Ginny watched as her brothers gradually filtered out of the train. First Percy, the oldest, approached and said hello and stood with them. Then the two twins next, laughing and talking with another boy. After saying one last thing that appeared to be a joke of some kind, the other boy laughed and went his own way. The twins came over with their luggage, their mood dropping rapidly as soon as they spotted Ginny standing there. Ginny watched another wisp of magic drift off one of their bodies and float over to the other and be absorbed. So interesting…

The youngest, Ron came next and Ginny had to clench her fists and control herself as she spotted the grinning Eric Potter standing next to him. There was a bushy haired girl there as well, straight backed and looking rather smug as she said something. Eric Potter’s eyes drifted over to the group as Ron spotted them and left his friends to reach them. He trailed after Ron as he made his way over and Ginny’s knuckles grew white as she tried to control her irrational anger as she looked at him.

Ron glanced nervously between the two of them as they drew close.

“Hey, Ginny,” Eric said, ignoring Ron’s look, “Just wanted to apologize. Have absolutely no idea why you reacted that way to me. Love and hate are closer than most people think, I guess,” He said as he gave her a wink. Dad shifted and his expression started to grow annoyed. Eric seemed to notice and turned back to her.

“Anyway, maybe read over my books if you want to know more about me. They’ve really captured my heroic exploits I’ve been on ever since I was a baby. I’m sure you have plenty of those old books kicking around from what Ron tells me. Have a good summer!”

He quickly turned around and started walking off, her Dad’s hostile look following him.

“Arrogant prick,” one of the twins muttered, “What kind of apology was that?”

“Language!” Molly said, “Mind your sister.”

The twin that had spoken looked at her. “Sorry, Ginny. We’ll teach you all the swear words later.”

Ginny perked up, “Thanks! I’ve got to get some better ones for when I next see Dumbledore! Calling him a meanie didn’t seem to work that well.”

The twin laughed, “Oh, yes. Now we just have to teach you…”

“Fred!” Molly said, “You will not be teaching your sister bad words! What’s wrong with you?”

The twin looked at her and put a hand over his heart dramatically.

“Fred? Mother, I’m George! You can’t even recognize your own children?”

A heavy atmosphere came over the group as Molly glared at the twin and he wilted slightly. He glanced at Ginny, “Er, uhm. Yeah, I’m Fred Mom. Sorry.”

Molly huffed and the tension broke, “If I hear you corrupting Ginny then you’ll be in big trouble. The both of you.”

“Yes, Mother!” Both of the twins chorused while not looking deterred at all. After a few more seconds of everyone checking they had their luggage, they all made their way back to the car and piled inside. Ginny sat in the back with Fred on her right and Ron on her left. After focusing hard, she had been able to see that while very similar, Fred and George had slightly different magical flows. So she could tell them apart now even if it was much more difficult than most other people, and she knew that the one that had spoken before was definitely Fred.

She startled a bit as she heard a soft squeak from her left. She turned and stared at the fat rat that Ron was holding. She hadn’t noticed before, but its magic was very strange. Vibrant and flowing fast, more than any of the other animals she had seen before. She leaned in and started inspecting the rat closely with her eyes.

“Hey, Ron,” She said, “I didn’t know you had a magic rat! Can he do any tricks?”

Everyone stared at her like she was crazy. “Scabbers?” Ron said, “He’s not magical, he’s just a normal rat. Percy had him while he was at school and gave him to me after he got an owl.”

Percy turned around from the middle row. The interior of the car was expanded so there were three rows of seats, with Percy and George in the middle row and Ron, Ginny, and Fred in the very back, then Molly and Dad in the very front.

“Yes, I had him. Just a normal rat. Never saw him do anything magical when I had him.”

“Where’d you find him? Are you sure?” Ginny asked, “He seems magical to me…”

The rat squeaked and dove in the gap between the seats and the door, appearing frightened as Ginny kept trying to peer at it. She could still feel it with her magic sense, but she leaned back disappointed. Oh well.

“Speaking of magical creatures,” Ginny said, “Dad, can we have Fawkes over tonight? It’ll be fun to introduce him to everybody.”

Dad was driving, and glanced at Molly briefly before facing forward again, “If your mother agrees,” he said neutrally.

“Can we? We want to meet a phoenix!” George said excitedly as Molly opened her mouth. She twisted around to observe all her children looking at her with pleading looks. Even Percy, who was visibly trying to suppress his interest.

Molly sighed, “Fine, we can have him over. I’ll have to make extra portions for the soup for him…”

They kept driving, and Molly quickly changed topics and started interrogating the boys on how they had felt they had done on their final exams. Percy was proud in stating that he thought he had done well. Fred and George didn’t seem as certain, but didn’t seem overly bothered by that fact. Ron stayed silent and only gave short answers to Molly’s questions, appearing to be nervous.

No one talked to Ginny too much and she just sat there and listened as they talked. They seemed to mostly forget that she was there. They got home and everyone dispersed to put their luggage back away in their rooms. Ginny noticed that Ron’s rat was simply put on the floor and scampered off on its own, Ron not even bothering to bring the rat back to his room. She was still sure that the thing must be magical somehow even if no one else seemed to know about it…

They had dinner and everyone was properly amazed when Fawkes arrived and started eating the meal with them. The boys had wanted to see if they could touch Fawkes, but the phoenix said no when Ginny asked him.

They were all very disappointed, and even tried to convince Ginny to let them do it anyway. But Ginny was firm. If Fawkes said so, then she couldn’t just say otherwise. How would she feel if people started randomly poking her while she was having dinner? Yes, he got to decide. Ginny was just happy that he didn’t seem to mind when she pet him. That was half the fun for when he came over.

When dinner was over, Fawkes hopped back into the corner and burst into flames again to disappear and return back to Dumbledore again.

Everyone talked for a bit, all the boys asking her all sorts of questions about Fawkes. Ginny happily told them everything she knew about him and told them about everything related to their familiar bond. It was fun, all of them were interested and asked her all sorts of questions.

— — —

The next day, Ginny noticed that Scabbers the magic rat was sniffing around the kitchen. She walked over and leaned down to the floor to stare at the rat.

“Hello, Scabbers,” She said, causing the fat rat to startle and squeak, “I know you’re magic somehow. Can you understand me? Were you looking for food?”

The rat sat there trembling and didn’t do anything or move as she kept staring at it. After nothing happened, she stood and looked at a rat for another few seconds.

“I’ll figure out what’s going on with you, Scabbers,” She said to herself, “You’re definitely not a normal rat… I’ll have to go tell Ron you’re hungry. He’s the one that’s supposed to take care of you.”

She wandered off and after telling Ron about Scabbers went outside. Fred and George were out there flying around on brooms.

Upon seeing her staring at them, they landed as one.

“Hey, Ginny! Want to come join us? We saw you sneaking to practice on the broom last summer, so maybe you’ve still got it?”

“I did?” Ginny asked, “I’ve never seen those things before. You fly around on brooms?”

The brooms looked old and rickety, but she could see that they were absolutely brimming with enchantments. It must be like Dad’s car, each little piece enchanted before they put it together.

Their faces fell a little, “Oh, right. You really don’t remember anything still?” Fred asked.

Ginny shook her head, feeling a little awkward. “Sorry, no. Nothing before the last month or so…”

George clapped Fred on the shoulder, “Hey, we’ll teach you properly this time! Brothers teaching little Sis how to fly like us Quidditch pros!”

“Quidditch? What’s that?”

“It’s a game you play on these brooms. Biggest sport in the wizarding world! We’ll have to play a game later if we can convince more people to play with us.”

A few minutes later, Ginny had a broom in her hand and the twins were circling around above her watching. She mounted the broom and felt its magic humming beneath her. She kicked off the ground and felt all sorts of complex enchantments activate. The enchantments kept the broom in the air and her butt firmly in the center of the stick beneath her so she wouldn’t fall. There was another enchantment on there too so it wouldn’t be so uncomfortable sitting on it.

“Yeah, just lean into it, and you’ll go that way!” Fred called out from above. She followed his lead and leaned forward slightly and shot forward. She leaned to the side and twisted to the side.

“Whoa! Sis, you’re going so fast! Wicked.”

Ginny twisted again and the broom followed her. Her magic sense gave her a perfect view of where she was even as she twisted and turned while jetting around on the broom.

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Ginny went for another sharp turn and felt the enchantments suddenly strain and sputter as the broom shuddered beneath her. Before she could react, the enchantments were overloaded and the broom began spinning like a top in circles as the stabilizing enchantments stopped holding her from tipping. She whipped around and descended towards the grassy ground in an uncontrolled crash. Just before she hit, she remembered her magic and extended a panicked spike of magic into the ground beneath her.

There was a wet thump as her tendril hit the ground and flexed to push down on it. But her magic didn’t push back and lift her up with the opposite force like if it was her hand as she had expected it to, so she continued and hit the ground at full speed.

She was thrown from the broom and rolled for a few feet after a hard impact on the grass. She lay there groaning as her whole body felt like a big bruise.

“Ginny? You alright?” Fred called as he approached from above on their brooms. Ginny rolled over and sat up, and winced as she felt her shin. It was all scraped and bruised from the impact along with her arms. Her dress was slightly ripped and muddy all over. Ginny looked at the dress in disappointment. This one was her favorite so far, hopefully Molly would be able to fix it with one of her spells…

She inspected her scraped arm. “I’m okay,” She said, “Maybe I went a little too fast…”

Fred laughed as his feet touched the ground a few feet away, “Hah! You’re a natural, seems like you’ve still got the muscle memory at least.”

Ginny stood and brushed herself off and looked at the broom sitting on the ground looking muddied but unharmed behind her, “The broom is fine? Why didn’t it break?”

“You think it’d be a goner after one bad fall?” George said as he landed next to Fred, “It’ll take a lot more than that to break these old things. Wait, are you bleeding?”

Ginny looked at her shin and lifted her dress slightly to look. There was a long thin scrape running up her leg that was bleeding a bit.

“I'll have to go ask Molly for help, I think she knows some healing spells… And to fix my dress, it’s my favorite one…” Ginny said as she checked herself for anywhere else she might be bleeding or scraped.

She looked up as they didn’t say anything and saw they had awkward expressions on their faces.

“Molly?” Fred asked.

“Yeah, Mom,” Ginny clarified.

“But you called Dad Dad,” George said, “Why aren’t you doing the same for Mum?”

Ginny shrugged uncomfortably.

The twins shared a glance, but didn’t press further and they all started walking back towards the house.

“She wants the old Ginny back,” She said suddenly, “From before I lost my memories. Not who I am now. That’s why.”

Neither of the twins responded and they fell into silence as they went inside. Molly bustled over as she spotted them from where she was standing in the kitchen.

“Ginny! What happened? You’re bleeding. Fred and George, what did you do?”

“We were just showing her how to fly on a broom. She’s a natural,” Fred said, “She took a turn too hard and wiped out.”

Molly fussed and inspected Ginny and she stayed still as Molly looked her over. Molly started casting a few spells and Ginny’s cuts and bruises began to slowly fade. After a minute or so the cuts were healed and Ginny’s bruises were there but not massive painful blobs anymore. Molly blasted her with a scourgify charm to remove all of the dirt as well.

Molly looked up from Ginny to glare at the twins, “What were you thinking, taking her for something like that? She could have been even more hurt! You can teach her after she…”

Molly paused.

“After I what?” Ginny asked.

“Nothing, dear. Your brothers just have to be more careful.”

Ginny glanced at the twins who were looking between her and Molly.

She looked back at Molly and reached down to show the rip on the lower part of her dress. “Can you fix it, Molly? It’s my favorite one.”

“Are you sure? You used to love that blueish one with the little flowers quite a bit. Have you tried that one yet?”

“Yes, Molly. I like this yellow one much better.”

“Hmph. Well, go and get changed and bring it back. I’ll need some time to make sure I have some time to focus on my spellwork so I can fix it.”

Ginny left and changed into something else and ended up handing the damaged dress over to Molly for her to repair later.

— — —

Ginny slowly opened her eyes, knowing that something was off. She shifted in her bed and focused on her magic sense to scan her surroundings. She relaxed as she realized what had woken her up. Ron’s magical rat had just entered her room and was pattering towards her bed. Did she have any food in here? Had the rat smelled something on her? She shifted under her covers, deciding to wait until the rat left. And tell off Ron later. He should make sure that his rat wasn’t running all over the place and into other people’s rooms…

The rat was five feet away and had stopped moving. Ginny waited to see what would happen, and to her horror the rat’s form bubbled and twisted until it assumed the form of a hunch backed man! She sat up and screamed urgently, pulling on her familiar bond with Fawkes. The other end twitched weakly. Oh no, Fawkes must be asleep!

Ginny saw the hunched man raise the wand in his hand towards her in the darkness, his whole body hidden by the darkness of her bedroom. The tip of the man’s wand began to glow with a bright white light and Ginny saw his magic flowing into the wand as he prepared to cast a spell at her.

Fawkes' side of her familiar bond twitched, harder this time. But the response was still sluggish, he must still be waking up, he wouldn’t be here in time. Ginny’s mind raced as the white light grew brighter and brighter as the spell was almost ready to fire from the wand.

She struggled, but her arms were trapped under the sheets and the man’s wand tracked her even as she struggled to get away. He still hadn’t said a word. Finally, Ginny’s frantic thoughts snagged on the last person who might be able to help her.

“Balthazar!” She screamed, “Help!”

The strange man flinched and looked around even as the spell stayed charged on the end of his wand, not shooting out just yet. But Ginny could see that he wasn’t feeding any more magic into it, he could fire it at her at any moment. And then who knows what it would do.

The man chuckled as nothing happened. “Ha!” He said, speaking for the first time, “Now time for the snip snip of your memories. Can’t have any of you too suspicious of the family rat after all… I’m just a normal rat…”

Ginny saw his arm tense as he prepared to cast at her and then the next instant she was splattered with hot fluid. She spat as her mouth suddenly tasted metallic as some of what she suddenly realized was blood splattered into it.

She screamed in surprise and tried to scramble back as quickly as she could, but still was getting tangled in the bed sheets.

She saw through her magic sense that the strange man had dropped his wand to the floor, his spell winking out as soon as the stick left his fingers. Piercing through his back and sticking out of his chest was the blade of an enchanted sword made of bone. Ginny wiped the blood from her eyes and saw that her room was lit up in a bright red glow as the sword was withdrawn from the strange man’s back with a wet snick. Behind him carrying the blade was a strange creature with a shifting crimson portal flickering behind it.

It looked like a human covered in pitch black spiky metal armor all over its form. It even had interlocking metal gauntlets and armor from head to toe. But at its head the helmet was open to reveal the lower half of its face. Instead of a human face, it revealed massive insect mandibles.

It clicked and buzzed as it stood there motionless, the bloody enchanted sword made of bone in its hand. Ginny looked at the weapon and saw that it was covered in glowing red runes like nothing she’d ever seen before.

The bug person ignored Ginny and turned to the wheezing man on the floor, slowly bleeding out and weakly trying to reach for his wand even as his skin rapidly began to pale from the blood loss.

The bug person clicked and chittered again and reached out an armored hand towards the prone form of the man. Its hand almost touched the man, moving fractionally downwards…

And then suddenly golden strings lanced into Ginny and she couldn’t control herself anymore. Her body raised its hand and her magic twisted and blew the armored insect man backwards away from the strange man that had tried to attack her.

The bug person was about to crash into the wall of her room, but suddenly a series of whitish runes lit up over its armor and its momentum stopped on a dime and it looked like it was hovering frozen in the air for a single instant. The runes disappeared and the creature dropped to the ground with a loud crash.

The bug person landed on one knee with its bone sword held at the ready in both hands as it stood and let out a buzzing and clicking noises.

“Soldier of Beyond,” Ginny’s mouth said, “You have no place here. It is not this man’s fate to die so soon. Return to your realm of origin or be destroyed.”

Ginny felt her magic churning as her body floated above the covers and stared down the bug person. The whole upper side of its head was covered in metal with only a few small holes scattered over it so she couldn’t even tell what the bug person was thinking.

Suddenly in a burst of flame and a loud cry, Fawkes appeared in the center of the room. Ginny’s body raised her arm towards the bug person. “Fawkes, attack the intruder!” Her mouth said.

Fawkes didn’t hesitate, diving down with his claws extended towards the armored figure as he flew. The bug person ducked and with a single strong strike from the flat of its sword sent Fawkes flying into the wall with a crash. Fawkes crumpled to the ground. Ginny tried to scream, to look at Fawkes to make sure that he was okay. But her body was too busy finishing the spell it had been weaving while the armored figure was busy dealing with Fawkes. The armored figure leapt forward not towards Ginny, but towards the prone man that was still moving weakly on the ground, his fingers weakly pushing away his wand as he struggled to grab it through the pool of his blood below him.

The armored figure launched forward in one big leap and with a white flash stopped its momentum directly in front of the dying man. It reached down and in a single blur of movement grabbed him by a leg and gripped hard with its gauntlet. The whole armored figure’s body twisted in a circle and he flung the strange man by his leg into the crimson portal it had come from at high speed. The man wheezed weakly as he flew, only to disappear in an instant as he flew through the portal.

“Fawkes, Attack!” Ginny’s mouth screamed and Ginny was able to notice out of the corners of her eyes that a beaten and battered phoenix was getting to its feet, flapping its wings to hover but looking like it was taking him a lot of effort to do so. Everything felt like it was moving in slow motion.

Ginny struggled as she realized what was about to happen. The golden strings were going to get Fawkes killed so they could have time to finish whatever this complex spell was that it was forcing her to build! No!

Ginny thrashed and internally screamed and her magic stuttered. The being puppeting her body instantly refocused the magic for the spell, and the golden chains elsewhere in her loosened slightly. Ginny kept trying to mess up the magic spell as she realized how to save Fawkes.

“Stop it!” Ginny’s mouth growled, “You are. Mine! I will put things back in their proper place!”

Ginny saw Fawkes slowly rise and start to extend his claws towards the armored figure that was turning towards the glowing red portal. He was about to dive. The golden chains were so focused on defending from Ginny’s attempts to disrupt the massive spell that when she suddenly shifted focus, they were caught unprepared.

“Fawkes! Don’t do it! Get back!” Ginny managed to scream before the chains shifted again and reasserted control.

“No, attack now! I fdlsakjiope- attieospaji!” Ginny fought for control and managed to turn the golden chain’s words into nonsense. Fawkes paused and aborted his attack and decided to instead swoop towards Ginny. The golden chains reasserted control over her, but it was too late. Fawkes had already abandoned his attack and the armored figure was sprinting towards the portal and about to dive through.

“No!” Ginny’s mouth shouted, “Die, Intruder!”

Her magic came to a point and quickly gathered between her hands into a glowing yellow ball. In a flash, the ball shot out and impacted the back of the armored figure as it was a foot away from the portal. It let out a high pitched inhuman scream as bolts of lightning washed over its metal armor and it started spasming. But it kept moving and its momentum carried it fully through the glowing red portal, which shrank and snapped shut behind it.

Ginny’s body shuddered and twitched as she felt her magic go lower than she’d ever felt it go before.

“No, NO!” Ginny’s mouth screamed in frustration, “I need him! I’ll find you if it’s the last-”

But even the golden strings weren’t enough, as her body’s trembling grew out of control and her magic spluttered and cut out and dropped her back onto her bed below. The golden strings tightened and pulled, trying to make her move, to speak again. But her body couldn’t take it anymore and began to shut down. As the golden strings seemed to realize that it was futile, they retreated and left Ginny as herself again.

She lay there, feeling everything fading around her and barely able to move. She felt Fawkes sitting above her, chirping and trilling in concern as he peered down at her. She dimly felt something wet hit her face. She blearily looked up and saw that liquid was falling out of Fawke’s eyes and falling onto her.

She dimly remembered something that her dad had said when discussing what Phoenixes were and their magical properties a few weeks ago. Phoenix’s tears had great healing powers, able to heal almost any ailment… And it wasn’t enough. Ginny felt better, but she still felt weak and the world was still dimming around her.

“Bye… Fawkes,” She managed to say before she finally fell unconscious with the phoenix crying above her.