A Window to the Past
It was forever, or just a second, nobody knew. All that the red-haired man and the brunette knew was they were awake and in some desolate field. They were completely disoriented.
"Ron?" Hermione called nervously.
"Any idea where we are?" he asked in return.
She shook her head and stood up to get her bearings. And then she froze. Standing just a little north of her position was a famed British legend.
"We are in Wiltshire. Somehow, we are near Stonehenge."
"Can we use magic?" wondered he out loud, drawing his wand.
"No!" she cried. "Don't use it."
"Why?"
"Because...because I think the ritual might have worked."
"What?"
She nodded. Ron stared at her. He had not counted on being alive, and by the look of things, neither had she. They had not expected to live, nor had they wanted to. Yet they were. An instant later, they were in an embrace, as they broke down, grieving for their family and their children. It was only five minutes later that they broke apart.
"What do we do now?" Ron asked. They had all always depended on Hermione to know everything.
"We have to get out of here. If that ritual has worked, there must have been a magical backlash which the Unspeakables might have detected."
"And we need to find out the time."
"That as well," she agreed. "There are always tourists here," she reasoned. "We have to blend in."
They ran and hid. The plan worked – almost too well. There was a close shave as they saw, and ignored the apparition of two grey-cloaked figures from their position in the group of tourists they had infiltrated, en route to Salisbury. They took a rest only at the train station.
"What do we do now?" she wondered as they sat down.
"We buy a ticket."
"Why?" Hermione asked.
"Hermione, you were brought up as a muggle. Think why! We shall find a date on the ticket." They were certainly still not in their proper minds, for otherwise they would have seen the several boards proclaiming the date.
She looked at him in astonishment. As usual, it made him defensive. "Just because I used magic to pass my driving tests, doesn't mean I am stupid."
"I didn't say you were!" she started warningly. "I was just surprised. It is you who immediately take offence!"
"Can we fight later?"
Hermione speared him with one last look of anger. "We need to plan," she declared shortly.
"Yes. To start with, which train should we take to get closest to the Burrow?"
"We can't go there Ron," Hermione countered.
"Why?" He demanded in irritation. "If we go there now, and it is before 1994, we can get Pettigrew!" It was a wonder that Ron had his priorities so straight. "It will put off so many problems!"
"Ron, it looks like summer, right now. We don't know whether the year is before or after 1991. Either way, your younger self will be there. You will go mad. And, since we have shared magic during marriage, I can't go either."
Ron sat back slumped and dejected. "We need to go to someone who will trust us, who will not get freaked out, and who we can trust."
"That leaves only two options."
"Harry and Hogwarts," he answered.
"Should we take a train to Surrey?"
"It depends. If this isn't post 1991, Harry might not freak out. If it is, he might think we are Death Eaters. In that case we will have to go to London and floo from the Leaky Cauldron to Hogsmeade."
Ron nodded and got up to buy them a ticket. Then he stopped with a stricken look on his face. "I can't face him," he told her in a low voice. "If he is a kid, he will look like, like..."
"He will look like Albus." The thought hurt her. It brought memories of her children and then her niece and nephews and then her best friend who had died defending them all. Then the very idea of Harry being that small made her smile. And then immediately, it made her very angry. "If he is that small, Ron, we have to meet him. We can't leave him there!"
It took Ron a moment to come to a decision. "No," he agreed. "We can't."
For a while, neither of them moved. They were still in shock over everything. Five minute cries of grief didn't drive it away. They doubted that they would stop grieving for the rest of their lives.
"SHIT!" Ron hissed angrily. "We aren't going anywhere there. We are going to set Malfoy Manor on fire first! I am going to kill that little son of a bitch."
Hermione was shocked by the vitriol. "He might be only a child!"
"And so were Rose and Hugo," he snarled back. "So were James, Lily and Albus. He murdered them all."
In another life, under other circumstances, she would have been dissuaded. But just those names were enough to cause an eruption of hatred. She nodded. "You are right. But we must wait. The Unspeakables are already on our trail."
Ron really hated it when she used logic sometimes. He left to get a ticket.
"It is the fifth of August 1984."
"Percy goes to Hogwarts three years from now."
"You really are fixated on the Rat."
"I am. He revived Voldemort. He must be the first to go."
"But at the moment we need other things Ron. Please. Think straight. We must get new wands."
"I don't have mine."
"I don't either."
"Then why did you stop me back at that place?"
"It was on reflex."
He just huffed in annoyance.
The journey to Surrey passed in absolute silence. Finding Little Whinging thereafter was not a big problem. Just outside the house, Ron stopped Hermione. "Are you sure?"
She impaled him with a glare. "Of course I am."
"No. I don't think you are. If we take Harry from here, where to do we take him? Don't you think Dumbledore will know? Do you have any money on you? He is a four year old right now. He won't be fussy, but he will still be a child. How are we going to feed him? Now that we have come into the past, what are we going to do? What for? We have nothing to look forward to. Our children are dead. We are children, Hermione. Are we going to leave him alone if we do decide to take care of the problem of Voldemort? Are you sure you can handle children, now?"
Hermione's shoulders slumped. "I don't know Ron. I can think of only one thing at moment. I can't let him stay with them."
In that moment, Ron knew that Hermione had zero objectivity where Harry was concerned. Hermione, the woman who planned and executed the Horcrux Hunt, could not think straight about anything else where Harry's safety and his happiness were concerned. He was sure that she was only looking at the child who would grow up to be her best friend. Then again, he doubted Hermione was thinking at all. She was probably working like an auto-whatever. If they did take Harry in, she would end up going mad in the process, for she hadn't grieved yet. She did love the children, as much or more likely more than she ever loved him. He snorted at the irony of being the one doing the thinking instead of her.
That said, though, he himself couldn't let Harry remain there for a moment more. But he needed to be sure of himself first. He had failed his friend too many times before. He couldn't afford to let that happen now. As a child, Harry would be entirely dependent on them. He wasn't yet sure whether he was ready to live a day more. They needed help. Hogwarts was obvious. But that wasn't useful, right now. He didn't want to face Dumbledore, not before he destroyed Malfoy Manor. Or preferably, he didn't want to face him at all.
It took him a long time to come up with the solution. Then again, Remus was long dead as he remembered him. But he was the only trustworthy person left who could help.
He looked doubtfully at the house. Were they ready? Was he ready to suddenly have his children die and then become the father figure to his best friend? If he did decide not to rescue Harry now, till he was sure of the arrangements, was he consigning his best mate to hell for however long it took, for his own good? Was he ready to work in this time, saving those who had died as he remembered? Destroying Malfoys was important for him. If that accursed book was there, it too would be destroyed. How many things would he be changing? If he did decide to help in this time, how many things should he be changing?
Dumbledore had once urged everyone to what was right rather than what was easy. Well, that bloody well wasn't easy to decide when he didn't know what the right thing to do was, was it?