At her parent's house, Hermione's summer quickly settled into a routine. She would wake up, go to breakfast and see her mum and dad off to work, and start working on getting her body battle-ready. Her six stint in the hospital wing was coming to bite her in the arse, as she was already a small, unathletic, bookish girl. Since she couldn't very well disappear all day, in case her parents dropped by or phoned, she had to limit herself to studying and exercising.
Her first order of business on her "first go-round" days was to find a solution to the whole Trace issue. The Trace was a spell placed on school-aged children to keep them from performing spells outside of Hogwarts; however, it had some pretty serious limitations.
First, the Trace only worked in areas without a high concentration of magic. If it recorded every time a spell was cast in Diagon Ally, it would be completely unreadable; this explained how she was able to cast so many spells in Diagon Ally (before her time traveling) including repairing Harry's glasses and lifting books off of high shelves. There was simply too much magic around for a general spell like the Trace to pick up one measly Leviosa in an environment constructed almost entirely of magic.
Second, the Trace only tracked what it considered "active" magic – that is, not day-to-day magic. Draco had been the one to tell her this, a year ago when they were reminiscing over happier times. Hermione could keep her wand lit with a Lumos for hours on end, if she cared to go through the trouble, but the spell was so light that it barely makes a mark on the Ministry's radar. It made a certain amount of sense. Light magic was generally of a weaker sort than darker magic, and it was generally easier for children to master. It was easy to consider it less of a threat, and simply keep it off the radar of the Ministry.
It wasn't limited to lighting your wand, however. Even more complex spells, such as a cleaning charm or warming charm, would be dismissed – the magical world simply couldn't imagine life without basic necessities like a warming charm (it helped that they thought the muggle world still functioned off of wood-burning stoves and candlelight).
All of this went out the window, of course, if a muggle was around. Specifically, a muggle who did not (officially) know about the existence of magic. So she could cast cleaning charms around or even on her parents, but it wouldn't trigger an owl from the ministry. If she did the same on her next door neighbor, however, she'd be getting both an owl and a visit from a Ministry Obliviator.
Hermione was quite willing to toe the line of what the Ministry considered "household" magic, but unfortunately household magics wouldn't cut it for defeating Voldemort. So Hermione had to make other plans. For now, she would ask Dobby to apparate her to a magically rich environment, where she could perform any spell without activating the Trace. Once her family left for France, the job became far easier.
Even with all Hermione's research, she wasn't able to find whether the Trace held overseas (and her inability irked her more than anything), but luckily, she was turning sixteen very soon. France's laws on underage magic were quite similar to Great Britain's, with the notable exception of age: Their underage magic laws ended at sixteen, meaning Hermione would be considered a magical adult (despite the fact that she wouldn't reach her magical majority until seventeen).
For now, however, she had to stick to household charms on her first go-round days. Her parents always arrived home to a clean house and supper on the stove, which she was only too happy to provide. She still felt mighty guilty for both obliviating them, and for bringing them back and painting shiny red targets on their backs.
Her first go-round days were filled with family fun and a surprising amount of relaxation – so, a ton of extracurricular reading – that balanced out the craziness of her second go-round days. For the first week, she was certain her second go-round self would be driven insane without the breaks inbetween.
The second go-round was where the magic really happened. She would turn the clock back at around 10 pm (the time she usually prepared for bed) in her closet, for a full 24 hours. She'd then catch some sleep, still in the closet, and wake up at seven.
Hermione on the second go-round had much more exciting days than research and exercise. The first day, she summoned Dobby to her at three-thirty, after her parents left to pick her up from the station (which was quite bizarre in and of itself). Dobby was extremely enthusiastic to help her, as she had actually employed him just that morning.
"Dobby, I want you to know something. And this is a secret, so no telling Harry or anyone." Dobby nodded emphatically.
"I will be keeping your secrets, Miss Hermione! I is your house elf, after all."
Hermione smiled gently. "Thank you, Dobby. That means a lot to me." Yet again, his eyes welled up, and she spoke quickly before he could cry. "I am using a time turner and doubling up on every single day this summer, so instead of three months, it will really be six. I'm technically only fifteen, so I'll need your help to move around and get some things done. I have a mission that I need to complete by the end of the summer."
She made herself pause for a moment, watching Dobby process all of that. He straightened proudly, and she continued, "I have some items that were made by He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. They're sorta like the diary from your old masters.
"This is a really important mission, and I'm glad I can trust you with it. We need to do this to keep You-Know-Who from coming back. Otherwise, Harry won't be safe."
"These items threaten Mister Harry Potter sir?" Dobby asked fearfully. "They is like the nasty book?"
"That's right. I need to retrieve them all, and I have to finish this summer. I've also got a few other projects. For now, can you transport me to Diagon Ally? I need to pick up some books."
Dobby had been only too happy to take her to Diagon, and she had been a little trigger happy in buying books, working through much of her pocket money. After the first week in real time, or two weeks Hermione-time, she had exhausted both her monetary resources, and places to go. There was simply no private place in the Wizarding World that Hermione could inhabit without arousing suspicion, and she couldn't be seen that often without people starting to question her.
Not to mention, her closet was getting quite cramped. She needed a safe house, somewhere to sleep on her second go-rounds, somewhere she could leave her more edgy textbooks, and somewhere for Dobby to live instead of going back to Hogwarts every night. All in all, her safe house had to be in a magically concentrated area, or she would be limited to household spells. In typical Hermione fashion, she started furiously making a plan.
AN: The review by 00 made me laugh. I'll definitely be writing more! Thanks for all the positive feedback on my story.