Tom Riddle's diary—in Chamber of Secrets Chapter 13, we know it's Riddle's diary because it has "T M Riddle" written on the first page. In the film, we know the diary is Riddle's because the book has "TOM MARVOLO RIDDLE" stamped in gold on the front cover. In this chapter and later chapters, I use the film-version of the diary.

Chapter 4
H&H Meet the Grangers and Ragnok

Tuesday, 23rd July 1991, early morning
Crawley, West Sussex, England

Hermione was about to ring the front doorbell of what clearly was her former home. Harry gasped and said, "Hermione, stop!"

"What's wrong?"

"These are the clothes we died in! We need to clean ourselves up, at the least. And maybe transfigure our clothes to something nicer?"

Hermione moved to where she was standing two feet in front of the door, facing Harry and with her back to the door. Harry and Hermione each drew their wand, Scourgify-cleaned each other's clothes, then transfigured each other's clothes to go-to-church clothes.

After both teens restowed their wands, Hermione walked back to the doorbell. This time she pressed the button, released it, pressed it again, released it, and pressed it again.

A full minute later, Harry heard a man's voice say from the other side of the door, "Hermione, stay back. Let me handle this."

A man in his late thirties or early forties opened the door. Harry saw that the man had curly, chocolate-brown hair with a receding hairline, and he was wearing a bathrobe. He had his right hand on the doorknob and his left hand behind his back.

Beyond the man, Harry saw a well-remembered eleven-year-old girl with bushy, chestnut-brown hair. The girl's face burnt with curiosity.

Before the man could speak, older Hermione spoke: "Hello, Dad, I'm your daughter Hermione Jean, nearly seven years older. May my companion Harry Potter and I come in and tell you, Mum and my young self about things that Professor McGonagall didn't tell you, ten months ago?"

Harry expected the man to need convincing. Instead, he peered at older Hermione's face, then said in a strange voice, "Nobody except my daughter has hair like that, so you must be her. Come in."


Harry and older Hermione got parked on the sofa whilst the Granger parents went through their routine to get ready for work. Dan Granger ordered young Hermione to stay away from the older teens till breakfast—not because he was worried about the girl's safety, but so she would not question-bomb their strange visitors.

According to older Hermione, this morning the parental Grangers took less time than normal at their morning routine; still, it took forty-five minutes before the adult Grangers, now with damp hair and wearing dental whites, were sitting at the dining-room table with the makings for breakfast. Young Hermione—who also was sitting at the dining-room table, along with the teens—was shaking with curiosity.

Young Hermione, when she finally had the opportunity, questioned-bombed everyone: "Dad, how did you know she was me from the future? Are you two from the future? Are you really Harry Potter? How did you two come back to 1991? Why did you two come back to 1991?"

Harry grinned at older Hermione. "You don't question-bomb me anymore. Hearing her do it, it's cute."

Dan Granger said, "I'll answer the easy question, princess: Nobody I know has hair like yours. Even when we go to gatherings of my family or Emma's family, nobody has hair like yours. But she does. Q.E.D, she's you."

Older Hermione smiled at her father, then said to her younger self, "Your hair is so wild because you're magical. By now you've noticed that whenever you're worried, or afraid, or angry, your hair gets bushier, right?"

Young Hermione nodded, her eyes wide with surprise.

"Notice in the future: When nonmagical people get emotional, it doesn't affect their hair."

Young Hermione turned to Harry. "You're Harry Potter? The Harry Potter? There are write-ups about you in—"

Older Hermione interrupted: "—Modern Magical History and The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts and—erm, one more—Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century."

Dan Granger laughed, then said to older Hermione, "You've convinced me again, you're our Hermione."

Harry looked at the three 1991-version Grangers and said, "Why are we here? A nasty magical Hitler will rise soon, and Hermione and I will use our knowledge of the future to stop him. Also, my younger self is being abused, and my Hermione and I plan to rescue him. In the timeline that my Hermione and I lived through, when young me goes to Hogwarts, his life will stay bad, but in a different way from home. Since young Hermione will get sucked into all that crap—"

"Language, Harry."

"—when she becomes friends with young me, my Hermione and I will be working to also keep young Hermione safe."

Dan Granger looked at older Hermione and asked, "What 'crap' did you go through during your Hogwarts years?"

"Hoo boy," said Harry. "How much time do we have? How long before you two leave for work?"

Emma Granger glanced at the clock. "It's 7:25 now; we leave for work at 8:30."

Harry and older Hermione shared a look. Then older Hermione said, "Two months after Harry and I started our first year at Hogwarts, a troll was brought into the castle."

"A mountain troll," Harry clarified. "They're twelve feet tall, and stupid. The good news is, Hermione and I surviving the troll together was what started our friendship."

Hearing this, young Hermione beamed a megawatt smile.

Dan Granger asked, "Older Hermione, before we hear more stories, how is it that your upper central incisors have no macrodontia like our daughter's?"

It was Harry who answered. "Magic," he said, with a cheeky grin.

Older Hermione slapped his arm. "Prat."

Younger Hermione now was grinning like she had just been handed a sack of gold.

Emma said to older Hermione, "Would you do magic for us, please? Professor McGonagall warned us that it'll be years before our Hermione can do magic away from school."

Older Hermione looked at her younger self and asked, "You bought your wand last September, correct?"

When younger Hermione nodded, older Hermione looked at her mother apologetically. "Before a magical child gets their wand, any magic that they do is considered 'accidental magic' and is forgiven. But after they get their wand, if they do magic at home, the Improper Use of Magic Office will send them a letter, or the Ministry will send out magical police to investigate. I really don't want my young self to get a letter for something I did, nor do I want magical police coming here and finding an older Hermione Granger here and an older Harry Potter here."

Seeing the Grangers' disappointment, Harry said, "Why don't we do magic tonight, after my Hermione and I assume our new identities?"

Older Hermione said, "In the meantime, my parents want to know about my Hogwarts years. Nine days after the incident with the troll, Harry played his first Quidditch game. Think three-dimensional polo, played on flying brooms. When an evil teacher tried to make Harry fall off his broom and die, your sweet, rule-abiding daughter..."


An hour later, at 8:25 a.m
After Harry and older Hermione tell their stories

Dan Granger groaned. "What can we do? Hogwarts sounds awful, and we've already paid Hermione's Hogwarts fees for the year."

Harry said, "Let's discuss that tonight, when you aren't under time-pressure."

Older Hermione said, "Remember that when we come back here tonight, we'll be in our permanent disguises. I don't know what we'll look like, except that we'll look different than now."

Then older Hermione said to young Hermione, "When an eighteen-year-old woman comes to your door tonight and she claims she's you, be ready with a question that she can answer but nobody else can."

Harry said, "Something either quite swotty or quite embarrassing. Oh, young Hermione, one more thing—"

"Yes?" the bushy-haired girl said.

Harry was grinning again. "When my Hermione and I come back here tonight, do you think you could draw up a list of questions for us?"

Older Hermione smacked his arm again. "Harry James Potter, if you were organised and methodical like she and I are, your life would've had much less frightening drama in it."

Harry smiled at the young girl. "Too true."

Happy young Hermione smiled back.


Five minutes later, elsewhere in Crawley

As Dan was driving himself and Emma to Granger & Granger Dental, Emma said, "Those two told us things that have me so worried, but one thing makes me happy."

"Oh?" Dan said. "What's that?"

"Did you notice how comfortable those two are with each other? We've hoped Hermione will make friends when she goes to Hogwarts, and seven years later, she has a relationship with Harry Potter that is better than that of many married couples we know."

"Just so they don't act like a married couple in other ways," Dan grumped.


Meanwhile, in the lobby of Gringotts

Harry was wearing a conjured hat that covered his fading scar. No wizards were paying attention to Harry or to Hermione, mainly because the bank had few customers this time of day.

The wait was short before Harry and Hermione were at the head of the queue for their teller.

Harry said to the goblin, "Teller, I will s-l-o-w-l-y draw both my wands and pass them to you. You'll understand why in a minute."

Harry moved as slowly as if he were practising a martial-arts kata, first to draw his holly-and-phoenix-feather wand from his left-forearm wand holster, and to lay the wand on the counter; then to draw his backup wand from his other wand holster, then to lay this wand on the counter too.

The reason that Harry was moving so slowly was that if either the teller or the goblin guards decided that Harry was drawing a wand threateningly, Harry would be dead within seconds!

When Harry had disarmed himself, he said to the teller, "I don't have a key to present. I know your procedure is to give me a blood test to determine my identity. I'm warning you now, when you see my name, you'll think I'm trying to trick you, which is why I surrendered my wands ahead of time."

The teller stabbed Harry's ring-finger with a dagger, dripped three drops of Harry's blood onto a parchment, then magically cleaned the dagger and healed Harry's finger.

Harry saw that, upside down, blood-red letters formed on the parchment. When the teller read the parchment, he looked at Harry in shock—

"Have you drunk a combination of Polyjuice Potion and Aging Potion, wizard? No way are you H—"

"Ssh! Don't say the name aloud!" Harry snapped. "But yes, that's me."

"How?" the teller demanded.

"I won't say how. Not out here, which is too public. But to Director Ragnok I will explain how I look like I do. Please pass my wands to him and tell him that a certain wizard"—Harry pointed to the blood-red name on the parchment—"age seventeen, wishes to speak with him."


Fourteen minutes later

Harry had been told that goblins hated time-wasting chit-chat. So as soon as Harry and Hermione were in Ragnok's office and the door was shut, Harry said, "Director Ragnok, I'm Harry James Potter, and this is my soulmate, Hermione Jean Granger. We're from the future—May 1998. This is when we died and this is when we met Thanatos, but obviously we're alive now. But our eleven-year-old selves are alive too. Thanatos has sent us back in time to fix the next seven years."

Ragnok was decisive, or he never would have achieved the position of Director. He was silent for only ten seconds before he asked, "What proof, besides what the enchanted parchment shows, can you give me to show that you're from the future?"

Harry said, "How's this? I predict that sometime on 31st July, eight days from now, a wizard named Quirinus Quirrell will try to break into Vault 713 to steal what's there."

Ragnok growled.

Harry added, "You should know that Quirrell is possessed by the wraith of Lord Voldemort—whose real name is Tom Marvolo Riddle." Harry spelled the name.

"How is Voldemort—or Riddle—not dead?"

Harry answered, "Because he made horcruxes." Ragnok snarled. Harry continued, "What is in young Harry's lightning-bolt scar is an accidental horcrux. A quite deliberate horcrux is the Cup of Helga Hufflepuff, which is stored in Bellatrix Lestrange's vault. Another horcrux, the diary that is stamped 'Tom Marvolo Riddle,' is stored either in Malfoy Manor or here in a Malfoy vault."

"He made three horcruxes?"

"Actually, he made six horcruxes, though he knows about only five. In 1994, he'll make a seventh—except that Hermione and I are here to prevent this."

Ragnok then held up his hand, to mean Hold that thought. He yelled something in Goblinspeak; a minute later, four unarmed older goblins had run into the office and had bowed.

Ragnok said in Goblinspeak, something about Lestrange Bellatrix and Hufflepuff Helga. Two of the older goblins bowed, then backed away towards the door. Ragnok spoke again in Goblinspeak, something about Riddle Tom Marvolo and Malfoy Lucius; the other two older goblins bowed, then backed away towards the door.

Ragnok returned his attention to Harry and Hermione. "So why are you two here? To kill Voldemort for good?"

Harry replied, "That's part of it. But also to rescue my young self. Dumbledore declared himself my magical guardian, whilst my mother's magic-hating sister and her angry husband were my Muggle guardians—and between Dumbledore and the Dursleys, my life was nonstop abuse and misery. My other plan, besides dealing with Voldemort, is to become my young self's magical guardian, at least till Sirius Black is freed."

Harry paused to explain how what "everybody knows" about Sirius Black was not true; and in fact, Sirius Black was innocent of all the crimes for which he was imprisoned without a trial.

Ragnok then asked, "What do you want from Gringotts?"

Hermione replied, "Thanatos put an Eternity spell on both of us; it activates when we each speak a certain phrase. The spell will change our appearance, our accent, our Hufflepuff Magical Signature Texts"—magical signatures—"and invent a new heritage for each of us. We want you to witness our change. Then we want you to send us to Gringotts New York for them to marry us."

Harry said, "Though Thanatos told us that since we're soulmates, all we need to do is to kiss and we'll become magically married."

Hermione said, "But whilst we're in Gringotts New York, we need magical passports with our new names and identities."

Harry scowled. "One more thing: Thanatos told me that Bronzedagger, the Potter Account Manager, was helping Dumbledore steal from me. Whilst Hermione and I are in New York, I ask that you rebuke Bronzedagger. But when you replace him, please make sure Dumbledore doesn't find out."

Ragnok snarled, "On my honour, I shall indeed 'rebuke' Bronzedagger. I predict that soon Bronzedagger will suffer a severe neckache. As will any other Gringotts employee who shares Gringotts galleons or Gringotts secrets with that bearded fool."

Then Ragnok asked, "Is there anything else you need from Gringotts today?"

Harry replied, "I'm going to tell you young Harry's street address, since Dumbledore put an owl-mail redirect on him. Right now, only four magical people know young Harry's address—one of whom is time-traveller me. But this isn't the problem it sounds like, because by tomorrow hopefully, young Harry will be gone from the bloody fucking Dursleys forever."

Harry expected Hermione to chastise him for his language. Instead, she hugged him.

"Anyway, young Harry James Potter lives at Number 4, Privet Drive, P-R-I-V-E-T, Little Whinging township, W-H-I-N-G-I-N-G, Surrey, England."

"Got it," Ragnok replied.


Again Ragnok yelled something in Goblinspeak; two unarmed young goblins ran in. Ragnok spoke more Goblinspeak then; Harry could make out the words Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey and Bronzedagger. Less than a minute later, the two young goblins ran back in. One of them handed a parchment to Ragnok, the two goblins bowed to Ragnok, then both goblins backed out of the room.

Ragnok said to Harry and Hermione, "Since November 1981, Dumbledore has been removing two hundred galleons a month from your trust vault, vault 687, converting the galleons to one thousand British pounds, and Gringotts has been paying that money to 'Vernon G. Dursley.' How the money was sent was by using the Nation's 'money-banish' spell, for which Vault 687 was charged two galleons each time. The ledger notes include the Nation-format map coordinates where the Muggle money was sent to—those map coordinates work out to be the street address you gave me."

Harry snapped, "What? Uncle Vernon has been receiving a thousand pounds a month for my care, from the beginning? In the ten years of '81 to '91, I doubt he spent a hundred pounds total on me, other than for food, and damned little of that!"

Hermione nodded. "Every September, Harry came to Hogwarts thinner than when he left, and his clothes were always oversize and worn out."

As Hermione rubbed Harry's back to soothe him, Ragnok's smile showed all his piranha-like teeth. "How would you like Gringotts to deal with Vernon Dursley?"

"After I've removed young Harry from Privet Drive, I ask you to rebuke the Dursleys—all three of them."

Harry looked at Hermione and said, "Acting like 'Mr Nice Bloke' achieved nothing in my life but getting me played for a fool by everyone—even Gerhardus. It sounds cruel, and maybe you'll lose respect for me, Hermione, but each of those people nearly killed me at least once, so it's not like they would be too harshly punished. Besides, if the Dursleys are dead, Dumbledore can't send young Harry back to them."

Hermione said, "I don't disrespect you, Harry. I love you." She kissed him on the cheek.


There was a knock on the door then; Ragnok commanded, "Enter!"

Two of the older goblins were back; one of them was holding a lead box. At Ragnok's command, that goblin put the lead box on a corner of Ragnok's desk, whilst the other goblin gave a report. Harry heard that goblin say Lestrange Bellatrix twice.

Then Ragnok spoke to those two older goblins. Whatever he said to them was favourable, because both older goblins stood straight, before bowing deeply.

Harry murmured to Hermione, "Should we tell Ragnok that how we got the Cup in 1998 was by breaking into Gringotts, and we stole a dragon to make our escape?"

Hermione murmured back, "If we tell him at all, I suggest we tell him in 1998."


After the two older goblins left, Hermione asked Harry, "Whilst we wait for the other two goblins to find the diary, is there anything left to do, before we change ourselves in front of Director Ragnok?"

Harry looked at Ragnok. "Thanks to Dumbledore keeping me so completely ignorant, I never knew that Potter Manor could be repaired, and I certainly never knew that Potter Manor had house-elves. May I call those house-elves here and let them meet me, now when I still look like Harry Potter?"

"You may," Ragnok said.

Harry said, "I, Harry James Potter, last of the Potter line, do call to me the house-elves bound to the Potter family and who care for Potter Manor."

Pop-p-p-pop. Four house-elves appeared—then nearly collapsed on Ragnok's stone floor. When the four house-elves looked at Harry, their faces showed both joy and confusion.

Harry tried to end the confusion: "I'm Harry James Potter, son of James and Lily Potter. Hermione Granger is my soulmate; she and I died nearly seven years in the future and were sent back in time to now. This is why your magic is telling you that Harry Potter is in front of you but also ten-year-old Harry Potter lives in Surrey."

One of the female elves asked Harry, "Do you plan to marry Miss Hermy-ninny soon?"

Harry grinned. "I plan to marry her later today, in fact. But when we marry, we'll look different and we'll have different names."

The house-elves looked confused.

Hermione explained to them, "We're time-travellers, and we can't have anyone besides my parents, young Harry, Ragnok and you lot knowing that 1991 now has two Harry Potters and two Hermione Grangers."

Harry asked the house-elves, "Is there anything you need that only I can give you?"

"Magic," replied Greyclay, the head Potter house-elf. "We's all four be's magically weak. Can you help we's, Last Potter?"

Harry placed two hands on the head of each house-elf in turn, then injected magic into that elf. Because Harry's magical bindings had all been removed and Harry was a magical adult, he had magic enough for this task, with plenty left over.


The other two goblins whom Ragnok had sent off, returned. They looked nervous as they gave their report in Goblinspeak.

Ragnok asked the two goblins several questions, before dismissing them. After the two goblins bowed themselves out the door, Ragnok told Harry and Hermione, "The diary-horcrux is not in any Malfoy vault. I stake my honour on this."

Hermione put her hand on Harry's arm. "We're still one for two."

Harry sighed. "Looks like we wait till August '92 to grab the diary."

Then Harry looked at Hermione and at Ragnok, and asked, "Does anything else need to be done before we change?"

Hermione shook her head. Ragnok said "No." The four house-elves remained silent.

Harry said, "The name is Potter, John Potter."

Hermione said, "I become Paulina Priscilla Moffitt."

Light flashed in Ragnok's office, and a brunette human-woman angel, with white robes and big white wings, appeared.

"Hello, Antonia," Harry and Hermione greeted in unison.