Ginny had finally given up her search on Albania, mostly because Sirius had convinced her that Tom Riddle travelling to Albania was just random, and was nothing of significance.
Sirius tried to convince her he most likely was visiting family, Ginny nodded along in agreement knowing she couldn't argue with him. Not unless she was willing to tell him she knew that Tom Riddle had no family because she spoke to him in a diary when she was a first year.
But it was freeing to go back to somewhat of a normalcy. Pushing thoughts of Tom, the future and her secret mission aside knowing it was futile to dwell on when she wasn't in contact with Tom Riddle.
Although Ginny was able to complete her assignments on time and avoid detention Sirius only seemed to add on to his already extended stay.
"What do you mean you have detention tonight?" Lily snapped at James, loud enough that they got several amused and dirty looks for onlookers.
"What's the big deal I've had detention for 2 weeks straight," James stated adjusting his glasses as he attempted and failed at dismissing Lily's outburst.
Sirius sitting next to Ginny however nearly choked on his stew, in an attempt to muffle his laugh.
"I take it you have detention than too?" Ginny asked looking away from her friends in an attempt to give them more privacy.
"Yea James and I got in a bit of a row with Thomas McGregor."
"Did this occur simple because he's a Slytherin?" Ginny asked putting down her spoon and rubbing her temples.
"After class, he nudged James in the doorway, so obviously I couldn't stand by and do nothing."
"It's ok I don't need the details," Ginny laughed shaking her head.
It was slightly amusing that house rivalries were very much the same in the future as they were now.
"We were suppose to have practice tonight, James wants the team to fly laps."
Sirius reached for the roll on Ginny's plate sensing that she was done with it.
Ginny knew Sirius was changing the subject, but she had learned a while back that their was no stopping the boys from getting into trouble, and their really was no sense in getting angry over it.
"After we had to listen to James lecture us on how important and mandatory attendance was at tonight's practice," Ginny smirked echoing James's words for their their last practice.
"You still h'vetago," Sirius spoke through a mouthful of stew.
"Fat chance, if the two of you aren't going to be at practice no way am i flying laps all night," Ginny said.
"No practice tonight?" Fabian asked, sliding into the empty spot on Ginny's right.
"Well James and Sirius can't make it," Ginny said.
"Oi! There's still practice tonight, you lot can run through drills and do laps tonight, just because I won't-" James called out from a few seats down.
"Sorry mate, if you two are skipping out so are Gideon and I."
"Same for me," Ginny grinned.
"Fine we'll just have to have a practice early Friday morning," James grinned victoriously.
"Hey now, I'll have you know I came all this way to tell you how excited we were for practice tonight, we were listening when you stressed how important it was before Saturday's game." Fabian defended.
"Exactly," Ginny pipped in grinning.
"Why should we be punished," Fabian finalized.
"I suppose, just promise to get a little practice in before Saturdays game, we need to beat Hufflepuff," James agreed.
"There you are brother, I take you told Captain Oh Captain we've got detention and can't make practice," Gideon greeted as he ruffled Ginny's hair playfully before squeezing his way in between Sirius and Ginny.
"Detention!" James cried outraged.
Fabian threw his hands up in exasperation, at Gideon's words.
Ginny couldn't help but laugh, at her Uncles.
"Forget what I said 6am practice Friday morning," James exclaimed shooting daggers at Fabian.
"Wait, what?"
"Shh, stop talking before you get us another morning practice," Fabian replied to his brother has he stood up from the bench.
"I guess you didn't tell him yet," Gideon whispered.
Sirius joined Ginny in her laughter as he listened to the two bicker as they made their way down the table.
"James you realize now you have to get up early enough to be on the pitch for 6, and you can't skip class after because we have a test," Remus spoke from beside James.
Lily smirked at the remark, most likely satisfied that James would be punished for getting detention on what would have been the first detention free night in two weeks.
"No problem," James responded.
Causing the group of four friends and Peter to start laughing as it was widely known that James was not a morning person. Sometimes James wouldn't go to class at 8 because he felt like the day shouldn't start until 10. And attending 3/5 classes was enough sacrifice.
"Make sure the rest of the team knows," Sirius added in an attempt to cover up his friend's embarrassment.
"Good idea," James mumbled as he got up from his seat.
"Want to do homework in the library tonight?" Ginny asked, turning to Remus as Sirius reached across the table and took the tart off of Peter's plate.
"I actually am all caught up on my classes," Remus responded sheepishly.
"Oh."
"I don't mind helping you," Remus added quickly.
"No that's ok, you stayed on top of things no need to make you suffer because i didn't," Ginny laughed.
"Fair enough," Remix grinned.
As the great hall began to thin and James and Sirius went to detention and Remus and Lily went off back to the common room excitedly discussing runes Ginny realized she couldn't put off her homework anymore and picked up her bag and headed towards the library.
Ginny opted for a secluded table in the back corner tucked between some dusty shelves and got to work. Even though she had managed to stay out of detention, just as she thought she was caught up in her classes she always seemed to get assigned more work.
"Ginevra, do you mind if I sit?"
Ginny looked up to see Severus standing across from her his head bowed shielding his face from his black hair as he fidgeted with his hands.
"Oh course," Ginny grinned thankful for the distraction as she pushed her parchment aside.
"I need to ask you something," Severus mumbled looking around to make sure no one was listening.
"Sure."
"I've been looking into time travel," Severus whispered.
Ginny felt her body go tense as she whipped around making sure no one was listening.
"Severus-," Ginny hissed, growing paranoid.
She never wanted Severus to find out, let alone to bring it up on the school library where anyone could over hear.
"What's your plan?" He asked.
"My plan?" Ginny responded taken aback.
"When you came here did you plan on ever going back home?"
Ginny didn't answer.
"Listen, Regulus told me about the ripple-"
"This is not the place," Ginny snapped a little too loudly.
Ginny grew agitated, what she told Regulus she told him on confidence knowing it was a secret he was take to the grave quite literally within a few years.
"Listen i know it wasn't his secret to tell, but he was trying to research it, I caught him and made him tell me. I wanted to come to you first because Regulus wasn't looking in the right places he was looking into dark magic. It seemed so simple to start looking at the beginning."
"What did he tell you?"
"That you traveling here so far back was against the laws of magic, something like that had never been done before and it created a ripple," Severus responded impatiently waving his hand as if it were all irrelevant.
Ginny signed internally with relief Regulus managed to keep Ginny's past with Tom Riddle a secret.
"But listen Ginny, what you did shouldn't have been possible, even a time turner only works in so many ways. If it were possible to travel so far back into the past don't you think witches and wizards would have been doing it for years?"
Ginny contemplated Severus's words, it was so easy for her to come to the past, surely she was not the only one to have done something like this, time travelers like her probably kept their travels a secret.
"What you've done cannot be undone, Severus continued.
"I know that," Ginny responded.
"No, it's more complicated than that, you can't return to your time, the longer you're here the smaller your window is."
"What do you mean?"
"Time travel isn't as simple as spinning a time turner," Severus said excitedly.
He pulled out the chair across from her and took a seat pulling out a book and sliding it open across the table to her.
Ginny reached out pulling the book closer to her as she looked down at the page. Their was a large diagram of a time turner, its thin hour glass shape. Ginny looked up to meet Severus's gaze not sure why he was showing her what a time turner was.
Severus pointed to the second page, his finger resting on the second paragraph.
'Time Turners are encased in a Hour-Reversal Charm, a charm that takes at least 4 skilled wizards nearly two days to embed into a time turner, thus the rarity of the devices. Currently their are twenty in existence, all locked away in the Ministry of Magic.
The number of times one turns the hourglass corresponds to the number of hours one travels back in time. However, one can only stay in the past for five hours at a time. Any more than five hours causes the traveler to change history causing grave danger to the future, but also erases the traveler himself.'
"What does it mean erases the traveler?" Ginny asked, looking up from the book to meet Severus's gaze.
"It means you entered a time where you didn't belong, where you would in theory eventually cross paths with your future self, this should be impossible."
"But I'm here, It's been almost a year and I feel fine," Ginny reasoned.
"There isn't much on time travel, or ripples but from what i could find there's something from your future that's so prominent in your past that is tethering you here, it has be be strong, almost as if you being here fulfills some prophecy."
"That doesn't make any sense," Ginny sighed, rubbing her temples.
Regulus was trying to find a connection to her and Tom trying to logically find the cause of a ripple, ironically Severus had stumbled across the cause without having put all the pieces together.
"But what did you mean about my window being small?"
Severus's pale face seemed to pale more as he avoided Ginny's eyes.
"It means whatever it is that is tethering you here, you both can't survive, you are the one that doesn't belong in this time, unless you create some kind of powerful force that can overrule your fate and alter magic, you'll die."