Ginny Weasley:

The Lion-Snake Prophecies

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter … I merely worship JKR!

Chapter Seven

…. And together they fell into the misty recesses of her mind. Ginny didn't know whether to be exhilarated or frightened as images of her life rushed past her …

…there was her father, kneeling in the backyard of the burrow, and Ginny knew it was her first true memory of him, grinning from ear to ear as he built her a sandbox "the muggle way" ….

… she was sitting on a stool in the kitchen and Fred and George were playing with her hair, having 'borrowed' their mother's wand to turn the bright red first purple, then green, and finally pink. Mom had come storming in; yelling at them to stop, but Ginny had only giggled and raced off before the magic rainbow could be undone …

… Ron had just gotten his Hogwarts letter; the whole family was sitting at the table, and each was congratulating him in turn, except for Ginny, who felt her heart break at the large grin that had taken over his face …

… and then thump! Ginny felt herself hit the ground and the images fled from her mind. Shaking her head to clear it, Ginny stood up and looked around, surprised to find herself standing in her own backyard. The Burrow itself lay just ahead on the grass, only it looked grey, filled with mist, and appeared only half-formed. Turning, Ginny saw Harry standing behind her. He too had just fallen into this place, and was dusting himself off as he stood. Something about him seemed odd, and Ginny had to stare for a moment before she placed it.

He looked … solid! – as real as he looked in the "real" world. Ginny looked down at herself, but saw the ground staring back at her through her body. Ginny looked away quickly, fighting back nausea. Why did Harry get to be solid and her a wondering ghost? After all, wasn't this her mind?

Trying to look casual, ignoring the way the flowers seemed clearer when viewed through her hand, Ginny cast her eyes around for Hiss but her reptilian friend appeared nowhere in sight. Either he hadn't made the crossing with them, or he was keeping still, and silent.

"Are we here?" Harry asked her, and turning she saw that he was staring at her as if trying to see her through the mist. To her ghost-like ears, his words seemed as slow and insubstantial as she felt. Ginny tried to shake her head, but wasn't sure if she actually completed the movement. "I don't know," she answered, in case she hadn't.

Harry glanced around again but didn't move from his place on the grass. Ginny looked up at the Burrow, still grey and misty, and saw that the path towards the kitchen door looked – for once – uninviting. A slight chill ran threw her, and she resisted the urge to hug herself, fearing her arms might slide right threw one another. She looked back at Harry and frowned, "I'm not sure if this is right."

"What do you mean?" Harry asked, walking up behind her, and even though Ginny knew he was near, his voice stayed dim and distant. Looking around, he seemed to pause for a moment at her shoulder, and then took two steps ahead of her towards the house. When he turned back to her, his green eyes looked accusing. "Or is there something you just don't want me to see?"

Ginny simply stared back at him, having no immediate answer to that particular question, and with one last harsh look, Harry turned his back on her and stalked up to the kitchen door. He didn't pause at its entrance, but the world seemed to shimmer around him, and there was the slightest hint of something hiding behind the shadows. Ginny's pulse raced, and fear tickled at her belly …

"No, wait!" she cried out, finally understanding, but it was too late, Harry had already taken his first step into the house. With a giant lurch, the world seemed to shift, and Ginny could have sworn she heard someone laughing as the vision swirled … and then they were suddenly standing in the Chamber of Secrets, the stone and mortar floor glaring back at them, the picture of tidiness and horror. A younger Ginny Weasley kneeled on the floor only a few feet ahead of them, caught with her back towards the door, scrubbing hard at the already shining stones.

Ginny was too shocked to move, and even Harry seemed surprised. He stood at her side again now, no longer up ahead. Though they made no noise, the girl who was Ginny seemed to sense them, for she stiffened in her place, put down her brush, and twisted back to look them each in the eye.

Ginny thought she was prepared for the sight, but even so, it twisted at her. The girl's face was Ginny's, her form was Ginny's, but her gaze was a cold, hard thing – her eyes so dark they seemed almost black, her body so thin she looked close to starvation. The once shining hair was limp, but startling red, and her face was twisted in hatred, her lips curled back into a sneer.

The girl made no noise, but Harry stiffened as if she had snarled. Eyes wide, he turned look at the real Ginny, as if to check this gaunt demon with the actual girl standing beside him. At his questioning look, Ginny could only nod. Her voice, oddly enough, was strong. Though it still frightened her, she had accepted this part of herself a long time ago …

"Yes," she told him, meeting his questing eyes briefly before looking back at the girl, "this was me. You didn't really see me that year, did you? You only saw me at the end, when I was finally free. Even later, when I lay dying on the Chamber floor, I was free. Finally free. But here –," and Ginny nodded towards the girl who watched them with such calculating eyes, "– here I was still fighting, but as you can see, the battle wasn't turning in my favour."

And against her own violation, Ginny's voice had twisted as she spoke; turned into the cold, angry pitch of a young girl caught in a web of lies she couldn't understand. Taking a deep breath, Ginny forced that part of her away, and turned her back on the tableau. Looking now towards Harry, she pierced him with her gaze, "I understand now – these are images, pictures of places I once thought were home. But it's a lie. I was no more at home here than I am now at the Burrow. It's more than a place, but it's not me. It's not where I keep what I am."

Harry stared back at her, his green eyes holding everything back, revealing for once none of his inner thoughts, "Where is, then?"

"Here."

And the world again shifted, and this time, when it settled, it somehow felt more real, more solid, then it ever had before. It wasn't a nice kind of real though; it was the hard bite of authenticity, the heavy feeling in your bones that told you that this was the truth, even if you didn't want it to be. Ginny knew without having to look that now, here, she was solid, and the thought did little to cheer her. Here there was no hiding from herself; and even worse, no hiding from Harry.

Beside her, obviously not meaning to, Harry gave a little gasp. It was more of a quick, indrawn breath really, but it did betray his suddenly surprise.

Together, side-by-side, Harry and Ginny stood before the cast-iron gates of an old, derelict house. A mansion, really, with doors and rooms that could take – would take – a lifetime to explore.

And even though she knew it to be the truth, Ginny still shivered at the sight. The house itself wasn't oppressing; in fact, if she had been asked to design her dream home, this just might be it. There was a wooden porch out front with a large front door and many windows that they could see. The house itself was crafted from wood and stone, with a wide base and two visible stories, plus a small attic on top. It was the – details – of the place that gave her the shivers, though. The iron gates, each pillar inscribed expertly with the detailed impression of a snake; the shuttered windows, kept closed by a set of rough-worked bars … there were weeds in the garden and the stone path itself was cracked. A hot, haunted wind blew in from a nearby wood, but it did little to warm this place. It looked neglected, rejected, and Ginny knew that there were things in this house, parts of herself, that she never wanted to face.

Still, Ginny thought as she squared her shoulders, this was what they came here to do, to see, and backing out now just because it wasn't pretty wasn't really an option.

She glanced back at Harry, who had seemed to recover himself and was casting his eyes around the ground. Ginny herself looked around at the stone path for a moment and remarked, "Well, I don't really know what 'recent passage' looks like, but the weeds aren't crushed and it doesn't look like anyone's been here in a while."

Harry nodded, glancing back down at the ground, before looking up and over to the house, "The gate – is it locked?"

Ginny frowned, "I'm not sure, but somehow I think so." Looking about her, Ginny realized that the path they were on led squarely to the gate. After taking a few steps towards it, Ginny realized how tall the gates really were. Each snake impression was twice the size of Hiss, and gave her the shivers the way her reptilian friend never did.

As she moved towards the gate, Ginny saw that there was indeed a pad-lock on it, and not only was it large and oppressive, plain except for some kind of detail worked in on the front, it left no room for a key.

Ginny sighed and turned back to Harry, not quite sure what to do now, when from the shadows of the weeds, just to her left off the stone path, a familiar voice called out, "Ginny?"

Ginny turned to see her father stepping out from behind the weeds; only they reached maybe to his ankles, and couldn't possibly have hid him. Ginny frowned at the sight; surely he could not have been caught in the spell too?

"Dad?" Ginny asked, and the figure smiled.

"Ginny," he said gladly, "You've come back."

It must not really be her father then, he looked to peaceful to be the man with so many stresses on him these days. It was probably an image from her unconscious mind, then … why, Ginny didn't know.

Cautious of the apparition now, Ginny asked, "What do you mean?"

Her dad, red hair gleaming, gestured towards the iron gates, and beyond them, to the house. "It's just that you've been so long away … we weren't sure you'd ever fully return."

"Mr. Weasley?" Harry's voice asked surprised from the path, and Ginny heard him walk up behind her. He steps seemed to echo loudly in this place, but she kept her attention focused on the speaker.

"What do you mean?" She asked her father, who had now turned to look at Harry, "Where have I been gone?"

The apparition refocused his attention onto her, "Oh you know, the usual. School, Hiss, boys … Tom Riddle," her father shrugged, "Just part of life, I guess. Still, it does get a little lonely."

Beside her, Harry frowned, "Tom Riddle? You mean Lord Voldemort … has he been here lately? And who's Hiss?"

Before Ginny could reply, the vision of her father turned back to him and said, "Ah, that Tom. Such a nice boy … at first. But then, like most men, he broke our heart. Tried to do some nasty things a while back, but he hasn't been around here in a while." He turned back to Ginny, "So you finally recognized the bad gnomes from the good?"

Ginny ignored the question, "So you're sure he hasn't been here within, say, the last several years?"

Her father shook his head, "Oh no, not here. Been rather quiet lately; like I said, you've been gone."

Ginny smiled at her father, "Don't worry, dad. It's taken me a while to get re-acquainted with myself, but I promise to visit more often." At the large grin on his face, Ginny couldn't help but laugh.

Turning back to Harry, Ginny smiled, relieved that the ordeal was finally over without her having to give away too much. "So," she said easily, "convinced?"

But Harry didn't return her grin. Instead, he glanced back at the forbearing house and stared into the closed windows for a moment before shaking his head. "How do I know you didn't plan that entire conversation? How do I know now that I can trust you with your family, with Ron and Hermione's life, any more than I could before? I've heard nothing, been giving no proof, that has changed that for me."

"But we've just talked with my mind! Surely you can see that? There's been no new activity; Voldemort hasn't been here in years!"

"But how do we know he didn't plant something in your mind the first time?" Harry shot back, "If you really are innocent as you say, how can you take that chance?!"

Ginny stared angrily at him, unwilling to give up what Hiss had told her, but determined not to let him any nearer to that house than she needed too. She believed what her friend had told her, and believed the apparition of her father too.

But Harry simply stared back at her, and after several moments with neither of them giving up, Ginny finally realized something shocking.

Harry wasn't just an angry, lashing teenager. He wasn't a knight in shining armour either. He was a man who had a destiny larger than she could comprehend, a destiny she had thought she understood because of a few words passed from ear to ear.

This man had the power, the strength and the determination to meet that destiny head-on. Suddenly, Ginny found herself feeling sorry for Lord Voldemort. He had no idea what he was up against.

Which didn't mean she was backing down. Harry's show of strength was just another reason why she couldn't let him run amuck into her innermost thoughts. There were secrets, knowledge, which she had to keep from him. Information she had garnered from Tom, information Harry could use – in a fit of impassioned youth – against those closest to him.

There had to be a way she could prove to him that she wasn't dangerous, without giving away those secrets.

Ginny closed her eyes. She felt Harry's surprise at her apparent back-down, but cast her thoughts away from him. It didn't matter; Harry didn't matter ... she let her mind calm, empty, as Hiss had said she'd need to in order to sense the people around her. Only now she wasn't trying to sense anyone else but herself … if that house was the visible picture of her mind, then there ought to be some way she could pierce it without having to step inside. If she could just figure out which rooms held the secrets she held dear, then they could travel safely through the house, without ever compromising her position, or her garnered knowledge …

… but as Ginny sought to pierce her mind, going deeper inside herself than she ever had before on her own in the real world, she found herself surprisingly blocked. It was the gates, she realized quickly, as her eyes blinked open. Harry's doubtful face met her gaze, and she turned quickly to face those wrought-iron snakes.

The gate, as it encircled the house, encircled her mind. It was a measure of protection, Ginny realized, a new addition that had been placed, unconsciously, after the horror of her first year at Hogwarts. It kept whoever did not belong in her mind out … but there had to be some way to get around it, some way to convince herself that she really was herself …

Ginny walked cautiously towards the gate, encircling it again in her mind, and heard Harry following slowly from behind.

"What are you doing?" He asked her, still sounding angry.

"It's a wall," she explained him, not even realizing how calm and collected she sounded, indicating the gate. "It's new, I can't get past it … it must have been set up unconsciously, after Tom tried to break me."

"Well what are we waiting for, let's go in!"

But Ginny shook her head, "No, you don't understand. It's protected … even I can't break it. There has to be some way around it, some path, but I don't understand …"

Harry growled angrily and strode up to the gate. Reaching out his hand, he placed it against the large pad-lock and shouting said, "Alright, enough of this! Come on then, open up!"

For a moment nothing happened, and then the pad-lock began to glow. It was a glow of deep, dark red – the colour of old blood – and it spread from the lock as Harry clutched at it, staining the iron, the snakes and the perimeter of the house.

And then Harry began to shake.

One moment he had looked angry, then worried, and angry again until finally, as the colour of blood spread to the rest of the gate, his face had widened in shock before pain descended upon him. His eyes were squeezed together, his teeth ground and his free hand clenched spasmodically at his side. He looked as if he wanted to scream, but could not spare the energy to do so …

Shaking herself free of the alarm that gripped her, Ginny rushed over to the gate and tried to look for what was paining him. Seeing nothing physical, she reached to his fingers, now white up to the knuckle, and tried to peel them back. But as her skin made contact with his own, a white/green/red flash blasted her, and Ginny once again felt herself falling …

Hey All.

Damn. That was a good chapter! I keep surprising myself I guess. Lol. I'd forgotten that they went to the "Burrow" and then the "Chamber" before the Mansion. And I thought I'd need to re-write a bit about the Mansion, but I really didn't. It seemed good to me.

So, of course, I want to know what you think.

Review review review!!!