Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I write for entertainment purposes only.

Author's Note: I appreciate all the comments I've gotten on this lately, and you've all really made me happy with your thoughts on this little story of mine! I'm trying to get the rest of the story plotted out so that writing it becomes much easier, but it's taking some time. Anyway, all that is to say here's the next chapter, and I hope you enjoy it.

Prisoner 79934: Ginevra Weasley

By: Rae

-A "Harry Potter" Story-

If Lucretia was good at anything, it was teaching her young student about the ways of pureblood families. If Ginny was good at anything, it was at absorbing every lesson and holding onto every spell.

The twins always did say she had a way with a bat bogey hex, after all.

Ginny spent the next week learning the ways of pureblood families of a certain status, and if the education she received was slightly unorthodox and contrary to some–well, many–of the things taught in the hallowed halls of Hogwarts, she put it at the back of her mind and decided to concentrate on her "lessons," such as they were. So now she was reciting a list of the oldest and wealthiest families in Wizarding Britain, careful to do so in the precise order Lucretia had taught her.

"The Blacks, the Malfoys, the Lestranges, the Rowles," she intoned as the list scrolled through her brain like it was one of Professor Snape's potion recipes scrawled across the chalkboard.

She finished the list and sighed. It seemed like today would be another history lesson altogether rather than one of the more interesting magic lessons they'd been having. Lucretia would spend time telling Ginny about many different dark magic spells sometimes, giving her a most intriguing look into the creation of spells and charms that could deal harm, and then choosing one for her to work on at a time. They'd started with some of the least harmful ones that most Slytherins came into Hogwarts having accomplished well before their first year, or so the other witch claimed.

Two days ago, Lucretia had taught her the stinging hex and a slightly more advanced version of the hex that she said was developed by her grandfather. Ginny dutifully repeated the two incantations over and over, trying to mimic the wand movements as Lucretia described them. She held her hand with her pointer finger out to mimic the wand she'd lost and followed the other witch's directions.

When she achieved a flawless spoken incantation, Lucretia sometimes rewarded her with actual lessons from her school memories. Ginny wasn't certain the other woman actually knew what year she'd learned certain things, however, as Lucretia rewarded her with the Lumos charm one time. Ginny, of course, had learned that one last year. Even so, she was thrilled to be learning more about the different charms and incantations her peers and older brothers knew.

"What do you know about the Confundus charm?" Lucretia suddenly asked, interrupting her recitation.

Ginny stopped and thought for a minute. "I think it…confuses people?" She said, more question than answer.

"Yes, it does," Lucretia said, her voice taking on a whimsical tone that Ginny knew came about when she was deep in memory. "You know the Sacred Twenty-Eight, and you know the beginnings of a good pureblood child's arsenal, but I think I'll begin teaching you some of the charms and hexes you need to know if you're ever out of here and need to know them. Starting with the Confundus."

"Why would I need to know that one?" Ginny asked curiously.

A nail scraped along the floor, and Ginny shuddered. It was the wrong question to ask.

"Your cell suddenly opens and you find a wand in the hallway," Lucretia said, her voice suddenly intent. "A guard comes at you from somewhere. What do you do?"

Ginny blanked.

"What do you do?" The question was hissed. "You're breaking out of Azkaban and a guard is going to stop you. Are you going to just stand there and let him put you quietly back in your cell?"

She tried to imagine it. The thought of breaking out of Azkaban had never occurred to her. Every time she thought of leaving the prison, it was always because she'd served her time and been freed or because her parents and Dumbledore had somehow managed to get her sentence overturned and proven her innocence. Though those daydreams had shriveled up of late as she'd realized they left her feeling even worse when she awoke from her reveries. Hope was a liar, she knew.

Lucretia scraped her nail along the floor again, and Ginny shook herself, realizing she hadn't answered the witch.

"Uhh, I curse the guard?" She asked lamely, aware she had few spells under her belt and precious little knowledge of what could help her in such an extraordinary situation.

"With what?" Lucretia spat. Before Ginny could formulate a response, she said, "You'll learn the Confundus, Expelliarmus, and Incarcerous charms first. And when you've learned them well enough, we'll move on."

"I thought you said I'm never getting out of here," Ginny said before she could stop herself.

A low cackle came from the other side of the wall, the kind that raised the hairs on the back of her neck.

"Little girl, I knew an Auror once whose motto was 'Constant Vigilance,'" she said softly. "In 'ere, we have no chances unless we're prepared. Always be thinking of how you'd take down a guard if you had the opportunity."

"How would you do it?" She asked, again surprising herself with the question.

"Two words, Heir of Slytherin," Lucretia said in that dark voice. Her tone turned even more sinister as she said, "Avada Kedavra." There was a pause in which a distant scream split the air like a knife. "But we'll get to that. For now, Confundus."

And so, in the space of three days, Lucretia began teaching Ginny a number of spells and charms she could use to escape from the guards, should she ever have the opportunity. Ginny learned to immobilize someone, to tie them magically with ropes, to petrify them, to lock their legs together, and even the stupefying charm.

"Langlock," she repeated four days later, the word rolling awkwardly around her mouth. She supposed it was appropriate for a charm that caused the person's tongue to stick to the roof of their mouth.

"That one was invented by a Rowle decades ago," Lucretia told her. "It takes great intent to invent a charm and actually infuse it with magic to make it work. Little lions like you are all too impatient to be able to do the work of creating charms, but snakes? Snakes have been building charms for generations. Shall I teach you one I learned before I became a resident of this fair institution?"

Ginny thought about that for a moment. Lucretia could be sarcastic at times, but she was never playful. In this, however, her singsong tone was almost mischievous, and that was when she was at her most dangerous, Ginny had learned.

That was when the insanity was on the brink of coming out to play.

That was when the screaming and scraping would start and linger for hours, sometimes an entire day.

There was no help for it, though. She had nothing else to do and no one else to talk to. Besides, Ginny craved this education in a way she couldn't quite articulate. It was grounding her in something so she didn't succumb to the madness creeping along the edges of her mind. But it was also proving to be more fascinating than any of her Hogwarts classes had been, even knowing that much of what the other witch taught her could be twisted and dark in the wrong hands.

"Yes," she said. "Tell me."

"It's a little hex a classmate of mine invented called Sectumsempra."