Summary: Hermione was meant to die that night. She was meant to die a gruesome death and live on through her works. Her murder was the headline of several newspapers both magical and not. He was an Unspeakable almost a hundred years from the future who fell in love with her through her work. He couldn't let her die. He has to save her. Would she let him?
A/N: Inspired by the plot of Holly Lisle's "Last Thorsday Night" which was published as a short story from "Mammoth Books of Time Travel Romance" by Trisha Telep. I didn't earn anything from writing this and please don't sue me. This series is already complete but I will be updating the next two chapters in a few days' time. I used the image of my beloved Takeshi Kaneshiro from his movie, "This is Not What I Expected" and the character's name, John Liu from "Turn Left, Turn Right".
The Time Traveler
My good friend and former boyfriend, Ron Weasley told me once I have never experienced life. Beyond the "thrill" of war and the adrenaline rush it gave that led to our then relationship, I realized later that I've never truly been in love.
They call it PTSD, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. An illness that afflicted soldiers even long after the war has ended. It never really ended for us. Going away from the England helped. I e-mail them from time to time but I have been avoiding a more steady communication, given how Ronald's new bride seems to have an unreasonable intense hatred of me.
Our writing group; nicknamed Merlin's Imaginarium were getting down to business when a cold autumn wind swirled through the room, leaving a tall, rugged Asian guy in its wake. He stood in the doorway, looking a little lost and a lot out of place. He is man who did not belong. Believe me when I tell you, it's hard to look out of place in a writers' group- especially ours, consisting of wizards and witches who live in both magical and non-maj (as muggles are called in the US) realm.
Let me count down the regular members of our group. There's Salazar who is working on his Potions mastery. He has a seeming mandatory waist length ponytail, a beard that can rival the late Dumbledore and surprisingly mundane no-maj tweed suits.
Grant who is only into cross overs wore black robes and pale make-up (some people in our group suggests he might be a vampire).
There's small statured and petite Nanette whose tiny heroines reminds you of her but in her stories, her tiny heroines can beat any wizard up. She has flaming red hair and the cutest freckles on her nose.
There is Hector who writes about Zombies and Dystopic societies, his body is fully of moving tattoos that he can never go around the no-maj world without long sleeves, a hood, socks and shoes. He'd also need some mask because that pixie tattoo of his always gets on his face.
Nimue wrote about strong enchantresses who conquered the world by seducing men. She is the most beautiful one of our group.
Even I, with my wild bushy hair am not exactly a ninja material. I also favor Mrs. Weasley's annually sent sweaters which always have something moving or flying in it. Today's sweater has cats that resembles Crookshanks.
By contrast, the new comer's black hair was cut as short as a naval officer and he wore plain no-maj clothes of solid color white with a pocket (no bright and odd patterns, weird sayings or flying brooms) and crisp jeans that looked good on his long legs (I admit I was inwardly drooling at this moment). He looked to be in his early 40s, have well-defined muscles but what he did not have was a "Look".
"Sorry I'm late," he said to Salazar, and I swear I could feel my knickers hit the floor at the deep rumble of his voice. He had such a sexy voice. "I'm sorry I got lost. I said a wrong address number to my floo. Thank you for inviting me." He said extending his hand to shake Salazar's who shook it.
He glanced at everyone in the room. But I didn't think I imagined it when his gaze lingered or dare I say studied me for a longer moment than everyone else, and gave me the sort of smile a child gives a chocolate bar. He strode through the circle of folding chairs and took the empty seat to the right of mine. I could feel my jaw drop in disbelief. Why?
Since I'm the woman men notice when there aren't any busty twenty-something goddesses or veela like girls around. We have both, and they had empty seats next to them, too. While it is true that after all these years I am known as a member of the Golden Trio, the lack of communications and distrust between the American Wizarding World and ours means my fame barely followed me in this continent.
The new guy swung his enormous backpack to the floor beside him, where it made a substantial thud, pulled a legal pad and pen out of it, then leaned over to me and whispered, "What have I missed?" To say I was speechless was an understatement. Years as a plain teenager at Hogwarts where I wasn't the first choice for a girlfriend tend to play its drums on my ego.
I managed to find my voice though, and I said, "Pizza. When Salazar hosts, he always has pizza for us before the meeting." "No writing yet?" He asked. "No. Official start time is in ten minutes. You're not actually late," I told him. "We 're waiting for two other writers to arrive – Yvonne, who has a long drive to get here, and Elphias." I'd been halfheartedly and sporadically dating Elphias for about four months, a fact I suddenly wished wasn't true.
Elphias arrived like the king for his coronation, spotted the stranger sitting beside me, and glared at him. He came over and took the empty seat on my other side, leaned over and whispered in my ear, "Who's he?" "New guy," I whispered back. "Salazar invited him. We haven't done introductions yet. We're still waiting on Yvonne."
Yvonne Cauldwell was our resident professional writer. She had fifteen published novels (both in the magical realm and in the no-maj), plus a bunch of shorts in various magazines. Yvonne actually wrote for a living. She was the one whose criticisms we all saved and double-checked as we were writing and revising. The rest of us were wannabes. I was in the process of translating and editing "The Tales of Beedle the Bard" but it's not as if I actually wrote it.
I do write. Several completed novels from different points in my life gathered dust and mouse droppings in the trunk at the foot of my bed. I just could not muster the courage to send out any of them. After a year in the group, I'd finally brought myself to read The Shadows Beyond the Veil, the best of my trunk novels, to everyone. Yvonne told me I should send it out, that it was really good. But I hadn't. I couldn't.
Next to me, the stranger was introducing himself. I realized Yvonne had come in and taken her seat while my head was in the clouds. "Thanks, Salazar," the stranger said. "I'm John Liu. I'm just getting started writing. I didn't bring anything to read tonight. I want to see how this works first." Both Nanette and Nimue oozed "Hi, John," in melting tones. Beside me, Elphias snorted.
"I'm Hermione," I told John. "I write, but I haven't sold anything yet."
John looked into my eyes and smiled again. All he said was, "Wonderful to meet you," but he said it like he meant it. He sounds like he really meant it. Like meeting me was the most important thing he'd done all year.
There may be a moment in every woman's life when she sees someone she doesn't know and, for just that moment, wants what she cannot have because every cell in her body is screaming at her that this this is the person she's supposed to be with. Or maybe that's just me. But right then, right there, feeling the bass vibrations of John's voice resonating in my chest, staring back into his eyes, with his left knee bumping my right one . . . that was my moment.
I think it was love at first sight.
I could feel Elphias stiffen in the seat on my other side. He put his arm around me and said, "I'm Elphias Delphinus Squill, the defense attorney..." He worked between the magical and no-maj community given how his weak magic made him almost a squib (Ilvermony is more open at accepting students with less magical abilities than Hogwarts). But he of course masks it by pretending he prefers to live as hard as his no-maj family do and that he admires hard work. "...I intend to be the John Grisham of the wizardry world." He said.
He was a Merlin's Imaginarium charter member, and he'd been using that as his introduction since I joined. Don't judge me, we've all dated a loser. I can't even bear to introduce him to Harry and Ron because I know both will make fun of him and Ginny would probably try to set me up with dozens of someone else. Luna would say some weird thing or another. I seriously regret dating this guy.
John called him on it. "Elliot Spavin had already done that twenty years ago." This caused Hector and Nanette, who couldn't stand Elphias, to burst out laughing. Giggles echoed around the rest of the room. I stifled my own laugh, but not fast enough.
Elphias's arm around me tightened. Everyone could feel the palpable tension between the two.
After Hector finished reading his latest reworking of his third chapter, which should in my humble opinion be the chapter where he kills off his utterly unlikeable main character, John gave Elphias a sidelong glance that would have killed small animals at a hundred yards.
Elphias glared at John and groped me, and I shook him off. The two of us were not there – never had been. They were two big hippogriffs, circling. I had no idea what was going on. But whatever it was, it made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
Halfway through the meeting, Elphias leaned over and murmured in my ear, "Why don't we get out of here and go to your place? I have court tomorrow morning, and I don't think I can stand any more of Nimue reading."
While I dislike listening to Nimue's sex filled chapter; I was sitting beside the handsome enigma. The burning question on my mind was, if I hung around, would he smile at me again? Besides, Merlin's Imaginarium meetings only happened every other week, and I loved them.
"I still haven't read yet," I told him. "I brought chapter one of my new story, and I want to get some feedback."
Elphias said, "Read it another night. I don't want you going home alone. I don't trust your neighborhood," but he wasn't looking at me when he said it. He was looking at John Liu.
John Liu then said, "Hermione, please stay and read your chapter. I'd love to hear it." He looked past me to Elphias. "I'll see her home, or one of the other men here will." "She doesn't know you, and neither do I," Elphias said.
Elphias had a point. John's interest in me, in my writing . . . it was completely out of place. It unnerved me. But I didn't want to leave the meeting. I was having fun.
There was something off in Elphias possessiveness, seeing that we've only gone out a few times and we weren't a couple. We hadn't even slept together and I always made it a point to kick him out at during those two times he did drive me home. There was something in him that creeped me out, which I couldn't quite figure out why. One time he even brought me breakfast and for some reason it scared me.
"I haven't invited you over," I told Elphias. "…And I'm having fun. My neighborhood's good, and I'll be fine." He looked completely unbothered that I'd blown him off. "I'll drop by first thing in the morning, sweetheart," he said, loud enough that Nimue stopped reading, which was a blessing, and that everyone else looked at the two of us with surprise, which was awkward.
Elphias was one of those men who didn't get it. We weren't working out, but he seemed to think we were. I decided in that instant that our last date would be the last. I'm never going out with him again. "I'll bring you breakfast, baby," he added.
He might as well have peed on my leg. He was telling John, "Don't be there," without actually coming out and saying it. As if John and I . . . well, as if there were any possibility for there being a "John and I".
"Don't," I said. I was glad to see Elphias leave.
The rest of the evening was fun. Long, but fun. I read, and people made useful comments. John sat silent after I finished reading, blinking like he was trying not to cry, which was crazy, because my first chapter wasn't sad at all. He reached over and touched my hand once, just brushed it, and said, "Thank you."
I didn't know what to make of that.
Yvonne read. Salazar read. The Merlin's Imaginariumers talked. We laughed.
At 3 a.m., we were all packing up and telling tired, silly jokes just prior to heading out the door, when John stepped in front of me and took a deep breath and said, "Before you go, can I show you something?"
I looked at the earnest expression on his face, and said, "Sure."
He turned so his back was to everyone in the room but me, and pulled a book out of his backpack. He put a finger to his lips, then handed it over. I took it, turned it over, and saw the title. The Shadows Beyond the Veil.
It was my title. My heart started to race, and when I glanced at the author's name, I had to sit down. Hermione Granger.
It was a new copy, printed beautifully by a publisher I'd never heard of. I opened it to the middle and out of habit sniffed the pages. There is no smell like book. I turned to the copyright page and closed my eyes.
The Shadows Beyond the Veil was in its thirty-seventh printing, with a copyright renewal in the name of the Estate of Elphias Delphinus Squill. It had a print date more than fifty years in the future.
I turned to the back of the book, to the author photo on the inside flap of the dust jacket. The picture was mine – one Elphias had talked me into having taken only a few weeks earlier. "Because you're so pretty," he said, "and when you're famous, you're going to want a nice picture of you when you were young to go inside your books."
It was the stupidest reason I'd ever heard for someone wanting a photo. I figured he'd just wanted it for himself. But there it was. I turned to the first page. The words were my words. I handed the book back to John, and saw how badly my hand was shaking. John took it, and touched my fingers lightly in the process. What he said next was the biggest understatement I'd ever heard.
"We need to talk."