A/N: Oh look! An update! How novel! Thanks for your reviews of the first chapter guys, I'm glad you're all intrigued by it. I'm not entirely sure how this fic is going to work so updates won't be massively quick, though I'm hoping to pick up the pace over Christmas. Anyway, hope you enjoy this chapter, let me know what you think.
Tempora Abducto.
by Flaignhan.
When Hermione awoke, she didn't have any clue how much later it was – an hour, a day, a week, a month, or maybe even a year. All she knew was that she was in the Hospital Wing and the sheets covering her were itchier than she remembered.
"Oh, you're awake," a male voice said in mild surprise. Hermione looked over and saw a tall dark haired boy walking towards Madame Pomfrey's office.
"Madame Rotherby!" he called through the wooden door after knocking politely. "The young lady's awake."
The door opened and a rosy cheeked woman bustled out. "Go and fetch Professor Dippet will you, Tom, and you'd better get Professor Dumbledore too, he seems to know more about what's happened to her than the Headmaster does. There's a good lad."
"What's happened to me?" Hermione asked, her head fuzzy, the conversation not making sense. Who was this Madame Rotherby and where was Madame Pomfrey? Had she been injured in the battle? Was she dead? Hermione swallowed hard at this thought and tried to sit up.
"You just stay there my love," Madam Rotherby said kindly as the boy, Tom, left the Hospital Wing. "Professor Dumbledore will explain everything to you. Lie still, I've just got to check you over."
Hermione did as she was told and felt the warm tingling of diagnostic charms spreading through her body. When she was finished, Madam Rotherby headed back into her office, reappearing almost instantly with a vial of purple potion.
"Here you are love, drink this. I'm afraid it's no Butterbeer but it'll make you feel ten times better."
Hermione did as she was told. "Where's Harry?" she asked, having swallowed the potion, tears burning in her eyes as it seared down her throat. She didn't feel ten times better at all, but decided to give the potion more than two seconds to kick in. "And Ron?"
Madame Rotherby frowned slightly. "Professor Dumbledore will explain," she said again. "Now what's your name, sweetheart?"
"Hermione," she told her, "Hermione Granger."
"Hermione," Madame Rotherby repeated with a smile, "that's a pretty name, we've never had a Hermione here before."
Hermione didn't respond and ran a slightly shaky hand through her hair, straight and tangle free. Frowning, she pulled a strand round so she could see it. It was several shades darker than it ought to be, and rather longer. Then she noticed her nails – usually bitten down past her fingertips due to stress and anxiety, they were now rounded, neat and in a state that her mother would definitely approve of.
"The spell that was cast on you did you some damage I'm afraid," Madame Rotherby informed her, watching her movements. "Your hair and nails didn't survive it – according to Professor Dumbledore it was poorly cast. Essentially you were splinched, so you arrived without hair and without nails. I didn't have any clue what your hair's normally like so I just did my best, we can change it though, don't worry, it's just I thought you'd prefer to wake up with different hair rather than none at all."
Hermione nodded. Madame Rotherby was right, different hair was much less shocking than no hair at all.
"I can fix it now if you'd like? If it'd make you feel a little better?"
Hermione nodded, and told Madame Rotherby what her hair usually looked like. In no time at all it was back to normal, bushy, brown and troublesome. She wouldn't have it any other way. "Will it grow like normal hair?" Hermione asked worriedly. George's ear hadn't been able to grow back after Snape had cursed it off, would her hair gradually thin until she was bald for good?
"Yes dear, but it'll just take a while to get going, once you're back on track it'll be fine."
Hermione breathed a sigh of relief. She was not a vain person by any means, but losing her hair was something she wasn't too excited about. The door to the hospital wing opened and Hermione looked up, no longer concerned about he hair.
"Ah, good to see you awake, Miss..."
"Granger," Madame Rotherby supplied helpfully, "Hermione Granger."
Her eyes widened as she took in the sight of Albus Dumbledore, auburn beard reaching midway down his chest, half moon spectacles resting on a nose which was just as crooked as it had been last time she had seen it, and very, very, much alive.
She had not quite taken it in when Madame Rotherby had asked Tom to go and get Professor Dumbledore – after all, she associated her time at Hogwarts (and her time in the Hospital Wing) with Dumbledore being alive, though not quite as young and agile as he appeared to be here, now.
He walked over with a tiny, wispy haired old man and both of them took a seat by her bed.
"Tom, would you mind giving us a little bit of privacy? Delicate matters, very delicate, you see," the little wizard said in a wheezy voice, glancing back towards the tall, dark haired boy that had been asked to fetch the two Professors.
"Of course, Headmaster," Tom said politely, nodding his head and stepping out of the Hospital Wing, closing the door behind him.
Madam Rotherby smiled warmly at Hermione. "I'll just be in my office if you need anything, all right love?"
Hermione nodded, still in shock, but manage to choke out a 'thank you'.
Dumbledore waved his wand and a blanket of hush fell upon them.
"No need for that, Albus," the little man said. "Quite unnecessary..."
"As you said, Headmaster, we are about to discuss a delicate matter," Dumbledore said calmly, "it is only fair that Miss Granger's privacy be respected."
"Very well, very well. I don't know why you don't trust the boy..."
"Another time, perhaps, Armando?" Dumbledore said pointedly, taking a seat next to Hermione's bedside.
"Yes, yes, more important matters at hand."
"Professor, where are Harry, and Ron?" Hermione knew that asking would most likely turn up no answers – had she died? If she was talking to a younger Dumbledore, along with Armando Dippet, who'd already been dead a good forty five years, then perhaps...
"The spell that was cast upon you is known as the Tempora Abducto curse," Dumbledore began. "It has only been used twice in recorded history, and is, understandably, very illegal. The caster will be sentenced to life in Azkaban, though usually they are never caught. I expect you've had no experience with time travel, Miss Granger, so -"
"Time travel? Oh no, no don't tell me -"
"I'm afraid you have travelled in time, my dear," Professor Dippet said in his nasally voice. "It's all very tricky business, very tricky -"
"Can I use a time turner to get back?" Hermione interrupted, assuming that there were still time turners available in this time – the stock at the Ministry were yet to be smashed to smithereens by her and her friends. "I used a time turner in my third year to attend my classes, surely I could -"
"Miss Granger, you know as well as I do that time turners can only be used to turn back the clock, not skip it forward," Dumbledore said, a sympathetic expression resting on his younger face. "But," he continued, "if you have used a time turner before then you know the laws, of course? You know what you must and must not do? You know the importance?"
"Yes, Professor," Hermione said, sitting up straighter against her pillows. "My Head of House made me read the laws through fifteen times before she even let me see it, I know them like the back of my hand."
Professor Dumbledore smiled.
Hermione asked the question that had been burning inside her since the words 'time travel' had been mentioned. The feeling of dread in her stomach accompanied her intuition that she would not like the answer. "So if I can't use a time turner, how do I get back? Can this Tempora Abducto spell send me back? I've never even heard of it, actually."
Dumbledore's smile disappeared and Dippet twirled his thumbs rapidly, his attention focused on his fidgeting hands.
"I'm afraid Tempora Abducto can only send people backwards, like a time turner, that's why it's always so difficult to catch the perpetrator – the victim has usually passed away long before the spell itself is actually cast."
"You mean I'm going to -?" Hermione began, panicking before Dumbledore cut her off.
"Oh no, dear girl, no no, I apologise if I frightened you. I merely meant that the two times Tempora Abducto has been used before this, the victims were sent back a good few hundred years. Thus their lives came to an end by natural causes before they grew old enough to see their present as it would have been."
"So that's it? I'm just supposed to...give up?"
Dumbledore heaved a sigh. "Greater wizards than myself and Professor Dippet have spent their lives trying to find a way forward in time, and all of them have been unsuccessful. I daresay by the time either of us would get anywhere near, you'd already have lived through the years until your present anyway."
"And what am I supposed to do? I haven't got any family, any friends, any identity, I don't exist in this time, I'm just here, and I'm not supposed to be!"
"Oh you're supposed to be," Dippet wheezed, "the time you know is not how time would have been had you not been sent back here. It might just be a small change, perhaps the colour of a room, the name of a child, but you have been here, you have always been here, and thus time as you know it is time adjusted to your presence in this time."
Hermione felt her lip wobble ever so slightly but managed to keep her tears at bay. She was not usually one for crying, though she thought the circumstances did rather call for some desperation, perhaps even a pinch of hysterics too. However, she would not cry in front of two former (or current and future) Headmasters of the greatest school of witchcraft and wizardry in the world. She was tougher than that.
"Madame Rotherby will most likely keep you in for a few more days," Dumbledore told her. "Have you completed your education or are you still a student?"
"I haven't taken my seventh year," Hermione said quietly, still trying to get her head around the situation she was stuck in, seemingly forever.
"Well that won't be a problem," Dippet said, taking a handkerchief out of his pocket and blowing his nose loudly. "You can enrol here, term starts in two weeks, we'll sort you into a house and you'll be able to complete your education. Now, if you'll excuse me I have to send an owl to the Department of Mysteries, they've been asking about you."
Hermione's eyebrows raised.
"Nothing to worry about," Dippet said as he got to his feet, "just general filing, they'll add you into wizarding records, you'll have your own history and no one will be any the wiser. I'm sure Tom will keep you company until the start of term, nice boy, Head Boy actually, he'll be in the same year as you, possibly in a few of your classes. Until next time, Miss Granger," he waved cheerily and hurried out of the hospital wing, giving off the impression that he had much more important things to be doing other than dealing with rogue time travellers.
"Is this the bit where you tell me there's a way to get back?" Hermione asked in a shaky voice as she turned to Dumbledore, ninety nine per cent certain that he would not unveil some grand master plan. That one per cent was still there, though, and just as valid as every one per cent that made up the ninety nine going against her.
Dumbledore raised a small, grim smile. "I'm afraid not, Miss Granger, there is no plan, no alternative, and no solution. Some things just can't be fixed, and inconveniently it's the things that need fixing the most which are often irreparable."
Hermione's shoulders slumped slightly and she swallowed a lump in her throat. "So this is it?"
"This is it. I'll let you get some rest now."
Hermione nodded, and couldn't stop the first hot tear of hopelessness from spilling down her cheek. Once he had closed the door, she sobbed into her pillow, and barely noticed when Madame Rotherby returned from her office and put her arms around in her in an attempt at comfort. No amount of hugging would have helped, and Hermione continued to cry until she exhausted herself and fell asleep in the arms of Madame Rotherby.
"Good morning."
Hermione looked up and saw the tall, dark haired boy who had gone to fetch Dumbledore and Dippet the previous day. She frowned slightly, wondering exactly why this boy seemed to have so much interest in her. "Hello," she replied politely.
"Tom," he said, holding out his hand, "Tom Riddle."
Overcoming her shock in an admirably short space of time, Hermione managed a polite smile and shook his hand. As she looked into his grey eyes, a memory stirred in her mind. One of the last things she remembered happening when she was in her own time.
The pain was still incomparable to anything she'd ever felt before in her life. The curse had been lifted, but she could barely tell. She had stopped screaming, certainly, but she was shaking violently in Ron's arms and every cell in her body felt like it was on the brink of exploding.
She felt Ron move backwards sharply, and opening her eyes, she saw a figure wearing dark trousers and a dark blue shirt approaching. He had grey eyes, and she flinched (though amongst the shaking, no one would have noticed) when she saw the fury in them. He raised his wand, and before Hermione could do anything to protect herself, she was hit by a spell.
It felt like she was drowning in goodness; liquid gold, something decadent like that, liquid gold that was warm and comforting. Her nerves finally settled and the man leaned down to whisper in her ear.
"Patience and trust, Hermione, patience and trust."
And then Tom Riddle had fought Lord Voldemort – though she hadn't stuck around long enough to see the outcome of that particular battle.
"So when are you from?" Tom asked, interrupting her memories.
"London," Hermione replied absently.
"When, not where," Tom repeated, a little arrogantly.
"What do you mean when?" Hermione said with a frown. "Here, now. Why, when are you from?"
"I am from here, and now, but you are not," he leaned forward, placing a hand on the side of her rather uncomfortable bed. "You can trust me, you know, Hermione."
Hermione looked away from him, unnerved by his very mechanical movements, all thought out previously to lull her into a false sense of security. Did he sit in his dormitory reading books about mannerisms and gestures that made people seem trustworthy? It was the very still, very confident look in his eyes that gave him away. He was sure he was going to get information, that she was a stupid girl who didn't have a chance against him. Oh how very wrong he was.
"Patience and trust, Hermione, patience and trust."
She shook her head to try and rid herself of that particular memory. The man in the future could not have been Tom Riddle. For a start, Tom Riddle was Lord Voldemort, and though he could divide his soul, Hermione doubted very much that he could be two separate people. Secondly, the man who had cast that wonderful healing spell on her was far too young to have been alive in 1944. Thus, the teenage boy sitting next to her and the young man in the Great Hall were two very separate people. She would not trust Tom Riddle and she certainly wouldn't be breaking the laws of time travel to satiate his curiosity.
"Tell me," Tom said, sitting back in his chair, "what is the last newspaper headline you remember?"
Hermione frowned. "What are you expecting? Self-spelling wands sell out at Ollivanders? Minister for Magic caught telling the truth?"
"Humour me," Tom replied, smirking slightly. "Last headline you remember."
Hermione's brain whirred as she ran through every History of Magic lesson they had had regarding this particular era. Grindelward was the obvious one, but he wasn't defeated until sometime next year...but as Rita Skeeter had said in that dreadful book of hers, the pressure had been mounting on Dumbledore for some time before he actually did go and duel Grindelward...
"I think it was saying how Dumbledore should go and do something about Grindelward, step up and actually take a stand, you know," she tried to sound a little uncertain, as though it were a memory, rather than uncertain because it was a very blind stab in the dark.
Tom smirked. "Very well, I'll leave you to get some rest."
This left Hermione feeling quite perplexed. Had she picked an appropriate headline? Even if it was a couple of months late, it'd still be believable...ish. She'd just come across as some brain dead dolt who never looked at the papers and had no grasp on current affairs whatsoever.
As she settled herself back into her pillows she had one question:
What in the name of Merlin had Voldemort been playing at when he sent her back to his own time?