AN:

This is the result of me getting carried away with the question of "what would Wakanda's defenses be like if Magic." If you've been getting tired of all the long exposition-y dialogues… enjoy?


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8th of September, 1995

Somewhere in Western Africa

Hermione stood in a large, warmly-lit cavern, watching as countless roots slowly unwove from the vast curtain they had formed and curled back to expose double doors worthy of a fortress - wood with the sort of lustre only magic-soaked things seemed to have, two luminous gems at least the size of her head set into either door, each surrounded by octograms utterly filled with complex interlocking glyph-arrays and framed by glyph-covered metal crossbars that pulsed and shimmered to some silent rhythm…

Around her, fellow travelers gathered their things and rose from their cushions around the dozen or so low, round tables - dark-skinned humans and green-skinned Sylvans (the local name for whom she'd yet to learn), oddly tall and intricately tattooed elves, a family of those bat-orangutan people who had fluttered down earlier to chat with said elves, several individuals with their faces concealed by carven masks and their bodies hidden beneath what looked like ghillie-suits made of raffia…

The door-gems flared with ultraviolet power - as did an organic-looking network of previously-invisible veins that spanned the floor and the domed ceiling of the cavern—

like a net, she couldn't help but think, hidden until you've wandered into it

The air seemed to thicken, almost like it had when she'd stepped off the plane into the Lagos afternoon, only without any heat, pressing in on her— goosebumps race down her spine, her arms, her legs—

Then the pressure faded. The veins and gems dimmed. The doors swung slowly outward, revealing another cavernous space she could only make out the faintest details of through the veil of swirling spellwork interwoven across the entryway - like the great archway of Armistice Plaza, complete with narrow vortices of magic wafting this way and that like the tendrils of some great ghostly jellyfish.

Hermione took a breath.

Then she turned to her parents —just in time to see them trade a somber look less intelligible to her than Kaptarian cryptoglyphs— and once she had their attention, asked: "Are you certain you don't want to…?"

Her mother smiled, but it was… off. Strained.

"Darling…" she reached out and grasped Hermione's good hand. "What would we do in a city of magicals? The mages back home have no need for dentists."

"So they say," muttered Hermione's father.

"The mages here might," said Hermione. "Well, there - you know what I mean."

"We do." Her father laid one large, gentle hand on her shoulder. "And you know that we have things arranged for us in Marseille."

"Yes…" Hermione huffed, struggling against the urge to draw the hawthorn wand just to feel it in her hand (it wouldn't bring the same comfort as her wand had, anyway).

Muggle France would be far more comfortable for them, was the thing - far easier than trying to acclimate to a city-state that had no mundane side. Hermione herself had never fully acclimated to magical Britain - but she'd at least been able to participate in it. Mjiwazamani might let ordinary people in (if they were lucky enough to be closely related to a mage), but to what extent could they really take part in its day-to-day society? Its gatherings and popular pastimes? Its culture?

Going to Hogwarts as a muggleborn was hard enough. Living in a magical city with no magic of one's own, and one's profession most likely unneeded…

What sort of life would that be?

Better they go back to France.

(A world away. Farther from her than they'd ever been.)

Hermione blinked frustratedly to stop herself from tearing up. She was only somewhat successful - and then abruptly angry at… what?

Her own tear ducts? Her sadness?

The Ministry?

The Statute?

The bloody International Convention of Wizards?

(Why was everything so infuriating?)

"Oh, come here." Maman pulled her into a hug, mindful of her sling-bound arm. "We'll be fine, mon chou. Dear Fleur's terrifying grandmères will allow nothing less."

…they did seem rather influential. How many retirees could entice a medical specialist to see an uninsured foreigner on his day off?

But if Riddle's death squads hopped the Channel… how high a priority would protecting a few acquaintances really be?

She hugged her mother tighter, gritting her teeth against the pins-and-needles that rippled through her right arm as it was smushed between them.

"Ah," said her father. She pulled back just enough to see his face and found him looking across the cavern, towards the open doors and the veil of magic between them, out of which brightly-dressed travelers were now bustling - most directly across the cavern, towards the archway that led to the main terminal, but a handful clad in matching robes - fiery orange, rich red, black, and silver. As she watched, one tapped their staff against the floor, conjuring a great burst of sparks that coalesced into the haloed-mountain sigil overhead. Then their voice rang out through the cavern, magically amplified: "Incoming students and new residents, please gather around!"

Hermione was already turning back to the table to unzip her bag and rummage through it as quickly as she could one-handed, pushing aside her notebooks, texts, and grimoire-in-progress until her fingers closed around warm, glyph-etched leather.

"Here." She pressed the journal into her father's hands. "You know what they do, you were there when I bought them."

He shifted uneasily - probably remembering all the unearned gold she'd spent to do so.

"I suppose we should be flattered that she thinks we knew what half of all that jargon meant," her mother muttered - then: "Instructions, chou."

Right. She supposed the phrase Hemacryptically secure sympathy-bond was somewhat less than self-explanatory…

"All the necessary spellwork is already in them," Hermione replied. "All you have to do is shed three drops of blood onto that central sigil on the cover — alternating , mind you, one from Nna then one from Maman and so on— and it will henceforth open only for the two of you."

Her father nodded seriously, eyeing the journal as one might a live snake that a zookeeper had assured you was perfectly docile.

"Write to me as soon as you've arrived back in France, alright?"

"We will." Her mother reached out to grasp Hermione's sling-free hand again. "And you'll do the same, once you arrive in Mjiwazamani?"

It wasn't really a request. Hermione nodded anyway. "I promise. I'm not sure about travel times or customs with - whatever is on the other side of those doors, but…"

Maman squeezed her hand. "You can tell us all about that as soon as convenient, then."

Hermione hesitated only briefly before leaning in for another awkward hug - and felt a flare of not-quite-spark-lighting anger at her right arm for being so - so in the way.

Her father joined them, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and tucking her head under his chin. The scent of shea butter, aftershave, and the subtle, indefinable smell of Nna mingled with the nutty, smokey scent of suya spice from Aunt Chigozie's kitchen, almost masking Maman's floral perfume.

Hermione took a deep breath in. She squeezed Maman as tightly as she could with one arm, gritting her teeth against the waves of pins-and-needles from her right, and pressed her forehead into Nna's shoulder. Felt the subtle, warm buzz of the amulets hanging from their necks.

"Incoming students and new residents, please gather around!"

Another deep breath.

Then she uncurled her fingers from the back of Maman's blouse, and let her arm drop to her side.

Her parents held on a moment longer before stepping back. Her father tugged the strap of her bag up her shoulder as if it had been slipping, which it had not.

"Well, go on," he said. "Don't wait around on us. You've got a new world to explore."

Right.

Yes.

The thought wasn't quite as invigorating as it had been a week prior - but it was enough for her to turn away from them, and put a slight bounce in her step as she strode towards the gathering.

It also launched her mind into a third review of the pamphlet she'd been given at the Embassy - entitled CULTURAL ADVISORY in what looked like the work of a stamp crafted specifically for the purpose, bold and clear but just slightly calligraphic. At the top of its first page were the words On Language, and beneath that…

The mother tongue of the founders of Mjiwazamani and their descendants is Ángkwò-Tsìḥréila - also known as Kiserelu, Siralic, and la Sireile. It is our primary language of governance, diplomacy, incantation, and high academia.

Kiswahili is our second official language, and more commonly spoken in recent generations.

Both languages are taught in our schools.

Though fluency in Siralic is not required of students until university or academy it will be a great help for the study of certain magical arts, such as englyphing - i.e. the use of magically-charged symbols to imbue objects with permanent magical effects.

(Hermione had never consciously tried to learn two languages simultaneously - but considering she'd absorbed three more or less at once while her brain was still developing, it couldn't be too difficult.

…right?)

The second page was entitled On Gender, and beneath that title…

Many ideas and customs now commonplace amongst the ordinary peoples of Africa remain foreign to the indigenous societies of Mjiwazamani. Things you may have taken for granted may baffle or even offend your future friends and neighbors.

One subject about which such confusion often arises is the idea of binary sex and gender. You will meet people that defy your understanding of what it means to be 'male' or 'female'. You will meet people that you may not be able to categorize in such terms at all. They are cherished members of our community, entitled to the same rights & dignity as any other. We ask that you practice patience and open-mindedness should any confusion arise. Intentional disrespect and/or harassment of citizen(s) of Mjiwazamani will result in the assignment of mandatory civility lessons. Repeated offenses will cause you to be sequestered from the general population until such time as you prove yourself capable of behaving respectfully.

which made her think of David Corran cutting his hair and binding his chest before each meeting of the Book Club, smiling brighter than he ever was when she'd passed him in the corridors or seen him across the Great Hall - of greek myths of people having their sexes swapped by petty gods - of Loki shapeshifting into feminine form - of an account she had read of Nymphadora Black the First 'assuming the trappings of Lordship' as she went about repopulating the House ( that part wasn't detailed, to Hermione's relief and —purely academic— disappointment both)…

The last page of the pamphlet, she recalled, was entitled On Religion, and stated:

Ours is a society of many cultures, and enforces a variety of anti-discrimination laws to ensure peace between them.

Anyone that finds themselves denied resources or opportunities due to their heritage, place of origin, religion, gender, attraction, or physical condition is entitled to redress in a manner decided by their local assembly. Unfortunately such denials are not the only form in which prejudice may be expressed.

There exists in the society of Mjiwazamani a widespread disapproval of:

A) Christianity and Islam , due to their historical association with colonizers and enslavers

B) The languages of the colonizers (such as Arabic, English, French, Portuguese, & Dutch).

While you are unlikely to be materially, professionally, or academically discriminated against due to your religion or language, Christian and Muslim residents have reported experiencing some measure of social stigma.

Information on how to seek mediation & recompense will be provided upon arrival to your host community.

"Hello there!"

Hermione blinked away the memory.

A woman in fire-and-charcoal-colored robes waved to her from the front of a small crowd - mages of all ages, from toddlers in their parents arms to people older than Aunt Chigozie, some in mundane clothes and other in richly patterned garments she didn't know the names of. Some of the older children looked like they could be firsties awaiting their first tour of Diagon, while others could've been seventh-years. She spotted little Uloma off to one side, standing between her two mothers, and the girl waved shyly.

"Good afternoon!" Said the guide, and to the crowd: "We welcome Hermione Ijeoma Granger of the Ìgbò."

Several people echoed the 'welcome'; others simply waved or nodded. A number of them looked rather nervous.

"I believe that's everyone we're expecting." The guide looked to one of her older comrades, who nodded. "Good! Everyone, please grant me your attention. In a few minutes, we will travel to Mjiwazamani by what is known as a 'port-key', in English."

Hermione suppressed a grimace.

Just lovely.

"This can be unnerving for those who have not experienced it before - but rest assured, it is a highly refined and time-tested method, modified for utmost safety."

Given that even the eminently sensible Delacours seemed to consider wrist-straps the pinnacle of portkey safety, this was less than reassuring.

The guide smiled at the group for a moment, gaze scanning from face to face; then she nodded, and turned towards the huge double doors.

"This way, everyone! Stay close!"

Hermione looked back.

Her parents stood where she had left them, Nna's arm around Maman's shoulders. She'd gone too far to see their expressions - but as she hesitated, Maman raised her hand to make a sort of - shooing motion.

Go on.

Hermione swallowed against the tightness in her throat, turned, and followed the guides through the swirling veil-ward of the double doors, shivering a bit as that feeling of disembodied scrutiny pressed in around her, not looking at the narrow, tendril-like vortex that reached for her…

Then she was through, the feeling gone, a hallway stretching out in front of her - made entirely, it seemed, of interwoven roots that threaded through with the same soft glow as the archway to Armistice Plaza and the baobab that served as Mjiwazamani's embassy. Hermione wondered if they could move like the roots that had covered the gate had moved, to snare trespassers perhaps, and then decided to postpone such thoughts until after she was no longer within hypothetical snaring range.

Vertically challenged as she was, it wasn't until the travelers in front of her reached the end of the hall and spread out that she could see past them, to the… boat?

Yes - there in the center of an almost completely natural-looking cavern (except for the smoothed-out floor) sat what looked like a medium-sized sailboat minus the sails and mast, and with its deck covered by a curving roof. The wood of it was softly luminous in her magesight, with brighter seams here and there. A boarding ramp led up to a gap in its bow-rail.

Hermione suffered a mental record-skip.

Who - no, why make a portkey out of a boat?

"All aboard!" One of the guides said cheerfully.

Up the boarding ramp and into the vessel, Hermione found its strange, oval-domed cabin almost entirely filled with what looked rather jarringly like airplane seats, only more padded - and with two seatbelts each, criss-crossing to form an X.

One might think such a familiarity amidst so much unfamiliar might be would be wrong.

The ceiling was covered in vaguely familiar sigils, each one an eight-pointed star made up of countless glyphs and surrounded by the two solid, concentric circles (with another sequence of glyphs between) characteristic of many area-of-effect protective enchantments.

Also a few cage-wards. The sort one might use for captives to whom an actual cage would be less than effective, in particular.

She really needed to learn the locally common glypharies. Preferably as soon as possible.

It was after she'd sat down, tucked her rucksack under her seat, and buckled the seatbelts across her torso that she discovered the second set of enchantments. The headrest sort of - puffed up, moulding to cradle the back of her head and neck. She felt rather silly for startling so badly. Then a squeak drew her attention to the next seat over, and the young woman strapped into it - who happened to have skin more green than brown and slightly pointed ears pierced with hoops of patterned wood. She smiled a sheepish sort of smile that Hermione couldn't help but return.

"Everyone please buckle up!" The guide who had last spoken walked halfway down the aisle between seats, then stopped to say: "Final safety checks are underway. Now, the last part of our journey involves some hiking. If that presents a problem which you have not already discussed with a Guide, please speak with us once we arrive at the next waystation. We will help you reach Mjiwazamani without hardship."

Hermione realized that she'd been so intent on taking in their surroundings that she hadn't paid much attention to her fellow travelers. As the guide moved on, she turned to the Sylvan woman and asked:

"Hello. I'm Hermione. What's your name?"

"He-lo," said the Sylvan, smiling again. "Meɖe kuku, nyemedoa Eŋlisigbe o."

Ah.

Not being able to communicate with (or at least technically speak the same language as) pretty much anyone she might encounter was still unfamiliar. And awkward.

"Kiswahili?" Hermione asked.

The woman cringed - playfully, not seriously - and replied in said language: "A little. Less than I should know."

"Me too! I have not… take - taken classes in a language that… I do not have…" Ugh, what was the word for fluency? Was there even a direct translation for that, or would it be communicated via some idiom, like in–

"Alright, everyone!" A guide called from the doorway - then stepped through it into the boat, and with a knock of their staff against a small sigil on the wall, prompted the wood around the doorway to grow together and fuse, sealing them all off from the outside. "If you haven't stowed your luggage or strapped in, please do so now."

Some hurried shuffling ensued.

The guide's aura flared and then condensed, brightest around where their feet were planted shoulder-width apart on the floor.

"Thank you for your cooperation!" He said. "We will be departing in ten, nine, eight…"

Hermione turned away to look at the back of the seat in front of her so as not to twist her neck, gripped the straps criss-crossing her torso

"...seven, six, five…"

took a deep breath, then another, then another

"...four, three, two…"

closed her eyes and tensed her midriff to brace for the horrible, stomach-turning spinning

"...one, and...!"

which did not come. There was a lurch, and a pull of sideways G-force that reminded her of the flight to Lagos, but - gentler, even as it shifted directions like being on a plane that was spinning as it fell, faster and faster and faster and faster - Hermione opened her eyes and saw only the seat in front of her and the sigil-covered ceiling above, protected from the whirling void by sturdy beams and planks - she started counting, one, two, three, four…

She'd just gotten to forty-three when a dull THUD shuddered through the deck beneath her feet - and then all was still. There was no dizziness. No nausea.

Oh, she thought. That's why.

"You see?" That guide still stood by where the door had been, with only their staff and their magic for support, looking completely unruffled. "Perfectly safe! You may all unbuckle, now."

They then struck their staff against the wall again –Hermione saw a flare of power at the impact-point this time– and the planks beside them seemed to melt apart, re-forming the doorway. A moment later, the very top of a boarding ramp clunked into place.

Through great force of will, Hermione restrained the urge to rush. This was not a class. There would be no exam - no house points given for being first. And there were elders and children in the group, too.

The first thing she noticed upon her first step out onto the boarding ramp was the humidity and heat - a thick warmth to the air accompanied by the not-quite-physical not- quite -warmth of wards that felt closer in power to those of the Delacour Villa than those of Chez Tonks. Older.

"Please keep moving," a guide called from beside the bottom of the boarding ramp.

Hermione lurched into motion, following the others out of the round chamber the boat-portkey had landed in and into a hallway formed by two rows of towering columns, which were made of some sort of stone she didn't recognize – and she could recognize quite a few, thanks to Professor Babbling. Vines wound around their bases, upwards towards where they widened and merged smoothly into the curve of the vaulted ceiling high above. All of this was marbled with veins of some sort of luminous mineral, which came together and bloomed from the ceiling in great crystalline flowers bright enough to light the entire space. Hermione nearly tripped over her own feet, and went back to minding her more immediate surroundings. Through the haze of reactive potential glowing between the columns, she could see… fog?

Then stone turned to wood, and she was walking into a great hall which appeared to be entirely woven out of living roots; she could see the veins of magic still flowing through them, like spiderwebs in sunlight. The passageway behind her was one of eight entrances. Another group of travelers was following their own brightly-dressed guides out of one such entrance, towards where at least a few dozen mages had already gathered, their auras overlapping in one many-colored, fluctuating cloud.

"Welcome to the Western Crossroads," said the eldest guide of Hermione's group, bald and white-bearded, voice magically amplified. "We now walk in the footsteps of many thousands who have, over the centuries, come seeking refuge in Mjiwazamani. Pilgrims from many lands, of many nations and creeds. Come."

He led them to join the gathering – many more travelers, humans and sylvans and elves and more in a wide variety of attire both magical and muggle, native and European-derived and many mixtures thereof. After a moment of listening, Hermione gave up on trying to count the different languages she could hear being spoken; there were at least seven in addition to the only four she recognized. At one point she caught a glimpse of red feathers in the crowd – but then they all began to move, directed by the guides past the the many entrances of the root-woven hall and through a high archway made of even more roots wrapped around stone, complete with another veil-ward that fogged Hermione's vision and gave her goosebumps as she stepped through it.

Ahead stretched a path made of hard-packed earth leading uphill, lined with… totems(?) made of dark, smooth wood, carved into the shape of some elf-sized, vaguely humanoid creatures with no facial features save for the twin gems serving as their eyes — which glowed with magic that seemed to flare brighter when she looked directly at them. In her magesight, each totem was emitting waves of faint golden magic that met and mingled with waves from the next totem in midair, forming a tunnel of golden light which held back the dense fog beyond. This tunnel ended no more than a dozen meters ahead, leaving the way forward shrouded in slowly swirling white.

The air was colder out here. Colder than the caverns, too.

"Pardonnez-moi!"

She glanced back to see the crowd behind her parting to make way for fellow traveler —human, African, missing his left leg below the knee— who was riding in a wheelchair made entirely of wood (except for a bit of rubber around the wheels), rolling along under the spell-power of the many small glyphs engraved in it.

She stepped out of the way and tried to read said glyphs as he rolled past, to no avail; they were the same curving, foreign set used for the spells disguising the pamphlets - Siralic, she assumed, or whatever ancient language it descended from like French descended from Latin—

Then the crowd closed ranks behind him, and she turned to keep walking just in time to hear the sound of two wooden objects knocking together and see the tunnel-ward pulse brighter and expand forward, further pushing back the fog. Something the guides had done, probably; she couldn't see the ones in front past everyone else in front of her, but those staves they carried had to be for something…

As Hermione walked past the first totem, she felt a wash of warmth - not unlike one of those heat-lamps some restaurants had around their outdoor seating. The totems were close enough together that it was only a few strides between their cozy auras.

For the first few hundred meters, the path led only slightly uphill - but then it gradually grew steeper, until some of her fellow travelers began to slow down. For once, Hermione found herself thankful for Hogwarts' many, many staircases.

Just as her calves were starting to burn, they reached a staircase carved into the solid stone of the slope, leading upwards into even denser fog. Two guides were first to climb the stairs - and as they did they knocked their staves together, sending out a pulse of power that made the tunnel-ward push forward again and the next pair of totems light up, like miniature lighthouses marking the way. Hermione couldn't quite tell if they were actually glowing, or if they just looked that way to her…

Directly behind the guides went three people in wheelchairs… which had become leg- chairs, in that their wheels had at some point unfolded into eight spider-like legs which climbed without tilting or jostling their passengers. They also made Hermione recall the stench of burnt Acromantula. She swallowed, and focused on counting her steps up the stairs. It was easier than clearing her mind.

The further up they hiked, the colder the air was in the yard or so between the auras of warmth that surrounded each totem. Before long, it was practically Scotlandish, thankfully minus the rain or snow.

Why leave gaps? She wondered. Why go to the trouble of turning an entire boat into a portkey for the comfort of travelers, and then letting them feel the cold when they don't have to?

There were no guides near enough to ask.

On the sixty-fifth step, she stumbled — because there was no sixty-fifth stair. Neither was their fog in front of her, at least not for quite a ways, because the tunnel-ward had opened up into a dome of light that came rolling in ripples up through and out of eight trees grown in a circle at least several dozen meters wide. Their leaves were vividly green amidst all the grey and white - and the way the golden power flowed through them was distinctly reminiscent of how long-incantation spells moved through a wand. Around and above them the ripples met and swirled together into glowing skeins, forming a constantly-morphing net of magic that sort of… pulsed .

And once again, there wasn't a single rune or glyph in sight.

Inside the circle was smooth, unmarked stone. As the travelers spread out across it to make room for those behind them, the guide nearest to Hermione made their way over to the nearest tree and started casting… something, their back blocking her view of whatever they were doing with their hand and staff, though it altered the ripples passing through the tree; she looked around, and caught a glimpse of another guide doing the same at the next tree over.

Hermione took the chance to dig some foil-wrapped ibuprofen out of her pocket and swallow it dry, not wanting to bother getting the water bottle out of her rucksack with her right arm still in its sling. After that she watched the other travelers make their way into the circle in twos and threes and fours, punctuated by the occasional spider-chair, which she decided not to watch - and it wasn't long before she saw the unmistakably flower-like auras of three… not Veela, Fleur had said that was a culture-specific name, that the near eastern tribes called themselves variations of Peri and Pariyan, but she'd never mentioned any in Africa; regardless, auras like big phantom flowers, complete with ghostly tendrils curling through the cool air around them. Hermione could only catch glimpses through the crowd, but—

Again, the sound of wood striking wood - from the guides, she saw, hitting the tree-trunks with their staves, at first in unison but then splitting up into two complementary rhythms, then four, then… eight, she assumed based on the doubling and the number of trees, though it was rather hard to count them when they were overlapping like that, and each rhythm sending out waves of magic that she could feel ghosting over her skin.

Then they started singing - the same song from all of them, harmonizing like the Patil twins did for rituals, only in what had to be some form of Siralic —Tsìḥréila— instead of Maharashtri, long gliding vowels punctuated by guttural consonants and the occasional sharp click -sound, filling the air with an almost-electric charge that made all the little hairs of her arms and neck stand on end, made the dome of light glow brighter and brighter at its apex, made her want to sing along, made her want to know the words—

Then that pool of brightness poured down into the center of the circle and sank into the stone - then shone back up out of it in another circle, just a few feet smaller. Many people gasped and jumped away from this new ring of light, so it wasn't just her magesight—

"Please step into the circle," said a magically-amplified voice - and it apparently only took a moment for all the stragglers to have done so, because Hermione felt a shudder pass beneath her feet, and then the entire circle of stone began to sink.

Thankfully Hermione's startled squeak was drowned out by many other, louder sounds of surprise. When the ground beneath her feet remained solid and level, she made herself breathe again, slow and steady, watching the stone outside the circle rise up around it, the ring of trees seeming to slowly revolve around it because the platform itself was slowly spinning - due, she saw, to many grooves carved into the surrounding stone, spiral tracks for the gear-like pegs extending from the platform's sides, slowing and guiding its descent - and, presumably, reducing the spellwork needed to do so. It had to be quite heavy, even without dozens of people standing on it.

It had sunk perhaps ten feet when a web of spellwork flash-wove itself across the hole it had left in the ground above - not gold, but instead a silvery-pinkish hue that reminded her of a protego, only many times larger and more complex - and apparently strong enough to be seen with normal eyes, judging by the murmurs from the crowd.

As the platform sank further into the earth, that shield and the fog above it seemed to slowly, steadily shrink, until she could've blocked it from view with one hand - and then kept shrinking. A number of her fellow travelers shuffled nervously. Hermione saw a little boy huddle closer to his mother's leg. Saw said mother cast some sort of wandless Luceat , a little ball of warm light that floated and bobbed around the boy like a faerie to distract him. The guides that hadn't participated in the… elevator-activation ritual made their way to the edges of it, careful not to bump or jostle anyone.

Perhaps two minutes later, the platform sank out of the shaft, and floated down into another, larger cavern - the floor of which was entirely shrouded in even more fog.

It was, however, much warmer. Enough so for some sort of softly bioluminescent lichen to grow around the bases of the stalactites hanging from its ceiling, and out of the furrows in its craggy walls. The platform settled with a heavy, grating CLUNK that echoed through the cavern. Still no sign of the floor.

The guides raised their staves in unison, and cast eight simultaneous pulses of magic out into the fog.

"Everyone," one of them said, eerily loud in the silence, "rest assured that you are all safe as can be…"

—which was not necessarily the same thing as perfectly safe, Hermione couldn't help but notice and immediately wished she hadn't—

"…and please refrain from any sudden movements."

Ah.

Wonderful.

She started deep-breathing preemptively, gripping the strap of her rucksack with her good hand, peering into the fog… and a moment later, for the first time in her life, she regretted having magesight.

At first it looked like powdered sapphire drifting on a nonexistent breeze, spread over an area much wider than the platform on which she stood. Then it grew brighter and denser, coalescing into a vast luminous pool… which slowly rose out of the fog like an alien sun.

Oh, Hermione thought with a sudden, full-body chill.

Oh shite.

It was an aura.

"Please also refrain from casting anything," said the guide.

The fog stirred, then - displaced by movement. She heard a small splash. Splashes, plural. Saw movement that she instantly recognized as serpentine thanks to all Padma's little friends, only bigger, slithering through the fog towards the platform, rising out of the fog, into the lichen-light so that she could see its… tip.

Because there was no head , nor any scales - just dark rubbery-looking flesh and some kind of whiskery tendrils branching off its end, which it waved slowly over the group - which was distracting enough that she didn't see the second bloody - tentacle until it was only a stone's throw away from her and coming closer, wreathed in that sapphire aura brighter around the tendrils—

More splashing. Fog swirling and parting around some sort of segmented, chitinous appendage that distinctly reminded her of a lobster she'd seen in a tank somewhere except big enough to bludgeon a bloody basilisk, exoskeleton thick enough to stop a blasting curse gleaming faintly metallic as the limb's pointed end slowly stabbed down into the fog beside the platform - and that distracted her from a half-dozen more whisker-tipped tentacles emerging from the fog to wave lazily over the platform and everyone on it, back and forth…

And then one twitched.

Paused.

Reversed course, bobbing lower - until it hovered directly over Hermione's head.

Which. Was fine. This was fine. She'd done nothing wrong, brought nothing with her more dangerous than a knife protected by anti-theft charms, meant no harm to anyone on this entire continent—

—another tentacle waved closer, whiskery tendrils mere feet from her face, closer, twitching individually—

deep breath in, hold, slowly out - nothing wrong she'd done nothing wrong—

—and then, with a strange shudder, the tentacles pulled away. Retreated into the fog.

Except for one, which waved over the nearest guide, and then - bopped him on the head?

Said guide proceeded to pull what looked very much like a chunk of raw diamond out of his robes and hold it up to the tendrils - which moved out of the way for another tentacle that ended in some sort of fleshy bulb. Said bulb then opened up like a lamprey yawning, exposing a three-pronged pincher that very carefully plucked the diamond from his hand before slithering back into the fog… just as another huge, lobster-like limb rose up nearby, bent rather precisely, and drove its pointed tip down into some point beside the platform with a THUD Hermione felt in her bones.

Then it pulled - and the platform rotated , slowly, with a slight grinding but significantly less grinding than one might expect from however-many-tons of solid stone, until something beneath it locked into place with a bone-shaking CLUNK.

Hermione blinked, and nearly missed the flash of power that rippled out from the platform. Gasps and murmurs drew her attention to the right - just in time to see the mist part, revealing dark water that gleamed oddly in the glow of the lichen. Out of that water rose one wide stone block, then another and another, forming a walkway that stretched across the cavern to a gate for giants, made of two solid slabs covered in countless glowing red glyphs and surrounded by eight ports of some kind. Up from the waters in front of it rose eight tentacles, which slithered deep into those ports and sort of - tensed, it looked like, which somehow sent a bright pulse through all those countless glyphs… and caused the gate to rumble open, revealing an archway so heavily enchanted that it looked to Hermione as if it were made of solid light.

"Behold," said one of the guides, "the oldest Mirror-Gate in Africa. Those of you that are especially sensitive to magic, have no fear; it bridges the final gap via deep Material Sympathy, which makes it the safest part of our journey."

It also sounded very much like how the Fairy Paths of Celtic folklore were thought to have operated, which remained folkloric because the exactitude of structural similarity between two objects required to facilitate Sympathy strong enough to safely transport living creatures was molecular - and human mages couldn't do that.

"Come along!" Called the guide, and started down the walkway with a bounce in his step.

No one needed to be told twice.

Hermione followed as soon as doing so didn't require cutting in front of anyone, and did not look back - or at the dark, gleaming water.

Not even what it sloshed nearby.

She ended up somewhere near the middle of the procession, but she could see the people in front climbing the stairs up to the mirror-gate and stepping through it as seamlessly as one might step through a mundane doorway, except for the fact that it pulsed slightly brighter every time someone did - and she had plenty of pondering to pass the time, mind jumping from instantaneous long-distance travel that requires no effort on the part of the travelers to accounts of how the advent of apparation completely changed magical warfare because of how crucial a strategic advantage mobility was to War of the Wasp - denying your opponent the chance to make full use of their might to how easy it could be to break a siege when your fortress being surrounded had no impact on the mobility of your forces…

And then she was climbing the stairs herself, the archway looming tall and bright in front of her - and on the other side a long dark hallway with some sort of huge statue sitting at its end, which for all she knew was a thousand miles away, but that didn't matter.

(How much pollution might be avoided, if ordinary people had access to gateways like this? If they had no need for jet fuel or petrol or whatever they used to fuel trains, no need for the industries that made all those things, all the mining and refining and manufacturing…)

"Go on," said one of the Guides, from her post beside the gate. "There's no trick to it."

Right.

Material Sympathy. No risk. Simple as a mundane door.

Hermione gripped the left strap of her rucksack, took a deep breath, and stepped through.

There was no discomfort, no crushing darkness or even a sense of motion other than that step.

She was very much looking forward to whatever enchanting classes Mjiwazamani had to offer.

Ahead of her stretched a hallway just as monumental as the archway behind her, carved entirely out of what looked like obsidian - eerily smooth and glossy, pitch-black, lit by seams of that glowing crystal she had seen earlier, criss-crossing the walls like lines on a star-chart, complete with bright starlike nodes where they intersected.

Her parents had taken her to Notre Dame, once. This felt rather similar… with the exception of the six-armed statue sitting cross-legged atop the broad stone staircase at the end of the hall, made from what looked like some sort of alchemized ceramic, smooth and pale and segmented like a suit of armor, tall as a house. Four of the arms were bent up at its sides, holding huge weapons in their gauntlet-like hands - an axe, a club, a sickle, and a trident, all glowing a dull red in her magesight. The lower two hands rested palms-up on its knees, as if in meditation. Its head was featureless save for six gleaming gems arrayed in a circle.

Hermione only noticed the figures standing in front of its crossed legs when one of them called out, words she wouldn't have recognized even if they didn't echo so oddly off the dark, star-studded space. One of the foremost guides called back in what had to be Siralic, lilting and lyrical.

Hermione had to walk more than halfway down the hall before she could make out any details of those figures - but once she could, they instantly reminded her of the embassy guards, dressed in enchanted wooden armor with masks over their faces. Four of the eight had auras very much like Fleur's grandmother - wider than a human's, fluid and flower-like, ghostly tendrils cast wide. Each of them held a spear that glowed like the staves the guides were carrying.

By the time she reached the staircase a good portion of her cohort was already there, and had formed a line at the urging of the guides and guards - whose masks, she now saw, were avian rather than mammalian, with sharp curved beaks and bright gleams in the dark depths of their eyeholes as they watched from the top of the stairs. It might have been intimidating, had Hermione not just been bloody well sniffed by… whatever that thing was.

She couldn't see what the line was for, but she could hear people speaking - one at a time far ahead of her, just quiet enough that in combination with the hall's strange acoustics she could only catch the occasional word of English or français or Ìgbò - and with strangely-echoing statement the nearby crystal-nodes glowed a bit brighter, and the statue's eight gemstone eyes gleamed. Its not-quite-face, she noticed, was turned slightly down as if to watch whatever was happening at the front of the line. After each statement, the line moved forward a bit.

After what felt like an hour, Hermione finally reached the top few steps, and across the platform, past the line of people in front of her, saw a wide basin made of the same pale ceramic as the statue looming over it - absolutely covered in intricate, overlapping glyphic sigils. Next to it stood one armored, bird-masked guard holding a bowl full of greenish-blue fire (cleansing flame, she recognized, bog standard for rituals the world over), and a robed guide holding a knife - which she stuck into the fire for a moment before passing to the person at the front of the line. Then she spoke, which Hermione could only tell because their mouth moved, and that person seemed to repeat after her. All of which added up to… well.

She hadn't planned on making a blood oath today, but she could hardly begrudge them their caution after hearing all about the Secrecy Wars. And the wording of it couldn't be too stringent, or at least some of the other travelers would have balked at it already, and none seemed to have done so - all those not in line stood in one group off to the side.

(Unless they were too scared to back out)

As she line moved forward, person by person, she listened carefully, and managed to catch a few more words and phrases - swear not to and Je jure de ne pas and M na-aṅụ iyi na… habitantes… except… and consent a few times per oath, which piqued her interest…

And then it was her turn.

She stepped towards the basin, and found it half-full of… well, something halfway between liquid and vapor, like liquid nitrogen minus the cold and plus what she suspected was powdered moonstone, based on that odd gleam to it. It was also churning, slowly enough as to suggest some viscosity. What wasn't in the basin was any sign of all the blood those before her had shed into it.

"Hermione Ijeoma Granger," said the guide standing beside it, "child of Joëlle and Amadi. That is your true name?"

"…yes?" She replied. "Yes."

"Have you come here of your own free will, under no compulsion or coercion?"

"I have."

A nod. "For the sake of Mjiwazamani's security, we now ask you to shed your blood into this basin. It is a symbolic act - an offering of your vital essence, which will empower the spells that protect our city to sense any danger or malicious intent you may bring with you - and to subdue you, should you violate the oath we must ask you to make. The blood you shed here will be destroyed once you have done so, so that it cannot be used for any other purpose. If you find any of this intolerable, you may choose to be questioned by our Peacekeepers."

"No thank you," said Hermione. Any questioning thorough enough to serve as a substitute for all that would almost certainly involve some sort of truth serum or mind-magic, and she'd had quite enough of strangers rummaging through her thoughts for one lifetime— "Ah. How exactly would one be 'subdued' , if they were to… accidentally violate their oath?"

The guide blinked, which should not have been an anxiety-inducing gesture, and replied: "They would find themselves physically bound, silenced, and sequestered while Peacekeepers questioned witnesses to the violation. They would then be questioned themselves, and most likely transported back to their homeland without any memories of the City, its people, or its defenses."

…well then.

No wonder there was no such arrangement for Hogwarts students. The Wizengamot Houses would never let their children be bound by any power outside their Houses.

(Unless, of course, that power indulged and empowered all their worst impulses)

"I'll… shed blood," said Hermione. "What exactly is the wording of this oath?"

The guide pulled a scroll out of her voluminous sleeve, and unrolled for Hermione's perusal - and as Hermione watched, the letters written on it reshaped themselves from what might've been Yoruba into English. She bit back the questions that immediately brought to mind, and read. And then re-read, to be sure she hadn't missed or misinterpreted anything, which she was almost completely certain she hadn't, because it was… relatively simple. At least compared to some of the old oaths and contracts she'd found in the Grimmauld library - which were not, perhaps, the best point of comparison.

It was also much more flexible than any of those.

"You may swear to whichever power suits you," said the guide, "so long as it neither contradicts nor weakens the oath, and the rest of the oath stays the same."

Right.

Hermione took a deep breath, and unclenched her good hand from the strap of her rucksack.

"Alright," she said… and then looked down at her other hand, still secure in its sling. "Will actively channeling magic while I do this interfere in any way?"

The guide blinked. "Not so long as you don't cast anything into the basin. Or at anyone."

Alright. Good.

"The knife, please."

The guide plucked it out of the cleansing flame, and offered it to her hilt-first.

Hermione focused, and visualized an invisible hand closing around that hilt, picking it up, holding it in front of her - and the magic obeyed. The knife floated, gleaming in the crystal-light.

Then she lifted her good hand palm-up, and took a deep breath.

Steady, now.

It's just a little pain.

She'd levitated her bookbag while having period cramps. She could focus through some momentary pain.

She willed the knife to float closer to her hand, and it did. She willed it to turn just so, and it did. She willed it to press down, to slide across—

—hissed out a breath through clenched teeth, through the sting—

The knife wobbled - and the guide plucked it out of the air.

Blood welled up out of the line it had left across her palm. She turned her hand over, let droplets fall into the churning, misty potion, breathed in to speak - and then faltered, all the fine little hairs of her nape standing on end, as the air seemed to press in around her.

Mage-sight was a misnomer. It had a tactile aspect as well. She could feel it when people looked at her, especially when they did so with intent. Especially when they watched her.

It was not a person watching her now. Human attention did not make something in the back of her mind silently scream at her to run, to hide, did not make her twitch with the urge to obey, did not make the air around her heavy.

Slowly, despite every instinct screaming not to, Hermione looked up.

The statue looked back, each of its eight gemstone eyes full of violet fire.

It had not moved, and yet—

And yet—

"The oath," said the guide, their voice almost - muffled by nothing but air and magic— "Speak the oath."

"I," Hermione gasped out, "Hermione Ijeoma Granger, daughter of - of Yael bat Miryam a-and Amadi Okoro, do hereby swear to the God of my foremothers a-and on—"

—deep breath in—

"—on pain of exile that I shall not knowingly harm any inhabitant of Mjiwazamani without their explicit consent, nor through inaction knowingly allow them to be harmed,"

—she clenched her left hand into a fist, grounding herself in the sting of it and squeezing more blood into the basin—

"that I shall abide by the laws of Mjiwazamani unless doing so would cause harm to its peoples or allow them to be harmed without their explicit consent," she forced out, fighting to keep her voice even, to keep her back straight and her chin up— "and that I shall treat every person within as the rightful sovereign of their own flesh."

—here she stopped to take several breaths, not daring to look away from that ring of glowing eyes, and in that brief pause the air pressed in around her even more, tingles of foreign magic brushing the edges of her aura—

"I hereby swear that I shall not help any person, creature, or spirit enter Mjiwazamani without explicit permission from either the Council of Immigration or a Commanding Officer of its guard,"

The eight gems glared brighter, sending a pulse of magic out in all directions and briefly revealing glyphs all over the statue's face—

"—that I shall not share any knowledge of the city's defenses with anyone unless granted explicit permission from the stewards of those defenses—"

—she could see a haze forming now, all around her, almost mistlike if not for that violet hue—

"—that I shall not knowingly aid any enemies of Mjiwazamani or its allies," she finished, and gasped out: "So may it be."

As if from a mile away, she heard the guide echo those last few words.

For a moment all was silent except for the sound of her own racing pulse, her own breath, and a slowly-building thrum at the edges of her hearing.

Then the statue moved.

Two huge gauntlet-like hands rose off its knees, and slowly reached forward

Hermione tried to step back - and couldn't. The air, the magic in it, the wards - they held her there, motionless as the statue cupped its hands under the basin and lifted it off the floor, up to chest-height.

No.

Not a statue.

A golem.

A final line of defense big enough swat her like a bug - and probably a focus for the wards, which had withstood full-scale magical warfare and would probably react to perceive trespassers like they were invaders—

The contents of the basin burst into ghostly-pale flames, creating a cloud of glimmering steam that swirled up towards the golem's head - where it was sucked into some invisible hole between its gemstone eyes, as if it had inhaled

The gems flared brighter again - and despite the lack of pupils, despite that huge head not moving, she knew it was looking at her - holding her there without lifting a finger, the wards peering through it like a magnifying glass

(Was this how Skeeter had felt, in the jar?)

Another pulse of power rolled over her, wrapped around her, filling the air with intangible, inescapable pressure that made every breath a struggle - it felt like one of Pomfrey's diagnostic charms, foreign magic sinking into her skin and then deeper—

Her vision narrowed until she could only see those eight blazing eyes, everything else going all dark and blurry - she was distantly aware that she was trembling, that she was sweating, and felt a strange warmth spreading through her chest, an anger not her own, a flash—

Then nothing.

.


AN:

'Yael' is the Hebrew name that 'Joëlle' is derived from, and Miryam/Miriam is the one that 'Marion' (AKA Grandma Granger) is derived from. Okoro was the name of Hermione's paternal grandfather.
One more chapter to go for this part :D