'Of Life, Time Does Steal'

Please note that Old Norse is an ancient language, and translations can vary based on context and interpretation. Chapter Titles are also in lower case, as the language did not have capital letters, something that was introduced later in time.

'This ain't a song for the broken-hearted.'
'No silent pray for faith-departed.'
'And I ain't gonna be just a face in the crowd.'
'You're gonna hear my voice when I shout it out loud.'

'It's my life.'
'It's now or never.'
'But I ain't gonna live forever.'
'I just wanna live while I'm alive.'
(It's my life.)
'My heart is like an open highway.'
'Like Frankie said, "I did it my way".'
'I just wanna live while I'm alive.'

'It's my life.'

It's My Life - Bon Jovi

Hermione Granger frowned as she rolled over in the bed she was using while staying at the Weasley's, her tired brown eyes landing on the item that had been keeping her up for most the night.

She couldn't work out why her former Headmaster, Albus Dumbledore, had left her with the book on wizarding fairy tales, and something kept niggling in the back of her mind that there had to be more to his last gift to her than some ancient bedtime stories.

Sitting up on the bed, Hermione scrubbed a hand over her face, knowing that she wasn't going to be able to sleep. She spared a glance in the direction where Ginny was snoring the hours away before her gaze once again dropped to the battered cover of 'The Tales of Beedle The Bard' and narrowed.

A scream was torn from Hermione's throat as Bellatrix put her under another round of the Cruciatus Curse; her body contorting unnaturally, feeling as though a hundred, thousand white-hot knives were suddenly piercing through every inch of her flesh and sending pain to flood her nervous system, causing it to feel as though her very blood was on fire.

Hermione's already beaten and scarred body felt as though it were about to give out on the witch at any moment, and her throat felt as though she'd been forced to swallow razor blades.

And somewhere in her swirling, pain-riddled mind, she wondered how she was still alive, still conscious after everything the sadistic bitch cackling away above her had put her through.

A huff left the bushy-haired witch as she glared at the book, trying to will it into revealing its secrets with her very mind alone. Though her efforts were for naught as the infuriating tome continued to sit there, mocking her inability to realise what it was her former Headmaster so clearly wanted her to discover.

Grabbing the book, Hermione shoved her other hand under her pillow and let her fingers curl around the base of her wand. She looked around, feeling as though she were about to break one of the cardinal rules of being a witch - even though she'd already surpassed the age of seventeen thanks to the Time-Turner Professor Dumbledore had provided her with in her Third Year.

What was only literally years ago felt like lifetimes as Hermione waved her wand over the book, muttering the revealing spells she'd used over and over again and ever since she'd been left alone with the pages of the fairy tale.

This time, however, something different happened as her wand moved over the cover.

Bellatrix released her spell, the merciless grin still stuck firmly upon her lips as she watched the girl on the ground twitch and writhe in pain.

The filthy mudblood's screams were now silent, yet still she wouldn't reveal how it was she had broken into her vault - and that was something Bellatrix needed to know.

Even within her crazed mind, the elder witch knew that there were far more important things hidden within the Lestrange's vault.

Things that were so very important to her Mast-

A sneer was quick to appear on Bellatrix's lips, and the deranged witch whipped her wand in the direction of the fallen girl, clearing the soiled smell from the air.

The book in Hermione's hand begun to give off an eerie, golden glow as its weight seemed to triple in her grasp.

Dropping her wand onto the mattress beside her, the brunette was quick to grab the book with both hands before she dropped it in her surprise. Though her eyes widened when she realised that instead of a book, the item she was now holding was in fact a small box that only looked like a book.

"What in the..."

Hermione curled up into a foetal position on the ground, her eyes squeezed shut as she prayed and prayed that her torture would stop, that the crazed witch would just hurry up and grow bored with the torture already and just kill her.

It was bad enough that the bitch had allowed Greyback to have his way with her, and it had been Hermione's one and only silent mercy that it hadn't been a full moon the second she'd felt the deranged wizard's unnaturally sharp teeth into the tender flesh of her neck.

"Nothing but a half-breeds' half-breed," she could remember Bellatrix taunting as the sick witch watched, knowing that even though Greyback hadn't succeeded in turning her, the 'widdle mudblood' had been marked for all to know what she had almost become.

Within the currently war-torn country, not one of them were certain if that was worse than being turned into the full beast the wizarding community did so claim them to be - and that was something that Bellatrix had absolutely lost her mind over, the deranged witch cackling like, well... a witch.

Hermione placed the box onto the mattress before her, scooting further up her bed so that she was sitting up instead of half laying down. Her wand was in her hand once more, a few more spells leaving her lips as she made certain that there was nothing dangerous inside - not that she actually believed Dumbledore would ever intentionally harm her.

Unintentionally, however...

Well, Hermione only had to look back on her last six years of schooling to see how much danger the former Headmaster had allowed to literally stroll through the doors of Hogwarts. If it wasn't two-faced Professors, ancient petrifying monsters and three-headed beasts, dragons - lots of dragons, werewolves, rouge Animagi-

Gods, Hermione didn't even have to think that far back, feeling the ever-present, ghostly itch of the scar that ran from one side of her chest and to her opposite hip. The witch knew that she'd been rather lucky that she'd managed to silence Dolohov before he'd gotten the curse out. Silent spells always required more power over vocalised spells, needing far more will, intent, and control for the caster's magic to know what it was needed to do. And she knew that the Death Eater she'd encountered had plenty of both at the time - if the rage in his eyes had been anything to go by.

He had just never been expecting to be silenced, and that had saved Hermione; the wizard not having put the necessary power behind his curse for it to be lethal while unspoken.

Shaking her head, and getting her mind back onto the mystery that was the box in front of her, Hermione once again placed her wand on the mattress at her side before moving it onto the lid of the box. She gave the still-sleeping Ginny one last glance before lifting the lid - and the air was ripped from her lungs when her eyes landed on what was nestled inside.

"What else did you take, what else?!"

Hermione barely registered that there was a weight upon her chest, that Bellatrix was once more on top of her as the dark-haired witch continued to yell and scream in her face.

"Answer me!"

The young brunette barely even felt the 'crunch!' of the Time-Turner as it shattered behind her back, Bellatrix's knees digging into her chest before the woman was suddenly gone, her weight disappearing as she jumped backwards and aimed her wand towards Hermione once more.

"Crucio!"

All the brown-haired could feel was a mind-numbing fog, even as the pain of the curse had her twisting and turning so unnaturally that the three horrified people watching what their kin was doing would have disappeared on the spot - if, of course, it hadn't meant their immediate deaths.

"How did you get into my vault?"

The insane witch was still screaming once more, and the feel of that weight returned upon her chest, the feel of something cold, metallic, and certainly cursed begun to carve into the flesh of her forearm. It had Hermione drifting out of her foggy haze, a scream being torn from her lips as she was ripped from the peaceful numbness she had retreated to.

"Did that dirty little goblin in the cellar help you?"

Suddenly Hermione's eyes shot wide and one thought and one thought alone crossed her mind at the same time an abrupt and sharp pain bloomed within her chest.

No! I can't leave yet!

Hermione shook her head, at His terrible timing and Bellatrix's questions. "W-we only met him tonight!" she managed to gasp out. "We...we've never been inside your vault. It isn't the real sword! It's a copy, just a copy!"

"A copy?!" the raven-haired witch screeched as she finished her - what she at least considered to be - beautiful knifework upon the mudblood's forearm. "Oh, a likely story!" she spat.

Hermione carefully pulled out the Time-Turner from the box, a finger running over the depictions of what looked to be a sun and moon engraved into the fragile hourglass.

Hermione's vision blurred as she lay on the ground, her body wracked with pain. But nowhere more than her forearm. Bellatrix's maniacal laughter continued to echo in her ears, and the room begun to spin around her. She felt the familiar, searing pain of another round of Cruciatus coursing through her veins and turning her nerve-endings aflame.

In her fading consciousness, Hermione's mind raced. Basic instinct screamed for her to get away, to escape this torturous nightmare. And ignoring her earlier denial of it been too early, too soon, the witch used what little strength she still possessed to reach for the shattered remains of the Time-Turner that had imbedded themselves in her back.

The piece glinted in the dim light of the cellar - not that Hermione could see that, of course. But with her hand trembling with both fear and lack of strength, she managed to grasp one of the larger fragments that had been causing her a mild discomfort. A gasp was torn from her, all but ignored by Bellatrix as she had begun to argue with the Malfoy's after Narcissa had finally demanded that the witch stop.

Hermione could still feel the power of the Time Magic that still clung to the piece in her hand, despite the damage, despite the lack of sand. And desperation fuelled her actions as she whispered - prayed the incantation that would take her to the one she did so wish to see.

"af lífi, tími stelur," she muttered, her voice weak and strained.

A faint golden glow surrounded her, and for a brief moment the pain and chaos of the Malfoy's drawing room fell away. Hermione suddenly felt weightless, as though she were suspended in the In-Between; the moments that lay between Time.

But then, and without warning, a scream resonated through the air - and Hermione Granger vanished from sight.