"What we need," said Dumbledore slowly, and his light blue eyes moved from Harry to Hermione, "is more time."
"But —" Hermione began. And then her eyes became very round. "OH!"
"Now, pay attention," said Dumbledore, speaking very low, and very clearly. "Sirius is locked in Professor Flitwick's office on the seventh floor. Thirteenth window from the right of the West
Tower. If all goes well, you will be able to save more than one innocent life tonight. But remember this, both of you: you must not be seen. Miss Granger, you know the law — you know what is at stake… You — must — not — be —seen."
Harry didn't have a clue what was going on. Dumbledore had turned on his heel and looked back as he reached the door.
"I am going to lock you in. It is —" he consulted his watch, "five minutes to midnight. Miss Granger, three turns should do it. Good luck."
"Good luck?" Harry repeated as the door closed behind Dumbledore. "Three turns? What's he talking about? What are we supposed to do?"
But Hermione was fumbling with the neck of her robes, pulling from beneath them a very long, very fine gold chain.
"Harry, come here," she said urgently. "Quick!"
Harry moved toward her, completely bewildered. She was holding the chain out. He saw a tiny, sparkling hourglass hanging from it.
"Here —"
She had thrown the chain around his neck too.
"Ready?" she said breathlessly.
"What are we doing?" Harry said, completely lost.
Before Hermione could answer, the door burst open to reveal Snape, who looked furious enough to be frothing from his mouth.
"I'll see to that both you are expelled from Hogwarts for illegal time magic." He snarled. "Expelliarmus."
A red beam slammed into Hermione's hourglass just as Harry's surroundings began to blur.
The hospital wing dissolved. Harry had the sensation that he was flying very fast, backward. A blur of colors and shapes rushed past him, his ears were pounding, he tried to yell but couldn't hear his own voice --
And then he felt solid ground beneath his feet, and everything came into focus again --
He was standing next to Hermione in a dark room with a musty smell. He tried to recognise where he was even as his eyes adjusted to the darkness, before noticing that Hermione was hyperventilating next to him.
"Oh no. Oh no. What did he do? What are we going to do? Oh no no no..."
Harry quickly removed the chain from his neck tried to comfort Hermione, not having any idea what was going on.
"Hermione, Hermione. Listen to me all right. Listen to my voice. We are going to be fine. Just try to breathe. Breathe."
His words had no effect whatsoever and Hermione's breathing began to escalate.
"That's not going to work, boy." Came a raspy voice from the darkness, causing Harry to jump. "Get her to breathe into a bag. Or maybe not..."
Apparently, the stranger's voice was enough to get Hermione out of her panic attack. "Lumos." She casted, lighting up her wand, making Harry feel stupid for not thinking of it.
In wand light, Harry was able to see the room, which was dirty, but nothing compared to the filthy, emaciated man chained up in the corner. It looked like what Harry imagined the Azkaban prison to be.
"Who are you?" Hermione asked, her voice shaking only slightly.
The man raised an eyebrow. "And here I thought that you Brits were polite." He said, in what Harry now recognised to be an American accent. "I'm Percival Graves." He continued, causing Hermione to gasp.
"But that would mean..." She trailed off.
Harry looked at her for an explanation and saw rising panic on her face.
"Hermione." He said loudly, fearing another panic attack, getting her attention. "May be you should explain."
Honestly, he was nearing the end of his patience. Sirius, his godfather, who was innocent was going to lose his soul any minute and Hermione had a strange device that brought them to this god forsaken place with this American zombie. It was a wonder that he had managed to hold off for this long.
Hermione took a deep breath and looked between Harry and Graves. She gingerly displayed the necklace that had got them into this mess.
"Harry, this is called a Time-Turner," Hermione said,holding up the hourglass, "and I got it from Professor McGonagall on our first day back. I've been using it all year to get to all my lessons. Professor McGonagall made me swear I wouldn't tell anyone. She had to write all sorts of letters to the Ministry of Magic so I could have one. She had to tell them that I was a model student, and that I'd never, ever use it for anything except my studies. . . I've been turning it back so I could do hours over again, that's how I've been doing several lessons at once, see? But. . ."
"Time Turner?? Does that mean..." He trailed off.
"We've gone back in time," Hermione whispered. "Decades back. . . Snape's spell messed with the time magic. We were supposed travel back three hours."
The horrible realisation dawned on Harry, crashing with denial.
"How do you know we are decades back?"
Hermione glanced towards Graves, who was watching them in silence. "Because of him. Percival Graves was a famous Auror of MACUSA. He was murdered in 1926, by Grindelwald."