Ginny had been gaining distance from the Burrow for what felt like an hour. She knew fully well that she was not actually running away from home; she had no means to provide for herself, and she was not in sufficiently serious trouble to justify her family's disowning her. Rather, she was engaging in a tactic she had long ago discovered, where if she pretended to be more distressed by the possibility of discipline than she actually was, and did something rash like run and hide, her mother would feel guilt and compensate by lightening the punishment and reassuring her that she was loved. It was a highly effective strategy that her mother had accidentally conditioned her to use.

Perhaps Ginny had overdone it this time, though. She wasn't even sure how to return home, and night was falling. She was in a strange neighborhood, but still felt a desperate need to get indoors, as wizarding areas saw all kinds of strange creatures appear in the dead of the night. Best case scenario, you meet a tame puffskein who you take home as a pet. Worst case scenario... stray mountain trolls were known to roam the streets far from their natural habitat, and eat little girls. In that unlikely-but-existent worst scenario, or a million other unlikely-but-existent worst scenarios, Ginny would be done for. The recently-constructed Peverell Family Hospital was a wonder of magical engineering and organization, but it couldn't raise the dead, only the near-dead. It was ideally suited for saving those who would otherwise die of the slow-creeping diseases of old age; the fate of accident victims was still largely up to chance. If you were dead before anyone found you, you were no better off now then you were before. (A wiser wizard might see this as a newfound incentive to take as few mortal risks as possible, to maximize his chances of immortality.) Ginny needed shelter, now.

Just ahead, beyond the cul-de-sac at the end of the road, Ginny saw an ancient undetonated Muggle bombshell, lodged in the middle of a wizard's garden. Past the garden, an enormous grave marker. Past that, a house she thought resembled an enormous statue of a horse's head.

"Oh, no," muttered Ginny, as she knew that this would be the house where she waited for her mother to find her. She could at least reassure herself that if they were serial killers, someone probably would have found out by now, unless everyone just thought it was too obvious. This house had a reputation in the local community; less mature children threw rocks, or rung the doorbell and ran. Simply looking for a place to stay, Ginny simply rung the doorbell and stood there, putting her in the company of less than 1% of the house's visitors. As she waited, she turned around and gazed again at Pandora Lovegood's grave.

"Answer the door, would you, Luna?" called the high voice of a young middle-aged wizard.

"Sure thing, daddy!" called what must be Luna's voice, and then there was a lull, followed by running footsteps. The door opened, and Ginny came face to face with the mythical Luna Lovegood, a girl her same age and height, but with blonde hair bordering on white rather than an earthy red, and much thinner and paler. "Come in."

"I'm sorry to bother you," said Ginny, stepping through the doorway and seeing Luna's father Xenophilius to her immediate left, slouched over in a chair staring intently at some sort of double-sided beetle through a magnifying glass. "I'm just a bit lost, and was looking for someplace to stay while I wait for my mum to find me."

"She'll find you here very soon," said Luna. "I can see it in your eyes." Ginny blinked; she thought she had been avoiding eye contact. "We can wait in my room if you like." Luna offered Ginny her hand; Ginny looked past her at a magically-operated printing press that was pumping out copies of the Quibbler. The headline? "GILDEROY LOCKHART DOES NOT EXIST! A NATION IS DAZZLED BY MASS HALLUCINATION!"

"Alright," said Ginny, though she pointedly ignored Luna's hand, and Luna led her to a spiral staircase, which switched from clockwise to counterclockwise, or vice versa, whenever you stopped paying attention to it. A bit of climbing later, and they were in Luna's room, sitting on the floor.

"I'm Luna Lovegood," said Luna. "You're Ginny Weasley, or else an impostor. I'm very sorry to hear about the incident with Scabbers. You must be very proud of your brother, though, for figuring out the truth about him." Ginny just stared at Luna, uncertain of what to say. "Can I see your hand?"

"Why?" said Ginny, reserved.

"I want to read your palm," said Luna. "I can get at least three good prophecies out of anybody's palm."

"So you're really a Seer?" said Ginny, trying to humor the girl, putting her hand out.

"That's what they tell me," said Luna, already getting to work, holding Ginny's hand with both of hers, carefully examining it. "I've been doing some independent study in divination; the Ministry doesn't even prohibit it- oh, this first prophecy is inappropriate for a young girl to hear!"

"What?" said Ginny, shocked. She had half a mind to take her hand back.

"I'm not even going to say it out loud, sorry," said Luna. "Hopefully the next one's better. Anyway, what was I saying? Oh, yes! The Ministry doesn't even prohibit underage study of Divination, provided that you don't use any other types of magic in the process. I expect to become a much more effective Seer once I can use other types of magic to aid my sight, so I'm excited to finally attend Hogwarts. Right now I can't even block out the Nargles."

"Nargles?" said Ginny.

"You're going to die of magical strangulation," said Luna.

"What?" said Ginny.

"Nargles are magical creatures associated with time," said Luna. "They're always making mischief in the future, which wreaks havoc on Seers trying to do their jobs, and they eat the past after it happens. They're why you can't turn time back more than six hours."

"No," said Ginny, frowning. "What was that about me dying?"

"Of magical strangulation," said Luna. "It says so on your hand." She smiled. "In the play Othello, the Dark Wizard Othello magically strangled his wife to death with a cursed pillow, because she had an affair with another woman. So I think your best bet is to never get married." Luna considered this. "Then maybe you'll live forever!"

"That's... quite a stretch," said Ginny.

"Oh!" said Luna. "And here it says that you'll leave a part of yourself in a secret area of your school, forever. That's almost certainly Salazar Slytherin's Chamber of Secrets. I don't know how you wind up in the Chamber of Secrets, it's been lost for years, and only Slytherins can go in there. Or so the legends say. As for the part of yourself you leave there... I think it's your skeleton. I know a Skeleton Removing Charm that I could learn in a few days if you need any help."

"No, thank you," said Ginny, quickly losing her grasp of what was going on. "I think your interpretations of your prophecies are making some counterproductive leaps of logic."

"Well..." said Luna, dropping Ginny's hand. "It'd be easier to leave a part of yourself in the Chamber if you had a horcrux. But my dad says I can't learn how he made that until I'm seventeen, so it's probably very difficult."

"And how do you know that the secret area is Salazar Slytherin's Chamber of Secrets?" said Ginny. "Hogwarts has hundreds of secret areas."

"It does?" said Luna, delighted. "It'll take ages to get 100% completion, then. That's delightful. Are you sure that you're just entering your first year, too?"

"Yes," said Ginny. "I'll see it for the first time this September."

"We should meet up on the train there," said Luna. "By the way, did you know that the Hogwarts Express isn't a real train? It's actually perfectly still, and enchanted to feel like it's moving. The windows are all just paintings. At the end of the ride they Apparate the entire train to Hogwarts."

"Are you sure?" said Ginny.

"I'm quite certain," said Luna. "Wait a minute. Look into my eyes." Ginny did, and Luna seemed to like it a bit too much. "Completely infested with Eye Fones. I could remove them orally, if you like."

"No thanks," said Ginny, and she scooted away.

"Alright," said Luna, "but you'll need glasses in a few years."

"I'll live," said Ginny.

"Until you get married," said Luna. "Then you'll be magically strangled."

"You came to that conclusion by citing a Marlowe play," said Ginny. "And even then the logical connection wasn't quite clear."

"I'm not sure what you're talking about," said Luna.

"There's a phenomenon called pareidolia," said Ginny. "People look at random data, that cannot possibly have meaning in it, and they draw patterns as if they were actually there instead of just made up in their heads. Shapes in clouds, faces on other planets. All constellations, really."

"Constellations have meaning," said Luna. "Centaurs use them for their type of Divination, which is the most advanced in the world. I'm pretty sure I've heard of types of Divination that use the shapes of clouds, too."

"Hmm," said Ginny, stumped. Perhaps the world made less sense than she thought. "There's a series you should read," she finally said.

"Oh, I love reading!" said Luna.

"It's by Harry James Potter-Evans-Verres," said Ginny. "It's called the Methods of Rationality."

"What's it about?" said Luna.

"It's about how to think," said Ginny.

"Oh, well, I already know that," said Luna. "In fact, I know more ways to think than most people I've met. Watch this." Luna stared into space for a few moments, and Ginny held her breath. "Most random numbers are three," she said. "I bet you've never seen anyone think that way before."

"But how do you know which ways to think are correct?" said Ginny.

"Oh, they all are," said Luna. "I know because they all reach correct conclusions."

"Are you sure?" said Ginny, leaning a bit closer, nervous.

"Are you?" said Luna, leaning a bit closer, putting a hand on Ginny's shoulder.

"Mum!" said Ginny, seeing her mother in the doorway.

"Ginny!" said Molly, more relieved than upset to see her daughter.

"Luna," said Luna, and she crumpled to the ground as Ginny stood up and ran to her mother's arms.

"Thank you for keeping Ginny safe and sound," said Molly.

"You're welcome," said Luna cheerfully. "My mother is dead. Goodbye." Molly blinked twice and took Ginny out of the house, stopping only to thank Xenophilius as well; he gave her a free copy of the latest Quibbler. Immediately outside, Molly took Ginny's arm and used Side-Along Apparition to transport her home to the Burrow.

"Ginevra Weasley," said Molly, unusually, unsettlingly calmly, "what were you doing in my Potions cellar?"

"Getting some peace and quiet," said Ginny.

"Well, you certainly didn't give any of us any peace of mind!" said Molly. "It's dangerous in there!"

"I'm sorry," said Ginny, and she shuffled her feet.

"The Potions cellar is for storage of incredibly powerful and potent substances, often for many years," said Molly. "I can't even remember everything that's in there. If you spilled one on yourself, who knows what would happen?"

"I'm sorry," said Ginny once again, and this time she blushed.

"I'm actually glad you went out," said Molly.

"You are?" said Ginny, in genuine confusion.

"Of course, it's not safe for a girl your age to be out here alone," said Molly, "but you made a friend. That's how I found you; your spoon turned to 'at a friend's house' on the clock."

"It did?" said Ginny.

"That said, never run off and leave us again like that!" said Molly, and she gave her daughter a gentle smack with the Quibbler. "You scared us!"

"I'm leaving for Hogwarts in a few days," said Ginny.

"Yes, and you'll make a lot of friends there," said Molly, and she smiled. "In Gryffindor, I'm assuming?" Ginny rolled her eyes.

"Of course, mum," said Ginny.

"Not a surprise," said Molly. "The entire family has for generations."

"I know," said Ginny. Both mother and daughter came to focus on the Quibbler.

"Gilderoy Lockhart does not exist," Molly read slowly. "I think they must be misinformed. I met him. Very nice man. Very charming. Just talked to him a few days ago, actually. I'm glad he owed me a favor, because the textbook I would have bought four of was expensive as sin. That's why professors shouldn't write their own books, I'd say..."