Chapter Text
Hermione Granger was falling through time itself. A moment before she began to fall, she had slipped on the cold marble floor of Malfoy Manor and crashed into a wooden case full of dark artifacts. Before that, she had escaped a prison cell in the basement through a mixture of blinding desperation and luck. Before that, she had watched Bellatrix Lestrange slaughter her best friend right in front of her. Before that, Bellatrix Lestrange had burst into the dungeons, grinning wildly as she declared that Harry Potter and Ron Weasley were dead. And before that—
Perhaps we should start at the beginning. Because this story is very different from the reality you have come to know.
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When Hermione Granger received her Hogwarts letter, her parents had been ecstatic, proud of their daughter for being invited and relieved to have an answer to her unexplained supernatural abilities.
“But this school…will it be difficult?” she had asked Professor McGonagall, who sat on her living room couch, expectantly waiting to answer her questions.
“Hogwarts is quite rigorous," the stern woman had answered. “But you seem like a bright young lady. I am sure that, under our instruction, you will thrive.”
Hermione had sent a nervous look to her parents, who seemed similarly concerned. “What sort of marks are expected at the school?” her father had asked. “Will she be expelled for failing a class?”
Professor McGonagall studied the Grangers, her lips drawn into a thin line. “Wizarding marks are judged differently than those used in muggle schools. We do hold our students to a certain level of excellence. But remediation is available to students who need it. We truly wish for every young witch and wizard to achieve full control of their powers. We do not punish poor marks with expulsion unless it is absolutely necessary.” She took pity on Hermione, who was squirming on the opposite couch. “Rest assured Miss Granger, if you struggle in any of your courses, you are welcome to come to me. I will be happy to give you whatever extra assistance you may need.”
“T-thank you, professor,” Hermione stammered. But she was unconvinced.
See, Hermione Granger had never been a top student. She passed her primary school classes, but had been assigned remediation courses twice, and often barely scraped up acceptable marks. It wasn't that she wasn't smart, she just struggled to focus on the task at hand. Her mind wandered in class, thinking about magic and adventures and dreaming of things that were far, far removed from mathematics equations.
When she heard the whispers of the Hogwarts houses on the train, she assumed that she would end up in Hufflepuff--she doubted she would fit anywhere else. So you might imagine her shock when the sorting hat placed her in Ravenclaw.
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First year passed in a muddle of coursework and worry. Hermione took McGonagall up on her offer of remedial classes by the time November rolled around, and was glad to find that it helped. No one in Ravenclaw house really seemed all that interested in being friends with a girl who liked to wander and dream, so Hermione spent much of her time by herself, wandering the Hogwarts grounds and exploring the castle. She did find some Ravenclaw habits rubbing off on her, and as the year wore on she spent more and more time with her head buried in a book. They were fiction, however—which did not help her make friends among her yearmates.
Hermione listened in to as much Hogwarts gossip as her stand-offish classmates would allow—and learned that Harry Potter had faced Voldemort himself in a chamber underneath the school. At the Gryffindor table, Ron Weasley excitedly relayed his side of the story to others—he, it seemed, had been there, too. Hermione watched the two boys with new interest. What would it be like to go on real adventures like that? She considered approaching them, asking for a firsthand account, but eventually decided that they'd have no interest in discussing such matters with a whimsical Ravenclaw. She resolved to keep a closer eye on those two, though. Who knew what adventures they might get up to next year?
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Second year, things immediately started looking up for Hermione.
She was in the common room on the day after the sorting, staring out the window, lost in her thoughts as she studied the clouds drifting by. Suddenly she was roused from her daydream by a light tap on the shoulder.
She turned to see a young girl with long blonde hair, wearing radishes as earrings and a striped purple sweater underneath her wrinkled Hogwarts robes. Oddly enough, the girl wasn't looking at Hermione at all, but at the clouds.
“The formations are beautiful today,” said the girl. “I suspect that the recent population growth of flofknolls is encouraging it.”
Hermione tilted her head to the side. “What are flofknolls?”
“Flying creatures. They live in the sky, and spin the moisture into clouds. Some of them are amazing artists.” She sat down on the window seat beside Hermione. “Do you mind if I join you? All the others are too busy reading books to pay any attention to the flofknolls’ art. It's a shame to waste a good day reading.”
Hermione looked at the girl, and grinned. “I'm glad I'm not the only sane one in this house. Hermione Granger.”
“Luna Lovegood.”
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Hermione and Luna quickly became the best of friends. They also became the bane of many Ravenclaw's existence. Because while the others were trying to study, Luna and Hermione were climbing on each other's shoulders, trying to reach the rafters of the common room to see if there were any nargles hiding in the corners, then collapsing to the floor in a fit of giggles. When they tried to do the same in a fourth-floor corridor, a very perplexed Ginny Weasley stumbled upon them.
“What are you two doing?” asked the redhead.
“Searching for nargles,” said Hermione breathlessly. In reality, they were searching for Luna's hairbrush, which had gone missing the day before. But Luna had stated firmly that they could check for nargles as well as long as they were up there.
“What are nargles?” asked Ginny. Then, before waiting for an answer, she added, “Why don't you try wingardium leviosa to get them down?”
“I never was much good at that spell,” said Hermione, who was teetering madly as she perched on Luna's shoulders, still a good six inches below the rafter they were trying to reach. “Can you do it? We could use the help.”
“I haven't learned yet, Flitwick just told us to research it for homework before we start the practical.” Ginny stared at their antics, shaking her head in confusion.
“I can do it,” said Luna. “Quite well. But nargles are good at resisting magic.”
Ginny stared for another minute. Then, with a sigh, she set down her schoolbag and knelt on the floor. “Let me help.”
“Help?” said Hermione. She lost her balance, falling toward the flagstone floor, her fall only broken by Luna, as they both ended up in a heap.
Ginny raised an eyebrow, unimpressed. She laced her fingers together and held them out toward Luna. “I'll give you a boost. Should help you with whatever you're doing.”
Luna smiled dreamily at Ginny. Hermione was a bit more wary. “Why are you helping us?”
Ginny shrugged. “You two seem weird. But in a fun way. I've never met a fun Ravenclaw.”
“Meet any fun Gryffindors?” asked Hermione as they resumed their tower, this time with three people instead of one.
“Gryffindors are too fun sometimes. Besides, it's hard to make friends when my older brothers are breathing down my back.”
“Hermione is a very good friend,” said Luna dreamily, as she hefted Hermione upward. “Maybe she can be your friend, too.”
Hermione grabbed hold of the rafter at last, and heaved herself up onto it. There were no nargles that she could see, though Luna's hairbrush was there, tucked among the dust bunnies. She grabbed it and peered down over the edge at Ginny, who gave her a curious look.
“I'm always open to new friends,” she said, throwing a grin down at Ginny. “As long as you're up for some nonsense.”
“I doubt your nonsense can get much weirder than Fred and George's,” said Ginny with a wry grin. “So sure, why not?”
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By the end of the year, Ginny had become a staple in their group, joining them on expeditions and sneaking over to the Ravenclaw table at mealtimes. Which meant that, at the end of her second year, Hermione got the gossip directly from the source.
“My fool of a brother’s the one who's been doing it,” Ginny seethed. “He's been opening the Chamber of Secrets!”
“What?” gasped Hermione.
“Your brother is evil,” Luna said with an alarmingly happy tone of voice.
“Which brother?” asked Hermione.
“Ron! He didn't do it on purpose, of course—Professor Dumbledore's not even going to expel him. He was possessed by You-Know-Who! He has been all year, apparently.” Ginny leaned across the table, eyes blazing. “Ron was the student who was taken into the Chamber last night.”
“Is he alright?” asked Hermione. This was a lot to take in. Ron wasn't dead, was he? Surely they would have heard if a student had been killed…
“He's fine,” said Ginny. “He survived.”
“And you're angry about that?”
“No,” Ginny huffed. “I'm angry because my brothers went down there to save him! With Harry Potter! And they didn't invite me!”
Hermione blinked. This was a lot to take in.
At least the school was safe now. She had started to get worried there for a bit.
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Third year was quiet for Hermione, and even Ginny admitted that she didn’t know of any antics that Ron had gotten up to. She had taken to observing Ron and Harry shrewdly, always suspicious that they were up to something that they refused to tell her about. Hermione quickly got used to the redhead’s grumblings and theories about whatever nonsense the boys were doing outside of class hours.
Fourth year was more interesting with the Triwizard Tournament and all, especially when Harry's name was pulled from the Goblet of Fire. Even more so when he won. Hermione didn't suspect Harry of murder for a second, though she was struggling to keep track of all the different claims being thrown around about Cedric Diggory’s death.
When Ginny returned the following school year, she was surprisingly tight-lipped about her summer. Hermione suspected that she had spent it with Harry, which wasn't unusual, as he often came to visit the Burrow. But Ginny threw curious glances at the Headmaster now, and muttered angrily at the Daily Prophet. When Hermione asked her about it, Ginny sighed.
“I'm not allowed to tell you what I know,” said Ginny. “And it's not like they've told me anything important. But You-Know-Who is back, Hermione. And there are people out there—good people—trying to fight him.” She threw a dark look at the head table. “I get the bad feeling that things are about to get ugly with that ministry witch here.”
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They certainly did get ugly, and that was a light way of putting it. At first Hermione had decided to simply roll her eyes at Professor Umbridge’s dreadful lessons, do the work required of her, and ignore the rest—it wasn’t a very hard class, at least. But the entirety of Ravenclaw house was fuming angry over the woman’s lack of teaching skills, and even Hermione wasn’t immune to the tension soaking into every stone in the castle. So one day she threw out a hypothetical idea for how to solve the problem, as any other student would’ve done.
“What if someone made a secret Defense class?” she said one day over reluctant homework in the library. Ginny sat at the table across from her, scowling down at her parchment, while Luna gazed dreamily out the window, twirling a quill lazily between her fingers. “Then maybe we’d all learn things and everyone would be happy for once.”
“No professor would agree to do that,” said Ginny. “They’d lose their job.”
“A student, then,” said Hermione. “A seventh year, maybe. Or, I bet Harry Potter could do it. He’s top of my year in Defense, and everyone knows he’s been brave enough to stand up to Umbridge already.”
Ginny looked up from her essay. “Huh.”
“What?” asked Hermione.
“That’s not a bad idea,” said Ginny.
Hermione frowned, and set her quill down. “I wasn’t serious. And if he does it, it’s not like he’d tell us.”
Ginny thought for another moment, then stood from her chair. “Come on.”
“What?” Hermione needed no persuading to stuff her textbook into her bag. “Where are we going?”
“To talk to Harry.”
“I just said—”
“That boy is denser than my brothers,” said Ginny. “And your idea is good. We need to tell him about it, ‘cause he’s never going to come up with it on his own.”
“Wait, Ginny—”
But Ginny was already halfway out the door, her red hair whipping out behind her. Hermione sighed and picked up her own bag. “Luna, you coming?”
Luna turned from the window, tucking the quill behind her ear. “I think I will, Hermione. It’s a very good idea. Maybe I’ll even make some more friends.”
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Within a month, Dumbledore’s Army was in full swing, meeting once every other week with members from every house except Slytherin. Ravenclaw was neck-in-neck with Gryffindor for having the most members—they had overheard Luna dreamily recount their conversation with Harry, and were thrilled to have some serious instruction happening. Hermione and Luna, for the first time since being sorted, finally were well-loved by other members of their house.
Hermione was in awe of Harry’s dedication, talent, and willingness to teach. She had never done so well in Defense classes as she did under his tutelage, and even McGonagall was impressed by her newfound drive to learn in their remediation lessons. Soon, Harry’s gaze was catching Hermione’s in the corridors, and he always smiled at her. Ginny took great delight in pointing out that Hermione blushed whenever the Boy-Who-Lived was around.
“I thought you had a massive crush on him,” said Hermione after one such instance, still blushing furiously.
Ginny scoffed and waved her hand dismissively. “I got over that years ago.”
Hermione knew her friend well enough to suspect she wasn’t telling the whole truth, but after a few more assurances, she finally allowed herself to crush on Harry with a clear conscience.
When Harry fainted in their History of Magic O.W.L. at the end of the year, Hermione watched him, worried. And when she caught him in the hallway with Ron half an hour later, half-mad with worry, she stepped in and offered to help.
Hermione had no clue why Harry was concerned over the well-being of escaped convict Sirius Black, and she was a bit concerned. But Ginny reassured her that Harry had good reason to trust Black, and the two Weasleys seemed just as worried as Harry was. Before the end of the night, Hermione found herself on the back of an invisible threstral, flying into London alongside Harry, Ron, Ginny, Luna, and Neville Longbottom, who had stumbled into their confusing rescue mission a few minutes after Hermione had.
Hermione mused that it was like finally living a scene out of one of her favorite adventure novels. She had never thought of herself as particularly brave—the Sorting Hat hadn’t considered placing her in Gryffindor for a minute—but, as she looked at the friends around her, she realized that some people were worth running into danger for.
Hermione was knocked out early into the battle by a falling prophecy orb, and by the time she woke in the Hogwarts hospital wing, Harry was staring at the ceiling, eyes swimming with grief.
“You and Black…” she said carefully, after he explained what she had missed. “Were you close?”
Harry nodded, clearly forcing tears back. “Yeah, Hermione. We were.”
Hermione wanted to know more, but she wasn’t sure she should. She wasn’t very close to Harry, afterall. But with all of her other friends either asleep in the beds around them or already back in their common rooms, she didn’t want to leave Harry’s side. She reached a hand out and set it on his shoulder, feeling as he shuddered at the touch, then melted into it.
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A week before the first Hogsmeade weekend of sixth year, Harry asked Hermione on a date. A date, in Hogsmeade, just the two of them! Hermione was over the moon. Luna gave her happy, cryptic smiles and vague comments. Ginny snuck her way into Ravenclaw Tower to help her pick an outfit, though Hermione could’ve sworn her friend wasn’t nearly as happy as she was pretending to be.
The date was…alright, for lack of a better way to describe it. Harry was kind but awkward, got distracted easily, and conversation tended to hover on either the weather or classes, neither of which either of them had much interest in. Hermione thought up things to ask him about—how he was dealing with Sirius Black’s death, the history between them, the future of the DA, his knack for getting into trouble…any of it. But her tongue was tied, and she got the feeling that Harry didn’t want to talk about any of those things. So the conversation lagged.
They spent the next Hogsmeade weekend together as well, but on the walk back to the castle, they had the most open conversation they had managed all day: a brief, casual acknowledgement that they were better off as friends. Hermione felt her year-long crush fizzle out without fanfare, and found herself smirking as they reached the castle’s front gates.
“Do you have a crush on anyone else in the school?” she asked slyly.
Harry went rigid. “Crush? Er…no, not…”
“Ginny Weasley, perhaps?”
Harry went bright red and started sputtering. “No—she—she’s Ron’s little sister! I couldn’t—I can’t—”
Hermione wasn’t sure if she would ever become close friends with Harry, but she learned in that moment that picking on him was a rather fun way to spend her time.
She laughed until he turned the question back on her. “What about you?”
She sputtered out some nonsense quite similar to Harry’s. Then she sucked in a breath. “I actually have no one on my mind, to be honest.”
He considered that for a moment. “You’re sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure!”
“Well, he’ll be disappointed to hear that…” muttered Harry under his breath.
“Wait, who—Harry!”
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Two days into the Christmas holidays, Hermione woke to the sound of explosions and laughter outside her window. Green light burst across the sky. At first, Hermione thought that someone was shooting fireworks. Then her mother screamed.
The Grangers escaped the Death Eater attack on their muggle neighborhood in one piece, but some of their neighbors were not so lucky. They were hastily welcomed into the Burrow for Christmas. Hermione spent the rest of her holidays in a half-state of shock, taking in the quirky magical home, surrounded by friends who tried their best to cheer her up. Mr. Weasley spent quite a bit of time talking to her parents, who seemed more rattled than she was, and Mrs. Weasley spent quite a bit of time telling her husband to ‘give the poor muggles some space.’ Luna came over on Christmas Eve, delighted to hear that Hermione was in the neighborhood, handing over a stack of Quibbler articles that she thought might cheer her friend up. Ron, to her surprise, was the most attentive, inviting her to join him for hours upon hours of chess, and not commenting when she drifted off mid-play, lost in thought.
When they returned to Hogwarts for the next term, Hermione’s parents gave her especially tight hugs.
“They’re sending us to a safehouse,” her father explained. “You can come see us there on the Easter holidays.”
But come Easter holidays, professor McGonagall kindly explained to Hermione that she had been in contact with her parents, and that they had all decided it was safest for her to spend the break at school. And by the time the summer holidays rolled around, she barely spent a month at the safehouse, a small, dingy cottage somewhere in Scotland, before Ginny invited her back to the Burrow, desperate for company and relief from her soon-to-be sister-in-law, a woman who Ginny insisted on calling ‘Phlem.’
The Headmaster had been killed on school grounds just weeks before, her childhood home was destroyed, and Hermione wanted nothing more than to stay tucked away with her parents. But her mother had pulled her into a long hug, taken the letter from her hand, and encouraged her to go be with her friends. She was, afterall, seventeen, of-age in the Wizarding World. She should be out enjoying her freedom, not clinging to her parents as much as she used to. Professor McGonagall, on one of her routine visits to the safehouse, agreed with her parents’ wishes. But the professor, who had always had a soft spot for Hermione, gave her a simple necklace—an old copper ring, tied to a leather cord.
“It’s a portkey,” said McGonagall. “I trust that Professor Flitwick has taught you about them? This one will bring you back here to your parents at a moment’s notice. The password is Jean.”
So Hermione joined the chaos of wedding planning at the Burrow, and allowed herself to get lost in the frenzied, energized life of the place. She spent her days with Ginny and Luna, played Ron in chess with an increasingly warm feeling in her chest, and threw jabs at Harry when he least suspected it. See, the Boy-Who-Lived had taken her advice and asked Ginny to join him in Hogsmeade…then, before Hermione could so much as step foot in the Burrow, he had broken up with her. Ginny insisted that it was fine, that he had good reason. But Hermione took extra pleasure in making the boy squirm.
Bill Weasley and Fleur Delacour’s wedding went beautifully. Though Hermione barely knew either of them, and found Fleur a bit grating, she still grew teary at the looks of love on each of their faces during the ceremony. The reception started out just as well…until a shining silver creature streaked into the middle of the dance floor, and announced in a low, deep voice that the Ministry of Magic had fallen.
The room broke into pandemonium. Death Eaters apparated in, giving Hermione flashbacks to the Department of Mysteries. Wedding guests apparated out. Hermione got a brief glimpse of Harry and Ron, spells flying as they fought their way to the edge of the tent. She watched a man she didn’t know fall to the ground under the light of a green spell.
“Luna!” she screamed desperately over the roar. “Ginny!”
Ginny was at her side in an instant. Luna appeared out of the crowd, her bright yellow dress practically a beacon for spellfire. “Let’s get out of here!” shouted Hermione. Any of the bravery she had felt at the ministry was gone. This was too much. She wasn’t prepared, couldn’t live through another attack—
She grasped her two best friends by the arms, and tried to apparate them out. Unfortunately for them all, Hermione hadn’t passed her apparition test. She might’ve made it on her own, but as it was, she was glad that it hadn’t worked at all—she realized, as the apparition hit her with the sensation of slamming into a brick wall, that she could’ve splinched the three of them horribly in her foolish attempt to apparate three people at once.
Luna was remarkably calm in the midst of the battle, as though they were simply sitting in the library. She reached for the leather cord around Hermione’s neck. “Why don’t you just use the portkey? Have you forgotten the password?”
She had told her friends about it, though maybe she should have been more cautious. But here, with Death Eaters surrounding them, it wasn’t safe. It might save them, but what if a Death Eater followed them? What if she led the danger straight to her parents? She would rather die than see them hurt.
“The password isn’t very difficult,” said Luna dreamily. “It’s only your middle name. But I forget my middle name sometimes, too…”
“Luna!” hissed Ginny. But at that moment, a beefy hand wrapped around Hermione’s throat.
“What is your middle name, I wonder?” said a low, gravely voice. Hermione was lifted off her feet, her airways too compressed to scream. She came face to face with a Death Eater she would later come to know as Antonin Dolohov. “Will you tell me?”
The Death Eater snatched up Ginny with his other free hand. Luna watched, her gaze distant, finally raising her wand when it was already too late—Dolohov apparated away, taking Hermione and Ginny with him.
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Hermione wasn’t sure if she was in captivity for weeks or months. Really, it didn’t matter. She was determined not to break, and Ginny was even stronger than she was. But it didn’t matter, anyway—the Death Eaters found her information easily, what with their access to the Ministry and Hogwarts itself. They took Hermione along to her parents’ safehouse, where she watched them set it ablaze, listened to her parents’ final screams as the Death Eaters held her in a Full Body-Bind Curse. They didn’t release her until she was back in the prison cell beneath the white marble manor. She probably would’ve been in too much shock to run, even if they had given her the chance.
Ginny, who was curled into a ball on the floor of the next cell over, didn’t have to ask what had happened. She simply cried alongside her friend.
Some more time passed, horrible, dark times in the windowless cells, only broken by the occasional meal of stale bread and the dreaded visits of various Death Eaters who decided to torture them. He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named himself came to visit them once, leering at the two young women. Hermione had become too broken to care, too tired to be scared anymore. So she had stared defiantly back at the snake-like man, daring him with her eyes.
He had hit her with a crucio. She had ended up on the floor, trembling, in a ball. But the next time the man came to visit, she stared defiantly at him again.
“I’ll have to plan something worse for you, mudblood,” he sneered. “But I see no reason to waste my time now when I have far more important people to kill than you.”
He had left the room then, after a long, lingering look at Ginny, which left both young women feeling very unsettled.
For a while, they spoke of rescue in quiet whispers. Ginny scoffed that Harry, noble as he was, would find a way to come save her. Hermione secretly hoped that Ron might feel the same protectiveness over her. But as the days dragged on, their hope drained, bit by bit, until the day when it dried up completely.
“Ha-ha!” A high-pitched, hair-raising cackle filled the dungeon. Hermione had heard it once before, in the Department of Mysteries. Ginny pressed herself against the bars of her cell, seething. Bellatrix Lestrange skipped down the dungeon stairs, manic with glee.
Hermione felt cold dread sink into the lowest part of her stomach.
“Harry Potter is dead!” the woman announced in a sing-song. “And that brother of yours, too, blood-traitor.” She laughed again. “The Dark Lord killed Harry Potter, but he left Ronald Weasley to meeee.”
“No!” screamed Ginny. Hermione had never heard her friend so agonized. “You’re lying.”
Bellatrix leaned close to Ginny’s cell, reaching out to caress Ginny’s cheek with a long, spindly finger. “Yes, little girl. Yes, I did. And the Dark Lord has given me permission to finish off the line.”
Bellatrix cackled again. And, before Hermione or Ginny had the chance to process exactly what her words meant, Bellatrix had jabbed her wand into Ginny’s stomach, and uttered the terrible words of the Killing Curse.
Hermione’s world seemed to dissolve around her as she watched her best friend crumple to the ground, lifeless. She did not scream, did not cry. She barely felt like she was in the room at all anymore. Her body was simply a construct, her consciousness somewhere far, far away.
“I would love to do it to you, too, but the Dark Lord wants you for himself,” said Bellatrix, a gleeful gleam in her eye. “He’ll be here for you soon.”
Bellatrix Lestrange withdrew from the room, and Hermione stood in her cell for a long, long time. Then, as pain tore its way up her throat, tears burst forth from her eyes, and the lock on the cell door in front of her burst into flames.
Hermione had not done accidental magic since she was very young. But she figured that months spent in a torture cell, watching her parents and best friend be killed, after her other best friend had betrayed them all through sheer foolishness, was enough to make magic explode out of the best educated wizard.
And Hermione had never been the best at magic.
She ran. She did not think she would survive. Chances of that were almost zero, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to live anymore, anyway. But running seemed like the thing to do when given a chance and faced with imminent death, so she did. She ran up the dungeon steps and into the vast, cavernous marble hallways of Malfoy Manor.
She was followed by the time she turned the first corner. Spells flew around her. But she kept running. Running, and running. And then a spell made the floor in front of her explode, and she skidded sideways into a thick wooden display cabinet, which glittered with priceless artifacts hidden behind glass. The glass shattered, the cabinet teetered under her weight. And the spells kept coming, even as one of her attackers shouted at the others to stop. Hermione, in a daze, barely aware of the pain coursing through her entire body, looked slowly upward as a gold, shimmering hourglass fell from the highest shelf and crashed into the top of her head.
The hourglass exploded into pieces, surrounding Hermione in a cloud of golden dust. Through the mist, Hermione could see the other artifacts in the broken cabinet freeze in midair, hanging among shattered glass. The Death Eaters, too, froze. Then they began to move backwards, and the artifacts began to find their way back onto their repaired shelves. Slowly, the Manor walls around her blurred into nothingness, and Hermione was surrounded by rushes of color as time itself fell to pieces around her. She felt her own body unravel, her mind cast into space in a way that, after all the horrors of her recent reality, felt almost comforting.
Then, after what could have been a very long time or no time at all, Hermione found herself sitting on the Hogwarts Express, alone in a car, her hands very small in her lap.
And this is where the story you’ve been told begins.