Author's Notes: I'm sorry I took an unscheduled break from posting, but hopefully this (and the next chapter of Unsubstantial Death, coming tomorrow or Friday will make up for my absence! Thanks to everyone who read and reviewed thus far!
We should have trusted Professor Snape. We shouldn't have come. He could have checked and told us it was a trick. Then this wouldn't be happening.
That was the last thought that fluttered through Hermione's mind as the hex the Death Eater threw at her pushed her into a shelf full of time turners. She wasn't sure if her vision went fuzzy from the glittering dust of a hundred broken from her head hitting the hard floor, but before she could decide, everything went black.
When she opened her eyes again, she found herself looking into caring brown eyes for just a moment before pain wracked her and she found herself curling up and whimpering in pain.
The eyes widened and before she drifted back into unconsciousness she felt a hand smoothing her hair and a woman's voice murmuring soft platitudes she could not quite grasp in her exhausted, pain-stricken mind, but the sounds were soothing nonetheless. The darkness was cool and she found herself slipping back into it.
She woke up sweating, eyes blurry and having trouble focusing. There were people in the room, and she felt safe, but it was too bright to be the hospital wing.
"...should have a choice, love." A male voice that sounded familiar and yet..said, strongly.
"Look how sick she is!" The voice she remembered comforting her shot back. "If we don't do it, she could…"
"She's awake!" A third yelled, almost identical to the male voice. If they hadn't come from different areas of the room, she would have thought they were the same.
Hermione winced, or it felt like she did. Bright ginger hair topped a head, but it was blurry and she couldn't make it out. The voice, however, gave her a hint. "Don' yell, George." She muttered, throat dry, as she shivered. "Or...you...Fred?" She said, tongue feeling swollen, and talking was difficult.
"Sorry, sweetheart, neither." The ginger who had yelled, said contritely. "You can call me Gid."
"Mmmkay." Hermione agreed, trying to figure out why that sounded vaguely familiar.
A cool hand brushed over her forehead, and the woman spoke. "Hermione, I need you to listen to me, okay?"
"Kay." Hermione agreed, trying hard to focus. Everything was muzzy, and her chest hurt worse the longer she was awake.
"You've fallen back in time." The woman said softly. "You ingested some of the sand from the time turners, and it's destabilised your magical core, and because you fell so far back, your core has nothing to draw on, no connections, your parents aren't even married."
Hermione's brain was slow, but even slowed from fever and sickness, she could put two and two together. She wiped her eyes, startling slightly as a glass was pressed to her lips. "Drink." The first male voice said quietly. Obediently she took a few sips of what tasted like the purest water she had ever tasted and it soothed her throat. "I'm going to die." She said, steadying herself in the resignation of her fate.
"No." The woman said, fiercely. "There is a way. There's a potion that if you drink it, will change your magical core. It is usually for adoptions...your core would recognise us as your bloodline as...as your parents, and be able to stabilise itself from drawing on them."
Hermione tried to focus, thinking of her parents, whom she would never see again. She knew better than anyone that time travel forward was not possible, not in her time, and certainly not back in whatever time this was. "When am I?" She asked, as a searing pain went through her system. "How do you know my name?" At least, that's what she tried to say, but the words came out stilted and slurred. "Who are you?" Terrible things happened to wizards who meddled with time, she knew that, and she didn't know if she could stand back and watch it all happen. It would drive her mad. "Why is everything blurry?"
The woman lowered the light in the room slightly, and whispered an incantation, and touched a wand to Hermione's sweaty forehead. "Better?"
Distracted, Hermione nodded. She studied the three people in the room, as much as she can with the chills and pain running through her. The men remind her of Charlie, ginger, broad-shouldered and well-muscled, but their smiles are the twins all over, hazel eyes sparkling. Fitting, since they were obviously twins. The woman was trying to smile, but worry creases her forehead. Hermione used to wish her hair was like this woman's if it had to be curly, an easily controlled ponytail of ringlets, and light olive skin. "Who are you?"
The woman smiled slightly. "My name's Dorcas Meadowes, and these two are Fabian and Gideon Prewett."
"Molly's brothers."Hermione slurred slightly. "You're all First Order."
"I'm also an Unspeakable." Dorcas said with a laugh. "I found you in the Time Room and brought you here after a bit of Legilimency. If anyone knew how far you'd come, or what happened...you'd never make it out of the Dark Cells."
Hermione didn't know what that meant, but it sent a shiver down her spine nonetheless. She opened her mouth to speak, but instead, a kind of shriek came out instead as she felt something run through her, like it was ripping muscle and sinew, shredding her from the inside out.
Instantly, there were comforting hands on her shoulders as she struggles, almost seizing through the pain. "Breathe, Hermione." Dorcas said firmly, commanding. "Accept it and push past it. Fighting it will make it worse."
Acceding to the pain was not in Hermione's nature, she was a Gryffindor after all, and she had learnt the need to fight as much as her innate courage in her House, but she gave in because cold hard logic, always her helpmeet in times of trouble, told her that this woman was trying to help her. Slowly, the pain waned and she fell back, feeling as though she was shredded and should be bleeding.
One of the twins flicked his wand, and studied the numbers that floated into the air. "The degradation is getting worse. The curse she was hit with is attacking her and every time she tries to resist it…"
"Yes, thank you, Fabian!" Dorcas snapped, her voice softening as she turned back to Hermione. "Please let us save you, paidi mou. I know...I know you have parents who love you, but please…"
Hermione was struck by how upset the Unspeakable was, and nodded slowly. She wouldn't have wanted to die anyway, even if she was so far away from Ron and Harry and her family, but this woman really seemed to care. It made her feel slightly better about being trapped in the past, where she would have to watch horrible things happen, and she really wasn't suicidal, for all that the pain made her think oblivion might be better. "Okay." She said, swallowing hard. "I'll do it."
"Brilliant! I knew she was a smart one!" Gideon enthused, grabbing a stoppered potion off the table. He approached the bed, allowing Dorcas to walk over to Fabian, who put his arms around her. "It doesn't smell very good, but the best ones never do." Gideon murmured, holding the phial to her lips. "Drink, Hermione."
Hermione drank. The potion was coppery and spicy, as if it was burning her tongue, even though the liquid wasn't hot. She swallowed and fell back into nothingness.
