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Chapter Text

Harry jerked awake, his hand shooting for the wand that for some reason wasn’t under his pillow. Panic flared. Had the Death Eaters discovered them? Had the safe house fallen? He fumbled for his glasses. The shapes in the room settled into ordinary household items. This wasn’t the stone ceiling of a house on the coast but the faded wallpaper of a place he had thought destroyed. Not a bedroll on damp ground but a real mattress beneath him. The air held no sea spray, no sharp trace of Dittany, only the stale weight of a house shut away from the world. Grimmauld Place. Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place. Impossible.

A sound drew his attention. No crack of Apparition. No boots pounding up the stairs. Only the slow, steady breath of someone asleep. Harry twisted toward the sound and found Ron in the other bed.

Ron slept as one who had never known war: sprawled across his bed, limbs tangled in sheets, mouth open. For Harry, the sight sent a jolt of memory through him. Ron. Not the distant, guarded ally who appeared at their safe house every few weeks with information and supplies, his eyes haunted by whatever he’d witnessed in the coastal villages. This was Ron before the horrors had etched themselves into his face, before the locket had driven that final wedge between them. Before he’d abandoned them in the forest, before the tentative reconciliation that never fully healed what had broken. This was Ron whole and unburdened, untouched by the future Harry had just escaped. He pushed himself upright. For the first time in months, his body offered no protest.

Harry studied his hands. Smooth. Too smooth. No incurable scar on his right palm, no burns on the knuckles. He examined his arm, finding it unmarked by the long gash from that Death Eater’s curse in Knockturn Alley just days ago. Or years from now, depending on how one measured time. He touched his shoulder, rotating it. There was no trace of the dull ache that had become a constant companion after the ambush that took Seamus, several years in the future.

This body didn’t fit. It was too light, too skinny. Harry knew his body by its scars. Without them, he hardly recognized himself.

Ron mumbled something from the other bed, rolled over, and pulled the blanket higher.

Harry stared at the curve of Ron’s shoulders under the blanket. So ordinary. So… years ago. Just a friend asleep in the next bed. In the life he’d come from, Ron had been little more than an ally, their friendship worn thin. They met when they had to, traded news, fought together if needed. The old ease between them had slipped away, leaving only duty and shared memory.

Questions crowded Harry’s mind, pressing against his skull with urgency. When exactly was he? Where in the timeline had he landed? He knew it was Grimmauld Place, which narrowed the possibilities. This couldn’t be the summer before sixth year. By then, Sirius was dead, and he hadn’t stayed here then. And it couldn’t be the summer before what should have been their seventh year, either. They’d stayed at the Burrow until the wedding. This had to be the summer before fifth year, when the Order had used Grimmauld Place as its headquarters. When Sirius was still alive.

August 1995, then. Before the Ministry hearing, before Umbridge, before the Department of Mysteries. Before everything went wrong. But how early or late in that August? Had he just arrived, rescued from Privet Drive after the Dementor attack? Or was it almost September, with their return to Hogwarts looming? What he needed was clarity. Where was he in the timeline? How much time before it all began again?

Harry scanned the room. Near the window sat a cage, and the sight of it stopped him. Hedwig.

He rose. It couldn’t be. Hedwig slept by the window, head tucked under her wing. Harry’s strength fled from him, and he caught the desk to stop himself from collapsing. She had died during their escape from Privet Drive, the summer before seventh year. Hedwig had been one of his first friends in the magical world. And now, here she was, alive again.

He pushed his hand into the cage, fingers shaking. Her feathers were soft, warmer than he remembered. Hedwig blinked awake, amber eyes sharp with the same impatience she had always shown when woken. The sight left him raw.

“I’m sorry, girl,” he said, not knowing whether it was for then or now.

The questions multiplied, branching into possibilities and responsibilities that made his head spin. He had a chance to change everything. Save everyone. But he would need to be careful, strategic. He couldn’t just tell them. They’d never believe it.

Hermione. Of course. Was she here, too? Did she remember? Or was he alone in this impossible reality, carrying the weight of a future no one else could see? If he remembered, if he’d been sent back with his mind intact, then surely she had, too. The Timeweaver Stone’s magic had affected them both. If anyone else knew, it would be her.

Harry smelled his t-shirt. Fresh enough. Jeans next, from the heap on the floor. Then shoes and socks. No time for anything else. His hair never tamed, anyway. He had to find her. Confirm they shared the same reality before facing anyone else in this house full of ghosts who didn’t know they were supposed to be dead.

The latch clicked as Harry slipped from the room. The corridor was narrow and dim, the wallpaper curling and frames streaked with age. In his memory it was worse: walls torn down, the hall split open in the siege. This entire section of the house had collapsed in the Death Eaters’ attack, four months into Voldemort’s Dark Regime. Harry had escaped through the wreckage, dragging an injured Hermione with him as Incendio spells scorched the air around them.

Now the walls stood intact, if shabby. Old stone, old spells, long neglect. The place stank. Dusty carpets. Damp in the walls. Something rotten that never shifted no matter how much you scrubbed. Mrs. Weasley’s cleaning potions cut through it here and there, sharp and sour, but the house kept its stink. Harry stared at his inheritance, each glance a strange tripling of memory. What was, what would be, and what now might never happen.

A door opened ahead. Hermione appeared. She had on jeans and a faded t-shirt, her hair knotted back into a braid. Harry froze. Hermione never wore her hair like that. Not in this timeline. Only in his. It had become the way she wore it once the Dark Regime took hold, tied back so it wouldn’t catch her eyes while running or fighting.

Ginny followed her, grinning at something Hermione had said. Her movements were light and carefree in a way that made Harry’s chest ache. The sight of her sent a shockwave through him. The dim light caught her hair, turning it copper. She laughed, unaware of the years ahead. Her smile was easy, untouched by war. But in his world he had found her shattered body in the ruins of a fallen safe house, wand in hand, face frozen in one last stand. What was that, two months after Hogwarts’ fall, perhaps? The memory pressed on his chest until Harry could barely draw breath.

And yet, looking at her now, something was different about his feelings. There was relief, yes, of course. She lived. She was here. Yet the old pull had vanished. The flutter, the rush, all burned out, replaced by something quieter. Something calmer. It had happened without him noticing. Sometime during the Horcrux hunt, maybe. After Ron left, before Malfoy Manor, in the nights when Hermione’s quiet presence kept him sane.

He no longer carried the same feelings for Ginny. That intense crush was gone, sometime during his seventh year. The boy who kissed her in the Gryffindor common room seemed as distant as another lifetime. In a way, Harry supposed it was.

He could not say when the change had come, when he had let go of even the last of those feelings. Maybe in the long trudge between safe houses. Maybe on the nights he lay awake, waiting for the world to end, while Hermione’s breathing kept the dark away.

Hermione’s eyes met his. In that instant, Harry knew. Recognition flashed between them, absolute and undeniable. Not just recognition of each other, but recognition of shared experience, of impossible memory, of a future that now existed only in their minds.

She remembered. She knew.

They were in this together, as they always had.

Ginny glanced between them, oblivious to the silent communication happening over her head. “Morning, Harry,” she said. “Sleep well? Ron’s still unconscious, I’m guessing?”

“Yeah,” Harry managed. His voice sounded strange. Younger, less worn by shouting orders across battlefields and through the smoke of burning buildings. “He’s still asleep.”

“I’m heading down for breakfast.” Ginny started toward the stairs. “Coming, Hermione?” She paused, one hand on the banister, waiting.

“I’ll be down in a minute,” she said, steady enough though her hands trembled. “Save me some toast.”

Ginny shrugged, then started down. The steps groaned after her; there was no such thing as quiet in this house. When the sound ended, the corridor seemed too small, holding only him and Hermione. She crossed the space between them with quick, measured steps. Her eyes never left his, as though one glance aside would undo the moment. Harry understood all too well.

“Did you sleep well?” she asked, her voice pitched low for any listening ears, but Harry heard the real question beneath. Is it really you? Do you remember everything?

“Better than I have in months,” he said, matching her casual tone while letting his eyes convey the truth. Yes, I remember. The Timeweaver Stone worked. We’re both here.

Neither spoke the artifact's name. They couldn’t risk it, not here. In these younger bodies, they were underage again, unable to cast the protective charms that had become second nature during their months on the run. No Muffliato to cloud eavesdroppers’ ears, no Imperturbable Charm to seal a room. Anyone might come upon them, and certain conversations would raise questions they weren’t ready to answer.

But no words were needed. Hermione’s eyes held the shadows of the future they’d escaped. The battles, the losses, the constant flight. Behind the youthful smoothness of her skin lived the woman who had stood beside him in a dozen safe houses. A determined witch, who had bandaged his wounds and guarded his sleep, whose tactical mind had kept them alive when hope seemed lost.

Three steps and she was against him. They crashed together in the hallway, arms wrapped tight, the grip of people who knew what it meant to lose. Harry pushed his face into her hair. The smell jolted him. No sting of Dittany, no harsh soap, only a clean, faint sweetness.

“We made it,” she said into his shoulder. Her voice was so low he caught it in his bones instead of his ears. “It worked, Harry. It worked.”

He crushed her closer. She was lighter in his grasp, no wiry edge to her yet, but she steadied him all the same.

“I know,” he said. “I can’t believe—”

He couldn’t finish the thought. The weight of it struck him all at once. They weren’t only in the past; they were inhabiting their own younger bodies. Everyone who had died in their timeline lived again. Every mistake that had led to Voldemort’s victory could be undone. The future that had crushed them beneath its boot might never come to pass.

They broke apart after a moment. Hermione’s hand stayed where it was, gripping his arm like the touch itself proved something. Her eyes were wet, but her face stayed fixed. Harry had seen that look before; her thoughts had already moved to what came next.

“We need to talk,” she said. “But not here. Not now. We should go down for breakfast, act normal. After, we’ll find somewhere private.”

Harry nodded, feeling the old, familiar rhythm establish itself between them. That balance of action and caution, instinct and planning that had kept them alive through Voldemort’s Dark Regime. “We need to figure out exactly when we are,” he said. “How much time we have before—”

Down the hall, a door opened. Ron emerged, hair tousled, eyes still heavy with sleep. “There you are.” He yawned, scratching his head. “Thought I heard voices. Breakfast ready?”

Harry turned toward his oldest friend, struck again by the absence of the wariness that had characterized the Ron of their future. This was Ron before the locket had poisoned his thoughts, before he had walked away, before the war had driven wedges between them. This Ron looked at Harry with simple friendship, uncomplicated by the layers of guilt and resentment that would eventually form.

“Should be,” Harry said, working to keep his voice casual. “Ginny just went down.”

“Brilliant. I’m starving.” Ron started toward the stairs.

Hermione gave Harry a look before turning to join Ron. “We should eat,” she said, practical as ever, though Harry knew her mind was racing with the same calculations as his. How much time they had, what needed to change first, how to navigate this second chance without alerting anyone to their knowledge.

They followed Ron down the stairs. The changes between then—he twenty, she twenty-one—and now at fifteen and almost sixteen, were too great for them to pretend to be who they’d been back then. Back… now. Harry knew caution was the only way forward.

The staircase moaned beneath the three teenagers’ combined weight. Harry’s thoughts leapt to the night those same steps had shattered under curses. He had jumped over broken sections while fire burst around him. Now the wood only sagged with age, the rail strong under his hand. The sense of time buckling and twisting around itself thrust him off-balance.

They reached the lower stairs and could already hear the kitchen. Plates banged, and bacon spat in the pan, voices carrying up with the smell of food. A barking laugh carried over the din, one Harry had not heard in years but recognized at once.

Sirius.

The sound slammed into him. Harry stopped where he was, midway on the final steps. And then came others. Tonks’s bright, clear voice saying something about Scrimgeour, followed by Remus’s quieter response. Fred’s distinctive chuckle joining in, overlapping with what might have been Moody’s gruff rumble.

They were all here. All alive. All unaware of the fates that awaited them. Fates that Harry now carried the knowledge to prevent.

Emotion broke over him in a rush. Grief and joy tangled together, impossible to separate. All the faces he had lost to the Second Wizarding War. He had carried their absence with him for years. And now they were there, just beyond that door. Continuing conversations cut short by war and sacrifice.

Harry clung to the banister and didn’t let go. He wanted to run to them. The desire to wrap his arms around each and every one of them, to tell them everything, was almost too strong. Sirius, who would fall through the veil in less than a year if Harry didn’t change things. Remus and Tonks, who would leave behind an orphaned son. Fred, whose laughter would sound no more after the Battle of Hogwarts. Moody, who would fall from the sky.

His vision went blurry, breath coming fast, rough, beyond his control. Everything stood on the point of breaking.

Then Hermione’s fingers touched his. A fleeting touch, hidden from Ron’s view, but enough to anchor him back to the present moment. Her touch carried the silent message they’d perfected over years of danger. I’m here. We’ll face this together. Hold on.

Harry forced air into his lungs, steadying himself. He couldn’t break down, not here. They had work to do, plans to make. The people beyond that door weren’t just ghosts to mourn but lives to save. Futures to rewrite. He needed to stay focused, to gather what knowledge he could. Brace himself for the battles still waiting.

Hermione’s gaze caught him, and in it he saw his own resolve. He smiled at her, then continued down the stairs toward the kitchen. Toward the voices of the dead.

Chapter Text

Hermione followed Harry down into the kitchen of Grimmauld Place. She wore an expression of what she hoped passed for ordinary morning drowsiness rather than the stunned disbelief still reverberating through her. Warmth closed around her the moment she stepped in, banishing years of cold shelters and sparse provisions. Bacon and bread scented the room, layered with voices and the clatter of plates. The contrast to those quiet, dread-filled suppers from before was so sharp she almost lost her step at the threshold.

She gathered herself, letting her eyes sweep over the room’s occupants as she might have once checked for exits. The basement kitchen looked the same, the broad wooden table holding its place at the center. In her recollections, Grimmauld’s kitchen had been a place of dim light and heavy gloom, its ceiling pressing down and its walls lined with shadows. But here and now, to her surprise, it carried a touch of comfort. Against the backdrop of lean years and cold shelters, this seemed almost homely.

Chairs borrowed from every corner of the house surrounded the long table, all except four now filled. Filled by people who, years in the future, were already dead.

Sirius lounged at one end, his arm lying along the chair’s back. The sharp burst of his laugh made Hermione start. Tonks leaned forward beside him, her hair a brilliant shade of purple this morning, eyes bright with curiosity as she addressed Remus across the table.

Remus looked younger than Hermione remembered, the lines of strain not yet permanent on his face. He nursed a cup of tea, eyes on Tonks while he nodded at Arthur’s animated chatter about some Muggle invention. Both men would die defending others. Arthur at the Ministry when the resistance cell within it fell, Remus beside his wife during the Battle of Hogwarts.

Mrs. Weasley bustled between the stove and table, her plump figure moving with efficient purpose as she directed food onto plates with her wand. The Molly of Hermione’s future had been a gaunt shadow of this woman, her movements quick with fear rather than maternal efficiency, her eyes seeking exits rather than ensuring everyone had enough to eat.

Fred and George sat hunched together at one side, passing something beneath the table that made periodic clicking sounds. Fred’s animated whispering, his whole face alive with mischief, sent a sharp pain through Hermione’s chest. His death had broken something fundamental in the Weasley family, the first of many losses, followed by Arthur, Ginny, and then later George, who just went missing one day.

Moody occupied the far corner, as though stationed there to survey everyone. His magical eye turned without pause, and Hermione stiffened when it caught her. Could it see beyond her composed exterior? Could it somehow detect the years of war and suffering she carried within this younger body? Reason told her it was nothing, but habit born of long vigilance made her strengthen her mental shields all the same.

Ron had already claimed a seat, reaching for a platter of sausages. Ginny sat across from him, bright and whole.

“Come on then,” Mrs. Weasley said, noticing them hovering in the doorway.

Hermione moved forward, calculating the remaining seats. She took the one beside Ron, while Harry chose to sit across from her. A deliberate choice; this way they could gauge each other’s reactions without making their silent communication obvious.

Harry looked steadier now, though a lingering paleness clung to his features. The shock of hearing all these people alive again had struck him harder, she knew. He had carried every loss as if it were his own mistake. Hermione caught the brief look he gave Sirius before turning to the empty plate before him.

“Sleep well, dears?” Mrs. Weasley asked, sending a loaded plate floating toward Hermione.

“Yes, thank you,” she said, accepting the plate with a polite smile.

The food itself was another shock: fresh, abundant, and served without the constant calculation of rations that had governed their meals during the Dark Regime. No need to preserve every crumb, no silent counting to ensure everyone received equal portions. Her belly pulled tight with the memory of hunger, of food rationed into nothing.

Beside her, Ron spoke through a mouthful of eggs, trying to engage Harry in Quidditch talk.   His casual enthusiasm was so disconnected from the Ron she remembered from the future. That wary, battle-hardened soldier who appeared at safe houses with scavenged supplies and haunted eyes, who spoke in clipped sentences about Death Eater movements rather than sports, was nowhere to be found yet.

“Pass the marmalade, yeah?” he said to her, oblivious to the storm behind her calm expression.

She handed it to him, then watched as Harry filled his plate under Mrs. Weasley’s watchful eye. There was subtle tension in his shoulders, a measured quality to his movements. Others might not notice it, but Hermione did. He was working to appear normal while processing the impossible reality around them.

Ginny’s laugh carried across the table, easy and unrestrained. In the other timeline, she had died defending a safe house full of younger students. The memory of that scene, of Harry kneeling beside her with a broken look on his face, crashed against the sight of her now buttering her toast. Hermione rested her fork on her plate before it shook loose from her fingers. The shock had softened since the morning, though not enough to free her from it.

“—and of course, there’s your hearing next week, Harry,” Sirius was saying, his words drawing Hermione back to the moment. “Dumbledore’s arranged things, but we need to make sure you’re ready for whatever they throw at you.”

Next week. The hearing. Hermione’s mind latched onto this concrete fact amid the swirl of emotions.

“Blimey, it’s only Sunday morning, and you’re already going on about the hearing,” Ron said. “Can’t Harry at least eat his eggs in peace?”

Sunday. That meant it was now the 8^th of August. The knowledge clicked into Hermione’s mind like the first step in a long calculation. Harry’s disciplinary hearing had fallen on Thursday, August 12th. It was still the start of the line of events that would lead them into the Department of Mysteries, cost Sirius his life, and bring Voldemort into the open. The knowledge was both overwhelming and clarifying. They had time. Not much, but enough to begin planning.

“Any plans for today, Hermione?” Mrs. Weasley asked, refilling teacups around the table. “We’ll be tackling the drawing room after breakfast if you’d like to help. Those Doxies are getting quite bold.”

“I thought I might sort through some of the books in the library,” she said, the lie easy enough.

“Always studying, that one,” Ron said around a mouthful of toast, though his tone held affectionate teasing rather than genuine criticism.

Mrs. Weasley’s brow creased at once. “Now, Hermione, the library’s not all ink and parchment. Some of those volumes bite.” Ron gave a snort, but she hushed him with a sharp glance. “If you must, go on, but only with gloves, and call me if anything looks the least bit suspicious.”

“Will do, Mrs. Weasley.”

She ate in silence, chewing with care while animated discussions flowed around her. When she looked up, Harry was watching, and in his face she saw her own reservations. They would have to plan first, mark the limits, before altering anything.

Moody’s magical eye swiveled toward her, and Hermione dropped her gaze to her plate. Another skill honed by years of survival. Never draw attention, never reveal more than necessary. The impulse to maintain secrecy was an ingrained part of her now. She and Harry couldn’t risk anyone discovering their knowledge of the future, not yet. Not until they understood what the situation was and how to proceed.

Tonks’s elbow caught the jug of pumpkin juice on the table,  knocking it off balance. A thick orange pool crept across the wood. The clumsy accident was so ordinary, so Tonks that an unexpected wave of tenderness washed over Hermione. In their timeline, Tonks had died beside Remus, leaving behind an infant son who would never know his parents.

But here she was, laughing at her own clumsiness, both her hair and her personality still bright. Here they all were, untouched by the horrors that had shaped Hermione’s memories. The weight of responsibility settled on her shoulders. This time, they would protect them. This time, they carried knowledge enough to change what lay ahead.

August, then. Four days before Harry’s hearing. Less than a month before his first detention with Umbridge. Months before the Department of Mysteries. Under two years to Dumbledore’s death. Less than three years before the fall of the Ministry, before the Dark Regime, before safe houses and the weaponized Trace and desperate flights through the night.

Hermione took a sip of tea, her mind already sorting possibilities, cataloging crucial moments they could alter, weighing risks against potential gains. They would need patience. Discipline. A wrong choice might make the future darker, not lighter. Even so, hope began to return, fragile but real.

They had a second chance. They wouldn’t waste it.

---

When breakfast wound down and chairs began to scrape against the stone floor, Hermione seized her opportunity.

Each step away from the kitchen felt like emerging from deep water. The noise below thinned until it was nothing. Hermione climbed with one hand sliding along the wall, steadying her uneven steps. She stopped at the library door.

Generations of Blacks had added to the shelves, until the place sagged under its own darkness. Books crowded the shelves in solid lines, the spines frayed with age. Dust floated wherever the curtains failed to block the sun. The air was close, rank with old parchment and the glue that held it. Hermione didn’t dare disturb anything. The Black collection reeked of dark magic. Even the curtains seemed suspect. Doxies could be hiding there, just as before, waiting with their poisonous bite.

Her gaze roved the clutter. There, perched on the sill beside yellowed periodicals was a dented can of Doxycide. Hermione grabbed it, shook once to be sure, and pressed the nozzle. The chair by the curtains darkened as the spray spread, bitter fumes rising at once. She bent to direct the spray beneath the seat and along its carved legs, making certain no shiny, beetle-like wings or needle-like teeth lurked out of sight.

She lowered herself into the chair once the spray had dried, her seat turned toward the door. Its hinges gave a tired whine. Harry slipped inside and left it half-ajar, careful not to seem secretive. He looked a little stronger now, though grief still clung to him. Without a word, he sank down beside her chair, resting against its side. They had sat this way before, in places far rougher than this, planning their next move.

Harry let his head rest against the chair. “I’ve been thinking about something. Are we ourselves, Hermione? I mean, did only our memories travel back, or are we still… us?”

“You mean, are we just our younger selves with future memories? Or are we our actual future selves somehow transplanted into these bodies?” she asked, her analytical mind already dissecting the problem.

“Exactly. Because if we’re just our younger selves with future memories, then certain things would be different than if we’re…” He trailed off, his eyes focusing on something distant.

“You’re thinking about the Trace,” she said, understanding where his thoughts were leading.

His head jerked toward her. “Yes. When I awakened this morning, I reached for my wand, sure I was still in that safe house. But in the corridor, when it was just us, I felt this instinct in my gut not to try. As if I were underage again.” He lowered his voice. “But that makes no sense, does it? We’ve always been able to do magic in wizarding houses. The Ministry can’t tell who’s casting.”

“I thought the same,” Hermione said. The relief was sharp, almost immediate; she hadn’t imagined it, after all. “It was automatic. Almost like a reflex.”

“I think it’s because of the Dark Trace,” Harry said, and the mere mention of it sent a chill through Hermione’s body. “Some subconscious part of me must have been convinced it wasn’t just the regular Trace or underage magic laws. That it was the Dark Trace, and it would find us here too, even with the Fidelius Charm, even with all the other protections, even with so many adults around.”

Hermione considered this, her mind racing through the implications. The Dark Trace had been Voldemort’s most insidious tool during the Regime. A corrupted, weaponized version of the Ministry’s tracking spell, expanded to cover not just underage wizards but anyone deemed “undesirable.” It had been devastating, capable of pinpointing magical signatures with terrifying accuracy, rendering concealment charms almost useless. So many safe houses had fallen because of it. So many friends lost.

“If we only have our original selves’ memories,” she said, “then only the original laws would apply, and we shouldn’t get into trouble for using magic here.”

“But if we are our original selves…” Harry left the thought hanging between them.

“Even then,” Hermione said, “the infrastructure for the Dark Trace doesn’t exist yet. The magical framework, the specialized detection charms, the expanded registry; none of that has been created yet. It’s possible that even if we are our future selves in some fundamental way, the Trace would revert to its normal, less invasive form simply because the mechanism for the enhanced version doesn’t exist in this time.”

Harry let the thought settle, sketching patterns with one fingertip against the worn rug. “We could test it,” he said, though his tone lacked conviction.

“At some point, yeah,” Hermione said. “But not now. Not yet. We need more information before we risk exposing ourselves. Besides, we have more immediate concerns. It’s the summer before fifth year. The eight of August.”

“Four days before my hearing,” Harry said. “We need to decide how much we’re going to change and how soon. And who, if anyone, we’re going to tell about what we know.”

For a moment words failed them both. The knowledge sat between them. The lives they could save, the suffering that was preventable. It was too much to contemplate.

“I reckon we ought to keep it to ourselves,” Harry said. “At least until we have a concrete plan. If we start telling people about the future, about what happens to them…” He shook his head. “We’d change too many variables at once. We might make things worse.”

Hermione nodded, comforted by his agreement. “Agreed. Caution first. And that brings me to another concern: Occlumency.”

He winced, no doubt dragged back to those miserable hours under Snape’s eye. “I’m supposed to be rubbish at it,” he said. “But after everything…”

“We’re both quite proficient.”

The ability to shield one’s mind had become as essential as breathing during those dark years. Many Death Eaters and elite groups of Snatchers had used Legilimency against them, tearing through captured resistance fighters’ thoughts without mercy. Learning to protect their minds had been a matter of survival.

“How do we explain that? Snape’s going to know right away that I’m not the novice I’m supposed to be.”

It was a fair point. Hermione worried her lip, her mind racing. “We’ll need a way to mask your ability. You’ll need to make it seem like you’re struggling when you’re really in control. It’s not ideal, but…”

“But neither is explaining how I suddenly know advanced Occlumency,” Harry said. “That would raise too many questions.”

Another hush fell, the air carrying only the far-off sounds of life elsewhere in the house.

“What about Dumbledore? I know you said not to tell anyone, but… he could help us.”

Harry’s face clouded, and Hermione understood the reason at once. Dumbledore had held back too much in the life they’d already lived. The prophecy, the connection to Voldemort, the plan that would have led to Harry walking to his death in the Forbidden Forest. What he called protection had often felt like control, his lessons chosen more for his purposes than Harry’s.

“Not yet,” Harry said after a pause. “It’s not… Look, I don’t think he’s against us, but—”

“But he never told us enough,” Hermione said. “And it cost us. Maybe if he’d trusted us earlier… maybe none of it would’ve gone the same.”

His eyes gave him away. Relief, as though she’d spoken the thing stuck in his throat. “Exactly. We’ll handle it ourselves, at least for now. We know what’s coming. We can prepare for it better than anyone.”

“And if we start interfering with too many things, people will notice,” she said. “Dumbledore especially. He doesn’t miss much.”

“So, we keep this between us,” Harry said. “We change what needs changing, but discreetly. Otherwise, it unravels.”

The corner of Hermione’s mouth pulled up in a small, grim smile. “Just like always, then. Operating in secret, staying one step ahead.”

“Except this time,” Harry said, looking up at her with the first real glimmer of hope she’d seen in his eyes in many months, “we know the enemy’s moves before they make them.”

The enormity of their advantage struck Hermione anew. They weren’t fumbling in the dark anymore, reacting to Voldemort’s actions. They could anticipate, prepare, position themselves. At last, the advantage was theirs.

They let the silence linger. The future was heavy with peril, but Hermione’s thoughts carried a focus she hadn’t possessed in many months. They had direction now. Purpose. A chance to rewrite a history that had claimed too many lives.

“So,” Harry said, “where do we start?”

The question hung between them, so simple yet encompassing everything they needed to accomplish. Beneath her calm countenance, Hermione’s thoughts raced beyond the tactical considerations to more personal terrain. The image of her parents surfaced. Not as she’d last seen them, oblivious to her existence, but as they would be now. At home, their lives unaltered. The knowledge that they were just a visit away, whole and untouched by the horrors she remembered, created a peculiar ache in her chest. So close yet separated by secrets she couldn’t share.

“We start with what we know for certain,” she said, forcing herself to focus. “The immediate events. The hearing. Umbridge’s arrival at Hogwarts. The formation of the DA.”

Yet even as she worked through the next steps, the past shoved its way forward. She remembered Harry’s face as she stitched him up, her hands steady despite the air in the safe house freezing them numb. The constant vigilance that had become second nature, eyes scanning for escape routes even in secure locations. The hollow feeling of waking each morning to a world emptied of those they loved.

One particularly harrowing escape surfaced in her mind: racing through snow-covered fields after their wards had collapsed, the crack of Apparition behind them signaling the arrival of Snatchers. They’d been forced to separate, reuniting three days later at a pre-arranged location, both half-frozen and exhausted but alive. In those days, survival itself had been victory enough.

Now, incredibly, they had the chance to prevent it all, to ensure those horrors remained nothing more than phantom memories of a timeline erased.

“I keep thinking about them,” Harry said, startling her. Hermione realized she had lost herself to memories. “You know, them. At breakfast.” He swallowed hard, and Hermione watched the muscles in his throat work against emotion. “Especially Sirius. I’ve had dreams about him for years, you know. Not nightmares, just… ordinary moments. Conversations we never got to have.”

The raw vulnerability in his admission touched her. Harry had always hidden his grief, showing almost none of what it cost him. The fact he shared it with her now said much about how time had reshaped them both. About the trust that had developed between them during those dark times when they had no one else.

Without thinking, Hermione reached down, her fingers finding his hair. The gesture was familiar, comforting; one she’d made countless times in their future when words seemed inadequate. Her hand brushed through his messy hair, gentle but firm. His shoulders lost some of their rigidness, his head shifting toward her touch.

“I know,” she said. The clash between memory and reality was staggering. Seeing the dead alive again, unscarred, moving through ordinary days. “It’s like walking through a dream.”

Harry shifted, looking up at her. “I’m sorry. I just realized: your parents are ‘back’, too. They’re waiting for you, not in Australia. Not oblivious to who you are.” His eyes reflected understanding of what that meant for her. “You must want to see them so badly, and here we are, stuck planning for a war they don’t even know exists.”

Something warm unfurled in Hermione’s chest at his words. Of course Harry would remember. Would understand what it meant to her to know they were safe, themselves again. Their memories intact. His own anguish hadn’t blinded him to hers.

“Yes,” she said. “I do want to see them. But this is more important right now. We’ll have time; that’s what we’re fighting for. Time for all of us.”

Her hand kept moving through his hair, a small tether to the present. She thought how odd it would look to anyone from their past: her at close to sixteen, stroking Harry’s hair like this. But they weren’t those ages anymore. They carried years no one else remembered. Time had remade them. They had endured close to two and a half years of Dark Regime together, their closeness forged in battle.

“We should start listing what we know,” she said after a moment, her practical nature reasserting itself. “The major events of this year that we might be able to alter.”

Harry nodded, straightening his posture a little although he did not move away from her touch. “The hearing’s first,” he said. “Four days from now. But I don’t know if it matters. They’ll never take my word over Fudge’s. I don’t have witnesses anyone respects. The Wizengamot’s already set on making me look unstable.” He let out a low breath. “All I can really do is survive it, keep my place at Hogwarts, and wait for chances that matter more.”

Hermione sighed. “True. Which brings us to Umbridge’s arrival at Hogwarts. The Ministry’s interference. Those Educational Decrees.”

“The blood quill,” Harry said, his right hand flexing. With a shudder, Hermione recalled the words once carved into his skin.

“We’ll need to handle her differently this time,” she said. “Find a way to undermine her authority without putting ourselves at risk. The blood quill… Harry, I won’t stand by while she cuts into you again. It’s forbidden, and she knows it. If she tries, we’ll make sure the whole school sees. No Ministry decree will protect her if enough people witness what she does.”

“And the DA will be crucial too,” Harry said. “But we’ll need to be more careful about security. Marietta Edgecombe—”

“Won’t get invited.”

They continued discussing the events as they remembered them, keeping their voices low. Hagrid’s absence and return with Grawp. Umbridge becoming High Inquisitor and then later Headmistress. The issues with Kreacher. The Daily Prophet smear campaign. The increasingly disturbing dreams that had led Harry to believe Sirius was being tortured in the Department of Mysteries. The prophecy.

“That’s the most critical point,” Hermione said. “The trap that Voldemort set for you.”

“We save Sirius,” Harry said. “And we keep the prophecy out of Voldemort’s hands while still forcing the Ministry to acknowledge his return.”

Hermione frowned. “It might require allowing some events to proceed as they did originally. We can’t change everything without risking unforeseen consequences.”

“No,” Harry agreed. “But we can change the outcomes that matter most.”

A board creaked out in the hall, silencing them both. Hermione’s head lifted, tension in every line of her frame. Harry pushed himself up just as Ginny stepped through and entered the library.

“I thought you were sorting books,” she said, her tone a little odd.

It reminded Hermione that next year, at sixteen, the original Harry would fall for this Ginny. But she also remembered the older Harry telling her how fast the fire had cooled, how the crush hadn’t survived the long separation during the Horcrux Hunt. The knowledge sat between her and the girl in the doorway like a secret no one else could read.

“Well, if you’re not,” Ginny was saying, “Mum’s looking for help with the Doxies in the drawing room.”

Harry shifted his weight, as though surprised by the interruption. “Right. Yeah. We’ll be there in a bit.”

“All right. See you soon, Harry. Hermione.”

As Ginny’s steps faded, Harry’s eyes lifted to Hermione’s. No words were necessary. They didn’t need to say it aloud: they were about to walk a fine line between fate and choice, between memory and secrecy.

This time, though, they weren’t blind. This time, they would be ready. They would not just survive; they would win.

Chapter Text

The corridor was dark, Harry’s steps dulled by the worn carpet. He hadn’t intended to be up, but the night would not let him rest. His thoughts pressed too close, memories fighting for space where they should not yet exist. From the drawing room came a golden spill of light. Someone else was awake, too.

A low creak ran along the hinge pins as the door turned. The space beyond looked drowned in gloom; only a low fire gave what light it could. Mrs. Weasley’s roaring blaze was gone. This was a gentler light, flames that cast rusty gold across the floor. Curtains hung stiff across the windows, keeping the night away. The Black family tapestry loomed across one wall, threads of gold flashing as the fire shifted. Harry glanced at it once, then turned his attention to the mess still scattered throughout the room.

He knew what lay hidden amongst it. The locket was here. Now he just needed Hermione to help him choose the right moment to act.

Sirius rested in a chair close to the fire, his leg hooked over the other in easy comfort. A drink gleamed between his long fingers, the liquid catching the light. Firewhisky, Harry guessed. His usual restlessness seemed hushed, replaced by a quieter air. In the shifting firelight Harry saw a flicker of the Sirius he had known only through an old photograph.

“Couldn’t sleep?” Sirius asked without turning.

“No,” Harry said. He entered the room, the door clicking shut at his back. “Too much on my mind, I suppose.”

His godfather tipped his head toward the empty chair. “Join me, then. Misery loves company, and all that, right?”

Harry moved to the chair and dropped into its sagging cushions. The fabric carried the scent of age, disuse, and Doxycide. The seat was comfortable enough, though. He let the fire warm his knuckles, fingers spread against the rising heat. The house had a way of swallowing seasons; it was always cold, always grey.

“I’d share,” Sirius said, lifting his drink a little, “but Molly would hex me blind. She’d have my head and probably both my arms for good measure.”

Harry grinned. “The smell’s strong enough, thanks.”

Words slipped away. Harry looked sideways at his godfather, memorizing details the photograph had never shown. Such an ordinary moment, just sitting by a fire, saying nothing of importance. Yet for Harry, it was extraordinary beyond measure. This man beside him had fallen through the veil. In another version of Harry’s life, the weight of that loss had anchored itself in him like stone.

Now here he sat, alive and whole, Firewhisky in hand. So unaware that in Harry’s memory, he had already been dead for years.

“You’re staring,” Sirius said, one brow arched as he glanced over. “What, did I grow an extra nose?”

Harry let out a short laugh, pushing the heaviness aside. “Sorry. Just thinking.”

“Dangerous pastime,” Sirius said with a wink. “Especially at your age.” He swung one leg down, twisting toward Harry. “Think your lot’s got a strong side for Quidditch this school year?”

The question was so normal, so ordinary that something loosened in Harry’s chest. Quidditch. Not war strategies or evacuation plans or lists of the dead. Just Quidditch.

“Hard to say,” Harry said, trying for lightness. “Depends on how much Slytherin cheats this year.”

Sirius barked out a laugh. “Merlin, you sound like your dad.”

Harry laughed with him, though the sound felt hollow. He remembered the way Malfoy had baited him after that first win, remembered the bans, the broomsticks locked away. The memory pressed close, but he swallowed it down. Better to laugh with Sirius than let the truth slip free.

The fire gave a sudden crack, sparks scattering up the chimney. A quick thrust of the poker had the log rolling, the flames racing higher.

“Speaking of Hogwarts,” his godfather said, setting the poker aside with a grin, “those treacle tarts still visit me in my sleep.”

“I miss them, too,” Harry said. Hogwarts banquets had turned into stories he told himself, while reality was stale crusts and limited supplies. “And the roast beef at start-of-term.”

“The roast beef!” Sirius groaned, throwing his head back. “And the Yorkshire puddings. You could build a tower out of those, and I’d still clear the plate. James and I used to nick extras under the table; swore it didn’t count if nobody saw.”

Harry laughed, and the ease of it shocked him. He couldn’t remember when laughter hadn’t cost him effort.

Sirius finished his drink in one swallow, glass landing on the nearby table with a muted tap.

“So,” he said, every bit of the word stretched, “you’ve grown a fair bit since I saw you last.”

“Have I?”

“Mmm.” Sirius nodded. “Bet you got half the castle looking twice when you walk past.”

Harry almost choked. “What?”

“Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed. You’ve got the hair, the name, and that brooding look you picked up somewhere. Girls love that.”

He turned back to the fire, ears burning. “I don’t—”

“Ah! So, there is someone,” Sirius said, looking delighted. “Come on then, out with it. I am your godfather, after all. It’s pretty much my duty to embarrass you about these things.”

Harry barked out a laugh that didn’t quite land, hand darting up to scratch the back of his head. “It’s… complicated.”

Sirius let out a short huff of laughter. “Complicated, eh? Let me guess: bright, clever, probably tells you off more than your teachers do?”

The knowing look in the older man’s eyes made Harry wonder if he was being more transparent than he realized. Had Sirius noticed something between him and Hermione today? Had their instinctive closeness given them away?

“Maybe,” Harry said. He couldn’t lie, but the emotions knotted in him left him speechless. His feelings belonged to a future version of him, not the boy sitting here now. Never mind that he was that boy.

In truth, he didn’t know what it was anymore that he was feeling. The Harry, who had first lived through this summer, had simple, straightforward feelings. But he was no longer that Harry. His feelings, like his memories, belonged to a different timeline altogether.

The conversation lulled. Sirius’s eyes drifted toward the wall with the family tapestry. His expression changed.

“Ugly old thing, isn’t it?” he said. “The Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.” His tone made the words sound mocking.

Harry followed his gaze to the tapestry. “Why haven’t you taken it down?”

“Permanent Sticking Charm,” Sirius said with a mirthless laugh. “My dear mother and her ancestors made sure their legacy would outlast any attempts to erase it.”

The fire settled lower, logs shifting with a soft collapse of embers. For a moment, silence filled the space between them.

“You know,” his godfather said, his voice lower, softer than before, “being off that tapestry is no loss. None at all. Blood means nothing; I learned that the hard way. What matters, Harry, isn’t the family stitched in gold thread. It’s the family you choose for yourself.”

The words hung between them as Sirius looked straight at him, and Harry’s throat constricted under the weight of it.

“For me,” Sirius said, “family begins and ends here.” He reached across the space between them, his hand squeezing Harry’s shoulder. “With you.”

The simple declaration hit Harry with unexpected force. How often had he dreamed of moments like this? Ordinary conversations that turned, without warning, into the affirmations he had craved his entire life.

He swallowed. He didn’t dare speak; his voice would splinter the moment he tried.

Sirius seemed to understand. His hand remained on Harry’s shoulder a moment longer, solid and real, before withdrawing. He didn’t demand a response or push for reciprocation.

Harry watched the play of light across Sirius’s face. Every line, every angle. Harry fixed it to memory. This time, he wouldn’t take these moments for granted. This time, he would remember.

“It’s getting late,” Sirius said with a grunt, giving his shoulders a roll until something clicked loose. “Better get you back to bed.” He stood up and extended a hand to pull Harry to his feet. “Your hearing’s coming up, and you’ll need your wits about you.”

Harry clasped it, holding firm. Sirius’s grip was warm and solid.

“Thanks,” Harry said, hoping Sirius would understand he meant for more than just the conversation.

“Anytime.” Sirius mussed Harry’s hair, eyes bright. “Comes with the title, doesn’t it? The perks of having me for a godfather. Keep you up, bore you with old stories, and send you to bed with terrible advice about girls.”

Harry laughed, the sound coming easier now. “Goodnight, Sirius.”

“Goodnight, Harry.”

At the door, Harry stopped, looking back. Sirius’s silhouette stood clear against the firelight’s glow, poker tracing lazy arcs through the burning logs. In that stillness, he looked almost content. A rare sight in the confines of the house he hated.

Harry committed the image to memory. Sirius Black, alive before him, firelight across his face, the shadows of Azkaban lingering but no longer owning him. Not a shadow from the past but flesh and blood, and he had just named Harry as family.

---

Several years in the future…

The salt air stung Harry’s face as he approached the abandoned inn, his footsteps near silent against the weathered cobblestones. Two years and some months after Hogwarts’ fall, he had learned to move like a ghost. Each step calculated, each breath measured. The coastal safe house looked derelict from the outside: windows boarded, roof collapsed. The look was a deliberate deception maintained by charms cast before the Dark Trace became sophisticated enough to detect their casting in real-time. Harry paused at the hidden entrance. No signs of intrusion. The wards still held. For tonight, at least, they were safe.

He tapped his wand against the weathered door frame. Three times in quick succession, followed by two slower beats. The door shimmered before revealing itself. He answered the security question and then slipped inside as the door opened just enough to admit his slender frame.

Hermione awaited him, wand lowered but not put away. Never put away anymore, even if they now, because of the Dark Trace, only resorted to magic in the direst of situations. She had her hair in a functional braid, her face thinner than it had been in their school days.

She scanned him with the practiced efficiency of someone who had patched him up too many times. “You’re hurt.”

Harry pulled off his cloak, hissing as pain bit into his arm. “It’s nothing. Just caught the edge of something in Knockturn.”

The interior of the inn belied its decrepit exterior. Though sparse, it was clean and organized. Maps covered one wall, marked with ever-changing patrol routes and danger zones. A workbench lined another, crowded with half-completed potions and communication devices they’d modified to evade detection. The air smelled of Dittany, salt, and the perpetual damp of the coastal location.

“Sit,” Hermione said, already moving toward their medical supplies. “Was it worth it?”

Harry sank down onto a wooden chair, his body slack and aching. “Sort of, yeah. I confirmed Fawley’s taken over the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. They’re ramping up the registry sweeps in the northern counties.” He closed his eyes. “And Dean was right about the new patrol patterns. They’re using Dementors in the city centers now, not just at the checkpoints.”

Hermione set down a small wooden box of medical supplies, her expression tightening as she knelt beside him. “Roll up your sleeve,” she said. His arm showed a torn line of flesh, dried blood crusted over it, with a sick shimmer crawling along the edges. “This isn’t ‘nothing,’ Harry.”

“Compared to what happened to Morrison and Carter, it is.” The names fell between them like stones, heavy with the weight of fresh loss.

Hermione’s hands stilled on his skin. “I know. Lee heard it on the official broadcast tonight. They listed Morrison’s family, too.”

A hard knot formed in Harry’s stomach. Morrison had a wife and children. Two of them, still very small. He had joined their resistance cell after his Muggle-born brother-in-law had vanished in one of the first registration sweeps.

“Was it clean, at least?” he asked, though he knew the answer. Death under Voldemort’s regime was never clean.

Hermione shook her head once, focusing on his wound with unusual intensity. Her fingers were cool against his skin as she cleaned the wound before applying Essence of Dittany. They had both become efficient at this, at compartmentalizing grief, at channeling loss into determination, at surviving one more day in a world that offered little reason to continue fighting.

“That makes twenty-seven,” Harry said after a moment, his voice flat. Their cell had started with thirty-five fighters in the chaotic aftermath of Hogwarts’ fall.

“Twenty-eight,” Hermione said, her voice quiet. “Hannah’s cousin didn’t make it back from Bristol yesterday.”

Another name. Another face Harry would never see again. The weight of command pressed down on him, suffocating in its constancy. How many decisions had he made that sent others to their deaths? How many plans had failed?

He studied the precision in Hermione’s movements, the calm written across her face. “Any news from the north?” he asked, reaching for something safer than his thoughts.

“Lee got a message through. The Sheffield cell is compromised, but a few of them made it out. They’ll try to rendezvous with McGonagall’s group if they can make it past the Dark Trace detection points.” Hermione capped the Dittany bottle. “And Dean managed to intercept a supply transport headed for a Death Eater outpost in Yorkshire. We have real food tonight. Actual bread.”

“Bread,” Harry said, lips twitching upward. Even that counted as a rare comfort now.

Hermione’s hand found his shoulder. She squeezed for a moment, then turned away to prepare tea. These small gestures of comfort had become their language; neither of them had much capacity for words of consolation anymore. She poured and measured with the same careful focus she used for everything else. Harry caught himself watching: the braid brushing her collar, the tilt of her neck, her hands working without pause. In another life, he might have given these observations a different name. In this one, he filed them under survival.

She handed him a chipped mug of tea. “The others will be here soon.”

Harry nodded, the mug warm between his hands. Seven survivors where there had once been thirty-five. “Not much of a resistance.”

Hermione looked at him. The steadiness in her eyes left no room for doubt. “It’s enough to keep fighting. It must be.”

A hollow thud at the door interrupted them. Three hurried taps followed by two slower ones, the very code Harry had used earlier. Hermione tensed, wand raised as she approached the entrance.

“When did we last see stars in daylight?” she asked the security question.

“When Lovegood’s Spectrespecs revealed a Wrackspurt invasion at Midsummer,” came the reply, and Hermione unlocked the door to admit two cloaked figures.

Dean Thomas entered first. Parvati Patil followed him, her hair cropped to her skull, a scar running along her jaw. Both had been part of the original DA, and both had survived the Battle of Hogwarts.

“All clear?” Harry asked, rising to greet them.

Dean shook his head. “Roads are quiet tonight. That only means something worse is coming.”

“We need to talk.” A sharp look at the cellar door made Parvati’s meaning clear. “All of us. The others are coming in through the sea passage.”

Harry and Hermione shared a look. They seldom dared call everyone into one place anymore; smaller circles meant better chances of survival. Whatever news Parvati and Dean brought must be significant.

“I’ll prepare the room,” Hermione said, already moving toward the hidden cellar entrance.

Within twenty minutes, the seven remaining members of their resistance cell stood gathered in the cramped underground space. Besides Harry, Hermione, Dean, and Parvati, there was Lee Jordan, who had taken over the dangerous task of broadcasting resistance messages, and two former Ministry employees. Both had escaped during the initial purge of “undesirables” from government positions.

“I suppose you’ve all heard about Morrison and Carter by now,” Harry said, his voice low but carrying in the quiet space. “And about poor William, Hannah Abbot’s cousin.”

Nods circled the room. They had all become accustomed to these grim announcements, these constant adjustments to their shrinking world.

“That’s part of why we wanted you all here,” Dean said. “Something has come to light. Something potentially game-changing.”

The mood shifted. Hope was no gift anymore; it burned as much as it healed.

“Our source inside the Ministry claims an artifact was unearthed in the ruins near York. Older than Hogwarts, older even than the first wands. They’re calling it the Timeweaver Stone.”

“Timeweaver Stone,” Hermione repeated, and Harry could almost see the pages of books flipping behind her eyes as she searched her vast mental library. “I’ve read something… legends of a stone that could alter the fabric of time itself. Not like Time-Turners, which create closed loops. This was said to be capable of rewriting history.”

“That’s what our source believes,” Parvati said. “They say Voldemort has been obsessed with it since winning the battle at Hogwarts, as if victory wasn’t enough. He wants to ensure his reign is absolute across all possible timelines.”

“Or he’s afraid,” Harry said, the realization crystallizing in his mind. “He’s afraid there’s still a way he could lose. That something could change.”

The implications hung in the air between them. If such an artifact really existed, if it held even a fraction of the power the legends suggested…

The meeting turned practical. Verification first. Security measures next. Then the shape of their response. All of it cold and methodical. Beneath every word, however, a different current stirred: one they had almost forgotten. Possibility.

Later, only the two of them remained. The safe house seemed larger without the others.

“Do you think it’s real?” Harry asked, breaking the contemplative silence. “This Timeweaver Stone?”

“I think,” Hermione said, “if it is real, if it truly does what the legends claim, then nothing stays the same.”

She turned toward him. In her eyes, Harry caught the echo of his own fragile hope.

“We’ve been losing for a long time,” she said. “Trying to survive, to save who we can, but with no real path to victory. If this artifact exists—”

“We could go back,” Harry said. “Change how it all happened.”

The weight of that possibility settled between them. Going back would mean seeing again those they’d lost. It would mean a chance to correct the mistakes that had led to Voldemort’s victory. It would mean risk beyond anything they’d attempted before.

Words were useless. The choice and its dangers needed no explanation. Harry found Hermione’s hand, and together they gripped the one certainty left: each other. The gesture felt both familiar and new, crossing some boundary they hadn’t acknowledged.

The war as they’d been fighting it was lost. The resistance was dying, person by person, safe house by safe house. But if the artifact truly held the power the stories gave it, the world might yet shift.

The thought cracked something open inside him, and hope slipped through.

---

The nightmare dragged him from sleep. Harry was upright before he could think, hand clawing at the nightstand for his wand. The memory of the safe house collapsed. Only Grimmauld Place remained. The night pressed at the glass, heavy as stone. Harry willed his pulse to quiet.

Two days back, and still the future clung to his dreams like chains. Harry drew in a long breath. No salt on the air, no sharp trace of potions, only the stale must of rooms closed too long.

His hand moved to his face. Sweat beaded there, his hair stuck to his brow. His scar remained calm, and the calmness felt wrong. His fingers lingered, half-expecting the old burn to flare. Nothing came. That silence unsettled him as much as the pain ever had. It was as though the connection still existed but could not pierce the defenses his mind now held by instinct.

The floorboards groaned under Harry’s weight. He winced. Across the room, Ron shifted but kept on sleeping. He had missed his best mate, his brother. This Ron had never seen Dean Thomas die, had never argued with Harry over failed strategy. Had never needed to choose between family loyalty and resistance work. This Ron was still whole.

Vision returned as soon as his glasses touched his nose. The rest didn’t take thought: pajamas stripped, jeans pulled on, t-shirt dragged over his head. Each movement was measured, quiet, deliberate. Even here, two days into their second chance, he couldn’t shake the habits of a man who had survived by silence.

Harry shook his head, willing the images to dissolve. The wooden boards beneath his feet were real. The soft snores from Ron’s bed were real. He and Hermione had made it back. The impossible had proved true: the Timeweaver Stone worked.

Ron kept on sleeping. Harry slipped out, careful with the door. The lamp by the stairs threw a dim patch of light, but beyond it shadows pressed close. After only a few steps, the blackness ahead stirred. A figure slid into view, and Harry’s wand snapped up before his mind caught up with what he saw.

His hand dropped. “Hermione?”

She stood framed in the gloom, a slender silhouette his eyes knew even in darkness.

“Sorry,” she said. She closed the distance between them. “I didn’t expect anyone else to be up.”

The dim lamp caught her cheek. A stray lock of hair lay across her face. Instinct carried his fingers upward, brushing the strand back. Hermione caught her breath, cheeks reddening.

It was both simple and somehow shocking. A continuation of the intimacy they’d developed during those desperate years, yes, but strange in these younger bodies. Harry withdrew his hand, conscious of the boundary he’d crossed without intention.

She swallowed. “Bad dream?”

Harry nodded. “You, too?”

“Yeah. Every time I close my eyes, I see…” She trailed off, but Harry understood. The dead walking these halls again. Friends they’d watched fall, now laughing over breakfast. A war that hadn’t happened yet.

“I was back at that coastal safe house,” Harry said after a moment. “The night we learned about the Timeweaver Stone.” He cast a quick look about, ensuring no one was around. “It felt so real. Dean and Parvati coming in with the news. The meeting in the cellar.”

Hermione’s expression softened with recognition. “I remember. That was about three months before we got to the Stone, wasn’t it?”

“About that. I keep thinking about it, Hermione. The Stone is out there, somewhere. In this timeline, Voldemort doesn’t have it yet, but eventually he’ll learn of it. He’ll want it, just like he did before.”

“My thoughts exactly. We can’t let him get it. Not ever.”

“We need to find it first,” Harry said. “Destroy it, maybe.”

“Can we destroy it without risking everything?” Genuine fear flickered across Hermione’s face. “What if destroying it undoes what it’s done? What if we’re sent back to that future?”

“I really don’t know.” His mouth tightened. “But we need to think about it. We can’t leave it out there for him to find. The risk is too great. Have you noticed it’s begun changing the timeline already?”

She frowned. “What do you mean?”

“I mean… I don’t think we saw Moody like this, both days since we've been here. Don’t you remember how Mrs. Weasley wanted to inspect that rattling writing desk in the drawing room, but she wanted Moody to be there for it, and it was only much later that he visited again. And no one's said anything about Snape. And then there's Sirius…” Harry scratched his head. “He seems… I don’t know… Happier? Not like he was before. I mean, he still hates this house, but it’s different. It’s not much, just little things. Only… I can tell. Being here again; it’s already shifting things.”

Hermione lowered her voice. “So, the future is already fraying. Perhaps not in ways that matter, but nevertheless, we can’t wait. The Horcruxes must take precedence, no matter how small the changes around us may seem. If what you say is true… and now that I’ve heard you say it, I can’t help but wonder how many little things may already have changed.”

“We started once before,” Harry said. “We can do it again. Better, this time.”

Hermione’s hand found his in the darkness. In that touch there was a promise. No speeches, no oaths. Just this.

“We will,” Hermione said, her voice strengthening with determination. “And this time, we won’t fail.”

The quiet that followed seemed almost alive. Harry studied her profile in the faint light. This woman who had stood beside him through horrors no one else remembered. Their closeness had outgrown friendship years ago, but Harry dared not call it anything else. During the Dark Regime, he had learned that safety was a lie. They had survived by living on nothing but what was necessary. Food, shelter, the next step ahead. Anything more was a distraction, and distractions killed.

But perhaps, Harry thought as he looked at Hermione’s determined expression, this here was a chance. A chance to discover what might grow in peace that had only ever existed in war.

“So…” he said, messing up his unruly hair even further. “What do we do about the locket in the drawing room? It's still there for now, but not for long. We've got to act before Kreacher hides it. Again.”

Chapter Text

The locket. Yes. Hermione’s thoughts snapped into motion.

“We go now,” she said, voice quiet but steady.

The darkness of Grimmauld Place pressed in close. Light from the sconces reached only so far, leaving deep hollows of black between them. They had trusted such darkness before, slipping between safe houses, hiding from patrols.

“Now?” Harry asked, almost under his breath. “But we haven’t—”

“It’s the middle of the night, Harry. That’s why it must be now,” she said, making for the stairs. “Everyone’s asleep. We can’t risk waiting until the morning.”

Harry gave a brief nod and kept pace with her. The old rhythm between them returned without effort, forged in too many nights of escape. The youth of their faces belied the heaviness that guided their movements.

Each board under them gave its own weary cry, a low complaint of old wood. Hermione paused each time, lungs straining against the silence, before she set her foot down again.

Three steps from the landing, the floor gave a sharp crack. They stopped at once. Hermione strained her ears for noise from the rooms above, but all she caught was the slow beat of the grandfather clock below.

“Clear,” she said.

They slipped ahead, two shadows more among many. The carpet softened the echo of their steps, its worn motifs obscured by grime. The drawing room handle bit cold against her palm, refusing to turn until she leaned her weight on it. At last, it yielded with a groan. She edged the door open, enough for them both to slip through.

The drawing room bore the marks of effort but not completion. The high plaster ceiling still carried dust, the corners still thick with it, even as the carpet showed signs of scrubbing. For two full days, Harry and Hermione had been at it with the Weasley children, moving furniture and tearing down cobwebs, yet the room stood unfinished. By rights it should have been ready. The first time, it took them three days, Saturday to Monday. Now, two days past their Sunday arrival, they were still not through.

“This isn’t lining up,” Hermione said, unease gathering in her stomach. “Last time, we’d already finished this room. The whole pace is off.”

Harry’s features looked stark in the dim light. “The timeline has already moved off course. The phases aren’t matching anymore.”

Her mind raced. “But we haven’t done anything that should have altered this. What else might not fall into place? What if the events we’re counting on don’t come at all?”

“We’ll adapt,” Harry said. “We always do.”

The certainty in his voice steadied her. How many times had they faced the impossible together? How many plans had crumbled, only for them to forge new ones from the wreckage? This was just another deviation, another variable for which to account.

Hermione stepped further in, her eyes adjusting. The Black family tapestry loomed at the far wall, gold thread catching what little light there was. She turned away, keeping her attention fixed on the task.

“It should be over there,” she said, pointing toward a small cabinet wedged between taller pieces. “That’s where we found it the last time.”

They crossed over to it. The boards lay quiet under the rug, but Hermione knew how fast they could turn traitor. She didn’t want that. One loud squeak could bring the whole Order down on them, wands drawn.

The dark wood cabinet, with brass fittings, was the sort of furniture that had once been fashionable among wizarding families, a century or so earlier. Hermione remembered how this had gone the first time, in the timeline they’d left behind. Once, in that time of before, they opened similar cabinets, laughing and chatting under Mrs. Weasley’s direction. So unaware of what lay within. Now, with the weight of knowledge pressing down, the simple act of opening a cupboard door seemed almost momentous.

The hinges whined as she pulled. They stilled until the sound died.

Inside, shelves sagged with old Black heirlooms. Snuffboxes that snapped at fingers, empty phials that still glowed, medals stamped with runes she didn’t know. Objects heavy with a family’s dark history.

“There,” Harry said, pointing.

She followed his eyes to the bottom shelf. Resting in the clutter was a gold locket marked with a coiled, green-studded ‘S.’ Slytherin’s crest, beyond doubt.

Her pulse jumped. She remembered it dragging Ron into anger, strangling Harry in the icy water, screaming when the sword struck.

And here it was again, whole, waiting. A shard of Voldemort’s soul tucked in with the rest of the Black family’s detritus.

“I’ll take it,” she said, sinking down on her knees.

Harry dropped down with her, a warning in his tone. “Careful. Use a cloth or something. Don’t touch it.”

Hermione reached for a stray cleaning rag and picked up the locket. It hung heavy in her grip, wrong for its size. She bundled it and slid it into her pocket. It sat there like a stone against her hip.

“One down,” Harry said, rising to his feet. “Or it will be, once we can destroy it.”

“That’s still a while away, though,” Hermione said, a sigh escaping her.

They retreated into a shadowed corner. Speaking even in whispers felt dangerous with Slytherin’s locket so close, as though it might somehow hear them, understand their plans.

“Why is everything different?” Hermione asked, keeping her voice low. “We haven’t changed anything major yet, but the timeline’s already shifting. The cleaning schedule, Moody being here when he wasn’t before…”

Harry leaned in, his closeness anchoring her. “I’ve been considering that. What if the Timeweaver Stone doesn’t just send us back? What if it… creates an interpretation of the past? One twisted by both nostalgia and real history. A timeline that’s similar but not identical?”

The thought sent a chill through Hermione despite its logic. “Like parallel worlds theory,” she said. “The Stone might not have returned us to our exact past but to a variant of it. Close enough to be familiar, different enough to be unpredictable.”

Harry pressed his lips tight, calculating. “Then we can’t trust memory alone to guide us. We’ll need to keep watch and be ready to bend with it. We can handle that. We’ve faced worse.”

They had, Hermione knew. Far worse than a shifting timeline. Memories surfaced. The fall of the Ministry, the implementation of the Dark Trace, safe houses discovered one after another. They had adapted then, learning to survive without magic, to communicate without wands, to flee at a moment’s notice. This was just another challenge to overcome.

“Harry,” she said after a moment of silence, “about what you were saying earlier. About whether we’re our younger selves with future memories, or our actual future selves somehow placed in these bodies…”

He shifted beside her, a shadow among shadows. “I’ve argued it out in my head, and the conclusion’s always the same. The longer I sit with it, the less I believe we’re only carrying recollections of that life. We’re ourselves, our future selves, somehow placed back into these younger bodies. Which, I suppose, would make sense if the Timeweaver Stone really is affecting this reality.”

“Other than the Timeweaver Stone, what makes you so certain?” Hermione asked, though part of her already knew what he would say.

“Because,” he said, lowering his voice further, “if we were only our younger versions with memories layered on, certain feelings should still linger. I should still feel something when I think about Cho, shouldn’t I? Some echo of that crush I had. But there’s nothing. And Ginny…” He faltered, the word alone carrying weight. “I still care about her. I’d still step in front of danger for her, like I would for you. Or Ron, I guess. But it isn’t the same as before. That pull’s gone. I only recognize it as something from the future we already lived. Even if this year and the next were to repeat, I don’t think those feelings would manifest again.”

The thought lingered, too heavy to chase off. Hermione gave a slow nod.

“You’re right,” she said. “I’ve felt the same. With Ron.” Speaking the name felt strange, distant, almost hollow. It should have carried echoes of warmth or longing, but it didn’t. “Whatever I once imagined Ron and I might have… it’s gone. We don’t fit anymore, if we ever even did. Those feelings… they belong to another version of me, a girl who hadn’t lived through what we endured.”

“Exactly,” Harry said, and there was relief in his voice. “It’s not that the memories have vanished. I remember feeling those things. But the feelings themselves…”

“Got replaced by everything that came after,” Hermione said. “By years that, for everyone else, haven’t happened yet. Might never happen.”

The understanding settled between them like a physical presence. They were not just travelers from the future. They were the future itself, compressed into younger forms. Resistance had tempered them into survivors, hard and enduring. Outward changes meant little; the essence of those years remained.

Hermione felt the weight of this truth. It explained so much. The ease with which they had fallen back into their wartime patterns, the instinctive caution, the difficulty of pretending to be their younger selves. They weren’t pretending at all. They were just what time and struggle had made them.

“It changes how we face this,” she said at last. “We’re not kids pretending at adulthood. We’re adults, forced back into these skins.”

“With all the knowledge and none of the authority,” Harry said. “Not until we come of age again.”

Hermione’s fingers strayed to her pocket, brushing the hard shape within. “We do have power,” she said. “Knowledge counts. And this is the beginning of the change.”

Hermione looked up, finding Harry’s eyes through the dark. That boy from the Hogwarts Express was hard to find in him now. His scar, his hair, his glasses hadn’t changed, but his eyes had. They were a man’s eyes, seasoned by loss. The man who had stood with her through death notices, who had shaped wild plans in the dark, who had kept fighting past the point of hope. Whatever they had once been, whatever waited ahead, the link held fast. Stronger, perhaps, for having crossed back together.

“We should go,” Hermione said, the weight of the moment giving way to caution. “This space… I don’t like it. Not at night.”

Harry inclined his head, and they left the room, secrets and dust behind them. The locket pressed against Hermione’s hip with each step, heavy with promise and threat.

They had changed the future with this single act. What that change would bring, Hermione couldn’t say. But for the first time since awakening in this younger body, she felt something beyond the shock of displacement, beyond the cautious planning. She felt purpose, clear and sharp as crystal.

They had a second chance. And this time, they would not waste it.

---

They moved down Grimmauld Place’s corridors in the same quiet way that had once kept them alive. With every step the locket knocked against Hermione’s hip, heavy and cold, its spite seeming to leak through fabric. The house closed in around them, walls tight, as if it knew what they carried. In the narrow stretch of hallway her shoulder brushed Harry’s arm. The touch jolted her. Not danger, not fear, but something else. They had leaned on this closeness during their resistance days, found strength in it. Here and now, in these younger forms, it brought with it questions she didn’t know how to face.

They halted where the corridor split. Straight ahead lay the rooms they were sharing with Ginny and Ron, doors shut, the floor quiet. Beside them, the stairs carried up to the next floor, where more bedrooms awaited, but on the landing above them stood a narrow, oft forgotten room.

Harry angled his chin that way. Hermione acknowledged it with a nod. That room would do.

The third-floor steps complained less than the main staircase, yet every small noise sounded loud in the sleeping house. Hermione counted the steps under her breath, putting each foot where she remembered the wood holding firm. She kept her weight to the edges of each step, the way necessity had taught them. Harry came after, setting his weight where hers had been, the old coordination falling back into place.

The sitting room was scarcely more than a box, long neglected and filled with dust. Nothing cursed awaited in the corners; this one had just been left to fall into disrepair. Under the single window sagged a low settee. Two armchairs slumped beside it, fabric worn to threads, color long since faded. The curtains were thin as old gauze, while moonlight cut the floor in pale bars. It would be full moon tomorrow, Hermione noted, thinking of Remus.

She closed the door. The room smelled of dust and old paper, laced with a faint bite. Almost, she thought, as if potion fumes had long since sunk into the stone.

“This will do,” she said, voice lowered more from habit than fear.

Harry went to the window, eyes on the empty stretch of street below them. Moonlight traced his profile. To Hermione, his face was familiar, yet strange on a body that hadn’t seen war. The hollow cheeks she remembered were gone, but the line of his shoulders and the constant readiness were the same. A commander’s stance.

“All clear,” he said, turning back to her. In the small room the space between them felt both too wide and almost nothing at all.

Hermione noted with sudden acuteness their solitude. In the future they’d left behind, being alone together had been commonplace, a necessity of survival when their numbers dwindled. They had planned strategies over maps spread across rough tables, tended each other’s wounds by firelight, fallen asleep back-to-back for warmth and security. But here, in bodies that hadn’t endured those years, the closeness felt altered. It carried a different weight, sharper, more complicated.

Her fingers brushed her pocket and met the hard edge of the locket. She held onto the reminder, clinging to the purpose in its shape.

“Let’s have another look,” she said, stepping toward the settee.

Harry followed and dropped down beside her. The old springs groaned, the cushion giving way. Their legs touched. His warmth pressed through the denim, and she jolted. A memory surged up. Another night, years from now, the two of them in a cave while snow piled outside. His arm had been around her then, breath misting the air as they waited for morning. For escape.

She pushed the image away and reached into her pocket. She set the locket down across her lap. The weight of it dragged against her thigh as if she had laid a heavy lump of metal there instead of a trinket.

“Let me,” Harry said. His fingers slid over hers as he took the bundle.

The contact stayed a beat too long, heat sparking against her skin. He worked the knot of cloth open, each fold giving way until the locket showed; gold, heavy, the serpent’s S marked in green stones. Moonlight caught on the emeralds and scattered across their faces in sharp green flecks.

“This really is the real thing,” Harry said. “I’d know it anywhere.”

“Be careful,” Hermione said as he lifted the locket by its chain. “We know what prolonged contact can do.”

His jaw set. “Yeah. Not that, not again, not ever.”

The locket drifted on its chain, the moonlight sliding across it with each swing. It looked ordinary enough, but Hermione remembered too well the truth. The thing had poisoned them once. It had amplified their fears, their frustrations, their doubts. She remembered how it had driven Ron away the moment they needed unity the most.

“One down,” she said, echoing Harry’s earlier words.

Harry folded the cloth back over the locket. “Best to make a plan for all of them. Figure out what we can access now, and what must wait.”

Hermione nodded, grateful for the shift toward practical matters. This was familiar territory, the kind of strategic planning that had occupied so much of their time during their resistance days. Her mind cleared, focusing with laser precision on the task before them.

“You’ve already destroyed the diary,” she said, counting off on her fingers. “And we have the locket now. That leaves the ring, the cup, the diadem, and Nagini.”

“And the piece in me,” Harry said, his voice flat, as if naming it cost him nothing.

Hermione’s chest knotted. He spoke as if it were nothing, the piece of Voldemort’s soul that had lived in him since he was a child, and the thought cut her. The way he spoke of his own death as if it were only another step to be checked off! The thought drew up a wall of refusal inside her. In the broken world they’d abandoned, she had sifted through ruined books and charred papers, begging the scraps to show her Dumbledore had been wrong. She had not surrendered then, and she would not now.

“No.” The word landed harder than she intended. “That’s not the same as the others. That’s not something we just… destroy.”

Harry’s face eased a little, but his eyes still carried that settled weariness. “Hermione—”

“We don’t know what Dumbledore really intended,” she said, leaning in, voice taut. “In our timeline, we never had the chance. Hogwarts collapsed before all the other Horcruxes were gone, before you could… We never learned if there was another way, if the fragment could be pulled out without—” Her throat closed on the words.

“Without killing me,” Harry said, barely above a whisper.

Moonlight cut across his face, hardening the boyish lines. His eyes carried a gravity no fifteen-year-old should bear.

“Yes. I’m serious, Harry. I will not believe your death is the only way. I cannot accept that Dumbledore, with all his wisdom, never found another path. He either didn’t look hard enough, or he decided the risk of trying was greater than the certainty of sending you to your death.”

“Maybe he was right,” Harry said. “Maybe the risk was too great.”

“Or maybe,” Hermione said, “he made the decision for you, rather than letting you choose. That’s what I can’t forgive. He steered you your whole life toward that one sacrifice and never gave you the chance to search for another way.”

Harry said nothing, sitting with the moonlight painting sharp shadows over his young face, shadows that made him look much older. Almost like the Harry she remembered leading them in the end. When he answered, there was a shift in his tone. Not quite hope, but perhaps the willingness to consider it.

“So, we find another way.”

The tension in Hermione’s shoulders eased. “Yes. We find another way.” Then she sighed, turning her attention back to the practicalities before them. “We should plan for each Horcrux,” she said, the familiar rhythm of strategizing steadying her. “The ring is in the Gaunt shack, where Dumbledore will find it. We know it’s cursed; it’s what killed him, in the end, despite whatever agreement he had with Snape.”

Harry frowned. “The ring’s in Little Hangleton, isn’t it?”

Hermione looked grim. “Yes. And that’s a long way from Hogwarts. Or from London, for that matter. Dumbledore doesn’t retrieve it until sometime next summer, though.”

“Then maybe we get there first.”

Her mouth tightened. “And do what? We can’t just walk into Little Hangleton in the middle of term.”

“I was thinking more like sneaking out during a Hogsmeade visit. Or maybe during Christmas. Just the two of us.”

Hermione’s laugh was soft, incredulous. “Sneaking out. To a village hundreds of miles away. To rob a cursed shack.”

“I didn’t say we walk there.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Then what?”

“Well, since neither of us can legally Apparate before Dumbledore finds the ring, I was thinking… We create a Portkey.” The word hung between them.

Hermione folded her arms. “That’s illegal. And traceable. If anyone catches wind, we’re finished before we even begin.”

“We’ll make it inside Hogwarts,” Harry said. “The Trace won’t know it’s us. The castle’s soaked in magic. And I’ve been to Little Hangleton. I know where it is.”

She wanted to argue. But instead, she leaned back, face tight, worrying her lip with her teeth. “I hate that you’re right. And I hate that I know how to create one. I shouldn’t need to know how to do that.”

Harry’s mouth pulled into a half-smile. “That’s why I said ‘we’, Hermione.”

She sighed. “All right. We’ll think about it. But you know just getting there isn’t enough. Don’t forget the Trace. The underage magic one, I mean. I think we’re safe from the Dark Trace here, but we still need to worry about the normal one. One flick of our wands in a Muggle village, and we’re done.”

Harry’s smile faded. “Then we figure out a way to get past those hexes and charms without tripping the Trace.”

“That’s not a puzzle you solve in a night.”

“Well, we got time.” Harry tapped his chin. “About the others. The cup is in Bellatrix’s vault at Gringotts; we can’t access it, and I’ve no idea how we could. Not yet, anyway, with Bellatrix still in Azkaban. The diadem is at Hogwarts, in the Room of Requirement. That’s our best immediate target once term starts. And Nagini…” His expression darkened.

A flash of sorrow filled Hermione’s heart. “I still think about him often, you know. Neville, I mean. How close he came to killing Nagini, only for Voldemort to…”

Harry’s face twisted with the memory. “Yeah. The killing curse. Right in front of us. And with Nagini, the cup, and the diadem still in existence, there was no point in me yet…” He trailed off, but Hermione knew what he meant. It would have been pointless for him to sacrifice himself, useless to die while so many Horcruxes still chained Voldemort to life.

Harry had later argued that perhaps his death would have given them the same shield his mother’s had given him. He had fallen into pieces, sobbing that he should have let Voldemort strike him down. That doing so might have saved Fred, or Tonks, or any of the others. Hermione remembered clutching him as he wept, rocking him like she could shake the thought out of him.

“This time will be different,” she said, her tone steady though desperation bled through. “We’ll destroy every one of them before it comes to that. And we’ll find a way to take the fragment out of you without—” Her voice broke off; she couldn’t force the rest aloud.

“I know,” Harry said. The plainness of it carried more weight than any promise could.

Hermione looked down at the locket, concealed in its cloth. “What are we supposed to do with it now? We can’t risk anyone finding it, and we certainly can’t wear it.”

“No,” Harry agreed. “Never again. Not after what it did to us… to Ron.”

The mention of Ron brought a memory Hermione would rather not revisit. His face twisted with envy, dark hollows under his eyes from the locket’s poison, the empty place in the tent the night he walked out. Tomorrow morning, though, they would see another Ron at breakfast: younger, whole, unaware of what lay ahead.

“You should keep it,” Harry said after thinking a moment. “In your trunk. I don’t want it anywhere near him.”

Hermione inclined her head. “Even if no one wears it, too much time close to it…” She let the thought trail off. They both knew how it worked, its slow erosion from within.

“We’ll think of something better once we’re at Hogwarts,” Harry said. “Maybe the Room of Requirement. We could make it into a vault just for this, just until we can destroy both it and the diadem. The basilisk fangs in the Chamber of Secrets should still work.”

“Yeah, this’ll be temporary, only. Just a few weeks until the term starts.”

She pushed the bundle deep into her pocket. Its weight dragged against her hip, heavy with more than metal. One Horcrux down. Four to go. And the last, buried inside Harry himself.

“It feels strange,” Hermione said. “To know ahead of time. Where they are, what they are. Last time, we wasted months guessing.”

“This time we can plan. Step by step. No rushing blind.”

“Still, we can’t lean on memory alone. The timeline’s already bending. It’s possible that things won’t line up exactly.”

For a time, neither spoke. Dawn crept nearer, and Hermione counted the moments.

“We should go back,” she said at last. “Before the others wake.”

Harry rose first and held out his hand. Hermione took it, letting him draw her up. For a breath, neither let go.

“This is real,” he said. “We’re really doing this.”

“Yes,” she said. “We finish it this time.”

They stepped into the stairwell and fell into the old rhythm, wary and quiet.

“Thank you,” Harry said as they reached the second-floor landing. “For believing we can change it. For not letting go.”

Hermione swallowed and let the truth spill out. “I’ll never give up on you, Harry. Never.”

She moved before sense could catch her, pressing a kiss to his cheek. Heat met her mouth, and, a little unexpectedly, the first fuzz of stubble along his jaw. She tried to draw back, but Harry’s hand closed around her wrist. A spark leapt through her. His eyes searched hers in the dim light. His hand was gentle; she could have slipped free, but neither moved until several heartbeats had passed.

Then his fingers eased away, slow, reluctant. “Get some rest, Hermione.”

“You too, Harry,” she said, matching his quiet tone.

They parted, walking to their doors. Beneath the unexpected warmth, steady and unshaken, was purpose. They had taken the first step toward altering everything. The locket in her pocket was only the start.

She shut the door behind her; Ginny didn’t stir. For the first time in years, true hope settled inside her breast. She and Harry carried with them the memory of ruin, yes, but also the means to build something better.

Chapter Text

The old kitchen was silent in the hour before daylight. The fire gave off a merry crackle. Harry cupped his tea mug, the heat pressing into his palms. The room smelled of stone, wood, and cleaning potion, the kind Mrs. Weasley used on the mildew. He remembered how he’d sat here once before, full of dread. Now, he sat steady, the fear pushed back.

A creak came from above, then another further along. Harry ran a thumb along the rim of his mug. His finger snagged on the shallow chip near the handle, a small bite in the ceramic that told of long use. His mind slipped to the night before, to the brief press of Hermione’s lips against his cheek. Warmth pooled in his belly.

His thoughts switched to Dumbledore. In the timeline they’d left behind, the Headmaster had visited Grimmauld Place on Tuesday night, though Harry hadn’t known until Wednesday’s dinner. He’d learned Dumbledore had come while he was asleep. Harry had been counting on that visit repeating, had planned to intercept Dumbledore and introduce the matter of the Prefect badge. But the visit hadn’t happened. Another small move on the board, another sign that this path would not repeat the last one square by square. The twinge that came wasn’t only about losing a chance to speak with Dumbledore; it was the reminder that the ground itself had already shifted. What other expected moments might fail to materialize? What unforeseen changes might spring upon them?

Hermione sat in the chair beside him. The quiet between them wasn’t awkward. Instead, it had the comfortable weight of knowing what didn’t need saying. Harry watched a loose strand of her hair rise and settle with each breath she took. He found his own breath matching it before he noticed.

“More tea, Harry dear?”

At the stove, Mrs. Weasley worked in her purple dressing gown. Pins hung loose in her hair. She stirred the pot and shifted dishes without looking. Before Harry could answer, she came to his side and tipped the teapot, filling his half-empty mug with liquid.

“Thank you, Mrs. Weasley.” He smiled, easier than before.

She turned back to the range, where bacon popped and hissed, and eggs waited for the spatula that obeyed a flick of her wand.

“You really ought to have a proper breakfast today, Harry,” she said, eyes already measuring plates and people. Her free hand went to her pocket and produced a comb as if she kept it there for emergencies. “And perhaps we can do something about that hair of yours before you go.”

Harry suppressed a grin. Some things, at least, remained the same across all timelines.

“Leave the boy’s hair alone, Molly,” Sirius said from his position by the far wall.

Mrs. Weasley huffed, though the comb retreated to her pocket. “He could at least look presentable.”

Arthur Weasley sat opposite Harry, wearing pinstriped trousers paired with a bomber jacket that looked ancient. He was working on something or another. Blue ink smudged his hands where his quill refused to behave. From time to time, he checked the old clock on the mantelpiece. Quite as if he was confirming if it still kept time.

“Morning, all,” came a hoarse voice from the doorway.

Remus Lupin stepped in with the kind of care a man uses when every step must count. Two days after the full moon, and his face was still pale as parchment. The map of old scars ran darker against it, shadows deep under his eyes. His shoulders hunched forward, as though they still recalled a different shape.

“Remus! You ought to be resting,” Mrs. Weasley said, dragging out a chair while glancing toward the pot bubbling on the back hob. “I’ve got a strengthening potion brewing—”

“I’m quite all right, Molly,” he said with a tired smile. “Some tea will do wonders.”

Before Mrs. Weasley’s hand found the teapot, a second figure, who caught the door frame with one shoulder, came bursting into the room, half stumbling, half laughing. Nymphadora Tonks, curls blond and unruly instead of her usual neon shock, looked as though the night had taken her by the collar and hauled her through it face-first. Shadows ringed her eyes, and her robes had lost any argument with creases hours ago.

“Morning.” She yawned, aiming for a chair and only just missing the table’s edge. “Or is it still night? Blimey, I can’t remember the last time I saw five in the morning from this direction.”

Her gaze drifted to Lupin and stayed a fraction too long before she pretended to examine the teacups. Harry glanced at Hermione, who had seen it too; her expression gave away nothing to the room and everything to him.

“Sit down before you fall down, Tonks,” Sirius said with a laugh. “You look like you’ve been wrestling Hippogriffs all night.”

“Worse. Paperwork.” She groaned, dropping into the chair beside Remus.

She reached for the teapot as if it were instinct, filling a cup for Remus, sliding it across, and only afterward pouring her own. The gesture seemed so unthinking that Harry doubted she would even remember doing it.

Remus inclined his head and took the mug in both hands. His fingers shook, enough to send the tea lapping near the rim as he raised it.

“Dodgy crockery in this place,” Tonks said. “Never sits straight, does it?”

“Indeed,” Lupin agreed, his voice warm despite its weariness. “One might almost suspect the dishware of being hexed.”

Mrs. Weasley slid a plate in front of him that could have served two. “Eat something, Remus,” she said. “You’re nothing but skin and bones.”

He winced, not from pain so much as from the size of the portion, but he picked up his fork. Tonks received an equally generous plate for her trouble.

“If you’re not careful, Molly, you’ll have him rolling rather than walking,” Tonks said, nudging Lupin’s elbow with hers. That won her a small, honest smile, the first since he’d come down, and Mrs. Weasley’s answering sniff disguised what sounded like satisfaction.

Their interaction kept finding its rhythm and then confirming it. Tonks reached across for the sugar; her sleeve almost swept the milk to the floor. Remus caught the sugar bowl before it, too, could tip, fingers brushing hers and pausing there. Tonks laughed under her breath. Remus shook his head. It looked like the first steps of a dance.

Harry met Hermione’s eyes. In the other timeline, Lupin had spent almost two years arguing himself into a corner. Too old, too poor, too dangerous, and both had paid for it. Happiness had come late, cut short by death. What if this time they didn’t have to drag through all that stubbornness? What if this, among horrors they had to stop, could be eased sooner? Hermione’s nod said she understood. The smallest interventions might spare not just lives but unnecessary suffering.

“Are you ready for today, Harry?” Mr. Weasley asked, setting his parchment aside and tucking it into the inner pocket of his bomber jacket.

“Yes, sir,” Harry said, surprised by how steady his voice sounded, and then not surprised at all. He knew the outcome. More importantly, he knew that far greater challenges lay ahead, making this hearing seem almost inconsequential in comparison. He glanced at the clock. “We should leave early,” he added. “Just to be safe.”

Let them all think it was nerves. In truth, he remembered all too clearly how they had been late the first time, how the hearing had been moved up and the location changed. Those “administrative errors” had been deliberate attempts to disadvantage him. This time he intended to turn up too early for anyone’s liking.

The clock’s hands crawled. Somewhere overhead, a door closed. Kreacher muttered in some distant room, the words blunted by age and walls. The house seemed to lean in, listening, as people do before a verdict.

Mrs. Weasley fussed over both his clothes and his breakfast, attempting once more to flatten his hair before giving it up as a lost cause. Arthur checked the watch twice in one minute, then rummaged in a drawer for a spare quill and slipped it beside the first in his jacket pocket.

“You’ll be fine,” Tonks called from the table. Her voice stayed bright despite the darkness under her eyes. “You’ve nothing to worry from Amelia Bones. She’s all right.”

Sirius pushed back his chair and came to Harry’s side. He laid a hand on Harry’s shoulder, the weight steady without pressing. “Trust yourself. You know what happened. Tell Madame Bones the truth as you experienced it, without embellishment or apology.”

Of course, it would not be Amelia Bones he’d have to persuade. There was Fudge, and Dolores Umbridge, and some fifty others. The thought of Umbridge and her girlish, simpering voice almost made him want to puke.

Hermione rose and wrapped him in a hug. She drew him in, cheek brushing his, arms firm across his back. The scent of her hair reached him: clean soap and the essence of something citrusy. Warm breath touched his neck and the edge of his jaw.

“You’ve got this,” she said. “This is just a formality.”

She pulled back, but not far, and met his eyes. Something that had always run under the surface stepped nearer to daylight, not sudden, just sure.

Mr. Weasley smoothed the front of his jacket. “Ready, Harry? We should be off.”

He nodded and followed Arthur into the hall. The door opened on a wash of cool air; London waited gray-blue and quiet, the streetlamps still lit, the sky lightening at the edges. He stepped out beside Mr. Weasley and let the house close behind him.

---

Mr. Weasley kept one hand in his jacket pocket as they walked toward the nearest station. Arthur’s shoulders were tight, his head turning often, as though danger might come from behind any parked car. Harry noticed it, but inside he was calm. Years ago, he had almost been sick on this same walk, dread pressing on his chest with every step toward the Ministry. Now, after everything else he had endured, a hearing felt like a small thing.

The underground station was already stirring with life. Office workers drifted in, carrying coffee and clutching newspapers under their arms. A board above the ticket machines read Out of order. Mr. Weasley hesitated, unsure, while Harry moved straight to the booth. He slid coins under the glass and asked for two tickets.

The turnstiles caught Arthur’s attention next. He fed his ticket into the slot, eyes widening as the barrier clicked open. On the platform, he studied the Underground map as though it were a rare text. His finger traced the colored lines, his lips moving as he tried out the station names.

The train rushed in, pushing warm air against them. They found seats without trouble. Then and now, Mr. Weasley asked questions about a stop or a connection. Harry answered, his voice quiet. His thoughts were already leaping ahead to what awaited him at the Ministry.

The train rocked on. He leaned back, allowing himself a rare bit of ease. They were early.

They came up from the Tube station into a rush of noise and movement. Crowded pavements, footsteps quick around them. A bus grinding past while a cab horn blared at the lights. Arthur paused, scanning the tide of strangers. Then he set his shoulders and guided Harry onto a side street. His worn bomber jacket caught a few curious looks, but he gave no sign of noticing them.

“I should admit,” Mr. Weasley said after a wrong turn that led them to a dead end, “I’ve never actually used the visitor’s entrance before. Always come via Floo or Apparition.”

“There,” Harry said. “The red telephone box.” He nodded toward the battered booth pressed up against a wall of graffiti. “Uh. Tonks told me,” he added, covering for his slip-up. The location of the Ministry’s visitor entrance was not something he was supposed to know.

Arthur opened the telephone box and let out a breath. He punched in the numbers: 6—2—4—4—2. A woman’s voice came on, asking their names and reason.

“Arthur Weasley, Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office,” he said. “I’ve brought Harry Potter for a disciplinary hearing.”

A small silver badge clattered into the coin slot. Harry took it, fixing it to his shirt. The engraving said what he already knew: Harry Potter, Disciplinary Hearing. The floor trembled and began to sink. He caught the edge of the booth. Once, it had left him startled; now, it served as a reminder of how much had changed.

The telephone box slid under the pavement and into the Atrium. Fireplaces lined the walls. Green fire flared as people arrived, stepping clear and brushing soot from their sleeves. They moved to the security desk and then passed toward the lifts. The one they stepped into was already crowded. Witches and wizards stood shoulder to shoulder, clutching files and parchments, while pale violet memos circled above like restless birds.

The disembodied voice announced each floor in turn. “Level Seven, Department of Magical Games and Sports…” A witch beside Harry shifted the stack of papers in her arms, muttering about Quidditch regulations.

Harry’s thoughts wandered. He remembered Mr. Weasley telling him how the Ministry windows could show any weather the Magical Maintenance staff wished, and how a strike once left every pane filled with storm clouds for weeks. That memory came with a strange sense of distance.

“Level Two, Department of Magical Law Enforcement, including the Improper Use of Magic Office, Auror Headquarters, and Wizengamot Administration Services,” the voice said. Arthur led Harry down the corridor.

They passed through into the Auror Headquarters. The room stretched broad, split into cubicles with walls covered by clippings and photographs. Harry looked them over, then caught sight of someone he knew. Kingsley Shacklebolt. Behind him, the cubicle wall sported a board dense with photographs, headlines, and alerts about Sirius Black. Harry kept his expression blank. He knew too much and had to pretend otherwise.

Kingsley strode over. “Arthur,” he said in his low, measured voice. He handed Mr. Weasley a bundle of reports and a rolled-up copy of The Quibbler. Harry pretended he didn’t know who Kingsley was. At least this time, Arthur didn’t need to step on his toes.

Arthur brought him into his office. The room was small, almost a cupboard. Two desks crowded the floor, while filing cabinets pressed against the walls. On a shelf sat a battered toaster. It clicked once, then hiccuped. Harry noticed the family photograph on Arthur’s desk. No Percy. Like before, he had walked out of the picture.

The office door slammed against one of the cabinets. An old wizard rushed in. His hair stuck up, his face red from running. The papers in his arms slid loose and scattered across the floor.

“Arthur! Thank goodness you’re early. They’ve changed the time and venue of Potter’s hearing. It’s at eight o’clock now, down in old Courtroom Ten.”

Mr. Weasley’s eyes widened. “Courtroom Ten? But that’s—” He shook his head. “Well, no worry, Harry. We’re well in time but let us be off.”

Arthur led him back toward the lifts. Harry followed at a measured pace. This was why he had insisted on leaving early. The Ministry’s attempt to throw him off balance would fail this time.

The lift rattled open. They stepped inside. A pair of witches argued in low voices about some new broomstick regulations, their parchment rolls jabbing into Harry’s arm as the doors clanged shut.

“Level Nine, Department of Mysteries,” the voice announced after the lift had all but emptied on Level Eight.

The doors opened with a groan. The change was sharp; this floor had none of the chatter or bustle of the ones above. The air was colder, and the walls were bare stone. The last few people filed out, shoulders hunched, shoes clicking fast on the floor. No one lingered. Mr. Weasley didn’t pause either. He turned left at once.

Harry hung back half a second, his eyes sliding straight ahead.

There it was. A black door at the far end, no handle, no sign. Nothing to mark it but the way it seemed to sit too still, as though the shadows around it bent toward it. He knew what lay beyond, though he shouldn’t, not yet. His stomach knotted.

“Harry,” Arthur said over his shoulder, half turning to look at him.

He tore his eyes from the door and went after him. The side passage ended at a stairwell. The rail was worn smooth, the middle of each step rubbed by long use. Arthur was already heading down fast, muttering under his breath about courtroom schedules and administrative errors.

The stairs ended in a low passage. It reminded him of the Hogwarts dungeons, with doors of thick wood strapped with iron. Harry kept moving past them until the corridor ended. Courtroom Ten waited there.

Mr. Weasley stopped. “I can’t go in. Good luck, Harry.”

Harry gave a nod. His hand pressed the badge flat against his chest. He felt calm, almost too calm. No wild rush in his chest this time, no last-minute hope they’d arrive in time. He pushed at the heavy door and stepped inside.

The room opened before him, wide and dark. Fifty heads turned toward him on the high benches. He saw them, let them look, and kept walking at the same steady pace. There was Fudge in his showy robes, sitting beside Amelia Bones.

Harry let his eyes pass over Percy at the desk and then stopped. Umbridge sat a little back from the light, squat and pink, that toadlike smile fixed as if nothing had changed. The jolt of seeing her was worse than anything else in the room. Every cruelty of his fifth year came back at once: the detentions carved into his skin, the lies spread through the school, the way she had tried to break him. He knew more than anyone in that chamber: she had sent the Dementors. He also knew what an opportunist she was. She swung whichever way gave her the most power. During the Dark Regime she had risen, not shrunk, seizing every chance to punish and humiliate. The memory of it twisted in Harry’s gut. He pressed the fury down hard; she would like nothing better than to see him lose control.

The hearing unfolded much as he recalled. Fudge tried to trip him with questions, but Dumbledore’s calm interventions cut through the Minister’s posturing. Bones pressed Harry on details of the attack, and he answered, letting the truth speak for itself. Mrs. Figg confirmed the story in her halting way, enough to satisfy the chamber. The Wizengamot stirred when he spoke of the stag Patronus, of Professor Lupin teaching him.

Umbridge interrupted where she could, pouncing on stray words, her syrupy voice carrying across the chamber in sharp little digs. Harry held his tongue, refusing to rise. That was a victory she would never claim.

At last, Bones called the vote. More hands lifted for acquittal than Harry remembered from before. Fudge slammed the gavel with unnecessary force, sour at being outnumbered.

Cleared of all charges. The words carried through the stone chamber, and Harry let out a measured breath. One battle ended. Many more waited.

---

Dumbledore rose from the conjured armchair. The chair vanished with a casual sweep of his wand. He had already started toward the door, his robes dragging across the stone, when Harry made his choice.

The first time, Dumbledore had walked out without a word. No glance back, no pause. Not this time, Harry told himself.

“Headmaster, wait.”

His voice sounded more even than he expected, steady rather than urgent.

Dumbledore stopped. For a heartbeat surprise showed, then he smoothed it away. His eyes slid off to the side instead of meeting Harry’s.

The chamber around them was emptying. The scrape of benches, the swish of heavy robes. Wizengamot members filed out through the back, a river of plum fabric and muttered conversations. Percy had bolted fast, papers clutched like a shield, his posture stiff and uncompromising. Fudge lingered, leaning forward as if to eavesdrop. Amelia Bones caught him with a sharp glance, and he gave in, shuffling toward the exit with a mutter.

The door shut with a heavy thud, the sound carrying. The torches hissed on the walls.

Dumbledore spoke at last. His voice was polite, edged with caution. “Of course, Harry. What did you wish to say?”

Harry’s mouth was dry. Apart from them taking the locket, this was the first deliberate move he had made since stepping back into this second chance. It was more than survival, more than just not repeating mistakes. This was action.

“First, I wanted to thank you for coming today,” he said. “I know the Ministry isn’t thrilled to see you here.”

“That is accurate enough,” Dumbledore said, a wry smile tugging at his mouth. “But their irritation is nothing compared with the importance of justice being served.”

Harry gave a short nod. “I should admit something, though. At the start of the summer, I was angry. Properly angry. Locked up at Privet Drive, shut out of everything, not told a thing. I hated it. I hated knowing Voldemort was out there, and I was stuck doing nothing.”

A crease formed between Dumbledore’s brows. His eyes still fixed somewhere off to Harry’s left, never on him. “A natural response. Isolation breeds resentment.”

“I know,” Harry said. He drew a breath, steadying himself. “But I’ve been thinking. Anger doesn’t do anything. It just leaves you stuck. There’s too much at stake to waste energy on it. What matters is what comes next, not how angry I was.”

There. He let the words hang.

Something shifted in Dumbledore’s stance. Shoulders pulling back, attention sharpening.

“That is a… well-considered view, Harry,” he said after a pause, tone softer, carrying a note of approval. “One many older than you struggle to achieve.”

Harry allowed himself a thin smile. “I’ve had good teachers. And enough reminders that time’s short.” He hesitated before continuing. “I wanted to talk to you about being made a prefect.”

If the words surprised Dumbledore, he hid it well. Only the slightest lift of an eyebrow showed.

“I know you’ll choose Hermione,” Harry said at once. “She deserves it. No one else matches her for discipline, knowledge, or attention.”

Dumbledore inclined his head. “Miss Granger does indeed have admirable qualities.”

“I’d like to be considered for other fifth year Gryffindor badge.”

For a heartbeat Dumbledore’s eyes met his. Blue, piercing, too aware. Then his gaze slid away again. “Go on.”

“I know my record’s not spotless,” Harry said, giving a crooked smile. “I’ve bent rules, broken some outright. But most of that was reacting. Always catching up to what had already gone wrong. I want a chance to be ahead of it. A Prefect badge would give me a chance to be proactive, to guide, to help keep others steady, especially with what’s coming. I also know how well Hermione and I balance each other. We would make a good pair. I expect you have many candidates to consider. I’m not asking for special favors. I’m asking for a chance to serve.”

Dumbledore’s voice dropped, carrying a trace of warmth. “You have changed this summer. More than I foresaw.”

Harry’s shoulders loosened. “We all grow up eventually, sir.”

“Indeed,” Dumbledore said. “Though often sooner than we wish.” He adjusted his spectacles with thin fingers, the lenses flashing in torchlight. “I value your candor. However, the Prefect badges are symbols, no more and no less. What you have spoken of, this wish to steady others, can be done with or without a badge.”

A pang of disappointment twisted inside Harry. Was he already too late?

“In any case, you’ve given me much to consider. I appreciate your maturity and will consider your words when making my decision.”

It wasn’t a promise. It wasn’t refusal, either. He hoped it was enough.

Harry inclined his head. “Thank you for hearing me out.”

“Thank you for speaking,” Dumbledore said. He glanced toward the door. “I must be about my business.”

“Understood, sir.”

The headmaster gave a short nod and walked away. His steps struck the stone and grew faint until the door shut behind him with a heavy thud.

Harry stayed in place. Had he convinced him? Harry couldn’t tell. But perhaps the point was less about the badge and more about the picture he had drawn: a Harry who was not just a boy to shelter, but a partner, an ally. Someone who could take responsibility. Someone Dumbledore might trust with more.

By speaking now, he had missed the sight of Lucius Malfoy leaning close to Fudge, purse strings pulling strings of government. In the other timeline, that moment had stung: proof of everything rotten. But he didn’t need the proof anymore. He already knew the board, the players, the loyalties. What mattered was setting pieces of his own.

He turned toward the door. The hearing that had once filled him with dread already seemed small, a shadow against what loomed ahead. Still, every word, every move mattered. Ripples spread further than anyone could measure.

Today, he had shown Dumbledore a different Harry Potter. A young man willing to shoulder the weight.

It was only a beginning. But beginnings, Harry reminded himself, had power.

Chapter Text

Grimmauld Place pushed back at every swipe, its spite almost alive. Hermione ran a cloth down the third-floor banister; the wood came up a dull brown, the rag turned black, and a fine web of dust drifted back as if shaken from the ceiling.

“This is hopeless,” Ron said from the upstairs landing. The iron sconce jutting from the wall had iron hooks like claws. One had caught his sleeve again. He pried himself free and glared at it as if that might help. “We’ve done days of this, and it still looks like nobody lives here.”

“Keep going,” Hermione said.

The ceiling bore black stains where water had run, streaking the plaster. A sagging rug concealed warped boards, each step producing a dull thud as if the house resented their weight. She leaned into the banister post, working wax into a scar that ran along the grain. Somewhere below, a pipe knocked; the sound walked up the walls and settled in the open space.

Harry had the velvet curtains down and was beating them by the open window. Each strike raised a dense gray cloud. He paused, eyes narrowed against the dust, then lifted the fabric again. His movements were methodical, efficient; too efficient for a teenage boy on summer holiday. He worked with the focused determination of someone accustomed to far worse tasks than household cleaning. Of course, he was. They both were.

Hermione brushed her pocket, feeling the locket’s hard edge. They’d taken it from the drawing-room cabinet earlier; two days later, she and Harry agreed the trunk wouldn’t do while they were out. Nights were fine; they locked the doors when they slept. But days meant stairs, buckets, and Mrs. Weasley’s lists. And an unattended trunk upstairs.

So, they’d set stricter rules. The locket would never remain unattended: they’d pass it every few hours so neither kept it for long. Nights, they’d rotate rooms. Harry had first wanted it nowhere near Ron; later, they’d both realized that Ginny was no safer, not after the diary Horcrux. So, they split the risk and kept it moving, never in one place long enough for Kreacher to notice.

Their solution had evolved into a daily ritual, an exchange that happened in quiet corners away from curious eyes. Every few hours, one would find the other, a subtle hand gesture signaling the transfer. Sometimes, their fingers would brush as the cloth-wrapped bundle passed between them. Just a moment, nothing special, and yet that contact carried weight beyond the physical object they shared.

The locket knocked against her hip now as she moved down the stairs. She’d take it to Harry after lunch, once Mrs. Weasley had assigned them to separate tasks again.

A board groaned somewhere behind her. Hermione turned. Kreacher stood at the end of the stairs. Small, still, eyes too bright in the gloom. His mutter reached her in scraps: “Thieves… Mudbloods… mistress’s things… dirty hands… shame…”

His gaze slid to the side-seam of her jeans, to the line of fabric where the locket rested. A cold dread settled over Hermione’s shoulders. Did he smell the metal? Or only guess?

“Hello, Kreacher,” she said, keeping her tone even. “We’re cleaning the house. Isn’t that nice, having this place turn habitable again?”

The elf’s face pinched tighter. He took one stiff step nearer, chin lifting as if to sniff.

“Kreacher serves the Noble House of Black,” he said at last, his voice rough. “Kreacher does not serve the Mudblood girl. Kreacher does not serve friends of the blood-traitor master.”

He stared at her pocket again, then skulked closer, still muttering.

“Kreacher knows they are searching… taking master’s treasures… What would my mistress say if she knew…”

Hermione suppressed a sigh. She knew what Kreacher could become. What he had become, in that other future. The devoted servant who had led house-elves of Hogwarts into battle in both Regulus and Harry’s honor. The loyal protector who had guarded Grimmauld Place against Death Eaters. The companion who had cooked for them during those desperate days when they’d hidden here after the Dark Regime began.

But that transformation had stemmed from a single act: Harry returning Regulus’s locket to Kreacher, honoring the devotion that had defined the old elf’s life. That small gesture of respect, along with Harry’s better understanding, had reshaped him. From bitter enemy to steadfast ally, all because someone had seen him as more than a servant, had acknowledged the depth of his loyalty.

They couldn’t give him the locket now, of course. Not with a piece of Voldemort’s soul still trapped inside it. But perhaps they could begin laying the groundwork for that eventual change.

“We’re not trying to dishonor your mistress’s memory, Kreacher. We’re just trying to make this house livable again. Wouldn’t she want her home to shine?”

The house-elf glared at her but didn’t shuffle away. It was a minute victory, but Hermione would take it.

“Sirius should be kinder to you,” she said. “I’m sorry that he isn’t.”

Kreacher’s eyes widened, just for a moment. Then his face twisted back into its habitual sneer. “Mudblood girl doesn’t understand. Kreacher serves the Noble House of Black.”

He disappeared down the corridor, but Hermione caught his continued muttering.

“Master Regulus’s locket… must protect the master’s treasures…”

Hermione watched him go. Her shoulders sagged. There was so much broken, so much waiting. She sighed and picked up her cloth again.

The morning slipped by in dust and soap water. Mrs. Weasley directed the work like a general, always finding ways to place her and Harry apart. Different rooms, sometimes whole floors between them.

“Harry, dear, the drawing room curtains still need attending. Hermione, I think the library shelves could use your careful touch,” she would say, or “Harry, help Ron with that cabinet. Hermione, come help Ginny and me in the parlor.”

No one commented on it, but the pattern held. If Hermione drifted toward the kitchen to ask Harry about a list, Mrs. Weasley’s voice would meet her at the door. “Hermione, love, windows upstairs”, and a moment later Harry would be handed a bucket and sent the other way. A cleared throat here, a fresh assignment there; two steady hands keeping them on separate tracks. Of course she noticed, Hermione thought. That’s a mother’s eye.

The thought pricked. She pictured her own mum fussing with her hair, her dad checking the ticket times. Only a few more weeks. They’d meet her at King’s Cross. The ache sat under her ribs like a small stone.

Sirius noticed too, but in his own way. Catching them by the window seat, he tipped his head and smirked. “Trading secrets in my hallway?” he said, then moved on, humming.

Ron’s patience frayed as the days wore on; drawers banged when she and Harry spoke in low voices. Ginny’s jokes kept their shape but cooled at the edges.

“Is it the locket?” Harry whispered during one exchange. “Could it be affecting them even from a distance?”

Hermione ruled out the locket. Ron and Ginny didn’t know about it, and the only time they shared a room with it for long was when everyone slept. What had changed was her and Harry. They found each other with a glance now, drifted together without speaking, finished thoughts the other started.

Ron and Ginny would need to have been blind not to pick up on that.

---

It was a couple of nights later that Hermione found herself alone in the kitchen. Dinner was two hours past. She tried to read, eyes on the page, but the words wouldn’t stick. The kitchen’s worn edges and clutter gave it a kind of warmth. It also helped that so long as someone sat there, Kreacher kept his distance. Upstairs, portraits threw insults at her, and grim objects held danger. Here, it was different. Here, things were ordinary: pans scuffed from use, herbs dangling and brittle above the hearth, the floor worn smooth by years of footsteps. The fire had burned to embers, steady and dim. Hermione flipped another page without noticing the words.

The hinges creaked, and the door pushed wide; Tonks came in mid-story, arms flailing, with Remus behind her, his voice quieter, measured. Neither noticed Hermione at first, caught up in whatever mission report they were discussing.

“—and then Vance says, completely straight-faced, ‘But they told me this was a routine inspection!’ Meanwhile, the parchment he’s holding starts biting him, and his robes are on fire!” Tonks’s bright laugh sounded in the dim kitchen.

Lupin’s lips quirked. “A classic sign of someone with no sense of situational awareness.”

“Oh!” Tonks broke off mid-laugh, eyes landing on Hermione at the far end of the table. “Wotcher, Hermione. Didn’t spot you there.”

Hermione put her book aside but didn’t close it yet. “It’s fine. Don’t mind me.”

Tonks hooked a chair with her boot and sat. Her shoulder brushed Lupin’s arm as he claimed the seat next to her. He went still for a beat. Tonks snatched a biscuit from the plate of leftovers from dinner and waved it at him.

“Go on, take one before I eat the lot.”

“I’m not hungry,” Remus said.

“You never are,” she said. “That’s half the problem.” She bit into hers, scattering crumbs across the table. “See? Easy.”

“Not hungry,” he said again, though softer this time.

“Rubbish,” Tonks said. “Everyone’s hungry for biscuits. It’s the law.”

She shoved the plate at him until he gave in. He took one, turned it between his fingers, then snapped it in half. One piece disappeared into his mouth; the other vanished into his pocket.

“See? Not so hard,” Tonks said, though her grin faltered when she noticed where the other half had gone.

Hermione’s chest tightened. Both pity and sadness invaded her thoughts. Lupin was a man so accustomed to scarcity and self-denial that he saved food for later, unable to just enjoy the moment’s abundance. A habit built in lean years. Save a bit. Make it stretch.

“There’s more,” Tonks said, nudging the plate. “You know how Molly keeps a second tin stashed for ‘emergencies’.”

“Old habits,” Remus said.

They fell into an easy quiet. Tonks’s boot swung under the chair, toe tapping the rung. Remus traced a nick in the table with one finger. The quiet grew, but not in a way that pressed. Tonks tilted her head, eyes still on Remus. Lupin kept his attention fixed on the scarred wood, jaw tight, thumb working that same scratch as though it held the answer to a riddle.

Hermione knew better than to stare, but she saw enough. The way he leaned away, careful to maintain the smallest space between them. The way his glance followed her anyway when she wasn't looking, betraying him.

It wasn’t a lack of feeling. It was the conviction he had no right to any of it.

Hermione closed her book. “I should head upstairs.”

Tonks sat back, startled. It was almost as if she’d forgotten Hermione was even in the room. “Oh, right. Don’t run off on our account.”

“I’m not,” Hermione said as she stood. The book slipped under her arm. “I’ve read enough for one night.”

She left them to their silence. Outside, she had just rounded the landing when Harry almost collided with her.

“There you are,” he said. “I’ve been looking for you.” His hand brushed his pocket in passing.

She understood. It was time.

Hermione glanced back toward the kitchen. A thin strip of firelight spilled under the door, flickering with the draft. She tugged Harry a few steps higher, out of sight.

“They’re in there,” she said.

“Who?”

“Tonks. Lupin.” She held the book tight against her ribs. “There’s something there already. She keeps testing the space between them, and he… he feels it. And then pretends he doesn’t.”

Harry shook his head. “That sounds like him. Never lets himself.”

“I know. And we’ll be at school soon, and they’ll still be here. Caught in that same place. It’s… hard to see the start of it, when you know how long it drags on.”

The stairs under them creaked, sharp in the quiet. From somewhere came the faint rustle of portrait curtains moving. Harry leaned on the banister. His arm brushed hers. Neither moved away. After a while, Harry’s hand shifted back to his pocket. The reminder was enough. They took the stairs, shoulder to shoulder, the old wood protesting.

Hermione cast one last look at the glow under the kitchen door. Her mind returned to the biscuit, broken and pocketed as if Lupin still lived by rules of scarcity, and that small act weighed on her more than words ever could. The thought stayed with her long after she and Harry finished their quiet exchange and went their own ways for the night.

---

Order meetings always turned Grimmauld into a different place. Hermione stood on the landing above the kitchen with the others, watching the room empty. Sirius’s laugh carried up, brittle and too loud, as he said something to Kingsley at the door. It wasn’t real laughter, not with the way it cracked. More the sound of a man forcing himself to seem part of things while the rest of the war slipped out of his reach.

Another night where they’d been barred from the kitchen, shut out from discussions that had everything to do with Harry.

Fred leaned out over the rail until George hooked two fingers in the back of his collar. “If you fall,” he said, twirling a stretch of flesh-colored string, “I’m telling Mum you were reviewing gravity.”

“Gravity always works,” Fred said. “Unlike the Extendable Ears. Not a single syllable. Moody’s gone all belt and braces on us. Imperturbable on the door.”

George nodded. “Door, walls, everything.”

Harry stood next to her, hip set against the rail. He wore the look he had more often now, quiet and counting. Even when he said nothing, something in him kept tally. His hand checked his pocket without thinking. Hermione knew the shape there and the weight of it; she had handed it to him earlier in a pass as unconscious as breathing.

The kitchen door opened once more. Snape crossed the threshold. He paused beneath the stairs, head angled back to see them gathered above. His eyes moved along their row as if counting stock.

“How touching,” he said. “Potter and his little entourage, desperate for crumbs they cannot understand.”

He didn’t wait for a reply, only turned and left, robes flaring.

“Greasy git,” Ron said when he was gone. “As if we’re Harry’s… fan club or something.”

“Let it go,” Harry said. His voice was low, even, tighter than the boy who used to snap back in a heartbeat.

Ginny scowled. “He can’t talk to us like that, professor or not.”

“Don’t know why Dumbledore keeps him around,” Ron added. “Bet he runs straight to You-Know-Who with everything he hears.”

Hermione said nothing. There wasn’t a way to explain it, how the man who never missed a chance to belittle them had carried a grief so sharp it tied him to Dumbledore until his last breath. She pressed her lips together. That memory lived beside the petty, vengeful figure who had just sneered at them. Both were true. She had never learned how to hold them both at once.

“Come on,” Fred broke the silence. “We’ve got something upstairs.”

George grinned. “Brand new. Needs volunteers.”

“What kind of prototype?” Ron asked, his voice a little wary.

“The unfinished sort,” Fred said with a wink. He swept an arm toward the upper floors. “Participants will gain eternal glory, minor rashes, and possibly the admiration of their peers.”

Harry raised an eyebrow at that. “Possibly?”

“Almost certainly,” George said. “Results may vary.”

The twins’ room was alive in a way the rest of Grimmauld Place never was. Color splashed across the walls, and parchments scattered on every surface, some curling from spilled potion stains. Gadgets lay in parts, clicking, wheezing, or just giving off colored sparks.

“Welcome to our headquarters,” George said. “Where ideas get born and tested, and where they sometimes explode.”

“And where Mum refuses to clean,” Fred added in a cheery tone.

“Now then,” George said, rifling through a pile. “Where’d it go? Oh, here.”

He presented it with a flourish. From what Hermione could see, it was a small, heart-shaped disc. “Ladies, gentlemen, and Ron, presenting: the Weasley Snog-o-Meter 2000!”

Ron squinted. “The what?”

“The name’s still pending,” Fred said.

George cleared his throat. “For those plagued by uncertainty in matters of the heart, the Snog-o-Meter offers clarity. At last, no more wondering if your crush—”

Ginny swished her hand, interrupting her brothers. “What does it do?”

“Detects compatibility. Sparks. That sort of thing. Glows a color depending on attraction.”

Hermione frowned. “That sounds invasive.”

George beamed. “Romantic potential! Scientific advancement in the service of snogging.”

“Absolute rubbish,” Ron said.

“Which is why we need tests.” Fred’s gaze skipped to Harry, then to Hermione, then back.

Heat crept up Hermione’s neck. “Absolutely not.”

Harry gave a short laugh. “Shouldn’t you try it on people who already know where they stand?”

“Boring,” George said.

“Besides,” Fred added, “Ron’s noticed you two always vanish together. Very suspicious.”

Ron’s ears flamed. “I only meant—never mind.”

Fred grinned. “Exactly.”

“Stop it,” Hermione said, though the flush on her cheeks betrayed her.

The teasing stung more than it should. It brushed against something she had only begun to notice herself. The slow shift, the quiet familiarity that no longer fit only under “friendship.”

Fred held out the heart. “Come on, Hermione. For science.”

“No.”

“Perhaps Harry and I could do it,” Ginny said.

Harry’s expression tightened, too brief for anyone else to notice.

“Sorry, Gin,” George said, waving her off. “Harry looks at you like you’re Ron in a skirt. No tension, no payoff.”

Ginny went red. Ron almost choked.

Hermione’s mouth dropped open. “That’s a horrid thing to say.”

“Accurate, though,” Fred said, grinning. “Now, if you want real mystery, you test it on people who spend half the day sneaking off together.”

Harry’s chuckle came out tight. “You’re imagining things.”

“Maybe,” George said, waggling the disc. “But let’s find out.”

Harry looked at her. “If we say yes now, we can say no to the next five ideas.”

“You’re bargaining with scoundrels,” she said under her breath.

“Friendly scoundrels,” he said.

George thrust the device toward Harry, triumphant. “Thumb and forefinger, both of you.”

She sighed. Suppose there was no escaping it. Her fingers brushed Harry’s as she reached for the heart. For a moment, nothing happened. Then it exploded in purple smoke, coating Harry and her in shimmering dust.

“Blimey!” Fred said.

The world turned violet: the carpet, clothes, glasses, hair. Hermione rubbed at her cheek and succeeded only in spreading the glitter further. The twins howled. Ron fought it, but a grin still slipped through. Ginny’s smile was thin, practiced, nothing like her real one.

Hermione couldn’t blame her. This time, years ago, Ginny had carried herself as if she’d outgrown her crush. She’d laughed louder, talked more, even teased Harry without a blush. But it had only been armor. Hermione knew that now. The eagerness in Ginny’s voice tonight had given her away. Too quick, too ready. The younger girl’s face tonight told the truth: her brothers’ careless words had landed, and the smile she forced tasted of hurt.

Hermione froze, a memory striking sharp.

Years ago, she had told Harry it wasn’t Quidditch the girls found popular; it was him. That he’d never been more fanciable, she had said. Now, with purple on his cheekbone and glitter on his glasses, with the set to his mouth that came from having weathered storms older than he looked, the word returned and sat wrong. Even in this younger frame, he carried himself with a different air. No boy left. Only the man who had survived.

Fanciable was too small a word now. Not wrong, exactly, but not correct, either.

“Well, I’d call that inconclusive,” Harry said, brushing purple from his glasses.

“Data’s data,” Fred said.

George nodded. “We’ll refine.”

“I’m washing this off before Mrs. Weasley bans your entire business,” Hermione said, already moving.

“Yeah, me, too,” Harry said.

As they left, she heard Fred murmur, “Interesting result.”

“Very,” George agreed.

Hermione walked faster. The glitter dust itched on her skin. Not as much, however, as the unwelcome warmth curling in her chest. The twins’ voices faded as the door closed behind them. Hermione shook her head, sparks raining down from her hair.

“They’ll never grow up.”

Harry’s laugh was soft. “That’s kind of the point.”

Chapter Text

Something moved outside his door. It tore Harry out of sleep in an instant. His chest squeezed before his mind could place where he was. Not the safe house. Not a raid. Grimmauld Place, 1995. The rush in his ears slowed, but the tightness in his body stayed.

His hand sought his wand. Only after the holly wood rested steady in his palm did he grope for his glasses. The blur of shapes sharpened: the heavy wardrobe, curtains sagging, Ron sprawled under blankets across the room.

The sound came again. A shuffling noise, too deliberate for the house’s usual groans.

Harry slid from the mattress, toes meeting the boards. In another life, the noise would have meant instant panic, a sprint for cover. Now he forced himself to remain calm. Not every creak meant an enemy, but caution had kept him alive too many times to let it go.

He edged to the door, wand low but ready. The hinges groaned, the metal dry from age.

A figure stood by Hermione and Ginny’s door.

Kreacher.

The house-elf’s gnarled fingers ran over the doorknob. His nose almost touched the wood, sniffing at what lay beyond. His mouth worked without pause, a faint mutter filling the quiet space.

“Thieves,” Kreacher said. “Taking the master’s treasures. Mudbloods and blood-traitors touching what isn’t theirs. Kreacher knows.”

Harry froze where he stood, gaze locked on Kreacher. The locket. They had shuffled it from room to room, pocket to pocket, never letting it rest long enough for Kreacher to seize. Yet, the pull of Regulus’s command still seemed to guide him. It clung to him like a scent only he could track.

Kreacher stiffened. His head snapped around. His eyes caught Harry’s in the gloom. The stare held, unbroken, sharp as a pin. There was no trace of surprise. Only a glare so fierce it made Harry’s stomach knot.

“The boy watches,” Kreacher said, each word rough with spite. “Blood-traitor master’s godson spying on Kreacher, yes. Always sneaking, always looking. Doesn’t know. Can’t know what they’ve stolen.”

Harry took a step forward. “Kreacher—”

The elf drew back, feet scuffing against the boards. He muttered broken phrases as he hurried past Harry.

Harry stood rooted in place. He wanted to go to Hermione, to knock and make sure she and Ginny were safe. However, rousing them from sleep would only raise questions he had no way to answer. Not to Ginny. Harry forced himself back into his own room and locked the door with care.

Sleep wouldn’t come. He lay on his back, wand still near, staring at the black ceiling while Ron’s steady breathing filled the silence. His mind pulled him elsewhere, back to the other Kreacher, the one he had later come to know. That change still startled him when he thought about it, how a snarling enemy had become an ally.

In those days, when Grimmauld Place was their only shelter, Kreacher had not cursed them but greeted them with hot food and clean towels. Respect had made the difference. Harry’s promise to honor Regulus’s sacrifice by destroying the locket had bound the elf to him in a way commands never could.

That Kreacher had kept their secrets and even risked his life for them. He had led the house-elves of Hogwarts into battle, small figures charging Death Eaters with knives and pans, a sight that still haunted Harry’s dreams. It had been both horrific and astonishing.

But that future was no more. Here, Kreacher still muttered in corners, steeped in bitterness, left too long alone with Walburga Black’s portrait for company.

And Sirius… Sirius treated the elf with contempt born of old wounds, unable to see past his own anger at the family who had rejected him.

Harry knew how that cycle ended. Kreacher had told Narcissa Malfoy what mattered to Harry: his godfather. That truth, twisted into bait, lured Sirius into the Ministry and to his death. While the elf couldn’t disclose the Order’s headquarters’ location or any confidential Order plans, he had exploited what Sirius hadn’t barred him from saying.

And now history threatened to repeat itself.

Every exchange was the same: Sirius’s voice sharp, Kreacher’s muttering low and constant. One lashed out of old hatred, the other hoarded relics and whispered curses. The house itself seemed ready to explode from the pressure.

Harry turned sideways on the mattress. Dawn had begun to press against the curtains. He would talk to Hermione as soon as it was morning. Together, perhaps they could find a solution. Some way to shift the dynamic before it was too late. Because this time, he knew. And knowing brought its own kind of burden, its own kind of responsibility.

---

Morning found him bleary-eyed but resolved. He caught Hermione as she came down for breakfast, tugging her toward a quiet alcove off the main hall while the others continued to the kitchen.

“Kreacher was at your door last night,” Harry said without preamble, keeping his voice low. “Muttering about thieves. I think he can sense the locket.”

Hermione’s eyes widened. “What time was this?”

“Early morning. Maybe at three or four o’clock?”

“Did he say anything specific?”

“That he knows we’ve taken it.”

Hermione’s shoulders tensed. “We knew this might happen. That’s why we’ve been so careful with the locket.”

“Being careful isn’t enough. Not with Kreacher.” Harry ran a hand through his hair. “In the Dark Regime, he fought for us. He protected us. All because we showed him respect, because we honored Regulus’s sacrifice. But now…”

“Now Sirius treats him terribly,” Hermione said, her mouth tight with disapproval. “And Kreacher retreats further into bitterness, clinging to the only purpose he has left: protecting what he thinks Regulus would have wanted him to protect.”

Harry nodded. “Exactly. And we’re stuck watching it happen, knowing where it leads.”

Hermione took a deep breath, her mind seeming to work through options. “We’re already doing everything we can, Harry. We can’t give him the locket, not while it’s still a Horcrux. We can’t tell Sirius about the future, either, not without risking everything else. We can’t even explain why Kreacher matters so much without raising questions we aren’t ready to answer.”

The limitations of their position hit Harry anew. For all their knowledge, for all their preparation, some patterns seemed destined to repeat unless they found the courage to make more radical changes.

“Then what else is left?” he asked, the question weighted with all the frustration of their impossible situation.

Hermione had no answer. Her silence spoke volumes.

---

The next few days unwound with tedious familiarity. More cleaning. More dust. The war against grime went on under Mrs. Weasley’s command. One afternoon, Harry worked beside Sirius in the library. They were sorting volumes worth keeping from those better destroyed. Sirius worked with surprising zeal, his fingers tracing spines with a scholar’s familiarity despite his oft-professed hatred for his family heritage.

“This one’s harmless,” he said, passing Harry a leather-bound volume. “Just family genealogy. Pompous stuff, but nothing that bites.”

Harry placed it in the growing pile of acceptable books. Perhaps it held something to exploit. The work had a soothing rhythm to it. Remove, evaluate, sort, repeat.

“Ah, here we go,” Sirius said, pulling down a heavy volume. “Ancient Magical Contracts and Their Dissolution. Moody’s been looking for this.”

For the next few minutes, they worked without speaking. Only the scrape of leather spines and the dull thump of heavy volumes filled the room. Now and then a page crackled as Sirius flipped through something before tossing it aside. After a time, he leaned back against the shelves, arms stretching until his shoulders gave a sharp pop.

“Merlin, I’m getting old. Or maybe it’s this house. It sucks the strength right out of you, and I’m not the only one. Remus, too. He’s been dragging his feet more than usual.”

Harry looked up from the book in his hands. “Is he alright?”

“Oh, he’s fine. Well, as fine as he ever is between full moons. But he’s been striding about as though his trousers are a size too small—” Sirius caught himself, eyeing Harry with sudden awareness of his audience. “Anyway, he’s been tense.”

“Why do you think that is?” Harry asked, though he knew exactly why.

“Tonks,” Sirius said with a knowing grin. “My dear cousin has been spending quite a bit of time here, haven’t you noticed? And not just for Order business.”

Harry nodded. He did his best not to look too interested. “I did notice they seem to talk a lot.”

“Talk? Suppose that’s one word for it.” Sirius chuckled. “He’s been doing this…” His fingers jerked at his collar, chin lifted; a parody of Remus trying too hard to look composed.

Harry looked down fast, hiding the grin that threatened to break loose.

“And Tonks isn’t exactly subtle either,” Sirius continued. “Girl broke three teacups last week just trying to pass him the sugar. That’s not clumsiness. Well, not entirely. That’s distraction.”

“Remus seems… hesitant,” Harry said.

“Hesitant?” Sirius barked out a laugh. “If he doesn’t loosen that collar soon, he’ll choke on it. Man’s wound tighter than a new watch spring. Can’t tell if he’s terrified of her, or terrified of what he’d do if he let go. Merlin, I might just have to lock the two of them in a broom cupboard myself.” He caught himself then, glancing at Harry with slight sheepishness. “Listen to your old godfather, going on about adult matters. Forget I said that last bit, all right? Not appropriate for young ears.”

Harry hid a grin. It was strange being treated as a child again, especially by Sirius. His godfather had always spoken to him more as an equal than most adults. The disconnect between his physical age and his experience created these odd moments of dissonance.

“It’s fine,” Harry said. “I’m not that young.”

Sirius ruffled his hair. “No, I suppose you’re not. Growing older quicker than any one of us would like.” A fleeting shadow moved across his features. “Still, some matters can wait until you’re older.”

Harry gave a nod, even as irony pricked at him. He understood exactly what Sirius had been implying. Yet, despite being mentally past twenty, Harry had no more experience in that realm, either, than his sixteen-year-old self had gained in a few stolen moments with Ginny. The Dark Regime had claimed everything: his childhood, his education, and any chance at normal relationships. It had given him only survival, war, and grief, nothing of ordinary life or its quieter pleasures.

Harry’s thoughts slipped back to those darker nights. Breathe wrong, glance away at the wrong second, and you were gone. Longing for more than survival had never died, but he had learned to lock it down. Desire had turned into a weakness he couldn’t afford.

“Speaking of young people and their… interests,” Sirius said, his tone shifting to something lighter, teasing, “I couldn’t help but notice you and Hermione have been rather inseparable lately.”

Harry stared at him. “What?”

Sirius’s grin was all provocation. “Oh, come on. Hushed conversations in corners? The vanishing acts? Even Molly’s noticed. That’s why she keeps assigning you to different jobs. Don’t tell me I imagined our earlier talk about you liking someone sharp enough to keep pace with you. I saw it in your face.”

“We’re just talking,” Harry said, his tone more defensive than he liked. “Planning for the school year.”

“Right, of course,” Sirius said, his tone making it clear he believed nothing of the sort. “Is that what they call it these days? Planning.”

Harry thought of the twins’ Snog-o-Meter, of the purple dust coating him and Hermione. Fred and George’s knowing looks afterward. Ron’s jealousy. Ginny’s hurt. Harry’s ears turned hot. The worst part hadn’t been the twins’ grins. It had been the sudden awareness that the idea of kissing Hermione wasn’t laughable at all.

“We’re friends,” Harry said, though he felt at once how weak the word was. Too simple for feelings forged in nights of danger and years of standing side by side.

The jab pulled at something Harry had barely let himself notice. His godfather, without knowing, had dragged it out into the open. His feelings for Hermione had been shifting, stretching into a space for which he didn’t yet have a word.

“Of course you are,” Sirius said at last, letting him off the hook as he stooped for another stack of books. “Now, give me a hand here.”

Harry bent to the pile, but his mind clung to the moment. Sirius had brushed it off, but Harry couldn’t. Something had changed. Hermione’s nearness steadied him. Had always steadied him. She anchored him more than he dared to admit.

He had spent so long just planning and surviving. He had never paused to examine what else was happening to him.

The afternoon light filtered through the dusty library windows. Harry sorted through books, his mind elsewhere, caught between timelines and possibilities, between the boy he appeared to be and the man into which his experiences had shaped him.

---

The forgotten room on the third floor admitted only a sliver of moonlight. A faint bar crossed the boards, turning the drifting dust silver. Harry slipped in after Hermione, then closed and bolted the door. The sound carried too loud in the quiet. She surveyed the room, the way she always had when they were on the run. Old habits hadn’t left either of them.

The settee sagged when they sat down. Its cushions were flat, the springs long gone. Like before, the dip pulled them close together, shoulder to shoulder. The press of her beside him wasn’t uncomfortable. Far from it. Harry found himself almost grateful for the wreck of furniture. The place suited them; their own pocket of quiet. No one would walk in here. No one would overhear.

“At least it’s not the woods this time,” Hermione said, so low he almost missed it.

Harry glanced at her. His mind filled with old hideouts. Freezing woods, broken cottages, caves where their breath had clouded in front of them while they waited out the night.

“Doesn’t mean it’s safe,” he said.

She reached for his hand. Her fingers found his in the dim light. The simple contact anchored him, steadying his thoughts. Her thumb traced the back of his hand. In that other timeline, Umbridge’s blood quill had carved its cruel message on that skin.

“I meant what I said earlier. I won’t let her hurt you again, Harry,” she said. The sudden shift in topic caught him off guard until he realized her train of thought. “Not like that. Not ever again.”

The memory of those detentions in Umbridge’s office surfaced. The stench of her perfume. The teacups on lace doilies. The kitten plates on the walls. The excruciating burn as the quill cut into his flesh with each line he wrote. I must not tell lies.

“She’ll do it again.” Hermione’s fingers tightened around his. “She’ll try. But she won’t get away with it. Not this time. The moment she brings out that quill, we expose her. No silent suffering, no martyrdom.”

Harry nodded. “No Quidditch bans this time, either. You know, a part of me can’t wait to get back on the pitch. The other part thinks I’ll be a disaster after all this time.”

“You?” Hermione gave a faint laugh. “You could pick up a broom after a decade and still outfly anyone.” Her voice softened. “But don’t make light of this, Harry. Quidditch bans are one thing. Torture is another. You don’t get to brush it aside.”

He met her gaze. “I’m not brushing it aside. I just… need something normal to look forward to.”

“Then hold on to that,” she said. “But promise me, if she tries anything, you’ll tell me. We’ll deal with it together.” Hermione’s expression darkened. “When I think of what she became after Voldemort took control…”

“Chief Registrar of the Bloodline Purity Office,” Harry said, the title still bitter on his tongue. “Responsible for establishing genealogical registries across wizarding Britain.”

They’d learned the fullness of Umbridge’s cruelty during their fifth month in hiding, when a bedraggled witch named Vanessa had stumbled into their camp, half-starved and wild with fear. She’d been fleeing from one of Umbridge’s “purification centers”; former Ministry outposts repurposed for processing those deemed unworthy of magic. The woman’s wand had been confiscated, her home seized, her children taken for “re-education.”

“Do you remember Penny?” Hermione asked, her eyes distant with memory. “The one who brought us those copies of the registration forms?”

Harry nodded. Penny had been a clerk in Umbridge’s office, duplicating documents for the resistance. She’d paid for her courage with her life when she was caught, but not before smuggling out evidence of what became known as the “pink forms”. Death cards, the resistance called them.

“She documented it all,” Harry said. “Every arrest, every confiscation, every family separated.”

“And Umbridge did it with that same simpering smile,” Hermione said. “The same affected girlishness. As if it were all just proper procedure, just a matter of maintaining order.”

It was strange to carry such knowledge, to remember a monster who, in this timeline, had not yet revealed the fullness of her cruelty. Soon, they would face her again at Hogwarts, knowing exactly what she was capable of becoming. The thought sat cold and heavy in Harry’s stomach.

“We can stop her this time,” he said. “Or at least limit her damage.”

Hermione’s thumb continued its gentle movement over his skin, grounding him in the present.

“We also need to consider the situation with the locket. Do you think…” Hermione’s voice dropped further. “Should we tell someone?”

Harry’s chest pulled tight at the suggestion. He’d thought of it himself, especially after finding Kreacher outside Hermione and Ginny’s door. Secrets grew heavier with time. Still… the risk of sharing them weighed just as much.

“Who?” he asked, though he already knew.

“Sirius. Not everything, of course. Not about the time travel. But perhaps about the locket. About what it is. If we tell Sirius about it being a Horcrux, about what it means, maybe he’d also understand why it’s important we treat Kreacher with respect.” Hermione hesitated. “There’s… something else to consider, too. Sirius is trapped here, feeling useless. What if giving him a purpose, making him part of the Horcrux hunt, helps pull him out of that isolation? Gives him something constructive to focus on instead of brooding over being stuck in this house he hates?”

The insight struck Harry with unexpected force. Sirius had chafed against his confinement, had taken risks that ultimately led to his death. What if they could redirect that restless energy? That need to contribute?

“How would we explain knowing about the Horcruxes, though?” Harry asked.

“What if… what if we used your connection to Voldemort? You’re already supposed to have those dreams, those glimpses into his mind.”

“You mean pretend I saw something about Horcruxes in a vision?”

“Yes,” Hermione said. “You did have those visions in our original timeline. And we know they’re real, that the connection exists. We’re just… accelerating the process.”

Harry considered it. “I could say I’ve been seeing flashes; that in one of them, Voldemort was thinking about objects that seemed important to him. That I recognized the locket we found in the drawing room.”

“And we could tell him about the diary,” Hermione said. “About your second year. And since you already destroyed that Horcrux, you could say you realized it was the same sort of thing, only you didn’t have a name for it back then.”

Harry frowned. “Sirius might think it’s too much for us to carry. He might want to take it all on himself.”

“True… but isn’t that better than him sitting in this house, chewing on his own frustration until it eats him alive?”

The plan was beginning to take shape. Tell Sirius about the locket and the diary, explain enough about Horcruxes to make him understand their significance, but frame it as information gathered through Harry’s connection and their own research. Harry knew the knowledge would set alarms ringing in Dumbledore’s mind. And once Dumbledore suspected, Snape would be dragged in. Occlumency lessons. Again.

Only this time, Harry was already far past what Snape could teach him. He’d learned the hard way, under the Dark Regime, when a single slip meant death. He would have to play dumb, flinch at the right moments, pretend to struggle. Shield his mind. Let Snape think he still had the upper hand.

“And if Sirius believes us about the locket, and why it’s important he treats Kreacher well,” Harry said, “maybe he could give Kreacher something else of Regulus’s. Not the locket itself, since we need to destroy it, but something else. A gesture that might shift Kreacher’s loyalty.”

“Exactly,” Hermione said, her eyes brightening. “Kreacher isn’t evil. If Sirius could show him some kindness, some recognition of the loyalty he showed to Regulus…”

The possibility hung between them, tempting in its simplicity. Yet Harry knew nothing was ever so straightforward. Sirius carried a raw hatred for this place and all it represented. Expecting him to temper that for a creature tied to it in every way would be no simple request.

“There’s one more thing,” Hermione said, her voice carrying a new hesitation. “Arthur Weasley.”

Harry gulped. In their original timeline, his vision of Nagini attacking Mr. Weasley had saved the man’s life. But those visions had come through his connection to Voldemort, a connection he now kept shut through Occlumency.

“I won’t be able to see it happening this time,” he said. “Not if I keep blocking Voldemort out. But letting him in isn’t an option. There’s too much he could learn.”

“That means we need another way to keep Arthur safe,” Hermione said.

Harry nodded. Too many lives depended on what they chose next; Arthur’s was only one of them. Harry likened it to tugging at threads in a tangled knot. Pull one, and half a dozen others tightened.

“We’ll need to approach Sirius soon, then,” he said. “Before we return to Hogwarts.”

Hermione gave his hand a squeeze. Only then did Harry register that they hadn’t let go once during the talk. The realization had warmth stirring low in his belly.

The moonlight had shifted, casting long lines across the floorboards. They couldn’t sit here forever. Harry shifted to stand, but something caught in him then. He stopped, turning toward her instead.

“Thank you,” he said. The words felt inadequate compared to the meaning they carried. “For being here. For remembering all of it with me. I couldn’t do this alone, Hermione.”

Before she could answer, he pulled her close. No thought, no hesitation. Just movement, as natural as breathing. She settled into place as if she had always known where to rest, as if they’d done this a hundred times. And in truth, of course they’d done this before, in darker places, under worse skies. The Dark Regime had left only survival. Yet, even back then, there were nights he stayed on his feet only because she wouldn’t let go. Her hand on his arm, her voice steady in the dark.

She held him the same way now. Palms hard against his back, breath warm at his neck. “We’re in this together,” she said. “We always have been.”

For a while, they stayed locked together, neither moving. Harry lost track of how many heartbeats passed. Something inside him shifted. Since the moment they had woken up in these younger bodies, memories of another life heavy in their minds, he had been circling around this truth. Now, with her in his arms, it was plain enough.

They broke apart but didn’t separate, their faces still close. His eyes dropped to her mouth before he could stop himself. What if he leaned forward? Just a few inches, and he’d be kissing her. The thought hit so hard it almost dragged a laugh out of him. The sort, Harry figured, that comes when you don’t know what else to do. It wasn’t the least bit funny, though. And Hermione hadn’t pulled back, either. That was worse. Or better. Harry couldn’t decide.

The silence stretched, taut as wire. Then the spell broke. A floorboard creaked in the hall outside. Both of them jerked toward the sound, every muscle tightening with reflex learned the hard way; unexpected noises rarely meant nothing.

The closeness vanished. They separated at once. Harry crossed to the door and listened. The corridor lay still. No voices. No footsteps.

“Probably just the house settling.” He didn’t believe it, not fully. Grimmauld Place had its own way of shifting when it wanted attention.

“We should go back,” Hermione said. She smoothed her jumper with nervous hands, though her face had steadied.

Harry nodded. The chance had slipped, but something remained, humming beneath the surface. The shape of their bond had changed, or maybe he was only seeing it for what it had always been.

At the downstairs landing, Harry caught Hermione’s hand again, holding it for one last moment.

“Sleep well.”

“You, too, Harry.”

He stood watching until the dark swallowed her steps. Only then did he retreat into bed. He lay awake for a long time. The war waiting for them wouldn’t leave his thoughts, nor would the memory of her, close enough to kiss. That moment had passed, but it left him sure nothing between them was the same anymore.