Disclaimer: Hermione Granger also belongs to JK Rowling.

A/N: Merry Christmas! Here's your present: a new chapter. We're now halfway through thanks to the holiday, and with a little luck, I'll have the next one ready for New Year's.

Chapter 3

"Miss Granger," Dumbledore said, "I would scold you for so berating my Potions Master, but I fear that little else would inspire him to better himself."

"And I'd scold you for rudeness," said Mum, "except that if what you said is true, that young man sounds like he deserved it."

"It's true, Mummy," Hermione said meekly. "I was trying to be fair about it, but he really needed to hear it early. In my time, a solid majority of the students would have given their wands to say all that to him, and they would've been much ruder about it."

"I take it that you had the pleasure of experiencing his classes?" Dumbledore asked.

"Six years of them," she grumbled. "Five in Potions and one in Defence, which was no better. The fact that you were forced to keep him on so long is one of the things I wanted to fix."

"So it's true, then?" McGonagall said. "You have found a way to travel through time long distances?"

"Yes, ma'am. Or to send my memories back, rather. My mind is…" She snuggled up closer against Dad in his lap, illustrating her point. "I don't know. Somewhere in between, I think. I'm not as emotionally stable as I was before. Anyway, it took me a year and a large team of Unspeakables, but we did it."

"I see. How far?"

"Eighteen years."

"Goodness. And these—your parents?" She looked at Mum and Dad.

"We—we didn't come back with her, if that's what you mean," Mum said wearily. "It's been a hard couple of days."

"I'm sorry. This must be very hard for you, especially as muggles new to our world. And you, Miss Granger, you have come back now to…"

"To tell you how to win the war, yes," she said. Dumbledore's eyebrows rose. "And I'm sorry, ma'am, but I would prefer to tell this to Professor Dumbledore alone."

McGonagall hesitated, looking to Dumbledore.

"I will handle this, Minerva," he said.

She nodded. "And your parents?" she asked.

Hermione smiled slightly. "They're muggles. Who're they gonna tell?"

"Very well." McGonagall headed for the door.

"By the way," Hermione stopped her, "you were my favourite teacher, ma'am."

McGonagall flashed a rare smile at her: "Why thank you, dear. That means a lot coming from someone so obviously accomplished." She slipped out of the room.

"Alright, Miss Granger," Dumbledore said, "Your story is very interesting, and you have already demonstrated intimate knowledge of things you would be highly unlikely to know or guess. However, I'm afraid that nothing you have said so far is incontrovertible evidence. I hope you understand that for security reasons, I must be certain."

"Hmm…" She thought about the various secrets she knew about Dumbledore and the war. "What if I told you the full contents of the prophecy, sir? I believe only you and the Keeper of the Hall of Prophecy know that."

Dumbledore nodded with interest: "That is correct and would be appropriate."

Hermione cleared her throat and spoke: "The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches...born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies...and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not...and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives...the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies."

As strange as things had already become, that still surprised Dumbledore. "I see," he mused. "Very well. I see that your story must be true. There is certainly no other way that you could have learnt that prophecy."

Mum and Dad looked equally surprised by those words. "So…the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord—that's Harry?" Mum said.

"Harry Potter?" Dumbledore asked.

"Yes, he is—or he would be."

"But how can you defeat him if only Harry can do it?" Mum asked.

"Prophecies don't work that way in the magical world, Mummy." Hermione turned to Dumbledore. "You told Harry that, Professor. They're true if we believe they're true. If we refuse to abide by them, they won't happen."

"Well…yes, that is true…" Dumbledore said nervously, "although I confess I've only ever understood that as a hypothetical. Human nature always seems to bring the prophecies about, even if the subjects technically have the choice to do otherwise."

Hermione bit her lip. That was a snag she hadn't expected. But she was still Hermione Granger. She was smart enough to work around it. "Prophecies are fluid, though, sir," she said. "Harry already fulfilled the prophecy in my time. That could count. Or…in the future, you said that the power Voldemort knows not is love. Maybe you were right…but it's not Harry's love. It's mine…because I love him…and I'm doing all this for him…You might even say that I'm Harry's right hand."

"Don't tell me you're looking to go out and fight," Dad said quickly.

"Of course not, Daddy, but dying by the hand of the other could be metaphorical. If I tell Professor Dumbledore how to beat him, even that could still count."

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled. "Yes, I suppose it could," he said. "And regardless, I should very much like to hear what you have to say, Miss Granger."

"Alright," Hermione said excitedly. She giggled and made a show of cracking her knuckles. "Where to start…well, the most pressing thing is that Voldemort's spy in the Order is Peter Pettigrew."

"Peter!" Dumbledore gasped. "But he—"

"Is the last person you'd expect? That's the beauty of it. He's been feeding information to Voldemort all year."

"Peter. I never thought—" Dumbledore shook his head.

"Well, his animagus form is a rat," she said.

The old wizard's eyes grew wide.

"Oh, that's right, you didn't know that…well, now you know."

"Animagus?" Dad asked.

"He can turn into an animal. It's a rare skill…Maybe I should learn it this time around. Of course, my form won't be a rat. It'll be an otter—"

Dumbledore cleared his throat softly.

"Oh, right," Hermione said. She was starting to think her attention span had been affected, too. "Peter's lost hope that you can win, Professor. The Death Eaters approached him a year ago and scared him into working for the Dark Side."

"The Dark Side?" Dad said sceptically.

"It's as good a name as any," she said. "I'm sure they were very convincing." She giggled again and said in a very deep voice, "You underestimate the power of the Dark Side."

Mum and Dad stared at her in confusion, and Dumbledore looked a bit worried. She looked between them and realised her mistake: "Oh, that's right, Return of the Jedi doesn't come out until '83. Never mind then. Okay, Professor, the next thing that you need to know is that Sirius Black is not the Potters' Secret Keeper. That's a ruse to throw Voldemort off the scent."

Dumbledore paled. He didn't like where this was going. "And who is?" he asked.

"The last person you'd expect," Hermione said seriously. "Voldemort's planning to kill them on Halloween. In my timeline, he killed Harry's parents and tried to kill Harry, but he invoked a sacrificial protection when he killed Harry's Mummy that broke his power and nearly killed him and also marked Harry as his equal. That ended the first war."

"There was a second war, then?"

"Yes, but hopefully we can avoid that. Anyway, Sirius Black was blamed and spent the next twelve years in Azkaban—without trial, I might add. You might want to do something about Barty Crouch—both of them, in fact."

"One moment, Miss Granger," Dumbledore interrupted. "I should record this." He pulled a scroll of parchment out of his desk and a Dictaquill, which stood on its point and began writing on its own. "Perhaps you could start from the beginning?"

Hermione sighed. "Okay, the spy in the Order is Peter Pettigrew. Peter Pettigrew is also the Potter's Secret Keeper, not Sirius Black. Voldemort is plotting to kill the Potters on Halloween, thus marking Harry Potter as his equal. Barty Crouch Sr. Is a wannabe dictator who'll throw people in prison without trial if you give him a chance…so's Rufus Scrimgeour, come to think of it."

"Who?"

"Eh, he's probably just a junior Auror right now."

"I see. I will take action to better protect the Potters immediately. What of the Longbottoms?"

"They're fine for now. I don't know how they're hidden, though. All I know is that in my timeline, after Halloween, Frank and Alice Longbottom were tortured into insanity by the Lestranges and Barty Crouch Jr."

"Barty Crouch Jr.?" Dumbledore gasped.

"Yes. His father doesn't know yet, although he broke him out of Azkaban after throwing him in there by having him switch places with his Polyjuiced, dying wife. But we'll get to the Death Eaters in minute."

"Um…Very well. Are there any other spies in the Order?"

"None that I know of, although I wouldn't trust Mundungus Fletcher as far as I could throw him."

"I quite agree. Please continue."

"Okay…other things you need to know soon…Is Dorcas Meadowes still alive?"

"No, I'm afraid not."

"What about Edgar Bones?"

"Yes, he is."

"Good, you need to watch him. Sometime before Halloween, Death Eaters are going to attack him at home. In my timeline, his niece, Susan, was the only Bones still living, although his sister, Amelia survived until the second war."

"I will warn them at once," Dumbledore said.

"Good," Hermione said. "That's the only attack I know about before Halloween. Now, to win the war, I have some very useful information…" She grinned. "I know where Voldemort's horcruxes are."

Dumbledore gasped for a third time and began coughing so violently that Mum rose from her seat to help him. Hermione was glad he hadn't started his sherbet lemon kick yet, or he might have choked to death.

"Horcruxes?" he stammered when he finally caught his breath. "Plural?!"

Hermione nodded solemnly: "Yes, sir. He has five, with intent to make a sixth—on Halloween."

The old man leaned back in his seat, looking very pale.

"Um, sorry, horcruxes?" Dad asked.

"They're literally the darkest magic in the book," she explained. "He breaks off a piece of his soul with an act of ritual murder and sticks it in a physical object. He can't die until all the horcruxes are destroyed, and not coincidentally, they're nearly indestructible."

"Oh, lovely," Dad said, while Dumbledore looked physically ill at the sight of a two-year-old girl calmly explaining this darkest aspect of magic.

"Yes, I know it's pretty gruesome," she said. "To destroy the horcruxes, sir, unless you're very proficient with Fiendfyre, I recommend a basilisk fang. You can find a basilisk in the Chamber of Secrets. Go to the second floor girls' loo, the one haunted by Moaning Myrtle, go to the broken tap and say the password, 'Hesha-hassah.' Yes, that's parseltongue. I learnt it from Harry. Long story. Go down the chute, speak the same password to the second door and then say, 'See-aachs ungatas Seleetheyin' to summon the basilisk."

"You just said, 'Speak to me, Slytherin,'" the Headmaster interrupted.

Hermione smiled. "Harry told me you knew Parseltongue. If you go down there with a rooster and take Fawkes as backup, you should have no problem."

"Um…no, I suppose not," the Headmaster said distantly, blindsided by this wealth of information about the fabled Chamber of Secrets that he never would have thought would be relevant, delivered at a mile a minute by a toddler. There was silence for a minute, except for the softly twittering instruments and the scratching of the Dictaquill.

Hermione giggled and said in a gruff voice, "Snakes. Why did it have to be snakes…? Has that one come out yet?"

Dad chuckled weekly. "Yes it has, dear," he said.

"Oh, and by the way," she added, "Hagrid's innocent of killing Myrtle, and he never opened the Chamber. It certainly wasn't that acromantula of his that killed her. You can probably find enough evidence down there to clear him."

"Uh, okay, I'm lost," Mum said.

"So am I," Dad agreed.

"It's a long story. Don't worry about it," Hermione said. "Professor Dumbledore just needs to kill that giant snake I told you about last night."

"It seems that my to-do list will grow quite long before this is over," the old man quipped.

"Now you know how I feel, sir. Now, about the horcruxes themselves. The first one's the easiest. The Lost Diadem of Rowena Ravenclaw is right here in the castle. Voldemort hid it here when he applied for that teaching job back in '57. Walk three times past the tapestry of Barnabas the Barmy on the seventh floor whilst thinking, 'I need the place where everything is hidden,' and the door to the room you need will appear. You'll have a job finding it, though. There's a thousand years' worth of junk in there."

Dumbledore nodded.

"Second one: the locket of Salazar Slytherin. It was in a sea cave near Voldemort's childhood orphanage, guarded by an army of inferi, but luckily for you, Regulus Black turned on his master and stole it before he died. It's now in a display case in the first floor drawing room of the Black Family Home at Twelve Grimmauld Place in London. You'll probably want Sirius to handle that since his mother is still there."

"Regulus Black?" Dumbledore said in surprise.

Hermione snapped her fingers twice. "Please try to stay with me, sir. Kreacher—the family elf—can corroborate the story. You'll need to be careful with that one, though. You have to open it to destroy it, and you have to speak Parseltongue to open it: 'Hesha-hassah' again. And when you open it, it will manifest shades of the people you care most about who will torment you with your darkest fears and regrets and then try to possess you."

Dumbledore paled again, but Hermione just kept going. "Third horcrux: the old Gaunt Family ring is under the floorboards of Voldemort's mother's childhood home, the Gaunt Shack just outside of Little Hangleton. You're going to want to take backup for that one. The ring has a very powerful Withering Curse on it and possibly Compulsion Charms. In my timeline, you put it on when you retrieved it, and you were fatally cursed as a result." Dumbledore turned even paler. "Also, I might as well warn you now, since you'll recognise it. The stone in the ring is the Resurrection Stone."

"The what stone?" Dad said as Dumbledore began to look light-headed.

"It's not what it sounds like, Daddy. It only lets you talk to the dead. And it also causes suicidal depression with prolonged use."

The Headmaster took a few deep breaths. "My apologies, but I may need a minute," he said.

"Sorry about this, Professor," she squeaked. "It must be a lot to take in at once. We had two years to go over all of it."

After a few minutes of thinking and rereading the transcript of the conversation, the old man collected himself and said, "Please continue, Miss Granger. You said there were two more horcruxes?"

"Yes, sir. The fourth one is Voldemort's schoolboy diary. You can find it in a warded chamber under the drawing room floor of Malfoy Manor. Don't write in it, or it'll try to possess you. To get that one, I believe you may be able to turn Narcissa Malfoy. She's not Marked, and in my timeline, she betrayed Voldemort in order to save her son. That was sixteen years from now, but I suspect if you convince her she's on the losing side, she'll help you. You won't wanna just raid it, or you'll tip off Voldemort, and that's not good because of the next one. The last horcrux will be the hardest. It's the Cup of Helga Hufflepuff, and unfortunately, it's in the Lestrange Family Vault in Gringotts."

"Gringotts?" Dumbledore said, his face falling.

"Yes, sir. In my timeline, we stole it—"

"You robbed Gringotts?!" he said in shock.

"Yes, we got it by having me impersonate Bellatrix Lestrange with Polyjuice Potion, Imperiusing the head teller—it wasn't Unforgivable at the time—and escaping by releasing that dragon they had chained up in front of the vault—which was barbaric, by the way—and riding it out."

Dumbledore's mouth was hanging open after that revelation. So were Mum's and Dad's, she noticed. Hermione reached up and pushed Dad's closed with a giggle. "However, I was hoping you could come up with something…better, sir," she said, "like capturing or killing all three Lestranges and having the Ministry confiscate their vaults."

"Er…I'll see what I can do," Dumbledore said slowly. "I don't think that sounds like an insurmountable obstacle, although doing things in the right order may be tricky."

"I'll leave that to you, Professor. Once you destroy all the horcruxes, you'll be able to kill Voldemort, assuming he doesn't get impatient and create a sixth one—he wants to use Harry or Neville for that. But if he doesn't know he's mortal, you'll have the advantage…And I know you don't like killing, but I think you'll have to do it. I wouldn't trust Azkaban to hold him with the Dementors guarding it, and I'm not even sure about Nurmengard."

"Sadly, I suspect you're right, Miss Granger. I will keep that in mind."

She nodded. "In the meantime, I have one more piece of information I can give you that will hopefully cut down a lot on the death toll in the war right away."

"And what is that?"

"The names of every Death Eater I know."

Dumbledore grinned.

"In alphabetical order," Hermione said primly, "There's Avery—Senior and Junior—Junior got off by claiming the Imperius Curse after the war; Alecto and Amycus Carrow—nasty pair, them, like to torture kids, and also used the Imperius defence; Barty Crouch Jr. I mentioned; Crabbe—also got off on the Imperius defence; Antonin Dolohov—" She rubbed her chest. "—he nearly killed me with that purple curse of his; Gibbon; Goyle—Imperius defence; Jugson; Igor Karkaroff—he'll sing like a canary if you can catch him; Bellatrix Lestrange, that bitch—"

"Hermione!" Mum scolded.

"You'd agree with me if you knew her, Mummy. She carved a racial slur into my arm, and that was her being nice. Then, there's Rabastan and Rodolphus Lestrange and Lestrange Senior; Walden Macnair—sociopath extraordinaire—he pleaded Imperius and got a job euthanizing animals for the Ministry, and by euthanizing, I mean with a black hood and a giant axe; Lucius Malfoy—Imperius defence, naturally—slipperier than an eel, that one; Mulciber—Senior and Junior—Junior's one of the top men with the Imperius Curse; Nott—Imperius defence; Pettigrew, of course; Augustus Rookwood from the Department of Mysteries—he's one of Voldemort's best spies; Evan Rosier, if Moody hasn't killed him yet, and Rosier Senior; Thorfinn Rowle; Selwyn; Professor Snape, but you knew that; Travers; Wilkes, if he's still alive; and finally, Yaxley from the DMLE—watch out for him—he Imperiused the Minister in my timeline.

"Oh, and Fenrir Greyback's working with them, but he's not marked. You'll also want to watch out for the Acromantula colony in the Forbidden Forest, the Dementors, and any giants that are still in the country. And finally, there are three more people in the Ministry I haven't mentioned who aren't Death Eaters, but should still never be allowed in positions of power: Cornelius Fudge, just because he's incompetent and wishy-washy; Albert Runcorn—he's a pureblood supremacist and a real SS type, if he's given the chance; and last, but not least, Dolores Umbridge," she growled. "She's also a pureblood supremacist, a pathological liar, has atrocious fashion sense, and is a sadistic bitch."

"Hermione! That's quite enough!" Mum said.

"Mummy, she was more universally hated than Bellatrix Lestrange. The only reason she wasn't a Death Eater was because she's too much of a patriot—'my country right or wrong', and she was usually wrong. She taught here for a year, and she made Harry carve lines into the back of his hand for hours as a 'detention'. Later, when Voldemort took over, she ran a kangaroo court where she threw muggle-borns into a concentration camp for the supposed crime of 'stealing magic'."

Mum went from angry to horrified: "Good Lord, baby, how did you get mixed up in all that?"

"A celebrity just happened to save me from a mountain troll when I was twelve," she said flatly. "I couldn't escape after that. Anyway, I think that's everything, Professor—Oh, one more thing: tell Pandora Lovegood to be more careful with her spellcrafting experiments. Her accident's probably been prevented by the Butterfly Effect, but it's still good advice."

"I…will," Dumbledore said. "Thank you Miss Granger. I believe this information will save many lives. What, then, will you do now?"

Mum and Dad looked to Hermione questioningly. "Well…" she said, "before too much time goes by, I want to do something about the fact that I'm a twenty-year-old woman in a two-year-old's body and in love with a boy who's still in nappies and doesn't even know I exist." Several awkward glances were exchanged. "I have some ideas about that, which I'd like to discuss with you, but I've already dumped so much on you, I'd like to give you a few weeks to take care of at least most of the things on your list and set the Death Eaters running. It'll be safer after that, and I want to see that Halloween goes right regardless. So if you could just keep us posted on what's going on by owl, and we could meet again at the beginning of November?"

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled again. "I think I can manage that, Miss Granger," he said. "And I will also give some thought to your problem if I have any time to spare. It's the least I can do."

"Thank you, sir. If there's nothing else, I was hoping you would let us use your Floo to get back to the Leaky Cauldron…"

"I would very much like to hear the rest of your story before you go, but I suspect it would take far too long."

"It would…But if you have another Dictaquill, I can write it down for you."

The old man smiled warmly and drew another large quill from his desk, along with two silver necklaces. "I look forward to reading it," he said, "and here are those Anti-Anti-Muggle Charms you requested. I wish you all well until we meet again."

"The same to you, Professor. Mummy, Daddy, we should go. Put the necklaces on, please. They'll let you see magic on your own." They did so, feeling a slight tingle in their eyes and ears. "Daddy, I need a handful of that powder in the urn beside the fireplace."

Mum and Dad gave her a confused look, but they obliged. She took as much of the green powder as she could in her little hand, and they stood in front of the fireplace. "Hold on to your butts," she squeaked.

"Hermione!" Dad said.

"It's from Jurassic Park, Daddy. It comes out in '93. Ahem. Diagon Alley!"

She threw the powder in the fire. There was a whoosh, and it turned emerald green.

Mum and Dad looked more sceptical than ever.

"Yes, we're supposed to walk through it. Trust me, it's just like Father Christmas."

"It is perfectly safe, Mr. and Mrs. Granger," Dumbledore assured then.

Dad sighed heavily and took Mum's hand. "Why can't they just make this easy?" he muttered. They took a deep breath and stepped through the flames.

Hermione was vaguely aware of screaming as the world spun around them, and fireplaces flew by at a blinding speed. Then, they all shot out of the Floo in the Leaky Cauldron feet first and fell on their backs. Thankfully, Hermione was on top.

"Oww…" Mum and Dad groaned.

"Rough trip, was it," Tom said, helping them up.

"Er, you could say that," Dad said. "We were, uh, just heading out."

They picked themselves up, brushed themselves off, and walked out the door back to the muggle world.

"I think that went well," Hermione said brightly when they were safely back in the car. Mum and Dad just exchanged one more uncomfortable look.