Chocking it up to a freak accident, the two of them continued to enjoy their time in Diagon Alley. Hermione learned so much more than she ever dreamed of about wands. The first wands used in recorded history, experimental wands and wands that are proven through the ages to be among the greatest. He even told her of the greatest wand ever in existence: The Elder Wand.

Ron had to go home, but with the excess in Floo Powder they had now, he only needed to use it to see his friends. Harry took Hermione to the tea shop that seemed to cater to couples. They were given the option to mix their own tea blend together and name it after themselves. Thus the tea flavor "Harmony" was created from a Breakfast Tea Blend, two rose pedals, two sugars, honey and cinnamon.

As wonderful as it all seemed, Hermione couldn't help but notice that Harry was having moments where he was gazing off into space. As she sipped her tea, she observed him without staring, but made sure to look at his general ticks and overall mannerisms. He was so still as he stared. She half expected him to have a lazy eye turn inward toward his nose. It was as if he was afraid he would offend someone just by moving. Given his upbringings, this wasn't especially alarming or unexpected. There was another white hot bit of loathing for those who caused his emotional shortcomings.

"Harry," She said, drawing his attention. He snapped out of it and hummed his acknowledgement before sipping his tea. "I want you to come over for Christmas." She said simply and his head began to tilt a little to the side. She smiled at him as he blinked at her.

"To your parent's home?" He asked and she nodded.

"Yes, they wanted to meet you when we rescued you from the Dursleys, but we couldn't for obvious reasons. I talked to my dad, he says it was the most fun he's had in years. He's especially glad that there were no police or injuries involved." Hermione said as an offhanded statement that Harry may have caught a little too readily.

"Yeah, they're just lucky the Dursleys care deeply about what their neighbors think. Having the police come to their front door is akin to Professor Mcgonagall showing up in full robes." He said, though his joking tone was somewhat flat.

There was a long pause. For some reason, Harry seemed to go back to staring. In fact, if she wasn't mistaken, he almost readily went back into it. That's when she furrowed her brow.

"Is something wrong, Harry?" Hermione asked and he shrugged.

"Well, I keep thinking that I'm becoming something of a bad luck charm. I'm not sure I want to submit anyone to it–"

"Oh, stop that rubbish, Harry." Hermione scoffed at him. "Don't you think this danger is somewhat warranted? I mean, if you remember, you happen to have some friends who have also been rather taken by this 'bad luck', and our involvement is rather cemented at this point, isn't it? As I remember, we all attacked Voldemort."

There was a long moment of thought as Harry looked off to the side. Any child who had been through as much as he had would be having possible psychotic episodes. It was really a wonder of his strength of will. Perhaps Gryffindor was his true calling, after all.

"Listen, Harry," She held out her hands and held both of his across the table. "No matter how you look at it, we're really in this together. If we separate from our friends, we'll be vulnerable. Dumbledore has always said that we're stronger together."

He took in the words, then nodded a little bit. He tightened his grip on her hands and she smiled at him. "Also, let's not go to my parent's house. That would probably be very boring. They would want to check your gums."

"Yeah, let's wait until I'm old enough to comfortably say no." Harry said and Hermione thought that was best.

The room they got at the Three Broomsticks was huge. Ollivander checked them into it and told them not to get into any "mischief that would be unbecoming of those so young". They simply shook their heads, telling him that they would never do so. Neither of them were entirely sure what he meant but they started getting up to mischief anyway.

First, they began ordering strange things off the menu, just to see what they were. Often, they were not pleased with the results. There was something called "Hippogriff Oeuf" and having read up on them, Hermione was revolted to find out that they had actually ordered hippogriff eggs, sunny side up. She was mortified to think that they had killed poor innocent hippogriff young for this very well laid out plate of food. Then it turned out that the eggs used for food never contained actual young, just inert eggs.

Next was something called a "Cruppy", and to Hermione's delight, it was a magical two tailed dog called a Crup. The Cruppy was their young and it must have been a week old as it almost comfortably fit in her palm. Then, she was horrified to find out it started snacking on a tea saucer. As it chomped off large bits of porcelain, Hermione called the front desk, and it turned out that Crups will eat literally almost anything. They both decided to take it back to the front desk after it began eating bits of the toilet.

Both of them sat on beds opposite each other and sent pillows at one another. They manually threw them, since neither of them wanted to risk using magic outside of the school. The fact that Hermione was allowed was not an excuse to push it.

Soon, though, both of them took a rest on their beds and it wasn't long before both were splayed out, asleep. Harry's glasses were askew against his pillow and Hermione's hair was matted against her face as she rolled over.

As fun as the night before was, neither of them were very bright eyed the next morning. The next day was much of the same, only they fell asleep much earlier that night, ready to go to the Burrow the next morning.

Her time under Ollivander's tutelage was invaluable, as now she felt she had the tools and the knowledge to at least have a fair chance of successfully completing her first wand. She began researching carving techniques and planned to continue her studies in the subject. She also planned to keep Ollivander informed of her progress through the coming weeks.

The Burrow was delighted to see them as they returned. George even offered Hermione a liquorice wand, but the smell of black liquorice made her queasy. Harry and Ron immediately went to Ron's back yard and did a bit of Quidditch practice whilst Hermione studied each of Lockhart's books.

They were some of the strangest tales anyone had ever told and Hermione was well-versed in Brothers Grimm Tales. She did a comparison of the Grimm tales to modern interpretations, and even that difference seemed tame compared to whatever this Lockhart fellow was up to.

According to him, he strong-armed a werewolf. As Hermione remembered, werewolves were capable of enormous feats of strength and often moved faster than a normal human could hope to. Lockhart must have also been a student of miracle magic, because Hermione had never heard of such a charm that he used. Nor did she think that there was any such charm that would cure a human of lycanthropy. She felt this was very untrue since there was no such thing as a cure for lycanthropy in the first place! Then there was the book where he gave a yeti a head cold! Really, how on Earth could anyone believe this nonsense?

"Hello, Hermione…" Her blood went cold as she heard the voice of a young lady behind her. She very quickly closed her book and set it aside, not looking at Ginny yet.

"Hello, Ginerva. I don't suppose you've come to talk sensibly?" Hermione asked and there was a noteworthy silence for a long moment. For a moment, she almost thought that she had crept away, but then she gave a long deep breath.

"I like him." She said in just above a whisper. "I think it's only fair that he be given the choice."

"He's already made the choice. If you intend to sabotage us, you will find that I have already learned quite a bit in my time at Hogwarts. If you would like for me to show you, I can." Her vine wand was at her hip and her right hand was gripped tightly upon it.

There was yet another silence as she still did not turn to Ginny, as if daring her. The fact that Ollivander had sold her a brand new wand did not escape her. She was there. In fact, she was fairly certain the red headed girl saw her while her mother was clapping. Yew, twelve and a half inches, unicorn hair, slightly springy.

"I'm not going to fight you, Hermione. I don't think I'd win." Ginny admitted, but then she looked out the window to see Harry on his Nimbus 2000 and she sighed once again. "But I will not give up and I don't think it's nice that you don't give me the chance."

"I'm not here to be nice. You don't burst into someone's life and tell them that what they have isn't fair. Ogle Harry at a distance and watch him like a vulture on a dying fawn if you truly wish, but know this:" Hermione finally turned to her in her chair, glaring at her with malicious intent. "One step out of line and I'll have you fly home in an envelope."

With that, there was staring and no mistaking that Hermione was very serious. Thankfully, though, Ginny seemed to get the message as she turned and kept walking down the hallway.

Hermione's hand was shaking as it slid away from her wand.

Soon, Harry and Ron came in, covered in dirt and grass. Evidently, the wind was rather strong that day and their landings were not quite so graceful. After a quick wash, it was time for their final dinner at the Burrow. The summer holidays were finally at an end and for some reason, Hermione felt a pressure in the pit of her chest. She couldn't stop thinking that there had been a few too many coincidences as of late.

Still, she fell asleep and woke up the next morning to the normal hustle and bustle as they all scurried to get their trunks and everything together to go. The twins were making all sorts of racket, dancing excitedly as they ran into each other while gathering their things.

"We're going to London on the Knight Bus?" Harry asked, looking around at whatever he could see around the house. They were out in the middle of nowhere. There was not a bus stop for miles. What bus could possibly come out here? Were they walking to a town? "What about taking the c–" Harry turned to Mrs. Weasley, who eyed him testily, and he stopped talking immediately. "Right then."

They filed out of the house and toward the edge of their grove. There were still many gnomes roaming about the yard, even after three degnomings since Harry had been there. Still wondering how on Earth a bus was going to get out here, Harry stepped to the edge of their enormous plot of land, where there was a fence all around it and a gate in the center of it.

As Mr. Weasley got to the edge of the yard, he pulled out his wand and held it aloft. He stood as if he were sticking his thumb out to hitchhike and there came the most purple vehicle that Harry had ever seen in his life. It came literally out of nowhere and was faster than any car he had seen. The Knight Bus was little more than a gigantic double-decker bus that looked far taller than was natural with an extra level on top.

Hermione was also quite taken aback by this bus and her hair flew wildly into her face as it came. She spat the strands from her mouth and watched as a young man exited the back.

"Welcome to the Knight Bus, your transportation for any wayward wizards. My name is Stan Shunpike, I'll be helping you today." He said as they all began to file into the bus. Ron, Harry and Hermione gazed at the bus's exterior, admiring its immaculate paint job.

However, as Stan got out of the bus to grab Ron's luggage, the Knight Bus zoomed off. The young man in the unkempt purple uniform turned around as his hat flew off his head and he gazed, dumbfounded.

"Oi! Where's it gone?" He looked around. "Ernest! Bloody hell! Where did he go?!" He looked at the three of them and then looked off into the distance. "Can you three go back to that house while I sort this all out?"

"What happened?" Harry asked and Stan balked.

"Like I bloody know! I need to get back to headquarters and get this handled. You three stay out of trouble and I'll try to get them back if I can manage!" Then, as if he were rolled up like a window shade, he disapparated in front of them, causing a crack that startled all three.

"Damn! What happened? What do we do now?" Ron asked, looking at both of them. "We can't get there with Floo Powder with our luggage. I don't even think we can do that with a portkey."

Then, as if by magic, all of them looked toward the Burrow as an idea kindled. Within minutes, their luggage was packed, they got food and water for the trip and then they set off in the pale blue Ford Anglia. Ron drove, and when they were well out of their very tiny village, which was comprised of several distant settlements, Ron pulled the controls that got them airborne.

Even at their altitude, and with the houses in the distance, Hermione thought it best to turn on the camouflage so that they were not seen by random passersby that they could not see from there.

"Well, wouldn't it just look like a muggle airplane?" Ron asked, and Hermione shook her head.

"No, it would look like a car suspended in midair. I think muggles would very much find it fascinating, as would the Ministry as they clapped us in irons." Hermione glared at him and hit the button to turn them practically invisible.

They had a good laugh together, but soon, it was a fight between who would take a nap and who would drive. It ended up with Hermione in the driver's seat, Ron in the back on his side and Harry in the passenger seat.

"What do you think happened to the Knight Bus?" Harry asked as they kept going through the clouds on their way to London. Hermione was keeping to the North East. Normally, this trip took over three and a half hours, they were going to make it there in nearly half the time.

"I don't know, but perhaps we should write to Hogwarts and see if they can find anything out. Hedwig's cage is in the backseat, she could probably use some flight time." Hermione said and Harry already knew he could find a quill and a piece of parchment in her bag. She had packed just about every necessity someone would need if they were stranded on an abandoned desert island. She even packed a loaf of bread.

They had to lower the altitude in order to open the window and let Hedwig out. As the wind came in, though, parchment began to fly in every which way. Ron sputtered and coughed, crying out as he was slapped in the face over and over again.

"Oi! What's going on! Whose parchment is this?!" Ron shouted as Hermione gave a little shriek as parchment continuously swiped against her face. She knew she had to drive but she lost visual. The car began to shake as the parchment flew out the windows and they struggled to regain control. Thankfully, in all of that chaos, Hedwig managed to slip out the window with the message in claw.

"Hermione! Let me land the car! We need to touch down before we reach London." Ron said and she shrugged him off, three torn pieces of parchment still in her extremely frazzled hair.

"I've got this, Ron! I just hold it steadily downward whilst maintaining a forward momentum and allow the back wheels to touch down first." Hermione said as if reciting from a book.

"How do you know all that?" Ron asked, looking at Harry, who was nursing a papercut on his cheek.

"Common sense, Ron. Now shut up, I need to concentrate!" Hermione said as she made her way downward. The ground was coming up quick as both Ron and Harry buckled their safety belts tight and held onto whatever they could, bracing themselves against their seats.

Hermione was at a level of concentration on par with neurosurgery as she leveled the car as best she could with the ground, but kept their forward momentum at a nominal rate. She held her breath!

Touching down onto the road, Hermione straightened the car out and kept driving as if she'd been doing it on the ground this whole time. She breathed deep as Harry put his hand on her shoulder.

"Well done, Hermione! That was barely even a bump." Harry said, causing her to glow with pride and more than a little relief.

However, Hermione wasn't very well versed in the ways of driving on roads with regulations and other cars. More than once, she came very close to hitting the car in front of her whenever there was a stop at a light. She came even closer to hitting a curb while turning, but Ron informed her that she needed to keep her foot on the brake whilst turning to maintain a decently slow speed and better control.

"How do you know so much about driving, Ron? Aren't you a pure-blood wizard who has lived in the wizarding world all your life?" Harry asked and Ron shrugged.

"My dad took this car apart and put it back together. Sometimes, he figured stuff out and I listened." Ron explained and Hermione was rather impressed.

Finally, Hermione was able to get her bearings and started remembering which turns to take to get to King's Cross. It was lucky that all three of them had at least some experience in getting there for themselves, or this trip would likely have not succeeded.

Ron kissed the ground as they finally got out of the car and started getting their trunks. A parking guard asked for parking validation and Hermione handed him the slip. He marked it and ripped off her copy. Then he seemed to realize that he had just exchanged official documents with a 12 year old.

The three of them made their way out of the long term parking lot. Hermione simply made a mental note to send the parking papers back to Mr. Weasley.

As they traversed the sidewalk toward the train station, there came a strange squeaking of metal and the sound of hissing. Then, all at once, a huge gush of spraying water pushed Ron straight down onto the concrete. Harry's arm was caught in the blast and spun him to where he nearly tripped up.

Hermione didn't catch the full blast of the fire hydrant but she was soaked by a spray all across her back and her hair clung to her head and neck.

"Ron!" Both of them went to him, trying to avoid the hard gush of water as they got him from it. By the time all three of them were done, they were soaked straight through their muggle clothing, which was thankfully rather dark.

Many people on the streets of London looked over at the three wet preteens sloshing wet socks with heavy trunks and a white owl across a busy sidewalk. Hedwig was flapping around and shaking water out of her feathers as they walked.

However, that was when there seemed to be a bit of a commotion from a distance behind them. There were six large cats chasing a small pack of mice. The people around them were moving out of the way and screaming, up until they got to the three wizards, who simply let them pass.

That was until the barking started. They looked back toward where the mice and cats had come from and now there were several dogs heading their way. Some of them had leashes around their necks and two of them were pitbulls.

"Ron! Harry! Get in front of me!" As crazy as she sounded, both of them did as they were told and she ducked down between both trunks with her wand out. "Ascendo!" She shouted, and stuck her wand out far enough between them that only the three medium sized dogs were affected. To the untrained eye, it simply seemed like the dogs had simply jumped very high as both boys leaned either side out of the way.

"Come on!" Harry shouted and grabbed his trunk. All three of them bolted off. Thankfully, Hermione stowed away her wand and it looked like no one was the wiser around her. Now, it was just a matter of crossing the street to King's Cross Station.

Then, there came a very welcome sight. Hedwig swooped down to them, with a letter firmly in her beak. Harry was quick to open her cage on top of his trunk as they slowed down to cross the road.

"Oh, Hedwig, you're a sight for sore eyes!" Ron said as Harry took her letter. Before he could read it, the light came on to cross the road. They got to the station is due course, soaking wet and absolutely miserable until they opened the letter.

"Family is fine. Good work getting to King's Cross but that was very irresponsible! Leave the car at the station and we will pick it up later. Fred, George, Ginny all headed there now thanks to help from MoM.

Talk again soon,

Mom and Dad"

"Well, that's a relief." Ron did sigh with a relieved stretch. "Welp, we've still got forty minutes before the train leaves. Suppose we can find something to eat?"

"Of course you would think of food when dogs and cats are literally stampeding toward us and fire hydrants blast us full force! Wake up, Ron! Something is trying to stop us!" That's when her eyes widened with sudden realization. She looked at Harry and pointed at him. That's when he suddenly realized it as well.

"What?" Ron asked, looking at them both with a puzzled expression.

"Dobby!" They both said at the same time.

"What, the house elf?" Ron asked, looking at them both. Then his eyes widened as well. "Oh yeah!"

"George said house elves have powers many wizards would commonly overlook! I think he's trying to stop you and setting off all of this somewhere in hiding." Hermione said, and all of them looked around for the little creature.

"I don't see him. Know any spells that can locate him?" Harry asked Hermione, who shook her head.

"I'm sure there are some, but I don't know any yet." She said, clearly in a worried voice.

"Hermione, you don't need to know everything. You know plenty more than us." Ron tried to say in comforting words, but Hermione didn't seem very swayed.

"Alright, let's run for it." Harry said and they all decided to walk very briskly into the station.

"Oi! Harry!" Fred was running up the sidewalk toward the King's Station entrance toward them. He was followed very closely by George and Ginny. All of them breathed a sigh of relief as they saw the ministry cars. However, they were driving away.

"Wait! Stop the ministry! We need their help!" Hermione said as she saw them go.

"What? Why? What's wrong?" Fred asked, clearly concerned as his smile went away. Then he got a good look at them. "Bloody hell, why are you all sopping?"

As the group all got together, the three of them regaled them with the tale of what had happened when they were left by themselves and with no other choice but to fly to London. As they got to the weird accidents and happenings, both Fred and George nodded.

"Yep, that's a house elf, alright. In that case, I wish I could use magic. I have a handy little charm that could–" Hermione immediately interrupted George by handing him her wand. "What's this for?"

"You can use magic with that wand if it's a movement charm. You cannot use jinxes, hexes or curses of any sort." They looked at her, astounded. "What? Some lessons in wand making require movement charms. Just get on with it!" She waved her hand impatiently.

"Cover me." George said as he flipped her wand around in his hand casually and walked into a small space on the side of the King's Station entrance. It was rather remote and only had an electric transformer unit sitting near the outside of the building. It was perfect for hiding George from sight. Once the coast was clear, he held up the wand. "Accio Dobby!"

There was a screaming from the distance and the house elf came straight around the far back corner of the building. Dobby ran straight into the wall beside George as he jumped out of the way. Before he could even think of moving, the Weasley twin pointed the wand again.

"Petrificus Totalus!" He whispered rather loudly and Dobby squeaked as he stopped moving completely. "Come on!" He quickly grabbed a newspaper from a rubbish heap and tossed it over the immobile creature. They all ran.