Disclaimer: I do not own the Harry Potter series, its characters, spells, etc. Anything you recognize from the book belongs to J.K. Rowling. I own only the plot and my devilish mind.
A/N: My first H/Hr romance! I hope it's not going to turn out too horrible. I'm having a block for To Remember A Past Life and am thinking about discontinuing it, so I got the idea for this one and am going to try to get this story straight. I believe there will be typos and stupid mistakes, because I usually beta it myself but am currently too laden with homework to do so. Do point the mistakes out should you see it! Well, what are you waiting for? Go read and enjoy, please.
THE MAGIC OF LOVE
By: Katrina
ONE
~The beauty of life is to have someone to love~
Why am I here? Hermione Granger asked herself again, as she listened to the meaningless droning of the minister about the meaning of love and stupid junk like that. She looked toward the altar at the groom, his emerald green eyes shining with happiness and his black hair still as windswept-looking as it had been the day she first met him. Stop it, Hermione told herself sternly, as she fought to keep the plastic smile upon her face. It's Harry's wedding and you should be happy for him.
"I hereby declare Harry James Potter and Christina Patti Paterson rightfully married. Mr. Potter, you may kiss the bride," the minister finally announced with a smile at the newlywed couple, after exactly thirty minutes of his speech.
Hermione, like everybody else, looked toward the couple, as Harry slowly bent down and gave his wife, Christina, a kiss on the lips. As soon as the lips parted, the two were greeted by loud applause and, in the Weasley twins' case, affectionate catcalling. Yet before the cheering could die down, it happened.
The lights in the church had suddenly gone out. "Oh goodness Merlin!" cried someone near Hermione. "The Dark Mark!" and presently, Hermione too saw the green glowing skull with the serpent tongue, illuminating the aghast, frightened faces of the guests.
Before Hermione could utter her surprised exclamation, she felt a draft behind her, and turning around, she saw a whirl of whiteness starting to form, seemingly wanting to suck her into it. Hermione tried desperately to get away, but since everybody was scared to death and getting in each other's way, it was nearly impossible for her to move. "Help!" she tried to yell out, but just at the moment, everything went black, or rather, white.
~*~
"Wake up, Hermione!" called a girlish voice.
"Mm…" mumbled Hermione sleepily, shielding herself with her hand, and suddenly she remembered what had happened just some time before. Her eyes fluttered open with a start. In front of her was a girl of about fifteen, who seemed to be oddly familiar. Parvati? Hermione sat up, slightly confused, as she took in her surroundings. One thing was for sure: she was definitely not in St. Peter's Church. "Where am I, Parvati?"
As she spoke those words, Hermione suddenly recognized the velvet hangings hung around her bed. Besides the different color, being blue instead of red, it was the same kind of hangings she'd slept with back in her Hogwarts days. Am I in Hogwarts? Or St. Mungo's? But Hermione's wonderings were soon cut short by the girl's answer.
"Parvati?" she answered, sounding very amused. "Really, Hermione, when did I become Parvati?"
Hermione examined the girl more closely. Of course! She could've smacked herself. Parvati looks older than this girl. But who is this then? Not her daughter, definitely! Hermione's gaze then fell on the girl's bracelet, with Padma engraved in a graceful, flowing script upon it. Padma…where have I heard the name before? "You are Padma?" Hermione asked, although she was just about as perplexed as before, if not more.
"You never mix me up with Parvati before," said Padma, still sounding amused. "And well, Hermione, I do believe you are in Hogwarts. Just like you should be."
Hermione sat up so suddenly that Padma took a step back. She looked at her attire, and was surprised to see that it was now a pale blue silk nightgown in place of the blue dress robes she'd been wearing earlier. Doesn't Madam Pomfrey make the patients wear the pajamas? She decided that this wasn't important, as of now. She wanted to know where everybody else were. "Padma," she said, still trying to place a finger on the name in her head. "Where's everyone else?"
"Sleeping," Padma replied. "Or down at the common room. You promised to tutor me on Arithmancy, so Miss Prefect, let's get going!"
"I did?" Hermione blinked at Padma in disbelief. She had never met this girl really before, except…and then it came to her. Padma was Parvati's twin sister. Besides pondering why Padma looked so much younger in age than her twin sister, Hermione tried to remember whether she'd ever promised Padma such a thing. She didn't really think so. And a Prefect? Contrary to everybody's beliefs, Hermione was never made a Prefect, and she had a high suspicion that Snape somehow stepped in. And what was with the common rooms? Does that mean she was in one of the house towers, not a redecorated Hospital Wing? Her head throbbed with all the confusing thoughts.
Padma looked exasperated. "Of course," she said. "Remember? Vector got really mad at me yesterday because I couldn't explain the number charts. See-" taking a crumpled sheet out of her pocket "I don't understand why the conclusion is the bird will sing on Sunday morning instead of Sunday evening. Something about the first two symbols and the theorems but I don't understand them."
Hermione frowned. Aren't I the Arithmancy professor? Hurriedly, she told Padma that she'd be with her in a second, as soon as she got dressed. But she couldn't find her clothes anywhere, and instead found some school robes at the foot of her bed. "Are those mine?" Hermione asked Padma, wondering why all of a sudden she was required to wear school robes.
Padma rolled her eyes and didn't even bother to answer, which Hermione took as a "yes". She took those robes and got off her bed. The room she was in was most definitely a dormitory. But it was not the Gryffindor dormitory. Reflecting upon what Parvati had described of her twin, she decided that she must be in the Ravenclaw dormitory. Why on earth would anyone do that? Hermione thought, taking in the circular room with four beds instead of the three beds she was used to seeing back in her Hogwarts career. Wouldn't it make a lot more sense if I'm in the Hospital Wing? I wonder if Harry and Ron…
Hermione decided that she'd find out later; after she get dressed, she'd go to the Hospital Wing. She descended the stairs down to the common room, which was again different from the common room she'd grown used to. The arrangement of the armchairs, for example, was around the fireplace instead of scattered about the room. There were also more tables than the Gryffindor one. Hermione would have preferred to be put in the Gryffindor one to recuperate, but she assumed, as she was still rather sleepy, that it was too full. To her surprise, she saw Lisa Turpin, an old friend of hers, stretched out on an armchair, reading a textbook. Hermione had seen Lisa at the wedding, and she looked younger than what she had been at the wedding. Hermione wondered if she was here to recuperate as well, but she decided to ask after she was dressed in what she supposed was a "hospital uniform".
The way from the Ravenclaw common room to a bathroom was unfamiliar to Hermione, but after a few unnecessary twists, Hermione found the Prefect's bathroom. The first word that came to her mind was "soap bubbles", which she said, and which opened up the bathroom to her immense surprise. But Hermione got a much bigger one when she got a good glimpse of herself in the large, crystal mirror.
Instead of a tall, young woman, Hermione saw a rather petite and slender girl, with bushy brown hair instead of the glossier chestnut hair Hermione had. Her brown eyes were less dull, and she didn't have any shadows under her eyes. Moreover, she looked younger. Just like Lisa and Padma, she looked like as if she were fifteen. But that's impossible, isn't it? Hermione thought, trying not to panic. I mean, the last time I checked, which was at the wedding, I was twenty-one. Cold realization suddenly chilled her. The wedding took place in August! It was August right now, when there was no school. Hermione could dismiss that thought, she supposed, but then what was with Padma's homework and the obvious students hanging around in the common room? And the school robes. And the beds. And the Prefect badge gleaming on the robes she was holding. Hermione suddenly cursed her logic. Out loud, she said, "I am not in the wrong place and at the wrong time!"
"What is it?"
Cho Chang, whom Hermione had somehow befriended, entered. Hermione's heart sank when she saw Cho Chang. Cho, too, was looking six years younger: sixteen. She was wearing school robes as well. And she was definitely not at the wedding, therefore she couldn't be at Hogwarts because of the attack, unless there was another one? Hermione knew that she was wrong. "Cho," she said, trying to sound even. "What day is today?"
Cho took out her cosmetics and started to put on lipstick. "Tuesday, December seventh," she replied. "Why? Do you have a test coming up?"
"And what year is this, if you please?"
"Nineteen ninety five, last time I checked," Cho said jokingly. "What's wrong, Hermione? You look like you had just seen a ghost."
I am a ghost! Hermione wanted to scream out. Things were starting to make sense, except they don't make sense when they do make sense. When they do make sense, they don't make sense. Hermione was somehow a fifth year again. Hermione suddenly remembered her plan to see the nurse. As insane as it would be, she'd try and figure her way out of this mess. Perhaps other people had been sucked into the past as she had. Besides, Time Turner accidents do happen. She pulled on her robes, still thinking fast, and ran out of the bathroom with Cho looking at her like one would an idiot.
After a few dead ends and wrong passages, Hermione, who after was a professor in Hogwarts, found Madam Pomfrey. "Poppy!" she called out in relief, before remembering that she was supposedly a student. "I mean, Madam Pomfrey."
The nurse saw her and came over. "What is it, Miss Granger? Are you sick?"
Just try once. Maybe, just maybe, that it is all a sick joke. "Madam Pomfrey," Hermione cried breathlessly. "I don't think you'd believe me, but I'm not supposed to be here. I'm from the future. I'm a twenty-one-year-old person, really, and the Arithmancy professor here. I'm transported here by the Time Turner I think at Harry's wedding. Did anyone else come?"
Madam Pomfrey looked at her with sharp eyes. "You're right: I don't believe you. Only the worst troublemaker claimed to have those things happen to him," she said sternly. "Really, Miss Granger, a Prefect too! I don't understand why you're doing this, but your so-called adventure has many flaws in it. If you are from the future, then there must be a past you here, shouldn't there? I don't see another Miss Granger. Furthermore, you'd look like your future self, and I swear by the name of Merlin that you look like you're fifteen."
Hermione didn't realize that. "Yes, but-"
"It might be influenza," interrupted Madam Pomfrey, very unkindly. "Here-" and she gave Hermione a packet. "Drink this thrice a day for five days and I promise you will feel like you aren't from the future again." Her tone was heavy with amusement and sarcasm. Hermione opened her mouth to protest. "Now, now, please return to your common room. Ravenclaw, I believe?"
"Gryffindor," Hermione corrected automatically.
"Your badge clearly said that you're a Ravenclaw, Miss Granger, and I recall hearing Flitwick praising you immensely. Run along now."
Hermione had no choice but to get shooed up by Madam Pomfrey, still not registering the surrealism of everything. It simply couldn't happen. It simply couldn't! Oh God, please tell me what to do! Hermione begged silently, as she tried to remember where the Ravenclaw common room was. Please tell me that it's all a bad dream…a nightmare…and Hermione rammed into a wall. If it was a dream, she would be awake, but she only felt the acute pain. After a while of wandering, she finally found what seemed to be the Ravenclaw common room, guarded by a statue of a golden eagle. Hermione stared at it, and the password came to her almost in a creepy way. "Sugary charms," she said, as if she were reciting form a script.
The eagle flew up to reveal the entrance. Padma was standing near the entrance, with her arms akimbo. "What took you?" she demanded. "Now you have to tutor me during breakfast! Arithmancy starts in thirty minutes!" She handed Hermione's bag to her, the bag that Hermione had discarded after her graduation. And the books…brand new, with none of the scratch marks of Crookshanks. Hermione wondered if Crookshanks was in the past, for he had died of old age. And then she realized that it couldn't be the past. Not her past, at least. She was never a Ravenclaw.
Padma quickly dragged Hermione to the Great Hall, which thankfully looked the same. Hermione started to make a mental note to consult Dumbledore, but a small voice reminded her that Dumbledore was not likely to believe such a tale either, because Hermione was starting to disbelieve it herself. Could she have dreamed everything? The reality which she thought was real? She hoped not. But Hermione would not care that much, if only she could be where she belonged again. She was so clouded with worries that she didn't realize that Padma was hissing toward her.
"Look," she said, sounding venomously. "Look at our dear Potter." The last word sounded like Padma was pronouncing the name of a slug.
Potter. HARRY! Overjoyed, Hermione looked naturally toward the Gryffindor table, but realized that Padma was pointing at the Slytherin table. The familiar mop of black hair calmed her somewhat, before she realized that Harry-he was in the wrong place too! How could Harry Potter be a Slytherin? Hermione reminded herself to talk to Harry. Currently, Harry was wearing a smirk that reminded Hermione of Draco Malfoy's famous Malfoy Smirk. "He thinks he's so great," Padma said angrily. "There we go again! Whenever he's smirking, that means he's up to no good. That Harry Potter! Just because he survived the Auror's Killing Curse made him no hero! What does he think he is, anyway?"
"Auror?" Hermione stared at Padma.
"Remember? His parents are the worst Death Eaters there ever were. They were thankfully killed by Aurors, but he…well, he somehow survived the Killing Curse. Or was that just a tale? I hate him so much."
Harry Potter, the celebrity, is now Harry Potter, the curse? Hermione would've laughed if the situation was not so serious. Then she wondered about Ron and Ginny. "Do you know Ronald Weasley and Virginia Weasley?" she asked.
"Hufflepuffs, if they are Weasleys," Padma said, waving her hand impatiently. "Now, teach me how to do this problem. I just can't get the hang of it."
Hermione, while digesting all the information she was crammed with, started to lecture her "student" about the theorems and axioms of Arithmancy. As she watched Padma scribbling away on her number chart while ironically praising how Hermione sounded like a real professor, Hermione made a mental note to try and meet up with Harry, Ron, and Ginny. Perhaps, just perhaps, they could figure a way out of all this mess.
A/N: Is this confusing? Does the minister's words sound real? (Never been to a real western wedding.) Do you think Hermione's reaction seems…realistic? I tried to put myself in her shoes, except they don't fit. (Lame joke.) Well, I really hope you like it. Review, s'il vous plait. Flames are okay, if you don't chop my head off with it, and if you flame me about the pairing, I will ignore you. =P Oh, if you want me to email you when you update, leave your address in the review and say so. =)
~Kat