A/N - Everybody hated the last chapter but it did happen for a reason. Also just noticed there was an issue with her clothing randomly appearing but since everyone hated the chapter regardless I'll leave it as it is.

4.1

I came to a sort of peace by the riverbank. While tempted to pull a Huckleberry Finn and float down the river on a raft I recognized that as being a very irresponsible idea. My emotions in this form were a touch harder to control but ultimately even back when I'd actually been thirteen I was a rational individual… mostly.

While I'd likely enjoy the meditative aspect of river rafting I was hardly well equipped for it. I knew a spell for producing clean, drinkable water, but food was out of my league. Not to mention I didn't have an inexhaustible supply of polyjuice potion and I wasn't sure how well I could swim in my half-arachnid body. And even if everything went perfectly I'd still have to walk on the way back and explain where I'd been if the journey took longer than twenty-six hours or so (roughly the maximum amount I could use the time-turner before it grew hot to the touch).

And so, after a few temporary magical alterations to my clothes to clean and adjust their size and another swallow of polyjuice I headed back through the portal. I shivered as the wind atop the tower hit me in force, forcing me to hurry inside. Even there it wasn't what most would call warm, the stone sucking away heat eagerly. It was almost enough to wish I had fur after all.

I meandered through the empty halls, not yet ready to return to the dorms but without much else to do. I'd long ago completed the reading for this year's courses as well as the next so the library was less than appealing. It was probably closed anyways. I wasn't sure exactly what time it was but Madam Pince tended to close the library early on Sunday nights despite that being the night most students actually wanted to use it.

Coincidence or my stomach drew me to the Great Hall. Dinner was long gone but the Goblet remained. A magical device that I'd heard was meant to choose the participants for a tournament. The winner was promised fame, glory, and 1000 galleons. It was a silly medieval thing that a bit of research while waiting for the potion to finish had revealed was the cause of a number of student deaths. This Triwizard tournament was supposed to be safer but considering the danger previous years at Hogwarts had brought me I had my doubts. Still…

It was a foolish idea. Childish fantasy really. Even so I found myself wondering what it would be like to win. The spending money would offer me plenty of new opportunities but I wasn't sure that was the most important prize. If I was to win, to show I was the strongest muggleborn witch - no, the strongest student of magic in three countries then they'd have to respect me.

My parents often said not to worry if other students didn't like me. That school was just a passing thing, that the real world was only a step away and success there would make up for all the travails of childhood. I had to disagree. Perhaps it was foolish to worry about the respect of inbred English wizards and witches in a backwoods school in Scotland but I was stuck here for four more years if I didn't find a way to graduate early. Four years of life wasn't nothing.

I approached the goblet warily, then more swiftly as I felt the fire warm my bones. There was a circle on the floor around it for some reason. There was a brief resistance as I stepped across it but it swiftly faded. A test of magical potential, perhaps? I shrugged and drew a slip of paper from the notepad in my pocket. Hermione Jean Granger, I wrote. With only a brief hesitation I tossed it into the goblet, fire searing upwards to claim it.

It felt good to do something proactive about my school life. I had fun exploring Arda and felt important during my quest to secure U.S. nukes from terrorist magic-users but for all my extra-curriculars I still spent a lot of time at Hogwarts. It made sense to try and make my experience here a little more liveable.

While the tournament offered a chance to change things if I was chosen to participate it didn't alter the state of things right now. I had no wish to greet my peers until the clamor about my transformation died down. My instincts about Arda were right, I felt. A little trip was just what the doctor ordered, but not by raft. Now that my hindquarters could fit on a broom again it was time to explore Arda much more thoroughly.

End Scene

A/N This is basically the end of the prologue. Some serious changes to canon from here on out (as if the consumption of the dwarves and Bilbo wasn't a clue).