Chapter Twelve – Finding Out

Chapter Twelve – Finding What?

Hermione's face had an expression that was difficult to decipher, Ginny mused, as she followed the Head Girl out of the Great Hall and back towards her private rooms. Harry looked as though he was thinking the same thing, and he looked back at Ginny quizzically when she glanced in his direction.

It wasn't until all three of them had walked into Hermione's private room and the brown haired girl had hurriedly waved her wand and whispered a spell to shut and lock the doors that the seventh-year turned towards Ginny and Harry. She held the book up in her hands, and Ginny was extremely surprised to see that Hermione's hand was actually shaking. From what, she had no clue; she knew that the poem that could be read in the book was about Harry, but why was Hermione acting so odd?

"Where did you two get this again? You said something about it finding you?" Hermione's voice had taken on the tone she usually reserved for asking questions in class; both Ginny and Harry could see that she was extremely curious about how they had come to have the book.

Ginny paused as she thought of how to answer the question. Thinking that it wouldn't do much harm for Hermione to know the truth, she looked up at Harry to see what he was thinking. He shrugged, and she took that as a cue to answer. "It did find us, really. We were walking into the bookstore towards you and Ron, and it literally just dropped on me."

Hermione's brow furrowed as she contemplated what this meant. "And when you tried to put it back on the shelf?" She knew Ginny wouldn't be one to knock a book down, even accidentally, and leave it on the floor.

"It got stuck to my and Harry's hands…then the shop keeper said something about that book always finding who it wants to." Ginny was very matter of fact about this; as the words were out of her mouth, the book in Hermione's hands seemed to twitch itself towards the redhead. "So he gave it to us, free of charge."

"Hmm." Hermione thought for a moment. She seemed to be thinking of a way to tell them something. "Uh, have either of you ever heard of this book before?"

Harry shook his head first, and Ginny did soon after. "Nope."

"It's an extremely old book, you guys. Extremely. Did you see when it was written?" Hermione's voice had gotten the tone she usually reserved for helping Ron with his homework. The two friends shook their heads again in answer to her question, and she half mumbled to herself, "Right, blank pages. Well, it's from the sixteen hundreds. There are rumors that it originated before then, but this is the only copy in existence today."

Ginny's eyebrows raised. "Why did it find us? All we did was walk into a store!" She'd really only been somewhat curious about the book before Hermione had seen it, but now she wanted to rifle through the pages one by one to see what else she could see. No wonder the pages had seemed so blank – they were old!

"That's the thing," Hermione said slowly, "It rarely ever lets anyone pick it up. That's why I thought it was a school copy in the Common Room – it's said that the book only presents itself to anyone worthy to read it, and it won't let itself be bought." Hermione looked closely at Ginny and Harry as she spoke; they were sitting on the loveseat covered in a Gryffindor throw blanket. "In fact," she continued, "it only presents itself to a person if the person is in a prophecy inside of the book. To make matters even trickier, if more than one person is involved in a prophecy, the book won't present itself unless all the people involved are within sight. That's why it's so rare of a read, plus it explains why the darned thing kept trying to jump out of my hands. "

Ginny's breath caught in her throat. She hadn't been expecting that news. Instantly, her mind froze as she ran through the so-called prophecy in her mind. She'd read it straight through last night, and now she could almost see the words on the page as they appeared in the book:

The boy who survives a trial as a child

Will learn of his family legacy

The year that he gains his full power.

He will know of his strength only when

He finds she of whom his heart desires.

The two are destined to be lovers;

One created for the other.

Innocent will they both be

Until in the arms of one another.

She'd only read it briefly; already she had it memorized. If Hermione were correct, then there was no doubt at all about what the prophecy was saying. She and Harry were destined to be…to be…

"Harry?" Ginny asked in a small voice.

All he could do was look at her with a strange expression in his eyes, an expression she was sure mirrored her own. They held each other's gaze until Hermione timidly cleared her throat.

"Um," she started off with, as she was realizing exactly what the other two were. "There's more to the prophecy though, you two. I know I've seen it before, somewhere in the Restricted Section of the library. I don't recall it exactly because I ran across it in my third year, when I was doing all of the time turner business. I was looking for something with ancient runes in it, and this prophecy book I found had some. I read this and I just remember thinking that it was about someone like you, Harry."

He seemed to have recovered from the recent discovery, and he was in all-on 'think' mode. "It's in our library?" He asked her; she nodded in response. "Then we should be able to find it no problem, right?"

She nodded again, taking on Ginny's habit of chewing her lip. Ginny frowned. "What else is there? You're nervous."

Hermione nodded. "I really just want to find that book in the library and double check it before I say anything else. I think I may be confusing two prophecies together."

Harry looked as though he were about to ask something, but he saw that she was getting more and more nervous as his gaze was trained on her. He looked at Ginny, and the realization of the meaning of the prophecy rang through his head loud and clear. What else could possibly be unloaded on us? Isn't this enough already? Ginny and I are…destined to be together?

With that thought, his eyes locked with Ginny's again, and Hermione gave an impatient sigh as she tried to remember what runes book she had been looking at when she saw the prophecy in the Restricted Section.

Ginny sat on her bed, the Gryffindor maroon draperies closed around her. Thoughts whirled across her mind faster than she could process them, and she knew that the night would be another restless one. She shrugged off her house cloak and tried to clear her head, but there was no chance of that happening. The previous night, all of her thoughts had concentrated on the kiss she and Harry had shared in the stairway. Tonight, all she thought of was why she and Harry had shared the kiss. The wonderful, excruciatingly exciting, passionate kiss.

Thought after thought kept her awake as she lay back on her pillows and pulled her comforter up around her. She'd had a nightmare about Tom Riddle the night before – a bloody Tom Riddle. He had frightened her into thinking that the seventh year boy's dormitories were gone; bloody, she had believed him. She'd gone downstairs, and Harry was there. Harry, her friend, her good friend, had comforted her when he saw that she was upset. And then he'd passionately pressed her against the wall while they'd ravaged each other's lips.

The book had popped up in the Common Room and she'd read the passage aloud before they shared the kiss. It was almost as though the book had wanted to warn them of what could happen if they DID kiss.

She groaned to herself when she tried thinking of the prophecy and what Hermione had said about the book. It only gave itself to people who were involved in a prophecy inside of it? That clearly meant that Ginny was the 'she' mentioned in the prophecy that had shown up last night.

And that clearly meant, if one could count following a prophecy in an ancient tome as something clear, that she and Harry were destined not only to be together, but to…to become…

Lovers?

An exciting wave of energy prickled the back of Ginny's neck as she thought that, but she didn't know what to make of it. She and Harry had just become friends last year, and granted she had liked him long before that, but…

Destiny?

She rolled over and tried blocking her thoughts by closing her eyes. She was tired, really, for after they'd left Hermione in search of her third year Ancient Runes notes, she and Harry had awkwardly worked on homework with Ron and Kota in the Common Room for the rest of the day, avoiding what they'd heard Hermione say nearly altogether, and it was tiresome hard work to try not to say what one really wanted to say.

She fell into a light sleep, smiling unconsciously when she realized as she dozed off that her bed still faintly smelled like Harry's cologne, rubbed off from his cloak the night before.

Ginny was dressed up again, in gorgeous robes for the upcoming ball. She could feel that her hair was exquisitely done on top of her head in an up-do that let a few curls fall loose around her face and neck. She felt rather than saw the robes that she was wearing, because the satin and silk was soft against her skin. She smoothed out the skirt of the robes as she stood from the chair, releasing the wrinkles, and she looked around for a mirror. Seeing one across the room, she picked up the skirt of her robes so they wouldn't brush along the ground behind her. Suddenly she felt the weight of a ring on her left hand as the rich material brushed against it.

Glancing down, she saw a thick band of shiny silver on her ring finger. She was surprised; she'd seen the ring before.

Tom Riddle showed up before she could think of anything else.

Sweating, Ginny opened her eyes as she gasped for breath. Blood. There had been so much blood on his hands. It had been the same dream as the night before, with a young Tom coming to her to say he'd demolished the seventh years and their dorm.

Why? Ginny thought as she tried to find a comfortable position in bed. Why am I dreaming about Tom Riddle? Unable to find a comfortable spot, she gave up on sleep and began to stare out the window, the sunlight starting to creep up across the horizon. Maybe Harry would find out why she was seeing Voldemort in her dreams soon. Or, she reasoned, maybe Hermione would since she kept popping into the situation with more information for them.