Hermione Granger and the Year Hidden from Hogwarts

Harry Potter Fanfiction

Chapter 21

A/N: Wow, sorry. I got busy. But here's another chapter! Thank you as always for the lovely reviews! They keep me going.

April 25th, 1992

Saturday could not have arrived soon enough. She'd spent the rest of Thursday practicing the language magic, and then yesterday trying to convince Ms. Walker to replace her daily nine a.m. block of World Language—currently with Professor Li—with a chemistry class, something Hermione thought might be useful for potions or even transfiguration or alchemy.

She really needed more reading material on subjects other than charms to round out her working understanding of the classifications.

The switch had been a tough sell until Ms. Walker relented and summoned Professor Li. Hermione spoke like a fluent native and earned Professor Li's blessing.

Since they didn't have another linguist expert lined up to take her place, and Dr. Weisberg was already on the roster for teaching her microbiology on Fridays during her two-hour elective block, Hermione convinced Ms. Walker to make the alteration.

Ms. Walker had warned Hermione though not to expect for this change to take place until they lined up another language, reminding her that the Secret Service trained experts, not people good at a variety of different things, and their goal for her was to go on expeditions and uncover beings. Doing so would take her to all corners of the globe, so continuing her languages took precedence over science things.

"If we need a science expert for something on your case, we'll scour around for an expert opinion," Ms. Walker had warned.

Hermione kept her lips sealed, having been warned by Professor Flitwick to keep anything magical from MI5—at least, that which they hadn't already been exposed to.

She'd not had the heart to tell him about Ignis or Erl, not after his reaction to the demiguise incident.

So, she was keeping secrets from everyone these days, the biggest of which was from her parents—who somehow, might've been keeping an even bigger secret from her throughout her life.

Either way, she planned to go to Hogwarts in the autumn, if like Flitwick told her, it was possible without any repercussions befalling her parents. If Ms. Walker found another linguist, she'd just demonstrate her "proficiency" in that language as well to buy more time with chemistry.

It wasn't as if she was slacking off. Less than one percent of the world's population spoke five or more languages, and fit nicely into that category with her English, French, German, Albanian, Latin, and a fair bit of Mandarin. No, she wasn't letting magic make her complacent, she was prioritizing her time.

She'd be facing a year's worth of missing curriculum if they allowed her to start school as a second-year student with her like-aged peers.

Hermione glanced up to the corner of her room where Erl had made himself at home. He now had various baubles he'd pilfered here and there from the lab or Dr. Hampton's desk, decorating his shelf home. "Erl, listen to this. Goblins often have large families, oftentimes raising children together in a neighborhood, or repsnad, as if they belonged to the community rather than individual parents. Goblinkin, the infants and juveniles, are expected to obey the adults in the community as much as they would their parents. If one is found guilty of disobedience, they—"

"You are going to be late to your class with Trainer Hart," Erl interrupted, not looking up from his whittling, even when the slivers of wood shavings piled up on his chest due to his supine position, kicked back on his bed.

Hermione gasped, glancing at her clock, and sure enough, it was nearly eight. If she arrived late, then Trainer Hart would keep her after for double the amount of time she'd wasted, which meant less time at Diagon Alley. "I'll be back!"

Hermione wasn't sure how much she'd be able to concentrate. With all the butterflies in her tummy, breakfast hadn't sounded appealing either. Oddly enough though, the increasing complexity of Trainer Hart's exercises sent the clock racing along, and before she knew it, she made her excuses for the next four hours and shut herself inside her dorm.

She pulled the locket free and opened it, staring at her microscopic reflection within the interior mirror.

With one last thought, she glanced at Erl. "Would you mind keeping guard?"

Mostly, she didn't want him around when Professor Flitwick showed. She still hadn't figured out to tell him she'd inadvertently and unknowingly exposed muggles to more magical creatures, not after his alarm followed by immediate relief at how a team of obliviators had supposedly wiped the demiguise from her friends' and colleagues' minds.

"Guard, mistress?"

"Yes, hide outside in the cupboards in the lab somewhere and if anyone approaches the door, you can alert me."

"Alert you how, mistress?"

That was a good question. She assumed Flitwick would cast the same Notice-Me-Not charms on her dorm, so she really didn't anticipate this being a problem.

"We share a bond, do we not?"

"No, mistress."

She paused, turning fully to Erl. "But you don't try to eat me any longer."

"That is correct, mistress, but while you have a bond over me, we do not share a bond."

Oh, that made a disturbing sort of sense. Hermione felt a chill of dread wash over her. Was that simple response the answer to why her bond with Ignis differed so greatly from the one with Erl? It was one-sided?

"The connection we have in place, will you be able to use it to alert me if anyone comes to the door?"

Erl considered that. "Perhaps. Erklings have never been bound before."

"Try it out," she encouraged before hastily tagging on, "if you wish."

Erl nodded, closing his dark eyes.

Hermione fully intended to fake a reaction just to get him out of the room, guilt aside, but was surprised to feel an actual twinge. In metavision, the azalea cord that tethered him to her glowed and vibrated from whatever Erl was doing to it.

In her vision, she also gave more credence to Erl's words and her own nagging suspicions. While Ignis' bluebell bond with her wasn't actively glowing, it still had a healthy back and forth flow. And if he weren't currently curled up within the nest of her hair, she'd see the singular point binding them together.

She'd wrapped a figurative net around Erl before he quit fighting to break free.

Pushing that aside for the moment, Hermione breathed, "I—I, Erl, that was perfect."

Erl opened his eyes. "Yes, mistress? It works?"

She nodded. "So, would you help me out by standing guard?"

He agreed easily, slipping out the door.

Hermione gave him three minutes to ensure he didn't return with a question, before her eagerness won out.

"Now, Ignis? You have to stay hidden, okay? Just until we learn a little bit more about this Wizarding World and if it's safe to show yourself. Okay?"

Ignis curled his tail against her neck and gave a complacent trill that she took for affirmation.

With her t's crossed and I's dotted, she opened the charmed locket and glanced in the small mirror. Feeling somewhat silly, she cleared her throat. "Professor Flitwick? It's me, Hermione Granger. Hello?"

Nothing sounded for the next two minutes while she cursed herself for not finding out more about how to work the impressive piece of magic.

Just as she was about to sink into metavision, a squeaky voice replied. "Ah, Miss Granger. You're right on time. I assume you're alone like we discussed previously?"

Hermione nodded before realizing the limited viewing area might not allow him to see what she was doing. "I mean, yes, alone as I can be here."

Professor Flitwick didn't answer. Instead, he said, "Pan around the space, if you will. I need a clear destination in mind to apparate somewhere."

Deciding not to delay their shopping trip by wasting time, she kept her lips zipped firmly shut against any questions and reminded herself that she had a game plan. She'd utilize the MI5 funds that'd been funneling into an account of hers for years to buy as many books as she could afford. And she'd probably be able to afford a lot. She'd worked for the secret service on and off for years, so she had quite the nest egg.

She pulled the necklace out and showed the interior of her dorm, and then less than ten seconds later, Professor Flitwick reappeared with an echoing crap in her dorm room.

She yelped, falling against her desk and disturbing the reading materials there. "Oh, you scared me."

"My apologies, Miss Granger," Flitwick squeaked, moving to help her right her notes that'd fallen to the floor. His brows rose. "You've been busy."

Grateful she'd had the foresight to put her notes on the goblin books away beforehand—not that it was a secret per se, but she was playing her cards a little closer to her chest now that she'd learned there were things about her outside the norm of the Wizarding World—Hermione shrugged off his implied compliment. "I like to read."

"I'd say. Did you finish all of them?"

At point blank, she couldn't lie to her one link to this unexplored world, not when he was here helping her out on his day off, so she braced herself and nodded.

Oddly enough, he seemed nonplussed, instead he laughed, placing her notes back in a neat stack on her desk. "Good on you, Miss Granger. Good on you."

It was rather anticlimactic considering the work she'd put into cracking the Gobbledygook language. Maybe there was a spell for language translation. "Thank you, professor. I thought it would be prudent to learn as much as I could since I missed a year."

"That's very pragmatic of you, Miss Granger."

Hermione beamed at the praise, some of her bad early childhood habits resurfacing in the face of such unknowns.

Professor Flitwick waved his wand, casting several spells that Hermione wasn't ashamed to switch into her metavision to observe since he already knew about that part of her.

He turned, his glowing form startling. "Ah, I will caution you against doing that while we're in Diagon Alley. It wouldn't do to draw unwanted attention before we know more."

"Of course," Hermione nodded, her eyes flashing back to their normal honeyed-brown state. His caution aligned with her current plan, after all.

"Now, I'm going to apparate us there."

"Like you did when you arrived."

"Yes, it's handy and fast when we're on a time schedule, but I must warn you. It can be an unpleasant bit of magic. You might be sick from the feeling, but just breathe through your nose, hold very still, and if you're lucky, the nausea will pass before your breakfast makes a reappearance."

Hermione's eyes rounded, hesitating before putting her hand on the professor's proffered fist.

"Very good, Miss Granger. Are you ready?"

She hesitated but ultimately gave her consent.

"Remember to breathe." With the last words of caution, they were gone.

The sensation was awful, suffocating, and when they appeared with a crack on a dark cobblestone alley, she dropped to the ground a was violently ill.

Flitwick vanished her sickness, patting her on the back and murmuring his instructions until she looked a little less green. "There, there. That happens to most their first time. Nothing to be ashamed of."

Hermione groaned, knowing she'd be replaying this moment for months as a mark of great humiliation. "I'm not sure the side-effects are worth the instantaneous travel."

Flitwick chuckled, helping her to her feet. "Side-Along is rather more unpleasant than regular apparition, but the more you do it, the better it gets until you don't even notice."

"I hope so," she mumbled before pulling up short at the sight before her eyes. They'd apparated in on some dead end, perhaps a designated apparition point to avoid…er, traffic jams, so to speak. But out here in the street proper, was a cobblestoned foot path, bright beneath the sun allowed to filter down. It was too narrow for cars, but definitely wide enough to glow with brightness.

Brooms brushed the entrances in front of several shops. Towering stacks of cauldrons defying the laws of physics with their curved, leaning structure stood outside a cauldron shop. Doodads and whirligigs whizzed through the air outside a brightly colored oddities shop. People, dressed in long robes and some even wearing pointed hats went about their business.

"School is still in session, so we won't have many lines to wait in, even for a late morning Saturday," Flitwick offered. "You should see this place in August."

Hermione nodded, her discomfort for the apparition long forgotten as she took in all the sights, reading posters advertising potions for certain afflictions, fantastical drinks, odd candies, and high-quality wizarding robes—even something that had all the looks of a sporting store, complete with an odd form of bat and uniform with strange shaped balls.

"This way, Miss Granger. We'll start at the bank. I'm hoping to get that blood test out of the way. I have some money that you can use—"

Hermione came out of her amazed trance. "Oh, no, professor. I've my own money. It's in a normal bank—err, a muggle bank, that is."

"Not a problem. The goblins have connections with muggle banking. They should be able to complete a transfer of the money so that you can do a bit of shopping if you're interested." He cast her a knowing look, and yeah, he probably did guess that she'd want to get her hands on some books.

"We can pick up a wand for you today if you think you can refrain from using it. That would almost certainly trigger the trace in a way your wandless magic hasn't yet."

That brought Hermione to thoughts the entire reason she'd missed her first year from Hogwarts. "Professor, I've been thinking about the spell that was placed on me to hide me. You made it sound as if my admittance was random, that my acceptance came out of the blue."

"It was. Otherwise, I'm sure that Albus or Minerva would've planned an arranged meeting before… well, before," he replied rather ambiguously. "It's usually on a wizard's eleventh birthday that they're added to the register, and then an owl is sent out the summer before you start. Yours wasn't even on your twelfth birthday."

"Maybe something I did cancelled out the spell? I've been messing around with energy manipulation—which I assume is actually wandless magic like you said."

"I suppose that's one explanation. I won't make the mistake of saying anything's impossible for you. Ah, here we are. Gringotts Wizarding Bank."