Part One: Summer
Chapter One
If anyone asked Hermione Granger how she would be spending her summer, she would have told them that she was spending it with her parents on vacation in France. While this was still partially true, it was no longer all true. She would never be able to tell anyone the whole truth, because half of it was illegal, and the other half was, quite frankly, unbelievable. Well, except for Harry and Ron, of course. She wouldn't keep anything from them.
The nondescript sandy-haired man accompanying her looked around the living room of the house they had just walked into, dumped his bags at the feet of the couch, and sprawled all over the forest green cushions, one foot propped up on the arm rest. "Not bad, not bad at all," a Polyjuiced Sirius Black drawled in a surprisingly mellow tenor, giving a little wiggle to settle deeper. "In fact, I dare say I could spend most of my time on this couch, exactly. Like. This."
Hermione gave the man a look of surprise. "Aren't you going to put away your things?" she asked the fugitive. It was the very first thing that she was going to do.
"Not at the moment, no," Sirius replied, idly swinging a leg.
She shifted on her feet, feeling out of place. It was reminiscent of how she felt living with Lavender and Parvati: they were all stuck living together although they didn't have much in common. This was certainly a different but arguably harder situation, but she owed it to him to at least try and reach out. "What about a tour of the rest of the house? I'm going to go look around."
He waved a hand indolently. "Have at it, kitten. I've already taken a look around."
She frowned at the nickname, knowing he said it just to get a reaction out of her. The first time he'd called her that, when Dumbledore brought the two of them together only a week earlier, she'd scowled at him. Delighting in her reaction, he now gleefully added it on whenever he thought to.
Pushing past that, she tried one more time. "Would you like to come with me?" She so terribly wanted to start this off on the right foot. Summer would be miserable if they didn't get along, even though they wouldn't really be spending all that much time together as they focused on their own tasks.
He turned his head to look at her, Quickfoot's disconcerting cornflower blue eyes meeting hers, and she had a moment of pure confusion watching someone she didn't know wear the expressions of someone she did know. Polyjuice could go rot, for all she was concerned. It tasted awful, it didn't last very long—only up to twelve hours depending on the strength of the potion—and it took rather a long time to make. However, Sirius hadn't had much choice: if he wanted to pursue Peter Pettigrew across the world and do it with the help of Albus Dumbledore and the attendant power, he had to pass as a law abiding, responsible citizen. And she, little third year Hermione Granger, was critical to that plan.
She nearly laughed at the thought.
"I think I'll stay here and break this couch in for you and make it more comfortable for when you come home for the day. Takes a fair amount of work to do that, you know." He adopted a long-suffering look. "But I'll do anything for you, my dearest, darlingest poppet. After all, I am your guardian."
"More like I'm your gatekeeper," she shot back, folding her arms. "I know you're not exactly keen on the idea of being responsible for me, but I can assure you I'm perfectly sufficient on my own in everything but name. I've got quite a lot of experience at it. You won't need to do a thing. I'll go to my apprenticeship and keep you in supply of Polyjuice, and you can do…whatever it is you'll do." She was still rather sparse on those details.
Sirius blinked at her, threw a hand over his eyes, and crossed his boots on a throw pillow. "Sounds good to me. I've got a lot of planning to do, so I'll get to it." Then, to all appearances, he went to sleep. How that qualified as planning, she wasn't sure.
Mentally, she shrugged at the entire exchange. If he didn't want to cooperate, that was on him. She could try again later.
Curiosity abounding, she made her way through the nearest door. It opened into a small but perfectly serviceable kitchen with all the appliances and a small table for two nestled against a large window that looked out into a nicely sized garden in full bloom. Briefly, she shot a silent thank you to Molly Weasley for mentioning A Housewitch's Guide to Cooking last summer when they'd all gone to Flourish and Blott's together. Otherwise, she'd be completely adrift when trying to use the wizarding equivalent of kitchen appliances.
She exited the kitchen, letting the door bang closed—Sirius didn't stir one bit from the couch—and passed through the living room again to continue her exploration. The rest of the lower floor was much like a typical middle class British house, really, with a small sitting room and library, a small closet right off the main door, and a staircase upstairs.
Quickly she peeked into the bedrooms, of which there were three. She was tempted to take the master bedroom to spite Sirius, but the third bedroom, the coziest of them all, was tastefully decorated in creams and soft greens. Its main selling point, however, was that it overlooked the garden, which was riotously and joyfully in bloom. Satisfied, she enlarged her trunk and placed it at the foot of the bed after she opened the windows, letting the fragrant perfume of flowers in bloom waft in.
Taking a deep breath, she smiled and closed her eyes for a long moment, almost feeling her body relax. It was hard to believe she was here, spending the summer in Bulgaria. Although it was simultaneously nerve-wracking and unbelievably exciting, she knew she could face whatever came her way. If she could survive the last year, she could survive anything.
Her eyes flicked to her trunk, and she could almost feel the presence of the Time-Turner locked away in a secret compartment, the golden necklace beckoning her, enticing her. She swallowed hard and made to move towards the chest when the sound of the window's shutters suddenly hitting the outside of the house brought her back to the present, snapping the lure of the Time-Turner.
Hermione shook her head hard, dispelling the phantom sensation of the golden chain slithering against her skin. Enough of that. She had a lot to do before she met Healer Lazarov, like revising all her notes for the past three years in the Transfiguration, Potions, DADA, Herbology, and Charms, the five main disciplines required to become a healer. Add that to her other notes, the notes about everything she had read about that she shouldn't know (according to the curriculum) but did anyways, and she had hours of work to do. Days, really, but she had hardly had time to prepare her things to get here in time.
The ever-present stress headache and feeling of perpetual exhaustion she'd felt all year began to creep up in her temples again. She sighed, a bit overwhelmed at the thought of all that work. But if there was one thing Hermione Granger didn't do, it was shirk from work.
She cast a quick tempus to check the time, glad that Dumbledore had talked to the Ministry to temporarily lift her wand restrictions since it made her life much easier. It was half three. Surely she had enough time for a quick nap. It would help her refresh herself after a day of bureaucratic red tape, paperwork, and traveling, she reasoned, feeling the bed beckoning. Yes, a nap sounded very good to her tired body indeed.
The heat wasn't unbearable, so she left the windows open and laid on the bed. It was surprisingly comfortable, not needing a cushioning charm, and she sunk into it with a sigh, eyes closing. The sound of leaves rustling and the soft summer air against her skin quickly lulled her into a light doze. She drifted off easily, glad for the quiet respite after a year's worth of frantic movement trying to keep up with everything. She had been so tired for so long that she'd almost forgotten what it was like to slow down and steal a moment for herself, and it would only be for a moment. As soon as she woke up from her nap, she would unpack.
The stale taste of sleep in her mouth was the first thing she noticed as she opened her eyes blearily, quickly followed by the pale morning light streaming through the still-open windows. The indication of early morning snapped her out of her haze rather quickly, and a rapidly cast tempus revealed it was half six. She relaxed marginally, thankful she still had an hour and a half before being expected to be at the Vulture's training ground, and rubbed the sleep from her eyes. It wasn't quite as bad as it could be, but she hadn't had time to review her notes, or unpack, or even get food.
Her stomach rumbled in protest, but she barely spared a moment for thought, mind firing rapidly now that she wasn't so exhausted. Merlin, she must have slept for ages and ages, surely more than twelve hours, but she felt much more like herself now than she had yesterday. The grime of travel and the stale feeling of a hard sleep clung to her skin. Quickly, she fixed that by jumping in and out of the shower, casting a quick drying charm on her hair, and braiding it back away from her face and tying it off with a ribbon.
As she hurriedly made her way through her morning routine, she frantically mentally revised all her Transfigurations and Charms knowledge—although she was absolutely certain she had missed some—by the time she made it downstairs and into the kitchen. Thankfully, there was some food stocked, and she quickly toasted some bread and grabbed some fruit before heading to the fireplace. She swallowed the last bit of toast, stuck the apple in the pocket of the plain burgundy robe that had been supplied to her by the Vultures, and threw some floo powder at the hearth. The flames turned green, and she took a deep breath, quelling her nerves and the rising excitement rising inside her.
This was it. Her first day as an apprentice to Krasmira Lazarov, one of the world's most premier Healers…and the primary Healer to the Bulgarian National Team.
She bit her lip, squared her shoulders, and clearly stated, "Vratsa Vulture's main entrance!" before stepping through.