Chapter Text
It began when the woman rang the doorbell, clad in a vaguely old-fashioned emerald green dress, her hair pulled back into a severe bun and wire-frame eyeglasses that dug into the bridge of her nose.
Hermione’s mother, Dr. Helen Granger, a woman with bright eyes and copper-brown skin, answered it. “Good morning,” the woman began. “I am Professor Minerva McGonagall, and I am here to speak to the Grangers’ about their daughter attending a school for the gifted.”
“Oh!” Helen said. “Well, please come in. I’ll get Hermione and my husband.”
Hermione was a girl with untamable brown curls, bright eyes, and skin barely a shade too dark to be called tanned.
Professor McGonagall entered and waited as Helen called Hermione and Richard, who came quickly. They sat around the coffee table, the Grangers on the sofa, Hermione between her parents, and Professor McGonagall across from them in an armchair.
“Have you ever noticed Hermione do anything…unusual?” the professor began.
Helen frowned. “Well, she has a photographic memory—”
The professor shook her head. “No, something more like magic, really.”
Hermione’s eyes grew wide as Richard answered the question, leaning forward and jaw clenched. “Yes,” he said quietly. “Like summoning a book from the highest shelf, or levitating her toys after she read Matilda? Like stopping rain from hitting her?”
“Yes,” the professor said. “Exactly like that. But in regards to levitating your toys, did you do it on purpose, Miss Granger? That is to say, you controlled the levitation?”
Hermione nodded, and in response, held out her hand and, with the appearance of deep concentration, a heavy book hovered a couple inches above the table. She lowered her hand, and the book returned to its place. “So, does that mean I have magic?”
Professor McGonagall’s eyebrows were raised as she replied, “Yes. You are a witch. And a seemingly very powerful one, if you have that level of control.”
Hermione beamed.
“So, I’m assuming that you are a witch as well?” Helen asked. The professor nodded. “And the school that you represent is a school for magic?” The professor nodded. “I hope you don’t mind that we would like to see some proof.”
The professor nodded for the third time and drew a brown piece of wood that must’ve been a wand out of her sleeve. “The spell that I am about to show you is a levitation charm, and one of the first things that you will learn at Hogwarts, the school that I teach at.” She drew it across the air in a swishing motion, then flicked it upwards and said the words “Wingardium Leviosa”, enunciating the syllables carefully. The book that Hermione had levitated earlier shot up.
“Well, that seems to be authentic,” Helen breathed. Richard was too stunned to reply, and Hermione was busy containing the gleeful grin that threatened to burst out.
The professor drew an envelope from her pocket and handed it to Hermione. “Your acceptance letter,” she explained. “If you choose to attend, which I would highly recommend, given that the nature of magic is that if it is untrained, it will be difficult to control, I would accompany the three of you to buy supplies.”
Hermione opened the letter and read it. “Are owls the typical mode of communication in the Magical World?” was her first question. Her second question was “Where do you find this stuff?” And her last question wasn’t a question, but a statement. “I’m going to Hogwarts.” She dared her parents to disagree.
Richard laughed. “Of course you’re going to Hogwarts. You’ll be the greatest witch of the century.”
Helen smiled one of her sharp smiles, one that meant she was planning something great. “Of course you’re going to Hogwarts,” she echoed.
The professor smiled. “Excellent. Tuition is free and I will be able to inform the Headmaster of your decision. We can leave for shopping now, but I must warn you that magical transportation can be uncomfortable.”
“That’s quite all right,” Helen assured her. “We’ll be fine.”
Professor McGonagall nodded and pulled out a blank scrap of paper. She instructed them to all touch the paper, which she called a portkey. She said something that sounded like “animage”, and there was a strange sensation of being dragged through a swirl of light and colours, through space and the very fabric of the universe, and landing on a cobblestone street outside a small, grubby pub. “Now, Drs. Granger, please take your daughter’s hand so that you can see the entrance. It’s disguised, you understand.”
They did as they were told and they gasped at once, following the professor into the pub, the Leaky Cauldron. She exchanged a brief greeting with the barman and headed out to the back. There was a small, walled courtyard with nothing but a garbage bin and a few weeds. The Grangers might’ve been confused, but they recalled the fact that magic existed and were soothed.
Professor McGonagall counted the bricks above the bin. “It’s two above and three across from this brick above the bin,” she informed them, then tapped the correct brick three times with her wand. The brick she had tapped quivered and a small hole appeared in it that grew larger, and larger, until it became a proper archway leading to a cobbled street.
“Now,” the professor began, “the first thing that you ought to do is to convert some muggle money into our currency, which is in galleons, sickles, and knuts. Seventeen sickles to a galleon, and twenty-nine knuts to a sickle—it’s strange, I know,” she said in reaction to their quizzical looks, “but there is some numerological explanation that I am not familiar with. Knuts are bronze, sickles are silver, and galleons are gold. All pure metals. The exchange rate for galleons to pounds sterling is about five pounds to a galleon, and supplies should cost about seventy galleons, not including anything like additional books or a trunk, which can be pricey. The bank, Gringotts, is able to work with muggle banks as well, so converting them is easy. Gringotts is run by goblins, though—” she paused, waiting for their reactions, which were unphased. They had read Lord of the Rings and loads of other high fantasy novels, so the existence of some of the species in them, now that they knew about magic, wasn’t much of a shock. “Be polite to them,” she warned.
They all nodded. “I have one question,” Richard began. “Does this bank have interest?”
Professor McGonagall laughed, in quite the contrast to her stern demeanour. “No, but as they don’t loan out their clients’ money, it wouldn’t make sense for them to. They are paid through the Ministry for Magic, and any incoming money to a Gringotts account is taxed by the Ministry, as a sort of income tax, but you won’t need to worry about that because you’re just converting.” Richard nodded as she directed them to what must’ve been the main road, because it was bustling with a large crowd of people wearing long, colourful robes. “It's not terribly crowded right now, thankfully, because back-to-school shopping starts more heavily in July, but we do visits by birthday, you see.”
Hermione and the Grangers absorbed the information absently, overwhelmed with everything else they were seeing.
“Are robes the common clothing in the Magical World?” Helen asked.
“Yes, for adults. It's more common for children to wear muggle—non-magical, that is—clothing, but robes are always used for formal wear, and any muggle clothing tends to be more formal if worn by adults. So you all don't stand out.”
Richard was wearing a button-down and black trousers, and Helen was wearing a light blue dress. Hermione was wearing a button-down blouse and jeans. They took note of their apparently acceptable attire and followed the professor to the burnished bronze doors of a large and gleaming white building. Standing beside it was a short creature, humanlike, but not quite human, clad in a scarlet uniform. The goblin (it must be a goblin, Hermione reasoned) bowed as they walked inside
As they continued into the building, they faced a second set of doors, silver (Hermione wondered if they were meant to correspond to the currencies). Inscribed into them was a poem:
Enter stranger, but take heed
Of what awaits the sin of greed,
For those who take, but do not earn,
Must pay most dearly in their turn.
So if you seek beneath our floors
A treasure that was never yours,
Thief, you have been warned, beware
Of finding more than treasure there.
“Must be quite the deterrent,” Helen muttered.
A pair of goblins bowed to them again as they entered a vast marble hall with about a hundred more goblins sitting on high stools behind a long counter, scribbling in large ledgers, weighing coins in brass scales, examining precious stones through eyeglasses.
“Good morning,” Professor McGonagall said to a free goblin. “The Grangers here would like to convert some of their muggle money.”
The goblin, who seemed to be like a bank teller, slid a piece of paper—not parchment, though the letter had been made of it—onto the counter with a pen. “Fill this out and place your ID on top,” he instructed.
Helen did so, and the teller examined the ID. “Six hundred pounds?” he confirmed. Helen nodded, and he wrote something in a book before asking, “Would you like that in galleons, sickles, or knuts?”
“Five hundred in galleons, seventy in sickles, and thirty in knuts,” she replied.
The teller handed Helen a pouch of coins. “There’s an undetectable extension charm,” he informed her, which Hermione assumed meant it was bigger on the inside.
“Wonderful, thank you very much,” Helen said, taking the pouch and following the professor outside.
“Right,” she said. “I think the first thing you ought to get is a wand.”
***
The shop was narrow and shabby, with gold letters over the door
reading Ollivanders: Makers of Fine Wands since 382 B.C. A single wand lay on a
faded purple cushion in the dusty window, and Hermione wondered why. A tinkling bell rang somewhere in the depths of the shop as they stepped inside. It was a tiny place, empty except for a single, spindly chair and rows of boxes stacked up to the ceiling.
“Good morning,” said a soft voice.
“Good morning,” Hermione replied, mostly by instinct.
An old man stood before them, white hair and wide, silver eyes that shone like moons, illuminating the gloom of the shop.
“This is Miss Granger,” Professor McGonagall said. “She is here for her wand.”
Mr. Ollivander’s gaze snapped towards the woman—witch—and nodded. “Yes, yes, of course.” He fixed his gaze back on Hermione. “Well, Miss Granger, let me see, hmm… Are you right or left-handed?” he inquired.
“Right,” Hermione replied.
“Hmm. Hold out your arm—your right one.”
He pulled out his own arm now, and summoned a silver measuring tape. He said something, and the tape began measuring practically every possible measurement involving the right side of her body. As the tape measured, Ollivander spoke. “Every Ollivander wand has a core of a powerful magical substance, Miss Granger. We use unicorn hairs, phoenix tail feathers, and the heartstrings of dragons. No two Ollivander wands are the same, just as no two unicorns, dragons, or phoenixes are quite the same. And of course, you will never get such good results with another mage’s wand.”
Mr. Ollivander was flitting between the shelves and taking down thin boxes that must’ve contained wands. “That will do,” he said, and the tape measure crumpled into a heap on the floor. “Right then, Miss Granger. Try this one. Pine and unicorn hair. Nine inches. Nice and flexible. Just take it and give it a wave.”
Hermione took the wand and began to swish it in the air like she had seen Professor McGonagall do, but Mr. Ollivander snatched it away almost immediately, replacing it with another.
“Silver lime and phoenix feather, eleven inches, quite whippy. Try—”
Hermione tried, but it too was snatched back. She tried again, and tried, and the stack of tried wands grew higher and higher, mirroring Mr. Ollivander’s increasingly pleased expression. “Tricky customer, eh? Not to worry, we’ll find the perfect match somewhere—perhaps—” he held out another wand—“Vine and dragon heartstring, ten and three-quarter inches, unyielding. Go on, try it.”
Hermione took it, and a warm feeling spread through her, the same sort of sensation she felt when she levitated things. Magic. She swished and flicked and said, enunciating very clearly, “Wingardium Leviosa.” The spindly chair that lay neglected in the small room began to rise, and Hermione beamed as Professor McGonagall and Mr. Ollivander applauded, her parents joining in.
“Oh, bravo! Yes, we can expect great things from you, Miss Granger, great things indeed.”
Hermione grinned, and the Drs. Granger smiled.
“You seem to be quite the quick study, Miss Granger,” the professor said, the traces of a smile on her face.
Helen paid seven galleons for the wand and they continued on. “You ought to buy your robes next,” said Professor McGonagall. “Madam Malkin’s is the best place for it.”
The four of them entered the shop, greeted by a squat, smiling witch dressed all in mauve. “Morning, Minerva,” she greeted. “Muggleborn shopping excursion?” Muggleborn—born from muggles—me.
“Indeed. These are the Grangers.”
“Excellent, come on to the back Miss Granger—got the lot here—another young lady being fitted up just now, in fact.”
In the back of the shop, a girl with dark skin and shiny black hair in a long plait was standing on a footstool while a second witch pinned up her long black robes. Madam Malkin stood Hermione on a stool next to her, slipped a long robe over her head, and began to pin it to the right length.
“Hello,” the girl said. “Are you going to Hogwarts too?” she asked Hermione.
“Yes,” she replied. “It’s my first year.”
The girl smiled. “Me too. My name’s Padma Patil, what’s yours?”
“Hermione Granger, pleased to meet you.”
“You as well, Hermione.” Padma replied cordially. “I’m a bit nervous—I’m the first in my family to go to Hogwarts—all the rest have gone to Vidyalayah—that’s in India—because my parents were the ones that moved.”
“I’m the first in my family to go to Hogwarts as well, beecause, well, I’m the first in my family to be a witch.”
“You’re a muggleborn? What’s the muggle world like?”
“I’m not quite sure—it’s all I’ve ever known, so I have no point of reference. I’ll tell you by December, how’s that?”
Padma laughed. “Sounds good. I guess this is your first time in the Magical World, then?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, if you have any questions, you can ask me.”
Hermione beamed. “I’ll take you up on that, Padma.”
She hopped off the footstool after her robe was finished and said a quick goodbye to Padma before rejoining her parents and the professor.
***
They bought Hermione a trunk next, feather-light and much bigger on the inside. It was fancy, leather with her name pressed into it in gleaming gold letters—Hermione J. Granger. It contained a library, with room for fifty books (Professor McGonagall had called her a Ravenclaw, whatever that meant), and if she called the book, it would come to the front of the shelf, which fascinated Hermione to no end.
She placed her robes inside and they got her other supplies—a cauldron, crystal phials for potions, a telescope, and measuring scales. And then, finally, finally, they headed to the bookshop, Flourish and Blotts. She got the Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1 and Grade 2), A History of Magic, Magical Theory, A Beginners’ Guide to Transfiguration (and, by recommendation of Professor McGonagall, Theoretical Transfigurations), One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi (these people had the strangest names—Phyllida Spore?), Magical Draughts and Potions, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection, Hogwarts: A History, and The Unofficial Guide to Life in Magical Britain, which Professor McGonagall assured them was terribly useful.
Next door, the professor showed them another bookstore, The Query & The Quill, that had some more useful books for background on theory. She grabbed Wand Movements and Incantations, Magic Versus Mundane: How to Tell the Difference Between Plants, and The Difference Between a Potion and a Poison: An Essential Guide. Recalling the portkey, Hermione also picked up a book on Magical Transportation and one on the government—called the Ministry of Magic. Hermione was glad she’d have all summer to research; she wanted as much time as possible to read them all.
***
The professor had used another portkey to get them back to their house, and Helen had invited her in for tea. She accepted, and they were drawn into a discussion about the various peculiarities of Hogwarts and Magical Society.
“So, tell me about the houses,” Helen said. “They don’t seem to be quite like n—muggle ones.”
“Ah, well there are four of them: Hufflepuff, Slytherin, Gryffindor (which I am Head of House of), and Ravenclaw. Students are Sorted into them on their first day during the Sorting Ceremony. I’m afraid the details are ‘classified’, but, not to worry, it’s not at all dangerous, despite what older students might tell you. Now, Ravenclaws are often both creative types and highly logical and analytical types, but what they all share is a love of learning.”
“Sounds like you, ’Mione,” Richard remarked.
“Gryffindors are brave, often reckless and what some might call stubborn, but I prefer to call determined, which makes being their Head a challenge. Slytherins are ambitious, sometimes as stubborn as Gryffindors once they set their minds to a goal, and they can be quite cunning and sometimes ruthless. Sadly, the House is often divided into two types of people: the purebloods—generally defined as people with four Magical grandparents—who are bigoted, prejudiced against muggleborns like yourself, Miss Granger, and the true Slytherins, ones with cunning and ambition, often half-bloods, non-bigoted purebloods called ‘blood traitors’, or even the very rare muggleborn. I’ve only seen a few muggleborn Slytherins in my time.”
“Hmm,” Helen mused. “You might belong there, Hermione, with the second type of people, but the first sound as if they would make your life torture.”
A steely glint grew in Professor McGonagall’s eye. “Not to worry, Miss Granger, if anyone gives you a hard time about your heritage, come to me, no matter what House you end up in.”
“Thank you, Professor,” Hermione said softly, a matching glint in her eye that didn’t quite fit her tone. “I suppose every culture needs to have its own morph of prejudice.” There was a pause. Then Hermione spoke again. “What about Hufflepuff?”
“Ah, Hufflepuffs are some of my most sensible students. Hufflepuff values are loyalty, hard work, and fairness, but if a student doesn’t fit into any of these categories, Hufflepuff will take them, something I’ve always admired Helga Hufflepuff for.”
“Helga Hufflepuff?” Hermione asked.
The professor began to launch into an explanation of the founding of Hogwarts, all the way until the eventual feud. “Of course, that’s what history books say, but they are hardly the most reliable. Given the threat that many muggles posed with the witch burnings, the threat with muggleborn students was mostly that they might reveal the location of the school.”
Hermione nodded thoughtfully. That was good, seeing as Slytherin was sounding like the right fit for her, either that or Ravenclaw, and it was nice to know that he hadn’t been a total bigot.
By the time Professor McGonagall had finished explaining how to get to Platform 9 ¾, it was five in the afternoon, and she had to leave. They said their goodbyes, and Hermione and her parents sat down for a talk.
***
“So,” Helen began. “You’re a witch.”
Hermione shrugged. “It certainly seems like it. I mean, we’ve known that I wasn’t quite human—or muggle, whatever, for a while.”
“True,” Richard said. “I think it started with levitation.”
“I think I’ll be a rather good witch,” Hermione said. “Professor McGonagall said I had good control.”
“True again,” Helen said. “But it’s not you I’m worried about; it’s the whole society. They fought a war about people like you, she said.”
“They fought a war about people like you in America, mum, and you lived in America.”
“I wouldn’t want you to move to America during Reconstruction, either, ’Mione. But it doesn’t seem nearly so bad as that.”
“I was always going to face prejudices, mum, dad, but I need to learn about magic—you heard Professor McGonagall, I have to learn magic.”
“Well, of course,” Helen said. “That’s amazing. But you need to be prepared. We’ll take a second trip to Diagon Alley and get some more books—something you can use to protect yourself.”
Richard frowned, uneasy. “Now, hang on a second. I’m not sure Hermione should be learning—or using—dangerous stuff.”
Helen raised an eyebrow and delivered the final argument. “People will be using ‘dangerous stuff’ against her, Richard. Hermione needs to be prepared.”
Richard sighed, and Hermione attempted to repress a grin. She would be the best.
***
Two days and many excited questions from an excitable Hermione later, the Grangers had all read The Unofficial Guide to Life in Magical Britain and Navigating the Ministry and The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection, and so felt prepared enough to return to Diagon Alley.
At Charing Cross, Hermione held her parents’ hands as they crossed into the Leaky Cauldron, and, by extension, the Magical World.
The Alley was bright, colourful, bustling with crowds and brimming with magic. Helen led them first to The Query & The Quill, where she picked up a few books on politics and history, a few on potions, one on warding, one on duelling (for defence, she said to Richard. For enemies, she said to Hermione), and, most surprisingly, one on common household charms (they’ll help you fit in, she said).
“Now,” Helen began, “I think we ought to get an owl, Richard. So we can send ’Mione letters.”
This was one thing that Richard agreed with wholeheartedly, so they went off to Eeylops Owl Emporium, where Helen bought a lovely screech owl, whom she named Diaktoros, the messenger.
Their next stop was the apothecary, where Helen bought multiple healing potions that worried Richard.
And finally, Helen found them a secluded place where Hermione could practice some of her spells.
The first spell she practiced was Wingardium Leviosa. She managed to lift a rock, a log, and a bigger rock. She tried to do two objects at once, but was unsuccessful.
“Hermione,” Helen began, “you know how you could do it before you had your wand?”
“Yeah…”
“And you know how Magical Theory mentioned non-verbal and wandless magic? Could you try that? Start with non-verbal?”
Hermione looked thoughtful. “Yes, I think I could.”
A swish and a flick later, the biggest rock was in the air. Hermione set it down gently before sheathing her wand and trying again wandlessly. She couldn’t lift the big rock, but she could lift two smaller ones at once.
“It’s easier to use the wand,” Hermione said, “but then I feel as though I’m stuck doing what the spell wants me to do. It’s like going down a well worn path versus foraging your own. And non-verbal casting feels like somewhere in between.”
“Try doing it nonverbally, but without the movement,” Richard suggested.
Hermione tried it, but it wasn’t any easier than wandlessly. “I think if you’re going to use any movement, even if it’s just pointing, you have to use the right one.”
“Maybe,” Helen said, “but I think that’s enough theory for now. It’s more important to learn some new spells. Try this one,” she pointed to her household charms book, “reparo.”
Helen took a pencil from her bag and snapped it in half. Hermione pointed her wand at it and said, “Reparo.”
Nothing happened, frustrating Hermione. Then, to everyone’s surprise, including hers, Hermione laughed. “Oh! I forgot, I need to visualise.”
She tried again, and the pencil was fused back together, but there was still a crack where it had been broken. She tried again, and again, and again, practicing until she finally made it as good as new.
Hermione Granger was going to be the best.