Tom had given little thought to the mysterious girl, and the thought that he had given was mostly embarrassment for the less than manly shriek of surprise he'd let out. Occasionally he wondered how she had gotten in so silently, but there were plenty of patrons that came and went without the use of the door.
Then without noticing he became obsessed with her arrival. Sure, plenty of people came and went stealthily, but he knew all of them. He had never met her, and she was obviously a liar. Plenty of people were liars, but it wasn't till several weeks after the fact that it started to really nag.
He hadn't even asked for her name! What a fool!
Even if he could remember her dark eyes, unruly hair, and dusky skin to a T, it would do absolutely nothing to help find her. Names had power in magic. Descriptions, even picture worthy ones, did not. There was the option of asking around or having one of his "friends" be on the lookout for her, but he didn't want to have people associate them. Still…
It turned out that Tom only had to suffer with his obsession for a few weeks, because one misty morning in the middle of the week she was there again. Her clothes were more fitting the current style, but that was all that had changed. She hadn't bothered to coif her hair or even attempt to tame it as far as he could tell.
"I need to have a word with you." Her voice was stormy, and her feet clomped on the floor heavily as she stomped to the counter. "The necklace," she pulled it out of her pocket and swung it in front of him.
"I remember," he said cooly as if he hadn't been thinking about all the things he was going to ask her if he ever saw her again.
"Where is the one you have?" Her knuckles where white.
It was still tucked away in a cloudy case on a dusty display, perfectly in place. He hesitated to answer though, not sure why he did so.
"I know that you have one," she spun around and started searching the store for it, her hair whipping around her as she spun and ducked and jumped to peer everywhere.
"Over there," he jerked his chin in the opposite direction, and she was on it like a bloodhound. He winced as she clumsily opened the case and pulled the pendent off, and not too gently. "Can I help you?" He finally asked.
The two necklaces were gripped in one of her hands and she was breathing heavily, here eyes were wild.
"Ahhhh! Junk!" She threw them on the ground in rage and he winced. They were still expected to sell it at a decent price, junk or not.
"Well I could have told you that, just look at it."
Her head snapped in his direction as if she had forgotten he was even there. Her glare was murderous. "You don't even know what this is, you idiot."
His hackles raised, no one called him an idiot.
"Excuse me miss, you'll have to leave now." Unasked questions aside, he wasn't going to entertain her abuse of his intelligence. She laughed rudely at him in response, and he felt his mood truly turning black. "Now listen here-"
"No! You listen," she scooped the twin pendants off the ground and slapped them hard on the counter in front of him. Did she not know how to do anything with grace? "This is the Mark of Chronos. They made only one, a very very long time ago. It took several witches and wizards to forge the metal and prepare the mold. Before the coin had even cooled they broke the mold and tossed it into the sea. It was meant to channel the energy of the God of Time himself. This is very old magic, but not even its creators knew how to use it. It's never, in recorded history, been known to work. No one knows what it does for sure, until now. I know what it does."
"And what's that?"
"Well how many do you see?" She asked rather bossily.
"Two," he rolled his eyes.
"And if they made only one, how are there two?"
"Cheap knock offs?" He really hoped she would get to the point.
"No, these are identical, down to every last detail. How could it even be possible that two of the exact same thing could exist at the same time?"
"It would be impossible, unless you could time travel or something," he snorted as if he had made a funny joke.
"Exactly."
"You're mental."
"No, I'm Hermione, and you are going to help me figure out how this thing works, because for one reason of another your magic, my magic, and this deceptive ordinary looking necklace have roped us together. You're going to be spending a lot of your free time with me, like it or not."
Definitely bossy.
"You are definitely out of your mind if you think I'm going to believe in time travel. That's completely insane. I'm not going to spend another minute with you, please leave. I would hate to have to make you." The lesser part of an hour with the strange woman had made him exhausted and bristled and Very nearly angry.
"Fine, don't believe me, but here." She slipped him a folded piece of paper. "Read that, and at the bottom is where you can find me when you change your mind. I accept written apologies. Till then." And without a word of acknowledgement from Tom, Hermione left Borgin and Burkes and disappeared into the forming crowd in Knockturn Alley.