Hi all. Welcome to my first HP fan fiction :) Thank you to all the betas that have proofread this chapter for me time and time again. Love your stuff and hope to keep working with you as this story goes on.
I do not own Harry Potter - but I wish I did.
Chapter One
Time and Time, again.
It was still dark out and well before dawn as Hermione slowly ambled her way down the main corridor of the first floor, heading in the direction of the library. Her wand was in front of her and a soft Lumos charm at its tip lit her way through the dark halls. She ignored the protests of various portraits about the light as she passed by, too occupied by the fact that today was that day. Graduation day. Far too soon for her liking, her last day at Hogwarts had come around.
The ceremony was to be held later that day, and as expected everybody was going to be there for her. Harry, the Weasleys and even Ron, who had been avoiding her like the plague since they had broken up. All the important people in her life would be on the lawns of Hogwarts – everyone except her parents. That was a hard fact she had been forced to swallow a long time ago. It was the price of obliviating them, but she still wouldn't change it, as it meant they had been safe and would continue to be as such.
After the war she had returned to Hogwarts, determined to complete the seventh year of study, making sure that she had a complete education. But on a deeper level, Hogwarts was the one place that she had felt like she would be safe. It had provided her with a sanctuary of comfort and familiarity as she recovered from mental and physical scars of war that she had been left with. It had taken months of work, but she finally felt like she was in a better place. Not good, but better.
However, there were some things that were not going to just fade away. A quick glance at her left forearm reminded her of that. Beneath her sleeve, she knew lay the fresh-as-the-day-it-was-carved wound. The word 'Mudblood' was a dark red that stood out horribly against her pale flesh.
She had been quite self-conscious about the scar at first, and it had only been made worse by the fact that no combination of healing potions or medical spells had been able to make it go away. Quite often did she wage an internal way over it – her vanity vs. her pragmatic side, as the appearance of it was terrible and would not improve over time. But it was the memories of how she got the scar that caused her more trouble than the actual wound itself.
Whenever she looked at it or ever just caught a glimpse, she would feel sick and ashamed. Even right now her stomach was starting to churn and her hands would no doubt soon begin to tremble as her body remembered the pain of the cursed blade sinking into her skin and being dragged across it. She would also sometimes remember the Cruciatus curse that had been inflicted upon her by the mad witch on the quest to get information out of her about the sword and the cup. Her feeling of helplessness would then surface, and she would be drowning – not able to do anything to stop the pain or save herself or her friends. So many nightmares she had about that day, one of them been the cause of her wakefulness at this hour.
Just as she turned a corner she felt the tell-tale signs of an episode beginning to come on. The hand that held her wand was shaking like a leaf, her heart was racing, and she could feel iron bars been pushed against her sides, constricting her breathing into short, sharp rasps.
She came to a halt in the middle of the corridor and bit her lip as a memory of Bellatrix swam to the surface of her mind. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath in and out to expel the thought. At first, this technique, that Madam Pomfrey taught her had not done anything for her, the traumatic memories not allowing themselves to be easily banished. But as time had passed, she had gotten a better handle on herself and had learned to overcome the dark reminiscences that sought to bury her in the past.
On the second exhale, she opened her eyes and cast her eyes around her. She breathed in and out once more, letting the air course through her lungs. In and out. She blinked slowly and took in the stone walls, carpet floors and paintings that were complaining about the rude interruption of their sleep. She was at Hogwarts, not Malfoy Manor. She was safe, no danger was around. Confirming these facts to herself until she believed them with absolute certainty, Hermione felt herself relax.
Her hand stopped trembling and her heart, while still racing, was starting to slow. She shook her head as she fought to rid the vestiges of the memory from her mind. Trying to think of something else, Hermione remembered once more what day it was. Her final day in Hogwarts. Meaning the final day to access the library.
The strength of that thought was enough to have her straighten up and continue at a brisk pace towards the library, not wanting to miss a moment more than what her little episode had annoyingly cost her. Although she loathed admitting it, those little episodes, as she had come to call them, were still quite a frequent occurrence and while they were manageable at school, being out of school, she did have reservations about how she would handle them, not to mention other people.
Finally reaching the library, Hermione looked around at the place that had been her haven and essentially her second home over these last eight years. Hundreds of hours she had spent amongst these shelves of dust and magic and it near made her cry standing here. This really was going to be her last time and chance to be surrounded by such levels of knowledge, but also a place that she knew had ensured her livelihood these past years. Not wanting to linger anymore, she swept past the check-out desk and the main study section, making her way to the back of the library.
She pushed gently on the framed doors of the Restricted Section, the hinges made slight creaks of complaint as they swung shut behind her. She didn't even wait to make sure she heard the doors relock before she starting heading deeper into the section. Right now she just couldn't bring herself to care if another student gained unauthorised access to the library - after all it was her last day and wasn't going to be her problem for much longer.
She took her time to get to the row of shelves that she needed, running her hands along the study desks, feeling all of the groves, bumps and dips that had been etched into the wood by students quills over the years. Feeling the initials H.P at one point had the nostalgia well up tenfold in her throat, pushing her restraint for keeping the tears at bay.
She stopped at the end of the tenth row of cases and then made a right. She didn't need to check the reference listing that was pinned to the end to know that she was in the right area. Standing on her tiptoes she began to search the shelves for the book that she was after.
About halfway down the middle of the shelves and on the top shelf, she found it. Reaching up, she extracted the book that she had been saving as her last read at Hogwarts. The book was heavy, but no stranger to weighty tomes, she carried it with ease back to the study desks and placed it on the desk with a gentle thud.
The wooden chair magically pulled itself out, and she took a seat. It's hard-wooden back as familiar to her as the wood of her own wand, which she had placed on the desk next to the book. It was always best to have it handy when dealing with books from the Restricted Section; the last one she read had attempted to attach itself to her hand, permanently.
Once she was all settled in and had the cushioning charm setup just how she liked it, Hermione let herself study the book. The book was made out of leather, that much she could tell. She reached a hand out and ran it over the cover of the book. The leather was a dull black and from the feel of it, she could affirm that it wasn't human. Murmuring a praise to Merlin for that small miracle, she moved on to tracing the title that had once been embossed in gold, Time and Time, again by Cassilda Willowspine.
Hermione had read her other work in preparation for getting around to reading this book and amongst reviews of her works, she noticed there had been quite a few rumours that Cassilda had somewhat lost the plot. Opening the book and seeing the preface as "Dedicated to my darling Kneazle: Sir Whiskers" it seemed that those rumours might just possibly be true. But not letting that deter her enthusiasm Hermione ran her hand over the musty ribbon that hung out the side of the book. She then let out a loud sigh of resignation and finally cracked open the cover of the last book that she would ever read at Hogwarts.
Time travel is quite simple to understand. All you need is an anchor and using yourself as the rudder you can sail through the waves of time. But be careful not to create too many ripples, as on the surface it will be calm, but after a while, it can become all-consuming as a tidal wave.
Dawn had broken long ago and the morning sun was filtering in through the library but she still was not having any luck making sense of the words in front of her. She was deep in chapter seven and her spark of delight for the book had well and truly faded. Instead, it had been replaced with the worst headache. Her brain throbbed – almost as if it were trying to escape from being inside her skull and to not have to bear the torture of reading this book any longer.
"One more chapter, you can do it. Just one more and then you can stop," she murmured to herself, hoping to stir some half-hearted resolve so that she could propel herself through the remaining pages she intended to read as quickly as possible.
When Hermione had first heard about the book she had been ecstatic. Since her third year, time magic had always been a special interest of hers and she was always keen to get hands on any book about the topic. Most of them were decent and sound in their theories, but there were always the odd ones like this that were a source of disappointment.
Deciding that she couldn't stand a moment longer reading the drivel, she closed the book. She let out a defeated sigh and closed her eyes as she brought both hands up to rub her temples.
Her forehead was pounding and she grit her teeth as the pain continued to spike. She groaned as a particularly nasty bit of pain flared up from behind her eyes. She lowered her head to the desk and clenched her eyes shut. This was the last thing she needed today. A bloody migraine brought on by trying to understand an unfathomably stupid book.
Opening her eyes by a smidgen, she looked down at the book, scowling at the morning light refracted of a bit of gold that was left on the front cover. Her eyes narrowed as more gold slowly spread across the leather and wove itself into intricate rows of runes and symbols up and down the front cover.
"What in the name of Merlin?" she whispered, her interest in the tome suddenly renewed.
Drawing her wand up, she tapped it gently against the book, waiting with baited breath to see if it would do anything. A few seconds passed and nothing. The newly revealed runes stayed where they were, shining with glee in the rays of morning light.
She quickly opened the book again to the page she had last been on and got a lovely surprise. Notes and scribblings filled the margins, but rather than in gold they were silver and from the looks for it, in English - meaning that she wasn't going to have to go and find a Runes reference book to translate it all. She was a bit concerned that these notes had not revealed themselves initially, but she cast that thought aside, more excited to potentially get something worth her time from the book.
Diving back in Hermione was quickly disappointed again. The notes didn't hold anything new or different to what was already written in the text. Frowning, she flipped to a random page to see what she could find. Doing so put her on page four hundred and there was indeed more writing, but it was messier than Ron's and it was partially smudged, making it an arduous task to try and make it out.
"Priore ad stationem," she read aloud. It sounded like a spell, but it wasn't any that she had ever heard of being used in time travel before.
Shrugging it off, she put her wand back down and using both hands she snapped the book closed. It was getting to the time that she would need to consider getting herself packed up and ready for the graduation ceremony and leaving, she reminded herself sadly.
Making a move to get up, Hermione instantly regretted it as doing so only made the headache that much worse. She lowered her head to rest on the cover of the book, relishing the cool feel of the leather against her face. She stayed like that for a few more moments before raising herself to try and getting up again, only to fail once more as her ears popped and her vision got blurry.
"Oh no," she had time to quickly mutter before one last sharp bit of pain knifed itself into the back of her neck and she lost consciousness.
Coming to, Hermione felt like her neck was stiffer than a plank of wood and her mouth tasted like blood. Raising her head slightly, she found her hair had become stuck to her face with blood. "How did that-," she started to croak out but stopped short when she realised she had a nosebleed while blacked out. Probably from slamming her head into the desk when she passed out.
Lifting her head and body so that she was sitting up fully, Hermione soon wished she had kept her head on the desk. She felt way too dizzy for her liking but determined to push through the sensation. Squinting and blinking, she a look around her. It was certainly bright and horribly so, that much she could tell. Said brightness through indicated that it had to be midmorning at the very least and she had been conked out for a while. It also meant that she was very late for getting ready to go, but she couldn't bring herself to care. Her head was still felt like someone was using it for drum practice.
Wiping the hair away from her eyes and Hermione scowled down at the leather-bound nightmare that drops of her blood had landed on, mingling with the dancing golden runes. She grimaced and cursed at herself as she thought of all the lost time trying to decipher the words.
Mustering what little strength she had left, she rose to her feet and tucked the chair in under the desk. Gathering the book and her wand, she moved to return the book to its rightful place on the shelf, rather than letting the magic of the library return it.
Slotting the hardcover back into its spot, she took a moment to pause. Every movement was taking considerable effort. In fact, she had not felt this drained since the War, which she knew was something that should have her worried, but again the effort of doing so was beyond her right now. Her mind just as foggy and left her unable to piece together a plan for getting back to her dormitory.
Turning back around to exit the Restricted section, Hermione was helpless to stop the run the dark-haired student from running into her. They had their head down, attention fully affixed to the large piece of parchment that they had in their hands. With an oomph, she was knocked down, her arse colliding with the hard oaken floorboards. Upon impact, she couldn't help but cry out, "Seriously?"
Hermione was fuming. She still had a migraine which had made her faint and now being run into and ending up on the floor? Today was really just not her day and she felt her temper flare. She was going to tell the inattentive idiot off and to get their head out of the clouds and pay more attention to their surroundings.
She raised her head, ready to tell them off. She took them in as her eyes travelled up. They had grey slacks, Gryffindor tie that was undone, hanging loosely around their neck and the top few buttons were undone revealing the start of smooth tanned skin. The broad shoulders revealing it was certainly a male student. Then there came the long dark hair that framed a strong jawline and grey eyes and... She stopped breathing as she took in the student fully. She couldn't believe. She wouldn't believe it, because standing before her with a hand extended out to help her up was Sirius Black.
