Author's Notes: In the original fest, this was a HUGE chapter - almost 10K. I've cut it up here to make it more palatable to read.
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Mid-April, 1998
Shell Cottage, Tinworth, Cornwall
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The next few months were a blur of happenings: they'd found Godric Gryffindor's sword, Ron had returned to them, and they'd destroyed their first Horcrux – that wicked locket was gone forever. They'd learned about the Deathly Hallows from Luna's father, been captured by Snatchers, taken to Malfoy Manor, and Hermione had been tortured to within an inch of her life by Bellatrix Lestrange. They'd buried Dobby, discovered the truth of the possible Horcrux hidden in Gringotts, had the Elder Wand's existence confirmed, and found out what Voldemort was really after.
Ever since then, Hermione had been convalescing, and Ron had been trying to convince Harry to go after the Wand of Death, rather than the Horcruxes, as Dumbledore had tasked they do. There was a fight between them on that point, and Hermione had sided firmly with Harry. Sadly, that split had become a point of contention between them, reopening old wounds.
Ron's return had really mixed things up on a personal level for Hermione, too. Yes, she still cared for her him as her best friend, but the infatuation she'd previously felt for him had completely faded even before they'd left Grimmauld Place last year. Unfortunately, it seemed as though the complete opposite was true of Ron. She didn't dare discourage him, though, as he'd been rather clingy upon his rejoining her and Harry, and Harry had taken great comfort from his friend's reappearance. She feared that if things became severely strained between her and Ron again, it would cause him to run off once more, and that would most definitely hurt Harry – and possibly cripple their chances of defeating Voldemort. So, for the time being, she allowed him the extra hugs and the longing looks he threw her way when he didn't think she noticed. It made her uncomfortable, but she endured for Harry's sake.
Now, lying in the bed in the room she shared with Luna that had been graciously provided by Fleur and Bill in Shell Cottage, she stared up at the ceiling and considered Harry's plan for breaking into Bellatrix's vault. It was extremely risky, but she thought necessary. They couldn't ignore the chance that the vault contained another Horcrux, but Hermione couldn't help but wonder what other horrors might lurk in the mad woman's private stash. What potential traps had she laid to keep something like a piece of Voldemort's soul safe? Surely, it would be defended by some of the darkest magic, like the locket had been.
For not the first time, she wished Ral was there with them, helping them in this fight. As far as she'd been able to determine, however, he'd never taken Dumbledore's deal to Lupin, McGonagall, or any other Order member, and was still firmly on the side of the Death Eaters. She'd carefully probed Bill and Fleur on the subject over the last week, asking vague questions about potential defectors to their side in the months since she, Harry, and Ron had disappeared from Order business, but they'd both replied in the negative. No one had stepped forward to offer a changing allegiance or their services to act as double agent.
To be fair, Ral had warned her he probably wouldn't cross lines, feeling it his duty to protect his brother first and foremost, and it wasn't as if she could have abandoned the Horcrux hunt to stand guard over Rolph in some Order safe house. Still, she couldn't help but feel deeply disappointed and truly worried that he hadn't changed sides by now, when it was clear things were coming to a head. In the battle that was sure to come, the other Order members would consider Ral their enemy, and some she knew had no compulsion about using nasty curses on a Death Eater. He could he be injured or worse. The thought frightened her.
What she wanted to do was to tell everyone about Ral – including Ron. She wanted the world to know his story, to understand him, and to know she was in love with him. Very soon, she would tell them, she thought. Her intuition told her as much. The feeling was very much like the one she'd had during third year when she'd been entrusted with the Time-Turner. Back then, Minerva McGonagall had warned her never to breathe a word of the truth of her stewardship of the powerful magical device to anyone, for time magic was known to have very bad side effects, and there was the potential for its abuse by those with less of a sense of responsibility. She'd lied all year long to Harry and Ron about that secret as a result, even though she'd hated doing it. It had been necessary, however. In the end, she'd revealed the device to Harry as she'd been meant to – not too early to cause him to want to use it before it was time, and not too late to save Buckbeak and Sirius. It was a delicate balance, playing with time like that.
The secret of Ral felt much the same: a secret abiding time for its revelation.
Time...
In between everything else going on, she'd given the matter of her strange fugue-like jaunts some thought, and she was sure the answer was in what her lover had said about feeling as if he knew her, but not in a past sense. She'd looked through some of the books she'd brought with her in her beaded bag (Ron hadn't been exaggerating when he'd said she'd taken along a library's worth of reading, but one never knew when one might need reference materials), and had re-familiarized herself with time theory. It made her wonder: could her use of the Time-Turner back in third year have altered her physiology or her magical aura? Was she travelling through time to get to Ral? Was that what he'd meant by knowing her in a future sense?
Just thinking so strongly of Ral again brought back the phantom memory of the scent she associated only with him: liquorice and sweet cloves. How she loved that combination now. It brought her comfort and warmth...
She smiled as the darkness crept in from the sides, overtaking her sight.
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Hermione blinked.
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She was in one of the hotel rooms at the Leaky Cauldron. She recognised the room from her overnight stay during the Christmas holiday of her second year, when she and her parents had booked a room for a night to experience a magical hotel before shopping in Diagon Alley the next day for Christmas gifts. The same goldenrod and buttercup yellow curtains framed a large picture window on one wall, and the matching bedding decorated the large, comfortable bed opposite the window. The same small side table and wooden chair was positioned beside the window, with the traditional parchment and ink and quill arrangement atop it just waiting to be put to use.
She walked to the window and stared down onto the Alley. It was raining outside, and a few witches and wizards moved up and down the cobbled street some under magical black umbrellas, others with protective charms cast over their heads. The air around her felt like the chill of autumn, not that of spring. Odd.
A pair of strong, comforting arms came about her from behind, and a warm, family body pressed in tight against her. The scent of liquorice and cloves tickled her nose.
"Hello, my love. I've missed you."
"Ral," she gave a relieved sigh and leaned into him. "I've missed you, too. It's been so long. Four months, and so much has happened—"
"Four months?" He leaned back and let her go. "Hermione, it's been eleven months."
She turned and looked up into his handsome face, seeking confirmation. His arctic blue eyes were shadowed with confusion. "That's not possible," she countered. "We last met in December."
He shook his head. "Last October. It's September, now, almost a year later."
She took a step back, shocked by his words... and by how much older he appeared, as she took a good, long look at him now. His face had filled in, his age somehow closer to the fully-developed male he was destined to become in another five or so years when he hit his mid-twenties. His hair was longer, too, the bangs hanging just below his jaw. She knew hair grew a half-inch every month, or thereabouts, and from the length… it looked as though he sported a good six inches of new growth.
"But it was December for me. Christmas Eve," she weakly protested. "It's should be April now."
Ral shook his head. "We last met on Halloween afternoon, and it's the nineteenth of September today."
The nineteenth of September? Her birthday.
A sinking suspicion began crept through her mind. "What date was it the first time we met?"
He began to look a little uncomfortable. "The nineteenth of September, two years ago."
Two years from his perspective, one and some change from hers.
They were out of synch… which meant they weren't in the same present space, as she'd suspected.
"What was it you said last time?" she asked him, concentrating, recalling his exact words. "Something about years that separate us from each other. 'I'm aware of them,' you said, 'but I can't get them back for some reason.'" She stared up at him in shock, finally understanding. "Time does separate us. What year is it for you?"
Ral shook his head, confused by her line of questioning. "It's 1981. Why is that important?"
Hermione's knees trembled. "Merlin, no," she whispered, putting together the pieces and seeing the whole puzzle. She finally knew what was happening to them.
Ral had been right all along. It was a matter of time.
Ral caught her a second before her knees gave out and she hit the floor. "What's wrong?" he demanded.
She closed her eyes, realising the significance. "We met on my birthday in 1979." The exact day and year, in fact. He'd been leaving Hogwarts to go home to Corsham so he could commit suicide in his own bed.
He'd gone to die the day she was born.
But she'd stopped him on that train, convinced him to return to Hogwarts. She'd changed history by jumping through time… and accidentally linked their souls in the doing. Their relationship had been fated all along.
But why had she been drawn across time to him, specifically? Why not her own parents, or the Weasleys, or the Potters? Why Ral? Who was he to her, really?
"So, we met on your birthday. Why does that matter?" he asked her, exasperated.
"What's your full name?" she asked him, trying to make sense of their personal connection. Who was he to her?
He seemed taken aback by the question, but answered. "Rabastan Alastair Lestrange. Why?"
R.A.L.
Ral.
Lestrange.
She gave a sob of despair and slapped her hands over her eyes.
Lestrange!
No wonder she knew him - she knew his eyes, his chuckle, his distinctive liquorice and clove scent because he'd been the Death Eater who'd challenged at her in the Department of Mysteries, who'd reached for her only to be elbowed in the face by Harry, and later to be thrown back into the grandfather clock by Harry's Stupefy in the Time Room, knocked unconscious.
He'd known her then. It had been obvious by the way he'd stroked across her magical aura with his own, igniting a sensual heat for him – even as he'd trained his wand on her friends. What they'd done now, here in the past, had carried across the years to that moment in the Department of Mysteries… where it had all begun.
It was a circular logic loop, as time always was.
"Ral, I know why this has happened to us," she said matter-of-factly. "We're caught in a magical time loop – a closed timeline curve. We're living Novikov's Self-Consistency Principle that governs time travel."
His eyes widened and he frowned. "Was that Greek or Russian, love? Because what you just said made absolutely no sense to me."
"I'm from your future," she said, realizing she was breaking all sort of laws in the telling, but knowing it wouldn't at all matter if her supposition was true. "Before I came here today, I was in my own time - in April, 1998."
He leaned back and stared at her as if she'd grown a second head."What?"
TO BE CONTINUED...
Author's Notes:
The rabbit hole grows deeper as Hermione tumbles down it. Secrets come to light. Explanations are forthcoming...
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