and thoughts that fell roughly in the middle. There had to be a reason.

Now, Ron was a lot more intelligent than he was often given credit for. His temper often got in the way, but really he did have rather a sharp mind. How else could he be such a fantastic chess player? That being said, he knew that there was something out of the ordinary going on at Azkaban. He wasn't sure precisely what it was, but he was fairly certain that it had something to do with Harry.

"I'll bet that this has something to do with Harry," he mused aloud.

"What was that?" asked a voice from the next cell.

Ron was startled, this was the first time that anyone had spoken to him while he had been here. He hadn't really expected that anyone in Azkaban would be in any sort of condition to carry on a conversation.

"Er... who's there?" Ron asked.

"Oh, nobody," the voice answered.

"I'm talking to nobody?" Ron asked, "What. Are you a voice in my head or something?"

The voice was quiet for a while before answering, "No. I don't think so. I'm a little bit confused though. I don't remember very many things."

"Why not?"

"I don't know. I forgot," the voice paused. Ron could almost picture an expression of deep thought on the face of the voice, "since yesterday, some things have been starting to come back to me. Not much though."

"What happened yesterday?" Ron asked, "Why are you starting to remember things now?"

"I don't know," the voice answered, "yesterday they just stopped coming around."

"Who did?"

"The dementors. The things that stole my memories away."

"I thought you said that you didn't remember what happened to your memory?"

"I didn't remember. Now I do. Like I said, things are coming back to me. I think I've been here a really long time. I think that when the dementors are finished with all of your good memories, they take whatever's left... they leave you with nothing. That's why I never said anything to you before now."

"The dementors took all of your memories?"

"Yes, but they're coming back... slowly. What do you think happened? Why did they stop coming?"

"I don't know," Ron answered, "but I think we'll find out..."

A/N: Hope you like it. Thanks to all who reviewed. :)