Harry comes to. Around him it's dark, and in the distance, he can hear the sound of waves crashing against rocks, dim illumination from the entrance of the cave he's now in makes the blood on his hand's shimmer. "Huh," Harry says to no one, "this is familiar."

He falls unconscious.

-
Harry regains consciousness much later, he can tell the passage of time by the fact that the dim light from the cave entrance is dark. So it must be mid-to-late evening. Harry moves, his body is stiff. His joints creak and crack, and as he rolls to his side, his back pops.

Fighting against that rune-trap took more out of him than he thought initially. Adrenaline is a hell of a thing.

Harry staggers to his feet, as his vision adjusts to the chamber around him, he notices there's a new addition. A fire is burning brightly in the center of the chamber when he had passed out, he had been close to the outer edge of the room.

In the distance, he can hear the steady drip-drip of water edging down stalactites into a body of water. The entrance is far enough away that the sound of waves can't be heard anymore due to the lively, crackling sound of the fire.

He wonders briefly where so much dry would have come from. Then, off to the left, he see's illumination coming towards him, an eerie shadow being cast against the wall. Harry palms his wand in preparation for a fight. He finally notices that he has bandages wrapped around his hands.

The approaching figure rounds the corner, by her illuminated wand, Harry sees the young scowling face of Ginny Weasley.

Harry sighs, pocketing his wand. "Good t-" before he can say anything, Ginny is in his personal space, smacking him solidly across the face. She spits at his feet. Her face is flushed and red, contrasting nicely with her auburn hair. "You have some fucking nerve, Potter, abandoning me here." Harry raises his hands trying to placate the fiery-headed woman's anger. It's too late to calm her down though, in her solitude she had been saving her anger, should she see him again, and Ginny intends for him to feel all of it.

"Don't you speak to me, don't you try and calm me down. I haven't seen hide nor hair of you in ten fucking years, and suddenly you waltz back into my life - a wanted man I might add - and now I'm sitting in a fucking cave in the middle of nowhere. I have every right to be pissed at you, Harry Potter."

Ginny pauses then to catch her breath to continue her tirade. If the situation was different, he would be turned on by her anger. It was always her most appealing quality, in his opinion. "Let me speak, please Ginny," Harry says. His voice is calm but does nothing to quell the woman's anger. Instead of giving permission for him to speak vocally, she gestures impatiently with her hands for him to start.

"It's my fault. Yes, I know. I have no excuse for just vanishing for ten years. Yes. I am a wanted man. But there is no answer that I can give you, right now, that will make you understand. I'm sorry." Harry feels more emotional than he intended. His hands run through his hair as he takes a deep breath. He realizes that his voice is elevated while he spoke. He calms himself, finding his center, before continuing.

"I should not have just walked into the bar without a disguise. That's my fault. It's drawn undue attention to you. That's why I sent you here, I didn't want to run the risk of someone like Mad-eye getting to you before I could speak to you again. I underestimated him, he told me that he was watching you, watching everyone. It was my own damned foolish fault for not paying it any heed-" Harry's own speech falters then.

His sincerity is having a better effect on Ginny than any other kind of placating. Her anger has softened, and he can tell that she just wants to be consoled. Harry spreads his arms wide and Ginny runs to him, burying her face into his neck sobbing.

She strikes him on the chest with her fist, and through her sobs against his neck, he can hear "I loved you Harry Potter and you left me. I would have gone anywhere with you. You just had to ask."

Harry doesn't know what to say. The complete one-eighty of the woman's emotions is hard for him to wrap his head around. Her anger he can understand. What he can't understand is her confession of love. Maybe it's the tears. He's terrible with crying women after all.

Instead, he wraps his arms tighter around her. Physical contact doing more than words ever could.

Eventually Ginny calms down, and the two of them take a seat around the fire. Ginny had just finished explaining to Harry what it was like finding him on the floor-

"You weren't moving, and I could barely tell that you were breathing. They must have given you a run for your money to be in such a state." Harry shook his head, he downplaying the events. "They caught me with something new. Something they haven't tried to use on me before, usually, I'm more prepared."

Talking more to herself than to Harry, Ginny whispers "So, that's where Hermione has been." Harry's eyes widen. Whether her words for meant for him, it made total sense. Out of all of his friends, Harry knew less about Hermione than any of them. After Hogwarts, she had gone into the ministry under the guise of Research and Development.

That obviously meant the Unspeakables. Thinking back to the crumpled list in his pocket, Harry reevaluates his priorities. He had considered her easiest to approach but forgot her most defining aspect; her complete devotion to authority.

During their days in Hogwarts, Hermione had always been the voice of reason. It would make sense to Harry, now, that the reason he hadn't heard from her wasn't that she was busy, it was that she couldn't. And while he couldn't link the rune-trap back to her directly, he knew that the average Ministry worker or even an Unspeakable would come up with something as direct as manipulating gravity. It was too muggle for a wizard to consider.

Harry now having his next objective, spent the rest of the evening getting as much information as he could from Ginny. It was easiest to ask questions about her family.

While Harry had thought about Ginny's whispered words, the room had fallen silent, Ginny had not continued to speaking after her last remark. Across from him, Ginny stared into the flames, her mind somewhere far away.

Harry slapped his hands together, the smacking sound serving to startle her, and draw her attention back to him. "So, how is your family. I know about Bill, but I don't know anything about anyone else. How are they?" Asks Harry. His voice is anxious. He feels excitement for the first time since stepping foot into Britain, but mostly anxiety. He's not certain he's going to like some of the answers he gets.

Before Ginny can answer he changes his mind and asks a more direct question. "How are your parents?" While he had missed his friends dearly, he had missed his surrogate mother and father Arthur and Molly Weasley more.

Ginny smiles, takes a deep breath and begins to tell him everything he missed in his ten-year absence. Despite being in a cave, the atmosphere is domestic. Two old friends reminiscing, telling tales of joy, and tales of sadness. It warms Harry to his bones, better than any fire could have. Harry had learned a long ago to take a moment when the moment was given. Be it in a cave, or in the middle of a war.

As their conversation progressed, deeper into the night, the entrance of the cave grew lighter as daylight approached. Ginny has fallen asleep, her head in Harry's lap. He moves to place her on a conjured pillow and pins a note by her side.

Harry walks to the cave entrance, the sun peaking over the horizon, and with a crack, he's gone. He has things to do.