Disclaimer: If I owned these original settings, characters or ideas, i would be one of the richest women in the world...as it is...you know the drill, the only thing i invented was the individual plot and characteristics that the characters have that may not be accurate to the original books but should be consistent to When I Was A Muggle. Thank you.

Author's Note: The first chapter is always exciting for me, i hope it is for you too! If you haven't read When I Was A Muggle (the prequel) you may wish to do so now, just click on my user name, head for my home page and scroll through! :) Otherwise...please review and tell me what you think, where you feel the story will go, and if you're happy that i made a sequel...Love always! This starts somewhere during Harry and Ron's final year at Hogwarts...so roughly three years after...not quite.

Blurb: Sometimes...she dreams she is a witch. She was too dangerous to be allowed to stay, but what if she's too valuable to keep away...but years on, can Hermione take back the danger, the power, and the responsibility? Can she ever face up to what she has done? Time to get serious.

The lift slides onward and upward and she wonders what on earth she is doing here, shuffling her uncomfortably heel-ed feet and tugging on her claustrophobic skirt. Everything, even the lift interior, is shiny and classy, there's not a single mark on the carpet- I bet they have someone on chewing gum patrol- she thinks involuntarily. Her box glides to a halt and she hurriedly checks for fly-aways in the mirror as the door opens smoothly and she is faced with the most intimidating walk of her life- well, second most intimidating, but that's long gone.

First of all you need to know what kind of a young woman Hermione Granger is. Hermione Granger lives in her average sized red-brick house with her two parents, who own a dental practice, and she is studying at college, counting down the days till she can apply for university. She enjoys runs after breakfast and has salad for lunch, and gets into school early to use the gym with her boyfriend Karl. They study together and are never tempted to do anything else during these assigned hours after school. She climbs at the weekends and her weakness is chocolate spread. She wants to be a writer and is trying, in vain, to get something (or indeed anything) published. She often writes long into the night while Karl snores next to her, and prefers tea to coffee to keep her awake. She is the girl that when boys speed past her, revving their engines, and then pull up to wait for her, leans down, rolls her eyes and says 'have you seen the speed limit?' before moving on. She hates being wrong or late, or worst, both. She has a group of close friends who all share her love of the gym, cats and anything Fair Trade. Hermione still goes on long family 'rambles', she reads feminist novels from the 70s and would love to have something-anything- to protest and be radical about.

She stepped moodily into the sunlight and wriggled out of her uncomfortable jacket. Karl got up off the bench, replacing his book in his bag and swept his hair from his eyes, taking a few steps towards.

"Don't." She muttered, tugging her hair down angrily and shaking it out.

"Never mind baby, next time." She stopped her mood, briefly, to kiss him and then allowed him to take her jacket and put an arm round her waist. "What did they say?" He asked tentatively, as they ambled down the bank of the canal, weaving in and out of the trees out of habit, as if they were in the park at the end of Karl's road.

"It's too fantastical." She wrinkled her nose in distaste, "I tried to tell them that it's a children's fantasy story- but no, they weren't having that at all." She sighed and became less sardonic, looking at the floor. "She was ok actually. She just said that it wasn't real enough, wizards and witches, kids just don't believe in them these days, it just wont sell enough copies apparently." Karl nodded, he didn't really have a reply, because he couldn't exactly argue with the publishers' verdict- he and Hermione knew they were right. "Back to the drawing board I suppose." She concluded, trying to sound positive but failing epically.

"Come on, while we're up here let's go get lunch somewhere posh before we get the train back. National Gallery?"

"Full of budding writers scribbling on the back of napkins and wannabe artists dreaming of fame and inspiration." She laughed at her own bitterness, "Sure, let's go. Maybe I can pick up some tips."

"And it's insanely close to the station." Karl pointed out fairly. Hermione looked into his blue eyes, slightly obscured by the gorgeous long, blonde hair and sighed, wondering where on earth she'd found a guy, with not only her own innate sense of practicality but also so similar to her in every other way.

Hermione's vices- if she really can be accused of any- only occur during the night time. She is the kind of girl who really enjoys to 'let her hair down' and have a night out. Hermione loves high heels, and fixing her hair to look wild, she loves to dress up and loves it when Karl dresses up too. She wears heavy eye liner and power-shouldered jackets and has more clutch bags than practical sized ones. She always eats well before she drinks, but yes, she enjoys to drink- cocktails are her favourite but she hates straight vodka. She also smokes, not regularly or habitually, but as an occasional past time she will share one with Karl at a party or on their way to a party. If they want to get into clubs, they never fail to pass as 18 (they nearly are anyway) and if they don't then they can always find a house party. Hermione is the kind of girl that can have fun, and still be a huge academic success. She has everything going for her during the day, and everything going for her at night- she could be anything she wants to be. But she has fears too. Besides her dislike of spiders and a bog standard fear of deep water, she has a fear that she'll never be happy. She has a fear that she doesn't know what she wants. And sometimes, in the early hours of the morning, when she's sleeping at her deepest, she has a dream. Hermione dreams about a dream, or an idea of a dream; she dreams that once, a long time ago in another life maybe, she was a witch.

Karl gently stroked Hermione's hair till she fell slowly into consciousness. She flattened her bed-hair and smiled,

"Home?"

"Yeah, we're home sweetheart." She reached for her crumpled jacket, which had been her blanket for two hours until it had fallen onto the scabby, blue and red, carpet of the train. Now she dusted it off and tugged it on, while Karl waited patiently in the isle, holding her over-large shoulder bag which was stuffed full of manuscript- back to the drawing board, she thought again.

Hermione followed her boyfriend's perfectly formed bottom down to the nearest exit, and hopped off, with some difficulty, onto the damp pavement. She was so tired she removed her patent black heels and held them in her left hand, holding Karl's fingers lightly in her right, not even caring that the damp from the rain a few hours before was seeping across her toes and up her tights (they would definitely be ruined). They skipped the harshly lit room that was all their one-horse station consisted of and slipped down the side towards the back street while the locals parked for free, smirking at those silly enough to buy a ticket in the station car park. Karl opened the door of his stale smelling, almost purple, Astra and she gave him a quick peck, appreciating the gesture of gentlemanliness.

"My place or shall I take you back to yours?" He asked, jumping in beside her and starting the engine (twice, because it needed it after being left stood still all day).

"What do you think?" Hermione smirked at him, "I'm not disturbing my parents this late."

"Good, 'cause mine aren't in." They smiled at each other and Karl pulled away. Hermione slid down into the not-so-comfy passenger seat, inhaling happily the smell of Karl and his after shave, almost run out air freshener, and cigarettes from a few nights ago- it was nice familiarity after the stiff no-smell of the publisher's office.

Hermione sees the flick of a red pony-tail at the end of the street and knows who it must be- idiot, she's running the wrong way, she's going to get caught. Hermione you don't have time for this. Her own thoughts run over each other but her body has volunteered itself before she has time to argue, and she's at the corner under the street lamp. By instinct she shrinks as quickly as possible from the place that can make shadows her enemy and hides instead within them, making them her friend. She sees the back of the poor red-headed girl running straight towards the subway- her mind is else where, she isn't thinking straight- and towards the waiting assassin crouched in the long, concrete tunnel. Hermione closes her eyes for a brief second and behind the subway there is an anonymous flash of light, and then a rattle- the red headed girl ignores it, but just as Hermione intended it is enough to shake the assassin. He shrinks back to the end of the tunnel and slips up the steps, to investigate the noise, just buying the red-head the time she needs to get through, blissfully unaware of any danger.

"Woah!" Hermione jolted awake as her face peeled from the ball of her hand and dropped suddenly; she just caught herself short of her face colliding with the keyboard of her laptop. Next to her Karl stirred and stretched, sitting up.

"Bad dream?" She shrugged and shook her body out, giving a good impression of a horse,

"Brrr. Guess so." Karl wrapped his arms round her from behind and leaned his annoyingly bony chin into the crevice in her should.

"How's the master piece?" He'd got so used to her obscure late-night writing hours that he didn't bother to question it any more, it was a part of their relationship and he loved every bit of it. Another shrug. Moodily Hermione hit the save icon, "Tea or coffee? As if I don't know." Karl heaved his weight off the bed, shivering in just his boxer shorts and socks.

"Tea, did you…did you leave the window open?" She spun round, noticing that she too was cold. The old sash window was open almost half way. "It's gone midnight why did you-?"

"I didn't." He cut across her. "Or maybe I did earlier and forgot. I'll get the tea." He was reluctant to argue, "And stop being so moody." He added, placing a hand on her head and pushing her away playfully.

As soon as Karl had left the room Hermione untangled her legs from the charger cable of the laptop, where she was sat at the end of his bed facing the underneath of his TV and the various wires that trailed from it- apart from the bed it was the biggest thing in the box-like attic room. She moved to the window and dragged it shut with a squeal of resistance from reluctant hinge-work. Hermione shivered again, and in an attempt to shake the dream she looked down at Karl's imprint where he'd fallen asleep on top of the duvet; there was nowhere she'd rather be than in his bedroom, definitely not in a dream chasing down a cold, damp alleyway.