Diagon Alley.
Hermione couldn't help but to compare the vision of the Alley before her to how she remembered it to be in the past. This lively, people packed street was clearly only beginning to feel the effects of Voldemort around it. People were laughing, trailing in and out of shops with various bags and magical products. There were boys crowding around the window of Quality Quidditch supplies where they were advertising new beater bats and extra strength grip dragonhide gloves. An owl flew overhead no doubt carrying a parcel of some kind. A series of snaps went off in the distance followed by a hearty laugh as a miniature firework burst into a vibrant magical lightshow, changing it's shape to reflect the wide-eyed onlooker of a young muggle girl. Her parents, nearly as astounded as she was, were pulled into the prank shop who was the culprit for the wonderful explosive display.
It was entirely different from the haunting, empty street she remembered. A Diagon Alley where most of the storefronts were boarded up or burned down, or run by blood supremacist's favored by Voldemort's regime. The memory of beggars in shabby clothes, kneeling and crying for anything that could help was the last thing that came to mind before she willed the memory away.
An arm nudged her, so Hermione turned to her counterpart for the small shopping trip today. Remus. He smiled hesitantly at her, amber eyes almost a brown hue with the sun shining dazzling behind him. "I appreciate you coming with me today, Hermione. I thought it would be good to get to know my new cousin a bit and, well, sometimes it's nice to not have to take these shopping trips alone."
Hermione smiled back reassuringly to him and followed his lead as they walked down the Alley to stand in front of Ollivander's.
"I thought we might start here," Remus said, opening the door for her and waving her inside. "I know if I were you, I'd feel nearly naked without my wand." He winced at his awkward phrasing. Hermione conceded gently to his statement. Over the last week that she'd been conscious and with the Lupins, it had certainly felt odd to not be capable of wielding magic. That voice within her writhed contemptuously whenever she thought about it. Even though she grew up for years without knowing the power she was capable of, the fact that she'd had to live as a muggle was something she was not content with.
He stopped her quick to whisper, "As a general warning, Ollivander is strange though he is an expert in wand-making. He's the only wandsmith in Britain. He'll set you right, and I'll be here in case you need me."
The bell rang as the door shut behind them and Remus's nose crinkled as he breathed in the musty scent of the store before sneezing. Hermione trailed a finger across one of the boxes holding the wands, leaving a clean line through the dust in her wake. Footsteps sounded that grew closer before Ollivander himself appeared with a contemplative eye. He focused solely on Hermione. She fidgeted a bit, feeling uncomfortable at the thorough observation.
"I have not seen you here before, yet, have I? There's something strange about you girl," Ollivander's words pointed and his eyes narrowed as they studied her.
"Erm," Remus fake coughed to gather Ollivander's attention, and Ollivander's eyes instead trained on Remus. "This is my cousin, Hermione. I thought I'd give her a tour of the Alley today as the only thing we're in need of is a wand for her."
Ollivander peered closely at the two of them, "Cousins, eh?"
Remus tugged Hermione under his arm in a half hug, his lanky form towering her by a good thirty centimeters at least. It was uncomfortable to have contact and Hermione fought the urge to squirm out of his grasp. She knew that while Remus had no reason to doubt their relation, that she still needed to play her part by acting as the convincing party. She tried to grasp at the Gryffindor courage she knew she had, and yet the courage evaded her. Regardless of the fact that she'd been well on her way to healing the majority of her wounds, the traumas of her past were harder to escape and she found she didn't have the energy to utter a single word to further explain her fictitious history.
She resolved to allow others to come to their own conclusions about her from that moment forward. She also decided when she opened her mouth and closed it, blushing furiously in embarrassment, that she would need to become comfortable with speaking to others again. Ollivander waited a moment longer, looking at the two of them, before continuing.
"We'll see if there's something to suit her here then," Ollivander replied as he disappeaed behind a row of stacked boxes, and there was the sound of him rifling through things that reached her ears. Remus when she glanced over at him again seemed just as off-put as she was by Ollivander's pointed statements. Ollivander would always be an weird man, somehow insightful to a fault, and the deja vu of having a similar experience what she was eleven was reassuring.
He returned before Hermione's thoughts could find more comparison's between this present and her past, and set a few different boxes down in front of her. Ollivander's hazy eyes watched her expectantly as he pushed the first of those boxes forward and waited in anticipation.
She felt the presence of the other soul within her rise up for a moment, and though she didn't know it there was a brief second where a glint of red peeked through her eyes to see what choices she had. A suspense filled her that she was uncertain was her entirely own. Hermione reached for the box on the right, her dominant hand picking it up and opening it to pull out the wand within.
It was silvery-grey and unyielding, shorter than the wand she'd owned previously. "White cedar from a coniferous tree in the Americas, firm and known to be excellent at repelling certain dark creatures like acromantulas. Nine and a half inches with a jobberknoll feather core. I was doing a bit of traveling at the time that this was made, and wouldn't have considered using a jobberknoll feather at all had the creature not offered me a feather of it's own volition before screaming it's last."
"I've heard of Jobberknolls," Remus hummed, brows furrowed. "The only noise they'll ever make happens a moment before they die, right?"
Ollivander nodded, "That's right, it's eerie in a way. It consists of every sound they'd ever heard repeated backward and can sometimes go on for weeks before it collapses. I thought it may resonate with you when I saw it in my inventory, Hermione. Give it a swirl."
Hermione did as instructed and an unearthly scream emitted from the wand as it ejected itself from her hands. It fell with a clatter to the ground. Remus had clapped his hands over his sensitive ears until the sound died out.
"Not that one, clearly. Strange, I was so certain it'd be the pick on the first go. There's more to you than meets the eye girl, eh?" Ollivander probed, and Hermione shrugged self-consciously. The wand's reaction to her was jarring and set her on edge.
"Oh well then, try the next," Ollivander motioned as he picked up the fallen wand and put it in the box.
Hermione opened the next wand box then reached her hand to pick up the next wand with a wood so dark it was nearly black.
"Ah, yes. This particular wood was taken from a pine tree after a wildfire. It was one of the only remaining trees in the area that could still be revived, though not before cutting the terminal branches. The core is a bit unusual as well as it contains clippings from the horn of a Japanese oni. Careful with that one."
As her fingers touched it to pick it up, the wood became a heat intense enough that it was beginning to smoke and it started to whistle as if it were steaming. Hermione immediately dropped it as the box that held it caught ablaze. "Nope, no. No, no, no. You would not do this wand well." He waved his wand over the box and put out the flames, then placed the lid back on the wand box. Hermione shook off the sting she felt as her finger blistered. Ollivander tucked the box away, far out of reach.
There was a piece of Hermione that was thankful to avoid a wand so entrenched in a fire element. She'd had enough of fires after surviving the Room of Requirement.
"Hotheaded, that one. It's going to need a match who can temper it or else the passion behind it would be all-consuming. Not worth thinking more of for now," Ollivander stated.
"Probably best you didn't get that one anyway, Hermione," Remus advised. "Oni's are a powerfully violent demon. A wand like that is likelier to turn you into a dark witch or wizard than not."
"Don't get ahead of yourself, boy!" Ollivander reprimanded sternly. "They're known for violence, yes, but only when serving justice towards those they deem evil. When controlled by those with as strong a sense of justice, these cores are capable of considerable positive change."
"Perhaps, but if it's 'all-consuming' then couldn't someone end up committing any sort of dark magic if they believed it would stop 'evil'?" Remus argue, eyes flashing gold as the temper of his wolf came through. "There are lines you shouldn't cross-"
"That would be true if you believed all dark magic to be evil, which it is not. The world is not so black and white. The casting of any magic that renders it dark or light depends on the intent of the witch or wizard, and not on the spell itself." Remus opened his mouth angrily as if to persist when Ollivander continued on with a reproving sneer, "I'm not here to debate you on the matter- you can ask your professors more about it when you return in the coming year." He rounded on Hermione, effectively ending what would have led to an argument, and placed both palms faced down on the counter and leaned in. His eyes held hers intently for a moment, quirking his head to the side thoughtfully. "Regardless, something tells me your cousin here could have done with a wand such as this. Alas, it was not meant to be and so the search for the right wand continues."
Hermione understood his que and opened the second to last box. Shocked at the familiar vine wood wand below, she inhaled sharply and snapped the lid shut again. The words poured out of her mouth before she realized she was speaking. "Not this one," she quietly asserted. "That's meant for someone else."
Remus immediately straightened from where he was slouching against the walls, head twisting to make sure he heard her. They were the first words she'd muttered in his presence. Her voice was soft and devoid of the internal struggle she felt. Though her heart longed to once again hold the wand she'd lost from her time, she knew that this wasn't meant to be her wand. Not anymore. Not now. She couldn't take it away from the innocent version of herself that would be born in a few years time.
Ollivander took it in stride as Hermione slid the box over to him with the lid firmly placed on top, humming under his breath as moved it away with a critical eye. There was one box left. Hermione opened the lid to see a reddish wood that she couldn't recognize, whirls of grain whimsically turned in every which way in a golden hue, making the wand appear to glow when the light hit it at the right angle. The handle of the wand had a gentle curve that twisted into a point at the opposite end with a carving to imitate what Hermione recognized as a griffin's head lifting proudly at the butt of the handle. As she felt along the handle, not as easily seen in the design, felt the carvings of a lion's mane leading from the griffin's head and that transitioned into feathers before turning into the smooth curve up to the wand tip. This wand was one of the most meticulously crafted she'd seen before. She lifted the wand from the box.
"This was one of my newer acquisitions, having been flown in four years ago from an interested investor in Greece and it's one of the few wands in my position that I didn't craft myself," Ollivander sighed regretfully, the animosity with Remus forgotten. He pointed at the pattern of the wood. "Not much is known about it, I'm afraid, though the wood pattern here hints at a time when the trees were still forced from the nymphs without care for the poor things left behind to waste. The hunt for this wood nearly killed them off completely, which caused the ban of this particular wood use in wand-making and resulted in the nymphs withdrawing from nearly all contact with the magical community. You'd be hard pressed to meet a nymph who would admit to being one even today."
He gestured again towards the red and gold wand before comparing it to his own. "This wand wood also fell out in favor of those more easily attainable and workable such as my own or young Remus's wand here, as this wood was rumored to be notoriously arduous to craft with anyway even back when there were still those alive who knew the technique. Moreover this level of artistic detail is difficult to craft in any wand as so most wandsmiths choose to forgo it in favor of practicality and time, which makes it even rarer to show in a wand wood like this. I've not seen a wand quite like it, and would hazard to say I wouldn't be capable of this level of craft myself."
Hermione listened as she examined the wand closer. There was no outward reaction from it yet, though she sensed a curiosity from it that made her wonder if the wand itself wasn't sentient. Ollivander continued his explanation, "It's deceptively old as a result, it must be if it's nymph wood. Eleven inches, and incredibly flexible. I determined there are two cores in the making of this wand, but I could only recognize one."
"Griffin feathers," Hermione surmised faintly from its design.
Ollivander noddded, "Yes, precisely, so this wand is adept at sensing danger. You may even notice the wand acting of it's own devices in the right circumstance. Whatever the other core it's combined with indicates that it may amplify that effect."
"Do you have any idea what the other core might be? Is it claw, or hair, or tooth?" Remus chimed in from beside her. His presence was calming and grounding.
"It's of a scale of some kind, but not of a creature I've ever seen. I'd fathom to say it may not even be from a creature at all, likelier from a humanoid being such as a Veela or werewolf," Ollivander shook his head while Remus flinched at the indirect reference to his affliction. "It's powerful though, whatever it may be."
This is wand is suitable for our needs.
The voice resonated with Hermione as that red glint in her eyes flashed again and her hand tightened around the wand. With a swish of the wand, brilliant lights surrounded her in a cascade deep enough to encompass a galaxy. Hermione agreed as she closed her eyes and allowed the feeling of acceptance to flow through her. The wand chooses the witch, but there was a part of Hermione that knew they chose each other. The distant look Ollivander gave her as they paid and left his store was peculiar, his final words ringing in her ear.
"It appears as if you're in the right place at the right time then, Ms. Granger. I wish you luck in your future endeavors," he'd stated ominously. Hermione wondered if he didn't know more than he let on.
They didn't do much exploring around Diagon after that. They popped by Flourish and Blotts and browsed the books (each making a purchase after much perusing), then gazed at the magical animals through the window of the Magical Menagerie (thought Hermione denied searching for Crookshanks there specifically, knowing logically he couldn't have yet been born).They both skirted around Gringotts as neither of them wished to admit their meager means to one another, and finished their exploration of the Alley by grabbing a cone from Fortesque's.
Hermione had chosen a peppermint ice cream bowl with a dark chocolate syrup drizzled overtop. After Remus had chosen simply a dark chocolate ice cream cone, they took their purchases to a small booth in the corner and sat opposite each other. Both were content to quietly read the new books they'd purchased from Flourish as they ate their sweet snacks.
Some time had passed, both engrossed in their reading, when Remus sighed as he closed his book. "Chocolate cures the soul," he declared. His cone had long since been devoured and Hermione's empty bowl pushed to the side. It was a richness that Hermione had not been privy to for over a year since the hunt for the horcruxes had first begun.
"It does," Hermione agreed fondly. She closed her book as well, having found a humorous non-fiction book of a traveling wizard.
Remus looked relieved to have heard her speak again. Normally he was able to discern others needs from his own heightened senses, but Hermione had been difficult to read since his mother had introduced him. Remus wrote it off as her being a stranger whose behaviors he would need to take time to learn in addition to the scars that crossed her small frame. Something unspoken had happened to her in the past recently that caused Hermione to withdraw into herself. Those were the types of wounds that would only heal with time and support, Remus knew, and he vowed he would support her however she needed since she had no remaining family.
He could be her pack, and her continuing to speak with him was both encouraging as well as allowing them another bridge to become familiar with one another.
"I hope you don't hold it against me that we're waiting to shop for our school supplies," Remus regretfully said. "My best mates and I usually go with towards the end of August as an annual transition, so I thought we'd all go together then just with you added along with us."
Hermione smiled reassuringly at him, "Remus, it's okay. There's still plenty of time until the next semester. I'm pleased you wanted to go with me at all."
Remus's eyes crinkled as he smiled at her, "Of course! You're family now, you can trust in me and the boys. Once you meet them you'll see, they'll be your brothers for life."
"That sounds nice to have," Hermione reminisced, thinking of Harry and Ron. "I... I used to have friendships similar to that."
"What happened to them, if you don't mind my asking?" Remus gently probed.
Hermione sighed despondently and was quiet for a moment. She was glad Remus allowed her the time she needed to collect her thoughts. "I lost them recently," she told him quietly. "I lost everyone and I-" Hermione swallowed a harsh lump in her throat as she rolled up her sleeve, clenching her teeth. Remus inhaled sharply as the word appeared there on her forearm. Mudblood. She forced the words to come out of her mouth carefully, "I'm not ashamed of what I've been through, but I'm not quite ready to talk about it either. Is that alright?"
Remus nodded fiercely, accepting her need to change the topic from her with ease.
His face lit up in excitement as he instead went into a recollective deep dive of his best friend's adventures so far at Hogwarts. Remus's presence was reassuring and Hermione felt the walls she'd had in place start to crumble as she was engaged in conversation. Talking with Remus felt safe and comforting, and when he laughed freely at one of his memories she could feel herself laughing along. She couldn't quite meet his exuberance that he had, and yet it was the most normal she'd felt since coming to this time.
From there the two conversed about muggle literature and the books they were reading as well as which subjects they were excited to be enrolled in for the coming year. Remus would occasionally ask questions as would Hermione, but Hermione's answers were always more vague than Remus's. He tried his best to be respectful of her boundaries.
By the time they left the Alley for home, there was a tentative familial bond beginning to form. Hermione had known Remus in part already, so when he shared his more studious side with her she wasn't surprised by that characteristic. The youthful energy and liveliness that exuded from him was startling however. The years after Peter's betrayal wasn't kind to him without the Marauder's there to balance out his own self-loathing.
She debated mentally when she thought about the future. She couldn't return to her own future by any means. However, she did have the option to recreate the circumstances surrounding it- which meant letting every horror that had happened in her time happen again- or she could do the impossible thing and dare to change it. Hermione had been warned in her third year about those who've meddled with time. At that time, she had been able to rationalize and agree to the danger that time travel offered to those who actively attempted to change it. And yet now, she wondered if maybe some risks were worth taking.
Since coming to this time, Dumbledore had not attempted to contact her like she thought he may.
He was the only one who truly knew that the knowledge Hermione had was of the most supreme value. It could be used to turn the tide of the war with ease for either side if someone were to get ahold of the information she held. Even knowing that though, he'd sent Hermione off to the Lupins for the summer without any added precautions? He wanted to integrate her into wizarding society, actively communicating with the very people she'd be able to save and attending classes with the ghosts of the future, without questioning what impact her very existence in this time may have?
By talking with Remus here, eating ice cream, who knew what she already had changed? She played with the new wand, still foreign to her hands, and wondered if maybe this wand should have been meant for someone else? At that thought a jolt shot up the arm that held the wand, almost in protest and oddly encouraging.
Dumbledore must have considered all of this already and yet knowingly placed her with the Lupins, a family that had aligned itself to the light, to keep her under close watch.
Clearly, even in this time Dumbledore could be manipulative. She had no doubt that it was once he knew she felt she belonged here that he would attempt to guilt her into releasing everything regarding the next twenty years. And, seeing as to how he'd snooped when she was unconscious, she believed that if she wouldn't comply with what he wanted then he would force legilimancy upon her to see if he could find it himself.
The negatives to what would happen if she denied him were adding up.
To have Dumbledore backing her, however, would be nothing to scoff at. Hermione would be stuck in this time either way. Dumbledore was powerful and had the resources she would need to do what she needed to do even if Hermione wasn't quite certain of what that was yet. How much change could she be capable of making without the feared ramifications of wiping herself out of the future? Or of potentially destroying the universe itself?
"Hermione?"
She refocused on Remus, who had been trying to get her attention for the last few minutes. "Sorry Remus. I was lost in my thoughts for a moment, what were you saying?"
Remus smiled at her kindly. "You're okay. I was saying that we should head home soon. Mom will have started dinner, and she's been looking forward to playing a hand of rummy with us."
Dinner with Remus and Hope was different and welcome. Without Lyall there, the atmosphere around the kitchen table had completely changed and chatter flowed. Though the Lupins' small cottage couldn't afford the space needed for a formal dining room like purebloods may have, the kitchen was homely and warm. Hermione was terrible at rummy, and Remus was clever at finding ways to cheat. Mrs. Lupin would teasingly reprimand him, and Remus would have a cheeky response that would make everyone laugh.
Hermione could almost imagine herself with the Weasleys, or gathered around her own family.
Hope was shocked when Hermione perked up in her defense at one point, though thoughtfully didn't mention Hermione's shy demeanor previously. Slowly, Hermione spoke up more and more throughout their conversations as her guard fell around them.
No one expected it when Lyall threw open the front door in a rage and happened upon them, the laughter at the table dying out. His jacket was sticky with grime, and he let his suitcase clamor to the floor. He eyed his son with distaste, "Remus. You're home."
Remus awkwardly stood up from the table and fidgeted, not moving to greet his father. "Hi dad. Mom asked me to come meet Hermione. I'll uh... I'll be heading back soon to the Potters for the... um... thing." He glanced sideways at Hermione, his entire stance radiating his discomfort as his face burned in shame.
Lyall snorted in derision as he sneered at Remus and mockingly said, "If that's what you want to call your carelessness, then so be it. Far be it from me to explain to you the dangers of letting a bloodthirsty beast run rampant on a full moon when there's safer alternatives for everyone involved." Lyall picked up his wife's glass of firewhisky and threw it back before slamming the glass down on the table, where it toppled over the side. He roughly wiped his mouth, barely glancing at Hermione as he warned, "You'd do well to be careful with this creature, Hermione, though I expect he'll have left by morning. Won't you Remus?"
When Remus didn't respond, Lyall scoffed and turned to Hope. "The vampire coven wasn't where our informant believed them to be. I'll be corresponding with representatives from Peru to coordinate a portkey to Lima by the week's end," he gruffly explained. "But for now I'm going to retire for the evening. Please join me when you're done fooling around with our present company."
"Lyall!" Hope exclaimed with wide eyes. "That's no way to speak to Remus or Hermione-"
Lyall heatedly pointed at Remus, "Get him out of my house Hope, before I lock him up or do something you won't forgive me for." He spit at Remus in disgust and stormed from the room.
Hermione sat frozen from the scene in her chair. What was once a good mood, now obliterated. Remus's shoulders sagged in defeat. "I should go, mom. We shouldn't test him further." Mrs. Lupin protested as Remus threw on his jacket and kissed her cheek, the words doing little to still him as he moved towards the door. He looked sadly at Hermione and half-heartedly smiled, "It was great to meet you Hermione. We'll see each other soon, yeah?" And then he was gone.
Hope stood dejectedly in the doorway as she watched her son disaparate from the drive. She sniffed and wiped at her wet eyes. "I better go check on Lyall, then," Mrs. Lupin said with false cheer. "Are you alright to see yourself to bed, dear?"
When Hermione silently consented, Hope left the room and Hermione was alone.
