A Lighter Shade of Black

Days are but Days

The number of days since he had stormed out of the hospital wing was lost to Greg's mind. At first, he only moped around the Three Broomsticks, ordering enough firewhiskey to drown a hippogriff. He racked his brain, desperately thinking of the places she could be.

In the end, he came up with nothing. No reasonable place for Nicole to be.

"Gods, I miss her." he muttered.

Suddenly, Rosemerta appeared before him and grabbed up the almost full firewhiskey bottle.

"Get out." she stated simply.

"W-What?"

"Get out." she repeated, "Go back to Hogwarts and visit your friends. Wish them well, at least, because they have someone to love, while you only pine after someone who doesn't trust you at all anymore."

Greg stood and pulled his cloak on, dropping a few coins on the bar. "Bye, Rosie."

"Maybe you'll find something useful there, Greg."

…

Taylor sat in Albus Dumbledore's tea room surrounded by her friends and, of course, Albus.

"You said you felt… different, correct?" he asked her.

"Yes, Headmaster," she said, "For the past two nights, I've been having these dreams."

"About?"

"They seem like… I dunno, memories." she replied, holding her head in hands, "They're always just these little flashes, but I can still make sense out of them. Then, I wake up and I just can't put it together again."

"Do you think the spell affected you somehow?"

All the girls looked to the floor at the mention of that night. None of them had heard anything of Nicole, or from Greg for that matter.

"Maybe," she whispered, "it was a powerful spell."

"And I've been getting migraines lately, I think it might be from the magic around here, so much filling up one space." Laura said.

"And you, Miss Weasley?"

"Me? Oh, well, nothing really." she said, "I have dreams about normal weird things, I don't feel different, no migraines or anything."

"I see." he murmured, pressing his fingertips together, "Thank you, ladies, you may go."

The three girls stood and left the headmaster to himself. They walked in silence, all lost in their own thoughts, all the way down to the entrance hall of the castle. But when Ginevra spotted Greg standing there, searching for any signs of life, she hit her knees right there on the marble.

"Oh goddess, Gin, are you okay?" T.J. said, dropping next to her friend.

Laura rushed off. "I'll get Dumbledore!" she called over her shoulder.

"Goyle!" Gin called in a voice that was anything but her own. It was so distorted… T.J. was shocked.

The tall boy approached her and jumped as she grabbed his hand in a death grip. Her head shot up and she looked him straight in the eye with her large, now blackened, orbs.

"She is in the earth, trapped in wood, laid to rest, only to do so no more." she said, grip tightening, "Her new purity rests, tonight she must return, Betrayer you must save her, atone you sins."

She released his hand quickly, gasping for air as though she had been holding it in. Her eyes faded back to their regular honey brown and she looked up at T.J. with fear.

"What's happening to me, T.J.?" she asked, tears falling down her cheeks.

"You're a seer, Ginevra," T.J. whispered into her hair, "you have such a lovely gift, Gin, and it'll all be okay, I promise. We'll all take care of you."

Gin held onto her friend, held her like she was drowning in the sea and only Taylor could save her.

"I love you, T.J." she whispered.

"Love you too, baby girl."

T.J. wasn't sure where all this loving assurance had come from. Usually she had always been the one needing comfort or help. She was the one to be supported, not the supporter. But, lately, a lot of things had been different. Gin needed some one to hold her up and she was the only one around.

Taylor turned towards Goyle and let out a harsh whistle. Greg looked over at her with raised eyebrows.

"You heard the witch, she's in a place of rest!"

Greg had wide eyes as he rushed out into the courtyard. "Thank you so much!" he called over his shoulder to her.

T.J. stared after the rushing man, shaking her head. Soon enough, Dumbledore and Laura arrived soon followed by Madame Pomfrey. They laid Ginevra on a stretcher and floated her up to the hospitial wing. She needed rest.

…

Gregory knew exactly where she was. He silently cursed himself for not realizing it sooner, because it was the simplest thing in the world. The spell had been cast to send Nicole back to corporeal body, the problem was the girls never thought to actually retrieve said corporeal body from her grave in Hogsmeade cemetery.

"Brilliant! Oh, thank you so much, Ginevra Weasley!" he exclaimed, reaching the ground he was searching for.

Greg flicked his wand at the shovel outside Rosemerta's tavern and watched as it flew into his opened palm. He flicked his wand again and the shovel set to digging up the soil. He would have her up on the surface soon enough.

…

She opened her eyes, though it made no difference, all was still dark. When had she fallen asleep? How long had she slept? She shook her head and sighed. No reason in wondering about pointless questions, it didn't matter. She was awake now and feeling much better.

"What woke me, I wonder?" she said aloud.

Just then, she heard a scraping sound above her. She jerked, surprised to say the least.

And then she screamed for help.

…

"Miss Weasley?"

Gin looked up at the nurse from her bed. "Yes, Madam Pomfrey?"

"Ginevra, dear, had many times has this type of thing happened?"

Gin's thoughts flooded back to that night after Cole died, when she was going through her things in the dorm… When she touched the knife, it had been just like this. The redhead looked up at her again.

"Once before, I touched the knife Nicole had in her trunk and all these… memories came flooding into my head. But they weren't my memories. They were hers. "

The elder witch took a seat next to her bed.

"Oh my…" she whispered, "And how did it happen this time? Did you do anything?"

"No, ma'am." Gin began, trying to remember exactly what had happened, "T.J., Laura, and I were walking down to the Great Hall after meeting with Professor Dumbledore. I looked down at the bottom of the stairs and I saw Greg… and I felt this pain… it shock from the bottom of my spine and all the way up to the back of my skull, then it spend into my whole mind… and I blacked out."

"Goodness me…"

"When I came to, T.J. and Greg were looking down at me and Laura was rushing to find you and the headmaster."

As she finished, Madam Pomfrey touch a hand to her mouth in astonishment.

"What's wrong with me?"

"Oh Ginevra, darling, there isn't anything wrong with you." she replied, patting her shoulder, "You just have a special power, dear, nothing to worry about. You're a touch-know seer."

At her confused look, Poppy continued, "Sometimes, when you touch certain things, you get a sort of reading off of them. You'll see the past or what happened when it was around or how it was once used."

Ginevra realized that this confirmed her thought about Cole cutting herself at the way her mother treated her and the things that happened to her.

"I see." she whispered.

"But, Miss Weasley, you must realize that only creatures that are not fully human may possess this power and be safe." Poppy added, "Even Sibyl is not fully human, with her little bit of dwarf's blood. Therefore, Ginevra, you must let me run a DNA scan to see if there's a chance of anything in your ancestry that isn't human."

Gin nodded her consent. She certainly couldn't say anything at the moment, because she knew two things that doomed her right now.

One, she didn't have anything but human and witch's blood in her DNA.

And two, if she didn't get something else soon, the visions would kill her.

She sighed as a single tear rolled down her cheek.

Goddess help me.

End Chapter