Chapter Two: The Hogwarts Express
With Ginny acting strange, Molly was reluctant to let her go. Ginny wasn't sure she wanted to leave either, but then again, she figured she'd never been the stay-and-wait-like-a-good-little girl type. So with many hugs and kisses for her parents, she boarded the train with all of her siblings and waved goodbye until the platform with her parents disappeared from view.
As the train gathered speed, Ginny realized that her family had already dispersed. Percy was off being Prefect somewhere; Arthur had helped him fix his badge before he got on the train. Fred and George had hooked up with Lee Jordan who apparently had a tarantula in a shoebox. Charlie was just gone, as was Bill. Ron had hustled into a car with Harry and the two of them were becoming fast friends already.
Ginny made her way down the halls. She spotted too many unfamiliar-familiar faces. There was Hermione Granger. She was already wearing her school robes. Her bushy brown hair was billowing around her head and her front teeth were oversized. She was prattling on and on about how she'd never known she was a witch until she got her acceptance letter. Both of her parents were dentists after all. She'd gotten all her books weeks ago and had done some light reading on the school.
Neville Longbottom was there too, weeping about how Trevor, his pet toad, was missing already. A few feet from him, talking to Katie Bell the blonde chaser for the Gryffindor house quidditch team, was Oliver Wood. He was less impressive in some ways now that she was older. He had a roguish charm to his grin and was making broomstick motions with his hand while animatedly telling Katie about a quidditch camp he'd attended over the summer. Ginny eavesdropped for a few minutes, then turned to find some answers elsewhere.
A few feet later the train lurched a bit and she stumbled to the side, nearly knocking a thin, pale faced boy down. "Watch it," the boy snapped, shoving her away from him.
Ginny took an offended step back. "Oi, Malfoy," she said, looking him up and down. "You're pint-sized." She didn't know why that bothered her so much. Malfoy had been a constant thorn in her side since she started at Hogwarts. He was a talented enough wizard, which had always made tangling with him a chore. Add to that his sharp, insult-ready tongue and well, it just wasn't right looking down at him.
"You must be a Weasley," he sneered, catching the sleeve of her robes where it was fraying. "More kids than money."
"You're like a little midget," Ginny repeated, still too stunned to be upset by his insult. She patted his head, noting that his hair really was gelled back. She's always suspected it, but had never worked up the nerve to touch the top of his head before. "Little midget Malfoy."
He flushed angrily, reaching for his wand.
"Do you even know any spells?" she asked. "Well, I guess you must know a few considering who your old man is, but honestly, you're so tiny."
She would have continued, but at that moment someone tall came up behind her, shadow blocking out the light. "Leave Draco alone, Weasley," a cool, cruel voice said.
Ginny turned slowly, resisting the urge to go for her wand. The speaker had Malfoy's pale face and pale blue eyes. He even had the blond hair, but instead of being slicked back it was straight out of a muggle conditioner commercial. It was long and silken, brushing the shoulders of black robes. The arrogant looking young man had a green and silver tie knotted immaculately at his throat and was wearing a ring with a family crest set with tiny emeralds.
"It's another Malfoy," Ginny managed to say. "A bigger one."
The bigger Malfoy had been a nightmare for her first years at Hogwarts. He'd been the one to give her Riddle's diary. She shivered, remembering all the horrible things he'd done to her and her family since then.
"I don't need your help, Lucius," Draco drawled. Two tall, burly mountain-sized eleven years olds materialized on either side of the smaller Malfoy. Crabble and Goyle. Malfoy turned and strolled off, the two big boys falling into step behind him like trollish bodyguards.
"So," Ginny said, gazing up at Lucius Malfoy. "You're looking decent." She scratched the side of her cheek. "Hair looks good. Not receding yet, I see."
Lucius touched his famous blond locks self-consciously. "Move along, Weasley," he said. "Before you get yourself hexed."
"Right," Ginny said. "Moving along." She stepped past him, not even caring that she was doing exactly what a Slytherin told her to do without question or insult. She reached the nearest car and slid the door open, popping her head in to evaluate its suitability as a resting place.
The young man that looked like Harry glanced up and gave her an easy smile. "Hello, Ginny," he said. He turned to the pudgy blond boy to his left. "That was her name, wasn't it, Peter?"
The boy named Peter whispered back, "Yes," as if he were passing the information secretly.
Ginny gave them both a pained smile and turned away. All the empty seats in the world wouldn't get her into that car. At least not until she had a better idea what the hell was going on. As she left, two more young men entered the car. Ginny didn't look at them closely, but one of them smelled faintly of car exhaust and sweat. "You're never going to believe what I finally got," he was saying as she hurried away.
Several cars later, Ginny was starting to realize the hopelessness of her situation. If it wasn't someone she knew from her time at Hogwarts, it was someone she knew was a death eater or a member of the Order of the Phoenix or Ministry employee. Sure she didn't know everyone, but it was just too weird seeing people looking so . . . wrong.
She peeked in another car window and didn't see anyone for a change. An empty car? What were the chances of that? She yanked the door open and flung herself into a seat by the window before she realized that the car wasn't empty by a long shot. Sitting across from her, glaring with black eyes from beneath lank greasy black hair was Severus Snape.
He was less intimidating as a teenager. Scrawnier and smaller all the way around. Well, except for his hook nose, which was as prominent as ever. "You," she said, tone accusing. He'd been the one that murdered Dumbledore. Her mouth formed an angry little line. He'd also been Headmaster at Hogwarts her previous, unpleasant year. The murdering skunk-bat had hired two death eaters – sometimes she thought just to make her life miserable.
He narrowed his eyes. "Miss Weasley," he sneered. "How lovely to see you again. I was beginning to think that I was going to have to spend the entire year without hearing your dulcet tones and simple-minded sentences."
Ginny leaned back, crossing her ankles in front of her. "Well, at least you're consistent." She pressed her lips together, twisting them to the side in her best unimpressed look. "I should warn you that if you even think about murdering anyone this year I'm gonna have to make you regret being born and all that stuff. The Dark Arts won't be enough to save you."
He raised an eyebrow, giving her the disdainful and patronizing look that only Snape had ever really managed to pull off. "I assure you that the only person I wish to murder is James Potter."
"Yeah, well in case you hadn't heard he's dead," Ginny said. "So I guess that means we're not going to have problems with each other, are we?"
Snape blinked rapidly. "Wait, what?"
"Well . . ." Ginny said, reconsidering. "Not really dead of course," she said. "I just meant figuratively dead. He's annoying and all." She had a sudden thought that the boy that looked so much like Harry was probably James Potter. Which would explain a lot. And it wasn't like other dead people weren't wandering the halls. She'd walked in on Cedric Diggory and Cho Chang snogging after all. And Cedric was as dead as Fred was supposed to be. Come to think of it, had Snape even survived the final battle? She hadn't seen him . . .
"That's disappointing," Snape said, leaning back. He folded his arms across his stomach and turned his attention out the window. They had passed through the city and the train was gaining speed in the open countryside.
"So," Ginny said casually as she could, "Back to Hogwarts."
"Yes."
"Excited?"
"Hardly."
"Notice anything strange today?"
"As a matter of fact I have."
"Really? What?" Ginny asked, hopeful for a second that Snape actually knew what was going on. If there was someone who could piece it all together it was the potions master. He was a master at occlumency after all.
"You," Snape said, eyes narrowing.
"What about me?" Ginny asked. "It's my age, isn't it? Well, maybe not my age. I'm the right age after all. It's everyone else. Like you. I mean how old are you?"
"Sixteen," he said tightly. "We're in the same year and have been for the past five years."
"Oh," Ginny said, elation vanishing. "Well, that's awkward."
Snape didn't deign to respond, and they sat in awkward silence for several long minutes. Then the door opened and the most beautiful young girl Ginny had ever seen ducked in. Her hair was a dark red and slightly curly. She was curvy and had a bright, welcoming smile. Her eyes were the same exact shade of startling green that Harry's were. "Hello, Severus," she said. "How were your holidays?"
"Good," Snape said, a very un-Snape-like expression lingering on his face. He moved over, making room beside him. "How about yours, Lily?"
"Oh God," Ginny said. "You're Lily Potter, aren't you?" She clapped both hands to her mouth in astonishment. Harry's mother was alive. Harry's dad was alive. But neither of them were old enough to be Harry's parents.
Lily frowned at her. Snape shot to his feet. "Her name is Lily Evans," he hissed. "She doesn't even like Potter." He spat the surname as if it were toxic. His pale skin was drawn, flushed with anger.
"I'm sorry?" Ginny managed.
"Well, you should be," Lily said. "James is a dickhead and petty bully. He flouts around the school like he's God's gift to the universe, but honestly he's not that impressive. Even if he does have a smile that would melt stone."
Ginny stood up, nodding in wordless agreement. "True, true," she heard herself saying. "I must be going now, so if you'll excuse me. Evans. Snape." She nodded to both of them and stepped back into the hallway, closing the door solidly behind her.
At this rate she was going to have to spend the rest of the train ride locked in a bathroom stall just so she wouldn't have to deal with anymore unexpected conversations and dead people revived. If they were revived.
She opened another train car and stared hard at the occupants. Three young women glanced at her. The one closest to her had straight chocolate brown hair and matching eyes. The one furthest away was tall and thin with pale blonde hair neatly coifed and cornflower blue eyes. The one in the middle was a freaking lunatic with untamed black hair, snow white skin, and soulless black eyes. Ginny would never forget those eyes. Just the day before she'd dueled the woman. A jet of green light from the woman's wand had come within millimeters of ending her life. Bellatrix Lestrange. Voldemort's lovestruck and most loyal lieutenant.
Ginny didn't want to be afraid, but she was. Her mouth was dry, palms sweaty, knees shaking. "Bellatrix," she breathed, taking an involuntary step away. She fumbled, reaching for her wand.
"What is it, Weasley?" the dark witch drawled. "You have something to say to me?" She threw back her head and cackled. "That would be something, wouldn't it?" Bellatrix dropped her head forward, chin dipped and all traces of mirth suddenly gone. "I heard from a wee little birdy that you've been a bad, bad girl," she cooed. "You were making fun of Lucius's mini-sized brother."
Ginny finally got her hand around her wand, but she didn't dare draw it. Bellatrix watched her with a predator's eyes. Ginny cast a silent spell to close the door and flung herself to the right to avoid any spells. Inside she could hear Bellatrix laughing manically, saying "Did you see her face? Her freckles were turning white!"
Ginny didn't care. She was too afraid to care really. She ran to the end of the train without bothering to look in the other cars. She skirted around the trolley witch and at last reached the last car. She risked a glance behind her and spotted the Lestrange brothers heading in her direction. At least she assumed they were the Lestrange brothers. The taller one appeared to be Bellatrix's husband. She yanked open the last car and prayed no one too scary would be in there.
Inside she saw to her palpable relief the familiar dragon fang earring Bill had been wearing for years. With nowhere else left to run, she stepped in and closed the door. She sat down weakly beside him, thankful that at the very least, Bill was still older than her and he still had that too-cool look. A Headboy badge was pinned to the front of his robes. She leaned against him, closing her eyes. "Hiya, Bill," she said, sniffing. "Life sucks."
"Right," Bill said awkwardly. "Uhmm . . . Ginny maybe you should wait outside. I'm kinda of talking with MacNair right now."
Ginny rolled her eyes up to look at him. She was going to develop a stomach ulcer before they got to Hogwarts. "Really? MacNair? Seriously? The Death Eater MacNair?" She groaned and flung her arms around him in a frustrated hug. "How could you be friends with him?" Voice muffled, she added, "Are you friends with him?"
"Yeah, I think we are," Bill said. Then he froze, picking something out of her words even as she was ending the hug and starting to leave the car. "Wait a second, Ginny."
"Wait for what?" She had one hand on the handle and was about to leave.
Bill looked at her suspiciously. "Do you . . . know?"
"Know?" she repeated.
MacNair shifted. He had spiky black hair and the shadow of a beard on his face. He was tall and overly muscular. His silver and green tie was hanging loosely over his shoulder. He didn't look much like a Death Eater. At least not in his haunted looking eyes. "Do you know that time is wrong?"
She rubbed her forehead. "Time is wrong?" she echoed. "What do you mean?"
"Does anything about today seem weird to you?" he asked.
"Yeah," she said dryly, moving her hand and leaning against the door.
"Tell me the weirdest thing," Bill ordered. "The most different thing you can think of."
She stared at him. "Where to start? I have younger brothers. Lily Potter hates James and isn't even a Potter. Harry is eleven. Snape isn't the potions master. Bellatrix is . . . she's back that way." She paused. "And that's just the start of it."
Bill looked pleasantly surprised. "Okay, somehow it didn't affect you either." He tapped his fingers against his leg like he often did when deep in thought.
MacNair's head was tilted to the side. "That must be why she's older," he said at least. "The spell couldn't affect her age because she didn't lose her memory."
"I don't know," Bill mused. "I'm certainly younger." Almost unconsciously he touched his face where the werewolf-wizard Greyback had mauled him in Ginny's Fifth Year. His scars were gone.
"I got turned back to seventeen too," MacNair acknowledged. "But maybe the spell works different on girls."
"What spell?" Ginny asked, looking between her brother and the Death Eater.
Bill suppressed an eye roll. "First off it isn't a spell. It's just magic. I don't know how to explain that better in a way that you'll understand, but just know that it didn't take a wand to make this mess. It took old elemental-like magic. Second, I think the magic affects girls exactly the same way that it affects men. So something else must have spared Ginny's memory and her age."
"You're probably right," MacNair said. To Ginny he explained, "Your brother experimented with Druid magic while he was working for Gringotts to break into a magical vault in Scotland. My father was a druid before he died and he taught me a bit as well. We're assuming that the Druid training spared our memories even if it didn't spare our bodies."
"I've never heard of Druids before," Ginny said. "What are they?"
"Magical muggles," Bill said. "So if you didn't practice Druid magic it has to be something else." He tapped his fingers faster, thoughts racing. "If you had to guess what it would be what would you say?"
"And before you answer, here's another question," MacNair added, "Do you think that you'd be willing to help us save the earth from the Dark Lord?"
"Did he do this?" Ginny asked, completely bewildered. "Is this some way for him to try and kill Harry – "
"We'll have to tell her," Bill said to MacNair, cutting her off. "You'll have to tell her. I took an Unbreakable Oath not to betray it."
MacNair was nodding. He popped one leg onto the seat, wrapping his arms around it and resting his chin on his knee. "It's like this, Miss Weasley," he started. "My da taught me some druid magic and concepts before he passed away. Then I became a Death Eater, well, not right away but eventually. I pretty much ignored my druid background, but when Lord Volde-" He cut himself off with a grimace. "When that dirty old bastard died I realized that he wasn't going alone. He was so corrupt that his – I don't know, essence maybe? – was polluting the soul of the earth. It would have destroyed everything. So I opened the White Gate."
"White Gate?"
"It's a portal of sorts that links the past with the present and the future. I don't know how it works really, but I can tell you that this was not supposed to happen. I wanted to travel into the past. Same age, same skills, same knowledge. I got the same knowledge and skills, but my age changed."
"Tell her the rest," Bill said quietly.
MacNair shifted uncomfortably. "The thing is I fucked up. I opened the White Gate wrong. Time spiraled out of control and warped back around on itself. Think of every year, every minute like it is a layer on a cake." He paused waiting for her to say something.
"That's a lot of layers," Ginny said.
He nodded in agreement. "What I did was the equivalent of running a steam roller over time. I squashed the minutes of the present with some minutes of the past and now here we are in the new now. This new time is somewhere between here and then. Here being the Final Battle at Hogwarts when I opened the Gate. That's the last moment for Bill and me and probably for you too."
"Can it be reversed?"
Bill shook his head. MacNair explained that he simply didn't have the skill to do it. "Neither of us know any real trained druids either," Bill added, "But even if we did, I can assure you that they would not tamper with this further. We're stuck in this time," he said. "This is reality now and forever."
"Okay," Ginny said slowly. "So we just have to forget the future/past?"
Bill shook his head, dragon fang earring dancing with the motion. "No. We've decided that we have to complete MacNair's mission. Voldemort isn't dead. He hasn't risen to power yet. We can save a lot of lives if we do this right and even if we fail it can't be worse than what happened the first time."
"You want my help?"
"I hate to involve you," Bill said. "But the more hands on board the better. Voldemort could even be here, you know," he added. "At the school. Or he could be out there already 100% corrupt, planning to destroy everything."
Ginny was nodding but she felt lightheaded. "Just . . . just give me a second," she said. "I need to moment." She pushed open the door and stepped into the hallway, taking a couple deep gulps of air. She became aware, almost painfully slowly, that someone was walking down the hall toward her.
It was a painfully handsome young man with black robes, a Slytherin tie, a Head boy badge and perfect white teeth. She knew his face better than she knew her own. He had the start of a slow, knowing smile. The charismatic demon from the diary, her Dear Tom. "There you are," he said softly. "I was beginning to think you were ignoring me."
If Ginny had been afraid of Bellatrix she was petrified with fear now, too afraid to even tremble. The Slytherin drew her into a cool embrace, rubbing her back in a familiar comforting motion. Ginny felt a chill descend over her heart. She wasn't some hopelessly romantic eleven year old anymore and the illusory promise of warmth from his arms held no sway.
He pulled back, brushing a kiss across her forehead. "Change into your robes, dear Ginny," he murmured. "We're almost to Hogwarts." He caressed her cheek with fake adoration before walking away. As he reached the connecting car he glanced back and winked before vanishing into the next car.
Ginny was still standing there shock still when Bill popped the door open to check on her. Her skin was sheet white. "You okay? You look like you saw a ghost?"
"It was him," she said. "Tom Riddle. He called me 'dear Ginny' and kissed me forehead and hugged me." A stillness settled over her features. "Why did he do that? What does he want?"
Bill and MacNair exchanged looks, but it was clear they had no idea. Ginny's mind flashed reluctantly on her precious Tom Riddle. Down in the dark of the Chamber of Secrets as he started spilling from the pages of the diary. She had been so cold and weak. Her voice so afraid as she called to him for help and was met only with a high cold laugh. Bill touched her shoulder, his warm skin like fire against her numb flesh. How could this be happening?
