The one I was

Died to give birth to

The one I am.

Victor Dixen, Cogito

Sirius Black was proud to belong to the House of Gryffindor, and had been since he was a young boy when he was assigned to it. He had turned his back on his prejudiced pureblood family and this house was a good fit. However, Gryffindors also had many faults and impulsiveness was unfortunately one of them. He had decided to enter Helena Grace and Remi Lucas' room on a whim, if he had known...

First of all, he hadn't told the marauders about his plan, they were all busy and would have more time to discuss what Sirius would find if he didn't bother them. Then the wizard had waited for the two people in the room to leave, not thinking when they would return. Finally, Sirius had simply not thought about what he was going to do.

He entered the room, as quietly as possible, and looked around quickly. There was nothing on the bedside tables or anywhere else in the room, not even a book that could give him a clue to the research they were doing. He tried to enter the adjoining bathroom, but it was magically locked and after a few attempts at unlocking spells he realised that he didn't know the spells. He turned back when something caught his eye. On the chest of drawers in the room were two frames, one of which depicted a young red-haired man, whom Sirius had no trouble identifying, Helena had turned Remus into his carbon copy during a transfiguration class, it was her friend Ron. In the other frame, the two people were standing still but smiling genuinely at the camera, behind them was a stretch of white sand and the beautiful blue sea. Sirius had never heard of them, perhaps it was other people that Helena had mentioned in her crisis, he couldn't remember their names. He grabbed the frame and ran down the stairs to the other marauders who were keeping Lily, Alice and Dorcas company.

"Look what I found in Grace and Lucas' room."

As her friends looked at the frame, Lily took exception.

"You broke into their room!"

"The door was open, I didn't go into the bathroom."

"It was locked, wasn't it Padfoot?"

Sirius nodded, looking defeated. James knew him far too well, it was getting disturbing.

"Who the hell is that?"

"Do you think it's him Harry? And the girl, who could it be?"

"I don't think it's Harry" Remus interjected. "In the astronomy tower she had him confused with James and this person is blonde with blue eyes, not really James if you ask me."

Hermione and Remus were in the park near Dorcas' house, thinking about horcruxes. They had destroyed two of them, knew the location of two others, one of them very precisely, but they couldn't go alone. The Gaunt's ring would definitely get them to try it, and they couldn't afford to lose a body part. They would have to go with someone from the Order who hadn't lost a loved one and whom they trusted, which narrowed down the options enormously.

"I sense that they are planning something" Remus began.

"Who? The Order, the Death Eaters, Voldy?"

"Oh, Voldy's always up to something, but I was talking about the marauders, they were staring at us far too hard yesterday."

"They can't have heard us, the silence spells are still in place and they don't know assurdiato. Besides, I often lock the door."

"Did you do that today?"

Hermione shook her head and Remus' instinct was to go and see, although she was sceptical, the witch followed her friend, she had sent him off a good number of times in his dubious plans, she could well return the favour. They entered the hallway and heard voices in the living room. They saw with amazement the marauders, Lily, Alice and Dorcas were talking with a frame in their hands, a frame that belonged to the Time Travellers.

Remus' blood ran cold and he rushed towards them before snatching the frame from their hands.

"Didn't anyone ever teach you to mind your own business and not steal someone else's?"

He went upstairs and everyone followed him with their eyes. Hermione looked at him with a small smile on her face, for once she was the one who had kept her cool and not the other way around, it felt good! She glared at the Gryffindors in the room and followed Remus.

"Grace, wait! Who were those people?" asked Sirius."

"They're not dead, are they?"

"James!" whispered Lily, nudging him with her elbow.

"No, there are at least two of my friends who aren't dead, that feels good."

"So why don't you go and see them? You say all your friends are dead but you don't go and visit the ones who are alive!"

"They're muggles, aren't they?" said Dorcas. "The picture doesn't move."

"Are you friends with muggles?" interjected Peter, who hadn't spoken yet.

"Do you have a problem with that?" she asked in a shaky voice, her eyes flashing.

The traitor cowered and didn't dare speak. The others looked at each other but didn't know what to say.

"Why don't you go and see them if you miss them so much?"

"They live far away..."

"You can apparate to Spain, it's not so far. And then a portkey doesn't cost that much."

"I don't think it's in Spain, Sirius" replied Alice.

"What makes you say that?"

"There's no coral reef in Spain... I don't think so. Take a good look at the bottom, there's no doubt about it."

"Ah, I knew you were hiding something, you're not Spanish, you're Australian!"

"Do I have an Australian accent? We lived in Australia for a year a few years ago."

"That still doesn't answer my question, why don't you go and see them?"

"Mind your own business Sirius Black!"

Hermione turned and kept her mask of coldness all the way to the bedroom, before letting the tears flow as she sat on her bed.

"What did you tell them?"

"Rem', I didn't see you, I thought you'd gone for some fresh air. They know they're muggles and Australians but that's it. They guessed it themselves. I couldn't imagine them doing that. Breaking into our room to steal frames. Good thing we didn't post Harry, or even Tonks or the marauders."

Remus sighed and sat down next to Hermione. The young woman had taken out of her bag the picture that Moody had given to Harry the summer before his fifth year. This picture meant a lot to her. The witch thought that it was a bygone era that she would never know, but she couldn't help but admire all those wizards, most of whom had given their lives for a noble cause. She was still young, but she was already thinking of taking over, with Dumbledore's army of sorts. How naive she had been. She couldn't believe that the people she had admired so much were mostly in the same house as her.

They had never really made a picture of the Order during the second war and Hermione regretted it. She would have liked to have a picture with the Weasleys, Moody, Kingsley, Minerva, Emmeline Vance, Sturgis Podmore, Hagrid, Hestia Jones, Dedalus Diggle, and all the others. A memory that would show that the war had not only existed in their heads and on the scars that had been caused by their opponents.

Remus went outside to get some fresh air, he needed to be alone and Hermione didn't stop him, sometimes solitude was the only way to let out his feelings, his frustrations, and Ella and Alex were part of that. She walked down the stairs and sat down in the living room, a book on the various Muggle fighting techniques in her hands. She started to read it and saw the marauders enter the same room as her. They stopped talking abruptly and looked somewhat embarrassed.

"You don't have to stop talking for me" said the time traveller, without looking up from her book.

"We wanted to" James cleared his throat before continuing, "apologise for going through your stuff. We shouldn't have done that."

"To say the least."

"Isn't Lucas here? We wanted to apologize to him, too."

"Rem's gone. He won't be back for a few hours, a few days at most. He's really angry."

"All this for a frame?"

"Yes Pettigrew, all this for a frame" sighed Hermione, quite annoyed.

"But why all the secrecy? I mean, we're not your enemies, and-"

Hermione closed her eyes sharply and snappef her book shut and got up from the chair.

"You have to agree not to find out our secrets, because you never will! Our secrets are dangerous, Mary sacrificed herself to protect them, I would do the same without hesitation. I will never tell you about my past, my life, why I became who I am today. There is an explanation for all of this, but you won't know it. You don't have to go into my room, into my bag. If you think that's how I'm going to trust you!" she finished, breathless from her tirade.

"So, you're not going to tell us who the two people in the photo were?"

"Their names are Ella and Alex, they're cousins and they live in Australia."

"Why don't you go and see them if you miss them so much?"

"We can't."

"Don't talk rubbish, a portkey-"

"That's not the point, Black. They don't remember us. It was safer. We obliviate them."

The last word stayed in the marauders' ears for a long time. What did they have to hide that was so important that they forgot their friends? Before they had time to ask any more questions, Hermione had left the room and gone out into the garden. She saw the Prewett twins practising their duel and stayed to watch them.

They were very good, more so than anyone Hermione had ever seen fight. Their wands seemed to be one with their arms, spells were flying everywhere, only the radiation made it possible to see the number of spells since the two wizards were not speaking. They were sweating profusely but not letting go. Hermione remembered painfully what she had heard about them, it had taken no less than five Death Eaters, all very good at dueling and dark magic to kill them. The witch stood in awe of them for a long time. She wished she could fight like that. She excelled in guardian combat, was quite good at Muggle combat, and was good at dueling, thanks to her hard work and the advice of Harry and Remus, but she was far from having the mastery of the Prewett brothers.

When they finished, Gideon suddenly realised that Hermione was there, and had probably been watching them for quite some time.

"Is something wrong, Grace?"

"Not at all, I was watching you, you're very good."

The two brothers looked at each other, they hadn't really had a chance to talk to Helena Grace but one thing was for sure, she didn't give compliments easily.

"You don't have to say anything, it's the truth. You must be told that a lot, right?"

"Not really, the Aurors are used to our duelling talent and the Order members don't really pay attention."

"I don't think it's talent. You've certainly got a predisposition, but you've had to work very hard to get there, haven't you?"

"That's true. But you seem really surprised."

"I've never seen you fight, I'd heard you were good, but I didn't know how good."

"Thank you. We heard you were pretty good too, you fought Muggle style during the Battle of Hogsmeade."

"That wasn't Muggle combat, I was using my magic. You can't just fight Muggle fighters against Death Eaters. I thought wizards were wrong not to focus enough on Muggle methods, but looking at the two of you, maybe I was wrong."

"Not everyone is as talented as we are" they said in one voice, smilling.

"Seriously" Fabian continued, "you've seen us train, maybe you could show us how you train?"

Hermione nodded and shuffled off before returning a few seconds later, her training dummy in her arms and dressed in Muggle sportswear.

"Muggle fight, wizard fight, guardian fight. What is this?"

"It's what I use in my training. I built it myself. The dummies that didn't move weren't useful to me, I needed something else and I had this idea. This is my mirror. It has exactly my strength, my speed, my power, my reflexes, my qualities and my defects."

"A war machine."

"In a way. Then, depending on what I want to do, I choose the mode of combat and go on the attack. What do you want to see me do?"

"Muggle combat" they said in one voice. "But you won't escape showing us everything."

Hermione adjusted the dummy as the Prewett brothers had requested and got into position. She attacked directly and the dummy responded immediately. She threw a series of blows and techniques but it always responded. She fought like this for a good ten minutes, under the astonished eyes of the two other wizards. When she felt that she was getting seriously tired and that the training would be useless, she avoided a last blow and deactivated her dummy.

"I must say I'm impressed Grace, you're really very good, even if I don't know much. But all those punches you threw, what would that really do to someone?"

Hermione took a drink of water, walked over to the dummy and muttered a spell. More or less red spots appeared all over the body and the young woman explained them in detail.

"The marks around the eyes are not very dark, it shows that I gave him a black eye, you see the almost black mark at his rib? If they had been a real person, I would have broken it. Afterwards there would be bruises all over his body, but nothing too serious. I wanted to fight him, not kill him."

"You are more interesting than I thought. You should open up to others more often, Helena Grace." said Gideon.

"Speaking of which," Fabian continued, "we may have been aurors for a few years, but if we're unarmed, we don't know how to do anything. How would you like to teach us some skills?"

"Only if you teach me how to duel like you" she replied with a sincere smile.

Two days passed without Hermione hearing from Remus. She knew that he was very angry and that this time was surely the last straw, the straw that broke the camel's back as the muggles would say, but she was starting to get seriously worried. He had to start taking his wolfsbane potion the next day, otherwise the full moon would be very painful and she didn't want her friend to suffer more than necessary. She went downstairs to have breakfast and saw that unfortunately the other people in the house were already up. To their astonishment she sat down at the table and began to eat. Feeling watched she glared at them and they mostly turned away quickly. When she finished, she cleared the table and washed it with her wand, much more convenient than washing the dishes, and went to sit in the armchair where she made herself comfortable before picking up a book of black magic.

The stares of the others weighed on her but she preferred not to say anything. She continued reading when she heard a loud noise and instinctively reached for her wand. She saw that Remus was lying there in a sorry state. She approached him and held back an exclamation.

"What happened on April the 15th in the worst year we've ever known?"

"Helena, he's hurt, put your wand down" ordered Lily in a firm voice.

"My son is born."

Everyone in the room cried out in shock. How come they had never heard of this son? Their teacher was a father but did not take care of him?

"Who's the godfather?" Remus continued, also making sure of Hermione's identity even if he has no doubt, no one can know about teddy's existence but her.

"Harry. By Morgana, Rem', what happened to you?"

Before he could say anything, she took him into the room with a spell before administering several potions to heal him.

The remaining people, namely James, Sirius, Remus, Lily and Dorcas looked at each other, still in shock at what they had just heard. They hadn't thought they'd be getting any new information for a while before this and now they were revealing it to them of their own accord.

"He has a son? But why isn't he with him?"

Lily's trembling voice answered him.

"I think we know the answer, Sirius. They said they were the only ones left of something. The only ones. His son must be dead. So is his wife, his parents, his friends."

"What the hell happened out there?"

"I have no idea. Spain doesn't share much information. Unlike the Muggle world, where information has almost no boundaries, in the wizarding world, everyone looks after themselves. I can assure you that no other country has heard of you-know-who, or very little, and does not take him as a serious threat. But the surrounding countries will not be spared. He's too crazy to settle for the UK."

"But Grace has a problem anyway. Why did she threaten him like that? She recognised him, he was hurt."

"And she was quite right to do so."

The young adults turned to the person who had spoken, questioning looks on their faces.

"Why?"

"This is wartime, Black! The Death Eaters can send spies and unless the person is unconscious, always ask a question that only the two people know. That's the minimum of security. They have very good reflexes, you will have to follow them. Wartime. Constant vigilance."

"But the Death Eaters couldn't get into the house, it's protected, they don't know its location."

"There may already be traitors."

Hermione went down the stairs and joined Moody and the others in their discussion.

"What are you doing here Moody? Are all the cells in Azkaban full?"

"There's a meeting here at eight o'clock tomorrow night. The whole Order. As for you," he pointed at everyone except Hermione, "you tell no one about Lucas' condition and no questions. That's an order. Grace, if you could teach them how to behave in wartime, that would be good."

Before anyone could retort, Moody disapparate and left them stunned in the living room.

"Did you ask him not to say anything?"

"No, you saw him with me without you? And he's right, there's nothing to say. If you ask Rem' questions, you'll hear about me."

"What did he mean by learning to behave in wartime?"

"Where are your wands?"

"Mine's upstairs" James began hesitantly.

"First rule, never part with your wand. That's what cost my best friend's parents their lives. Go get them."

When they returned, Hermione grinned as she saw their wands in the back pocket of their trousers.

"You know how many wizards have lost part of their buttocks keeping the wand behind their trousers?"

"You really do sound like Moody here."

"We'll see when you're at St. Mungo's with a missing buttock, Black. So, I repeat, never part with your wand. Second rule, never go on a mission alone. I don't think Dumby or Moody will let you go alone, but if you decide to go on a whim, send a note, a patronus, whatever you want. Third rule, there can always be traitors so ask questions that only the two people know about. This is very important. Fourth rule, it's logical, but always check that no one is around when you talk about the war and the Order. Fifth rule, respect the four previous rules as best you can."

"Is that all?"

"That's more than you do."

Lily thanked Hermione for her advice and the Time Traveller felt she had gone out to practice with her dummy under her arm.