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Chapter Text

It is only fitting that Hermione dies after the battle ends. 

After Voldemort collapsed in a brittle, wasted heap; after the dust and rubble infused the air around them with a strange sepia haze; after Ron kissed her and then left her to mourn with his family.

And it’s especially fitting that her death is—at least in large part—due to a fucking book.

With everyone together now with their families, she can’t help a nostalgic walk by the library—which is currently in shambles, large sections of wall missing, singed pages of books shuffling across every surface. The wind from the shattered windows whistles. 

It feels nothing like the home she’s come to consider it. 

And now is as good a time as any to mend something—however small—after all that destruction. 

Her arm is bruised and trembling, but she lifts her wand at a nearby shelf, determined to right it. Books topple from the sides, but she persists, clearing the debris beneath it before setting it down. She blinks and imagines it full of undamaged volumes, the labels on the edge crisp and clear. 

Again.

She turns to the next shelf, and the next, the sweat beading across her forehead as the rays of sun filter in through the broken windows—

A book is resting on the window sill beneath the jagged glass, spine cracked. 

Hogwarts: A History.

Unthinking, she moves toward it, transfixed.

As she grows closer, she hears something layered beneath the sound of papers and wind.

Ragged breathing.

She approaches cautiously, wand raised in a palm slick with the sweat of her efforts, until she nearly trips over a body huddled against an overturned table. It takes a moment, but then she recognizes him:

Thorfinn Rowle.

An ominous smear of blood lies across the ground where he’s dragged himself. His robes are soaked through with it, such that Hermione can’t pinpoint where he might be injured. She hesitates, unsure whether to hex him or stun him and heal him—or all of the above—and in that moment, the window beside her shatters. 

Lashes of pain rain down across her exposed skin. She looks up to see his wand pointed at her chest and a sick smile across his blood-spattered face. She should have known—should have cast a Homenum Revelio the moment she stepped inside.

But she’s weak from her makeshift repairs; from days of fighting; from months on the run. Exhaustion has settled into her bones and broken into her marrow.

“I haven’t forgotten you,” Rowle snarls, “despite your best efforts.”

“Stupefy!” she cries, and red light jets straight for his torso.

She doesn’t hear what he says at the same time, and she’s not quick enough to shield right after casting. 

Familiar purple flames rush toward her, sear across her chest, and the last thought she has before her consciousness floats away is, For fuck’s sake, not again.

She wakes with a gasp in the hospital wing. The first thing she registers is that the ragged gash across her chest has reopened, pulsing with the same searing pain as when she sustained it at the end of fifth year. The second thing—

“Granger, try to take slower breaths. I’ll have your next dose of healing potion ready soon.”

—is that Severus Snape is somehow alive. 

Well. Perhaps thinking she was dying was a bit melodramatic. 

She nods, trying to follow his instructions, vaguely noting how similar this is to when it happened the first time. 

And yet, it’s not the same at all.

For one, she knows what true pain feels like now. Pain at the end of a wand; pain at the end of a knife. She can breathe awareness through this pain—the pain of her body knitting its magic together to heal—and try to calculate how long it will take her to recover. She must have been out for quite some time if Snape is up and brewing potions and speaking in his normal voice. He approaches, sleeves rolled and collar unbuttoned, a vial of golden potion in his long fingers, and she catches a glimpse of his pale throat. 

It’s completely unmarred.

“How did you—” she begins, her voice weak from disuse.

He raises an eyebrow. 

“You’re not dead,” she says, shifting upright against the metal headboard. “How?”

He doesn’t deign to respond—merely consults the parchment at the foot of her bed instead. 

“How long have I been unconscious?” she tries instead. 

“Two weeks. Aside from the delirious raving about Hogwarts: A History and Weasley always leaving you when you need him. Your parents have been informed, although they received more of a summary than the much more concerning details regarding breaking into a government building and fighting Death Eaters, as well as—”

“Parents? But they’re in Australia. They don’t remember me.” 

Snape checks the parchments again. “Madame Pomfrey,” he calls. “I should have no reason to doubt your diagnostic abilities, but has anyone double checked that Granger didn’t suffer any intracranial effects from—”

“Intracranial effects?” Hermione says, incredulous. He thinks she’s gone round the bend just because—

Because—

She gestures in disbelief, and it’s only then that she catches a glimpse of her own forearm. 

Mudblood.

It’s familiar and…not familiar. Instead of angry and raised, the letters feel smooth as she traces them, and they shimmer as she turns her wrist in the light. 

She looks down at her bandaged chest, the wound fresh with congealed blood and covered in sticky concentrated dittany ointment. Beneath, her stomach is soft, her ribs no longer visibly jutting out. She can feel the cool metal of the anklet she used to wear—

Fifth year. She used to wear it fifth year. 

She blinks. 

Keeps staring. 

At a body that is hers and…not hers—not anymore—at least it shouldn’t be.

“Can you see this?” she asks, holding out her scarred forearm to Snape and already knowing what the answer will be. 

Fucking time travel. 

Chapter Text

The first rule of time travel is that you can’t change anything that has already happened. Well that obviously isn’t a rule-rule anymore, as Hermione has already usurped her former self for long enough to require several surreptitious calming draughts and a barrage of questions from both Snape and Pomfrey.

(She’s pretty sure she’s also fucked up at least several other rules—and quite possibly the very laws of physics themselves.)

She grits her teeth and lies—unconvincingly, if Snape’s scowls are anything to go by—through the rest of her time in hospital. Yes, she’s feeling better. No, she doesn’t remember her strange assertions that she’s been cursed beyond what happened with Dolohov. Yes, she’s ready to leave as soon as possible for the love of Circe. 

And no, she doesn’t remember making any comments about Snape dying—it’s been a very stressful time, and she’s struggling enough just to recover. 

Secretly, she keeps hoping that he’ll forget entirely about that line of thought, but this timeline was rendered different the moment she first opened her mouth, and Snape isn’t one to let things go. 

It takes several more days before she’s brave enough to do anything deliberately different, but the next time Snape grills her about what she thinks she might have seen, she volleys back several questions on antidotes to venomous snake bites in exasperation. This he ignores, and at last she thinks they’ve reached an uneasy truce of mutual indifference on the topics. But on the day of her discharge, he approaches with several stacks of research articles and a look of resignation.

“Are these all…” Case reports. Healing potion trials. Even several references for related reading in Fantastic Beasts. “Thank you,” she murmurs, spirits lifting. 

“Don’t thank me for capitulating,” he says and presses a hand to his temple. “I’d also suggest taking a look at volume sixty-three of Curses at the Cellular Level for more information on the spell Dolohov used against you. I believe there is an article on telomere instability that might prove useful.” 

Hermione doesn’t remember that suggestion from the last timeline at all, and she wonders if her relentless questioning might have sparked something else. “I will. How did you know I’d have questions about—”

“You have questions about everything. This is my no doubt futile attempt to head you off at the pass.”

“But now I bet you’re realizing that you’ve merely opened up a new area for further questions,” she catches herself replying. 

“May my office hours rest in peace.”

Where she once might have been mildly affronted with his comments, now she finds herself more amused than anything else. 

“I’ll bring more questions to the wake,” she says.

She’s dismissed with an appraising look, a crate full of additional healing potions, and a “Don’t injure yourself further, Granger; you’ve depleted me of an entire shelf of dittany.”

She can’t help but beam in response. 

When she makes it to the main gates, she’s met by the majority of the Weasley clan. Molly envelops her in a warm hug, and Hermione blinks back tears as she looks over her shoulder. It’s like being gently draped in nostalgia, the blurry vision of Fred in the background no doubt discussing some new WWW product with George. 

And Ron—

She gives him a shaky smile as Mrs. Weasley lets her go. Because he’s there, and he’s Ron. But he’s not her Ron. Not the one that kissed her on the battlefield. Not the one that left her in the tent. 

This Ron smiles and flushes when he sees her and says nothing. This Ron reaches a hesitant hand toward her shoulder—which she promptly steps under as she hugs him—and this Ron seems surprised that he’s allowed to hug her back.  

A strange impulse flares up to just tell him what’s going on. It’s been weeks now, if she includes the time spent not fully conscious, and she’s already created enough of a ripple effect in the current timeline to render her own future different. And she wants, desperately, to know how different. 

But there’s no going back, is there?

Not when she barely has a shadow of a theory of what brought her here in the first place. She itches to go back inside and consult all sixty-three volumes of Curses at the Cellular Level. While the thought of the library sends an icy chill down her spine, the pull toward more knowledge is greater. Trauma be damned; she needs to figure out what the fuck is going on.

“Did you forget something, Hermione?” Ron must have noticed the way she keeps looking back at the castle. 

“No. No, I think I’m ready to head to the Burrow,” she says, resolutely turning back toward the group. “Thank you for coming to fetch me.” 

The walk to the Apparition point is fraught with other little lies like this one. Half truths, omissions, non-committal hums and subject changes. They’re no different than the lies the school must have fed her parents and—

Her parents. 

They remember her. 

“Wait,” she says, when they reach the small copse of trees. “I should—I should probably let my parents know I’m released.”

“Of course, dear,” Mrs. Weasley says, her face a mix of sympathy and warmth. “Why don’t you stop by the phone booth at the edge of Hogsmeade while we figure out how to side-along everyone back.”

Her mum answers midway through the second ring. 

“Hermione! They sent us one of those owls about you, but I was a bit distraught as you’re usually the one to write us—hold on, your father’s coming, let me put you on speaker—”

Her dad’s voice carries the same grounding presence it always does, and in between asking how she’s feeling and reassuring her mum, Hermione presses the cool plastic against her ear more and more firmly. She wants all of the static and sound, to absorb all of the details of their voices. Even if the sharp crackle hurts.  

“I’m sorry for making you worry,” Hermione says, her voice low with the heaviness of her remorse. 

“It’s not your fault; it’s our own for having you. We knew going into it that the second you were born, we’d spend the rest of our lives worrying. It’s called being a parent.” Her dad chuckles lightly, and she knows that he’d be bumping her shoulder if she were there next to him. “Speaking of which, I hope you’ve been flossing.” 

“I have, Dad,” she lies. And hangs up the phone on the rusted hook with as much care as she can manage. 

The Burrow this time is how Hermione always wants to remember it. It’s not on fire for starters, Fred’s hand on the clock still moves when he travels (never mind that they all point to Mortal Peril—at least the ‘Mortal’ bit still means they’re alive), and she’s so taken by the bustling kitchen before her that she forgets all about the new boxing telescope prototype from Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes. 

It’s worth the bruise she gets when she tries to peer inside.

She settles quickly into the warmth and noise, and the ease of familiarity is almost a distraction from the bizarre circumstances that led her there. 

Even Ginny’s petty feud with Fleur is somewhat comforting. She coughs loudly whenever Fleur speaks, and Mrs. Weasley sometimes fails to suppress her amusement, and Hermione vows this time not to take sides. 

It must work a little more visibly than the last time, as Fleur approaches her before dinner when Hermione is just finishing a vial of healing potion. The glass of wine Fleur hands her can only be described as generous. 

“We are going to need this,” she murmurs, and Hermione laughs. She’s more right than she knows. 

Sensing that Hermione is no longer foe, Fleur continues. “What is this frog-in-the-pond that we are about to have for dinner? The very name is just—just—dégoûtant!”

“Er—do you mean toad-in-the-hole?”

“Even worse,” Fleur whispers solemnly. She studies Hermione for a bit, apparently finding no judgment in her expression, before continuing, “I thought at first that the ‘orrid food was the reason Tonks has been so sad. Molly keeps making her tea and biscuits, and Tonks keeps trying not to cry.” 

“Erm. I think that’s Molly’s way of offering comfort.”

Fleur snorts. “It is ineffective. Wine is better. Or perhaps whiskey.”

“I don’t think the Weasleys usually keep much alcohol on the premises.” With Fred and George around at all hours, it’s probably wise. In fact, the glass in her hand is the first Hermione’s been offered at the Burrow, and judging by the label on the bottle, it must have come from France—from Fleur. 

Hermione must appear distracted, because Fleur closes up a bit and says, “Ah, well. It was only a thought.”

“What was only a thought?”

Fleur pauses for a moment, studying Hermione further before she shrugs and says, “Ce n’est rien, Hermione. Let us go brave the chicken coop so that I can make us croques madames in the morning.”

The rest of the evening goes by in a blur of warm laughter, doses of her healing potion, shy smiles from Ron, and another glass of wine that Mrs. Weasley wisely pretends not to notice. Crookshanks seeks out her lap just like always, and for the first time in almost a full year, Hermione falls asleep easily, a pleasant buzzing around her temples and renewed hope in her heart. 

The next day she awakens to find Harry has arrived, and she nearly tackles him when she hugs him. He grins at her with sleepy eyes, and she realizes just how young he is.

Too young for all of the things looming in the near future. She swallows.

Ron carries them through the debrief she remembers, and Hermione listens again as Harry catches them up on the details of the prophecy. He still looks much too young, explaining wearily that he’ll be the one to face Voldemort in the end. 

At once the impulse rises again to simply tell them what happened. Tell them they can do it, because they already did. Tell them that as daunting as it seems now, there’s still a light at the end of the tunnel, however dim. 

She bites the inside of her cheek. No. That will have to wait. She’ll need to sketch a rough timeline to ensure that everything proceeds more or less as closely to the original as she can swing it. Who knows what she’s already changed? 

But surely giving Harry a little hope—a little knowledge that he’s not alone in this—is worth the risk. Isn’t it?

Her inner calculations are brought to an abrupt halt by the arrival of three owls appearing at the window. It takes a moment, but then she remembers: it’s her OWL exam results. She can’t help but grin when she remembers how utterly convinced she had been that she’d failed. Honestly. She was a bit high strung in the last timeline. Perhaps all of the trauma from the past year was like exposure therapy for her anxiety. 

As everyone gathers around the dining room, the smell of truly delicious French breakfast fills the air. Hermione accepts her envelope and tears it open to the sight of a line of Os, broken only by her E in Defence. It’s strange, she muses, how much weight she used to think these marks carried. Now, perhaps for the first time since waking in the Hospital Wing, she considers that another year of school isn’t exactly an enthralling prospect. She’ll have to study enough to recall the fundamental concepts, but not so much that she garners suspicion for how easily she masters the material. She has a reputation of being hard-working, and she’ll have to maintain it. She’ll also have to sit through History of Magic—again—and pretend to care, when the whole time she’ll be jotting down notes on snake venom antidotes and Dolohov’s curse and temporal instability and hoping no one tries to copy off her and—

“What?” she asks. The background of congratulations has faded to utter silence, and everyone is staring at her. “Oh. Er—I did well,” she says, a bit lackluster. 

Ron snatches the parchment from her hand, just like last time, and something about the gesture is so endearing that she bursts into laughter. 

“Everything alright?” Harry asks, a bit nonplussed.

“Seriously, Hermione, you’re alright with getting an E in Defence?” Ron hands the parchment back.

If only they knew.

“And here I was thinking you’d fail every single subject,” George says.

“My bet was on Arithmancy,” Fred adds. 

“Thanks for the reminder! You owe me a sickle.”

“I owe you no such thing; we’re business partners now. It all goes back into the business.”

“Er—shouldn’t you consider diversifying some of your investments—” Hermione begins, but Ginny cuts her off. 

“Oi! Stop trying to change the subject. Why are you so nonchalant about all of this? It’s almost as if you already knew your marks before even opening the letter.” 

Fucking thanks, Gin. “Er—I just—”

“Yeah, what’s with the newfound peace and ability to process?” Ron asks.

“What’s with the newfound perception?” Hermione counters. 

Ron merely grins and holds up his hands. 

“Please do keep in mind that I nearly died mere weeks ago,” she tries. 

“Yeah, but that’s every year, pretty much,” Ron reasons. 

Fuck. He does have a point. But now she’s not sure whom to tell or how much more it will skew the timeline, so—

“Fine!” Lying will have to do. “Snape gave me a bunch of calming draughts to help me ‘process my trauma,’ whatever that means, and I didn’t want you lot constantly insisting he was trying to poison me!” She shoves a gigantic bite of croque madame into her mouth and chews and hopes it appears more angry than ridiculous. 

So many pairs of eyes are now trained on her face. Most of them skeptical. To be fair, on the Roonil Wazlib scale of lies, it’s about a four.

“Yeah, but how do you know it’s not poison?” Ron asks. Thank Merlin they’re skeptical for a different reason, Hermione supposes. 

“See?” She laughs, toasting them with a vial of her healing potion and wondering why she really felt the need to lie. 

She tries to make up for each lie with an attempt at making this timeline a little smoother. 

This time, she steers them away from Knockturn Alley and backs Harry up when he theorizes Malfoy has already taken the Mark. (After all, he’s right.) 

This time, on the train (the train! It feels like pure nostalgia stepping on board to the sound of churning steam), she borrows the invisibility cloak strategically so that Harry won’t get punched out and left unconscious in Malfoy’s compartment. 

And this time, she reaches for Ron’s hand inside the carriage up to the school.

In her dorm once again, she downs her last healing potion and lays across her bed, letting the chatter from across the room draw her back into the rhythm of the castle. Crookshanks noses at the various boxes on the floor and pads off, ready to explore. Left behind, Hermione turns her attention to Lavender and Parvati, who have a veritable arsenal of makeup piled on the bed between the two of them. 

And she sees their offer to let her borrow it as what it really is this time—a way to include her. 

“Any chance you can help me figure out my hair?”

The next morning, Hermione scrunches out the holding potion from her curls and makes her way down to breakfast. 

Her schedule is, for lack of a better word, daunting. Why did she insist upon taking so many classes the first time? It's almost ironic, considering the last time she did this she had a Time Turner. Now, if she wants to figure out what sort of temporal displacement has overtaken her, she’ll need uninterrupted study time, enough sleep to keep her mind sharp, and—and office hours with Snape. A strange flutter rises in her abdomen.

She convinces McGonagall that she should drop Ancient Runes in favor of more time spent in her core classes. McGonagall concedes after assigning her additional advanced Transfiguration work and then hinting that Hermione should be working harder on Defence in the meantime—after all, it was her only E.

Ironic, now that she considers all she’s done in the field. 

But she knows there are always opportunities to learn something new—especially at curse mitigation—so she heads to her first Defence class with Harry and Ron, determined.

Watching Snape billow into the room this time swirls all sorts of nostalgia around her thoughts. 

“You are fighting that which is unfixed, mutating, indestructible.”  

Mutating. 

Like whatever curse has taken hold of her body and sent her back in time. 

She reaches for her magic, tries to feel it coursing through her veins instead of the curse that has burrowed into her cells and changed her, all while Snape finishes his speech and then begins the lesson on wordless magic. She keeps her hand down this time, avoids the brunt of Snape’s disdain, and sets up across from Neville, mind wandering toward the wordless curse Dolohov had slashed across her chest— 

Protego! she thinks, almost on instinct, as the flash of light from Neville’s wand flares toward her. Her shield pulses strong and unyielding. She quickly dispels it as Snape whirls around.

He gives her a nod, brow knitting together. As if he can’t believe she’s the one who achieved it first.

She needs to be careful if she’s going to try to keep her head down. When it’s her turn to try against Neville, she pretends to struggle, all while keeping Harry in the periphery. 

Snape’s approaching him, and Harry’s going to say something irritatingly stupid at any minute. How did it happen last time? 

“Protego!” His shield forces Snape stumbling into the desk. 

Ah. Like that. 

“Do you remember me telling you we are practicing nonverbal spells, Potter?”

“Yes.” Harry’s gritting his teeth together, and Hermione needs to time this right if…

“Yes, sir,” Snape corrects.

Harry opens his mouth, and wordlessly, her wand mostly in her sleeve, Hermione thinks, Langlock. 

Harry’s momentary struggle is taken as a concession, and Hermione releases the spell, shooting him a warning glare. 

Keep your mouth shut for once, Circe help us, she thinks. 

Snape follows Harry’s gaze back toward Hermione, and the corner of his mouth twitches—the briefest of gestures she can’t interpret—before he strides toward the door, barking out their next homework assignment as he leaves. 

That’s one less detention for the year for Harry, at least. Here’s hoping that number remains in the single digits.

Potions class dredges up all the feelings of frustration, inadequacy, and righteous indignation that Hermione had the first time. She would have hoped surviving a war would have mitigated them somewhat, but no, it’s still unbelievably unfair that Harry’s about to brew a perfect Draught of Living Death with instructions from Snape’s old textbook. 

She earns her points for Gryffindor at the start of class by knowing all about the sample potions and sets up her cauldron and tries—really tries—not to read Snape’s spiky notes in the margins over Harry’s shoulder. 

She fails.

It’s incredible how easily petty jealousy still bubbles to the surface. But this time, Hermione notices, her jealousy has expanded to include Snape. 

Snape and his creative modifications to these Potions recipes. 

Snape and his perplexed, disbelieving frown in response to her abilities. 

What’s so hard to believe that she might have some talent at something that requires improvisation? And speaking of, how did he come up with the workaround to crush the sopophorous beans? And to add an extra stir? And to—

Her potion begins to hiss, and she returns her attention to the lackluster textbook instructions. 

Surely there’s something here that she might be able to finesse a bit—never mind that she’s spent exactly zero minutes thinking about theoretical potions since waking back in this timeline—she’s basically nineteen damn it, and she’s innovative too. 

Right?

And wait, how old is she, really? There has to be a spell for that—and come to think of it, there has to be another spell to know if what she sees when she looks in the mirror—that vague, shimmering almost-light that bounces off of her curse scars—is ever going to manifest itself to others. And what about—

Her cauldron gives an ominous rumble and turns a putrid shade of grey.

Fuck. 

Harry still wins the Felix Felicis.

This time, Hermione doesn’t get asked to join the Slug Club.

Her classes are both easier and harder than she remembers them being. It’s embarrassing how hard it is to sit and slog through several hundred pages of dense material—and remember it—now compared to before.

But the practical spell work is beginning to feel almost second nature, to the point where she has to at least pretend to try hard in Charms and Transfiguration to avoid suspicion. Transfiguration especially has become somewhat of a reborn interest now that she’s finally wrapping her mind around the theory of multidimensional molecular structuring. It’s the gritty how of the way things are changed into other things that’s finally starting to make sense. Quantum shifts to borrow space from other dimensions for the rotational components of each structure—it’s all fascinating, and Hermione wants to research even more.

But instead, she judiciously uses her previous Ancient Runes time to finally make headway on researching Dolohov’s curse. Even this is proving to be both easier and harder than she anticipated. (Easy because she’s curious. Hard because there’s virtually no information to piece together.)

The reference journal Snape had told her about is obscure and scientific and probably requires at least two upper-level uni biology classes to understand—classes that she’ll have no way of attending, although she does put in a request from the nearest muggle university library for the texts—and she still hasn’t mastered how to analyze her own blood work for more answers. That requires a lab with more equipment than would ever be at Hogwarts, even at the NEWT level. Even at the apprentice level. But perhaps not at the level of someone with a mastery…

“My office hours don’t start for another four minutes, Granger, and I intend to spend those four minutes free of your pacing.” 

Hermione freezes, mid-step. “Oh, erm, I didn’t realize you could hear—”

“Three minutes and forty-five seconds. Please spend them out of earshot.”

Hermione tries to quiet her footsteps on the damp stone as she slips away down the hall, eyes trained on her watch. One minute and fifty-five seconds later, she spins on her heel and marches back.

The door opens at her approach, and she feels a wave of strange nerves wash over her as she steps through the threshold to Snape’s office. 

He’s seated at his desk, a mess of parchment in front of him and a forgotten cup of tea beside him (a deep chestnut color with no milk), and at her entrance he merely gestures to the plain chair opposite the desk. 

Hermione sits. 

Snape scrawls an “A” across the top of one of the parchments—Neville’s, not that Hermione is looking—and sets his quill back in the stand. “Yes, I have already graded yours, and no, I will not share that information with you now.” 

Hermione almost laughs. She’s forgotten entirely about the essay she turned in last week, and she realizes she doesn’t even care about her marks beyond doing well enough not to arouse suspicion. How different she’s become.

After a pause, Snape picks up the quill again and continues marking, and Hermione realizes he intends for her to guide whatever discussion is about to take place. 

“I’ve been reading…” she begins, unsure of how to broach the topic of a potential secret professor lab hidden in the dungeons.

“Have you?” If he were anyone else, Hermione would think Snape’s tone was amused. But he’s Snape, so he’s probably just irritated with her. 

“Er, yes, about Dolohov’s curse as I’m still—” waking up every day as a sixteen-year-old? Too dramatic. Temporally displaced? No, that reveals too much. Best keep it vague. “Still having some side effects. And I realized I might need to move from theoretical concepts to more practical ones,” Hermione continues. It’s a bit obvious where she’s heading, but she’s never been one for subtlety. 

Snape’s quill doesn’t stop moving. “What is it that you want now, Granger?”

She’s apparently really terrible at subtlety. “A lab,” she says plainly. She takes another breath. “With sophisticated enough equipment for me to analyze my blood to look for cellular changes from the curse.” 

Snape’s mouth twists, and in the brief moment she studies it, she wonders if it’s approaching a smile. Then he sets his quill down and sighs. “Unfortunately Slughorn’s taken over that room for his private storage. Most of the equipment was donated to St. Mungo’s at the end of summer.” 

“Oh.” She tries not to let her disappointment show. “Of course.” 

Snape hesitates, one hand lifting from the desk, before he seems to think better of himself and crosses his arms. “If that will be all…”

“I guess I’ll have to spend more time working out the theory,” Hermione says, rising and adjusting her satchel on her shoulder. She feels a strange pulse of wandless magic, and one of her rolls of parchment tumbles out

“Hey—” she begins, as she summons it back.

“It’s easy to notice when wordless spells are used in close proximity to oneself, isn’t it?” 

Something tells Hermione to keep her mouth shut for once. She waits. 

“Sensing the magic isn’t difficult once one knows how. I’ll not ask what Potter may have wanted to say, but I will ask where you came to learn the spell you used to… literally keep his mouth shut.” 

Hermione hesitates. 

From you. 

In a book.   

“Word of mouth,” she settles on carefully. The irony tastes delicious.

Snape stares at her for a long moment as if trying to figure her out. Blood begins to warm her face. Then he reaches for a spare piece of parchment and scratches down several items. 

“For you to continue ‘working out the theory,’” he says, sliding the parchment across the desk. 

Hermione reaches for it, scanning her eyes across to see more book titles and references. She can’t stop the smile from spreading across her face as she studies the parchment, fingers tracing its textured surface.

“You’re still here,” Snape says eventually—and says nothing further as she turns to leave, but she can feel his eyes on her back. 

She’s sure her heels strike loud across the stone as she retreats down the hall, a strange bounce in her step.

“You missed it!” Ron calls when she returns to the common room.

Missed what?

Her expression must betray her, because Ron explains, “Six saves out of six! I even beat McLaggen—he’s off sulking somewhere, no doubt—and Harry’s got a brilliant line up for the season!” His butterbeer sloshes onto his armchair, darkening the fabric to a deep crimson. 

Oh. Right. 

Quidditch. 

Hermione gives an encouraging wave and heads up to her dorm, feeling heavy with guilt at how she had Confunded McLaggen the last time. Who even does that? Just randomly hexes people so her crush can unfairly succeed? 

She falls asleep to the knowledge that Ron never needed her to interfere with tryouts in the first place. 

Classes continue, and Hermione settles into the rhythm of school work again, finally striking a balance between her former eagerness and her current, newfound pragmatism on how to manage her time. She still keeps her head down in Defence, secretly cataloging Snape’s movements as he demonstrates various spells and practicing them on her own in secret, and she wonders why she finds herself watching him so closely. 

Like she’d promised him, she does spend time studying the theoretical aspects of Dolohov’s curse with the limited time she can afford. In between, she fills her breaks with more research about snake venom and the coagulation cascade. Her knowledge in all areas, however, stagnates, and after a particularly fruitless evening of research she vows to at least enjoy what she can until an opportunity for lab space opens up. 

But enjoying herself—this weekend, at Hogsmeade—opens up another opportunity. 

Like last time, they nearly trip over Mundungus Fletcher on their way to the Three Broomsticks. 

And like last time, Harry recognizes him.

“You took that from Sirius’s house,” Harry says, fuming. They’re just outside the door, and Harry has Mundungus Fletcher in a vice grip. “What did you do, go back the night he died and strip the place?”

Harry tackles him to the ground, and while everyone looks on in shock, Hermione dives for the suitcase beside them. She tears through the spilled contents, silver clanging on the dusty ground as she flings each piece aside until—

Yes.  

It’s here.

She snatches the locket up. A familiar darkness tugs at her as she shoves it in the pocket of her robes, a strange pulsing draw on her attention—

“Hermione?” 

She snaps her head up to find Ron staring at her. 

The locket’s cold bites into her fingers as she grips it in her pocket. 

The sleet is relentless on their way back to the castle. Waves of nausea overtake Hermione with each step, the memories of self doubt from the last time she wore the locket rising and falling as she struggles to calm the surface of her thoughts. She tries to focus on her footsteps, but she bumps into several people and has to be pulled away before almost colliding with Katie Bell, who drops her gloves and a package on the side of the path. 

“Hermione, are you alright?” Harry asks beside her, placing a hand on her shoulder.

“I’m fine, I just—” she takes a breath, wishing she could tell them about the locket. Maybe she can. Maybe she can accept that this timeline is so irrevocably different that she should go ahead and alter things. “There’s something I need to—”

A piercing shriek cuts her off and she feels the air leave her lungs. 

Before them, suspended in the air, Katie Bell convulses, her hand—her bare hand—clutching at—

No.

It can’t be. 

Hermione gapes in shock as the cursed necklace in Katie’s hand throbs with darkness as if pumping her full of poison. Katie screams and screams, the veins at her wrists, her neck turning black like the cracked bark of a charred tree—

Abruptly, she grows silent. And then collapses to the ground in a crumpled heap. 

No.

“Everyone stay back!” McGonagall shouts. Hermione feels like she’s moving through water, the shouts and cries around them muffled and distant. 

Ron’s pulling her and Harry to the side as she stares in disbelief. 

“But that wasn’t—she wasn’t—” 

She wasn’t supposed to die. She wasn’t supposed to die she wasn’t supposed to die she—

“Hermione.” 

Her vision swims and then centers on Ron’s face. He’s kneeling in front of her, both hands on her shoulders. She blinks. The rest of the crowd has dissipated and gone back to the castle. Katie’s body is no longer on the ground. 

How long has it been? 

She’s seated on a bench, and the sky is beginning to darken. 

“We should go,” she murmurs, standing and feeling how numb her fingers have grown. She drops the locket back into her pocket and clenches and unclenches her hands. 

“Hermione, what is really up with you?” 

“I—you won’t believe me.”

“I’ll believe you,” Ron says, and his expression is so earnest that it strikes something deep inside her heart. She remembers the feel of him, warm and solid against her, every one of his touches filled with such meaning. 

“I—I’m sorry,” she whispers. And then breaks. 

She tells him everything. Under a Muffliato on the walk back to the castle, and later in an empty classroom on the fourth floor after they peel off their coats. First about the time travel. Next about the war. About the horcruxes, about how Bellatrix sliced up her arm with a cursed knife. She tells him that he dated Lavender Brown, that Harry tricked him into thinking he’d slipped Felix Felicis into his pumpkin juice to win a Quidditch match and how mad she’d been and how silly it was in hindsight, that he saved Harry’s life in the frozen pond. And she tells him that people died. A lot of people. Including her. 

But not Katie Bell. 

He leans forward on his gangly elbows and listens all the while, eyes not leaving hers until the end when he blinks and asks, “Do dark curses circumvent time like that?”

Hermione doesn’t know what he means until he gently takes her wrist and pushes up her sleeve. The shimmering Mudblood scar looks more prominent. 

He can see it. 

He can see it, and he knows, and he must believe her. 

“We should take this to Dumbledore—he’s already destroyed one, hasn’t he?” Ron asks, gesturing to the cursed locket clasped tightly in her fist. How long has she been holding it? How long has its darkness been seeping into her skin this time, just like the last time?

Hermione forces herself to relax her grip on it. She knows he’s right. She knows, and yet some strange desire compels her to resist. Her silence is taken for agreement, and Ron smiles encouragingly before setting off down the hall. She wills her feet to follow.

Somehow telling Dumbledore feels like less of a weight off of her shoulders than telling Ron. 

Even when he smiles warmly at her, even when he takes the locket from her hands and sets it on the desk between them, even when he settles in his chair, cursed hand hidden from view, and listens to her account of everything without a single expression of surprise. 

When she finishes explaining, she slumps back, feeling strangely vulnerable. Ron bumps her shoulder gently in support, but she barely registers it. 

The locket glints harshly in the light. 

“Thank you, Hermione. I will take care of this,” Dumbledore says, nodding his head toward it as though it’s nothing but a sweets wrapper to be disposed of. 

Hermione rises to leave and then hesitates. “We can ask Harry to open the Chamber of Secrets again to harvest the Basilisk fangs. I can’t believe no one thought to dispose of it properly—Basilisk venom is highly valuable—”

“That can be arranged.”

Hermione shifts onto her other foot. “And perhaps we can get the diadem while we’re—”

“The diadem is too risky. If what you’ve told me about Draco Malfoy and the vanishing cabinet is correct, then any attempts to enter the room and destroy it will be met with suspicion—and quite possibly shift events even further from your trajectory.”

“But if we can destroy it, we could potentially save a life—Crabbe burned to death in that room—”

“And if we proceed cautiously, we can destroy it at a later time, still sparing his life.”

“What do you mean, ‘we?’” Hermione asks, realizing that once the Death Eaters storm the castle as planned, Dumbledore certainly won’t have time to do anything other than die tragically. Gods, is this the sort of wearied pragmatism he lets inform all of his decisions? Is it merely the result of too much time spent in war?

Dumbledore chuckles, eyes twinkling. It’s unnerving how easily he finds humor in his own impending murder. “Astute observation, Hermione. I trust that if you’ve achieved all of this once with obscure clues and limited time, you both will be able to do so again with improved technique.” 

“Improved technique?” Hermione gapes, incredulous. Instinctively she steps partially in front of Ron as though this small act could shield his innocence. 

Dumbledore reaches into his desk and pulls out a familiar-looking object that glints in the light. 

The Deluminator. 

“No.” She flinches. “He’s not ready.” 

“He has more information now than he did the last time, and it was always my plan to give this to him,” Dumbledore says, keeping his voice and his hand steady. 

“Not yet,” she says, her words sounding oddly like a plea.

“You’ll need a strategist sooner rather than later if what you’ve told me about the goblet is true. What you describe last time is the combination of serendipity and recklessness that only comes from pure desperation and unyielding willpower…” The implication that her willpower is somewhat less than unyielding this time grates on her, but she reasons it’s supposed to.

What other choice does Dumbledore have? He’s becoming more of a walking corpse each hour, the weight of his life’s purpose being shouldered by others whom he knows are too young, but—

No other choice, Hermione realizes. His death is as inevitable in this timeline as in the last one. He’s been stripped of the freedom of choice and now, beneath the odd twinkle and the grandfatherly smile, he has the resigned look of someone being carted to the gallows. 

Hermione snatches the Deluminator and shoves it in the pocket of her robes. 

“There is, of course, the matter of secrecy,” Dumbledore continues, calmly beginning to pace the office. 

Of course it wouldn’t be this easy. Of course not—

“A vow?” Ron suggests, and Hermione swallows, throat tight. 

It’s as if the inescapable nature of Dumbledore’s fate has spread like a fog around her. 

“Yes. I believe that is the best way. Ronald, if you’d be willing,” Dumbledore begins, gesturing for him to approach. 

“Ron? Are you sure it’s—he’s—” 

“Consider this your first real contribution to the Order,” Dumbledore says to him. 

Ron steps closer, and Hermione’s stomach sinks a bit more with each passing moment. This isn’t what he’s meant to do—not now. How much could this irrevocably shift everything further? 

She kneels and stares at the stripe of his Gryffindor socks just visible below the frayed hem of his robes. 

Dumbledore crouches before her and grasps her wrist with his living hand, the other dangling ominously beside him. 

Ron holds the scuffed tip of his wand over them, and Dumbledore begins. 

“Will you vow to continue aiding the Order in our efforts to destroy Lord Voldemort?”

“I will.” 

Light twines around their hands.

“Will you vow not to interfere with the plans I’ve set in motion for my own impending death?” 

It sounds selfish of him—and perhaps it is—to use one of the three promises for something centered around his own abandonment of the war efforts. But Hermione knows there is more riding on this than anyone would have told her the first time around. Another vow. Another life.

“I will.” 

“And will you vow to disclose nothing further about your time travel or the future that could risk the integrity of the Order without my express permission?”

Hermione’s hand wavers in Dumbledore’s grasp, her mind racing to parse out the layers of meaning in this statement. She glances up to see Ron’s encouraging smile, so full of faith in her that her heart swells. 

“I will.”

The cords of light bite into her skin and lash against her nerves, jolting up her spinal cord.

She rises, her back that much straighter against the weight of her commitment. 

The walk back to the common room with Ron is somber. When they step through the portrait hole, there are no other students and only the embers of the fire remain.

“Sit with me a minute, yeah?” Ron asks, casting a spell to relight the logs. They settle side-by-side on the ground in front of the fireplace and watch the sparks twirl into the air and vanish.

“It seems like there are things you still want to talk about,” he says.

“Since when did you get so perceptive?” Hermione asks, mouth curling into a smile for the first time all day. 

“Since you told me last year that I had the emotional range of a teaspoon. I figured I should at least expand to measuring cup levels.” 

Hermione laughs softly and leans her shoulder against him. “I think I can tell you some things—these won’t ‘risk the integrity of the Order.’ And they’re not really the future, are they? If they’re about—about us? About things that won’t happen because I’ve already altered everything so much—”

“You can tell me anything,” Ron says and presses back against her.

“Well, we got into a horrendous fight over something stupid, and I took Cormac McLaggen to the Christmas Slug Club party for the sole purpose of making you jealous,” she offers. 

Ron laughs beside her. “Did it work?”

“I think it made me feel worse than you,” she admits. “And he’s a terrible kisser.” 

At this Ron goes silent. 

Realization sets in and Hermione bites her lip, willing herself not to volunteer anything about Ron’s kissing abilities. Merlin, this is confusing. She misses him—this much is true—but she misses him in the way that she misses her childhood dreams of roller skating across Saturn’s rings. The thrill of excitement has been replaced by nostalgia.

“So I’m guessing there was something between us,” Ron says finally, eyes searching her face.

“There was,” she admits. Was—past tense—because there’s no going back to that now. 

“Did we ever, erm…” Ron trails off, cheeks flaming. He can’t meet her eyes. 

“Yes,” she answers, surprised at how even her tone remains. “You were my first. While we were on the run in the tent. Before—before you left.” She thinks of how different her Ron had been, all purposeful touches and whispers that he’d wanted her for years. How different she’d been, high on the realization that he wanted her, desperate to know just how much. And under the scratchy covers of the cot, her legs around his waist, she had wondered if she loved him. 

And then he’d left. 

“I came back though, right?” This Ron asks, his face still flushed but deeply earnest. 

“You did,” she affirms. 

“I shouldn’t have left.”

“No, you shouldn’t have,” Hermione agrees. “But I shouldn’t have—when you came back, I… I hit you. Repeatedly.”

Ron chuckles, seemingly relieved at the subject change. “I probably deserved it.”

She tries to laugh but can’t. And suddenly it’s—“It’s not funny.”

“Aw, come on, Hermione, it’s at least a little funny—what’s that they say about distance? The further away you get, the closer you get to finding the humor in something?”

“It’s not funny, and you didn’t deserve it.” An icy remorse washes over her. “I shouldn’t have hit you. I’m—I’m sorry, Ron.” 

“You haven’t hit me,” he says cautiously, and she’s now aware of how distraught she must look.

“Well not you, no. But the other you.”

“He sounds like a berk. Hit him all you like.” The way he seems so unbothered about the whole thing makes Hermione dig deeper.

“But what if—what if the situation were reversed? What if I left you because the horcrux targeted me—targeted me because I was the glue that held us all together—and I fought tooth and nail to find my way back to you and saved Harry from drowning, and when I came back, you just… fucking decked me?”

Ron blinks. “Gods, Hermione, in this other timeline, did I hurt you? Did I—”

“No!” she says, exasperated. “And that’s exactly the point! I tell you I’m the kind of shite friend that physically attacks you, and your first assumption—which should be that I’m either delusional or sociopathic—is that you somehow deserve it?”

“Hermione—”

“I was horrible to you.”

“You’re not horrible.”

“I don’t deserve another chance to fuck things up with you.” 

“You won’t fuck things up.” 

“I already have—don’t you see?”

“It’s a second chance though, don’t you see? We don’t have to do any of the things we did the last time.”

“You’re right,” Hermione says softly after a long pause. “We don’t have to make the same mistakes.” 

The tears well up as she presses the Deluminator into Ron’s hand and squeezes it one last time.

This time, instead of finding him with Lavender Brown wrapped around him in the common room after a Quidditch win, she finds Ron in the library the next day, leaning against the windowsill with puffy eyes as Luna Lovegood runs her hand softly through his hair. 

It still feels awful.

Snow descends upon the castle, and only a few students linger behind for the winter break. Katie Bell's funeral is being held in her hometown, and Hermione wants to vomit every time she thinks about how all of it is her fault. She can't bear to go. And she can’t bear to go home—to face her mum’s well-meaning questions and baked goods or the way her dad asks her about school and tries his best to understand. 

It goes without saying that she’s avoiding the Burrow. 

Instead, she tries to console herself with more research into Dolohov’s curse, but it’s barely any sort of consolation. She runs out of every one of Snape’s theoretical resources to consult on day two and finds herself outside of his office door, desperate for a distraction and trying not to pace. 

It opens with a jolt, and she flinches. 

“I suppose academic breaks mean nothing to someone who spends any free time in the library anyway,” Snape offers in greeting. 

“I wasn’t sure if you were still holding office hours, but it is five minutes after three, and—”

“You may enter.”

His desk looks the same as usual, but the door to his living chambers is now open. Inside, a fire is crackling in the hearth, and there are books and journals spread haphazardly across a worn couch. Hermione snaps her gaze away. 

“I’m a bit stuck,” she finally says. 

“And you’ve consulted the resources—”

“Yes. All of them.” 

Snape stares at her for a long moment, the two of them still standing in the threshold before he jerks his head toward the sitting area. 

She steps inside, making her way toward the fire and the couch with all its books and settles on an equally worn armchair across from it. 

Snape follows her and gives a graceful wave of his hand to shuffle the reading materials out of the way before he sits. 

“I never asked you what ongoing symptoms you had,” he says. 

Shite. 

Hermione bites her lip, equal parts wishing she could just tell him everything and wishing she’d never mentioned anything in the first place. 

Snape’s eyes dart across her face briefly before turning back to the fire. “If it’s anything like the Cruciatus, I have a store of potions that might be of assistance.” 

Something strange and unfamiliar unfurls in Hermione’s abdomen. “Oh. Thank you, but it’s—”

For the first time, she feels a warning shock from the vow. It’s nothing like the Cruciatus would open the door to more questions about her time travel. 

“It’s not anything that would require those,” she settles on instead. 

Snape gives a curt nod. 

“What I could benefit from, however, is even just a bit of makeshift lab equipment—”

Snape laughs—a brief, harsh chuckle that he cuts off before it’s even really begun—and then says, “Merlin, Granger, you’ve not exactly been subtle about it.” He studies her in the flickering light. “I’m surprised you haven’t taken over your old DA headquarters to make one.”

Of course.

The Room of Requirement. 

How could she have been so narrow-minded? If not for Malfoy’s constant occupation of it and Harry’s insistence on stalking him on the map, she’d have gone there straight away. 

“Keep in mind that the room’s makeshift equipment will be just that—makeshift, and likely not up to the same standards as research-grade materials would be.”

“Of course.” Hermione grins.

“And Hogwarts is not to be held responsible for any failure to follow basic safety protocols.”

“Naturally.”

“And this is an idea that you came up with on your own, with no outside suggestions or influence.”

“None, whatsoever.” She pauses and then tests her luck. “Especially not from anyone else who might have had the same idea when they were a student.” 

Snape presses his thin lips together and doesn’t respond. 

He doesn’t need to. 

The next morning, before she heads to the Room of Requirement, Hermione finds herself staring at her reflection in the mirror. It’s foggy from her shower, and she’s got her hair wrapped in some charmed twisty microfiber miniature towel that Parvati told her to use “for at least twenty minutes, and then gently take it down—and if you scrub at your hair in any way, I will know.” 

She’s got dark circles under her eyes and the same ragged scar across her chest. Her cheeks are plumper than they were at the end of the war, but—she squints—is that because she’s been eating back at the Great Hall for the past few months or because she’s actually physically sixteen again? The edges of her silhouette feel blurry and undefined, like a mirage or one of those optical illusions where the image flips back and forth until you can’t tell what it’s supposed to be.

She leans forward. Purses her lips. Frowns. She’s never put much thought into things like wrinkles or sun damage or weight, and she wishes perhaps she’d been more shallow in the past, because then she’d at least have some idea if her appearance has really changed or if—

There.  

She stares back at her own wide eyes. Darker circles. Faintest of lines around her mouth. Scars. It’s her—herself as she really is, however old.

She takes her hair down and doesn’t scrub at it and wonders who else might be able to truly see her.

Then she makes her way to the Room of Requirement. 

Locked. Of course. It grates on her, although it shouldn’t. 

She knew she’d be up against this, but living through everything again is sometimes just exhausting. Especially when it’s been hours of staking out the room, feet tucked up underneath her as she sits in an adjacent alcove behind some tapestry that will not fucking shut up with their ceremonial drunken revelry. Crabbe and Goyle don’t seem to be faring much better, on lookout in the form of two lower-year girls, but at least they’ve got Exploding Snap to keep themselves occupied. Hermione only has her thoughts. She knows what Malfoy is up to inside; knows that the diadem is just sitting there on some shelf, ready to be destroyed. And she’s supposed to just—leave it alone? What if something else changes? What if Malfoy notices it—there has to be a chance he’ll notice it, what with him working in such close proximity to it on another dark project for days upon days, and—

The door clicks open. Hermione shrinks behind the tapestry as Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle trudge down the hall.

Finally, she emerges, blood draining away from her head in a dizzying rush until she flexes her legs and steadies herself before the door. 

A lab. That’s what she needs. 

A silver crown. That’s what she can’t stop picturing. 

The two images flip back and forth in her thoughts. Like she’s staring at her own image in the mirror. 

“...just need to try one more thing, and you’ve got at least twenty minutes left—” The voice cuts off abruptly as Malfoy rounds the corner again. 

Hermione whips around and instinctively draws her wand. 

“Better be glad I’m not taking points,” Malfoy says and sneers. 

Hermione stares him down until that sneer falters. “As if anyone gives a fuck about points anymore,” she counters. “But since you brought it up…” She eyes Crabbe and Goyle, still Polyjuiced as younger girls. “Ten points from Slytherin each for being out after curfew.” 

“But we’re—” one of them—Goyle, probably—begins to protest before Malfoy elbows him sharply in the ribs.

“I’ll take them back,” Malfoy says, realizing how everything must look. He pauses for a moment, and Hermione has the sudden impulse to rush forward and tell him that he doesn’t have to do this, that he can go to Dumbledore for help—

At the thought of Dumbledore, she hesitates, because that’s not who he should trust—not really—he should consider seeking out Snape instead—

Footsteps echo across the hall, and she blinks to find the group retreating into shadow. 

A lab. A crown. 

One image takes form in her mind as she turns back toward the door. 

Her first step is ginger, but by the end of her pacing, the thought rings out as strongly as if she’s been shouting it through the hall: 

I need to hide something.

The room feels wonderfully familiar when she steps inside, the teetering piles of clutter strangely comforting; homey. Like the Burrow. 

She sidesteps a mustard-yellow ottoman and meanders through aisles of discarded furniture, deliberately avoiding anything that resembles a cabinet. The vow won’t let her interfere with Dumbledore’s plans for his impending death, and she has no desire to test it now.

Because what she’s here for is twinkling in the light six paces ahead. 

“Accio,” she murmurs, and the diadem floats into her outstretched hand. 

It’s cool and somehow buzzing with energy—not in the dark, haunting way that the locket felt, but in a way that suggests untapped power. For a brief moment, she studies it in the light, lifting it up, tilting it so that she can—

She shakes her thoughts free and shoves it into her satchel. 

All through the next day while Hermione waits for Dumbledore to return, she senses the diadem. It tugs at her thoughts as she settles in the library for more research on snake species, makes her pause every few minutes to lift her quill and wonder what else—what more—

It’s dangerous. 

This much she knows as she packs her things, blinking in surprise as the unread stack of books beside her. Her productivity—something that she would have sworn the diadem could help—has plummeted. Her thoughts are scrambled, a mess of hypotheticals and questions and possibilities, and she can only wonder if what might help her sort everything out is tucked away in her satchel. 

Like she said: dangerous. 

She makes her way up to the corridor outside of Dumbledore’s office and paces until he finally rounds the corner. 

“I have something for you,” she says in greeting, and he responds with a tired nod. 

“Sugar quills,” he says to the gargoyle, and the lighthearted password only feels hollow and empty. They wind their way up the stairs and through the doors, and Dumbledore sinks down in his chair, his good hand bracing against one of its armrests. 

For a moment, Hermione feels a strange compassion well up inside of her. Then she feels the diadem humming against her side. It rings out loudly against the desk as she flings it down. 

Dumbledore blinks at it and says, “I thought you vowed—”

“Not to interfere with your impending death,” she finishes. “I vowed nothing about leaving horcruxes lying around the castle—in fact, neglecting to destroy this could be a violation of my vow to continue aiding the Order.” 

Dumbledore shifts and presses his good hand to his temple in thought. 

“I suppose you are correct,” he concedes. 

“Have you harvested the Basilisk fangs yet?” she asks.

He pauses, regarding her for a moment, before saying, “Yes. Harry and I made a trip down to the Chamber before the winter hols.” 

Hermione blinks, momentarily taken aback by the response. To her knowledge, that never happened last time. She wonders what they discussed—all the secret meetings between the two during the last timeline had felt so mysterious.

And why were they so mysterious? What information did he have that he didn’t want to risk sharing?

“Do you think the fangs or the sword would be a better option for this?” she asks, trying to set aside her musings. 

Dumbledore pauses again, this time for much longer. During the silence, the ticking and whirring of the gadgets around the room begin to itch at the corners of Hermione’s attention. It’s like the diadem has created some sort of undercurrent of disruption in the electrical impulses of her brain—of the baseline static of the very air.

“I think,” Dumbledore finally answers, “it is best left to me, Hermione.”

Hermione steps back. She hadn’t exactly expected him to invite her to participate, but she’d expected something—some indication that he’d registered the danger of the object before them—some indication that he had a plan.

“Thank you,” Dumbledore says, and from his tone, it’s clear that this is Hermione’s cue to leave. 

Reluctantly, she turns from him and begins to make her way to the door. She reaches for the handle (it clicks in a way that almost feels like a shock, and she wonders what the range is like on the diadem’s influence and if she’s the only one whose brain gets swirled around like soup in its presence or if Dumbledore can feel it too—)

She glances back.

And sees Dumbledore holding the diadem up to the light with his good hand. It glints and shimmers, and he adjusts his grip almost as if he—

As if—

“Stop!” she cries.

The diadem clatters back onto the desk. Dumbledore shoves himself back away from it, horrorstruck. 

“Why aren’t you trying to destroy it?” Hermione asks, her voice sounding innocent, foreign.

“I thought…” he begins and swallows. “I thought I could try researching it, perhaps. Discovering if it has any links to the others—”

“I told you everything I knew about the others and how we destroyed them!” 

“But the goblet left so much to chance. I thought if there was a way… But I realize now, I could have easily been misguided...”

Hermione stares at him. The lines in his face seem so much more pronounced, the charred skin of his cursed hand that much darker. He looks half-dead already. 

She crosses the room to the cabinets, and Dumbledore wordlessly spells one open. The sword of Gryffindor gleams in the light. She takes it by the hilt. 

When she turns back around, Dumbledore is opening a charmed hidden drawer in his desk and pulling out something else—something that looks like a silver—

“You kept it? This whole time?” Hermione asks in shock. He sets the locket on his desk, and it feels like it’s mocking her. Of course it would make sense if he had been trying to discover a link between horcruxes; he’d need at least two. But still, she can’t help the feeling of betrayal that washes over her. 

She sweeps both the locket and the diadem off of the desk with the blade of the sword, breaking a Sneakoscope and an inkstand in the process. 

Then she slashes through the air, splitting through the darkness inside each, leaving them shattered. 

On her way back to the empty common room, she pauses above the dungeons and wonders if Snape is below. 

She wants to go to him—to ask him for advice—to vent about her research or get drunk on eggnog or spend forty-five minutes in a shared hate-rant against Dumbledore—

The vow itches in the tiny nerve fibers in her skin, and she knows she can’t. 

She drags the sword along the floor and hopes he can hear it—can hear her anguish in the high-pitched scream of metal on stone. 

Christmas this year is lonely and cold. 

Hermione drapes her duvet around herself like a cape, pulls Crookshanks into her lap, and eats far too many chocolate frogs. The sword of Gryffindor rests at the foot of her bed in a makeshift Transfigured sheath. Beside it are her gifts from Harry and Ron (she teared up when she opened the envelope to find a library pass at the nearest magical university) and a letter from her parents that made her tears spill over. 

She spends the day by the fire in the common room trying to read and waving aside Dobby’s constant offers of fruitcake and treacle, until he finally convinces her to at least make an appearance in the Great Hall for the small feast. 

When she gets there—late—she reaches the door at the same time as Snape, who looks exhausted and unkempt, strings of his lank hair falling into his face. 

“Happy Christmas, Professor,” she says weakly.

“Is it?” 

It’s pretty fucking terrible, she wants to say, but instead she shrugs and holds the door open for him. 

He offers a gruff “Thanks” in return, and then they enter the warm room full of candlelight and cheer, feeling out of place. 

Out of time.

Hermione beats Malfoy to the Room of Requirement by five minutes on Boxing Day and this time—this time, she pictures a lab. 

Moreover, she pictures a lab the way she thinks Snape would have pictured a lab, eighteen and sullen and gangly and probably looking to make a few Galleons from selling whatever he was brewing in said lab, because he probably had connections and things—connections like Narcissa Malfoy with her perfect hair and stunning cheekbones—but that’s not the point. 

The point is:

I need a lab where I can study blood for curses and the effects of snake venom. 

And temporal paradoxes, she adds.

The door opens to a long stainless steel table and cabinetry to the sides full of glassware, cauldrons, stirring rods, pipettes, notebooks with graphing paper—everything she could need. And on the opposite wall, a gigantic blackboard. 

She runs her fingers along the smooth surface of the table, takes a breath, and gets to work.

The rest of the break passes more or less in an odd rotating shift between Malfoy and herself. Neither wants to acknowledge that the other is using the room for anything, and they take care to avoid each other in the halls. 

Once classes resume, Hermione strikes an uneasy truce with Ron and Luna, who looks at her with curiosity and something more complex than pity that Hermione isn’t ready to examine. 

Harry’s meetings with Dumbledore continue, and he resists her attempts to debrief. She’s not sure what other secrets about Voldemort he’s learning—if anything is different than the last time—and it makes her restless and unsettled. 

She throws herself into her research instead, wondering if—or when—she should seek out Snape again. 

It’s funny the things Hermione used to be scared of. 

Snape. Curses. Getting expelled. 

And needles.

Why she ever felt such blind panic at the site of a small glint of metal escapes her now as she snaps the tourniquet around her upper arm. She curls her hand into a fist, flexes her wrist, then lets it all open and relax as she draws the needle closer, syringe attached. 

She’s done this probably a dozen times by now, and it’s beginning to feel like its own strange ritual. She watches with detached interest as the syringe fills with her blood, then pulls back, flips the safety cap over the needle, and presses a slice of gauze against her forearm. She’s been trying to use wandless magic to loosen the tourniquet, and this time it works with a little wiggling of her arm. 

Progress.

Never mind the part about the progress. 

Hermione growls in frustration, hair frizzing in every direction, shattered glassware at her feet. 

It’s been weeks of the same issue with her blood samples. Something goes haywire whenever she attempts to analyze them, as if a portion of them simply vanish. 

If she had more fine-tuned equipment maybe—or a centrifuge that wasn’t so wonky on the spin once it picked up momentum—then maybe she’d have a chance at something other than error after error. 

She tries to finagle her coursework into something of use, but McGonagall is onto her, and Flitwick is beginning to get suspicious, and Snape is… Well, Snape is as impassive as ever. 

Hermione swallows, her mouth suddenly dry. She knows what she has to do.

“Yes?”

“I know you’re not secretly hiding a bunch of centrifuges in here after Slughorn evicted you from his new closet, but, erm, could you weigh in?” Hermione asks, holding up one of her blood samples. 

Snape raises a brow and spells open the door to his living quarters. 

“I’m running into a brick wall every time I even try,” she explains, setting the vial of her blood on the small coffee table and sitting on the armchair. 

Snape picks it up and strides away to another door. Behind it, she can hear the clinking of glass and metal. 

He returns, a deep line in his brow that Hermione is beginning to recognize means he’s perplexed.

“I’ll need to run a few more of my own tests, but… Whatever curse you’ve experienced is still present. The errors in your tests are likely due to an error with your methods—” 

“My ‘methods’ or the shoddy equipment I’m jury rigging into—”

“Blaming the lab equipment is a privilege only allowed to published researchers, and you’ve a ways to go yet, Granger,” he says. 

She frowns up at him, uncertain if the way he’s mocking her is supposed to make her laugh or tear out her hair. 

But what he said before bounces around her brain. The curse is still present. A constant, tied into the blueprint of her form tight enough to drag her back years. Enough to drag her back to the first time she’d been exposed to it. 

And if it’s still there, then what does that mean for her future in this timeline?

She’s startled out of her thoughts by Snape rising, darkness flooding her vision for a moment as he leans over her. She catches the scent of herbs and something smoky and finds herself wanting to breathe it in more deeply. 

“If you insist upon better equipment, perhaps this will be of use,” he says, handing her a thick text he must have pulled from the shelf behind her.

She thanks him and sets it on her lap, studying the cover. Microscopic Transfiguration: Techniques for Standardizing Conjured Equipment, Vol 3.

“It… likely won’t be enough though without apprentice-level Transfiguration experience,” he says, and she wonders if she’s hallucinating the rueful tone in his deep voice. 

“I’ll try anyway,” she says. 

She does try.

And fail.

And fail some more.

She gathers what information she can about clotting factors in the vain hope that someday she’ll remember enough to figure out an antivenom for Nagini. But as for her own curse, nothing new manifests. She finally concedes defeat and makes her way back to Snape’s office, twenty minutes after office hours start. 

His door is open this time, and a first year is shuffling out with a stack of books taller than his head. Hermione smiles as she steps around him.

“Granger,” Snape says in greeting. He rises from his desk and opens the door to his living quarters. 

Hermione sinks into the armchair by the fire (she’s not ready to think of it as her armchair, although she’s sorely tempted). “I need a Transfiguration apprenticeship, and McGonagall wants me to wait to explore more advanced material until after I’ve sat exams this year.” 

“She always was too logical for her own good,” he says. His tone is even, as is his expression, so Hermione must be hallucinating the way he seems conciliatory in his response. 

“It appears I also might have benefited from such an apprenticeship”—he summons a familiar vial into his hand and sits on the worn couch across from her—“but if you tell McGonagall, I’ll—”

“I promise I won’t.” 

Snape shifts, hunching his shoulders a bit. “At any rate, I’ve not found anything conclusive with the equipment I’ve managed to salvage from Slughorn’s takeover.”

Hermione stares into the flames. “So the curse is still present, and we’re still out of answers.”

Snape nods. “I’m afraid that’s the extent of our current resources this year.” He lifts the vial of her blood up and twists it in his fingers, expression indiscernible. For a long moment, he’s silent. Thoughts of perhaps in the summer or at the apprentice level drift in the periphery of the room, unsaid. Then, almost apologetically, he places the vial back into her palm. 

“Thank you,” Hermione murmurs, and the words aren’t enough for all that he’s done, but they’re the extent of her current resources too. 

The weeks go by, and everything feels like a sepia-toned family video reel.

Classes.

Petty school drama.

Malfoy and the cabinet.

Hermione’s reality has, in essence, become a futile venture into complete and utter stagnation. She can’t do anything. She took a vow, and it’s pointless. 

She spends an inordinate amount of time regretting ever taking a vow.

Seriously, what was the fucking point of a vow? 

She’s let Dumbledore’s need for control overtake her own. And she’s now realizing that perhaps she should have trusted herself more. 

As it stands now, she’s been assigned the task of researching Gringott’s (some of which she delegates to Dobby and Kreacher, if only to test the security limits the bank has imposed on other magical beings), and she suspects Snape has been assigned the task of keeping tabs on Bellatrix Lestrange. 

She wishes she could ask him about it. Wishes she had something more to work with him on, now that everything with Dolohov’s curse has crashed to a halt along with her hopes for developing any sort of antivenom against Nagini. 

Instead, she comforts herself with small victories. Letting herself be the first one to successfully Apparate during their lessons. Breaking into Slughorn’s office and vanishing the poisoned mead. Convincing Ginny to break up with Dean and take Harry on a makeshift date in the Room of Requirement—with the side benefit of effectively cockblocking Malfoy and the cabinet. 

It’s petty and immature and immensely fun. 

And when Harry stumbles into the common room one day, asking about his “soulmate and One True Love, Romilda Vane,” she brews him the antidote to Fred and George’s love potion, all while using one of their recording quills to keep a close account of every word he says before he drinks it. 

“Blackmail for life,” she says and grins, and for the first time in a long time, they laugh together like they used to.

Maybe she can get used to this. Waiting, patiently, for time to pass and for things to work out again, like they did last time, with a little luck and a lot of advanced planning. Maybe she’ll figure things out.

It happens when she’s leaving the library late at night, Microscopic Transfiguration: Techniques for Standardizing Conjured Equipment, Vol 3 in her satchel.

A strange shift in the air around her, like the gravity around the school has bent around itself and then snapped back into shape. It feels wrong. 

Instinct kicks in, and Hermione Disillusions herself and hugs the wall along the corridor.

In the distance, muffled shouts and panicked voices, footsteps rising and falling, the occasional thud. 

She creeps along the halls back toward Gryffindor Tower and strains to listen.

Slowly, almost as though time itself is warped, the portrait hole opens. And then closes. For a moment, Hermione only blinks, unsure of what just transpired, until quiet footsteps draw closer. 

“Harry?” she whispers. 

“Hermione!” Ron’s face suddenly appears, then disappears, as he’s pulled back under the cloak. 

“We can’t be seen,” Harry warns. He lifts the cloak for Hermione to duck under, and they huddle together until they can tuck inside an alcove. 

Hermione casts a Muffliato around them. “What’s happening?”

“Death Eaters are in the castle,” Ron whispers harshly. 

“What? It’s too—” the vow jolts against her throat before Hermione can finish her thought: It’s too soon.

It’s not even March, and she’s kept her distance from the Room of Requirement as ordered, so how would Malfoy have had any additional edge? Was it subtle effects from the room with her lab? Did something happen with Snape—did Malfoy finally confide in him and agree to let him help? Her mind races through the possibilities, everything a murky panic. 

Ron’s voice pulls her back. “Common rooms are on lockdown, and we only just managed to sneak out—”

“Why are you sneaking out at all? You shouldn’t be getting involved!” This time. Or ever.  

“Dumbledore said that if anything like this happened—that if anyone broke into the castle, I should try to find him under the cloak,” Harry explains. “He said he had something he needed to show me—”

“He can’t be serious,” Hermione murmurs. 

But she knows he must be. He’s banking on the prophecy to ensure that Harry’s not at risk of dying when the Death Eaters break in—banking on what she told him about how things transpired the last time, as if there would be any consistency—and the wand, she realizes. Dumbledore must still think Harry’s chances of mastering it are in danger unless he’s there to go after Malfoy or Snape immediately after what happens next. 

What happens next—Hermione swallows.

And maybe he’s right. Maybe Harry does have better odds of disarming one of them now. He already has the cloak, and it’s only a matter of time before he takes possession of the stone if all goes according to plan. 

“Okay,” she says. “Let’s go.”

The three of them are much too large to fit securely under the cloak together, so after a brief argument over heroics, Harry takes the cloak, Hermione recasts her Disillusionment and casts another one on Ron, and they set off down the dark halls. 

The shouts and noises grow nearer, and Hermione’s heart pounds in her chest. 

“We think there are at least four,” Ron whispers into her ear. “McGonagall sent word to Flitwick and Snape—”

At the sound of his name, Hermione bites her lip. 

A loud crash sounds directly around the corner, followed by a heavy thud. 

The three of them press back against the wall and hold a collective breath. 

A whispered command carries down the hall. “Go ahead, Draco, we’ll clean up this mess.” 

And then Draco Malfoy crosses in front of them for a brief moment before disappearing, heading toward the Headmaster’s office. 

Hermione feels Harry beside her begin to dart away, but then he hesitates. 

“Harry, you need to be first,” she whispers. “Follow him. It’s important for you to—just trust us, we’ve got your back, okay?”

“But I can’t leave you—”

“You’re not leaving us. We’re covering you, and we’re coming with you as soon as we secure the perimeter,” Ron says. His voice has gone all authoritative and calm. Like how it was the last time. 

But Hermione can’t afford to think of last time. There’s only here and now in this twisted different present she finds herself. 

“I’ll see you up there,” Harry says, and his soft footsteps fade away up the stairs. 

Hermione turns, shoulder-to-shoulder with Ron, and widens her stance as the steady footfalls in the distance grow closer. 

In between breaths, she thinks of Dumbledore—of his failure to destroy the horcruxes, of the vow that creeps up between her shoulder blades. She wonders if this is how Snape feels at all times. If the burden of it all feels backbreaking. If he ever wants to just give up. 

Bile rises in her throat at the dread of what’s to come, and she forces it down. 

Then, Thorfinne Rowle rounds the corner.

Under her Disillusionment, Hermione almost wants to laugh—and she probably would if not for the raw terror clawing against her throat. 

But. 

It’s Ron who moves first, shielding her with her body and shooting a stunning spell ahead that barely misses Rowle’s left shoulder. 

Then it’s Ron who falls first. 

Rowle must have been startled—must not have been expecting anyone—and like an impulse, like the way Hermione’s vow seems to arrest her very thought sometimes, he shifts on his heel and mutters and flicks his wand, and a flash of green flies toward them. And then disappears just in front of her—into Ron.

It’s shock alone that drops the Disillusionment she had cast on him. 

Because it can’t be real—she has to see it to make sure, see his determined face, the half-crooked grin he gives when he says something funny on-the-fly—because he always thinks of something funny, even if it’s at her expense—

His eyes are half-lidded and immobile.

Rowle is staring at her, a sickening grin on his face.

With a start, Hermione realizes her own Disillusionment must have also fallen, and she springs into action. She narrowly twists to the side just as a spell hits the wall behind her. 

Incarcerous, she thinks, slashing her wand at him. 

He dodges. 

Before Hermione even knows what he’s about to do next, she throws up a shield charm and dives behind the gargoyle in front of Dumbledore’s stairs.

It crumbles to dust. 

Incarcerous, she thinks again, wand in a vice grip and channeling every ounce of her intention. 

This time it works, and Rowle freezes, mouth in a strange rictus, massive arm with his wand pointed directly at Hermione’s stomach, before thick cords lash around him and his wand falls to the floor.

Wordlessly, she flings him up against the opposite wall and advances until she glares up at him, her chin barely reaching above his sternum. 

She thought he would look different—wiser, somehow. Cleverer. Not like some empty-skulled brute whose only emotion seems to be a crass, uncomplicated sort of hatred.

He tries to spit in her face, but she blocks it with a wordless Langlock, and then releases it. 

“Where’s Dolohov?”

“He's not here, pet.” 

“Where?”

He chuckles darkly, and Hermione cuts it off, a hand against his throat. Her other arm pulls back, pointing her wand up at his face.

His expression shifts, a flicker of something, and suddenly it’s as if she’s back in the library after the battle, purple light flooding her chest—

No. 

She’s here, in the dark, her best friend dead at her feet and Rowle at her mercy.

“What did you do to me?” she growls, pressing tighter. 

A labored wheeze is the only response. 

“What the fuck did Dolohov teach you?” She forces herself to loosen her grip. 

Rowle blinks, trying to smirk, but his expression crumbles as he’s seized by a coughing fit. 

Then, abruptly, he goes unconscious amidst a red glow. 

“Granger, what are you doing here?” asks a familiar voice.

Hermione blinks, momentarily astonished, then whirls around with her wand raised. 

It’s Snape. 

Snape with that familiar deep line in his brow.

Snape whose voice, somehow, brings with it an odd sense of relief.

Snape with the subtle shimmer of a close-fitting shield charm around himself, as if he knows what she’s capable of doing in a knee-jerk reaction. 

Or what Rowle is capable of doing.

“He—he killed Ron,” she murmurs, slumping against the wall.

“Oh,” Snape says softly. 

He takes half a step toward her and then stops, surveying the scene. Almost as an afterthought, he vanishes the ropes from Rowle’s unconscious form and sends a silvery spell that winds around Rowle’s temple. His hand trembles slightly—whether with fear or with rage or something else, Hermione isn’t sure.

Then he squares his shoulders, and it’s like a curtain falls across his face, leaving it expressionless. 

“There isn’t time for me to—more are coming, and you need to—here.” He hauls her fully upright and plants her behind a nearby suit of armor. From here, she can’t see Ron anymore, and for that she is grateful. His hands linger a bit on her shoulders, steadying her, as if willing her to stay put, before he steps back. 

She feels a cool wash of magic over her and looks down to find herself Disillusioned again. 

When she looks up, she only catches a glimpse of Snape’s cloak as he disappears up the stairs to Dumbledore’s office.

Time is strange, isn’t it?

She should know, after all. 

“Three turns should do it.”

On the other side of the armor, Ron’s body exists, his soul somehow outside of—

“Time waits for no one.”

If only there exists another pocket of it that she could take—

“My use and value unto you are gauged by what you have to do.”

Filling her own pocket with the sands of it—

The vow she took should be over soon, its own time running out as events unfold above.

She waits, hidden and silent, for what feels like hours. 

Footsteps descend the stairs, and in a whirl of tired magic, Snape and Malfoy have cleared the rubble.

It’s done. 

For the briefest of moments, Hermione swears she sees Snape’s eyes search the hall for her, but then that’s done too.

A wave of loss crests over her as she watches them pass, layered on top of what she already carries for Ron, and it surprises her to find that it has nothing to do with Dumbledore. 

This might be the last time she sees Snape before—she can’t finish the thought. 

She wants to reach out to him—to tell him somehow that she understands more than just the vow he took. That she might be just beginning to understand the life he undertook. That she wants to help him. 

And then maybe she could tell him more.

“And will you vow to disclose nothing further about your time travel or the future that could risk the integrity of the Order without my express permission?”

“Express permission” is no longer an option, but surely something must be implied there, now that Dumbledore has already died. 

And her vow has died with him.

Right?

“Wait!” she calls, but she chokes on the word as a blinding pain shoots up her spine. The vow seizes her like icy hands tightened around her neck, and she staggers to a halt, watching Snape and Malfoy recede into shadow.

It’s only after the rest of the Death Eaters leave the castle that she notices: the Disillusionment that Snape had cast on her is still holding.

The next days are dull and lifeless. It's like the Deluminator, which she took from Ron's pocket and now keeps under her pillow, has drained her surroundings of any feeling. Her body numbs. She barely tastes the food that’s placed in front of her, and the well meaning inquiries into her emotional state bounce off of her as though she’s permanently surrounded by a shield charm.

She failed.

She made things worse this time.

Katie Bell. Ron.

Ron.

She thinks of how swift he’d been to take on Rowle. He must have known the risk, or maybe he stupidly thought the same thing would happen to him and he’d be the one sent back to try again, or maybe he thought he’d defend her this time—save her this time. She doesn’t know—can’t ask him now.

Can’t do much of anything now. The magic of the vow has transcended death. One of their deaths, at least. According to the obscure text she pulled from the restricted section one sleepless night, only the death of both parties involved in the making of such a vow will fully extinguish it. 

That would have been nice to know before. 

Passing time erodes her willpower bit by bit. She forgoes exams, declines Pomfrey’s offer to set her up with a mind healer from St. Mungo's, and considers what options she has left. 

The horcruxes are still out there, and now she's at even more of a disadvantage than last time. With even less hope than last time. 

Last time, they barely managed with Ron, and this time, Harry hasn’t been eating or sleeping or speaking to her much. There’s no way they’d be able to accomplish it the same.

And lurking in the background is always the possibility that Voldemort could make more horcruxes if he ever discovers the locket and diadem have been destroyed. 

Hermione’s mind spins in circles and each time lands on the same outcome: more deaths. More suffering. 

If only she could undo it all again.

Ideas swirl around her head and she wonders for the first time why none of this ever occurred to her at the start. 

Why did she feel the need to tell Dumbledore? To limit herself within his parameters? 

Why did she even go back to Hogwarts when she knew what was to come?

If she could do it over again—a third time—

She tries to shake away the thought, but it clings to her, a vine whose little shoots spiral away in every dimension. So many options she could have had; so many paths she could have taken, Dolohov’s curse following her down. And at the end of each of these tendrils of possibility, only one fact exists that is certain, solid as matter itself: eventually, in myriad ways and in any scope of time itself, she will die. 

Dying again would be giving up. 

Wouldn’t it?

Except—

“Whatever curse you’ve experienced is still present. The errors in your tests are likely due to an error with your methods—” 

Snape's words burrow into her thoughts. Error with her methods or error with the timeline itself? 

Because if it’s the timeline, who else could she save if she—

No.  

There’s no guarantee it would work again. And then she’ll have died for nothing.

She shouldn’t think of it as a viable option. 

Shouldn’t let even her mind go down that path.

But if she died again... Went back again…

She writes it down. 

All of it. 

All of her memory of the battle, the horcruxes, the months on the run in a jumbled collection of scribbles with venn diagrams and rudimentary spreadsheets and stars and underlines and—in rare instances—all caps. It fills the entirety of two small spiral notebooks and four feet of whatever cheap parchment she snatched off of that abandoned table in the library. She folds up the parchment as best as she can and crams it between the pages, the ink-blotted edges jutting out of the sides like broken butterfly wings.

It looks utterly depraved. 

Confronted with the impossibility of the future she’s actually lived, she embraces the strange pride that strengthens her spine against the constant counter-drag of the vow. 

Each time it threatens to overwhelm her, she wills it away. 

I am writing this to gather my thoughts.

Her hand relaxes from the spasm that tries to tear the pages from her grasp.

I am making this for myself—at least for now.

The shower of needles against her back recedes.

I am creating a record in case of my death. 

And isn’t that really the true intention behind it all? The vow can’t argue with a hypothetical. It certainly tries, but it can’t kill her over a hypothetical. (What it can kill her over remains to be realized.)

And so, it is hypothetically that she ponders the best method to deliver her notes to a hypothetical location where they might—hypothetically—be read by the one person left that she trusts. 

And she does trust him; she trusts him irrevocably. It’s surprising and yet as deep and accepted as the other fundamental truths in her life. 

It takes seven hours and forty-five minutes before Pettigrew finally leaves Spinner’s end. Lying in wait in the boarded up building across the street, Hermione vanishes the empty crisp bags beside her and stands, stretching out her joints. No one else has crossed through the doors, but Hermione knows Snape must be inside. She can feel it, something solid amidst all of the uncertainty that’s wound itself around her. 

The vow flares along each nerve as she crosses the street. It feels like electricity crackling through her body with each step. 

She reaches the porch, steels herself, and knocks. 

The door is wrenched open, and Hermione lets out a breath of relief as soon as she sees that it’s Snape.

“You could have killed me, stunned me, Obliviated me—but you didn’t.” A warning jolt from the vow, but Hermione presses on. “I know why you killed Dumbledore—why you had to.” 

Snape’s face goes blank, save for the darting of his eyes back and forth, as if performing a quick calculation. Then he seizes her arm and pulls her through the crackle of strong wards into the cramped, dusty sitting room. 

“How?” he asks. His hand is still warm on her arm.

“I vowed not to tell anyone.” But she wishes she could tell him everything.

Snape’s gaze bores into her and plunders her foremost thoughts. 

“Try me,” she murmurs, so close they could steal each other’s breath.

His face retreats, and in the faint swirl of air between them, Hermione feels the loss. 

“There is nothing for you here,” Snape says. “No shelter, no… assistance. Why do you insist upon burdening me with your requests? And repeatedly? It’s as if—”

“As if I trust you.” She steps closer, back into his realm. “As if I know things that I can’t share with you, no matter how desperately I want to.” 

He freezes, jaw clenched, eyes narrowed. 

“As if you somehow want to trust me too,” she adds in a whisper. 

He gives no indication that he even heard her, but he doesn’t move away. It’s as good of an acceptance as any she’ll receive from him. 

Will it work? The vow chases her intent across each synapse, and she knows she’s been branded. But she also knows that this has to be the best option. Because there’s always a possibility, however faint, that she might get another chance. 

Desperate, she wills Snape to hold her gaze.

“Take it. Please.” Shakily, she holds out her binder of notes, knowing it will seal her own demise and hoping that—in this world, in this timeline, at least—it will be enough. 

It has to be.

The vow grasps at the base of Hermione’s skull and twists, and just before she collapses, there’s a soft brush of fingertips against her own as Snape takes the binder.

Chapter Text

Sensation returns to Hermione’s limbs, her spine unburdened for the first time in months. The vow is no longer in existence; she senses its absence in the free firing of her nerves, in the free swirling of her thoughts. Gratitude fills her to the ears, and she floats, fighting against the fog of disorientation until her gaze lands on the metal rungs at the foot of a hospital cot. 

“You’re awake. I have your next dose of healing potion almost ready,” Snape calls from across the room. 

“It worked,” Hermione marvels. 

Or perhaps it didn’t work—she did die, after all. 

But not permanently. 

She wonders what happened in the other timeline—if the other timeline even exists anymore—if Snape made use of her notes and didn’t fuck quite as many things up as she did. Or if he, along with everyone else, simply vanished into the ethereal cosmic soup, at the mercy of probability and quantum fluctuations that transcend her understanding of reality. 

This Snape approaches, potion in hand, apparently unperturbed by the great shift in the universe that has just occurred. 

(Or maybe her death wasn’t so great.)

“How long have I been unconscious?” she asks, trying for some consistency between timelines. 

“Two weeks. Aside from the delirious raving about Unbreakable Vows and some choice words about the Headmaster—”

“Why are Unbreakable Vows so idiotic?” she demands, and—shite. So much for consistency. And beyond that, she hopes Snape hasn’t taken his vow yet this time around—when did all of that occur? Everything is murky—after the battle the first time, Harry hadn’t exactly given her a neat little spreadsheet of dates to follow—and in the last timeline, she’d been forced out of questioning anything by Dumbledore and her own vow. 

“They are like most things born of desperation.” Snape hands her a vial, and she knocks it back. 

“How desperate have we gotten?” she asks, rolling the vial back and forth between her palms. 

He plucks it out of her grasp with long fingers. “Certainly not enough for you to begin acting all macabre. You’ll be out of here in less than a fortnight.” 

“I know,” she says. Her instincts are telling her she needs to play things differently this time—be more honest this time. Especially with Snape. 

Snape, who appears to be fighting off an eye roll. “Yes, I’m sure you’re quite well-read on the recovery from a curse so intricate and secretive that its incantation has never once been captured in writing.”

“I’m actually not that well-read on this subject,” she begins, slowly gathering momentum to reveal what she can, “but I have read everything from Curses at the Cellular Level —which was only helpful enough to let me know that I’m in need of a high-end lab to research things more. And before you go asking about where I found time to read through the entirety of volume sixty-three during my stay here, I should probably tell you…” she pauses to take a breath and reevaluate her brashness. 

Fuck it. She’s all in this time. 

“I’m from the future.”

Snape blinks. “Madam Pomfrey, I’ve no reason to doubt your diagnostic abilities—”

“—but has anyone double checked that Granger didn’t suffer any intracranial effects?” Hermione finishes.

Snape clenches his jaw and glares at her as Madam Pomfrey’s footsteps grow closer. She’s given the all clear, and they wait in tense silence until Pomfrey steps away again. 

“It’s not possible,” Snape says coldly. 

Hermione realizes he must be waiting for further proof, but—“Erm. You didn’t say that bit before.” 

“Then as I said: not possible. Time is immutable, and events do not diverge.” 

“With the use of a Time Turner, maybe. I would know that. The loop is nice and pretty and closed with a limit of only a few hours. Too bad they were all destroyed a couple weeks ago in the Ministry.”

Snape narrows his eyes. 

“But the thing is, I’ve died twice now,” Hermione continues. “And I’ve woken up back here each time. I’m not using a device or a spell or anything, I just…” she trails off, thoughts growing more turbulent. She should have questioned it more the last time, shouldn’t she? Why did she end up back here at all other than a spell—Dolohov’s spell—’a spell so intricate and secretive that its incantation has never once been captured in writing?’ (That would have been helpful to know last time, wouldn’t it?)

“You haven’t exactly died if you’re currently alive,” Snape says flatly. 

“Am I alive though?” Hermione muses. “Or is this some sort of afterlife where we’ve managed to have a five-minute conversation without you insulting me?”

Snape pauses. “You are utterly insufferable. Is that enough of an existential confirmation?”

“I suppose,” she concedes. “Now how about fetching me some of these from the library?”  She begins to jot down a list of reference articles she remembers from her previous research the last time, although it’s unfortunate how few she can name off the top of her head. “I should probably do some research on the curse while I still have access to the resources here.” 

Snape pockets the list, whatever surprise he might have at her knowledge of the references well concealed. “How did you know that the Time Turners were all destroyed?” he asks instead, his tone impassive. 

“Because that’s what has happened before,” she says simply. 

“You must have overheard us discussing it,” Snape replies, but he doesn’t sound so convinced.

“Maybe,” she says. “I don’t remember much of the last two weeks.” 

Two weeks of being only marginally conscious at times—two weeks of “delirious raving” about Unbreakable Vows and the Headmaster—what could have happened during those two weeks? It’s probably too soon to ask about Snape’s vow, but— 

“Dumbledore’s hand!” she blurts suddenly. 

“What about Dumbledore’s hand?” Snape asks, and Hermione can’t tell if he knows anything or not.

“He’s going to put on a cursed ring—if he hasn’t already—and you’ll confine the curse to just his hand. But it will spread. You’ll give him about a year to live. And then”—she lowers her voice—“he’ll ask you to kill him.” 

The only initial sign that Snape heard her is the tightening of his grip on the metal frame of her bed. “And if this were to happen, what would you suggest I do instead? Let him die? Refuse to offer him mercy?”

Oh. So that has already happened. 

“Honestly, he doesn’t deserve much mercy after making such a shit show of the last timeline. Although, I suppose much of that was my fault as well for agreeing to that asinine Unbreakable Vow.” She glances up. “You better not tell him anything about this by the way. He can get fucked this timeline for all I care.” 

Snape stares at her, unamused. 

“Er, sorry, Professor, for the swearing. It’s gotten worse the older I get and the more shit I’ve seen. Actually I wonder if that’s something to do with Dolohov too, or Rowle, maybe—”

“You cannot blame your lack of filter on Dolohov and Rowle—”

“They tried to fucking kill me!”

“And yet you lived to tell the tale—in a manner fitting of a sailor.” 

“Well what about—”

“Granger. I have several active potions brewing for your recovery, and my delicate sensibilities cannot further suffer more of your… embellishments.”

Did he just—was that a… joke? Hermione’s mouth opens, and thankfully no further curses spill out. 

“Your account of what happened—have you considered writing it down?” Snape asks after a beat.

The strange parallels this question stirs blur together in a kaleidoscope of bright possibility, and Hermione is helpless against it. She can only burst into laughter. 

Write it down, indeed.

The next day, Hermione awakens in the late morning to a stack of books and journal articles on the small table beside her. On top are two healing potions. She can swear she tastes Snape’s admonishment as she downs the first one and summons Dobby for a strong cup of coffee to accompany it. She needs her energy to refresh her memory. 

She works her way through her references, Madam Pomfrey’s gentle assessments, and the second healing potion over the course of the morning and finds it surprising how easily she settles back into the research. 

She should be devastated. Shouldn’t she? 

She got Ron killed.  

Didn’t she?

Her emotions feel all tangled, and they’re not helped by Ron’s friendly Get Well Soon missive that arrives by owl at lunch. 

And when Snape returns in the mid afternoon with a fresh bundle of dittany flowers, she watches him work and wonders how much more she should tell him. 

“Don’t take the vow,” she blurts, pointing the corner of one of her journals at him as he’s about to exit. 

He turns, eyes narrowing. 

“Not—not whatever you told Dumbledore; I understand that much from yesterday. I mean the”—she swallows, her mouth suddenly dry—“the one with Narcissa. The Unbreakable Vow.” 

Snape stares at her for several long moments. 

“It locks in your fate, doesn’t it? Leaves no room for inference,” Hermione continues. 

“Does it?” Snape asks, both his tone and his expression indiscernible. 

“Just, please. Don’t do it. Not this time.” She wants to say she’s seen what it did to him—she knows what it must have felt like—the weight of it, the constant awareness of duty and commitment and inescapable obligation. 

Snape blinks once and then turns from her once again, sweeping out of the room. 

Does he believe her? Could he believe anything she’s told him? 

Her time in hospital dwindles, and Hermione finds herself preemptively nostalgic for the quiet times when Snape visits to check on her and brew more potions. She’s torn between enjoying the comfortable coexistence and risking it all to ask more of him, but with a limited time to develop new areas to study, she knows she needs to. 

“Out with it, Granger.” 

“Sorry, Professor?”

“You’ve been itching to ask me something. I can practically feel your hand waving in the air.” 

“Erm.” 

Snape crosses his arms.

“Don’t let Slughorn take over your makeshift lab. I’ll need it this time around.” 

Snape gives her a long look and an even longer sigh. “Alright. Come find me when you’ve fully recovered at the start of term.” He uncrosses his arms to run a hand through his hair. “So help me Circe, if this results in me being set on fire again, I will personally ensure you’re banned from any extracurricular research for all foreseeable timelines.”

“Understood.” She’s not sure what makes her do it. Some combination of unprocessed trauma and giddiness at the prospect of finally getting her hands on a working centrifuge, no doubt, but—

She extends her hand. 

Snape’s fingers are cool against her own, his grip firm and full of intent. 

She hugs each of the Weasleys in turn upon her release and doesn’t let go of Ron until he awkwardly clears his throat twice. 

“You’re a good man,” she tells him, and she grins when his face turns red. 

Then she heads to Hogsmeade and tells her dad on the phone that no, she hasn’t been flossing. 

“I know, love. But I’ll still try to remind you anyway.”

The Burrow is still welcoming and warm, and Hermione still feels at once enveloped in the background noise and smells like they’re a plush quilt of memory. 

She remembers the boxing telescope this time and gives Fleur a hug and then beams when an even more generous glass of red wine appears in front of her on the table. 

“We are going to need this,” Hermione says, and Fleur laughs. “And don’t worry about the toad-in-the-hole—it tastes much better than it looks.”

“I am hoping you are right, Hermione, because the very name is just—just—dégoûtant!”

“It really is,” Hermione agrees. “Although not much better than merda de can, no?”

Fleur laughs, head thrown back. “I didn’t know you’d had that! It is delicious, one of Gabrielle’s favorites.” She pauses, taking a sip of wine, before continuing, “I thought at first that the ‘orrid British food was the reason Tonks was sad. Molly keeps making her tea and biscuits, and Tonks keeps trying not to cry.”

“I think that’s Molly’s way of offering comfort,” Hermione says (again).

Fleur snorts. “It is ineffective. Wine is better. Or perhaps whiskey.”

Hermione takes a breath, realizing this is where things had closed off last time. “Wine is better,” she agrees.

“Perhaps if… Never mind, it was only a thought,” Fleur says.

“What was only a thought?”

“That I should help Tonks to feel better. But it is silly.” 

“Why is it silly?” Hermione asks, genuinely curious. She can’t remember a time Fleur lacked confidence in any idea, although she also can’t exactly recall Fleur embracing vulnerability.

“She does not care about my silly ideas. And why should she? She is so successful, and strong, and—”

“If you were planning on making French breakfast in the morning, you’ll need to collect the eggs tonight,” Molly says, bustling into the kitchen and into their conversation. 

“Of course,” Fleur says. “I will brave the chicken coop. Hermione, you should rest and enjoy your wine before the twins sneak off with the rest.” 

Hermione watches her go and spends the next few minutes in thought, only just remembering to take her healing potion in time. 

When the OWL results arrive, Hermione plasters on a smile and pretends to be surprised. 

And when they go to Diagon Alley for supplies, she sneaks away to find out how to request a delivery for several more advanced textbooks on microscopic Transfiguration and cellular-level healing. 

When she gets back, Harry tells her all about seeing Draco Malfoy in Borgin and Burkes, and she tries to dissuade him from any future spying, knowing that her efforts might be futile. 

On the train, she keeps Harry’s nose intact and inadvertently sets up a Gobstones date between Luna and Ron, and then she takes a solitary thestral carriage up to the castle, Crookshanks making biscuits on her lap. 

It’s not so bad, being back again. 

Hogwarts still feels like home.

“Ms. Granger, I’m unsure of your motivations, but surely you don’t need this much extra time to improve in Defence,” McGonagall says over the rim of her glasses. 

Apparently dropping Arithmancy in addition to Ancient Runes was too much? Hermione takes a sip of orange juice and tries to shake off McGonagall’s disappointment.

“I was hoping to direct my focus to a more research-oriented career. I need time to explore independent projects,” she says, hoping this disguised version of the truth will be enough. 

“Very well. But I will be holding you to high standards in Transfiguration as always, and I expect you to be taking advantage of office hours as you explore these ‘independent interests.’” McGonagall narrows her eyes as if trying to discern her ulterior motive, but Hermione nods enthusiastically, mind already scrambling to plan her time in Snape’s lab. 

Speculations about the lab—and Snape—fill her thoughts through the morning until the slam of a door jolts her back to the present. 

Snape—in the flesh—strides past as everyone files into their seats for the first Defence class of the year (and Hermione’s third first class). Hermione catches a whiff of smoke as he brushes past, like he’s brought the coolness of autumn with him. 

“The Dark Arts are many, varied, ever-changing, and eternal. Fighting them is like fighting a many-headed monster, which, each time a neck is severed, sprouts a head even fiercer and cleverer than before.” 

Hermione lets the deep tones of Snape’s voice wash over her and wonders if this time she’s fiercer—cleverer. 

She has to be. 

In Potions, her Draught of Living Death is decent yet unremarkable. But she makes two adjustments that are hers—and hers alone—and even as Slughorn praises Harry, she allows herself to feel like she’s won a small victory. 

Knocking on Snape’s door for his office hours the following week feels like a homecoming of sorts. There’s his brusque “Enter;” there’s his abandoned tea on the desk beside him, his haphazard stack of essays, his quill stand, his—

“If you’re trying to find your essay, I’ve hidden it at the bottom,” he says, not meeting her gaze. 

“I’m here for something better than any sodding essay—even my essay,” she says and grins. 

“I should have known as much,” Snape says. He rises from his chair and gestures toward the hallway. 

She follows him deeper into the dungeons, the damp air causing a chill to seep into her lungs. The sounds of dripping water and their footsteps on the cold stone floor echo eerily against the walls until Snape abruptly stops in front of—Hermione blinks—a blank space of wall.  

“Either you’ll sense the magic or you’ll use the visual memory,” he says over his shoulder. 

Hermione eyes a spindly crack in one of the stones that reminds her of a spider web and tries to calculate the distance they’ve just traveled so she can easily find it again. She wonders which method Snape uses and why she finds that matter so important. 

“Place your hand here,” Snape says, indicating a smooth patch in a deep slate color. She presses her palm to it and wills herself to sense whatever ward magic is in place. The sleeve of her robe slips down to her elbow, and she holds firm, trying not to wince at the ragged Mudblood scar that looks clearer than ever. Gently, Snape places his hand next to hers and casts something nonverbal that twines around their wrists. It’s gentler than the vow; a strange tingling warmth that makes the hairs on her arm rise.

“Welcome to your new workshop,” he says beside her. The rocks shift against each other until a small doorway forms, and Hermione steps through the threshold. When she glances back, Snape is already gone, his footsteps catlike and near-silent in the hallway behind. 

The lab itself is—for lack of a better word—beautiful. Hermione’s jaw drops when she moves further inside and can take in the whole view. There’s a long marble work table with three high-end magical centrifuges, a muggle microscope, and along the walls there are rows and rows of ingredients, storage vials, and reference materials. Soft, warm globes of light float suspended in the air above, and beyond them a large skylight and ventilation fan take up most of the high ceiling. 

“Why on earth would Slughorn turn this into a closet?” Hermione wonders aloud. 

She meanders over to a small desk beside the ingredient shelves and smiles when she sees several scattered notebooks all with Snape’s characteristic handwriting. In the center of the desk, in the one small cleared area, a scrap of parchment flutters:

Remember, Granger. No arson. 

It’s twenty minutes past curfew when she finally drags herself away and back toward Gryffindor Tower, her hair a frazzled mess and her mind buzzing with new ideas. 

“Hermione, where have you been? You missed Quidditch tryouts and we haven’t seen you around the common room.” 

In the past, she’d roll her eyes at Ron’s petulant tone, but now, she can sense the insecurity underneath. 

“I’m sorry.” 

She aches to tell him everything, just like last time. 

But she knows she can’t. 

“I’ve just been really busy with research,” she says instead, forcing herself to take in his crestfallen expression. She wants to reassure him—to remind him she’ll be there—but she can’t quite bring herself to lie.

In the morning, she eats breakfast alone.

Classes this time are easier, perhaps because Hermione cares even less, and she finds herself spending more and more time in the lab. 

Her research progresses, and with lab equipment that actually works, she finds herself no longer needing Microscopic Transfiguration: Techniques for Standardizing Conjured Equipment, Vol. 3. Her cells still vanish any time she attempts to prod at them or cast more invasive diagnostics, but at least she can separate out each type with her centrifuge.

She finds that boom berry extract helps them withstand her attempts at analysis and foxglove causes them to vanish faster. She borrows six Herbology texts from the library to find a list of related plant species and then hides her disappointment when Snape tells her during her next office hours visit that the majority grow near the equator and can’t reasonably be obtained on a teacher’s salary. 

“Guess we’ll just have to break into Gringotts then,” she jokes, and then her smile immediately dies on her lips. 

She’d been studiously avoiding thinking about horcruxes this time around, unsure if she should even bother or if, like last time, any interference would cause more second-hand harm. But the truth has been simmering in the back of her mind: 

The goblet was a fluke. 

There’s no way she could come anywhere close to repeating what had happened the first time around, and even attempts to visit Gringotts with the intent of gathering intel would be risky. 

Beyond that, she has no desire to impersonate Bellatrix Lestrange again.

But what other option is there? Security will be even stricter in the coming months, and as of now, she has surprise and foresight both on her side. She’ll need to put in a request for curse breaking texts from the nearby university to figure out what to do—and she’ll probably need to return her books on microscopic Transfiguration first before they allow her any more. How important those books had seemed when she had woken back up in this new timeline, and yet, they’ve since been rendered obsolete by Snape’s fully functioning lab. She wonders what other former certainties will suffer a similar fate and wishes there was some way she could preempt it. Along those lines, she realizes with some chagrin that she’s barely spent any time researching antivenom for Nagini; the knowledge that their fates are so malleable means that he might not even get bitten this time. 

If she even makes it that far.

It’s strange how knowing what the future could hold doesn’t make anything simpler at all. It’s as if—

“Granger.” 

She blinks, thoughts pulled back to the dark eyes across the desk in front of her. 

“You’re not seriously considering breaking into Gringotts,” Snape says, almost as if willing it to be true. 

“I’ve done it before,” she says, aiming for nonchalant and missing by a wide margin. 

“And how’d that work out for you?”

“I didn’t die there if that’s what you mean.” Only almost. 

“If you think there’s something that will help you with Dolohov’s curse—”

“I don’t.” She takes a breath. “I’m thinking of this as more like a side project.” 

“Merlin knows you certainly need more of those. I suppose I shouldn’t even bother to ask about your course work—”

“I’ve done it twice over already, it’s fine!” Hermione says, exasperated. “Next spring, Harry will say that ghosts are transparent as if it’s some great revelation, and next week I’ll turn in an essay on the Bubblehead Charm—that I’ll ace, thank you very much—and who even cares because I’ll just die and have to repeat it all again the next time, and…”   

“And it’s all fucking pointless anyway,” Snape finishes. 

Her mouth falls open, and out spills a completely unglamorous bark of laughter. 

To her surprise, Snape joins her, a stifled deep chuckle rumbling in his chest. The sound stretches across the spindle of the moment until it snaps and settles somewhere hidden once again.

Hermione bites her lip, realizing she’s overstayed the end of office hours by four minutes, when Snape slides open a small drawer beside him. 

“I’m assuming it was Bellatrix’s knife…” he begins softly; apologetically. Hermione feels the blood drain from her face until she realizes he’s sliding a small jar across to her. 

Healing ointment. 

“Thank you,” she breathes. 

“I’ve no idea if healing can transcend time loop-related deaths, but—” he breaks off in an uncharacteristic shrug. 

“I’ll let you know the next time.” 

Snape runs a hand through his lank hair and then stands. “You know, it took me quite some time until I finally fully believed you. And it's dangerous, knowing how futile every one of my actions has become. I suppose we’ve both gotten a little reckless this time, haven’t we?” He inclines his head down toward her, a shy grin on his face that looks simultaneously roguish and vulnerable. Hermione has the strange urge to trace his mouth and learn the curve of its expression with her fingers. 

Reckless.

It’s with that feeling pulsing through her veins that Hermione stalks down the corridor to the Room of Requirement. Despite the late hour and her exhaustion and the chance that Draco’s still there attempting to mend the vanishing cabinet, she feels a strange energy, like this is what she’s supposed to be doing. 

I need to hide something, she thinks. 

And the truth is, this time, that there are plenty of things she needs to hide. 

The door opens, and she summons the diadem, the familiar jolt of dark energy running up her hand and into her mind, and she wonders if—

No. 

Best not. 

She tucks it away in her satchel and throws a blasting hex at the vanishing cabinet on her way out, just in case. 

The locket is easier this time. She gets to Hogsmeade early and catches Mundungus Fletcher before Harry and Ron even start down the path. 

Then she intercepts Madame Rosmerta in the Three Broomsticks bathroom and snatches the necklace, wrapping the package cautiously in her scarf and shoving past a bewildered Malfoy at the bar.

She takes all three cursed objects to Dumbledore’s office (“Sugar quills—ugh, of course it’s the same”) and dumps them unceremoniously on his desk. 

“These need to be destroyed immediately,” she says, ignoring his offers of candy and pleasantries. “Get the sword.” 

Dumbledore’s eyes glint as he surveys them, unconsciously leaning forward. 

“Don’t,” Hermione warns. 

“‘Don’t’ what, Hermione?” Dumbledore asks mildly. 

“Don’t think of ways you can discover their connection, don’t attempt to track their former whereabouts, and for the love of Godric, don’t touch them.” Even as she says the words, she can feel the diadem radiating new ideas—what if there was a way to discover a connection between the horcruxes? Then she could finally figure out a direct path to the goblet and maybe have half a prayer of carrying out another successful Gringotts break-in—

Fuck. No. No ideas, no anything right now.

Dumbledore sharpens his gaze, blue eyes cold despite the warmth of the fire in his office. The faintest push at the side of her temple and Hermione shuts her eyes and clenches them tight. She forces herself to take a slow breath in and out and then opens them to find Dumbledore mercifully with his back toward her, opening the cabinet to retrieve the sword. 

When he turns back, he hesitates for a brief moment, then nods and raises it above his head. 

It’s much less satisfying watching than destroying the horcruxes herself, but the lifted weight from Hermione’s shoulders is worth it. 

She ignores Dumbledore’s command to stay, ignores the questions he flings at her as she descends the stairs, and ignores Peeves’s attempt to pelt her with dead cockroaches at the foot of the stairs. 

It’s crowded in the common room when she returns, and she finds a tipsy Katie Bell and hugs her. 

“It’s good to see you,” she says simply. 

“It’s good to see you!” Katie shouts back, raising a full handle of scotch into the air. She holds it out to Hermione, who can only think, I will regret this tomorrow, before she takes a swig and relishes the burn.

The next morning, the first thing Hermione does when she gets to the lab is brew herself a hangover potion.

Still, though, despite the potion and a blessed coffee from Dobby, she vomits the first time she draws her own blood, and the noise of the lab equipment drills into her eardrums relentlessly. Crookshanks, who has somehow managed to sneak his way in, perches on a stool and twitches his tail in a manner that can only be described as judgmental. 

She writes the morning off after shattering two petri dishes in a row (causing Crookshanks to bound away with a backward hiss) and escapes into the cool darkness of the dungeon hallway. 

“Oh, hello, Hermione.” 

“Luna, hi. Er, aren’t your feet cold down here?” Hermione asks. She hasn’t seen much at all of Luna, and a mix of fondness and guilt wraps around her. 

Luna looks down at her bare toes. “Oh, I suppose. It’s just easier to feel the magic of the castle this way.”

“I see.”

“Well, one doesn’t really see it so much as sense it, but I appreciate the sentiment. I hope things are going well with Professor Snape and your research.” 

Hermione closes her mouth. 

“It’s okay; you don’t have to tell me anything, and it’s not my place to ask,” Luna says, large eyes blinking earnestly. 

“Erm, thanks.” 

“See here? You can sense the perimeter of the warding spell.” Luna points her pale toe at a seam in the grout beneath them. 

Hermione tentatively steps over it and feels… Nothing. Crouching down, she wonders absently if placing her bare hand on the ground or taking her shoes off like Luna would be considered stranger, then throws caution to the wind and does both. 

Underneath, a faint, pulsing energy reaches up through the rock. 

“It’s there!” Hermione follows it, smoothing her hands against the damp and grime to the wall and up along where she knows the doorway to form. “That’s incredible, Luna.”

A group of Slytherin lower years snicker at them from down the hall. Hermione shrugs and puts her socks and shoes back on, her wet feet causing them to stick uncomfortably.

“Now you can find it in the dark too,” Luna says, gesturing to the lab. 

“How did you—”

“Oh, I found it first year when I was wandering around after curfew.” 

“Right.” 

“Professor Snape told Dumbledore I was sleepwalking, so I kind of went with it. But since then, I’ve been trying to figure out how the castle’s magic works. It’s a bit of a side project.” 

“We all need a side project,” Hermione reasons. 

“That and figuring out how the Death Chamber in the Department of Mysteries works,” Luna adds. 

Hermione blinks. 

How does the Death Chamber work?

Luna smiles and begins to make her way back up to the main part of the castle, Hermione following with squelchy footsteps. 

“Something happened to me there, during the battle this summer.” 

Hermione pauses, mid-step. 

Luna lowers her voice. “I heard—I heard my mother, telling me how to sense where the Space Chamber was—that’s where Ron and Ginny and I went when we were separated. And it’s—I don’t know how to explain it, but it was like I could feel how space and time were interconnected there. And I swear”—Luna grasps Hermione’s arm—“I swear I didn’t get hit with a brain like Ron, no matter what you think.” 

Hermione nods, her mouth suddenly dry and her head beginning to spin again. “How—er, how is it all interconnected?” she manages to ask. 

“Events aren’t,” Luna explains, “like a bunch of dots on a line so much as… a bunch of patches and materials that you’ve laid out on a quilt. And they shift and fall as you billow it, and some get trapped as you fold it, and maybe some of them slide off of the quilt entirely and others always stay on no matter where they end up once everything settles.” 

Hermione trips on the staircase as they ascend and barely registers the pain in her ankle.

Luna steadies her and smiles. “My mum used to do quantum Arithmancy research with a focus on Divination. Her life line was a loose thread that slid off of the quilt.” 

Hermione sits with Luna the next few days at breakfast. 

In the mirror, she looks older and more tired, but the cursed scar on her forearm seems fainter, and when she presses her fingertips against it, she can swear the margins are less raised. 

Her little jar of ointment is half-gone, and she’s ashamed to admit that she imagines Snape’s fingers each time she applies it. 

It’s—it’s just because he was kind to her. 

That’s all. 

And anyway, she really should process whatever happened with Ron, shouldn’t she?

The ointment is warm against her skin and smells faintly of herbs.

The last leaves fall, and Hermione forces herself to at least try to make an exam study schedule, for old time’s sake. Especially since it will give her an excuse to skip meals in the Great Hall, where she’s been studiously avoiding Dumbledore’s piercing gaze. 

She trudges to the library under the heavy weight of her borrowed texts and narrowly misses being seen by Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle, whose heads are bent at a table tucked away by the restricted section. 

“It’s like whatever destroyed the cabinet made it paradoxically easier for me to work out how to fix it. I just—it’s that room, I swear,” Malfoy whispers.

Beside him, Crabbe grunts, and Goyle asks, “What room?”

“The room you’ve been standing outside of for weeks.” 

“It’s just a wall though?”

“Merlin help us,” Draco mutters under his breath, before turning back to Goyle. “Yes, my mistake. It’s ‘just a wall’ that I disappear behind for hours on end. There couldn’t possibly be a room on the other side.”

Hermione smirks in spite of herself and rounds the corner to return Curses at the Cellular Level, volumes 64-67.

Her exams come and go without event, and the castle bustles with the last minute exchange of gifts before the holidays officially begin. 

In her lab, away from the crowds, Hermione runs out of boom berries and watches each portion of her cells vanish on the muggle microscope. Ribosomes. The Golgi apparatus. Some squiggly things that maybe used to be the endoplasmic reticulum, or maybe—doesn’t matter; it’s vanished too. Slipped off the quilt—or microscope slide—it’s all the same, really. Only the mitochondria cling to her current reality for a few moments more. 

“Boom berries are expensive. Try again next timeline,” Snape says, when he learns of her predicament. He goes back to grading essays, but the chair in front of his desk slides out for Hermione to sit all the same. 

“If I keep the lab, any ideas what I should focus on next?” 

Snape looks up from his marking. “You should pull me away from this purgatory and ask me to fake my own death and help you full-time.” 

Hermione gapes. 

“I’m only… sixty percent kidding.” 

Before she has a chance to process this, shouts echo in the hallway outside of Snape’s office, and Hermione jumps up with a start, wand in her hand. 

The door bursts open and—

“Hermione, you’re a girl!” 

Oh this again? Hermione shakes away the deep horror of possibly going back in time to fourth year and registers the person in front of her. 

“Neville?”

“Do you hang out with Romilda much? Romilda Vane?”

“No.” Not now and certainly not in any foreseeable future timelines. 

Neville’s glazed eyes begin to fill with tears, and it’s only then that Hermione realizes—

“Oh gods, I forgot about those love potion candies. Did Harry give them to you?” 

Neville nods absently. “Said I could take them down to the common room to share, but no one else wanted any, and I couldn’t find Romilda anywhere." He begins to sob uncontrollably. 

Hermione mentally berates Harry for regifting something so idiotic as she says to Snape, “I should probably help him, but let’s get to the lab where we can start brewing the antidote.”

She gets to work, summoning ingredients and trying to entice Neville to sit still with the promise that Romilda values patience above all else. 

“I’d do anything for her,” Neville says earnestly. “I’d die for her. I’d—”

“Sit quietly in this chair for twenty minutes for her? I’ll set a timer.” 

Beside her, Snape snorts and begins to stir the cauldron. They work in silence, Hermione finding herself nervous despite having brewed this exact antidote before. Half expecting him to critique her dicing technique and half worried she’ll have to explain the slight tremble in her hands, she keeps her head down and tries her best to focus. 

“I bet Romilda Vane is an excellent brewer,” Neville says from his chair, and Hermione almost drops the gurdyroot as she fights against a laugh. 

“She is more proficient than you, Longbottom, despite being two years younger,” Snape says drily beside her. 

Neville rubs at his chin, his fear of Snape warring against his transient love of Romilda, until he finally says, “I wish she was in the Herbology Club with me.” 

“I can think of no more romantic place to be with someone than the Herbology Club. Not even the Slug Club comes close,” Hermione can’t help but respond. 

The potion mercifully finishes, and Hermione ladles it into a goblet to bring to Neville. 

“From Romilda,” she says in explanation, and he drinks its entire contents without complaint. 

Snape manages to slip back into the hallway before the moment of realization washes over Neville and he drops the goblet with a loud Clang!  

“You… you saw all that, then,” he murmurs. “Oh gods—Snape, too.” 

Hermione gives a sympathetic wince.

“Right. I’m just going to go… die now,” Neville says, and plods down the hall. 

After he leaves, Snape returns to help her clean up the equipment. 

“I don’t think he’ll remember much about your lab,” Hermione says. “He’s probably going to pay off some upper year Ravenclaw to Obliviate him.”

Snape snorts. After a moment he says, “You seemed to know exactly what ingredients were needed.” It’s not quite a compliment, but Hermione finds herself feeling proud nonetheless as she helps put away the cauldron. 

“How did you know this would happen?”

Hermione grins. “Because that’s what always happens. Well, it wasn’t,” she amends, “Neville the first time; it was Ron, and then last time it was Harry, but someone always eats the date rape chocolates. It’s got to be some Gryffindor boys’ dorm rite of passage.” 

“What else ‘always happens?’” Snape asks. 

“I’m—I’m not sure,” she answers truthfully. “Are things the same because I kept them the same or because they’re destined to be that way?”

“You mistake consistency and deviation for the direct result of free will.” He heads back down the hall to his chambers and sits by the fireplace. Hermione follows and settles into her usual chair. If Snape notices how comfortable she appears, he refrains from commenting. 

“Do you truly believe we have no choice?” Hermione asks.

“Much of our lives—much of this war—has been determined by prophecy. People live and die according to the predictions of Seers.” 

She straightens her spine, still grateful for the freedom that comes without ever taking a vow this time. “And some of us die and live according to an arbitrary curse.” 

“I’d hardly call any of what has happened arbitrary.” 

“Isn’t it though?”

“There has to be some reason you’re back. Even if it’s just the way the fabric of the universe has folded.” 

Hermione stares into the fire, watching the flames shift and dance, imagining what they’d look like on the surface of a quilt. “Did you ever read A Wrinkle in Time?”

“I did.” 

A long moment passes, during which Hermione feels a strange ache just behind her sternum. “I never told you how I died last time.” 

Snape watches her, eyes deep and intense. 

“I took an Unbreakable Vow with Dumbledore. To avoid revealing anything that might compromise his plans for the war. And I… sort of… broke it. By giving you an entire binder full of war intel.”

“Were you sure it would work and you’d end up back here?”

“About… sixty percent sure.” She wonders if he's noticed how her words have mirrored his own from earlier. 

He pauses, inscrutable, for longer than she thinks is necessary before answering, “I probably would have done the same.”

The fire dwindles, but neither of them move. 

“I… I didn’t take the vow with Narcissa,” Snape says quietly. 

“I’m glad,” Hermione murmurs back. “You don’t deserve to have that burden.” 

“Bellatrix is suspicious. More so than usual.” Snape appears hesitant, as if unsure what more he should reveal. Hermione chews on the inside of her cheek, waiting as long as he needs. 

“She’s been dosing Pettigrew with Veritaserum and interrogating him about my activities. She’s attempted to convince the Dark Lord to kill me twice. I… I’m handling it, but I can’t help but wonder. Who knows what other shifts my actions have created?”

“Those can be someone else’s problem.” 

Snape crosses his arms beside her. 

“Or those can just all… go away the next time I die. If it gets to be too much, send me an owl and I’ll make it happen.” 

“Hilarious.” 

“I should probably have a reliable method, just in case—”

“In case you need to quickly dispatch with this entire timeline without a backward glance?” Snape’s tone is strangely bitter. 

“I have grown fond of this one,” Hermione admits. She wants to reach across and place her hand on his shoulder in reassurance, but the fear of him flinching away from her is enough of a deterrent. “I’ll miss you—this you—when it all goes to shit again.” 

Snape rises, and in the flickering light, Hermione’s surprised to see a pale hand hovering in front of her. She takes it, and he pulls her to her feet and murmurs, “Perhaps this time you’ll realize that everything going to shit isn’t just your fault.”

Her sleep is fevered and restless and filled with thoughts of daring ventures: running away to build her own lab somewhere in the countryside, traveling to the equator to harvest boom berries and wild orchids, taking down the Death Eaters with Snape by her side.

The next morning, Hermione lets herself sleep in, Crookshanks purring against her hip. It’s the day when everyone else is leaving for the winter hols, so she gives herself an extra few minutes to trudge down to breakfast. 

More students are present than she’d have expected, and she makes her way to the table amidst whispers and hushed murmurs. A crowd is already gathering around a spread copy of The Daily Prophet, a sneering portrait on the front page—

No.

BREAKING NEWS: Two dead in Wiltshire, suspects in custody

Early this morning, the body of Severus Snape, Potions Master and Professor of Defence Against the Dark Arts at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, was discovered in a field in south Wiltshire. An autopsy is currently being performed at St. Mungo’s, however the preliminary cause of death is thought to be the killing curse. 

Not long after, the body of escaped convict Bellatrix Lestrange was discovered in Knockturn Alley. The characteristic bruising and splinched limbs suggest an unknown illness at the time of her death. 

The suspects, Melissa and Mei Xin, are a muggleborn couple currently under Ministry custody.  

Blood pounds in Hermione’s ears. 

No. 

“Bellatrix is getting suspicious. More so than usual.” 

He knew he was at risk, but surely he didn’t mean—

“She’s attempted to convince the Dark Lord to kill me twice. I… I’m handling it, but I can’t help but wonder…”

Surely ‘handling it’ meant something other than—

Hermione scans the utilitarian article again for any clues.

“...characteristic bruising...unknown illness…”

What illness? Unless—

Hermione blinks to see several other students openly gawking at her. Harry and Ron both begin to rise from the table, concerned expressions on their faces, but they blur before her as tears well up. 

“Let’s go, Hermione,” a soft voice says, and she finds herself being gently steered toward the Great Hall’s doors, Luna Lovegood’s supportive arm around her shoulders. They post up in an alcove beside a tiny window, snow swirling in the distance. 

“I guess he was a patch that slid off of the quilt,” Hermione admits through her tears. 

“Dobby says you’re an excellent seamstress,” Luna says. 

Hermione wipes her eyes on the back of her hand and studies Luna’s calm expression. How much does she know?

But Luna only gives a sad smile and turns to gaze outside. 

Next time, she’ll have to ask her more. 

“Boom berries are expensive. Try again next timeline.”

“Perhaps this time you’ll realize that everything going to shit isn’t just your fault.”

“I’ll let you know the next time.” 

Next time.

Hollow and trembling, Hermione runs her hands along the cool dungeon walls as she makes her way back to the lab to regroup. She places her palm against the wall and wishes Snape were here next to her—wishes she could ask him about the magic of the castle, about what had really happened between him and Bellatrix, about what to fucking do now—

On the desk, a torn scrap of parchment. Hermione’s hands won’t stop shaking as she grasps it.

Debrief in the hospital wing, July 1996. Whatever happens, I’d say not to get too reckless, but then I’d be a horrible hypocrite. 

Slowly, she feels herself break into a smile, the darkness of his words strangely nourishing like strong, bitter tea. 

The sun is harsh as its rays shoot between the buildings of Diagon Alley. Hermione shields her eyes against it, tries to ignore the throbbing headache from staying up all night to frantically research Gringotts, perfect the undetectable extension charm on her satchel, and, with stomach turning, break into the Quidditch storage room and take the cleanest broom she could find.

She’s pretty sure she was seen sneaking out of Hogwarts to the Apparition point, but she doesn't have time to shake off a tail. Maybe next time—after she resets Dumbledore’s suspicion—she can work on avoiding detection. Several people around her on the main street let their gaze linger, and the faint silvery blur of a Patronus floats just out of her view. She clutches her satchel closer to herself and quickens her steps toward the towering marble structure ahead.

“I’d like to learn more about opening a high security vault,” she says after striding through the door as confidently as she can manage.

“We have brochures available—”

“I’ve read the brochures. I need to see it in person.” 

The goblin at the counter above her leans over and crinkles his nose as he scrutinizes her. 

“And what does the witch seek to store in something with such high security requirements?” 

Hermione crinkles her nose right back. “Let me meet with someone and then we’ll talk.” 

It turns out recklessness is a pretty good substitute for confidence. 

Maybe that's how they were able to do this the last time.

Hermione finds herself in a large windowed conference room with two goblins who appear to be somewhere in the realm of financial advisers. They’re happy to answer even her most far-fetched questions after learning that she is, in fact, from the future and that she has insider information on the muggle stock market in the coming months. 

And if her questions about estate transfers seem suspiciously timed to the recent news of Bellatrix’s death, no one says anything. 

“Assets are frozen in the event of arrest or death,” one explains, doing a fantastic job of avoiding any references to the Lestrange vault. “Nothing can be withdrawn until the appropriate paperwork is complete.” 

“So it all just… sits there.”

“Pretty much.” 

Questions form and burst like bubbles on the surface of her thoughts. How is anything transferred? Does one take over the vault or merely the vault’s contents? How was Sirius able to access his vault to buy Harry the Firebolt while he was thought to be in Azkaban? How did Molly Weasley make a withdrawal for Harry before? 

Security at Gringotts seems like a nebulous, shifting thing that would take weeks to understand. 

But given the crew of aurors gathering on the steps outside who appear to be searching for someone, Hermione estimates she only has minutes.

“Take me to the vaults,” she says, her voice more commanding than she’s heard it before. 

The two goblins conference with a third, all intermittently pausing to eye her doubtfully, until one finally beckons her through a door and onto a rickety cart. They approach the pouring Thief’s Downfall just as the aurors shout from the entryway.

Let it be said again, in every timeline, that Hermione really fucking hates heights.

The cart descends deeper and deeper, Hermione swallowing back every threatened scream, until at last they screech to a halt outside of a vault. Hermione gathers her wits and opens her eyes to see the number:

700.

"We need to go deeper; this is much too accessible." 

"That's not an option for someone of your birth status," the goblin says. She can't tell if his tone is apologetic or scornful.

“So this is it?” she asks, affecting disdain. 

“This is it,” the goblin says, folding his arms. 

“I’m not interested.” 

“Then let’s go back to the surface. This was a waste of both our time.” 

Bluffing was careless and stupid, and hindsight is always full of clarity. Hermione knows what awaits her at the surface. It’s now or never. 

She feels bile rising in her throat and forces it back down, plunging her hand into her satchel. 

Maybe it’s not heights that Hermione hates so much as falling.

Because that’s exactly what it feels like, her sweaty palms slipping on the handle of the broomstick, her stomach flying up into her chest, and the cold air whipping her hair—

A huge burst of flame barrels toward her from below, and she swerves. The edge of her robes singes around her ankle. 

All around her, the clattering rush of carts. And below, an anguished roar. 

Hermione dives, frantically searching for where she remembers the Lestrange vault—

“Stop!” The goblin from earlier is planted firmly in front of it, hands outstretched as if to physically push her from the ledge. 

She swoops down, out of his line of sight and toward the chained dragon. 

“Relashio!” she cries, aiming her wand at the chains that bind the dragon’s feet. 

Fire and smoke swirl around her and the dragon beats her wings, scales thrashing on stone, chunks of rock tumbling into the abyss below. The chains wrench from the walls one by one, and upward she soars. Hermione watches the ceiling break, watches the dragon, bloody but free, reach the cover of clouds.

Then she kicks upward toward the Lestrange vault and tumbles off of her broom, righting herself in front of the goblin, feet stumbling on the trembling ledge beneath her. 

“Open it,” she commands. The goblin shakes his head, resolute even still. 

A rumble sounds, and a large crack breaks through the ledge. 

“Please,” she implores, gesturing around them. 

An errand rock narrowly misses his head, and he jumps back against the wall. “No. Doesn’t matter anyway,” he says. 

A great crash sounds from above them, and Hermione looks up to see a car-sized boulder tumbling toward them.

When she looks back at the goblin, he has a strange expression, almost like pity. “Don’t know why you’re after this one; it’s been—” 

The boulder collides with the upper corner of the vault, and the heavy door groans under the pressure, dust and rubble rising around them, the goblin pinned beneath a large fragment of rock—

“Wait!” Hermione pleads to no one in particular, feeling the ledge crumbling away beneath her feet—

Desperately, she waves her wand to clear the haze as her heel slips backward—

And through the warped deformity in the vault’s door, she can finally see:

It’s completely empty. 

The ledge beneath her breaks away and plummets to the ground. Hermione leans back and lets herself fall.

Chapter Text

Hermione wakes in the hospital wing, biting the inside of her cheek so hard it bleeds. 

“Fuck, I thought we’d stopped the bleeding—oh. You’re awake.” Snape clears his throat. 

Gods, she missed him. She wants to smile, but blood wells in her mouth.

“I have your next dose of healing potion ready. If you need—” He summons a flannel and then spells it to hover just under her chin. 

She cleans her face and vanishes it all. “Thank you.”

Snape ignores her gratitude and hands her a vial of healing potion. 

“What’s in this?” she asks, drinking it down and trying to detect the elements within it around the metallic tang of blood. 

“Dittany, elderflower, crushed boom berry seeds, among many others.”

“Why do they work against Dolohov’s curse? And do they have any temporally stabilizing components?”

“You’ve been unconscious for nearly two weeks, aside from delirious raving about reckless behavior and something about a debrief. Perhaps you should allow your mind time to rest before jumping headlong into advanced areas of research.”

Perhaps. 

“I was serious about that debrief, though. Let me know when you’re ready.” 

In the morning, Hermione begins her list of reference materials again and includes the ones from the nearby university. 

When Snape arrives to check on her, she hands it to him along with another request to debrief. 

“If we must,” he says, turning back to survey the array of vials on the counter. “You’ll need these every—”

“Every four hours, yes. I remember,” Hermione cuts in. 

Snape whirls around and glares. 

“I’ve actually been through this before,” she explains. “Dolohov’s curse seems to have trapped me in some strange sort of time loop.” Maybe approaching it this way will make him more likely to believe her. 

“What’s strange about it?” 

Whatever she expected him to respond with, this was not it. 

“Er, sorry?”

“You said ‘some strange sort of time loop.’ Time loops by nature are strange, so how is this one ‘strange’ in particular, and how is it only ‘sort of’ a time loop?” Snape’s sharp gaze pierces her as he approaches, furrowing his brow. 

Hermione blinks and gathers her thoughts. “Well, it’s strange because I’m not sure how it works; it takes more to end than simply falling asleep or leaving a confined area to reset. And it’s only ‘sort of’ one because I’m not sure its limiting condition is time itself or…” she trails off before summarizing, “Basically it only ends when I die.” 

At this, Snape only raises his eyebrows. 

“And what I’m trying to understand is why I keep ending up back here.” She takes a breath. “And is there any chance of fixing it?”

“Temporal stability affects more than just curses. It’s working always in the background with potions absorption and metabolism, whether for healing or for harm.” He paces a bit at the foot of her bed,  then continues, “There appears to have been some catalyst with the curse. I haven’t seen it do anything other than kill people before.”

Reassuring. 

“The first time I died, I…” she trails off, wondering how much she should reveal this time. “It was because Thorfinn Rowle cursed me with Dolohov’s spell. I assume that’s what activated—or reactivated—everything.” She doesn’t mention the battle, the crumbling castle, the book on the windowsill. She doesn’t mention the vow or the horrible gut-wrenching fall in Gringotts.

Snape purses his lips, brow furrowing in thought. 

“It’s not unheard of; to have something dormant that’s activated by a second phase. Potions suspended in lipid spheres for example, that dissolve when they come into contact with enzymes in certain parts of the intestine. Or a capsule that’s broken with a certain spell. I’ll have to think on this more.” 

“It would be nice to have a Time Turner, to be able to go back and observe what happened in the DOM if nothing else,” Hermione muses. 

“That was my first thought as well. But they’ve all been destroyed.” Snape’s voice is grim.

“I suppose we’ll have to find some other way to study it, then,” Hermione concedes. 

Oh—

“The lab! I need it much more than Slughorn.” 

“What lab?”

Hermione grins. “Don’t play coy with me. I’ve been using it for months now.” 

Snape gives a begrudging nod. “And why on earth my previous self ever let an unqualified student take over my one safe haven in this forsaken place—”

“It’s not about qualification. It’s about necessity. I’ve failed in plenty of things, and I intend to fail some more, but I’ll learn. And you won’t have to spend the year knowing Slughorn’s pedicure basin has taken up residence where your high-end lab equipment used to be.” 

Snape twists his mouth in a strange expression that appears halfway between a wince and a smirk. 

“You can kick me out at any time,” she offers.

“Oh, can I? I’m allowed to ask students to leave my own personal space? That’s very generous, Granger.” 

“Oh sod off. You know what I meant,” she says, exasperated, then adds, “Er. Professor.” 

Snape’s face is expressionless as he leaves her, but she feels cheerful all the same. She stays up late into the night sketching out new ideas for her research and falls asleep with more questions to explore.

Her dreams that night are fitful, full of the memories of the dead. 

And then, Snape’s words ring clearly in her swimming thoughts:

“Temporal stability affects more than just curses. It’s working always in the background with potions absorption and metabolism.”

She jolts fully awake and catches sight of the healing potion on her bedside table.

“Whether for healing or for harm.”

Of course. 

Poison. 

That’s how he must have killed Bellatrix last time—that would explain the bruising and the sudden “unknown illness.” Bellatrix was right to have been suspicious. 

So what does that mean for this time?

She drifts back to sleep, unease nestling alongside her.

Snape greets her late in the evening the next day with a gruff nod and slumps into the chair next to her bed, a messy stack of parchment in one hand. 

“I dredged these up from the lab that I still can’t believe I told you about before.” He rifles through the stack and pulls out a couple sheaves to pass to her. 

She squints as she studies the scrawl and ink stains. Her eyes feel scratchy, and she’s sure to have dark circles beneath them. 

“Delayed activation spells and how to block them,” she reads. Listed are references for methods from multiple disciplines… Charms, Defence, Potions (naturally)—even Divination.

“From a few years ago, when we were brainstorming how Sirius Black was getting into the castle,” he explains. “We’d thought it would be some sort of concealment spell on a time-delay that allowed him through the castle wards.”

Hermione flips back and forth between the parchments, mind reeling with the new paths opening before her. And yet…

“Where was this the last time?” she half-asks, half-demands. Immediately she feels wrong-footed; Snape has no idea what was there the last time, and she can’t exactly hold him accountable for actions he has yet to take (or not take).

“It’s been in the filing cabinet since 1994,” he says without inflection. 

“Right. Sorry. I know it’s not your fault, but this would have been helpful the last time,” she says, attention already turning back to the curious Divination references. Absent-mindedly, she wordlessly spells her hair up into a bun and secures it with her wand, her other hand turning the parchment over again. 

She looks up to find Snape staring at her and catches the briefest glimpse of outright surprise before his expression neutralizes. 

“What?”

He stands and doesn’t answer before making for the exit. 

A minute later, and Hermione’s chasing after him in the halls, bare feet slapping against cold stone. She hopes to all the gods he’s not going to Dumbledore because if he is, she might as well stop this timeline right fucking now. 

She skids to a halt at the top of a staircase, breathing heavily and feeling lightheaded. 

“Do you have a death wish, Granger?” Snape’s footsteps are quiet as he ascends within view. 

“That depends on if”—she pants—“you’re planning to tell Dumbledore any of this.” Her vision begins to go dark at the edges, spots of color taking over the middle. 

“You’re not supposed to be up at all, let alone sprinting,” he chastises. He reaches her and waves his wand toward the hospital wing. A moment later, a vial of her healing potion sails into his hand. 

She manages to drink it, then she slumps against the wall and slides to a seat, waiting for her strength to return. 

“Why did you leave so suddenly?”

“Why don’t you want the Headmaster finding out?” he asks as though he hadn’t heard her.

“Because he made me take an Unbreakable Vow the first timeline and it got me killed.” 

“Figures.” 

“I’m not much better though, seeing as I got you killed the next time.” 

Snape raises an eyebrow. 

“Oh. Fuck. I should probably tell you everything that happened, shouldn’t I?”

“I am sorely tempted to leave you here in recompense, but I suppose I should take you back to the hospital wing so you can explain.” 

Debriefing fully takes two hours. It goes by surprisingly quickly, with Snape only interrupting to give Hermione a blood replenisher and ask a couple clarifying questions before seating himself back in the chair beside her bed. She marvels at how easy it is to adapt to his dark eyes never leaving her face, his attention fully hers. 

“The more I do this, the longer the explanation is going to take,” Hermione muses in conclusion. “Perhaps in the future, Legilimency might be a workaround.” 

Snape gives a noncommittal hum and then furrows his brow in thought. “So I need to determine what I used to successfully poison Bellatrix and where she relocated her Gringotts vault contents.” 

“I’m still not sure why the vault was emptied in the first place.” 

“I’d assume she was suspicious enough that someone would come after it—that’s something we could test, or we could just follow what happened last time.” 

Hermione mulls this over, but—“Erm, like I mentioned, last time did get you killed.” 

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.” 

Hermione glares. 

“What, you’re the only one who gets to have a death wish?” Snape doesn’t wait for her response before recentering their discussion. “I think avoiding the Unbreakable Vow with Narcissa was what triggered her suspicion, so that’s the first step I’ll take.”

If avoiding the vow is the first step, Hermione isn’t at all opposed. 

“You should get some rest,” Snape says. His tone is flat, but the words are uncharacteristically kind. 

“I’ll sleep when I’m dead. Again.” 

Snape doesn’t laugh, and Hermione glances at the clock. It’s well after midnight. “So should you,” she says, trying not to let her gaze linger on the shadows beneath his eyes. 

He rubs a hand down the side of his face and rises. “Tomorrow, if you’re well enough, we can get a head start on preparing the lab.” 

Hermione sleeps, ironically, like the dead, and when she awakens, the familiar jar of healing ointment is next to her potions. 

She replays the scenes from the previous day in her mind until she arrives at the moment when she found Snape staring at her—she’d just been securing her bun, and her arm had been raised, and he must have seen the scar from Bellatrix’s knife. A mixture of relief and dread climbs up her back as she contemplates the opportunity—and the danger—this could bring them. So he can see her. So he believes her. That’s what it means, right?

She spreads the ointment over the scar and wonders if she keeps this up long enough, will it disappear? 

“I’m bringing this with,” Snape says as he enters brusquely, holding up a small crate of vials which look to be more healing potions. 

Hermione sets the ointment aside and rises, fighting the dizziness that washes over her. The walk to the dungeons is slow, and she can sense that Snape is used to a brisk pace but deliberately stopping at points to allow her to rest. 

They reach the dark corridor, and Snape steps aside, no doubt in a makeshift sort of test to see if she really does know where it is. Hermione skims her fingers along the wall, searching for the familiar tug of magic and confirming with the spiderweb-shaped crack in the stone. For a foolish moment, she wonders if the castle magic can sense that she’s been here before—

But only cold stone meets her hand. 

Snape presses his hand to the wall beside her again, and she fights the urge to lean into the heat around him. His magic as he adds her to the wards still makes her skin tingle, and she shivers as it courses over her. 

Beside her, Snape clears his throat and steps away. 

The rocks shift, and the doorway materializes, and together, they step through the threshold.

The rest of Hermione’s recovery is spent alternating between the hospital wing, library, and lab. The storage area is full of boom berries, and Hermione’s head is full of ideas. 

Snape is absent most of the time, and Hermione tries to embrace the strange peace she had found so easily in the lab during the last timeline. It’s not as if she misses his presence—even if she keeps a running list of questions to ask him at the earliest opportunity, even if she can’t help by become transfixed by his hands as he works, even if—

“It’s time to go. I’ll see you at the start of term.”

The words jolt Hermione out of her thoughts and she nods, wondering why she’s feeling so homesick as she packs her things away.

To fill you in on what you might be missing from the last timeline, apparently you like scraps of parchment as a means of communication. Less effort than a Patronus. 

Hermione stares at the message on the lab table and wonders if it’s too much—too swotty, too familiar, too—

She leaves before she can change her mind. 

Seeing the Weasleys again feels like pulling an old photograph out from the shoebox beneath her childhood bed. Will greeting them always feel this familiar; this nostalgic?

She spends nearly thirty minutes on the phone with her parents and stops in the chemist’s to buy dental floss before letting Molly side-along Apparate her to the Burrow. 

“You look like you could use a glass of wine,” Hermione says to Fleur when they find themselves in the kitchen later.

“I hid this bottle so the twins would not steal it,” Fleur says with a conspiratorial grin. 

Hermione grabs two goblets and beckons for Fleur to follow her outside, remembering how Molly had interrupted them the last time. They settle on a garden bench, and Fleur uncorks the wine to fill each goblet to the brim, then downs what remains from the bottle itself. 

Hermione reassures her that dinner will taste better than it looks, and Fleur jokes about the British food upsetting Tonks, and then—

“I don’t know how I’m going to get married,” Fleur says suddenly. 

Hermione sits up. This is much different than the last time. “You don’t have to get married, Fleur,” she says gently. 

Fleur looks at her and then away again, leaning back against the bench and staring up at the stars. “You’re the only person who’s said that to me,” she says. “On trinque.” She clinks their glasses together, and they drink in silence for several minutes. 

“I sometimes wonder if the only reason Bill proposed was because I let my guard down. Let him see me without suppressing my Veela magic.” 

Hermione takes a slow sip of wine and waits for her to continue. 

“I worry that it is not me he loves, but how I make him feel.” 

“I hope not,” Hermione says, not knowing what else she can offer in support. 

“Moi aussi. But how is one to tell?” Fleur muses. She drains her wine glass. “Perhaps this is all just silly. How is it you say in English—cold feet?”

“There you are!” Molly calls from the open kitchen door. 

“And now it is time for more British food,” Fleur says, rising and helping Hermione to her feet. Her face is grim and determined, like she's going into battle, and perhaps she's fighting demons of her own.

Harry and Ron look even younger in the morning glow, and Hermione realizes they’re the same age—it’s just that she’s the one who is getting older. 

This strange knowledge carries her through her OWL results, Diagon Alley, and back to Hogwarts on the train, where she insists on Harry staying put. 

“I believe you,” she whispers as the train pulls into Hogsmeade Station. “You don’t need to prove anything right now.” 

When she descends onto the platform, she catches a flash of blonde hair and races to catch the door of the carriage. 

“Luna,” she says, catching her breath. “Er—how was the rest of your summer?”

“Fine, I suppose. Now what did you really want to ask me?” Her words would be harsh coming from anyone else, but Luna is just… honest with her.

Hermione vows to herself to be the same. “I wanted to know more about the Death Chamber in the Department of Mysteries.” 

“You and me both,” Luna muses. “You know I heard my mother in there?”

Hermione hesitates. Honesty. She can do this. “Yes.” She takes a breath. “You told me.” 

“When?” Luna asks, neither surprised nor expectant.

“In another time.” 

“Oh. That makes sense. Had we figured anything out yet? During that time?”

Hermione smiles sadly. “No.”

Luna studies her with her large blue eyes. “You look wiser, Hermione. Maybe you’ll figure it out.” Whether she means the Death Chamber, her time loop, or life (or death) in general, Hermione isn’t sure.

The carriage arrives, and she watches Luna float away into the castle.

Her dorm bed pillow still smells the same, and Crookshanks still likes to hog at least half of it. 

“It’s going to be alright,” she tells him. At least for him, it always is. Maybe his contentment is one of the patches that always stays on the quilt. 

Early in the morning, when she can’t sleep, Hermione finds herself in the lab and finds a torn off corner of parchment in place of the missive she’d left. 

I don’t need to be filled in on my own personal tastes, Granger. ‘Like’ is a generous estimation. Have you tried adding diluted dittany? 

She beams as she pockets it. 

Will do. 

“The Dark Arts are many, varied, ever-changing, and eternal,” Snape says as he strides into the first Defence lesson of the year. There’s something comforting in his words, even if the idea of eternity settles heavy on Hermione’s shoulders. Some things are constant—even if the only constant is change. 

She volunteers to pair up with Harry as her nonverbal dueling partner, who looks utterly gobsmacked when Snape rolls his eyes and agrees. And then she’s utterly gobsmacked when, after twenty-five minutes, he hits her with a successful nonverbal Petrificus and she thuds ungracefully to the floor.

She’s still sore from the fall during Potions class, and in a silent apology, Harry slides his copy of Advanced Potion Making between them, giving her unrestricted access to teenage Snape’s notes. 

They both brew a perfect Draught of Living Death, and Hermione hopes that joining the Slug Club will grant her access to more boom berries. 

“Thinking like a Slytherin,” Snape says when Hermione tells him her plan at the first office hours session of the year.

“I suppose all I needed was a bit of wisdom,” she says. Come to think of it, how would one be sorted as an adult and not a naive 11-year-old? Perhaps the next time she visits Dumbledore, she’ll swipe the hat and ask it. But that would mean having to visit Dumbledore again, which is not a thrilling prospect. 

“How’s the research going otherwise?” 

“About the same as last time,” Hermione admits, slumping into the chair across from him. It’s the same vanishing cells, the same boom berry stabilizer, the same problems, and not much else despite an extra few texts of knowledge and Snape’s suggestions for additional tests to run. 

Snape doesn’t seem phased however. “Sometimes dead ends are part of the process. Perhaps you could ask one of your new Slug Club connections for advice?”

Fuck. Networking. The thought makes Hermione’s stomach churn. ‘I’d rather die’ dances on the tip of her tongue, but then she realizes that dying won’t actually solve this problem. 

“I think,” she says instead, “I’ll just work on the horcrux problem instead.” Saying the word out loud still feels like airing a dirty secret—even when she’d told Snape everything in the hospital wing. Satisfied, she rises from the chair and nods. “Until next time.” 

“You’re acting like this is a regular occurrence,” Snape says warily.

“For me, maybe,” she says and shrugs. “But you have the joy of experiencing only a few of these meetings each time.” 

Snape merely frowns in response.

“For the next one, you usually invite me into your sitting room,” she supplies helpfully, and then turns away before she can see his expression.

The horcrux problem is easy enough this time around. A quick trip to Hogsmeade and a pitstop at the Room of Requirement and Hermione has both the locket and the diadem as well as a triple-wrapped package containing the cursed necklace from Borgin and Burkes. 

“Sugar quills.” 

The same password.

“Don’t. Touch. Them.” 

The same admonishment to a steel-eyed Dumbledore. 

“My turn.”

But this time, a satisfying smash when Hermione destroys them all, having snatched the sword from the cabinet before Dumbledore could take it. 

I hope Bellatrix is at least half as suspicious as Dumbledore, Hermione scrawls onto the back of her History of Magic essay, and leaves it on top of Snape’s pristine mortar and pestle set in the lab. 

(She received an E, but she cares more about Snape’s response than her mark.)

Classes drag, her research won't budge no matter how many boom berries she crushes, and Hermione spends as much time as she can reading with Crookshanks on her lap. The air outside cools, and she marvels at how quickly the fall is passing.

At the next office hours session, Snape doesn’t invite her to his living quarters, and Hermione tries not to feel stung. 

“I think I’ve succeeded in making Bellatrix suspicious enough,” he says, flipping over an essay. “She was gone from the Manor for a couple days, and I think she emptied her Gringotts vault.” 

“How certain are you?” Hermione asks, leaning forward. 

“About… sixty percent.” 

The words tug at Hermione’s memory of the last timeline, and she misses the reckless, nihilistic Snape from before. She was closer with him, wasn’t she? Why was that?

“You’ve said that before,” she murmurs.

“I always say that,” Snape explains. “It makes people nervous—as they should be. It makes them realize how much of a gamble anything can be.” 

She nods, filing away the knowledge. 

“What else have I said before?” Snape now looks strangely guarded, spinning his quill in one hand and clearly not looking at the essays anymore. 

“Not much about yourself personally,” Hermione admits. “Although I’d like to know more.” 

“You just want to blackmail me in the next timeline so I can solve your research road block. Well I’m not falling for it, Granger.” 

She laughs in spite of herself. 

Snape cracks a smile and then seems to think better of it. “I suspect the goblet is now at the Manor,” he says, redirecting them. “Bellatrix doesn’t trust Rodolphus and wouldn’t dream of using the Lestrange property for anything valuable. I doubt even Narcissa knows exactly where it’s hidden.”

“Can we find it?” Hermione asks. 

“Who is this ‘we?’ No, you’re not going hunting through an ancient pureblood mansion looking for a cursed object.” 

Of the things Hermione’s done, this would barely be considered dangerous. When she points this out to him, Snape tosses the quill onto the desk and crosses his arms. He pauses for a long moment, staring down at it, before he finally says, “Alright. You can hunt for the goblet if I get to find a way to kill the snake.” 

Hermione blinks. 

“Can one poison a venomous snake with another snake’s venom?” Snape continues, ignoring her gaping. 

“Only one way to find out,” she says.

Hermione’s heart picks up speed as she visits the lab the next day.

Gods, now I’m thinking like a Gryffindor.

Hermione presses the note to her heart and tilts her head back to stare at the swooping motion of the extractor fan above. 

The start of the winter hols is marked by a large scene in the great hall after Ginny Weasley sits on Romilda Vane’s lap in the middle of lunch and kisses her senseless. The two have to be broken apart by McGonagall, who demands that Slughorn brew the antidote to the love potion chocolates. 

“For once, it’s not my problem,” Hermione says to herself.

“What’s not your problem?” Ron asks beside her, making her jump. 

She blinks as he peers into her face with concern. Guilt presses into her and makes her squirm. She’d forgotten all about Harry and Ron for so long, dodging them in the common room on her way to the lab, skipping Quidditch tryouts and games to spend time with Snape, each time telling herself she was protecting them. Was it because she couldn’t bear to face the friends she’d gotten into such trouble? Or because she was selfishly brushing aside the very concept of friendship when she’d have infinite opportunities to patch things up?

“I’m sorry,” she blurts. “I’ve been neglecting you both.” 

“We’re not plants,” Ron says and smiles. 

“We can water ourselves,” Harry adds.

“But you can’t be trusted not to tell when candy is containing a love potion,” she says, bumping his shoulder. 

“Oh so that’s why Ginny and Romilda…” 

“Yep.” 

“Oh,” Harry says. “I wanted to be supportive, but it’s hard when she’s actively sucking face with another girl…” 

“That’s very noble of you,” Hermione says. She thinks of how long Ginny’s been in love with Harry, how even when she was a first year, that’s all she wrote about in Tom Riddle’s diary, how it led her deep under the castle to the—

“The basilisk fangs!” she says suddenly. “Harry, I know I’ve been a shite friend, and now that I’m finally wanting to spend time with you I’m about to ask a favor, but… I need you to open the chamber.”

Descending down the damp pipe is eerily familiar, and Hermione tries to shake the visions of the final battle from her head. Before, she followed Ron, wondering if he loved her, wondering if they’d even survive enough to tell each other. 

Now, she leads the way, wondering if Snape will survive long enough to see the outcome of his attempt at poisoning Nagini. 

They land on the crumpled pile of old bones, and Ron helps her up, hand lingering on hers. 

“Hermione—” 

Before, she let him kiss her, gripping his tattered clothes like they could anchor them both among the living. 

Now, she gently shakes her head, and he lets her go. 

On the way to Snape’s office, Hermione passes Draco, Crabbe, and Goyle, no doubt on their way to the Room of Requirement again. 

“And it’s easier—I swear something happened. It’s like a spark went off, and I’m suddenly fixing everything,” Draco is saying.

“What spark?” Hermione asks, stopping in the middle of the hallway. It’s highly unusual for her to speak to them at all, but she has to know. What happened that made it so easy for him to repair the cabinet during the subsequent timelines? For a sudden horrifying moment, she wonders if he’s also stuck in a time loop, but then realizes that would require him to be cursed by Dolohov or Rowle (which she never witnessed), and that she would have probably encountered at least one timeline where he ran away to his family villa in Portofino. 

“None of your fucking business.” 

With the basilisk fangs clacking together in her bag, Hermione takes a step forward. “If you’re talking about that vanishing cabinet, it should take you until nearly March. Why the sudden progress? What’s different? Why are you suddenly so competent?”

The look of shock on his face is satisfying, Hermione has to admit. But a split second later, he’s raising his wand, and she does not have time for a petty hallway duel. 

“Obliviate.”  

Hermione’s spell is faster. She doesn’t bother with Crabbe and Goyle, who will likely forget the encounter all on their own over the next day or two. Then she casts a wordless Disillusionment over herself and hurries to Snape’s office. 

“This should hopefully be enough,” she says, hefting the bag full of fangs onto his desk. “Also I cast a memory charm on Draco Malfoy, so erm, I guess just be aware if he’s acting confused.” 

Snape levels his gaze at her. “Should I even bother asking?”

“No,” Hermione says and grins. 

“I could have gotten these myself.” Snape lifts the bag, and the tendons on his forearm tense. 

“I know. I wanted to help you though.” And maybe impress him, but that’s beside the point. 

A moment passes, and then Snape rises stiffly and spells open the door to his quarters. “You can help me extract the venom,” he says.

She wants to make a joke about what a fun date that would be but stops herself just in time. What is she even thinking? He’d kick her out and forget all about their horcrux plan; then she’d have to kill herself and start all over again in a timeline where she hadn’t just awkwardly flirted with her professor.

She clears her throat as though the sound will vanish the entire train of thought. It doesn’t work. 

“Please don’t accidentally spear yourself,” Snape says, as they set up at the little makeshift potions counter to the side of the room. 

“Same to you.” 

They work in silence, each drop of venom added to a small suspended vial between them. A strange nervousness flutters in the periphery, and Hermione can’t help but think of how ironic it would be if she accidentally injured herself now and ended up back at the hospital wing. She wants to see this thing through—see if she can cross a few more horcruxes off her list this time around.

“Slughorn keeps asking who you’re taking to his Christmas party tonight.” 

Hermione drops the fang, and it clatters to the floor. Does he secretly want her to stab herself? That can only be the explanation for this line of questioning.

“I’m not going.” 

In fact, she’s dodged every Slug Club meeting so far this year, in part because she doesn’t want to relive the more boring parts of her sixth year, and in part because she doesn’t deserve to attend when she only got invited based off of Snape’s Advanced Potion Making cheat codes. She certainly doesn’t want to be reminded of Cormac McLaggen’s clumsy, brutish hands ruining her hairstyle at any rate. Realistically, she’s not sixteen and has no interest in pretending to be sixteen anymore. Classes have been agonizing, the whirlwind of flings and breakups impossible to keep up with—there are so many permutations, different every timeline—

Snape hums beside her, hands never stopping their work. 

“Are you going?” she asks, hating the breathless quality her voice has taken on. 

“No,” Snape says. “I’m heading to the Manor tonight.” He gestures to the slowly filling container of venom.

“You’re not missing much,” Hermione says.

She decants the last of the venom from her current fang and reaches for the next, deciding she and Snape should plan as much as possible instead of make small talk about the Christmas party. Snape shares what he knows about the layout of the Manor and encourages her to seek out a house elf guide. Hermione describes the way that Neville beheaded Nagini during the first battle, and Snape concedes that he’s impressed. This is familiar territory—scheming, strategizing—not navigating the complex social structure of Hogwarts. 

Eventually, they finish, and Hermione’s thoughts are firmly centered away from the party they’re both missing. Snape caps the vial and pockets it, and they clean the workstation as though they’ll come back to it.

“If this doesn’t get us killed…” Hermione begins. 

“It will likely get us killed,” Snape interjects helpfully.

“As always, your optimism is much appreciated.” 

Snape’s mouth twitches. She thinks he’ll leave without a backward glance, but instead he furrows his brow and studies her face. Her cheeks warm. 

“If optimism is so valuable to you, then why is it always me you seek out?” 

Her mouth goes dry. 

“In each timeline, you—why not Potter or Weasley or McGonagall—she’d probably know much more about what to do about all of this than I would.” 

It’s a question Hermione has been avoiding asking herself. 

“Because I trust you.” It’s an answer, but only part of the answer. 

“That’s what I don’t understand.” Snape leans against the doorway. 

“Why’s that so hard to understand?”

Snape pushes off and begins to turn away. “Because it seems like you know me,” he says, and leaves. 

“That’s exactly why I trust you,” she says softly to his retreating form. 

He’s gone by the time the sun rises the next day. 

No news is good news, she tells herself, when the evening Prophet has no reports of any deaths.

She calls for Dobby and confirms that he can take her through a secret passageway into Malfoy Manor to search for the goblet.

Then, she sneaks out under the cover of the stars to the Apparition point and spins away into the night. 

“Miss must be quiet, and miss must not touch a single thing!” he instructs, as they crawl through a house elf-sized door in the cellar. “Everything is being cursed against muggleborns.” 

They reach the door to the first floor, and Dobby spends a full minute charming it open. “All door handles are being cursed,” he says, holding it open for her to slip through. “And all window latches,” he adds. 

Hermione wills away the churning unease in her stomach. 

“We will be making toward the east wing,” Dobby explains, dragging her from hall to hall, empty room to empty room. 

They wander through the dark, ominous manor for several more minutes before Hermione whispers, “How many rooms are there?” 

“Does Miss want an actual number?”

Does she want an actual number? 

“Yes,” she whispers. 

“Two hundred forty-eight rooms,” Dobby answers, clicking his fingers to open a hidden door behind a nearby bookshelf. 

Fuck. 

“But Dobby knows the goblet is hiding somewhere in the fifty-six rooms of the east wing,” he supplies helpfully. 

“Fifty-six chances to relive my PTSD,” Hermione mutters. Better than two hundred forty-eight chances though, she supposes. 

The first room in the east wing has blood red walls and a grandfather clock whose ticking rattles in Hermione’s skull. The second is the ensuite, a windowless, soulless place with a bathtub that Hermione imagines must have housed at least six murder victims at various points. The next is a walk-in closet full of doxies, the next a parlor with cloth-covered loveseats, the next a guest bed with gleaming window latches that Hermione avoids touching. 

They finally reach a room that has some signs of recent use, and this is both hopeful and terrifying. Mens' shoes are scattered across the ground, and several sets of Death Eater robes hang in the open wardrobe. 

“Where is Bellatrix’s room?” Hermione whispers, and Dobby takes her hand to lead her back to the hall. 

“Bellatrix’s room is off limits.” The voice is clear and harsh and followed by a loud cackle. 

The torches on the wall rush to a fiery light, and Hermione comes face to face with Bellatrix Lestrange.

“Crucio!” she cries immediately, without ceremony, and Hermione flinches instinctively, forgetting all about her wand, her magic—the only thing she can feel is a deep fear that reduces her to a cowering mess against the wall. 

It takes a long moment before Hermione hears the screams. 

Not her screams.

Dobby’s. 

“Sectumsempra!” The words fly out of her mouth before she even realizes she’s jumped back upright. The spell slashes the wall next to Bellatrix, who leaps away with a start, her own spell broken. 

“Leave, now!” Hermione urges Dobby, who has slumped to the ground. 

“But—”

“That’s an order!” she insists, hoping desperately that he’ll understand—that she won’t have to explain—

“Dobby will only leave to fetch help and then Dobby will come back,” he says firmly. The pop! of his departure is the relief she needs to sustain her through Bellatrix’s next spell, aimed directly at her. 

“Crucio!”

Time stands still, and Hermione floats at the edge of her awareness, vision blurring around flashes of light, contorting limbs, flitting between a narrow hallway and the wide, desolate expanse of the drawing room. Her forearm is scarred and healing—it’s red and dripping. She’s suspended—she’s dreaming—she’s—

The spell ceases, and Bellatrix prods Hermione’s leg with her pointed heel. “Wake up, mudblood. We’re only getting started.”

“Where’s the goblet?” Hermione asks without ceremony. Maybe if she can bait Bellatrix enough, she’ll tell her, and then she’ll at least be able to carry the knowledge with her into the next timeline. 

But Bellatrix hits her with another blast of the Cruciatus and then looms into her vision. “Where’s Snape?” 

“I don’t know,” Hermione answers truthfully, trying to draw a ragged breath. She’s bitten through her cheek, and there’s vomit all over the carpet in front of her.

“Is that so.” It’s not a question, so Hermione doesn’t answer. Bellatrix knocks her flat on her back and then binds her limbs together. 

“He seems to have developed an unhealthy level of fondness for you,” Bellatrix says, absentmindedly twirling her wand with one hand. With the other, she reaches into her pocket and withdraws something cruel and sharp—

Hermione tries to slow her breathing. Where is Snape where is Snape where is—

“He always did have a thing for mudbloods.” Bellatrix shrugs, as if the slur is simply fact, and as if the fact is simply a boring side detail. “Still. You’re a loose end.” 

Hermione struggles against her binds, willing her gaze away from the glint of metal. She can't think of the cursed knife—not now—

“Going to feed me to Nagini, then?” she asks, hoping desperately that this will set something off—give her some form of information—

Bellatrix’s expression shutters completely. Hermione recognizes it for what it is: Occlumency.

“Nagini has a more sophisticated palate. Now, if you’re not to be of use to us, then you’ll at least be entertainment.” 

“Nagini’s dead,” Hermione spits, eyes never leaving Bellatrix’s. It’s a clear bluff, but she needs whatever miniscule hint she can pick up and—

There.

For just a flash of a moment. 

Bellatrix’s brow raises in shock, and—

It’s gone. She scowls and approaches Hermione with a look of determination.

“You know, my favorite thing to do before I kill someone is take a peek inside their thoughts. You know. See all the terror. The pleading. The completely useless hope—that one is always amusing.”

Hermione swallows and clenches her eyes shut. Fuck. It doesn’t matter that Bellatrix is deflecting, despite the small flare of hope in her chest that Snape’s plan worked; what could happen if Bellatrix finds anything about the time loop? She should learn Occlumency the next time, shouldn’t she—no—fuck, she shouldn’t think about ‘next time’ anything with Bellatrix about to pry inside her skull—

“Let’s see what means of dying will be the most traumatic for you,” Bellatrix croons, cupping Hermione’s chin with a cold hand. 

Unpracticed, sloppy, terror-filled scrambling is what happens next in Hermione’s mind, all while Bellatrix casts a searing spell to pry her eyes open.

Her entire vision burns. She can’t see anything but darkness and blood, and she wonders absently if Bellatrix has literally sliced off her eyelids. 

Another spell, this one caustic, and she can see the blurry margins of Bellatrix’s face. 

“Legilimens,” Bellatrix murmurs, her fingers a cold caress down Hermione’s neck. 

It’s exactly like a knife bisecting the soft, entirely futile defenses Hermione has tried to construct. Her thoughts cleave and separate. 

Visions are wrenched from her, unbidden:

Writhing on the floor, blood dripping from her arm—

Blinding pain. 

Dropping a black hair into the bubbling potion, stomach already rebelling at the sight—

Raw screams—those must be hers. 

Rowle, raising his wand—

Rowle, choking under the firm grasp of her hand against his throat—

Katie Bell collapsing in a heap—

Ron in a lifeless slump beside her—

And throughout, the knowledge that she doesn’t fear death. Not this time.  

It’s that dizzying relief that her fearlessness lends her that lowers her guard. She can feel Bellatrix receding, growing bored of her recklessness, until—

The hospital wing. Snape’s familiar scowl. 

“I’m from the future.” 

Bellatrix pauses. Digs deeper again.

A scrap of parchment. 

Debrief in the hospital wing, July 1996—

“Can one poison a venomous snake with another snake’s venom?”

Hermione tries desperately to redirect the deluge of memory, but Bellatrix seems to sense she’s hiding something and plunges ahead.

BREAKING NEWS: Two dead in Wiltshire

The body of escaped convict Bellatrix Lestrange... characteristic bruising and splinched limbs...

Scenes from the original battle resurface no matter how she tries to shove them away. That awful, haunting noise of Bellatrix’s laughter in the background. Hermione can sense her following it, jumping from blood-laden memory to memory—

“NOT MY DAUGHTER, YOU BITCH!” 

A flash of green, and the Bellatrix from her vision falls. 

This Bellatrix drops the connection immediately and jumps back as if burned, cursed knife clattering, forgotten, to the ground.

“Find what you were looking for?” Hermione asks, forcing her aching head up to meet Bellatrix’s gaze. Her eyes still burn, and the image before her is murky and blood-tinged, but she doesn’t need to see any details to know that the terror Bellatrix has just found is her own. 

Bellatrix’s shoulders tense, and then she strikes Hermione across the face without warning. 

Her mouth wells with blood. 

“What did you see?” Bellatrix asks, looming closer and gripping Hermione’s chin once again. 

Hermione smiles, letting the blood run down her face. She licks a rim of it around her lips. Bellatrix watches the movement of her tongue. Doesn’t let go when the first drops make contact with her trembling hand.

“For someone who hates my blood so much, you seem to look like you want to taste it.”

The next strike hurts worse, but Hermione can only laugh. 

“What did you see?” Bellatrix demands again, tone increasingly frantic.

“Your death,” Hermione says simply. 

For a moment she feels something strangely akin to sympathy when she notes the terror in Bellatrix’s expression. Because now, she’s starting to wonder if Bellatrix’s death is as inevitable as her own.

“What did Snape—in that memory, when my body was found—” Bellatrix breaks off and seems to shrink into herself. “Poison, wasn’t it? Whatever venom concoction he made, probably a modification of the one I asked him for that blood traitor last month. Poetic.” She pauses, considering. “I suppose there’s a high likelihood he’s already poisoned me again.” 

Hermione opens her mouth, almost as if to apologize, but before she can utter anything, Bellatrix cuts her off. “No. It doesn’t matter. You’re after something that belongs to the Dark Lord, and even if I die, my one last act will be for him.” She brandishes her wand in Hermione’s face, drawing a deep breath—

“Avada Kedavra!”

Chapter Text

She sits bolt upright, the scratchy hospital sheets sliding off her shoulders. She can’t help but gingerly press around her eyelids to make sure they’re intact. 

“Granger, it’s alright. You’re in the hospital wing. I have a dose of healing potion ready,” Snape says. 

She rests back on the metal headboard and catches her breath. 

“How long have I been unconscious?” she asks after drinking the potion, falling back to what is now growing to feel like routine. 

“Two weeks, aside from delirious raving.” Snape takes the vial back from her. “Your parents have been informed, although they received more of a summary than the much more concerning details regarding breaking into a government building and fighting Death Eaters, as well as your tenuous recovery.” 

“Thank you. For healing me.” Has she ever properly thanked him before? “I know it must have taken up a lot of time.”

“St. Mungo’s was too risky; after what happened with Bode… We couldn’t have sent you there.” It’s not exactly ‘you’re welcome,’ but Hermione figures it’s close enough. 

Snape goes back to organizing the array of healing potions on the shelves across from her, and she studies his angular shoulders. Should she tell him what happened? Should she risk his life again? The last two times, he had seemed to be on board, but this time… 

How many times can she risk his safety? His cover? His life? 

He had wanted to debrief before, but she hadn’t had time to see if he’d left her a message in his—her—their lab before getting herself tortured and killed. Would he want to? Should she make any assumptions with how things have been going?

Snape begins to head toward the exit, when Hermione wonders aloud, “What was I deliriously raving about?”

Snape turns and presses his lips together, as if deciding whether or not he should even share. “The inevitability of death,” he finally answers, then strides from the room. 

That night, she tosses and turns alongside her doubts, debating how much she should drag him along into her mess of a time loop. 

“In each timeline, you—why not Potter or Weasley or McGonagall—she’d probably know much more about what to do about all of this than I would.” 

Why him? He’d asked the last time, and she’d told the truth: she trusts him. 

But should he trust her? Is she worthy of anyone’s trust at this stage?

Her mind swirls in half-sleep, reviewing the events of the last few weeks before the disastrous break-in to Malfoy Manor. Snape was going to poison Nagini—and likely succeeded, if that brief glimpse of surprise on Bellatrix’s features was a tell. But what happened to him? Had he fled? Had he been killed? Surely if that timeline had continued, he would have been found eventually, cover blown, fate sealed, survival a mere pipe dream.

She can’t jeopardize his safety again. Not like that. Not if they want to keep any hope of winning the war again.

But—

She needs to make sure he avoids the unbreakable vow with Narcissa and all that it entails—needs to make sure Bellatrix is still suspicious enough to empty her Gringott’s vault—but not so suspicious that she goes after Snape too soon. 

Her head spins.

How is she going to strike the right balance? And on top of that find the goblet? She supposes she could try another handful of rooms in the Manor at a time before being killed, but that seems like a daunting prospect and a waste of several timelines. If only there were a way to—

Oh. 

Oh no.

“I thought… I thought I could try researching it, perhaps. Discovering if it has any links to the others—”

Dumbledore’s words from long ago ring in her ears, and she realizes with a sinking feeling of dread that she might have to seek out his help again. This time, though, it will be on her terms. She falls into an uneasy sleep, her apprehension buzzing.

“Don’t take the vow with Narcissa,” she says to Snape when he enters the next morning. 

He stares at her with a cool, guarded expression. 

“Consider it a premonition—if you believe in Divination, which I generally don’t, as it’s an entirely subjective field of study, and the marking is even more subjective—”

“Granger.” 

“Right. Just… Don’t do it. Please.” 

Snape approaches with her potion, which she takes without ceremony. 

“It’s going to make Bellatrix more suspicious,” she continues, “but that should help us in the long run, as long as you’re on your guard around her.” 

Snape frowns, looking down at her hands which are nervously rolling the empty vial back and forth.

“And please, if you’re going to promise anything, promise me you won’t tell Dumbledore. Not yet, at least.” 

“Why the sudden distrust in the Headmaster?” Snape asks, frown deepening. 

“Well, he’s partially responsible for me ending up here,” Hermione tries, and hopes he buys it. 

The only response she receives is a half shrug before Snape suddenly has his wand pointed directly at her:

“Finite Incantatem.” His magic is an electric warmth across her skin. 

Nothing happens.

“What was that for?”

Snape squints at her, as if trying to figure her out. She squints back, trying to parse out why he would—oh.

“What do I look like to you?” she asks without pretense.

Snape clenches his jaw.

“Fuzzy, without clear borders, like an illusion?” she supplies. “One of those ones that flips back and forth between two different images in your head until you can’t figure out which one is real?”

Snape’s face is completely expressionless. 

“It’s not a concealment spell; it’s a curse,” she explains. “I’m afraid of what could happen if I told you all of the details. But I have been having premonitions, and I do know what I’m talking about. I know it’s asking you to trust me on blind faith, but I can prove it to you. You need only ask.” 

Snape gives a cool, formal nod, and then doesn’t ask.

She wishes the gesture didn’t hit her square in the chest.

The minutes tick by until it’s time for her to leave the hospital, and she reads and rereads Curses at the Cellular Level and hopes she made the right decision this time.

Because this time, she wants to make sure Snape stays alive for as long as she can guarantee it. This time, she’ll have his safety, and that has to be worth his companionship, doesn’t it?

But this time, going through the motions feels purely mechanical, her fate confined to an airtight, locked container. All she can do is run the reel and wait it out until it’s time to gather the horcruxes.

“See you at office hours, Professor.” 

“You’re a good man, Ron.”

“I love you, Dad.” 

“Dinner will taste better than it sounds. But you should know, it will be impossible to escape Molly Weasley once we start drinking this wine.” 

“I believe you, Harry.”

“I was hoping to direct my focus to a more research-oriented career.” 

“It’s going to be alright, Crookshanks. We’ll get there.” 

“Granger, I can hear you pacing.” 

Hermione freezes, mid-step, and then watches the door to Snape’s office swing open. He’s seated at his desk, dark tea beside him, red ink pot beside a messy stack of essays, and her heart feels a little tug. She follows it to the seat in front of him. 

“Sorry, I know I’m a bit early, but—”

“Your essay will be handed back in class, and you’ll discover your grade at that time,” he says, flipping over the parchment in his hand. “If that will be all…”

She wants to tell him she doesn’t care about the essay. She wants to tell him she already knows her grade. She wants to tell him that her essay gets more concise and polished every time, and that at this point, she could probably publish it somewhere, or sell it to one of the NEWT-level Slytherins, but—

“I understand. I actually had some questions about Dolohov’s curse.” 

At this, he levels his gaze at her and sets the parchment down. “What have you been reading so far?”

Everything there is to fucking read. “Most of the relevant volumes from our library and the nearby university library, as well as some basic guides to lab analysis. Although I would think bench research would require something a bit more sophisticated than what’s currently available here.” 

If Snape is thinking of his lab, which is now likely home to Slughorn’s summer wardrobe, his expression gives nothing away. Hermione has been trying her hardest not to think of it either—not to miss it with its airy ceiling and comforting globes of light and torn pieces of parchment in spiky scrawl that make her heart jump a little with glee each time she discovers them—

But now there’s nothing to discover, except maybe a deeper appreciation for avant-garde men’s fashion. 

“You’re correct about the bench work,” Snape replies. He hesitates, as if to say more, but then he dips his quill back in the ink. “I’m afraid I won’t have the answers to your questions if you’ve already read as much as you claim.” 

Hermione’s stomach sinks into the stone beneath. “Thank you anyway,” she manages to get out. Her feet are heavy as she carries herself up from the dungeons.

“Congrats on making Keeper, Ron.” 

“Parvati, can you help me figure out how to style my hair?”

“We can do this, Crookshanks.” 

Waiting for the Hogsmeade trip and Mundungus Fletcher is more of the same. Hermione watches the leaves drain of color and swirl to the ground, watches the quill scratch across the parchment of her assignments, watches the people around her follow their singular paths into the chill air of fall.

She ambushes him and snatches the locket, the cold bite of it in her palm a familiar ache. 

“Did it ever fuck with your head too?” she asks him, holding it up. 

He only curls his lip and Apparates away, leaving Hermione behind to go and retrieve the cursed necklace from Madame Rosmerta. 

From there, it’s just a matter of fetching the diadem from the Room of Requirement, which sails into her hand and scrambles her nerves, and making her way to Dumbledore’s office—

“Hi, Hermione.” 

“Luna. I was just…” she searches for what to say next, but finds only a truth that’s been desperate to spill out since the moment she decided to keep the entirety of it hidden from Snape. “Can—can we talk?”

Luna nods and leads her to an empty classroom. Hermione locks the door and casts a Muffliato and tries not to think of how Snape invented the spell when he was a teenager, and if he were stuck in this time loop, he’d know exactly what to do—in fact, he’s already had better ideas than her each time despite it being the only time from his perspective, and—

“What’s wrong, Hermione? Your brain has gone all swirly.” 

“Its—” Hermione breaks off. Can she tell Luna? What if it gets her killed just like Ron? Just like Snape?

“Something happened to me,” she begins again. “In the Department of Mysteries. But if I tell you, you have to promise me not to do anything reckless, or risky, or—” 

“I can’t promise anything like that,” Luna says. “But if I do, it will be my choice, and it won’t be your fault.” 

“Of course it will be my fault, I—”

“You can’t be responsible for everyone else’s bad decisions,” Luna says firmly. “It’s what my therapist told me after my mum—after she died, and I didn’t stop it. Well, couldn’t stop it; I was nine.” 

Hermione’s heart fills with a rush of sympathy. “I’m so sorry, Luna,” she murmurs. “Of course that wouldn’t be your fault.” 

“It took me a long time to realize it—to really believe it. And it might take you a long time too,” she says and shrugs. “I just felt like you should hear it.” 

“Thank you.” 

Luna smiles gently. “What happened to you in the Department of Mysteries?”

Hermione takes a deep breath. And then she tells Luna everything. 

“I wonder if it has something to do with the Death Chamber,” is the first thing Luna says when Hermione’s finished. “Did you touch the veil? Hear or see anything?” 

“No, but I know you did,” Hermione says softly. “You told me during a previous timeline.” 

“Ah, so you know my theory about the quilt, then.” 

“Yes. I just don’t know where I fall when it comes to that theory.” 

Luna pauses, looking up at the ceiling as she considers. “Well you’re not a fixed point, but you’re tethered to the hospital wing by something stronger than death itself. And I’m sure there are other fixed points or tethers that you’ve seen—things that are always the same, no matter what you do.”

Hermione thinks of the consistencies—Dumbledore’s cursed hand, Fleur and Molly and the wine, Snape’s Defence lecture at the start of the year—and the bizarre circumstances surrounding the love potion chocolates that Romilda Vane always seems to acquire. “Yes. Maybe. Somewhat. I’m not sure.” 

“Hm,” Luna says. “I’m sure they exist, just as I’m sure there are things that are totally different.” 

“People dying,” Hermione blurts. “I can save people. Or get them killed.” So why is it a fucking cursed chocolate that survives each and every time?

“People can save themselves too,” Luna observes. 

“But everything is my fault, remember?” Hermione says, and Luna laughs. 

“I wish I could help you more,” Luna says, suddenly growing serious. “I’ve been meaning to go back to visit the Death Chamber, and perhaps the Time Room might have more answers for you. We could go together.” 

“Not this time. I’m too—I can’t get more people into trouble. And I have something else I’m working on.”

“Find me next time, then,” Luna says. “Or the time after that, or the one after that; I won’t know the difference, will I?” She shrugs. “Oh!” She jumps off the desk she’d been sitting on. “The time travel! That’s probably why you look older.” 

“You can see?”

“Yes. As soon as you told me. Before, you looked a bit blurry—but then, I looked back at you, and there you were.” 

“There I was. Here I am.” Hermione breaks into a smile, giving a flourish with her hand.

“Wherever you go, there you are,” Luna says sagely, grinning. 

Hermione’s laughter bubbles over, and she finds herself floating free for the briefest of moments. Maybe that’s all she needed—a friend, a confidante, someone who can see her on the circular path and see beyond; that maybe it’s actually a spiral. Maybe she’ll drag herself up out of this mess yet. 

“Professor Snape!” she calls, knocking firmly on the door.

“Need I remind you that office hours aren’t—”

“I don’t give a flying fuck about office hours. We need to talk to Dumbledore.” 

The door opens, a sneer forming on Snape’s face—

“Now.” Hermione reaches into her bag and pulls out the diadem, waving it between them. 

He grips her wrist to stop the movement, his hand cold against her skin. “What is this?” he hisses, no doubt able to sense the vast amounts of dark magic concentrated into something so small. 

“A horcrux,” she answers, and he lets go immediately. “And it’s giving me all sorts of strange and twisted ideas, so I should probably put it away.” She does, a bit reluctantly, resisting the pull of promised knowledge and burying it deep in her satchel. 

Snape watches her, one hand unconsciously reaching up to press against his temple. “I suppose you’re right about consulting the Headmaster.” He steps into the hallway and shuts the door behind him, wasting no time in making for the stairs. 

Hermione lengthens her stride beside him, and asks, “So you didn’t take the vow with Narcissa, right?” 

Snape side-eyes her. “Why do you need to know such a”—his eyes dart toward her satchel, and he seems to understand—“Fine. I didn’t.” 

“Perfect. And by now, has Bellatrix, by any chance, emptied her Gringotts vault?”

He pauses to narrow his eyes at her again. “Where would you get that information? Another one of your ‘premonitions?’”

“Speaking of which, do I still look blurry?” 

“You look half-mad to be touching cursed objects with your bare hands.” 

“I would be half-mad to touch Bellatrix’s vault contents with my bare hands. Any idea where they might be?”

Snape glares and then begins walking briskly down the hall once again. “I’m sure the Sight will give you that information.” 

“Actually, I’m hoping the horcrux will.”

Dumbledore’s office is filled with the static of ticking and whirring instruments, each sound like a little shock to her thoughts as the diadem buzzes from her satchel. 

“I’m ready to talk,” she says, more to herself than Dumbledore. 

“I’m ready to listen.” 

Hermione sits in front of his desk and, after an apologetic glance at Snape, she remembers what helped him believe her the last time and begins, “I’m stuck in a strange sort of time loop.” 

She summarizes the gory bits, emphasizes how telling Dumbledore in the beginning was a complete mistake, and—perhaps with a bit too much relish—recounts his utter stupidity at putting on the ring and similarly attempting to wear the diadem. 

“The only reason I’m here,” she concludes, “is to see if there’s any truth to that theory of yours that the horcruxes share a common connection. If we’ve played our cards right, we should be able to find where in Malfoy Manor Bellatrix is hiding the goblet. And then…” she pauses, giving a looping wave of her hand. 

“Severus?” Dumbledore turns toward Snape, who remains immobile to the side of the room. 

“I can’t confirm, but I also have reason to believe the goblet is currently hidden somewhere at Malfoy Manor.” He pauses, says nothing about Hermione’s account of her time travel—which stings, just a bit—and then continues, “If we could find it using the other objects, we might have a chance at destroying it.” 

“Please tell me ‘using the other objects’ does not entail impulsively putting them on,” she says.

“Granger, did you ever consider that the Headmaster might have had access to the connection through wearing the objects? And perhaps that —rather than sheer impulsivity—may have been the reason he donned the ring?” 

What? An actual logical—no. Fuck. No. He can’t have—

“I refuse to admit that you might have a point,” she says, crossing her arms. “Gods, it’s irritating.” 

Snape, to his credit, remains silent, an amused smirk climbing up one side of his mouth. 

“Thank you, Severus”—Dumbledore turns back to Hermoine—“I suppose it’s my turn to share something useful.” He withdraws his cursed hand from his robes and rests it on the desk, the blackened texture making Hermione fight back a shudder. “I’ve tried and failed once, as you can plainly see.” 

Hermione nods, staring at the hand. 

“My current theory is that it will require two objects to create a link to the observer, who can then use that connection to search for the others. As the ring was fortunately destroyed, that left me without other options. Until now.” 

Two objects. 

Right. Okay. Hermione can do this. It’s just the locket, which nearly sapped her of all hope while she was on the run, and the diadem, which, quite frankly, terrifies her with what it could do. She glances at Snape, who’s listening, expressionless, to Dumbledore’s continued explanation. Something about magical core integration with the soul fragments or something—Hermione really should be paying attention, but what matters more to her right now is if Snape thinks she should go ahead with it. A part of her aches for the tentative ease they’d achieved by the dwindling fire in his quarters. Next time, she’s not sure if she can help but seek that out again. All she needs to do is get through what’s in store with the horcruxes.

If this works, she’ll only need to do this once. It’s what she told herself when getting tortured by Bellatrix. When watching her friends die. But sometimes lying to oneself is the easiest way to get through something. 

She places the locket and the diadem on the desk. 

“I need to be the one,” she says simply. “It will no doubt kill me, and I’m the only one who can carry the knowledge through death and back to a time where it will be useful.” 

“Surely there’s another way—” Snape begins, stepping forward. 

Dumbledore silences him with a hand. 

“Hermione is correct. Sacrifices have to be made in war, and this is no different. Perhaps next time, you’ll seek out my counsel sooner,” he says to her, eyes twinkling. 

Fat fucking chance, she thinks, and she knows both he and Snape can probably hear her thoughts. 

“So all I need to do is put them on?” she asks, trying to swallow down her fear. Her hands shake as she unclasps the locket, and it snags on her hair after taking her three attempts to fasten it behind her neck. The cold presses against her chest and infuses her with doubt. 

Gently, Snape frees the curl it’s caught on. “Are you sure? There might be a different way we’ve yet to realize. It’s reasonable to take some time to at least research other avenues—” 

“I’ve spent months researching,” Dumbledore says wearily. “This is the only way.” 

“Then perhaps give Granger a minute to…” Snape trails off. Hermione supposes ‘say goodbye’ is a bit melodramatic, but she appreciates the sentiment. 

“It’s okay,” she tells him, placing a hand on his arm. “I’ll see you back in the hospital wing.” 

Snape does not appear at all reassured. 

“And if you continue in this timeline, it does appear that Basilisk venom is effective poison against Nagini, and you’ll need to destroy the cursed necklace that’s still in my satchel, as well as the poisoned mead that Slughorn’s got stashed somewhere—oh, and someone is going to eat some chocolates that have been laced with a love potion.” 

“Who would—”

“You’ll find out.” She shrugs. “Or you won’t. I’m actually not sure what will happen to you all when I—” she clears her throat. 

Dumbledore slides the diadem across to her, and she picks it up, feeling the buzzing, frenetic energy within. 

“Once it’s on, I’m going to begin to cast the necessary spells,” Dumbledore says mildly, “as well as one to keep the objects on your person.” 

‘Keep the objects—’ Hermione grimaces. It’s so she can’t take them off. Right. 

She lifts the diadem in the air—

“Granger.” 

She turns to look at Snape. His face has gone ashen, and he looks like he wants to tell her to stop—to think—to—

“Tell me earlier,” he settles on. “Next time. I want to do more than just watch you die.” 

If only he knew how deeply Hermione can feel those words. 

The glint of light off of the edges of the diadem is sharp. Hermione closes her eyes and lowers it onto her head. 

Fire claws at her temples, a series of jolts wrack her body with spasms, a blinding rush of lights and images race across her vision—she scrapes her nails against her scalp, but only manages to tear out her own hair, the diadem firmly affixed—she feels the ruthless pulse of Dumbledore’s magic, the spell binding her, choking her—she screams and collapses to the ground—

At once, her thoughts are shattered and split into shards—no longer able to reach her own body, she becomes a jagged line of magic between objects—a locket against her chest—who is she?—a snake curled up on smooth, cold tile—and why is she still screaming?—a teenage boy, sitting by the fire in the Gryffindor common room—who is he?—a crown, heavy with intent—a voice breaks, and the screams turn hoarse—and there—why does it matter? It must matter—a goblet, nestled in a silver box behind a series of burgundy books, on a dark wood shelf with a dragon carved into the frame—

And then, she’s cast out once more into the black void of uncertainty.

Chapter Text

She wakes, screaming, in the hospital wing. 

“Granger, try to calm down and drink this,” Snape says, thrusting a vial at her. 

“How long have I been unconscious?” she gasps, finally able to ground herself back in her physical form. She tries to focus on the feel of the sheet across her legs, the tickle of hair at the nape of her neck.

“Two weeks. We had to sedate you; you were screaming so much.” Snape’s tone is detached and clinical. 

“Oh.” 

“Are you in any pain?”

“No, not beyond the usual.” 

“The ‘usual?’”

Fuck. 

“I need a pen and parchment,” she deflects. She wants to jot down as much as she can about the goblet’s location before she forgets. She doesn’t want to consider the need to put on the diadem again.

Briefly, she considers extracting the memory for a Pensieve, but with a chill, she realizes that her own mind is the only reliable vessel for information that she has—the only thing that she can carry with her back to the little cot with the scratchy sheets and cold metal headboard. 

Pomfrey gets her the parchment, and she sketches a rough approximation of the bookshelf from her vision of the goblet’s location in Malfoy Manor. Fifty-six rooms. But now she has months to find it. 

And this time—

“Tell me earlier.”

—she’ll have Snape to help her. 

“Is this some sort of cryptic request for access to the library?” Snape asks, peering over at her sketch. 

Hermione can’t help but laugh in response. “Gods, no. I’m pretty sure I’ve exhausted the library’s resources at this point. No; this is for something else. Actually… It might be easier for you to just look around inside my head rather than have me try and explain this time. You know, Legilimency?” she clarifies, as Snape’s brow furrows deeper with each word.

“Madame Pomfrey,” Snape calls. “I should have no reason to doubt your diagnostic abilities, but has anyone double checked that Granger didn’t suffer any intracranial effects from Dolohov’s curse?” 

Madame Pomfrey confirms that no, Hermione’s mind is completely normal, and Snape scowls at her retreating form. 

“So… Legilimency?” Hermione raises her eyebrows in a silent challenge. 

“Why are you so keen to have me venture into your thoughts?” Snape asks, still scowling. He doesn’t trust her. 

Yet.

“The curse has gotten me stuck in a strange sort of time loop.” 

Snape blinks. “What’s strange about it?”

Hermione smiles. “Let me show you—it will save us a couple hours.”

Snape hesitates before sitting stiffly in the chair beside her. “If you’re sure.” 

“I’m sure.” She acts as though this is all routine—that this is what they do every time and that her heart isn’t beginning to pick up speed at the thought of giving him free access to every hidden bias, every failure—

“Gods save me from whatever teenage spectacle I’m about to witness,” he grumbles. 

“I’m not a teenager anymore,” Hermione says, meeting his dark eyes, just before he casts the spell. 

Snape’s presence in her mind is vastly different than Bellatrix’s knifelike insistence or Dumbledore’s subtle, cunning attempts at slipping past her defenses. Snape is… unobtrusive. She has no doubt he could barrel ahead and drag the information forward, but he doesn’t. He waits. 

Here goes nothing, she thinks, and pulls forth the memory of the final battle: Voldemort’s limp form and the dust-smudged, bloody faces in the crowd. A quick image summary of the horcruxes, destroying them all in the months leading up to the battle. She doesn’t revisit Snape bleeding out on the floor of the shack. As soon as her mind considers it, she switches abruptly to Thorfinn Rowle in the library. Her exhaustion mixed with triumph and loss. The book on the windowsill. The blood on the ground. Her first death. 

A flare of shock—that must be Snape’s—and she’s waking up in the hospital wing to healing potions and—“You’re not dead.” Fuck. Can he sense her unusual preoccupation with his neck? She plunges onward, speed running them through her return to Hogwarts, pausing at Katie Bell’s death, her confession to Ron, trying to skim over the more personal bits and finding that Snape, mercifully, pulls back until she can recenter them on the horcruxes and Dumbledore’s vow. She can’t keep her distrust in the Headmaster hidden. She can’t keep her grief from spilling out of her eyes as she revisits the Death Eater break-in and watches Ron die, feels Snape’s strong arms grounding her, feels his magic protecting her. And when she takes them back to Spinner’s End, she lets her unwavering trust in him rush forward at full force. 

A counter-rush of disbelief sends her reeling for a brief moment until it vanishes. She realizes that it must have been from Snape. 

It’s true, she thinks. You were the only one I trusted. Then, she pulls them into the next loop without waiting for a sarcastic rebuttal. “Don’t take the vow.” Her months of dead-ends with her research. She tries not to let her shame through, but fails. Office hours by the fire. “Reckless.” The rising giddiness at what could happen and the crushing fall when she sees the article, her grief at his death an icy abyss that swallows her whole as she plummets from the ledge at Gringotts. 

Granger, do you need a break? This is admittedly much more than I expected—

No. It’s fine. She sends them back to the hospital wing. Again. The comforting familiarity of Snape’s presence. Her excitement about getting back to the lab. Their lab. She tries to quell the strange emotions surrounding their messages and skips ahead to the research again. Boom berries. Road blocks. Horcruxes. The search in the Manor. She stops once Bellatrix appears. 

I’m—I’m sorry, his voice echoes in her mind.

It wasn’t the first time. She pulls up a memory of applying Snape’s healing ointment to the scar on her arm, not bothering to hide her gratitude, and then focuses back on the last loop. Her distance from him and how it resulted in the earliest death she’s had. “Tell me earlier.” She shoves him away and breaks the connection before he can follow the fragmented hallucinations brought on by the diadem.

“Well, fuck,” he says.

“Right?” Hermione realizes she’s panting and tries to calm the pounding in her chest.

Snape pauses, running a hand over his face before murmuring, “This changes everything.”

It doesn’t, however, change the fact that Hermione still needs to drink her healing potions every four hours, or that she still struggles to walk down the hallway without feeling short of breath, or that Ron’s friendly get well soon owl still tugs at her with a mixture of guilt and nostalgia. 

After that first day, Snape declines her further offers to use Legilimency to share her research and findings from their shared lab, and she feels more relieved than disappointed when she considers the effort it would take to keep her emotions at bay. Plus it gives her the added benefit of more time speaking with him. (Since when did that become a benefit?) 

“So, like most students with no regard for resource conservation in the lab, you’ve been using up the supply of boom berries each loop.” 

“Well they come back along with me,” Hermione reasons. 

“How many hundreds of galleons—” 

“Wouldn’t you if you had the chance?”

“Obviously. But that’s beside the point,” Snape says, as though he has somehow become the epitome of righteousness. 

“Any chance you’d want to waste some expensive ingredients with me, now that you know you can do it guilt free?” She shouldn’t feel so nervous at this proposition—they’ve worked together before—but still, it’s something she’s been missing throughout the entire last loop. 

“You’re forgetting the immense guilt I’ll experience while taking away a third walk-in closet from Slughorn.” 

“How ever shall you cope?” 

“You seem to think squandering the school’s potions ingredient budget will suffice.” 

“It has before,” Hermione says. She can’t help but let a tentative smile creep up the corners of her mouth. 

“Fine.” Snape makes for the exit. “But you should fully recover before we begin. I’ll not have you die tomorrow from exhaustion after spending all of this time learning about the future.” 

“You’ve given me a reason to live,” Hermione calls at his retreating form, and the truth of it will remain unexamined.

The next morning, Hermione reviews her sketch of the bookshelf in Malfoy Manor. A silver box, burgundy books, a dragon carved into the frame of the dark wood shelf. How should they find it? What if Bellatrix discovers someone looking in the room and chooses somewhere else to hide the goblet? What if they inadvertently change something else this time that indirectly keeps her from emptying the vault?

Her head spins, and she takes her first healing potion as if it could stave off such a crisis of possibility. 

Snape, to his credit, hasn’t seemed phased. He greets her with a gruff nod and the same jar of ointment from previous timelines, turning away as she places her arm in her lap to apply it. 

“I’ll have a few Herbology texts sent up this afternoon,” he tells her. “Unless you’ve read all of those too.” 

“Herbology?” Hermione asks, tracing her scar. Does it seem fainter because she wants it to be or because it’s actually healing? Perhaps this time she could ask Snape—

“Yes.” He turns back, holding up a jar of dried elderflower petals. “You should research related ingredients this time. You’ve examined all you can on the nature of the curse itself, but sometimes you need to start from the other side—the cure.” 

Hermione screws the lid back on the jar of ointment and nods. Related ingredients it is. 

Not to knock Neville Longbottom, but Herbology is really fucking boring. 

It’s been several days of leaf pictures and blurry species names, and Hermione tries to keep track of what ingredients she should prioritize once she gets back into the lab before they all merge together in some vine-like, berry-filled monstrosity. She sighs and flips back through the pages of the latest text, Hybrid Ferns and Clubmosses, and wonders if Snape assigned her this task to test her mental fortitude.

“I didn’t take the vow.” 

Hermione looks up from her reading to find Snape standing stiffly at the foot of her bed. 

“Oh. That’s good. I suppose I figured you wouldn’t, since you didn’t the last few times,” she says, studying his posture. He crosses and uncrosses his arms twice, then heads to the counter to face the shelf of healing potions.

“I should… update you. This time. In case anything goes wrong and I need to change my actions the next time,” he explains. 

“That would be really helpful. I appreciate that,” Hermione says. 

“You seem to—we’ve worked closely together in the past, it appears. So you have probably realized I’m not exactly what one would describe as an open person.” 

Hermione fights off a smile. “Not exactly, no.” 

“Regardless, there are large gaps in your memory surrounding my actions. I… wish I had shared more with you before,” he says, “so that this time I wouldn’t feel so—” he breaks off and turns back toward her. 

“And then next time I can tell you what worked or what didn’t,” Hermione supplies. 

“It is a bit daunting to be always thinking of ‘next time,’ but I suppose I should get used to the prospect of my current consciousness being wiped clean.” 

Hermione presses her lips together. She’d never really thought of it that way. To know that the second someone else dies, her entire reality may collapse without warning—daunting certainly would only begin to describe it.

“To that end, if, for some pigheaded reason, I decide not to believe you in future timelines…” He steps over to her, and almost as if against his better judgment, sits down in the chair beside her bed. “My immediate instinct is to assume subterfuge. Therefore, if your memories fail to convince me—and they might, especially if I doubt your motives—I’ll ask for other information. Personal information that only I’d know.” 

“Somewhat like the Order verifying identities. That makes sense.” Then why does he look so horrified by the prospect? “Er—what sort of personal information do you feel comfortable telling me?”

“Nothing, Granger, obviously,” he says, exasperated. He shoves the chair back, hands on his knees as if to rise. Then, thinking better of it, he sits back again, restless, unsettled. 

“I’m not sure if this is going to make it worse or not, but”—Hermione forces herself to meet his eyes—“I do know some things already.” 

The color drains from his face. 

“You gave Harry some memories the first time—the first time I watched you die. I figure you’d picked up on the fact that you died from seeing my thoughts, although I tried to spare you the details.”

He nods. 

“I didn’t watch the memories or anything,” she rushes to add. “He just told me about them.” And everyone else at the final battle, she doesn’t add.

Snape clenches his jaw. His next words barely make it out through gritted teeth. “What did he tell you?”

“About—about Lily,” she says and swallows. A strange sort of envy presses down on her shoulders until they slump, and she can no longer hold his gaze. 

He sits, hands still splayed on his knees, for what feels like an eternity. Then, very levelly, he asks, “What about Lily?” 

She looks up in surprise to find his expression completely blank. “The prophecy.” She pauses, takes a breath. “That you—that you loved her,” she says, her voice thick. “Your Patronus is a doe.” 

“Of course I loved her,” he says softly. His expression, too, softens. “And yes, we both had the same Patronus.”

Hermione forces herself to nod, then stares at the blurring surface of the hospital sheet.

“It’s hardly a secret though,” he says, frowning slightly. “I suppose only a select few know that I got her killed, but anyone who remembers me from Hogwarts would know about the matching Patronuses and the month of detention and the spectacular falling out we had. Although I suppose a fair few of them have also been killed by now.” 

Anyone would know?  

Wasn’t it some secret unrequited romance that lasted decades? 

And what ‘month of detention—’

“I suppose it should be something from the muggle side,” Snape says and sighs, running a hand over his face.

“What?” Hermione's head is still spinning.

“The information you should know.” 

“Oh.” 

Several seconds pass in silence, Hermione afraid to look at him again.

“I… got into a bar fight when I was seventeen. I’ve not told anyone this.” 

Hermione blinks. 

“I was under Polyjuice. Took the form of a sheet metal worker so I’d be stronger.” He stands and ignores Hermione’s gaping mouth. 

“I broke my father’s jaw.” 

Later, when Snape returns, it feels as if something has shifted between them, a delicate, frail trust sprouting up from their earlier conversation. It carries Hermione through the rest of her recovery.

“If you die from forgetting to take these,” Snape says, thrusting a collection of healing potions at her, “my displeasure will carry through to the next timeline, and I certainly won’t be sharing anymore personal anecdotes then.” 

“Understood. See you back at the lab when term starts.” 

For the first time heading out onto the sunny grounds, Hermione feels like she’s not alone. She glances back at the castle, smiling to herself as she thinks of what—who—awaits her return. When she turns back, she catches sight of the Weasleys, and her smile broadens. 

“It’s good to see you all,” she says. 

The walk to Hogsmeade is filled with cheerful conversation, and when she breaks away to phone her parents, she brings a little bit of that joy with her, wondering if they can feel it being sent along the telegraph wires. 

“I have word that you’re hiding wine from the twins,” Hermione whispers to Fleur conspiratorially. “Wise decision.” 

“We are going to need it more than them,” she whispers back. 

They wait for Molly to head upstairs, then sneak the bottle and two goblets outside. “We should hide on the front porch,” Hermione says. Maybe this time it will buy them a few extra minutes. 

“I have not yet learned the best places to hide here,” Fleur admits as she pours the wine. “But why am I wanting to? Should I not be wanting to get to know my new family?”

“I don’t know if there is a ‘should’ in this case,” Hermione says levelly. “We can’t help how we feel.” 

“I wish that I could.” Fleur swirls the wine in her glass. “Then I could choose what feelings to keep and what to throw away.” 

“But if you threw away something that was true, wouldn’t you miss it in the end?” 

“Perhaps.” Fleur stares in silence at the crooked steps for a long while. “Perhaps I wish I could throw away someone else’s feelings." She takes a sip, like she's examining how the next words will taste on her tongue instead of the wine. "Bill’s feelings," she says finally. "When he encounters the Veela magic in my blood. Hermione, sometimes—sometimes I think that is the only reason he proposed! And I thought—I thought that he was the first to not be affected—to see me as I am; as a person. But… What if I’m wrong?”

“You don’t have to get married,” Hermione says gently. 

“You’re the only person who has said that to me,” Fleur says, sniffing. 

“And I’ll keep saying it,” Hermione assures her. “It’s your decision. Not Bill’s. Not your Veela magic’s. And certainly not Molly Weasley’s.” 

“If I call it off, she will rub it in my face.” 

“Only if you let her. And from what I know, you never let anyone make you feel inferior.” 

“What on earth are you girls doing out here?” Molly admonishes from the front door. “You best be careful on the steps there, the middle one is broken, and especially with all of that wine.” 

“We live life on the edge,” Hermione says, helping Fleur up. 

“I was a Triwizard Champion. Danger is my middle name,” Fleur says, tossing her hair and stepping past Molly into the house. “Now about this frog-in-the-pond we are to have for dinner…”

In the morning when Harry arrives, Hermione sits on the rickety bed between him and Ron and wonders if she should ever tell them about her time traveling. 

Maybe another time, she decides, looking at how bright and innocent Harry’s green eyes are in the morning light. There’s too much at stake to risk him telling Dumbledore, for one, and—

And she’s too selfishly protective of her burgeoning collaboration with Snape this timeline to put any of that at risk. 

“Snape really helped me in the hospital wing,” she tells them instead. “I know you hate him, but beyond how he acts in class, where it’s all image and desperate attempts to keep us from burning down the castle… He truly does the right thing.” 

“I’ll believe he ‘does the right thing’ when he stops giving me detention every week,” Harry grumbles, but Ron gives her a calculating look and then nods, as if he understands something she doesn’t. 

This time, Hermione sneaks out the morning they receive their OWL results and Apparates to Diagon Alley ahead of schedule. She cashes out the entirety of her Gringotts vault and heads to both Slug and Jiggers and Mr. Mulpepper’s Apothecary to buy as many boom berries as she can afford—along with three varieties of related species. As she passes by the entrance to Knockturn Alley, she wishes she could pop in and destroy the cursed necklace right then and there—or sabotage the vanishing cabinet further. The objects are just sitting there, waiting to fulfill their obligations as much as Hermione waits to fulfill hers, and the strange fatalistic aspects of her future gnaw at her resolve. 

Keep it consistent, she tells herself, and spins away back to the Burrow.

On the train ride back to Hogwarts, Hermione makes Harry promise not to spy on Draco Malfoy and then pulls Ron and Luna into a compartment at the back. 

“Listen, I’ve got an idea. Play a game of chess, and keep track of all your moves. Then find me after to give me the results. Er, please,” she tells them. 

“Alright,” Luna says, just as Ron asks, “Is this a head start on one of your Arithmancy assignments?” 

“No; I’m dropping Arithmancy and Ancient Runes this year.”

“I knew I’d be a good influence on you one day,” Ron says proudly. 

When she later spots Luna, parchment in hand by the thestral carriages, Hermione jumps inside with her and whispers, “Tell me more about your theory. About the patchwork quilt of spacetime.” 

If this were anyone other than Luna Lovegood, the request would garner a double take, but Luna simply smiles and pulls a spare quill out of her hair. “It’s only a theory, mind,” she begins, flipping over the parchment with her and Ron’s chess match, “but there’s often truth to be discovered in the abstract.” 

Hermione watches her trace out a series of loops and squiggles and irregular shapes. 

“Here, this will be easier if I have—” Luna pulls a flower out of her hair and begins to pluck the petals and leaves from it, collecting them in her lap. With the tip of her wand, she prods small holes at various points in the parchment, then sets it on the wobbling bench between them and shreds the flower’s stem between her fingers into thin strings. 

“This is the universe as most people see it,” she begins to explain, gesturing to the complex image on the parchment. “It’s written. People who believe in prophecy—really believe—think it’s fully immutable; that everything could be a prophecy, even things as mundane as pouring milk in tea.”

Hermione nods, increasingly glad she dropped Divination. 

“But events”—Luna scatters some flower petals onto the parchment over the shapes—“can shift around.” The carriage hits a bump, and several petals slide to the ground while others move positions on the parchment. 

“I think you’ve explained this part to me before,” Hermione says. 

Luna’s eyes widen slightly, and she smiles. “Well, sorry if I’m repeating myself. Did I get to the tethers before?”

“A bit,” Hermione says. “Is that what the stem is for?”  

“Exactly,” Luna says and smiles. She pokes each shredded piece of stem through the holes and then uses her wand to attach one end to the remaining leaves and petals. “These are tethered. They might shift around a bit, but they’re a part of the whole now—a part of fate.” 

“The candies,” Hermione murmurs to herself, watching a petal flutter around the parchment, its long tether giving it free reign of nearly the entire sheet. 

“I wouldn't eat any of this,” Luna warns, perplexed. 

“Nevermind,” Hermione says, as the carriage approaches the castle. “What do you think about events that are tethered? How many do you think there are, and is there a way to cut the tether and shove them off to the side? Are prophecies tethers?”

“I don’t know, but I don’t think the big things are as set as we think—wars, elections, scandals. I don’t know that there’s any way to truly know what we can change and what we can’t—” 

“What about death?” Hermione asks. The doors to the carriage open. 

“Everyone’s death is on a tether; some are just longer than others.” 

Up at the castle, Hermione sleeps fitfully, twisting her legs in her quilt at the foot of her bed, and when she wakes, Crookshanks has taken over her entire pillow, his rear end in her face. 

“If that’s not portentous for the start of the year…” she grumbles. 

She gets a minor scolding from McGonagall (and a thumbs up from Ron) about dropping Arithmancy and Ancient Runes, and then heads off to her (sixth) first Defence class. 

Snape’s speech is the same, and it’s strangely invigorating to watch; this is the first time—the only time—from his perspective, as if he only has the one chance to impress upon all of them the gravity of what’s to come.

In Potions, she keeps her head down and brews a perfectly mediocre attempt at her Draught of Living Death, intent on flying under the radar to maximize her time in the real lab.

“I still find it difficult to believe you’ve been willingly subjecting yourself to my office hours,” Snape says in greeting when Hermione enters. Instead of a messy stack of parchments and an open pot of red ink, Snape’s desk is clear. He rises from it and strides to the door, and Hermione feels her pulse start to pick up speed. They’re going to the lab.

She doesn’t need to follow this time, so she walks beside him down the narrow hallway, their sleeves brushing occasionally. When they reach the hidden entrance and she places her hand on the cold stone, a shiver runs through her; Snape’s hand, so close to her own; Snape’s magic, so familiar that she realizes she must have been missing it—

The doorway appears. 

“By the way, I believe Bellatrix is growing suspicious. I’ve stopped my search for the room where she’ll hopefully hide the goblet. I didn’t want to risk her picking a different location.” 

Hermione pauses, back against the newly formed stone frame. “Thank you. For the update.” 

Snape nods and takes a step back. “I’ll leave you to it, then.” 

She wishes he would stay.

You seemed fond of receiving messages—Rowena knows why—so I hope you know that just because I was a naive fool in past timelines does not mean I won’t be conducting quality control assessments on your work this time. 

I’d expect nothing less. Also you are welcome to my entire life savings in the form of magical berries. 

She remembers to tell Ron good luck before Quidditch tryouts, and he tells her thanks, nervously rolling a butterbeer cork back and forth between his hands. 

“Granger, I never thought of you as a bloody temptress.” 

“S-sorry?” Hermione nearly drops her satchel on the ground, frozen in the doorway of the lab.

“Where did you get all of these?” Snape gestures to the jars and jars of boom berries (and elderberries and mistletoe berries and one other type of berry that Hermione can’t for the life of her remember, but it’s an odd orange color and some type of hybrid). 

“Did you see my note?” 

“You truly did spend your life savings on potions ingredients.” Snape frowns, as if he can’t quite believe the evidence in front of him. 

“Well I have access to most books at the library,” she reasons, cheeks warming further when she realizes that books were the immediate alternative she came up with.

A single huff of laughter and he brushes by her.

Hermione’s research yields more or less the same results with the new berry varieties as with the boom berries, her cells vanishing before her eyes. Crushing the elderflower petals and reducing the powder along with the combined mixed juice of all of the berries buys her a few more seconds, so at least there’s that. 

At what point do I throw in the towel and just start arbitrarily testing ingredients on myself?

You’re not giving up this easily, Granger. Try the glass needle for microinjection first.

The weather cools, and Hermione spends her first Hogsmeade trip snatching the locket and the cursed necklace, then swinging by the Room of Requirement for the diadem. If she keeps her gloves on while inside so she doesn’t have to touch it—if she triple-wraps it in cloth just like the cursed necklace—it’s just an extra precaution, she tells herself. 

“I’m destroying these, and you’re not to interfere,” Hermione says to Dumbledore when she reaches his office. 

A satisfying series of slashes later and the cursed objects lie shattered on the desk, the sword heavy in her hand. 

“Er—might not want to eat those,” she says, glancing into the bowl of lemon drops, which are now mixed with a few warped pieces of smoking metal. 

“Hermione, I believe this warrants a discussion—” 

She doesn’t hear the rest. 

She takes the sword with her. 

“We’ve been playing more chess,” Ron says at breakfast a couple weeks later. He slides over a sheaf of parchment with more letters and numbers. “Luna’s actually getting quite good.”

Hermione glances down to see the alternating black and green ink with each of their moves, some—the green ones—outlined with sketches of leaves or flowers. She smiles.

“I wasn’t trying to burden you with more assignments, but something tells me this is more of an opportunity than a burden,” she says. 

Ron flushes a bit. “Er, yeah. It’s been nice. I mean, I hope you’re not upset that Luna and I—” 

“I’m glad,” she says, and she means it.

After all, she and Ron aren’t tethered. 

The glass needle is steady in Snape’s hand as he tests her progress. 

“Another minute of stability. That’s progress,” he says. Hermione can’t tell if his tone is meant to be encouraging or derisive. 

“Something tells me you’d make more progress on this than I would.” 

Snape sets the instrument down. He seems so sure, so knowledgeable—even in a completely new timeline, he always has ideas. He’d have to have a better shot at this than her. 

Snape turns to face her, the steam from the cauldron behind him rising toward the light like a strange sort of halo. “It’s… difficult for me to make the leap. To know that my actions here might carry through long after this timeline collapses and you’re sent back to the summer. To know that I’ll carry nothing through. I cannot so easily set aside the war for the sake of a new path.”

“You don’t want to break away from your responsibilities,” Hermione says. And why should he? What if a change in his actions sets them spiraling off down some darker path? And besides, how is there any guarantee that the loop won’t suddenly close? How could she ignore her own responsibilities—how could she take a chance or intentionally risk anyone’s life in any timeline? How many times has she stolen back the cursed necklace, crushed the locket under the blade of the Gryffindor sword, implored Snape not to take the Unbreakable Vow?

Snape nods, once, a furtive gesture that appears contrite. 

“I understand,” Hermione says. And she does. 

“I should give you another update.” 

Snape found the room.

He found the room, and it’s empty, but the word from the house elves is that Bellatrix is planning a Gringotts visit soon.

“There’s no way I’m going to be able to remember all of this,” Hermione says, half laughing as she spreads the sheaves of parchment in front of her on the couch cushions. Luna and Ron have been playing a lot of chess. “It was just an idea I had, and now I’ve dragged you both in.” 

“I’ve quite enjoyed being dragged,” Luna says, grinning as her knight slaughters one of Ron’s bishops. They’re at the small table by the fire in the Gryffindor common room, sitting so close across from each other their knees touch. 

“I wanted to see if your chess moves were tethered,” Hermione says cautiously, “but now I’m realizing perhaps that was a bit short-sighted.” 

“‘S why you’re never any good at chess,” Ron says cheerfully, mouth full of… something—Hermione doesn’t need that detail either. “You’re thinking it’s about the specific moves, but really it’s about adapting strategies against your opponent.” 

“I suppose it is.” Hermione would know all about adapting strategies.

December approaches, along with exams Hermione has prepared for multiple times over. Her studies have become a cruel reminder of her situation, stuck reliving sixth year as someone who’d otherwise be finishing up a Mastery somewhere—she hasn’t allowed herself to dream of where, or even what subject.

She spends most of her time in the lab, hoping for more progress and finding none, her failure the most constant theme in every timeline. Even the small successes—the few seconds of extra time—feel like an extension of that failure, merely prolonging the inevitable—

“I’ve found it.” 

She startles, dropping the pipette in her hand. 

Snape stands in the doorway, tension radiating through his shoulders. He quickly steps inside and shuts the door. “The goblet. I didn’t touch it, just in case it’s still cursed, but it’s—it’s there.” 

Hermione gapes, heart thudding in her ears. “You found it,” she echoes. 

He nods, stepping closer, and it’s only then that she discovers the flash of uncertainty on his features. 

“Do we—erm, do you want to—” 

“Destroy it?”

“Yes.” 

“Absolutely.”

Hermione lets the tiniest bit of her fear merge with excitement and says, “Good, because I have just the thing.” 

They meet in the dungeons three days later at dawn, when Snape is reasonably sure the Manor will be at its emptiest. Bellatrix is allegedly in France on a mission, and the house elves are going to begin cleaning the east wing to deter anyone else from stumbling upon them. It seems like as good a chance as any—it would be hard to do worse than the last time Hermione was there, but she’s apprehensive all the same. 

“You’ve been keeping the Sword of Gryffindor under your dorm bed?” Snape says in greeting, eying the hilt grasped in her hand.

“Yep.” 

“And the Headmaster just…” Snape trails off, apparently speechless in disbelief.

“Well, he knows something’s up, I’m sure. I’ve just grown rather skilled at avoiding him.” Especially since he did get her killed—twice if she’s counting the vow. 

“And you haven’t passed these skills along to me?” 

She looks up in surprise to see a small smirk on his face. If teaching him that would earn her more of those looks, then, “I’ll certainly consider it.” 

They leave the castle amid a burst of frigid air and cross the grounds in the feeble sun, frost crisp underfoot, voices silent until reaching the Apparition point. 

Snape turns to her, half hesitant. “I’m assuming the Trace is no longer active.” 

“I turned seventeen in September the first time,” she says, leveling her gaze. She shouldn’t feel such a prickle of irritation at him questioning her age—

Crack!

She’s left standing alone, only her petty indignation for company.

But not for long.

Hermione lands beside Snape just outside the grounds and leads them to the secret cellar entrance Dobby had shown her before, clambering out first before turning to help Snape, whose much taller frame takes longer to squeeze through the elf-sized door. She pauses at the first human-sized door, feeling her face suddenly heat. 

“I, erm, can’t touch anything. All of the doors and windows are cursed.” She can’t bring herself to say the rest—against mudbloods. She knows she shouldn’t be embarrassed about the archaic bigotry contaminating the Manor, but she can’t help but feel useless and out of place.

Snape opens his mouth as if to respond, then closes it, reaching past her to open the first door instead. 

Silently, they pass through the winding corridors, eerie morning light casting strange shadows around every corner. Hermione clutches her wand in one hand, the sword in the other, and avoids even brushing against any door handles they pass, all while Snape stalks, sure and catlike, in front of her. They pass by a collection of cleaning supplies and drop cloths, and the faintest hint of relief takes hold as they move into the east wing without encountering anyone else. 

Finally, Snape stops in front of a solid mahogany door, hand hovering over it for just a moment before he charms it open with a pulse of wandless magic instead. He raises a hand in caution, then casts several detection spells and begins to gently dismantle the wards. 

Moments later, they slip inside.

“It took me three separate tries to break all of the curses on this,” Snape murmurs as he shifts the books around on the large shelf. Hermione lets her gaze trace the lines of the dragon carved into the side, studies the burgundy books. The Complete Works of John Milton. 

“I wonder how they’d feel if they knew the horcrux was hiding behind some muggle poetry,” she muses. 

Snape snorts softly. “I wondered the same thing.” He steps back, waving a complex pattern of wandwork around the gleaming silver box, then takes it from the shelf and sets it on the ground. It opens to reveal the goblet. 

“Care to do the honors?” Hermione asks, handing him the sword. 

She doesn’t know—can’t know—what horrors he revisits as his eyes dart from side-to-side as if witnessing something chilling and grievous from his past. She only knows that he blinks, refocuses, and plunges the sword down, the horrible shriek of the shattering metal blunted only by her hastily cast Muffliato. 

Sweat beads at his temples, and his hands shake as the sword clatters to the ground. 

“You did it,” Hermione says in awe. 

“I fucking did it,” he says, laughing in relief. He slumps against the bookshelf and slides to the ground, his long legs stretched out close enough for Hermione to touch. 

“Congratulations. I feel like we need to celebrate or something.” 

“Gods, yes. I could use a drink.” 

Hermione sits up with a little jolt. Does this mean—should she ask if he—

“I’m sure there’s some of Lucius’s overpriced whisky stashed around here somewhere,” Snape says, gesturing around the room, “but I should probably stay sober in case Bellatrix comes charging back in here.” 

Right. Of course. 

“On that note,” he continues, drawing his legs in and shifting to a crouch in front of the broken pieces of the goblet. “We should probably make this look less…”

“Brutally slaughtered?” Hermione offers. 

“I was going to say ‘like the aftermath of her first marriage,’ but same difference.” He gives her a tired smile and then refocuses his attention to the goblet, waving his wand over it and murmuring softly as the pieces begin to knit together. The gold gleams, the intricate carvings reforming, the handles unwarping back into their delicate form. 

“It’s beautiful,” Hermione says softly.

Snape shrugs. “I had a lot of practice repairing broken dishware as a child.” 

“Oh.” Of course. She knows she shouldn’t pry into anything from his past and feels suddenly wrong-footed, the same way she always does when Harry talks about the Dursleys. With no merciful subject change springing to mind, she watches him finish repairing the goblet in silence. He places it back in its silver box, dusts the exterior, and hides it back behind the stack of books before saying, “Let’s replace all of the security spells and then get the fuck out of here.” 

It feels surreal, being back at Hogwarts, after everything Hermione has endured at the Manor. Her exams blur by as if in the background. Her every awareness is trained on Snape as he enters the Great Hall for dinner, surly and mercifully still alive; Snape as he lectures in Defence, eyes ringed with shadows; Snape as he sweeps into the lab, long fingers closing around another jar of boom berries. 

So far, so good. 

I’m glad you haven’t been found out and murdered this time.

Yet.

(And yes, me too, Granger.)

The first snow takes her by surprise, a thick pillow of it over the grounds. Is the weather always this way? Does it change, too, with the shifts she creates in each timeline?

She declines Harry’s invitation to Slughorn’s party to curl up in bed with Crookshanks and stare at the snow drifts. 

She tries not to wonder if Snape is going.

“Have you seen Romilda Vane?” Lavender asks at breakfast the next morning, and Hermione jolts upright. 

“No,” she responds cautiously. “Is there a particular reason you’re asking?”

“Oh, I just wanted to borrow her hair straightening serum—actually, there she is! Romilda!” Lavender calls, waving her over. 

Hermione narrows her eyes as she approaches. She waits for the conversation with Lavender to lull, waits for Romilda to toss her perfect, sleek hair over her shoulder, and then says, pointedly, “Don’t give those chocolates to Harry. They won’t work.” 

Romilda blinks in undisguised shock. 

Maybe she shouldn't be testing the limits of their hypothetical tether, but Hermione has to at least try to stop the candies from claiming their next victim.

“Not to mention they’re probably illegal. And what if someone else were to eat them? Do you really want… I don’t know, Millicent Bullstrode chasing you around, trying to shove her tongue down your throat?”

Romilda pauses, considering the prospect with an ambivalent expression.

“Ok well maybe you're into that. But what if she regrets it as soon as the potion wears off, though?” Hermione adds.

Romilda frowns. “Fine. I see your point.” She crosses her arms, then somewhat more softly asks, “What else would you suggest I get Harry for Christmas, then?”

Right. Christmas. It’s been a while since Hermione’s experienced Christmas. 

She suggests that Romilda get Harry something Quidditch-related, falls back on her usual go-tos for him and Ron along with some quilting supplies for Luna, and then grows strangely anxious the next time she steps through the doorway to the lab. 

Should she get Snape a gift?

No, that would be ridiculous. 

Wouldn’t it?

Unless he got her a gift, and then she’d feel even more ridiculous to remain empty-handed, but—

She doesn’t know what he even likes—he mentioned scotch, but that seems costly and impersonal and also strangely… suggestive? 

And she’s not suggesting anything, she just… 

She just Apparates to Diagon Alley the first afternoon of the holiday break and slips into the first magical liquor store she finds.

It’s only after, as she’s trudging back up to the castle, thick glass bottle in hand, that she realizes no one there questioned her age.

The next few days pass with a fluttering anxiety in her belly each time she heads to the lab; each time she contemplates the heavy bottle, wrapped with silver paper, hidden in the bottom of her trunk. 

Christmas Eve finds her in much the same state, chewing on the inside of her cheek as she paces in front of her research. It’s late—in fact, it could be Christmas already—but the soft glowing orbs above give the whole place a comforting air of timelessness that she really needs right now. 

Gently, the door opens, and Snape enters, appearing tired but surprised to discover her there. 

“Not celebrating?” he asks. 

“The pursuit of knowledge is always a celebration,” she says, no longer trying to hide the cynicism in her voice as she shoves her latest experiment aside. 

Snape watches her, seeming to evaluate something, before he says, “I wasn’t intending to enlist your help until after the holidays, but… Perhaps something different—a new project—might give you some inspiration.” He withdraws several glass bottles from his pocket, setting them side-by-side on the workbench. 

Hermione studies them in the warm light and asks, “Not celebrating either, then?” 

He gives her a pointed look. “I was going to take advantage of the lack of classes and start developing a poison for Nagini. The way I apparently had before.” His tone seems strangely bitter.

“Of course. I should get Harry to help me open the chamber again to harvest the basilisk fangs. The way I did before.” 

“I’m sure he’d love to spend his Christmas doing just that.” 

“You know, if you’d given him more detentions this year, you could have had him open the chamber. Perhaps that’s an opportunity for the start of term.” 

“Perhaps,” Snape says noncommittally and begins to set up an area to work. 

Hermione clears more space for him and watches, trying not to let her gaze linger on his nimble hands, the concentration in his brow, the way he—

A familiar and uncomfortable shift in the air around them jostles her out of her thoughts. 

“The wards,” Snape says sharply, spine rigid. 

No.  

It can’t be. 

Death Eaters? But it’s—

“It’s too soon.” 

“Someone must have breached the castle—what do you mean, ‘too soon?’” he asks, as they make their way out of the lab, toward what Hermione’s not sure.

“This—this happened in June the first time, and then February during another timeline. Why now? How did Malfoy fix the—nevermind. We need to…” she trails off, wondering what, exactly, they need to do. 

What she really needs is more time. 

What she really needs is—

“I need you to kill me.” 

“What?” 

“Just, quickly, so I can restart the loop before anyone dies this time.”

Snape’s expression shutters. He takes a breath, slowly, in and out. “I was planning on killing Dumbledore when this moment happened, but I suppose you want to jump the line.” 

“Very funny. But I’m serious. I’m not risking more people dying here just so we can keep tinkering around with offing Nagini—none of any subsequent variables will be in play in the future if I can help it, so any success with Nagini this time likely won’t be relevant.” 

Snape clenches his jaw. 

“And we already know you can brew the right poison,” Hermione adds, a reluctant grimace taking hold of her features.

“So that’s it, then.” Snape sounds more resigned than bitter.

Fuck. She’s going to miss him. “I’m sorry, I realize I shouldn’t have asked that of you—especially not so callously—” 

“No, you’re right. It should be quick. I know what’s at stake—what you need to do. I just…” he trails off, then backs up a few steps away from her. Hesitantly, he raises his wand. His eyes narrow in focus. He takes a breath, and—

“Fuck. I—I didn’t expect it would be this difficult.” He sighs, dropping his wand to his side and scrubbing at his face with his free hand.

“It’s my fault,” Hermione says. “I know how much is being demanded of you, and I shouldn’t be adding to that list—shouldn’t ask you to harm your own soul out of mere convenience for me. Let’s think of another option.”

Well. Falling worked once. How close are they to the Astronomy Tower? She shudders to think of plummeting to her death again, estimating the height and wondering if her latent magic will attempt to protect her at the last minute—waking up with every limb broken and Skelegrow pumping its way into her veins is a gut-wrenching thought. She needs something foolproof. 

She needs, ideally, another murder. 

Who would be that ruthless? That calculated? Who could do what’s necessary, sacrifice her for the greater good, let their eyes turn to cold steel and—

“Come with me! I have an idea!” 

For a moment, she considers taking his hand, but she loses her nerve and turns down the hallway instead, sprinting toward the Headmaster’s office. Snape follows close behind, casting muffling charms on both their feet and a hasty Disillusionment that sends a shiver down Hermione’s spine. She ignores the shouts and footsteps that echo nearby as they grow closer and focuses instead on how it could only be fortuitous if the Death Eaters discover her first and decide to hasten the process. 

Like they did with Ron. 

A sickening regret tugs down on her heart. 

She struggles against it, breaths coming faster, sweat breaking across her temple, and skids around the corner to the gargoyle. 

“Sugar quills!” she shouts, just as a voice down the corridor entreats, “Hurry, Draco!” 

She dashes up the winding steps, Snape beside her with his wand pointed behind them—

A loud crash and the foot of the staircase is reduced to rubble.

“It will buy a few extra moments,” he explains, out of breath and reaching the top of the staircase before Hermione. He opens the door to the office, and they step across the threshold together. 

Heart still racing, Hermione surveys the room—the same whirring instruments, the same cheery fire, the same Dumbledore seated, calm, poised, behind the desk. His expression is… Surprised?

“Death Eaters have broken into the castle,” Snape begins to explain, but Hermione cuts him off: 

“You need to kill me,” she tells Dumbledore firmly, meeting his eyes. She lets her guard down as much as she can, feels the subtle nudge of his Legilimency, and gives him what she can. Starving in the woods. The final battle. Bellatrix. The diadem, affixed to her head by his spell. “I’m in a cursed time loop, and it’s time to reset.”

Dumbledore frowns. “I suspected something abnormal had happened to you, but, Hermione, are you quite sure—” 

A loud crash sounds below, followed by quick footsteps on the stairs. Alecto Carrow’s laugh bounces along the walls, forcing its way under the crack in the door—

“Yes. I’m sure. Now!” She plants her feet wide.

The door bursts open—

She turns to glance at Snape—

In the periphery, Dumbledore raises his arm—

“Granger, I’m sorry—” 

The flash of green from Dumbledore’s wand consumes her.

Chapter Text

“He fucking did it,” Hermione says with a short bark of laughter, smoothing the scratchy hospital cot sheet across her lap. "I mean"—she clears her throat—"hello, I'm awake."

“Welcome back, Granger,” Snape says dryly, turning toward her, and for a moment she wonders if he somehow knows—“Your next dose of healing potion is ready.”

“Oh. Thank you.” She shakes off her disappointment that such a silly impulse would come true. If only she could take him back with her—

No. 

Gods. 

The last thing she needs is for him to suffer the same curse, to relive marking the same essays, attending the same Summons, watching the same war unfold and failing all the same to stop it.

“I need to show you something,” she says instead. She drinks the vial and hands it back, letting her fingers brush his as if the fleeting moment of contact could send him everything she wants to say. Then she turns her forearm face up so that the scar shimmers in the light. “Look at my arm first. Please. Professor,” she adds as he narrows his eyes. “And then look in my mind.” 

Her Legilimency summary improves this time. Other than the humiliating disaster at Malfoy Manor where he somehow latches onto their discussion of Lucius’s hidden whisky and her idea to ask him for drinks—a thought that she didn’t even allow herself to finish at the time—and alright, there was also later when she got him a Christmas present and—

Right. Time loop. Horcruxes. Murder. Back to that. 

She can’t help but linger on the vision of Snape’s expression in the most recent timeline, just before she died. It twinges more than she’d expect, a little ache somewhere in her middle that she wishes she could soothe away with more healing potions. 

The present Snape in her mind doesn’t dwell on it. 

“Well, fuck.” 

“You could say that again,” Hermione says, crossing her arms and slowing her breathing. “And you probably will, come to think of it, each time we do this.” 

“That does not help, Granger.” 

“Sorry.”

“Fuck,” Snape says again, pressing his palm to the side of his head. “How many times have you—”

“Six. I think.”

“You think.” 

“Give or take.” 

“I need to think,” he says, and abruptly storms out. 

Well, that could have gone better. 

Two hours later, Snape returns and hands the familiar jar of healing ointment to her. 

“Does it look different now?” she asks, holding out her forearm. 

He doesn’t touch her—doesn’t take her hand in his or trace the letters with a gentle finger—but he bends down to peer at it, and the air that swirls around the movement raises gooseflesh all the same. 

“It looks better than in your memories,” he murmurs. Has his face ever been this close to her skin?

“The ointment must be working. I think your magic transcends time.” 

His cheeks flush and he steps away toward the shelves of healing potions. 

(What the fuck is wrong with her?

“I think your magic transcends time.” 

Is she sure she’s not sixteen fucking years old again?

Gods.

Fuck.

She can’t let that moment be made permanent. Time to plan for her next death.)

“Anyway,” she says, voice pitched too high, “as you can see, we’ve successfully dealt with the majority of the horcruxes—all except Harry, which we’ll need to figure out at some point. But we need to work on timing.” 

Snape nods, back still turned. 

“And how to break Dolohov’s curse,” Hermione adds. “I’ve been banging my head against the wall trying to figure it out without much luck.” 

“And you’ve looking into Curses at the Cellular Level—”

“Yes.” 

“And explored the options at the nearest university library—”

“—and researched related berry species, and cashed in my entire Gringotts vault to spend on potions ingredients, and asked you to help, but I understand that you can’t just drop everything to fix my problems for me.” 

Snape whirls around, frowning. “Have I already suggested all of those other options?” He appears to be searching his newly acquired account of her memories for confirmation. 

“Erm—yes. In the previous loops.” 

“I see.” He clenches his jaw.

Now would probably not be the ideal time to bring up the fact that he also shared personal information with her. He must hate not knowing everything that’s happened from her perspective. Hermione has almost forgotten how much she hates that feeling too—not knowing something there is to know, being out of the loop, on the outside of some grand secret—having been stuck in an ever-present state of knowing far too much for far too long. The little morsels of Snape’s past feel that way to her now; hints at some hidden truth that she aches to uncover. It can’t be worth dwelling on.

“Maybe instead, we could focus on something else this timeline. Something I haven’t had a chance to do yet. When I needed to die last time, I almost… couldn’t.” The thought of watching, helpless, as Snape was forced to kill Dumbledore again with no recourse is enough motivation.

“What, exactly, are you proposing, Granger?”

“Maybe you could help me design a better way to off myself, should the need arise?”

Snape twists his mouth to the side, and for a moment, she thinks he’ll refuse, until he finally breaks into a rueful smile and says, simply, “Alright.” 

“But not yet. You’re not getting out of your research on Dolohov’s curse so easily,” he adds before striding away. 

She spends the rest of her hospital stay reading about the most effective methods for preparing blood smears, mending her torn robes from the DOM, spreading Snape’s ointment on her scar, and wishing he would visit more frequently. 

When the Weasleys come to meet her at the Hogwarts gate, the reunion feels bittersweet.

She calls her parents at Hogsmeade and smiles as she lets her dad rant about the longevity of molar crowns. 

“Remember to floss, love,” he says as the conversation winds down. 

“I always do.” 

Back at the Burrow, Hermione pulls Fleur, wine in hand, up to her room and locks the door. 

“I hope Molly doesn’t find us,” she says, handing Fleur a glass. 

“She knows everything that goes on in this house,” Fleur responds, taking a sip. “She must know what happened to the fabric samples for my bridesmaid gowns.” 

“I’m sure they just…” Hermione trails off. ‘Went missing’ would certainly be a generous falsehood. 

“It is no matter. One day she is sabotaging the wedding and the next she is asking about grandchildren.” 

Hermione grimaces in sympathy. She hasn’t really considered the prospect of children, and with her ongoing curse, she’s not sure children would even be a possibility in her future. Would she want them, if she could have them?

“I am only twenty,” Fleur continues. “Although Molly always comments that the Potters were twenty when they had Harry…”

“She must know how idiotic it would be to follow in their footsteps. Er—sorry. I know that was dark,” Hermione says, biting the inside of her cheek. 

Fleur laughs and says, “I like dark.” 

Molly’s footsteps sound down the hall, and both of them go silent, clutching their wine, motionless, until she passes. 

“I think about her, sometimes. Lily,” Fleur whispers, glancing at the door to make sure Molly isn’t about to return. “It is silly; I never knew her. But there she was, young and terrified, getting married fresh out of school when perhaps her parents wanted her to—to—” Fleur breaks off.

“Harry’s never talked about his grandparents,” Hermione says softly.  

“Maybe they did not matter. Or maybe they did… Maybe they told her when she was a little girl that she could be whatever she wanted. And then she became married—and shut up in some other family’s house. I think about that sometimes, too. All of those people that died before they could really become themselves. Lily… Lily became a mother, sure. But now that is all she ever was. And is it so selfish of me that I don’t want the same?”

The wine sits heavy in Hermione’s stomach. “You’re not selfish. And you’re not going to die, Fleur.”

“Dinner’s nearly ready!” Molly calls from the foot of the stairs. 

Fleur drains her glass, rises, and says, “We’re all going to die, Hermione. The question is simply when.” 

When Harry arrives in the middle of the night, Hermione’s conversation with Fleur is still buzzing around her mind along with the lingering wine. What was Lily really like? Was motherhood her only identity? What happened between her and Snape? He never elaborated.

“What are you doing up?” he whispers, catching her in the hall. Something about his kind smile despite the weight of his knowledge about the prophecy tugs at her conscience. She hesitates for a long moment before she whispers back, “You need to get some rest. I just need to talk to Ron about something.” 

She wakes Ron from a deep slumber, drags him to the porch amidst the chirping crickets, and tells him, again, about the time loop. Then she forces him to swear (not vow—she’d never make anyone vow to do anything anymore) not to tell a soul. And the way he agrees with such eager, child-like innocence amazes her. 

“I might have lived this year six times over, but you and Harry are still my best friends,” she says. 

She lets Ron ask his questions over the remaining summer vacation, in between OWL results and trips to Diagon Alley for healing berries, tries her best to answer, and finds it easy—comfortingly easy—to share.

The only things she leaves out have to do with Snape. 

On the train back to Hogwarts, Hermione and Ron skive off their Prefect duties to hole up in a compartment with Luna to discuss what else she knows. Maybe it was a mistake telling them so early on, but she’ll (hopefully soon) have a more effective way to reset the timeline in case it all goes belly up. Luna, to her credit, seems remarkably unphased by the whole situation.

“To confirm, you cannot, under any circumstances, reveal any of this to Dumbledore,” Hermione clarifies. 

Ron frowns but then nods, almost as if he knows they must have tried that strategy before, but he still asks, “Why not?”

“Because he’s probably gotten her harmed before,” Luna says, eyes wide. “I don’t trust him either.” 

“Dumbledore would never—” Ron begins, but then clamps his mouth shut. 

“Actually he would,” Hermione says. She doesn’t need to know the rest of what Ron might have suggested; she knows Dumbledore would do a great many things to end the war. And, come to think of it, maybe his subtle interference in the background is what has been inadvertently leading to the Death Eater break-in happening earlier each time. She thinks through all of their interactions in past timelines—all the way back to the office with the sword and destroying the horcruxes—and she resolves to limit her contact with him even more this time. Which means…

“I have a hunch that it will be helpful to get the Basilisk fangs sooner rather than later this time. Find a way to convince Harry without telling him about me.” 

That night, Hermione sneaks back into her dorm late, her satchel full of Basilisk fangs. Harry blessedly had asked no questions when his friends wanted him to open the chamber, and had stayed to make sure they safely exited before wanting in on the plan. 

“It’s for an extra project,” Hermione told him, which wasn’t technically a lie.

“And who were you out visiting this evening?” Parvati says, giggling. “Your hair’s even messier than usual.” 

Hermione freezes, trying not to shudder when she thinks of the dust and grime in each frizzy tangle or about the fact that Parvati is undoubtedly going to start some far-fetched rumor. “I wish it were that exciting,” she says. She approaches Crookshanks curled up on her bed and scratches him behind the ears. 

“Don’t worry,” Lavender says, a sympathetic smile on her face. “It will happen for you. I just know it.”

Hermione hums noncommittally, her mind drifting to all the tasks that lie ahead of her before she’ll allow herself a chance for anything to happen.

Classes resume. Again. And Hermione dutifully walks the halls and lugs her books from room to room and counts down the minutes until—

“Are you always this punctual for office hours?”

“I know how much you despise me being early,” Hermione says, slipping inside. She smiles when she sees the cleared surface of his desk, empty teacup on top of a neat stack of parchments. Her smile grows when he rises and meets her in the doorway. 

“Shall we?” he asks, as if going to the lab together is old habit for him too, and Hermione wishes he could carry some of the memories with him into each loop. They make their way down the hallway and place their hands side-by-side on the cool stone, Hermione fighting a shiver as she’s added, once again, to the wards. 

The doorway appears, and Hermione hesitates on the threshold, wondering if he’ll join her this time, wondering what she should say for him to step across with her. 

Snape seems to hesitate too, but then he crosses his arms and says, just like last time, “I’ll leave you to it, then.”

Hermione enters the lab alone.

So I didn't exactly know how to phrase this earlier, but… 

You seem good with poisons. Thoughts on this option?

Oh I have thoughts.

Why does that message send a flare of heat low in her abdomen?

Hogwarts, as it turns out, is rife with poisons. The mead in Slughorn’s office, the Basilisk fangs under Hermione’s bed, the expired Vicodin confiscated from the Slytherin seventh year dorms, not to mention Snape’s own personal ingredient stores. 

Surely combining them all could make something effective. Hermione gathers the Basilisk fangs and heads to the dungeons.

“I’ve been thinking,” Hermione begins, as she bursts into Snape’s office, “I should have an easy way to take it—in case my wand is taken or I’m bound or otherwise incapacitated.” 

“About what happened with Bellatrix—” Snape begins, sitting up, elbows on his desk.

“It’s ok. I won’t let that happen again. And besides, you murdered her once, so in a way you’re helping me with the whole vengeance agenda.” 

“Wasn’t that before?”

“Mm, but maybe it was like foreshadowing. It all blurs together when the laws of time itself grow irrelevant.” 

Snape seems unconvinced. “How, though, did I end up poisoning half of the inhabitants of Malfoy Manor—”

“I believe it was only Bellatrix and Nagini—”

“But how? How did I do it?”

“Erm.” Hermione swallows. “Basilisk venom for Nagini, and”—she searches through the murky words from her encounter with Bellatrix—“some sort of potion for Bellatrix. She said she had you brew it for a blood traitor and then modified it for her. It caused bruising all over her limbs and then she splinched herself.” 

“Probably something with crotalid venom,” Snape mutters to himself before sighing and squaring his shoulders. “Alright, Granger,” he says and stands. “Let’s head to the lab and do some illegal brewing.” 

“These could be useful for an antidote,” Snape says, eyeing the jars of berries that have been stashed to the side. Only half of Hermione’s life savings this time, as she hopes she won’t spend as much time on Dolohov’s curse.

“If you like,” Hermione offers, “although the point is sort of that I don’t survive.” 

Snape exhales sharply through his nose—almost like a disguised sort of laugh—and they get to work.

Hermione’s gotten better at extracting the Basilisk venom, but her nerves are still there whenever Snape checks on her progress. Not for the first time, she considers the possibility of her hand slipping and an early restart to the loop. The fact that dying as a result of an accident would only be a mere inconvenience makes her wonder if she’s grown too careless—too reliant on the curse. Does she even want to fix it? 

She shakes the thought away. Of course she does. She just wants to fix it when the time is right.

Snape nears her side again, a faint heat reaching her arm. “How concentrated do you need this to be?” he asks, adding several drops from other vials to the tiny bubbling cauldron. “Are you thinking of a tablet of some kind or an injectable or…” he trails off, thinking of other possible modalities. 

“It needs to be as concentrated as possible. Have you read any spy novels?” Hermione asks, closing the small distance between him to gently bump his shoulder.

Of course it’s a tooth capsule—her parents are dentists.

Snape helps her take a mould of one of her back molars with a compound that he whips up in under twenty minutes. It’s… irritatingly impressive, how good he is at improvising. Hermione focuses on that thought rather than the fact that his hands are virtually inside her mouth.

Next, Snape whips up another compound (this time in under fifteen minutes) to mimic the resin material used for crowns in muggle dentistry. He peels it off of the mould, and then he adds two drops of dark green liquid to the interior surface before sealing it off.

“It should shatter if you bite it with enough force,” he explains, holding it up for her inspection. The green poison barely shows through the bone-colored compound, but she knows it will be more than enough. “And of course it will be painless,” he adds. She nods, realizing she never questioned that aspect; she trusted him to make it every bit as comfortable as it was deadly. 

She opens her mouth and sets it gingerly on the surface of her tooth, and Snape charms it into place, one hand on her jaw. The skin under his fingers heats, and Hermione steps back as soon as his hand falls away, clearing her throat.

“Should I… you know.” She gestures to her mouth.

“No, Granger, I absolutely do not know. Nor do I even want to consider what you’re proposing.”

“You don’t think I should test it?” 

“Christ, Granger, are you insane? Of course not! That’s supposed to be for last resorts only, not to mention it contains enough poison to kill fourteen Hippogriffs—I doubt it needs testing for efficacy. It’s going to kill you; not cure you of some rare affliction.” 

“Right. I guess I’ll test it when Bellatrix catches me again.” 

Snape pales. “You shouldn’t risk that either. You shouldn’t have to.”

“I’ll risk what’s necessary,” Hermione says. “Just like I know you will.” I wish we didn’t have to, she doesn’t say.

The first Hogsmeade trip yields Hermione the locket and the cursed necklace, like it always does, and she swings by the Room of Requirement for the diadem, like she always does, only this time she sneaks off with Ron and Luna to an abandoned classroom to destroy the objects with Basilisk fangs. 

It feels better like this. Without the sword. Without Dumbledore. With a team. 

“You’re kind of a badass now,” Ron says to her on their way back to Gryffindor Tower. 

“I guess I kind of am,” she says and grins.

The weather grows colder, and Hermione bundles up before each Quidditch practice, intent on fully supporting Harry and Ron this time. 

On the side, she keeps up with her feeble attempts at research, bolstered by Snape’s visits to the lab with updates. 

“I think Bellatrix is heading to Gringotts soon. I’ll have the house elves cordon off the east wing for cleaning, since that seemed to work last time.” 

“It worked quite well last time,” she agrees. “You have good ideas.” 

Snape frowns and moves to the microscope to check her progress. “I’m assuming we’re going to use one of the Basilisk fangs to destroy the goblet when we find it?”

“Yes,” Hermione says. “We had the sword last time, but I haven’t been to Dumbledore’s office this time, and I don’t want to risk it now.” 

“Right,” Snape says, appearing to confirm something to himself. “I’ll work on the warding around the room, and you let me know what day we should go.” 

A soft smile spreads across her face. She shouldn’t feel this pleased that he’s still trusting her or that he’s assuming already that they’re a team, but it’s encouraging nonetheless.

Hermione runs into Luna the next evening as she’s heading back from the library, forced to review the most relevant information for the upcoming exams. She can’t quite bring herself to blow them off completely—what if she makes it a few more years in the current timeline and has the chance to apply for a Mastery that will reveal how to break Dolohov’s curse? 

Or what if she just doesn’t want to see her grades slip because it would be embarrassing failing anything at this point?

Luna is barefoot and carrying an armful of silver taffeta material. “Ron asked me to a New Year’s party at the Burrow,” she says by way of explanation. 

All of a sudden, a surge of guilt slams into Hermione’s chest. Luna might not make it to New Year’s—to the party or to the spring or to the end of the war—and Hermione will be the one ripping away that future the second she bites into the poisoned tooth capsule. She’s been spending so much time with Snape that she hasn’t stopped to consider how no one else has any idea that their entire timeline will inevitably collapse in a moment with no notice. 

“Making plans is fun by itself sometimes,” Luna says, as if she can sense Hermione’s inner turmoil. 

“Do you need any help?” Hermione asks, gesturing to the fabric. 

Luna beams. “I’ve never had anyone’s help with this sort of thing before. That would be lovely.” 

They head up to Ravenclaw Tower, Luna explaining the basic idea for her dress design, until they reach the tall door with its glinting bronze knocker. 

“How do you break an Unbreakable Vow?” it asks.

“You die,” Hermione says simply, and the door opens.

“Do you think Unbreakable Vows are curses?” Luna asks pensively as they head inside. 

“Yes,” Hermione says, remembering the electric pain shooting through her nerves, the constant sensation of weight along her spine.

They head to Luna’s dorm, where Hermione helps her pin different sections of fabric together. It reminds her of the dress she wore to Slughorn’s Christmas party all those timelines ago, and Hermione wonders if it’s the same fabric, since Luna must not be going this time. Speculating about Luna's dress is easier than letting her mind drift to Slughorn's party and who might be going there with Snape.

“In the other timelines,” Luna begins, “did you ever go back? To the Department of Mysteries?”

“No,” Hermione answers. “Not that I wasn’t curious. I just have a lot of problems to work out, and I’ve never really considered it.”

“I just wish I could go back there and find whatever it was we were supposed to find,” Luna says, her tone wistful. 

“What do you think we were supposed to find?”

“That’s just it—I don’t think I was supposed to find anything then. But there might something there after that was worth going back for. I think. I might have also had a head injury.” 

“Luna, before, you told me about the Death Room and how you heard your mother’s voice from the veil telling you to seek out the Space Room,” Hermione prompts. 

“And I did,” Luna says, nodding. “And she led me to Ron and Ginny, and I got a glimpse of something beyond understanding—the way the universe connects to itself…” she trails off, looking out into the dark night as Hermione considers her quilt theory. 

“Anyway, it’s probably too late now,” Luna says, much more pragmatically. “Maybe you can take me with you next time, if you go. My father says that two weeks after a break-in is the best time to try to break back in again.”

I saw you eating peanut brittle in the great hall. I hope you were chewing on the other side of your mouth. 

(He was watching her in the great hall?)

(He was watching her mouth in the great hall?)

And yet I live to disrupt your office hours another day.

Hermione takes a chance and makes her way to her chair by the fireplace the next time she visits Snape before beginning, “Erm. Is it true that the best time to break back into a building is two weeks after the initial break-in?” 

“Where on earth did you hear that?” he asks, clearing away some of the scattered books and parchments on his couch.

“Luna Lovegood. Well, her dad’s the one who told her that.” 

“And you’re asking me for confirmation because…” 

“You’re—you, erm—” 

‘You know everything’ doesn’t seem like the right response, even if it was her first impulse, but neither does bringing up his past—

“I’m assuming you know I’m from a shitty mill town. But I wasn’t a petty criminal.” 

Hermione bites her lip and nods. “Of course not—”

“I also—hypothetically, of course—would not be so moronic as to try the same place twice in as many weeks.” He sighs. “Xenophilius would likely be the only one to test out the theory. And it's actually two to four weeks.” 

“Am I missing some crucial backstory here?” Hermione wonders. “I always knew he was eccentric, but how many crimes has he committed?”

Snape waves away her question. “Onto more important break-ins. I think Bellatrix has stashed the goblet in the room you showed me in your memories.” 

They meet in the dungeons at dawn, just like last time, the same faint light and frost greeting them as they step out onto the grounds. 

This time, though, Snape doesn’t ask her about the Trace, and she’s the first to spin away to the Manor. 

Snape lands beside her, moments later, and they make their way to the secret house elf entrance. Hermione’s heart is racing, and even though she knows she shouldn’t be nervous—Bellatrix is in France, just like last time, and they’ve already done this before with no issues—she still feels her limbs shake as she climbs inside. 

Wordlessly, Snape takes the lead, and she wonders if he had remembered from her memories that the Manor is cursed against muggleborns. She’s grateful he doesn’t mention it; grateful she doesn’t have to explain again. 

They’re faster, this time, at reaching the east wing, now that both know the way and Hermione doesn’t have to worry about the sword accidentally knocking over some priceless display. Breaking into the room itself, however, takes the same amount of time, and when they enter, Snape says, just like last time, “It took me three separate tries to break all of the curses on this,” as he gestures to the silver box.

“Perhaps you can teach me? That way it won’t take us as long in the future,” Hermione reasons. 

Snape turns to her, brows raised in surprise. “Why the fuck didn’t I do that last time?” 

“I think we were a bit preoccupied with everything else,” Hermione says, chuckling. She casts a silencing charm at the door and locks it before moving to stand beside Snape.

It takes Hermione four tries to master the curse breaking. Not that she’s counting.

They set the box on the ground and it opens, golden goblet inside.

“You can do it. You did it last time, and you were brilliant,” Hermione says gently, offering her satchel to Snape. 

A flash of something unreadable crosses his face, and then he nods, jaw set. He takes a Basilisk fang out and stabs the goblet without hesitation, a grim resolve the only emotion displayed on his features. 

After—after the piercing shriek and the metal shattering and Snape setting the fang aside with a shaking hand—Hermione combs the rest of the room for Lucius’s rumored whisky. While that search leaves her empty-handed, she does discover an odd assortment of magical knick knacks that she knows better than to touch. 

“Looking for something in particular?” Snape asks, raising a brow. 

“Whisky,” Hermione says, crouching beside him to watch him repair the goblet. 

“Ah.” His eyes dart to her face briefly, and she feels a flush creep up her neck. 

“But I suppose we can get that through more legal channels if we are so inclined,” she says with a sniff. She feels his gaze on her face again before he turns his attention back to the fragmented goblet and begins to repair it. Hermione watches, entranced. When he’s finished, he closes the silver box, and together they replace the warding spells. 

Hermione doesn’t get Snape a Christmas gift this time. 

It’s irrational, but as the holiday nears, she’s becoming increasingly paranoid about the Death Eaters breaking in again. And while she knows that this one action likely has no bearing on Malfoy repairing the cabinet, she can’t help but worry. 

Her spirits are temporarily lifted when Harry brings her a hastily-wrapped box. 

“Sorry, I’ve been out with Dumbledore and time slipped away from me,” he says awkwardly as she opens it. 

She can’t help but laugh. 

It’s the chocolate candies. 

“Thank you, Harry,” she says and hugs him. “I’ll save these for later.”

“What’s next?” Ron asks, when Hermione finds him in his dorm, packing his trunk to go back to the Burrow for the winter hols. 

“Next, Snape and I are going to work on a poison for Nagini.” She pauses, frowns, and adds, “If we have enough time.”

“Fun way to spend Christmas,” Ron jokes. 

“If we even make it to Christmas.” 

Ron looks up, smile fading. “Why wouldn’t you make it to Christmas?”

“I don’t want you to worry about it, because at this point it’s out of our control. But sometimes the Death Eaters break into the school earlier than we’d like. It’s—I’m working on it.” 

“How can I help?” Ron asks, sitting on his bed and leaning forward, hands on his knees. 

“You can… You can meet up with Luna before your New Year’s party. You deserve some time together. Just in case.”

“It’s going to be alright, Crookshanks,” she says, drawing him to her chest. 

The Death Eaters break in, inevitably, on Christmas Eve again. 

Hermione and Snape are in the lab, beginning to plan the poison for Nagini, when the telltale shift in the air happens.

Hermione suspected it was coming, but she had been clinging to some small shred of hope that something would be different this time. She had kept Dumbledore out of it, avoided buying Snape a gift just in case that had jinxed it, followed the usual steps—they had destroyed the goblet at Malfoy Manor again for fuck’s sake—so why is this the event that forever lands early?

“We’ll work it out next time,” Snape says, as if reading her thoughts. “And whatever tempted you to break back into the Ministry—perhaps you can figure that out too.”

“I’m sorry.” She traces the artificial edge of her molar with her tongue. 

“It’s not your fault.”

“At least now I can finally test out the capsule?” she jokes, but it falls flat.

“I’m glad you’re getting your wish.” He steps closer, as if he’s about to place a hand on her shoulder, but then he crosses his arms and nods.

“I’ll see you back at the hospital wing.” 

Snape’s dark eyes bore into hers as she twists her jaw and bites down.

Chapter Text

“The potion worked!” she calls, as she wakes in the hospital wing. Instant, painless, perfect; Snape truly is a master. 

“The healing potions? Yes, of course they worked; I brewed them,” he says from across the room. 

“Of course,” she agrees, watching as he approaches with a vial. “Thank you.” 

“Well, St. Mungo’s was too risky,” he begins and clears his throat.

“After what happened with Bode, I understand. Thanks all the same.” She toasts him with the vial before drinking it down, and he takes it back without a word. 

She tries not to study him too closely, this version of him, not ready to face what could happen if she compares him to before. “How long have I been unconscious?” she asks, merging back into familiar territory.

“Two weeks, aside from delirious raving about a ‘spy cyanide capsule.’ I’m not quite convinced you haven’t suffered any intracranial effects from Dolohov’s curse.” 

She feels a smile lift her cheeks. “Hm, if only there was a way for you to look inside my head and see.” 

“Well, fuck.” 

“Indeed.” She catches her breath and secretly praises herself for sticking to the facts this time. For not letting her mind wander to the confusing mix of emotions surrounding her growing closeness with Snape. 

“And you’ve died—”

“—Seven times, yes.” 

“And I’ve been helping you.” It sounds a little more like a question than Hermione expects. 

“You have,” she says and smiles. “We’ve made quite a lot of progress.” 

At this, Snape frowns and crosses his arms. “There’s still the matter of Nagini, not to mention if what you implied is true about Potter being a horcrux.” 

Hermione’s smile falls. He’s right. She’s been willfully ignoring Harry’s role in everything. Dumbledore’s theory about the Deathly Hallows aside, they’ll still have to find a way to destroy the horcrux element inside Harry without killing him in the process—is it even possible? And what about the prophecy? Hermione knows how malleable events can be, but she doubts very much that one can go changing prophecies—those have to be fixed points upon the fabric of spacetime—and even risking attempting to break the prophecy might result in unintentional deaths.

And what happens to all of those people who die in each loop? Will they be there when—if—she breaks Dolohov’s curse? And what happens to the generation of any new prophecies in each loop? She hasn’t seen one, but she hasn’t exactly been looking for them either. Not for the first time, she thinks back to the Department of Mysteries.

Her head spins, and she rests back against the metal rungs of her headboard.

“I need to think,” Snape says, and leaves her to her own ruminations.

When he returns, he brings her the jar of healing ointment and sits stiffly in the chair beside her bed. “It appears we follow some similar patterns each time.” 

“We do,” Hermione confirms, twisting open the lid. “And my scar is getting better each time.”

His eyes flit to her forearm and up to her face, and she feels suddenly self conscious spreading the ointment across her skin. 

“I suppose the newest pattern will be making my tooth capsule.”

“When you’re cleared to walk, we can work on it,” Snape says. He pauses, clenching and unclenching his jaw. “And in the past, while you’ve been here in hospital, I’ve told you… identifying information. About myself.” The words sound like they’re being forced out of him.

“Er, yes. Just in case you don’t believe me in the future, the closer we get; the more I know.” 

“I see,” he says, and then he goes silent for a long moment.  

“It—it doesn’t have to be something incriminating,” Hermione says. Curiosity wars with caution, but she forges ahead, knowing this timeline could potentially get cut short if she follows her plan. “You could finish telling me about how you and Lily had matching Patronuses.” 

Snape looks up sharply, a flash of genuine confusion taking hold of his expression. “Why would you want to know that?”

Her face feels like it’s on fire. “Or,” she hastens to add, “you could tell me something else from Hogwarts—like something you got detention for, or…” she trails off, determined now to end this timeline as soon as possible.

“I got caught with a whole gallon of high-strength Wit Sharpening potion before finals.”

“Damn,” Hermione says in spite of herself.

“It was for Goyle—Goyle senior. He has a learning disability, but his family didn’t believe in seeking a healer for that sort of thing.” He shrugs. “Potter was the one who caught me.”

Three days later, she’s finally cleared to walk the halls, and she meets Snape in the dungeons. 

“Merlin, Poppy didn’t give you back your robes?” 

“I, er… didn’t exactly tell her I was coming all this way,” Hermione says, face heating. The thin hospital gown isn’t exactly comfortable in the cold of the lower level, but she wasn’t exactly thrilled at the prospect of risking Pomfrey’s ire if she found out Hermione would be disappearing for several hours. 

Snape wordlessly summons a spare cloak from his quarters and hands it to her before heading off down the hall. As she wraps it around herself, she catches the faint scent of him lingering on it and lets it warm her. They place their hands side by side on the stone wall like usual, and like usual, Snape’s magic sends a shiver up her arm. 

The door opens, and she half expects him to leave, but then he gestures for her to proceed. “Time to get brewing, Granger,” he says, and it sounds more like an invitation than an admonishment.

“Last time we had Basilisk venom,” she begins, as she steps inside.

“I might have some available from my private stores.” 

She blinks, momentarily taken aback. On second thought, he never exactly mentioned it when she barreled in, arms full of multiple fangs. Had he gone to the chamber to harvest it too? Or was it simply standard for a Potions Master to have on hand? Or was this another subtle bid at bringing her further under the fold; of sharing with her, in his own way?

She shakes off the questions before blurting, “I’ll pay you back.” A rush of guilt overtakes her when she thinks of how she did in the past—

“In the form of boom berries like in your memories?” he says, impassive.

—and how, given her plans for this loop, she likely won’t have time to gather all of the ingredients for him. She might have time for a Gringotts run, however. “In cold hard cash if that’s what you’d prefer,” she says and gives a tentative grin. 

He dismisses the suggestion with a shake of his head. “Forget it. I’ll likely be gone within the year. Now,” he says, bringing out a small cauldron and setting a flame beneath it, “how would you modify your reduction phase with only a third of the available venom?” 

He stays this time.

He stays, and this time, Hermione figures out how to cast the mould of her tooth herself, and she only asks Snape to charm it into place when she’s finished. This time—and she mentally kicks herself for caring so much—he doesn’t steady her jaw with his other hand, and she’s not sure why she feels so disappointed. 

She’s strangely disappointed in herself, too, when she thinks of the Death Chamber and finally resolves to tell him her plans for this loop. 

“Granger, you only got cleared to walk the halls this morning, and you want to revisit the place that resulted in your extreme incapacitation?” 

“You said to figure out what was going on in the Death Chamber this time,” she says, a bit defensive. 

“I’ve said a lot of things that I regret,” he responds, face expressionless. 

“I just want to make sure I’m not missing anything there.” 

“But why now?” 

“Two to four weeks later is the ideal time—” 

“Yes, you showed me that bit,” Snape says, waving her off. “So what if the initial interest has waned along with the increase in security while the staff is still out on leave—”

“These are the exact reasons why I need to go as soon as I get out of the hospital.”

Snape glares. “And no doubt you’ll be taking Lovegood back with you—never mind the fact that she’s still a child of fifteen—”

“I never said anything about Luna!”

“You didn’t have to. Your memories said enough.” Snape’s nostrils flare and he grips the edge of the work table. “Have you suddenly lost regard for the safety of others?” 

“It’s not like that. At all,” Hermione insists, thinking of how many times she’s probably cared too much about the safety of others. She saves Katie Bell every time. She’s determined to end her own life before letting anyone else’s be taken again. And he can see all of that in her memories, so why—

Snape leaves without a word, and the door to the lab slams shut, echoing in the empty room.

He doesn’t visit her in the hospital wing again. Hermione alternates between seething and questioning what went wrong. He had shared more with her—had seemed to accept her maturity and experience with minimal pushback, only to throw up a sudden and unscalable wall the second she mentioned deviating from the usual pattern. 

It’s not as if he’s lived through each loop. He shouldn’t have expectations.  

Ron’s get well card arrives just as she’s mentally fuming about Snape and his sudden about face. 

Resolute, she summons a fresh sheet of parchment and drafts a response. 

Ron,

Thanks for the card. I’m recovering quite well. I know I was supposed to join you all at the Burrow once I get out, but don’t worry about coming to get me. There’s something else I need to do.

Hermione

Finally, Hermione is deemed healthy enough to be discharged from the hospital wing. She gathers her belongings—the same set of torn robes she was wearing during the DOM battle—and slips as many healing potions as she can fit into her pockets. 

“I’d have thought taking those would defeat the purpose of recklessly walking to yet another death,” a deep voice sounds from behind her. 

Startled, she whips around to find Snape leaning against the doorway. 

He came to see her off after all. 

She tries to squash the feeling of relief that wants to bubble to the surface of her emotions and instead rests one hip against the hospital cot.

“Of course I might die; I’m going to the Death Chamber,” she says levelly. “But I want to at least make it there first before I collapse on the street in London.”

“How responsible of you,” he says with a cold sneer. 

Any relief at seeing him evaporates as she takes in his expression. He’s still upset about this? “Once again, I’ll remind you that it was your suggestion.” 

“It wasn’t me—it was some other version of me who had clearly gone half-insane after months spent brewing you a suicide method!” 

“The brewing only took a few hours—”

“—and here you are, acting all cheery about the prospect of dying again—”

“—I always die again. Having a sense of humor about it is a useful coping mechanism—”

“—Perhaps I can understand that. But what I don’t understand is”—he breaks off, roughly scrubbing at his lank hair—“what was the point of sharing your memories and—dumping all of that jumbled mess of spacetime fuckery on me if you’re not going to stick around to explain yourself?”

Hermione freezes, mouth open, before a surge of anger brings her more words. “It’s not my responsibility to explain the inner workings of the universe to you. And just so we’re clear, I would —every fucking time—if I had any idea!” 

“And you jaunting off on some mission to break back into the Ministry means you don’t have any idea?”

“I only have questions at this point, and this is my one chance to look for answers—”

“Bullshit it’s your ‘one chance.’ You could just as easily do this next time, or the time after that—”

“Why are you so opposed to me doing it now?” Hermione demands, the volume of her voice blasting into the air between them.

Snape doesn’t answer; he just presses his lips together and clenches his hands into fists.  

She tries to let her own emotions calm, but all she succeeds in doing is keeping her mouth shut against further needling questions or insults. 

It’s a long, awkward few moments before either of them speaks again. 

“Seeing as you’re going to be disregarding the entirety of this timeline, you might as well light these on fire just like you did my robes when you were a first year.”

He flings a folded piece of parchment at the foot of her bed, where it lands like a slap. 

When she looks back toward the doorway, he’s already gone.

She pockets the parchment with a shaking hand before she leaves the grounds and Apparates to the Lovegood house. She can’t bear to read it yet—not while her anger still simmers at the edges of her every awareness—and instead she focuses on the guilt that’s beginning to grow with each step toward the front porch she takes. 

Luna had said she wanted to go. 

But was Snape right? 

Is it at all worth the risk? 

Hermione pauses, one foot nudging the bottom step of the porch with her toe. 

Then she growls and spins away before she can change her mind. 

It’s exceedingly irritating that Snape might have had a point, she thinks, as she emerges from the London alley. It’s nearing the evening, and she has a few hours to kill before attempting to enter the Ministry. She holes up in a small bar with a drink and a scowl, perched on a wobbly stool in the corner where she can see the door. The sky darkens out of the dusty window, and a crowd begins to gather inside as Hermione absently traces the edges of the parchment in her pocket with one finger. 

What she still doesn’t understand is why he’s so angry with her. Why did he want her to defer this visit to the Ministry to another loop? He’s never struck her as the type to procrastinate. And they’d been getting on so well.

Her hand grips the folded parchment and, with a little dread, she pulls it out and tosses it on the sticky table in front of her. She downs the rest of her drink for fortitude and then unfolds it.

Your suicide tooth capsule (and apparently that one time I murdered Bellatrix) gave me an idea: delayed-action poison for Nagini? 

• Slow-acting absorption vs. contained microspheres that can be activated with a spell
• Allows her to die at the correct moment
• Buys time to strategize

Her heart jumps at this, and his words from long ago echo in her thoughts: 

“Temporal stability affects more than just curses. It’s working always in the background with potions absorption and metabolism.” 

Yes. That has to be it. She bends her head closer to the parchment to read the rest of his notes—his thoughts on creating microscopic, isolated droplets of basilisk venom, possible spells to activate them, and alternative agents to test on Nagini—and by the end, the letters of his spiky scrawl are blurring. 

She could have stayed. She could have helped him with all of this. Perhaps she should have stayed.

“We’re closing in ten, love,” the bartender calls gruffly. Hermione clutches the parchment in her hand, returns her glass, and makes for the door. It’s too late for her to go back now, but she vows to remember as much as she can of his notes for next time. 

Getting back into the Ministry isn’t nearly as easy as last time, and Hermione wonders if security measures haven’t relaxed just yet. It’s either that or the Death Eaters had paved the way the last time. She has to use two Confundus charms and nearly gets seen through her Disillusionment, mentally taking note to borrow Harry’s cloak if she fails this time and needs to go back again. But her reflexes are still sharp, and she’s got the extra experience from learning to break down Bellatrix’s security spells on the goblet from last time—

Her heart lurches when she remembers Snape from that timeline—how he taught her, how he helped her—and how different he was from the one she just fought with.  

She slips onto the lift and feels her stomach drop as it descends to the ninth level. When she enters the dark round room with its identical doors, she feels panic begin to prick at her temples as she recalls the last time she was here.

But this time, there is more than one room that might offer her some insight, even if her end goal is the Death Chamber. She traces her tongue along her tooth capsule, takes a breath, and strides toward a door to her left. 

Immediately, her feet lift off of the ground, and the blood pulses in her temples. She must be in the Space Chamber. She blinks, letting her eyes continue to adjust to the dim light, noting the planet models scattered around the room. Pluto is still conspicuously absent—she vaguely remembers hearing about how Luna hit it with a blasting hex during the battle—and the faint points of light all around that resemble stars seem entirely unreachable. 

She floats, the walls and ceiling and floor all blending until it feels like she’s suspended in a dimensionless soup, completely untethered to reality. 

If this is what gave Luna such a revelation about the nature of the universe, then perhaps Hermione should have brought her after all, as she’s left with nothing more than vertigo and a deep feeling of placelessness. Was it the right thing to protect Luna by not risking her? Or was it a selfish misdeed to deprive her of the opportunity for further knowledge?  

After she finally makes it out, she sways on her feet back in the circular room. 

The door in front of her is locked—that must be the Love Chamber—and not for the first time, she wonders what would really happen if she were to make it inside.  

The next room is full of shattered glass and dust, and it takes Hermione a moment before she recognizes it as the Time Room. The door to the Hall of Prophecies is closed and covered with some sort of warding spell that Hermione knows better than to try to dismantle. She’s sure there’s probably all sorts of risks that go along with magical hazmat clean up for materials like time sand, and it probably takes a special crew—a special crew who might be busy behind the closed door of the Hall of Prophecies, as those are probably even more hazardous. Her curiosity stretches toward the door, though, and she wonders if the prophecies in the room would change over time in each of her loops; if she could create or destroy them either with or without intent, or if a prophecy could lock her back within the confines of standard time—

A faint glimmer of light catches her eye in the corner. 

She approaches, footsteps kicking up more dust that sparkles as it drifts back to the ground. She knows better than to hope—even Severus had told her all the Time Turners were destroyed—but she can’t help but wonder what would happen if she had the chance to go back even further—to save Sirius and Cedric and—

She crouches down.

The sliver of light that winks back up at her comes from the jagged edge of broken metal. 

She sighs, slumping against the wall. It would never have been that easy. She picks up the broken Time Turner, careful to avoid nicking herself, and holds it up to the light. Inside the cracked glass, the tiny amount of time sand glimmers as it shifts back and forth. 

If only she could have gotten to it earlier; if only she could wake up earlier, cursed body still here in the Department of Mysteries instead of the hospital wing…

Time passes, and nothing changes, and Hermione pockets the broken Time Turner and wonders if it’s something that can even be repaired. 

She’ll have to try. 

Back in the circular room of doors, Hermione feels a cold shiver run up her spine. 

She remembers how the room will let one leave if asked politely and squares her shoulders.

“I need a way out, please,” she says, gingerly fingering the Time Turner in the pocket of her robes. 

The air cools, and the door directly in front of her opens. 

“That is not what I meant,” Hermione says, just after she steps through. She turns around to leave, but the door slams shut. 

Not fucking funny. 

She turns back, eyeing the large stone steps warily, following them down to the crumbling archway in the center of the room with its eerily billowing curtain. 

The last time she was here, she heard nothing—no whispering voices of lost loved ones—but this time, she has lost more people than she’d thought possible. 

Would it sound different? 

Would she hear them?

She blinks to find herself descending the last step as if her body had been in a trance. Shaking her head to clear it, she narrows her eyes at the archway with its shifting black veil and then turns, once again, for the exit. 

I need a way out, please.

She freezes, spinning in place. Had she just heard that, or had she asked it again? 

And why is she now here, standing before the arch as if she can see right across to the other side?

It feels, strangely, like a mirror.

A way out.

The veil billows softly. Hermione stretches her fingers toward it, her steps growing light, her head starting to spin with possibility. 

What’s on the other side?

Chapter Text

The hospital wing. That’s what’s on the other side. 

“I am such a fucking idiot!” she mutters, clutching her hair. “I should have known. And people call me the brightest witch of my age.”

“Conscious for barely ten seconds and already fishing for compliments, Granger?” Snape asks from across the room.

“I’m not so much of an idiot that I’d expect anything remotely encouraging from you,” she snaps back. It’s not fair to this new Snape, but she can’t help the lingering irritation at her interactions with the last one. It’s like when Ron cheated on her in one of her dreams that one time and she didn’t speak to him all breakfast the next morning. 

It’s idiotic, is what. 

Almost as idiotic as that time just now when she let herself get played by the fucking Death Chamber. It’s all just… “Fucking bullshit.”

When she turns back to look at Snape, she sees his eyes widen almost imperceptibly before his expression shutters. “I’ll procure a calming draught, as you are evidently in need of one,” he responds, swirling away. 

She takes the opportunity to strip back the hospital sheet and begin cataloging her body for residual clues. The cursed scars shimmer like usual, her body in that suspended between state that makes her head pound the first few times she looks in a mirror. 

No sign of anything new from the veil. She shouldn’t feel so disappointed. She’d gone back to the Ministry with a multitude of questions and she’d heard nothing—learned nothing. 

“Fuck the stupid Department of Mysteries,” she growls. 

“Indeed,” Snape says, suddenly by her cot. Two vials are placed beside her—a familiar healing potion and the calming draught Snape had mentioned. Hermione glares at them both before deciding it’s probably best to play along after getting off to such a horrendous start in this timeline. 

“Thank you. For saving me,” she murmurs, as she feels the effects sink into her bones. Her eyes droop, and she lets herself drift back under. 

She wakes with a start, moonlight floating in through the high windows. 

Fuck. 

What time is it?

What day is it? 

“Madame Pomfrey!” she calls. 

“Oh, good, you’re finally coherent,” Pomfrey says, bustling around the corner. “Professor Snape does tend to brew a more concentrated draught than what’s sold at the standard apothecary. Although I don’t think he knew that I’d already dosed you with one earlier that morning—it’s probably why you’ve been sleeping for so long.” 

A cold dread seeps under Hermione’s skin. “How long have I been out?”

“Well, since the first time you awoke, it’s been a couple more days.”

“What?”

“I’m sorry, dear. I’ve been trying to wake you during the day to reset your circadian rhythm, but you’ve been through so much. You needed your rest.” 

“Where’s Snape?” she asks, her heartbeat rushing in her ears.

“Professor Snape had to leave for the rest of the week, but he should return when he’s able.” 

“No—”

The vow—

“I need to speak with him immediately,” Hermione says, flinging off the sheet and stumbling to her feet. 

“That’s not wise, you know he has important business outside of this school,” Madame Pomfrey says, her voice soothing. “He wasn’t even supposed to be here at all this summer, but he insisted upon helping brew your healing potions after what happened—”

“Right! The healing potions!” Hermione exclaims, feeling her face light up. “Can you send him a Patronus? Tell him I’m in need of more?”

Madame Pomfrey crosses her arms. “He’s ensured you had a full stock before taking his leave. Now, you need to get back into bed until you’re cleared to walk.” 

“Of course,” Hermione concedes gracefully, slipping back under the sheet. 

Five minutes later, she’s sneaking past Pomfrey and ducking out into the hall, stone floor cold against her bare feet, heart struggling to keep up with her movements. 

“Expecto Patronum,” she murmurs, holding her wand aloft with a trembling hand. If she can somehow reach Snape before he takes the vow, maybe she can still salvage this timeline.

Nothing happens. 

“Expecto Patronum!” she tries again, trying to focus her thoughts on a happy memory—instead of the steadily increasing dizziness that’s making the edges of her vision blur and fade. 

Shit. 

Maybe Pomfrey was right. 

“Accio healing potion,” she mumbles next, swaying on her feet. 

The glass vial careens through the air and shatters on the ground, and moments later, Hermione follows suit. 

She wakes, once again, in the hospital wing. 

For a moment, she clings to the hope that she died again out there in the hallway, if only to get a jump on getting things right this time—

“Congratulations. You’ve bought yourself an extra three days of bed rest, Granger,” Snape says from the foot of her bed with a sneer. 

—but then Snape says that, and she knows she’s even more fucked than when she started.

“Madame Pomfrey said you were asking for me,” he continues.

“I was, but I suppose it’s too late now,” she says with a sigh. “You’ve already taken the vow with Narcissa, haven’t you?”

Snape’s face turns ashen, but his expression doesn’t change. 

Hermione’s heart plummets in her chest when she realizes she must be right. “Damn. This timeline’s fucked.” 

“I beg your pardon?”

“We’re fucked,” Hermione repeats, enunciating. “I took your calming draught—which is really on me at this point, knowing how effective everything you brew is—and then you went off and made an idiotic Unbreakable Vow with Narcissa, and now Bellatrix is never going to be suspicious enough of you to empty her Gringotts vault—and I cannot break in again—that was a one-off thing—and—” 

“Do you need another calming draught, Granger? Circe, take a fucking breath.”

Hermione does, forcefully, through her nostrils. 

Snape waits for her to finish. Then he takes a seat in the chair beside her bed and commands, “Now. Explain.”

Once he’s in her head, Hermione tries her best to guide him through the muddled assortment of memories, but her despair brings a harsh spotlight to her mistakes, and her irritation causes her to dwell on their fight from the last loop, which causes her even more irritation as she realizes she could have skipped over the whole thing. Her guilt at leaving then takes center stage as she reaches the DOM and descends the steps to the arch in spite of her insistence on resisting it. All in all, it’s a mediocre recap, and Hermione hates herself a little more as she feels Snape withdraw from her thoughts. 

She can’t meet his eyes as she leans back against the headboard.

“First of all,” Snape begins, and she almost feels like she should be seated at a desk, quill at hand. “I did take the vow.” 

She opens her mouth—

“Second—” 

—she closes it—

“So the timeline’s fucked.” He crosses his arms and leans back in his chair. “So what? You didn’t expect this one to be the one where you solved all the world’s problems.” 

“Well of course I didn’t—” 

“And even if you managed all that, there’s still the small matter of you dying.” 

“I always die—”

“Exactly. And end up back here. Even if you were to find a way to save everyone and off the Dark Lord in the process, you’d just have to do it again.” 

“Fuck.” 

“Thank you for your commentary.” He rises, his tall form casting a shadow across her bed. “Let’s find a way to make the most of this one, knowing it’s completely futile. I’ll be back tomorrow, and I’ll expect some coherent ideas.” 

Watching his robes billow behind him shouldn’t leave her with some unfathomable mixture of emotions, but as the door shuts, she feels tears well up in her eyes, folds her hands over her stomach, and sobs.

“We have several options as I see it,” Snape begins as he visits her the next day. “All of them, as you might expect, ultimately lead to your convenient and hopefully comfortable demise.” 

“Which means that I’ll need to make the tooth capsule as soon as possible,” Hermione says, proud of how composed her voice sounds.

Snape frowns. “I assume you already know about my private stores of Basilisk venom. Seeing as you’re still not allowed out of bed, I’ll be taking on that responsibility for the time being.”

Her stomach sinks. As if he needs more responsibilities this time. 

“Once that’s taken care of,” Snape continues, “we could resume development of a delayed-onset poison for Nagini, begin research on how to remove the horcrux from Harry, continue to try to break Dolohov’s curse, or figure out why the Death Eaters keep breaking in so early.” 

Hearing it all listed out like that in Snape’s deep, authoritative tone makes Hermione feel suddenly very small and inept. 

“Or we could use this timeline as a sort of control experiment,” he adds, “keeping consistent with your first loop back and collecting observational data.” 

“Absolutely not. I got Katie Bell and Ron both killed the first time I came back—not to mention myself.” 

“Very well,” he concedes. “We could consider a modified control at that rate.”

“Do you have a preference?” Hermione asks. How does one begin a laundry list of impossible tasks with an ever-approaching end to one’s conscious awareness? If anyone would know, it’s Snape.

He looks taken aback for a moment before he responds, “I prefer whatever will result in the greatest amount of progress for future loops. Having not lived through the previous ones, I don’t yet know what that would be.” 

“I don’t know either,” Hermione admits. But Snape had asked her for coherent ideas. So she takes another breath and forges ahead. “Every time I try to work on researching Dolohov’s curse, it feels like I’m banging my head repeatedly into a wall. I’m terrified of telling Harry, because knowing him, he’ll do something rash and fuck everything up even more. You’ve already succeeded at poisoning Nagini, so I doubt that will take much effort from you—it can be a little side project if you want—which leaves…”

“Figuring out the break-in. Alright,” Snape says. “We can make obvious exceptions for Bell and Weasley—as well as your ill-advised vow with Dumbledore—but I still think it wise to mirror that timeline as closely as possible, as it featured the break-in happening latest in the year.”

Hermione nods, not particularly thrilled at the prospect of slogging through the Scotland winter, but he’s right. If they need to figure out what triggers the break-in, they should attempt to delay it as much as possible.

She blinks, finding Snape by the door about to leave.

“Wait—”

He waits. And he doesn’t even scowl, but the tired, resigned look on his face is worse. 

“It’s just…” Hermione begins, twisting the sheet in her hands. “It’s just that I’m worried something will happen if we delay the break-in. Some sort of—I don’t know—karmic exchange,” she says, pushing past her embarrassment. “The only times they broke in after the new year, people died.” 

“And you still want to save everyone?” Snape asks, dark eyes glimmering.

Hermione can’t tell if he’s judging her or amused by her naiveté or something else, but she holds firm to her desire to avoid more blood on her hands. “How much should I let others suffer and die just because I can erase it all? Is it ethical? Is it wise?”

“Only you can answer that.” 

“What would you do? If you were in my position?”

Snape stares her down, and for a long while, she thinks he’s not going to answer. Then he rubs a hand over his face and says, his features strangely candid, “I’d… I’d spend at least one timeline fucking off into the sunset somewhere warm, get burnt to a crisp after falling asleep drunk by the beach, and wake up and realize how much of an idiot I’ve been before getting my shit together and soldiering on.” He seems to catch himself and clears his throat. “I certainly wouldn’t be going to Transfiguration class at any rate.” 

Hermione feels her face flush. “Should I just leave, then?” 

“And go where?”

The truth is, she doesn’t know. The truth is, she doesn’t want to go anywhere else, because she worries then she’d never want to leave. “The beach,” she says half-heartedly.  

“You’re stealing my amoral fantasy, Granger.” 

“I’ve stolen a lot over the course of my adventures through time. You don’t get some special pass.” 

“It’s a war,” he says softly. “No one does.” 

Later, Snape brings her the materials to create a mould of her tooth, adding the venom to the capsule once it’s finished and charming it into place over her molar. 

He doesn’t touch her.

She isn’t surprised. 

This Snape certainly doesn’t harbor any positive feelings toward her. He can’t; not since she completely fucked him over by losing it to the point of requiring sedation when she woke up back in the hospital wing. She doesn’t deserve his trust or his time. 

And yet she craves it anyway.

It’s probably for the best that Hermione has avoided the lab so far this timeline, for consistency if nothing else, but a part of her aches to go back, even when she knows the only thing that will meet her there is more failure. She wonders how much time Snape has spent there over the years; if he ever went there as a student; what problems of his own he’s encountered and solved there.

And it’s thanks to her that he’s going to have to give it up this time. 

She apologizes about the lab the next time he visits her in the hospital wing, and instead of forgiveness, Snape gives her a notebook full of references on delayed-onset potions.

A strange fondness wells up inside her, and before she can stop herself, she takes hold of his wrist.

“You know, this time you could also—” she begins, suddenly very nervous. “You could just… forget about it all. Forget about the war, your spying, your teaching—just—”

Snape stares at her, all emotion gone and his features now completely neutral.

“Just forget about it all this time, just for a few months, and help me?” she asks, her voice catching at the end.

He wants to, she can tell. She’s learned that he’s usually the most guarded when he’s afraid of showing emotion. 

“No.”

She nods, blinking away the smarting feeling in her eyes, before he takes a step back and leaves the room.

She doesn’t see him much the rest of her hospital stay, but he brings her the same healing ointment from her memories, and she wills herself to note how much fainter her scar appears. 

More than once, she has the urge to impulsively bite down on the tooth capsule and give them a better chance, but knowing how Snape had responded during the last timeline when she left for the DOM, she can’t bring herself to commit such a selfish act. No. Fucked or not, she’s sticking with it this time. Following the plan. If not for herself, then for the version of Snape who's about to spend the next few months anticipating the end to his entire awareness.

On the day of her discharge, Snape meets her with the familiar crate of healing potions and says, as if she hasn’t just begged him to run away with her into some research-fueled fantasy escapade, “You’re to try your best to remember what happened the first time you came back, and relive it as closely as you can. Take notes and come find me at the start of term.”

“I wouldn’t miss office hours for the world,” she says. 

The corner of his mouth twitches. 

She slides her arms through the torn sleeves of her robes—the same robes she was wearing in the DOM the first time—and balances the crate on her hip— 

Something clinks against it.

Something in her pocket. 

She tosses the crate onto the cot and shoves her hand inside and—

“Ouch!” 

The pad of her thumb is pierced, and she withdraws her hand in shock. She spells away the bead of blood that has formed there and seals the wound before carefully levitating the object out of her pocket with her wand. 

Oh.

The broken Time Turner glints in the light as she shakily lowers it into her palm.

“Where the fuck did you get that?” Snape asks, striding forward and grasping her wrist to steady it the second he recognizes what it is. 

“The DOM. But only during the last loop—”

“Impossible. It came back with you?” 

“How?” she asks, bewildered. Their faces are inches apart, peering down at the cracked glass and the jagged metal, a faint spot of her blood on the surface. 

“I was hoping you knew going into that thrice damned side quest of yours.” His tone is gentler than she would have thought. His hand on her wrist is gentle too. 

“I was hoping it would come to me in a flash of insight,” she says. Their eyes meet, and he releases her. It feels like she’s holding a tiny universe in her palm. “What are we going to do?” she murmurs, her voice sounding pathetically fragile. 

Snape gives an incredulous huff of laughter. “I was hoping you knew that too.” 

“We’ll figure it out,” Hermione says, sounding more confident. “We’ve been figuring out all sorts of impossible things since this all started.” 

“Perhaps another version of me will figure it out,” he amends. “It is quite nice being able to kick the can down the road and abdicate all responsibility. I’m surprised the version from the last timeline was so cross with you for ending it early.” 

Hermione narrows her eyes. “We’ve joked plenty about death wishes, and you’re not getting off that easily.” 

“Neither are you, Granger.”

There’s a beat of silence next that feels charged with something frenetic and unstable. Then Snape begins to turn away and pace. “I still think we should try to keep other elements in this timeline consistent. Time Turner or not, we need to figure out the break-in and what to do about Draco’s task of killing Dumbledore. We will have no idea how much this will change things… Plus, it will be easier to swerve off course if the Time Turner yields anything than try to get back to anything consistent if we deviate now...” His pacing continues, and he looks at Hermione for input.

But all she can think is, "You know, last time, when I said I needed to go back, and you had your doubts—”

“That wasn’t me—”

Hermione waves off his protest and continues. “I was right.”

“You’re seriously going to”—Snape places a hand to his temple— “I’m so glad that that is the critical feature you’ve retained from this fundamental shift in the fabric of spacetime.” 

“Well I was,” Hermione says, a bit petulantly. 

“Congratulations,” he says flatly but without any malice. 

She holds out her hand toward him before she can stop herself. “You’ll figure more out than me in the next couple weeks. And knowing me, I’ll just inadvertently get discovered with this at the Burrow anyway. Take it. As a gesture of faith.”

The sensation of his gentle fingertips forms a new memory on the surface of her palm.

When Molly Weasley hugs her at the edge of the grounds, Hermione tries to think past all of her memories to that specific feeling the second time. Who else had she hugged? Was it Ron? He steps forward to place a tentative hand on her shoulder, and she ducks underneath it to hug him—because she wants to, and because he deserves it, and because she’ll drive herself crazy trying to do everything exactly the same. 

“I’m sorry for making you worry, Dad.” 

“It’s not your fault; it’s our own for having you—”

“I’ll floss extra to make up for it.” 

Back at the Burrow, Hermione forces herself to peer into the boxing telescope to keep the timeline consistent. It’s surprisingly challenging, taking the small, sharp punch to the eye, despite how easy it’s been walking directly to her death all those times before. 

“A papercut would be worse,” she mutters to herself, as she sets it aside. 

“Or stepping on one of those muggle plastic blocks,” Fleur adds, coming up beside her and opening a bottle of wine. 

“I’d need more than wine to recover from that,” Hermione says.

“I might need more than wine to recover from this visit. What is this frog-in-the-pond that we are about to have for dinner? The very name is just—just—dégoûtant!” 

“It’s called toad-in-the-hole. Which isn’t much better,” Hermione admits. 

“I thought at first that the ‘orrid food was the reason Tonks has been so sad.” 

“You might have more success than Molly trying to cheer her up,” Hermione says, studying Fleur’s expression carefully.

A faint blush appears high on the other woman’s cheeks, and she says, “I’ve been wanting to spend more time with her. Do you think she likes croques madames?”

“I’m sure she’d love them if you made them.” 

“Well you’ll need to visit the chicken coop soon if you plan to make your French breakfast tomorrow,” Molly says as she enters the kitchen.

Buoyed by this subtle new revelation from Fleur, Hermione drifts asleep to all sorts of ideas on how to matchmake during subsequent loops.

In the morning, she nearly tackles Harry with the force of her hug, and as the days go on, she contents herself with repeating as much as she can remember from her first trip back to the Weasleys.

Her heart still races when she thinks of Hogwarts. Of the broken Time Turner that somehow made its way back with her.

Of Snape.

By the time she arrives on the train, she’s amassed four separate sheaves of parchment with scribbled dates and crossed-out words in her attempts to sort out what had happened during her first loop back. She realizes with some irritation that she’ll have Arithmancy class again, and that she’ll actually have to study for it, having dropped it the previous several times and forgotten anything useful. 

Back in her dorm, she lets Parvati and Lavender give her tips for how to manage her hair, lets Crookshanks scamper off to explore the castle, and lets herself sink back onto her familiar pillow. It seems completely futile to attempt to keep things the exact same—she’s already made so many subtle alterations, not to mention bringing a Time Turner back with her—but her head pounds when she tries to figure out which subtle alteration might be the crucial explanation for the Death Eaters breaking in. 

She sleeps restlessly and awakens to the ever-looming start of term.

The door to the Defence classroom slams, and Hermione feels a jolt just behind her sternum.

“The Dark Arts are many, varied, ever-changing, and eternal,” Snape begins, striding into the room. “Fighting them is…” he pauses, his gaze seeking out Hermione’s for the briefest of moments before he continues. “Fighting them is sometimes an exercise in futility. It can cause one to question one’s own sanity—one’s own purpose amidst constant failure.” 

The class goes silent, and Snape crosses his arms. “Split up into pairs. It’s time to learn how to embrace that failure.”

She fails, deliberately, in Potions class, and for the first time doesn’t feel that twinge of jealousy when Harry wins the Felix Felicis. 

“My office hours don’t start for another four minutes, Granger, and I intend to spend those four minutes free of your pacing.”

Something a bit like joy lifts the corners of Hermione’s mouth as she pauses, one foot held awkwardly in the air. “I’d say I didn’t realize you could hear, but…” she trails off, still smiling to herself as she walks down the corridor before turning around again. 

When she returns, Snape spells open his office door, and she sits in the chair in front of his desk. 

“What have you found with the Time Turner?” she asks, leaning forward. It’s been so hard to keep her restless mind away from the subject and instead focused on the tedium of rehashing her calendar from Hogwarts. But now—

“It’s broken,” Snape says tonelessly. “And it can’t be repaired.” The finality of his words hangs heavy. The dark circles beneath his eyes and the unkempt, stringy nature of his hair give him the appearance of having stayed up all night just to be sure. 

“Alright,” Hermione says, letting the sting fade. Then, summoning half a smile, she adds, “It’s a good thing I can already go back in time, then.” 

Snape merely stares her down. “That’s it?”

“What?”

“No interrogation on how, exactly I came to this conclusion, no demands on the full folder of my notes—”

“I trust you,” Hermione says simply. 

Snape crosses his arms. He still doesn’t believe it. He might believe her when she says she’s from the future, or when she confirms his entire universe will collapse the second she takes her own life, but her trust in him? It’s something he struggles with in every timeline. 

“Walk me through, step by step, what happened in the first loop,” he says, abruptly changing the topic. It’s a welcome deflection. 

She withdraws her notes and slides them across his desk, feeling suddenly very childish. It’s like she’s a student again, presenting him with a revised copy of an essay for more points—they haven’t been mentioning it much, but her performance in his class is just competent enough not to arouse suspicion, and she’s lost any attachment to her essays. This, though. This feels like she’s somehow made some fatal error in judgment—if she only knew what.

Snape studies her rough timeline without comment, dark eyes scanning back and forth. 

Does it mean anything to him that she’s censored all of her irreverent comments about Dumbledore? And what does it mean that she was able to sort out the exact dates and times she attended Snape’s office hours in the past? 

After a long while, he looks up. “Thank you. The next step will be compiling these for the other timelines, so we can piece together commonalities and differences.” 

Statistics. Of course. How had she not thought of this before? Holding increasing amounts of information in her brain has been the only reliable way for her to take that information back with her, but it’s also created an increasing difficulty analyzing everything. Perhaps she shouldn’t have kept dropping Arithmancy each time, and she’d have figured this out herself.

“I’ll get started on that,” she says, rising.

“Granger,” Snape says, looking up. He places the Time Turner on the desk, and she slips it into her pocket once again. “Has anyone seen you this timeline? As you are?”

She pauses, looking down at herself, at the lengthening ends of her hair (when did she last have it cut?), and says, “Only you.” 

“Congrats on making Keeper,” she tells Ron when she gets back to the common room.

“How’d you know?” he asks, a huge grin on his face. 

“She knows everything,” Harry says, just as Hermione answers, “Lucky guess.”

She bides her time until the first Hogsmeade trip, holing up in secluded sections of the library to record her estimates of the previous timelines. 

(And to secretly research the Time Turner and anything else she can on Unbreakable Vows. Just in case.)

But just like with Dolohov’s curse, her reading turns up nothing particularly helpful. Unbreakable Vows are broken only by death, and Time Turners cannot be repaired. Even their creation involves an intricate process with multiple suspended dimensions and a finite amount of time sand—something that requires years of study to even begin to wrap one’s mind around. The sand itself is fickle, its properties shifting whenever anyone attempts to manipulate it. Even if Hermione somehow learned how, there’s no way the Ministry would allow it given the current state of things. Broken ones cannot be repaired, as by their very nature, they would exist as broken in any timeline. This must be why the Ministry was so unbothered about guarding the smashed fragments in the Time Room, Hermione realizes, peeking in her pocket at the warped metal and cracked hourglass. This must be why the Time Turner could exist here in this timeline; it will remain forever broken.

To fix it would be to create a paradox.

As if she needed any more of those.

Eventually, it’s time to brace the chilling winds and make her way to Hogsmeade, head still turning over the information she’d just learned. 

She intercepts the cursed necklace inside the Three Broomsticks, consistency be damned, because she will not watch Katie Bell die again. And when she snatches up the locket from Mundungus Fletcher, she shudders to think that consistency would entail another vow with Dumbledore. 

The first time, she delivered the locket to Dumbledore—where he kept it without destroying it. The first time, she also told Ron, but judging by the early break-in when she told him during a later loop, it shouldn’t have a direct correlation with the Death Eaters. She’ll keep it to herself this time—no need to burden him yet again, especially when there’s no hope of this timeline materializing into anything remotely salvageable. 

She sends a silent prayer that none of these actions connect to the Death Eaters and makes her way back to the castle. 

“Here,” she says, tossing the locket and necklace onto Dumbledore’s desk. “I’m not answering questions, but obviously these are dark objects that need to be destroyed.” She hopes this is enough information—but not enough for him to figure out that she knows it’s a horcrux. Lumping it together with the necklace is her best hope at deflecting his attention while walking the path of her previous actions as closely as she can.

Dumbledore pauses for a long while, staring down at it, before he smiles gently, calculatingly, and says, “Thank you, Hermione. I will take care of this.” 

Hermione hesitates, trying to remember what she had suggested before. “We can ask Harry to open the Chamber of Secrets again to harvest the Basilisk fangs to destroy this. I can’t believe no one thought to dispose of it properly—Basilisk venom is highly valuable—”

“That can be arranged.”

Hermione shifts onto her other foot. The first time, this is when she had mentioned the diadem—and then Dumbledore had asked her to defer before handing Ron the Deluminator and compelling her to make the vow—

She shudders when she remembers the shock of commitment biting into her nerves. 

No. This will have to be enough.

If it’s not, she’ll just reset everything.

She nods to herself and leaves Dumbledore’s office, knowing he’ll keep the locket preserved, but taking comfort in knowing she won’t have to submit to him again. 

“Do you think our discussions in here have any bearing on the ultimate outcomes?” Hermione asks, as she settles in the chair before Snape’s desk. 

“Anything could be a potential catalyst, but I’d theorize it’s more the decisions we make here,” he responds. Then, he glances down at her notes, stands, and spells open the door to his quarters. “Just in case,” he says stiffly, lighting the fire and clearing space for them to sit beside it. 

Hermione follows behind and takes her usual chair, smiling in spite of herself. “Sitting by the fire is the crucial step in delaying the break-in.” 

Snape levels her with a look. “Is that what you’ve discovered putting together the sequence of events in the other timelines?”

Hermione takes out her notes and passes them over to him. If only it were that simple. She watches him copy the dates into his notebook with its gridded pages, the crackle of the fire accompanying the rustle of parchment. He’s so methodical this time; nothing like the reckless version of him from before.

Eventually, she shares her findings from the library about the Time Turner, which he confirms. 

It can’t be repaired. 

She knows this—has known since Snape told her the first time—and perhaps she has known since the very beginning when she discovered it in the DOM—but the knowledge still feels incomplete somehow. 

“What if I go back and try to find it again?” she asks, tracing the worn seam on the side of her armchair. 

“You won’t,” Snape says. “It exists in only one place and one time now. Duplicated amounts of time sand don’t exist—can’t exist—outside of a working Time Turner. It is much as you are; there is only the one version of you, not the two that were present when you had use of the Time Turner during your third year.” 

That makes sense; two broken, pointless singularities in a universe that remains utterly fucked.

Winter approaches, and Hermione dutifully plods through her exams for what feels like the thousandth time. Only a few students remain behind for the break, and she knows that Malfoy will likely be spending the majority of his time in the Room of Requirement, fixing the cabinet. How did he repair it so quickly before? And how can he repair a multi-dimensional cabinet while she can only carry a damaged Time Turner around with her—while occasionally getting stabbed by the broken pieces of it that she can’t fix?

She ducks behind the familiar tapestry to wait it out, watching Crabbe and Goyle, Polyjuiced as second years, playing Exploding Snap until Malfoy finally emerges. The first time, he’d doubled back wanting to try something else, but this time, she manages to slip inside just before they round the corner. 

The diadem still fills Hermione with an odd mix of dread and possibility as she summons it from the air and quickly thrusts it into her satchel. Already she’s tempted to withdraw it again, curious if it could offer her any insight into the Time Turner—just for a moment—just to see—

She firmly tightens her satchel’s flap, keeping it closed. 

Resisting it is harder this time. She’s not sure if it’s because she’s worn it before or because she has more questions now than when she started, but it tugs and prods and zaps at her thoughts all through the following day while she waits for Dumbledore to return. She longs to go to Snape, to speak with him about it all, to see if he has any ideas, but she can’t sort out if that desire is due to the diadem too—if it preys on the intellectually curious and would cause even more problems for Snape. 

When Dumbledore finally does come back, Hermione follows him up the spiral steps and places the diadem on his desk just like the first time.

“Do you think Basilisk fangs or the sword would be a better option for this?” she asks, trying to mirror her question from the earlier loop.

Just like before, he waits a long time before he finally answers. “I think,” he says, “it is best left to me, Hermione.”

“Of course,” she says, unable to keep the sarcasm from her tone. She backs away to the door, waiting for the moment when he reaches for it, lifts it up to the light—

“Stop!” she cries.

The diadem clatters back onto the desk. Dumbledore shoves himself back away from it, horrorstruck. 

She shouldn’t be at all surprised, but she finds herself seething nonetheless. “And the locket?” she asks, narrowing her eyes. He must sense the sheer magnitude of her ire through some sort of Legilimency as she holds his gaze, because wordlessly, he spells open the hidden drawer and removes it. Seeing the two objects together, glimmering in the light amidst the whirring gadgets, stirs up another torrent of anger. 

“This is why we can’t have nice things!”  

Hermione stomps over to the cabinet where she knows he keeps the sword of Gryffindor. 

“You’d think”—she wrenches it open—“you’d have learned by now”—she yanks it out—“not to be alone in a room with a horcrux!” She whirls back toward the desk and raises the sword above her head. “And yet, each time, you insist—upon—testing—the limits—of—dark—magic!” she finishes, her words punctuated by repeated blows to the diadem and locket. Their fragmented pieces shriek and hiss and smoke until the air finally settles. 

Dumbledore is still staring at her, mouth agape. 

She pokes the end of the sword at the small bowl at the corner of his desk. “And if you keep those lemon candies uncovered like that, you’re going to get ants,” she adds. And then storms out.

Still carrying the sword, she bursts into Snape’s office—with a bit too much vigor, from the way he winces at the sound of his heavy door swinging against the wall. She doesn’t wait for the echo to fade before demanding, “Can you just get on with it, already?”

“I’m afraid I’ll need you to be more specific.” Snape stares at her, unamused.

“Fulfilling the terms of your Unbreakable Vow.” It feels like playing with fire. She strikes a match. “Killing Dumbledore,” she clarifies.

Snape sends a wandless Muffliato at the door and pinches the bridge of his nose. 

“Very funny, Granger.”

“I swear he’s one eye twinkle away from becoming the next dark lord himself,” she says, collapsing into the chair in front of his desk. 

“Says the woman barging in here with a gigantic sword, advocating murder.” 

“Very funny, Snape.”

There’s a tense beat of silence before he blinks and says, “I suppose you had an actual reason for this visit?”

“Oh, erm, yes,” Hermione says, pulling herself more upright. “I destroyed the locket and the diadem and—as you noticed—took the sword of Gryffindor. I’m estimating it’s within about 15 minutes of when I did it all the first time.” 

Snape hums and reaches for his notebook to record her testimony. 

“I didn’t come here afterwards, though, the first time,” she admits, squinting in her attempt to remember. “But I figured it was worth the deviation to keep you in the loop, especially with the holidays approaching.” 

Snape adds an additional line of spiky text to his notes, then says, “I’m glad you came.” 

Hermione’s face lifts into an unexpected smile. 

“Not glad enough to off Dumbledore just yet though,” he amends, setting his quill in its stand. 

“Should I leave this here, just in case you change your mind?” she asks, holding up the sword. 

“Temptress.”

“Spoilsport.”

Snape’s eyes crinkle as he inclines his head. “Go enjoy your quasi-immortality for a few days, Granger. I’ve a sneaking suspicion we’ll make it past Christmas yet.”

All Christmas Eve, Hermione paces her dorm, the common room, the corridors, anywhere she can pace. She feels restless and unmoored without the lab to ground her, and her mind is too agitated to focus on any further research. 

Midnight strikes.

Then one. 

And the castle remains quiet and calm. 

Snape was right.

It’s beginning to become endearingly irritating.

When Hermione finally rises late Christmas morning, she’s alone, but for the first time—her first Christmas in over two years if her calculations are accurate—she doesn’t feel lonely.

She opens her gifts and eats too many chocolate frogs with Crookshanks making biscuits on her lap, and then she accepts Dobby’s constant supply of fruitcake and treacle until it’s time for the feast in the Great Hall. 

When she gets there, she makes conversation with the lower years, some of whom are spending their first Christmas away from home, and she even toasts Dumbledore when he begins to sing carols. All the while, Snape watches from the other end of the table, silent but at least appearing rested. How different this feels than the last time. She knows she should treasure it—even if she didn’t believe they’d make it this far until the early hours of the morning—and she knows it’s thanks to Snape that she gets to experience the holiday at all this year. A small part of her mourns the fact that she never got to give him a gift, but with how things feel between them now, she doesn't want to disturb the delicate balance they've managed to achieve.

Once the dessert is cleared away, she bids the table goodbye and wonders if she should linger by the sideboard—wonders if Snape is also considering these options—and oh, no, she did not just glance at him and lock eyes—

He rises and follows her out into the atrium. 

“You were right,” she concedes. After all, it’s Christmas, and she’s feeling generous. 

“Any theories as to how I knew?” His expression betrays nothing, but his eyes gleam in the candlelight.

“Not at present, but I’m sure you’ve cracked the Arithmancy formula.”

He hums noncommittally. “I had an idea. Perhaps tomorrow I can explain in the Room of Requirement; you’ll be there frequently over the rest of the break according to your schedule from before.” 

Nervous anticipation churns in Hermione’s stomach at the prospect of visiting the room with Snape—at the prospect of learning what actions correlate with the impending break-in. “Tomorrow, then.” 

Snape starts down the hallway, but then he turns and says, “You’ll be disappointed to know that the Headmaster’s mulled wine did not contain poison.” 

Hermione feels her mouth slowly break into a grin. 

“There’s always New Year’s,” she offers. 

“Don’t get your hopes up, Granger,” he says and stalks away down the hall. 

It’s too late. Her hopes are soaring.  

Boxing Day finds Hermione awake early, applying Parvati’s products to her hair and wondering why she suddenly cares so much about her appearance. 

When she gets to the Room of Requirement, the door is locked, and she has a brief moment of panic when she wonders if she spent too long on her hair, before it opens to reveal Snape.

She steps inside and then freezes when she takes in the scene. 

Gone is the makeshift lab with its tourniquets and needles and faulty centrifuge, and in its place a high-ceilinged room with wood paneled walls and a luxurious Persian carpet. On one side is a desk covered with parchment notes that form a gigantic spreadsheet. Directly across from her, there’s a roaring fire in the hearth against the opposite wall, a large dining table in front of it laid out with a decadent breakfast spread and accented with—are those—?

“Dobby insisted on the candles and flowers,” Snape grumbles, stalking toward the desk. 

Hermione makes herself a plate of strawberries and tiny pastries and then joins him to peer at his data of the various timelines laid out on the grid. 

“Here’s everything we’ve gathered so far,” he says, waving his wand over the surface, so that the words and dates quaver as if unmoored from the parchment. 

“Here’s what happens when I run a correlation spell for any of these actions”—he flicks his wand, and a number of cells glow a deep cobalt—“and the break-in.” The cells shift and merge into an incomprehensible mess. “And here’s”—he presses the tip of his wand gently to the parchment—“what happens when I narrow it down to a specific time range.”

Hermione watches in awe as the dates shift back to where they started, this time only one cell glowing for each timeline. 

22 December 

(14 October) 

(19 October)

19 October 

19 October 

22 December

Each one just under two months before the break-in—during the timelines where she even made it that far. She notes that the dates in parentheses must have been during her impulsive trips to Gringotts and Malfoy Manor, when she died earlier in the month of December.

“What happened on each of these dates?” 

“You tell me, Granger,” Snape says, a rare intensity in his eyes.

“The nineteenth is the first Hogsmeade trip,” she begins, racking her mind for what could have possibly happened. Hogsmeade, the biting wind and bone chilling sleet, Katie Bell and the necklace, the horcruxes, meeting with Dumbledore—it all tangles together in a web of uncertainty—

“Just tell me,” she caves, planting her hands on the table and leaning forward.

“Might it be possible to show you? I need to confirm it for myself before I’m fully convinced,” Snape says in response. He gestures, somewhat hesitantly, to his temple, as if he’s not even sure it’s warranted—as if it’s an imposition or an overstepping of boundaries. 

Hermione’s long since lost any sense of personal boundaries. “Show me, then,” she says, meeting his eyes. 

“Legilimens.”

At once, she’s back in the corridors of Hogwarts, flitting between scenes like Snape is flipping a catalog in her mind. There she is on her way to Dumbledore’s office. There she is smashing everything with the sword. There she is again at the base of the spiral steps, rolling her eyes and muttering, “Sugar quills.” 

Here, Snape says in her mind, pausing just after she tells a previous version of him that she had to Obliviate Draco Malfoy. 

Before, he says, and redirects her to just minutes earlier, when she ran into Draco along with Crabbe and Goyle in the hallway. 

“And it’s easier—I swear something happened. It’s like a spark went off, and I’m suddenly fixing everything,” Draco is saying.

“What spark?” memory Hermione asks, stopping in the middle of the hall. She revisits her frustration that he suddenly had some epiphany that made the cabinet easier to repair.

“None of your fucking business,” memory Draco responds, and Hermione fights the urge to revisit the even older memory where she punched him in the face third year.  

“If you’re talking about that vanishing cabinet, it should take you until nearly March. Why the sudden progress? What’s different? Why are you suddenly so competent?”

Snape lets the echo of the words hover for just a moment before searching through her thoughts again, looking for more memories of Draco, until, in another timeline—

“It’s like whatever destroyed the cabinet made it paradoxically easier for me to work out how to fix it. I just—it’s that room, I swear,” memory Draco whispers to Crabbe and Goyle, hunched over a table in the library.

What destroyed the cabinet—oh. Hermione answers her own question when she recalls the memory of snatching the diadem from the air and sending a blasting hex at the cabinet on her way out in the previous loop. 

But it wasn’t the blasting hex that made it easier for him—

It was the removal of the diadem.

“Oh gods, you’re a genius!” she exclaims, inadvertently knocking her plate of breakfast to the floor with a crash. 

Snape straightens his posture, a faint flush on his cheeks. “I merely plugged in the data to see what could be extrapolated—”

“Of course it was the diadem—how many times had it scrambled my brain just by being near it?”

And of course Snape figured it out—how many times had he solved a problem with only a single shot?

“It does seem like the most likely causative action,” he says, straightening his sleeves. “It interferes with problem-solving and creates a near-constant distraction. Being perpetually within arms’ reach of it probably impaired Draco’s efforts.”

Hermione’s head is still spinning, and she laughs, clutching her hair. “Brilliant! Now we know leaving it for as long as possible will delay the break-in." She catches her breath. "I don’t even smoke, but I feel like I need a cigarette or something.”

Snape glares at her. 

“What? I’m probably just going to die again anyway.”

“Of lung cancer?”

“Well that would be new.” 

“I’m glad you’re so open to broadening your experiences,” he says dryly, reaching into his pocket. Instead of the pack of cigarettes she’s simultaneously dreading and hoping for, it’s a tiny vial. Inside is a dark purple liquid that shimmers green in the light. 

“Since you need to keep the room occupied to delay Malfoy’s progress, perhaps you can work on recreating this for subsequent timelines.”

“Is that…” she peers at it more closely, tiny bubbles swirling inside it. “The sleeper agent poison for Nagini?” 

“Delayed-absorption microspheres,” he corrects. “You certainly enjoy your spy novels.” 

Hermione runs her tongue along her tooth capsule and grins. 

Snape tears his gaze away from her mouth.

The rest of the break goes by too quickly, but Hermione manages to master the general formula for the sleeper agent poison. It turns out Snape had used the very last of his remaining personal stores of Basilisk venom to create the prototype in the vial, so Hermione spends the majority of her time calculating ways to scale up for future timelines. 

The room shifts a bit to accommodate her brewing and research, but the desk with the spreadsheet remains. 

At first, its presence buoys her spirits, but when she returns to study it, she notes the last date at the end of the original list, glimmering as though mocking her:

22 December

The day she destroyed the diadem in this timeline. 

Classes resume, once again, and the dread that had been in the periphery of Hermione’s consciousness begins to creep forward as January winds to an end.

February.

The break-in will happen in February.

She wrestles the love potion chocolates away from Dean Thomas in the common room and lends Luna Lovegood a pair of winter boots and rumples Harry’s already mussed hair each time he returns from a mission with Dumbledore, and still, she feels as if the movement of time is a punishment. She longs for just a moment to swap theories with Luna, to lean against Ron’s steady shoulder as he assures her she’ll figure it out, to sit with Snape in front of the fire in his quarters and let it warm her with a hope that the pieces will miraculously fall into place. 

She hasn’t exactly been close with this Snape—not like she has before—but somehow living this timeline so similarly to the past highlights all of the differences with him underneath a spotlight. Has she ever spent this much time noticing him? Noticing the precise way he moves through every action, no matter how futile? There he is, taking points in Defence. There he is in the Great Hall, haggard in the early morning and sipping coffee. There he is behind his desk, a stack of graded essays beside him that makes Hermione feel a sudden need to provide some form of solace, because what is the point of having to grade essays when the entire timeline is about to collapse?

She has nothing to offer, though. 

And when the castle wards give way to the onslaught of Death Eaters at nearly midnight on the 26th of February, she beelines for Snape’s office. 

“The vow—we have to get to Dumbledore’s office—” she bursts out with as she nearly collides with him in the dungeon corridor. A crazed part of her wants to jump in and kill Dumbledore herself if she has to, just to buy a little more time—

“Granger, you need to reset everything,” Snape says, his voice deep and calm. “You’ve got the Time Turner still?”

“Yes,” she says, pulling it out of her pocket to show him, “but maybe we can buy a moment to consider—”

“Consider the possibility that Draco becomes a murderer? Consider the other deaths that could happen? No. It’s over, Hermione. It has been from the start. You knew that,” he says, gentling his voice. 

She did know that. 

She does.

But—

It’s just not fair. She needs him—needs more time with this version of him. “You did all this with me—figured all of this out—and now you’re just going to disappear—” 

His body gives an involuntary jolt, as if electrocuted. She winces in commiseration, knowing the awful sensation of the vow beginning to take hold. As it fades, his eyes seek out hers, and something gives in her chest that feels like he's crossed a little tripwire. 

Instinct takes over, and she steps forward to fling her arms around him. 

“I’m sorry,” she says, face pressed to his neck, breathing in the scent of him, gripping the Time Turner tightly in her palm and ignoring the way it bites into her flesh. 

“Don’t be.” His words find their way into her hair, his hands resting tentatively on her lower back. The gentle contact sends a shiver up her spine. 

“I don’t want to leave you,” she whispers, involuntarily brushing the rough stubble of his jaw with her lips as she draws back. 

He shudders against her, a tormented expression on his face. Something about it looks different from the pain of the vow, and she’s not sure what it means until she feels one of his hands slide up her back to nestle in her hair. 

“Granger—” he breaks off and takes a shaky breath. 

Hermione stills, heart beating frantically, painfully, afraid to move.

“Tell me to stop, and I will,” he murmurs, his voice hoarse. 

Hermione only has a moment to even hope that those words mean what she craves before her body acts of its own accord, face tilting up, up, up—

His lips descend upon hers, dry, chapped, desperate, and she wants, more than anything, to take him with her. She stumbles against him as she kisses back, tongue swiping his lower lip, arching her back to press her breasts against his lean frame. The hitch in his breath in response sends a swoop down her middle.

He breaks away, eyes closed. His lashes look feather-soft, and she wishes she had time to trace them with a fingertip. 

“Do what you have to, Granger,” he says, lips still parted. 

Another violent spasm overtakes him, and, still clinging to him, Hermione bites through her sob to crack the capsule.

Chapter Text

“Don’t take the vow!” 

Snape nearly drops her healing potion in shock at her sudden outburst. “I suppose you’ve awoken, then,” he says, recovering. 

“How long have I been unconscious?” Hermione asks, wondering with a racing pulse if she should explain what just happened—and how she would even begin to explain— 

“Two weeks. Aside from the delirious raving about the nature of”—he looks away, cheeks pink—“age differences in relationships.” He clears his throat. “Your parents have been informed, although they received more of a summary than the much more concerning details regarding breaking into a government building and fighting Death Eaters, as well as—”

Her mouth is arid, and the words stick on their way out: “Age differences?” Oh no, no, no, no, no, what had she said—

“Gods, as if I need more exposure to the thoughts of teenagers under the influence of disinhibiting sedative potions,” Snape says under his breath.

“I’m not a teenager,” she says reflexively.

Snape gives her a stony glare. 

“I’m… fuck, how old am I now? Twenty-one? Twenty-two? I’ll have to run through my timelines again.” She shuts her mouth, realizing quickly that both swearing and out-loud calculations likely won’t help her make her case.

“Madam Pomfrey, I should have no reason to doubt your diagnostic abilities, but has anyone double checked that Granger didn’t suffer any intracranial effects from Dolohov’s curse?”

Hermione crosses her fingers in a silent prayer. “Please let this time be the one where we figure everything out.” 

Legilimency is efficient but also exposing.

Is it her, or does Snape dwell on that mortifying fluttering sensation in her belly whenever they make a new discovery together? 

And on the way she rushes toward him the night of the break-in—

No.

She shouldn’t let him see.

She can’t—

“It’s just,” he says and pauses, leaning back in his chair and shaking his head as if it jarred him to be kicked out of her mind so abruptly. His jaw clenches and unclenches. Like he’s forcing himself to relax. “It’s a lot to process.” 

Maybe she shouldn’t have shoved him away just before the Snape in her memory kissed her, but what else was she supposed to do? Let him see how she felt during that moment? She hopes her instincts were quick enough and that he hasn’t inferred what had happened; after all, it’s so bizarre that he probably wouldn’t believe her. 

Right?

“I realize it’s going to get weirder and weirder each time I come back claiming to be in my twenties and claiming to know you,” she says tentatively, fighting the intense heat in her face. 

“I’d expect I’d be more and more cynical, but then you’ve got all these memories to back you up.” Snape absently rubs his forehead with the heel of his hand.

“Let’s hope I don’t get hit with any amnesia spells then.” 

At this, Snape frowns. “That would be a serious risk, yes. You’ll need other proof too, ideally.” 

Proof like—

“The Time Turner! Is it here? Did I bring it back with me again?” Her heart begins to race.

“Yes. It had sliced up your hand rather deeply. It’s a good thing it was I who discovered it and not Madame Pomfrey.” 

“Can I see it?” she asks, needing to confirm for herself the presence of the cracked hourglass and sharp, unforgiving twisted metal—

Snape places it on the small table beside her bed. 

She breathes a sigh of relief. 

“Now what, exactly, do we do with it?”

“You’re asking me,” Snape says, raising a brow. 

“You’ve helped me out of every conundrum before,” Hermione reasons.

“I’ve done nothing of the sort. Perhaps you’ve somehow stumbled across the worst possible version of me.” 

“Doubtful. Every version of you has this dreadfully maddening quality of being right about nearly everything.” She smiles, perhaps too fondly, and Snape clears his throat. 

“I’ll look through my notes and see what else we should work on. At some point—perhaps this point—we’ll have to bring Potter up to speed,” he says. 

“I’ve been dreading it.” 

“As you should be. He’ll no doubt waste several timelines with rash, impulsive, idiotic—”

“—Okay, he’s still my friend—”

“—completely disruptive, foolhardy, dangerous—”

“—I think I get it now—”

“—and willfully reckless actions, all while winning the House Cup and dodging expulsion for yet another year,” Snape finishes and clicks his teeth shut. 

He’s not wrong. “Good thing I’ve got several timelines to waste then,” Hermione says. 

Snape’s expression goes blank, and a moment later, Hermione’s stomach sinks. 

She’ll have to leave this version of him too.

When she’s cleared to walk again, Hermione accompanies Snape to the lab, where he uses the majority of his private stores of Basilisk venom to help her with her tooth capsule, hesitating briefly with his hand hovering in the air by her jaw before spelling everything into place. The remaining venom is scant, and Hermione fills him in on the previous Snape’s prototype of the delayed-activation poison for Nagini. 

“We’ll have more after I talk with Harry,” she says, wishing the prospect didn’t fill her with unease. “Then he can open the chamber again for us to harvest the rest of the fangs.”

“I suppose that would also help develop his trust; it won’t be easy seeing as he despises me on principle,” Snape says levelly.  

“He probably despises Voldemort more,” Hermione says and shrugs. She traces her tongue along the surface of her molar, an old habit now, and watches Snape finish surveying her notes. 

“Perhaps it’s growing tiresome for you,” he begins, looking up, “but for me the prospect of killing Nagini still holds some intrigue.” He says this as though he’s slightly embarrassed by finding something interesting, and Hermione wonders—not for the first time—how exhausting his life must be. “I bloody hate snakes,” he adds.

They brainstorm different ideas on how to remove the horcrux from Harry during the rest of Hermione’s time in hospital, making lists, peering over sheaves of parchment together, taking turns studying the cursed scar on her forearm.

It’s definitely getting fainter with Snape’s healing ointment. 

Slowly but surely. 

When Hermione’s given the all clear to leave the hospital wing, she pauses in the doorway with Snape, suddenly nervous. 

“See you at the start of term,” she says, accepting the familiar crate full of healing potions. 

“I hope it’s not presumptuous—” he breaks off, swallowing, arms crossed tightly as if to ward off any nervous fidgeting. 

Hermione’s eyes go wide, and she instinctively steps toward him, something light fluttering in her chest at the sheer opportunity held by his next words—

“I put together a list of other potions ingredients you could begin to use in your experiments with Dolohov’s curse.” 

“Oh.” She can’t hide the disappointment from her tone. 

Snape catches it immediately. “Of course I don’t expect to be able to dictate the course of your research, but it appears past versions of me have been falling back on the Socratic method out of either pride or apathy at actually taking an active role—at least from the beginning.”

“Thank you, truly,” Hermione says, chiding herself for expecting anything more. He only recently found out she wasn’t a teenager anymore—it’s not like this version of him was the one kissing her mere days ago. It's not like this version even knows.

“Keep me apprised of Potter’s reaction,” he says in lieu of a response to her gratitude. And then he’s nodding and striding away down the hall, black robes whipping around the corner. 

This time, Hermione’s every move at the Burrow is inattentive, fraught with the knowledge that she’ll have to bring Harry in on her time travel. 

She sips her wine in silence with Fleur in the living room and volunteers to help Molly with dinner for the distraction and wonders when, where, how to tell him.

In the morning when he arrives, she can’t bear it quite yet, but she listens with intent when he explains the prophecy and tells him she has some ideas to discuss later, perhaps on the train, which should have the added side benefit of avoiding him getting punched by Draco Malfoy. 

The rest of the summer goes more or less the same as it always has, this time with Hermione studying the ingredient list Snape gave her. She gradually drinks the remainder of the healing potions in the crate and replaces them with the items on his list: boom berries, mistletoe berries, elderflower and elderberries, dittany, rambutan, powdered dragon scales, powdered moonstone. All the while trying to make sense of it. Of why he’d be so invested in helping her this time. Could he sense, somehow, from her memories what the previous versions of himself had been feeling?

When she's alone, she balances the Time Turner upon the parchment he gave her and watches the way the light refracts across Snape’s spiky scrawl, wondering if some vast secret is about to be revealed. 

In the end, she tells Harry on the train to Hogwarts. Just like in the past, she slips away from her patrol duties and pulls Harry into a compartment with Ron and Luna. It feels oddly comforting, having them there, even if this version of Ron and Luna have no idea she’s been reliving the moment many times. 

“Remember how I had the Time Turner third year?” she opens, and Harry nods. “Well, something else happened, and I have a different Time Turner now—a broken one.” She pulls it out of her pocket to show him. “It’s from the Department of Mysteries.” 

He blinks, turning her words over in his mind, and then suddenly beams. “So you’ll fix it then? You’ll fix it and find a way to go back for Sirius, and—”

“I can’t,” she cuts in, surprised at the finality of her tone. “It can’t be fixed. We can’t go back. The earliest I can get is waking up in the hospital wing this past summer.” 

He’s silent for a long moment, mouth working as though to figure out the meaning of her words, until he says, “Oh. So you’ve tried it before.” 

“Yes,” she says, relieved that part has gotten through to him. “And unfortunately, most of what I’ve tried has got me killed.”

She fills him in on the rest of her journey through time, the unknown curse from Dolohov, her failed research attempts, everything. (Leaving out the parts about Snape. Obviously. Other than that he’s helping her with her research.) And for once, Harry listens with rapt attention and doesn’t interrupt.

“Not to be rude,” he says when she’s finished, pushing his messy fringe away from his head. He seems to refocus his gaze on various parts of her face until he finally settles on, “You look, erm, older.” 

That night, while they sneak toward the girls' bathroom to open the Chamber of Secrets, Hermione explains more details about the horcruxes to Harry. She’s surprised at how much of a relief it is that he believes her, even though she never gave him the chance to think anything differently in her previous loops, too preoccupied with her own issues and too scared to risk his safety or the unpredictable nature of his actions. 

Like Ron had the first time she’d told him everything, Harry asks about the rest of the war—who survived and who didn’t—and all the little things, like who won the first Quidditch match of the season and what happened at Slughorn’s Christmas party, and it dawns on her, once again, that he’s just a kid trying to bear the future of the world on his shoulders. 

Harry whispers in Parseltongue to open the chamber, then asks, “So are you and Snape going to brew some foul acid to pour all over my scar to eradicate the horcrux?”

It’s… “Not a bad idea, actually.” They could test different reagents and see if topical application—like with the healing ointment on Hermione’s scar—would be effective. And if not, they could move on to ingestible potions, spells, perhaps, or—

“Woah, hold up,” Harry says, as he sees her beginning to brainstorm. “I didn’t actually mean—”

“Thanks, Harry,” Hermione says cheerfully, before stepping past him to the opening in the wall.

They descend into the tunnel and make quick work of the fangs in the darkness, and Hermione wonders if she’s at all qualified to share some of his burden.

But—

It’s not about qualification. It’s about necessity, she tells herself, remembering what she had said to Snape all those months ago.

She smiles when she sees the growing collection of fangs nestled in her bag, knowing his supply of Basilisk venom is about to be restored.

“You know, I’m surprised this didn’t kill the horcrux when I was bitten second year,” Harry says, dropping the last fang into the bag.

He’s right. “Why didn’t it?” And does that mean any potential poison she and Snape might use to target it would also be rendered ineffective? Should she waste time in subsequent loops trying to figure it out? 

Harry smiles and shrugs. “Dunno.” 

Fuck.

The next morning in the common room, Hermione cuddles Crookshanks in her lap and gives Harry a pep talk for the first Defence class, intent on preventing him from talking back to Snape.

It works. 

Sort of. 

He still fails to block anything non-verbally, but he at least has the sense to bite his tongue and avoid detention, so she calls it a win as they head to the first Potions class.

“You know that’s Snape’s old textbook, right?” Hermione says, grinning mischievously as they clean their cauldrons at the end of class. They’ve both got Slug Club invitations, but that knowledge doesn’t seem to help Harry, who looks physically ill and doesn’t respond.

Classes continue much the same as they always have, with Hermione spending more time meeting with Harry after hours to review what he’s been learning from Dumbledore (and to ensure that Dumbledore isn’t learning anything from him) amidst trips to the lab to work with Snape on the sleeper agent poison for Nagini.

(“Why you insist on bringing fictional spy terminology into this is beyond me,” Snape says, and what she doesn’t tell him is that it lightens her mood to hear him grumble good naturedly about it.)

Along with that, they begin to narrow down ideas for how to remove the horcrux from Harry. The overlap between those two projects is… disturbingly wide.

It’s during one of her visits to his office hours that Snape first brings up the Deathly Hallows. 

Oh. Right. Those. 

“I’d, erm, forgotten,” she admits. At the time, they had seemed like a farfetched fairytale, and she’s realizing that now they don’t seem much different.

“I barely caught anything about them from your memories, but it seems like they were important the first time around.” He levels his gaze at her. “You know, the one time the Dark Lord was actually defeated.” 

“Considering that timeline got you killed—and me—and many others—” she begins, but Snape halts her with a hand. 

“I understand that we should not be attempting to recreate it. But it appears as though you’ve been ignoring the hallows in favor of your horcrux scavenger hunt and coasting in your classes,” he says, holding up her most recent Defence essay. His long fingers hide the mark scrawled on the top, but she knows it’s an O—it always is—and that he’s merely baiting her. 

“Do you propose I skive off more, then?” she asks, smiling as innocently as she can manage. 

“I propose we gain control of the hallows,” he responds, as though becoming the master of death is simply another item to tick off the list of curiosities that she has amassed with her time travel. Still, it’s an intriguing idea. She has to admit she’s impressed, and she tells him as much. Trust Snape to work in yet another hypothesis to test despite having only lived this moment once.

“Occasionally I’m not a complete dunderhead,” he says, reorganizing the stack of essays in front of him. 

“It’s a regular occurrence in every timeline that you’re brilliant,” Hermione says, half exasperated and half fond. 

Snape rises abruptly, ignoring her comment. “I suppose you’re already somewhat of a ‘master of death,’ but the wand should prove useful at the very least.” He gestures for her to precede him, and they leave his office together, heading for the lab.

“Now, show me what you’ve learned from that ingredient list I gave you.” 

She’s learned quite a lot, it seems. Her cells stay put under the microscope for a full minute longer than any of her previous experiments, and even Snape with his inscrutable expression refrains from criticizing her progress. 

Or maybe it’s really his progress; he’s the one that suggested the modifications after all.

“I wonder if either the powdered dragon scales or the moonstone act as a sort of substrate,” she muses. “Something granular to modify the way the reaction activates.”

“I figured as much,” he responds, and this close to her at the workbench, she can see the faintest crinkle in the corners of his eyes.

I meant it when I said you were brilliant.

He doesn’t reply to her message, but she catches him watching her in the great hall the next morning, and he flushes when she smiles at him.

“What’s it like? Dying?” Luna asks casually, holding the door for Hermione as she leaves the great hall. 

Hermione blinks. 

“I’ve been wondering,” Luna says in explanation. She leads Hermione over to a familiar-looking alcove under a tiny window. 

They sit together, hidden from the rush of students heading to their classes, while Hermione tries her best to explain. What is there to say though, when she wakes up in the hospital wing each time? Does it really even count as dying?

“I don’t think ‘counting’ is something that’s relevant when it comes to retracing your steps through time,” Luna says. “I’m sure I must have told you my theory before, about the quilt?” 

Hermione smiles, the constants in this strange conversation comforting. “You have. And I went back to the Department of Mysteries a couple timelines ago to see if I could find out more.” 

“Two weeks after, right?” Luna says eagerly. “The best time to break back in?” 

“Something like that. It’s where I found the broken Time Turner. You had told me that you thought there was a reason to go back, and I can’t help but wonder if this is it,” she says, pulling the object out of her pocket and holding it up for Luna to see. “At any rate, I didn’t gain any new deep understanding of the universe.” 

“Did you visit the Space Room?”

“Yes. And the Love Chamber was still locked, and the Death Chamber took me through the veil and right back here, where I proceeded to live out another version of sixth year. Again. To be honest, it felt like a total rip-off,” Hermione says and laughs.

Luna seems amused for a moment and then furrows her brow. “I wonder, maybe, if there are some things we’re not meant to know until we’re ready.” 

The first Hogsmeade weekend, Harry and Hermione work together to ambush Mundungus Fletcher, while Ron heads inside the Three Broomsticks to intercept the cursed necklace. It’s almost like old times, banding together to fight evil, and she forgets for a moment the fact that both of her best friends are still sixteen.

She remembers when they accompany her back to the Headmaster’s office and gape at her bluntness as she tells Dumbledore, “Get the sword. We need to destroy these.” 

“I think, Hermione, it is best left to me,” he says, eyes twinkling. 

She feels a tug on her robes as Harry and Ron head toward the door, taking the obvious dismissal with grace, but she bids them to continue on without her and turns back to Dumbledore. 

“Best left to us,” she amends, crossing over to the cabinet herself when it’s clear Dumbledore isn’t planning on moving. She shatters the locket and the necklace in two swift blows, then sits in front of Dumbledore’s desk, staring at the bowl of lemon candies as if it could give her more nerve to do what needs to happen next—what she had talked about with Snape. 

“Hermione, are you quite alright—”

“Expelliarmus!” she shouts, the force of her spell knocking him backward in his chair until he slams against the wall behind. The Elder Wand sails across the desk, and she drops the sword so that she can catch it. The clang of metal on stone echoes throughout the office as Dumbledore narrows his eyes at her. 

“Sorry, Headmaster. I’m conducting a sort of experiment,” she says, tossing him her own wand. “I also need the Resurrection Stone.” 

His face pales and then sets with the hint of a grimace. “And how did you know about that?” he asks. She can feel the brush of Legilimency against her mind, and for once she doesn’t try to block him. Memories surge forth: the glittering snitch in Harry’s palm, the sight of Dumbledore’s decaying hand, the final battle itself, Voldemort wielding the same Elder Wand that’s now held in Hermione’s shaking grasp.

“I’ve shared more with you before, but it didn’t end well,” Hermione says, shutting her eyes against the onslaught of images. 

“I see,” he says calmly. 

“I also know that Harry has become a horcrux,” she says, opening her eyes once again. “I’m going to try to find a way to remove it that doesn’t involve him confronting Voldemort.” 

“I doubt that will be possible,” Dumbledore says wearily. “I’ve explored those avenues for years and always end up at the same conclusion: the prophecy cannot be altered. He has to face Voldemort on his own.” 

“I’m going to try anyway,” Hermione says firmly. If there’s anyone who can shatter the rigid structure of a prophecy, it’s her. 

Or maybe Snape. 

“You may try. And fail. But what other choice do you have? I certainly have no answers,” Dumbledore says. 

She leans forward and presses her forehead to the cool surface of his desk, defeated.

She hears Dumbledore sigh across from her, a long beat of silence, and then the gentle scrape of something being slid across the surface of the desk. 

“Take it,” he says hoarsely.

She lifts her head to see the dark stone, as if offering itself; as if waiting for her.

“I believe the goblet has been moved to the Manor,” Snape says, the next time Hermione finds him in the lab. “Perfect timing, since this is now finished.” He gestures to the cauldron in front of him, and Hermione peers inside to see the simmering purple potion that occasionally gives off a flash of green as the bubbles reach the surface. 

“Perfect,” she repeats, smiling softly as she looks up. The steam rises between them and obscures his face, but she hopes he’s smiling too.

They wait for the potion to cool and then decant it into one larger vial along with several smaller ones, and Hermione can’t help but wonder, “Do you think we could use this for Harry’s horcrux? Just to see?”

Snape’s hands pause in their movements as he ponders her question.

“He’s already prepared to waltz into Malfoy Manor and duel Voldemort with the intention of losing,” she adds. 

Snape sighs. “Of course he is.” He lifts one of the vials in the air and studies it in the light. “Perhaps,” he settles on. “We can attempt to modify this one at the very least.” He sets it on the work table in front of them. “Judging by how things went before, I think we should break into the Manor just before Christmas,” he continues, “and I’ll attempt to feed Nagini the poison around then.” 

Hermione feels suddenly anxious at the prospect of this, and she tries not to let her voice shake when she says, “Promise me you’ll make yourself scarce after that.” 

Snape furrows his brow but doesn’t cut in, waiting for her to explain. 

“The last time you pulled a stunt like this you were murdered by Bellatrix. I can’t let that happen again—can’t let your cover be risked in case this goes well for once and we succeed.” 

“Way to jinx it.” 

“Just—please be careful.” 

“I will,” he says. “Besides, the poison should be inert until activated, and I don’t intend to do that unless something goes wrong.”

Hermione nods, trying to will herself not to worry. It’s foolish to even consider hoping that this time they manage to pull it all off, especially with Harry—

“Harry!” she says suddenly. “Will the activation spell affect him if we modify the potion to target his horcrux?”

Snape inclines his head. “It will.”

“When it rains, it pours,” she says, resigned. “I’ll talk to Harry about it and make sure he’s on board.” 

Of course Harry’s on board. Harry would be on board with jumping off of the Astronomy Tower if she asked. She tries to impress upon him the weight of such a decision, but he waves her off, insisting that he’s been preparing for this all year—all his life—and she promises that if it doesn’t work, she’ll give the next version of him anything he wants. He only laughs and asks her to figure out how to stop the loop, once and for all.

If only she could.

Snape, meanwhile, has plans to subtly poison several Death Eaters with the potion, in addition to Nagini. He details these plans from his desk during the next office hours as he watches Hermione apply the modified potion to Harry’s scar, casting spells that allow it to sink into the skin every so often until the small vial is empty. 

Harry doesn’t stick around for long after, but he seems otherwise healthy and in good spirits.

“I don’t think it’s going to work,” Snape admits, resting his head in his hands, elbows on his desk. 

“We have to try anyway,” Hermione says. “You know, someone really brilliant once told me that fighting is sometimes an exercise in futility. But it’s a chance for us to learn to embrace failure.”

“For fuck’s sake, Granger, are you seriously quoting my own melodramatic speech from a previous timeline back to me?”

“You do give great advice.” 

He raises his head to meet her eyes. “What else aren’t you telling me? About these other timelines. I could sense that you were holding something back—” 

Blood rushes to Hermione’s face and she grips the edge of his desk and blurts the first thing that springs to mind, a total non sequitur: “Do you want to destroy the diadem with me?”

They wait until the start of the winter hols, then meet up together the night of Slughorn’s Christmas party. They watch from around the corner as Draco Malfoy is caught and dragged inside by Filch, then make a break for the Room of Requirement. If Hermione is secretly pleased that Snape is skipping the party to destroy a cursed object with her, she tries not to let it be too obvious. 

I need to hide something, she thinks, aware of the number of levels that statement is true when she catches Snape’s eye. 

The door opens, and they make their way inside amidst the teetering piles of objects, Snape instinctively catching her elbow as she nearly trips over a pair of antique skis. 

“It’s there, above the vanishing cabinet,” she says, taking his hand and pulling him toward the diadem.

Already a strange buzzing is taking up residence in her head, and she halts before they get within range of it. 

“Don’t put it on,” she warns. 

She expects some sarcastic reply, not the simple “I won’t,” and the gentle squeeze of her hand in acknowledgement. She hadn’t realized he was still holding it.

Reluctantly, she lets go so that she can take the Basilisk fang she’d brought out of her bag. “This one is always a bit tough for me,” she admits. 

“Steady on, Granger.” 

She raises it above her and then approaches the diadem, ignoring the static pull, the wish to touch it, to hold it to the light—

And plunges the fang down, where it stabs the glinting metal, a high-pitched shriek piercing the room. 

She turns to find Snape with his wand aloft, no doubt casting a Silencing charm. She shrugs and brushes the smoking pieces of metal aside, where they collect behind a broken globe and crystal vase on the shelf. Stepping back to ensure that the remnants remain adequately concealed—not that anyone else, especially Draco, would have any idea what they even are—she surveys the vanishing cabinet beneath.

“We might as well see what happens when I stab the cabinet too,” Hermione reasons. 

“By all means,” Snape says impassively. “Continue stabbing things.” 

She does. Several times.

And nothing much happens, so she shoves the fang back into her bag and hurls a few blasting hexes at the cabinet instead.

Beside her, Snape’s wand twitches in his hand. 

“It’s actually kind of fun,” she says, panting a little but smiling. 

He purses his lips together. 

And then casts a series of hexes in quick succession, the cabinet disintegrating before her eyes. 

They slump down side by side against a torn ottoman with a broken leg, and Hermione grows keenly aware of the press of Snape’s arm against hers. 

“Now all that’s left for us to do is to head to the Manor,” he says, still breathless.

The knowledge of what lies ahead fills Hermione with a deep dread, and she reaches for him as if she could keep him here, hidden away in this room among the trinkets and secrets. 

He reaches back. 

She curls up against him, resting her head on his angular shoulder as he slowly traces his hand up and down her arm, each moment ticking by with an immutable sureness, and Hermione’s suddenly afraid to move, afraid to try, afraid to risk anything more.

Sleeper agent in place. 

Goblet tomorrow.

Frost hardens across the ground, and Hermione gazes out across the desolate scene from her dorm window, dressing in the early morning chill. Call it superstition, but she dons the same worn school robes that she had worn during the battle at the DOM. The same robes that had carried the broken Time Turner back with her. She pockets it again and arms herself with a Basilisk fang for the goblet, the Elder Wand, and the Resurrection Stone, wondering what—if anything—it will help her with. 

She meets Harry in the dim light of the common room, and he hesitates for only a moment before thrusting the invisibility cloak into her hands. 

“It’s yours,” he says firmly, and she wishes for all the world that she felt the slightest bit different with all three Deathly Hallows in her possession.

The Master of Death.

Harry had said in the first timeline that it meant one who didn’t fear death. But didn’t she already go willingly in the past? And what did it mean when she could never really die?

“Also. I’m going with you,” he adds and grins. 

She tries to protest—after all, in the past it’s only ever been her and Snape destroying the goblet, and selfishly she wants more time with him alone, not to mention the risk that Harry poses to himself and others at all times. But Harry stays firm. He points out that if they are able to destroy the goblet, then only he and Nagini would remain, and it would make the most sense to test the sleeper agent poison as soon as possible so that they could have a chance at catching Voldemort by surprise, especially with Bellatrix away in France.

It’s not the best plan, but it’s logically sound, and Hermione knows that she needs to begin involving Harry more if she ever wants to make it any further. She sighs and nods her assent, then wraps the cloak around them both before they sneak out of the portrait hole and through the empty halls, wondering if any answers will be revealed.

All the while, Snape’s words from the last timeline replay themselves in her thoughts: 

“Even if you managed all that, there’s still the small matter of you dying… Even if you were to find a way to save everyone and off the Dark Lord in the process, you’d just have to do it again.” 

They meet up with Snape by the entrance, and if he’s surprised to find Harry by her side, his expression betrays nothing. They walk in silence to the Apparition point, breath fogging in the cold air and feet crunching along the grass, and Hermione misses the warmth of the fire in Snape’s office, the warmth of his hand—

She shakes her head and clears her thoughts and focuses on Harry gripping her arm, before taking him side-along to the edge of the Manor grounds.

“Don’t touch anything, don’t say anything, and don’t even dare breathe too loudly,” Hermione cautions him immediately after they land, only pausing to give him a moment to right himself after stumbling. Snape appears shortly after, and they Disillusion themselves while Harry takes the cloak—borrows the cloak, she mentally corrects, because she's still its owner. She's still the Master of Death by whatever arbitrary metric set in place by the hallows' creators.

“Dobby knows a secret entrance,” Hermione explains as they approach, “and Snape and I both know the way to where the goblet’s hidden.” 

“It’s ‘Professor’ Snape, Hermione,” Harry says, and she doesn’t need to see him through the cloak to know the smug, cheeky grin he must have on his face.

They wind their way through the halls with a surprisingly minimum amount of difficulty. Harry stops a couple of times, only briefly, but falls back into step without issue. Even though it’s been several timelines since Hermione's been here, it’s as if her feet know the way on their own. She dismantles the wards to the room just as the previous Snape had taught her and leads them inside before shutting and locking the door. Harry, who has just removed the cloak, winces at the sound and clutches at his head. 

“What’s wrong?” she asks on instinct. 

“Nothing,” he mutters, adjusting his glasses. 

She peers into his face, but he waves her off. “I’m fine,” he insists. “Now where’s the goblet, and more importantly, am I the one who gets to destroy it?”

Hermione hesitates, glancing toward Snape, but Harry continues, “I mean he gets to kill both Nagini and me—and I know he’s been wanting to kill me for probably as long as Voldemort—” he breaks off as if something has startled him.

“Are you sure you’re alright, Potter?” Snape asks, turning from where he’s already started breaking the curses on the bookshelf.

Harry flushes, but he crosses his arms and nods. 

“Very well,” Snape says, finishing his spellwork and levitating the silver box from the shelf to place it on the ground. 

A strange electric charge seems to fill the air when the box opens and Harry steps forward to peer inside. His hand shakes as he takes the proffered Basilisk fang from Hermione, and for a split second, she wonders if it’s wise to let him do this—

But then he grits his teeth and rams the end into the goblet and the shriek that assaults the air around them feels more cathartic now than any other time. 

Harry beams, dropping the fang to the side, for one perfect, triumphant moment until—

Something heavy pulses all around them. At the same time Snape raises his wand and says, “The wards!” Harry collapses, writhing in agony and clutching his scar. A cold shiver runs up Hermione’s spine, and she draws her wand as well, crouching down beside him. 

“What’s wrong?” she asks, trying to remember what diagnostic spells Pomfrey had used on her in the hospital wing. 

“My scar,” Harry groans. “I think he saw—I think he knows—” 

“Granger, be ready to reset,” Snape says, stalking toward the door before he abruptly stops and winces himself, glancing at his clothed forearm. 

A Summons. 

No.

“He must know I’m here—you guys have to activate that poison—” Harry breaks off as a spasm overtakes him. 

No, they had come so close—

“Are you sure, Potter?” Snape asks, then looks to Hermione when he nods. 

“Leave me here—leave my body by the horcrux. He’ll think I acted alone,” Harry says. “Unless you’re planning on killing yourself now, Hermione, you might as well give this a shot.”

“Fuck, he’s right,” Hermione says, as voices begin to sound in the distance. “I’m so sorry, Harry. I'm right here. I'll stay with you as long as I can, and we’ll try to—”

“It’s okay,” he says, cutting her off, and then to Snape, “Do it. Now.” 

Snape gives a single, stiff nod, and then murmurs the incantation, twirling his wand in a complex pattern in the air. 

Beside her, Harry goes limp. 

Please please please, Hermione thinks, clutching his hand, but he doesn’t move. How long had he been out before? The first time? She searches through her tangled thoughts trying to remember. It had to have been at least a few minutes, but—

“Granger,” Snape says gently, his hand on her shoulder. “We need to move.” 

“I know,” she says. But she can’t seem to let go of Harry. 

Snape hauls her to her feet and cups her face with one pale, cold hand. “You did well.” 

Her eyes well with tears as she says, “So did you.” Instinctively she steps closer, as if pulled to him by some inescapable tether. 

Slowly, so softly she can barely feel it, he traces her lower lip with his thumb. “Last time, did we—is this what you weren’t telling me in the beginning?” he asks. 

She blinks, letting her tears spill over, and nods. 

“I’m sorry I let my own selfishness begin something that we can’t possibly sustain. No matter how badly I might want to try,” he adds, gently releasing her. 

Shouts ring out directly below them, and Hermione realizes people must be discovering Nagini’s death—and whomever else in the vicinity was affected by the sleeper agent poison and Snape’s activation spell. If only they had more time—

“Reset, whenever you need to,” Snape says, refocusing her thoughts. “I'm going to see how many I can disarm, to give Potter as much of a chance to come back as possible. I’ll see you in the hospital wing, and when I do, I’ll try as hard as I fucking can to fix this mess.” 

And with that, he slips away, like sand through her fingers.

Hermione stares at the door where Snape just left, hoping beyond all hope that Harry will somehow awaken beside her, but knowing the likely outcome that he’s gone. Of course he would be reckless like that, and of course he’d go willingly, but watching him fall has broken a piece of Hermione’s resolve away. 

He’ll come back, she tells herself, forcing herself to finally step out into the corridor. Like the first time. He’ll come back, and then—

“He’s not coming back, you naive girl,” a cold, piercing voice says suddenly. It’s everywhere in the dark hall and in her head.

Hermione feels the blood drain from her face, ducking into the hall to find the nearest room empty. For now. She doesn't want to know the intricacies of Voldemort's abilities when fueled by the dark magic permeating the Manor, but she can sense his presence nearby like an icy dread, his voice chilling, as if he's right next to her.  

“He’s dead, and soon you will be too.” 

“Perhaps,” Hermione concedes, tracing the edge of her tooth capsule and trying not to let the knowledge of it float too far toward the surface of her thoughts. For all the time she’s spent eradicating bits of his soul, she’s never actually faced Voldemort in her trips back through time, and the prospect still terrifies her. Instinctively, she reaches into her pocket to feel the broken Time Turner, the Resurrection Stone clinking gently against it.

Should she—

Not yet. 

She holds the stone between her fingers and moves deeper into the east wing, focusing on her footsteps, on the fear that builds with every panicked beat of her heart.

“You’re stuck in a labyrinthine Manor specifically cursed against mudbloods. I don’t see how this situation ends in any option other than your death.” In the distance, a door blasts open. Footsteps follow. Then another door. Muffled voices draw ever so slightly nearer from the hall. They’re going to find her eventually, but for the time being, she needs to buy a few more moments for Harry to awaken, no matter how little hope she has. Which means… distraction. 

“You seem to be quite sure of yourself,” she begins, her voice trembling. “But you don’t seem to have considered the fact that I probably had at least some plan before flouncing in here directly into a trap.” 

“Arrogant child. You must think yourself immune to danger.” 

“Not immune; just… resilient.” She spells open a nearby door and casts a shield charm before stepping through to a room that resembles a small parlor, drop cloths covering a sofa by an empty fireplace with wide windows that let in feeble rays of morning sun. 

“And yet you never stopped to ask yourself: to what end are you so willing to die?” 

At this Hermione laughs. She knows exactly what she’s willing to die for—for something as small as an embarrassing comment at the beginning of this timeline—but she doesn’t owe Voldemort an answer. “And yet you’ve never stopped to ask yourself”—she catches sight of Lucius’s overpriced whisky on the mantle and feels a half-hysterical laugh bubbling up from her stomach—“When you’re drunk on this much power, what will the hangover feel like?”

“You think this is funny, do you?” In the hall, more crashing sounds of splintered wood and stone. Hermione can make out individual voices now, announcing each room clear as they move methodically through the wing. 

Still no word from Harry.

She fights off the sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach and forces herself to continue, casting a Sonorus charm over her throat in the hopes that her voice will reach him if he miraculously wakes, and knowing it will hasten her discovery by the Death Eaters all the same.

“You’ve no long-term objectives. Taking over magical Britain and then what? Then you’ll be faced with the reality that you’ve actually got to deal with everything you’ve beaten into submission. You’ll have to spend time and energy changing your appearance back to something less revolting—more palatable—to the general public so that they’ll listen to you and grow to love and respect you, and that’s where we really get into revolting territory, because—”

“—She’s down this corridor!” shouts a voice that’s too close for comfort. 

With a shaky breath, Hermione feels the smooth surface of the stone and turns it over in her hand once. Then, she casts a warding charm at the door and opens her mouth again. “Who cares what they think? The masses. The mudbloods and blood traitors and animals and sycophants? They bore you. They disappoint you. Even the torture of them for sport will grow tiresome and stale. And then you’ll be left wondering what else—”

“—This one, Rowle—”

She turns the stone over again—

“—what else will ever be interesting again? What else will you have to hunger for again?”

—and a third time, its weight settling into her palm, wondering if at the very least it will show her Harry, if he truly did die—

The door in front of her blasts open, and Dolohov steps into view, flanked by Rowle.

“So here’s where the mudblood whore has been hiding,” he says, leering at her. 

Hermione swallows, wand aloft in one hand, the stone still clutched in her other. 

Nothing happens. 

No one appears, spectral figure or not. No Harry, no Snape, no one other than the two Death Eaters in front of her that started this whole mess. 

She drops the stone and readies herself to fight.

Hermione feels the intent of Dolohov casting before he even moves, and she spins out of the way, wrapping herself in a shield charm. The purple light slashes against the bookcase behind her, and putrid smoke fills the air. 

He grits his teeth and fires off a volley of spells, each glancing off of her shield and sapping its strength until she’s forced to dodge physically, backing herself into a corner. Panting and clenching her jaw against her tooth capsule, she manages to fire a wordless stunning spell at Rowle just as he moves across the threshold of the room.

Dolohov ignores the sound of his body hitting the ground. “Watch the window latches,” he taunts, sending another curse her way that has her diving underneath one of the large panes. 

“Or what?” she asks, glaring up at him and clawing her way to a crouching position. “You’ll have to watch me die from a Malfoy curse and not your own?” 

This has the desired effect, and he growls something unintelligible, another jet of purple aiming right for her. She parries it at just the right moment for it to redirect straight at his torso—

He jumps out of the way—

And the spell catches him across the top of one of his legs. 

For a moment, Hermione can do nothing but watch, stunned, as he lets out a gasp of surprise.

Then his leg begins to open up with a festering wound. Blood bubbles from it, turning a sickening bilious green before sending smoking tendrils of darkness into the air. 

He howls with the force of pain, writhing and incoherent, before Hermione springs forward, disarms him, and grips him by the jaw. 

“What did you do?” she asks frantically. “How do you heal it?”

He grimaces, panting, and then bites out, “Oh, suddenly you’re a kind hearted virtuous mudblood—”

“Like I give a fuck about saving you,” she says impatiently. She casts a few rudimentary healing spells at him that seem to achieve next to nothing, and he continues to groan and spasm with the force of the pain.

Eventually she realizes a numbing charm might be more effective to at least give her a chance at getting an explanation.

He can’t hide the relief evident in his features.

“I’ll cancel it if you don’t talk,” she warns. “We’re both dead either way, but do you want to spend your last few minutes in pain with me laughing in your face?” 

He tries to spit at her, but she smothers his nose and mouth with her palm.

“Fine,” he seems to say against her hand, and she removes it, casting a pointed cleaning charm over it. 

He takes a shuddering breath, almost as if about to change his mind, before he bites out, “It’s a modification on a standard blood curse, designed to create an ever-expanding wound. St. Mungo’s could probably fix it, or so could some pricey healing potions, but most people die before that point.” 

Hermione glances down to see the wound spreading, deepening, a section of his femur now visible through the decaying flesh. 

“What else?” she asks.

“What do you mean ‘what else?’ That’s it. Sanguis exulceratio. It’s a curse designed to cause pain and imminent death—isn’t that enough for you?” 

That’s it?

No. It can’t be. Snape had once called it 'a curse so intricate and secretive that its incantation has never once been captured in writing.' There's no way—

“You’re lying,” she says, grabbing a fistful of his robes in her hand and jerking his head up. 

He laughs, teeth bared, and asks, “Why the fuck would I lie about that? I’m dying of it, aren’t I? What’s the fucking point of anything now?” He glances down to where his leg appears eaten away, connected only by long strips of bone and tendon as the curse works its way lower. 

He’s lying. He has to be lying.

“Legilimens,” Hermione says without warning, and she plunges into his mind.

Fuck you, he screams as she tears through scene after scene of the curse, searching for something to do with time, something to do with untethering oneself from the fabric of the universe—but there he is, watching people scream and disintegrate, watching them die, Apparating back and bragging about the 'intricacies' to anyone who will listen—but nothing is remotely intricate about the curse—he only keeps the incantation secret for intrigue, and she can feel the waves of sick smugness rolling off of him each time he claims to have modified it—Oh so you’re a fucking expert now? he growls in her head—and she shoves the words aside only to find the same torture, the same words, the same intent—to harm, to kill, to hurt—

And nothing more.

That’s it.

“You have got to be fucking kidding me,” she says, wrenching herself from Dolohov’s twisted thoughts. 

She cancels the numbing charm, listens to him scream at the sudden onslaught of pain as though it could satisfy any aspect of the emptiness that’s overtaken her, and then grinds her teeth together as hard as she can.

Chapter Text

“You’re awfully quiet,” Snape says, handing her a healing potion as she slowly sits up in the hospital cot. “After two weeks of delirious raving about Dolohov’s curse and how much you hate him—and I’m skipping over your… embellishments—I was expecting to need some calming draughts on hand for when you awoke.” 

Hermione wants to laugh at the absurdity of it all (calming draughts, really?) but all she can do is give a half-hearted shrug. She lets her eyes travel up Snape’s lean frame as she tilts her head back to drink the potion. He’s standing ramrod straight, his face nearly expressionless. 

Back to the beginning again. She feels something shrivel in the pit of her stomach.

“Dolohov was bluffing,” she says. She wants to fling the empty vial against the wall until it shatters, but Snape takes it from her clenched hand as she draws it back. 

“He nearly killed you.” Snape’s tone is as gentle as he can probably manage while still sounding perplexed. 

“Yes, but it was with something boring and uninspired. ‘Sanguis Exulceratio.’” 

Snape pauses for a long moment, furrowing his brow. “Blood and decay,” he mutters. “Certainly effective, and that would track with your injuries, but are you sure that’s the entirety of the spell? Surely it must—” 

“That’s it,” Hermione cuts in and sighs. “That’s all it is. I saw inside his head. Saw him casting it; saw him bragging about it with this self-satisfied sort of—feeling.”

“You saw… How?” he asks, sitting stiffly in the chair beside her.

“I used Legilimency. I’ll explain, in a bit, but”—she waves her hand lazily, dismissively—“damn. I just… I thought it would be something more impressive.” 

At this, Snape gives an unexpected huff that sounds like it could be a stifled laugh. 

“Didn’t you?” she asks.

“For quite some time now,” he concedes, inclining his head. “But Dolohov was always rather uncreative.” 

“It just doesn’t make any sense,” Hermione says, feeling the familiar burst of irritation fire up in her chest. 

“You’ve just explained it all—what’s not making sense?” 

She braces herself. “The strange sort of time loop I’m stuck in.” 

She can’t keep her growing hopelessness from clouding every scene from her memories, even as Snape gently gives her space between each one.

She leaves out the time they kissed entirely again. Perhaps it’s selfish of her, or perhaps too generous, but she can’t bear to let this new version of him see how embarrassingly smitten she had become back when she still had hope.

“Well, fuck.” 

“I know.” 

“But even being cursed twice by that spell of Dolohov’s shouldn’t change the outcome—”

“I know.” 

“And the fact that it was non-verbal the first time should mean it would be less effective—”

“I know.”  

What Hermione doesn’t know, however, is how any of it makes sense.

She lies in bed and stares off into the middle distance, wondering what use becoming the Master of Death had been when she still didn’t actually die. It’s ironic, she thinks, that so many have sought immortality from the title only to find themselves perishing in their attempts, while all she wants is to become mortal again.

The Resurrection Stone leaving her alone and unmoored was like some twisted garnish on top of the whole experience. She had no one. No one to help her through her last moments. Would that still hold true in the future? 

And will the future even happen if she’s relegated to this Sisyphean pattern for the rest of her existence?

She had been so convinced that Dolohov’s curse had been the cause of it all, and now that she knows the truth, she can’t quite accept it. What else had happened in the DOM? What had given Luna the strange visions and given her this?   

Her dreams are listless and destination-less, and when she wakes, her thoughts are muddled. 

“I think Dumbledore was right,” she says, sighing, when Snape visits the next morning. “I don’t think I can do anything about the horcrux inside Harry.”

In fact, the horcrux probably meant they were doomed from the moment they appeared at Malfoy Manor, what with Voldemort’s sudden ability to sense that Harry was there, somehow. A connection that would draw them closer; a tether that would shorten until they ultimately met their fate.

“The potion was only one hypothesis,” he begins, but Hermione shrugs listlessly.

“He said that we can’t change what’s been predestined. That he’s looked into it, too.”

“I can tell from your memories that your trust in him is… somewhat lacking,” Snape says, sitting in the chair by her bedside. Her jar of healing ointment is in his hands, and he spins it back and forth as he thinks.

“I’ve heard something similar before, though,” she continues. “From Luna. Prophecies are woven into the fabric of spacetime; fundamental and unchangeable aspects of time. We can’t break them. I can change almost anything by going back, but not… not that. We can’t circumvent the fact that Harry has to face Voldemort on his own.” 

“He’s faced him once before, in your memories,” Snape says softly. “Is it such a letdown that you’re free of just one self-assigned obligation?”

“I thought I could save him,” she says, tears welling up against her will. “I know he’s alive and well at the Dursleys right now, I just”—she angrily dashes them away as they fall—“I didn’t know it would be so hard to watch him die like that. He had so much hope. He was so convinced that it would work—that we’d—that I’d not fail him—”

“Granger, you have to reassess your constant need to assume responsibility for everything and everyone—” 

“That’s rich, coming from you—”

“Yes, and I’ve earned that responsibility,” he cuts in sharply. “Everything that fell apart was my fault.” With his next exhale, he appears calmer, more distant. “You might think yourself at fault, but trust me: you aren’t.” 

It doesn’t feel that way. Doesn’t feel that way at all.

It only goes downhill from there.

What is there to say about the rest of Hermione’s current loop other than she loses herself somewhere in time? 

She dies three days later, when she sneaks away to visit the library to confirm her research about the immutability of prophecies and forgets to bring another healing potion with her. 

And this time, undoubtedly, it’s all her fault.

Chapter Text

She wakes in the hospital wing, clenching the sheets in her hands in frustration.

“It’s all just so meaningless,” she says, as she accepts the healing potion from Snape. She holds it up to him as if to prove her point, and he motions for her to drink. She presses her lips together and stares at it in her hand for a long moment before she finally does. 

“I should hope the countless hours I’ve spent brewing this outside of my usual work responsibilities aren’t ‘meaningless,’” he says sharply, snatching the empty vial from her outstretched hand. 

Hermione ignores his barbed comment and continues, “I think the only solution is for me to figure out how to die for real.” 

Snape stares her down, unblinking, then calls, “Madame Pomfrey, I should have no reason to doubt your diagnostic abilities, but has anyone checked that Granger didn’t suffer any intracranial effects from Dolohov’s curse?”

“Don’t worry,” Hermione says absently. “Sanguis Exulceratio basically just creates a giant flesh wound.” 

Snape drops her empty vial where it shatters on the stone floor. “What did you just say?” 

She meets his eyes, tuning out Madame Pomfrey’s approaching footsteps and the whoosh of her spell work to clear the broken glass. 

“Sanguis Exulceratio. Dolohov’s curse.”

“There’s no way that can be the entire incantation. It’s never once been recorded in writing—”

“—Because he was deliberately keeping it secret, as though it were something complex and impressive?”

Snape narrows his eyes. 

“He was bluffing,” Hermione says. “And we fucking fell for it.” She takes a long, slow breath in and out. “Here, sit down. I’ll explain. Again.”

She bares it all this time. All her fears, her failures, her growing desire—everything—with Snape a steadfast presence in her mind. 

For the first time, she truly feels like she has nothing to hide anymore, falling headlong into raw, roiling honesty. She shows him the kiss, shows him the panicked longing as he traced her lip in the Manor, shows him the whisky she’d got him for Christmas all those timelines ago. Shows him her all-consuming guilt at failing again, and again, and again. 

It’s cathartic, this outpouring of her deepest emotions. It’s as if she can somehow cleanse herself of doubt if she only exposes enough. 

“Well,” Snape says, straightening in the chair beside her bed and clearing his throat. His eyes are fixed at a spot on the wall above her headboard. “Fuck.” 

She secretly loves the way his chin remains jutted out at the end of the ‘k,’ as if his facial expression alone could elongate the end of the word. It’s these little idiosyncrasies like these that feed her. Give her just enough to keep going. With every theory on Dolohov’s curse newly extinguished, her resolve needs to be rebuilt, brick by brick. And after that stunning display of apathy the last time, she’ll need to marshal her strength to investigate anything else that could be contributing to her time travel, her unhealthy fascination with Snape notwithstanding. 

And now he knows about it. 

Oh gods…

It’s times like these when she wishes she had a working Time Turner to—

The Time Turner!

A bolt of panic shoots up Hermione’s spine. “Where is it?”  

“Where’s what?” Snape asks, suddenly alert.

“I had it. In my pocket again. The time before last, but—did you—where—have you seen it? The Time Turner?” she pleads, her hands restlessly twisting the sheets. 

Snape shakes his head, then wordlessly summons her belongings from one of the storage areas. “Here are the robes you came in with,” he offers, face blank, but eyes never leaving her. 

She frantically searches the pockets, heart thudding in her ears, until—

The familiar prick of broken metal takes her by surprise. “Thank fuck,” she breathes, pulling it out. It looks the same as it always does; just as she must have left it last time, when she died with it still tucked away in the hospital wing. Her relief spreads throughout her body like one of Snape’s calming potions.

“Although on second thought,” she considers, “I’m not sure why I’m so thankful for something broken that I can’t fix.” 

“Perhaps a metaphor for your experience,” Snape says dryly beside her, and she can't help but laugh. He rises, summons a couple healing potions to place on her table, and makes to leave. “By the way, Granger, that was quite the speech back at the Manor. You gave the Dark Lord a run for his money.” 

“Not as good as yours at the start of defence,” she counters, before she can help it. “I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve heard it.”

He narrows his eyes in response and doesn’t acknowledge her statement—doesn’t acknowledge anything from what he must have seen in her thoughts. “I’ll work on your tooth capsule,” he says instead. “You should rest.” 

‘We don’t need a repeat of last time’ goes unsaid.

“I’ll think of what else we should—I should work on during this loop,” Hermione says, still studying the Time Turner in the harsh hospital wing lighting. 

Hesitantly, Snape reaches forward and curls her fingers around it. His hand is gentle, and he pulls away too soon. 

She wonders desperately what he’s thinking—what he’s feeling—after seeing her memories. But she can’t bring herself to ask. 

“I think you already know, Granger.”

He meant the Time Turner. He must have.

She wishes he meant something else. 

She works her way through several library books on the theory of time over the next several days (remembering extra healing potions this time) and is left with the same questions she always has. 

How and why did I find the Time Turner?

What purpose does it serve if I can never fix it?

When is Snape coming back to visit?

He brings her the same healing ointment, and she feels the same self consciousness creep into her cheeks when he watches her apply it. 

“If you’re ready,” he says, holding up the supplies for her tooth capsule. 

She nods, swallows, and opens her mouth.

She tries not to think about his lips taking the place of his hands, tries not to let the goosebumps across her arms show, tries not to meet his gaze as he finally pulls away after taking the mould. Are his cheeks flushed too? Perhaps he’s just embarrassed by everything she’s shown him so far. Creating the crown takes an agonizing minute of flustered silence until finally, mercifully, he charms it into place over her molar. 

She’s tempted to bite it just to end whatever strange atmosphere has descended around them, but then she catches sight of his face again.

He’s definitely blushing. 

She licks her lips.

“I didn’t take the vow with Narcissa,” he says, a little too loudly. “What are your plans for this next loop?” He turns away, cleaning up the equipment scattered on her small bedside table.

“I don’t know.” This she can do more easily; admit her shortcomings. After all, she still has no clue what even happened with Dolohov’s curse if it didn’t involve anything time-related. She sucks in a breath and lets it out and says, “I’m just so utterly done with watching Harry cheat off of your old Potions textbook and trying to pretend like I give half a fuck about Quidditch. I could place bets on all the matches, but what’s the point of making all that money if I end up just dying again and ending up back at the start?”

“The point is you can spend all of that money on whatever you want,” he says, turning back toward her. “And please don’t say that rare potions ingredients are the only things you want. I’ve seen inside your head.”

Hermione’s mouth goes dry. Surely he can’t mean—

“I’m certainly not about to blow it all on a Portkey somewhere warm,” she jokes, not willing to confront any of the implications of his last statement. 

“I feel like you’re using my past confessions against me.” He crosses his arms. 

“Hardly. You’ve confessed nothing that could even be considered half interesting to Rita Skeeter.” 

“Perhaps that’s why I haven’t been discovered as a spy.” 

“Perhaps,” Hermione concedes. She bites her lip, but it doesn’t stop her from letting out the question that’s been bugging her for ages, the idea of confession at the forefront of her thoughts. It comes out in a rush: “What was it with you and Lily having matching Patronuses and spending a month in detention?”

His eyebrows raise in genuine surprise. 

Apparently she’s not done completely humiliating herself, because she adds, “What was it, like, some soulmate thing?”

To his credit, Snape doesn’t laugh. He only looks completely bewildered. “No,” he says slowly. “More like some childhood thing.” 

“Oh.” 

“There was a doe painted on the closeboard fence on the playground where we first met.”

“Oh.” 

“It was half-falling apart, and there was this hole rotting where one of the hooves should have been, but—that was where we first practiced any magic.” He shrugs. “The month of detention was after Lily ran away into the forest fifth year—er, fifth year before the”—he clears his throat and steels himself—“and I went after her. We thought McGonagall was a Dementor when she found us—”

“You thought Professor McGonagall was a Dementor?” 

“Have you seen her with that hooded dressing gown? Bloody terrifying.”

“Right.” Hermione feels a wave of laughter bubble up inside her chest and forces it down. “That dressing gown is tartan, you know.” 

“Well it was nearly pitch black out, and we weren’t exactly looking at the pattern on it,” Snape says. “But yes. That’s when we found out. We accidentally knocked her out cold with the combined force of the spells.”

“And that’s why you got detention.” 

“And that’s why it was that much more bloody infuriating that Potter’s was a stag. Fucking copy cat.” 

“Copy stag.” 

He levels her with a glare. “Anyway,” he says pointedly.

“Anyway,” she echoes softly, “why did Lily run away into the forest?”

Snape frowns, a pained look flashing across his features before he says, “It’s not my story to tell. But as her best friend at the time, it was my job to pull her out of her lovesick self-pity—and the forest, as it were.” 

Lovesick self-pity? Best friend?

“It was a comfort, I think to both of us, to know that friendship could prevail over love when it came to that sort of thing. That something pure and innocent from childhood could carry us through broken hearts and growing up and whatever else life threw at us…” he trails off, clenching his teeth together. 

Friendship. Does that mean only friendship or—

“Are you going to tell Potter again this time?” Snape asks, abruptly changing the subject.

“I think I have to,” she says and sighs. “I can’t see any way around it. The issue is whom else to tell. You know, I’ve considered a light version of it; telling people I’m having ‘visions.’ And then I could start giving ‘prophecies’ and the like.” 

“You need to work on your delivery if you expect people to believe anything you say is a prophecy. At least let your voice go all raspy like Trelawney.” 

“I’ll also need a full bottle of sherry if you expect me to even think about Professor Trelawney right now—wait! Is that why her voice goes all raspy?” 

“No one knows the mysterious workings of Sybil’s abilities.” 

“Perhaps during this timeline, I’ll figure it out,” Hermione says, tilting her chin up. 

“I’m glad you’re putting your newfound immortality to good use,” Snape replies dryly, a small, barely noticeable smile tilting up the corners of his mouth. He takes one of the healing potions from her table and hands it to her. “It’s not sherry, but it’s strong stuff nonetheless.” 

Like always, she leaves the hospital wing with a list of books to acquire for the research that will fill the rest of her summer. And like always, she feels a strange pang in her chest when she says goodbye to Snape. 

“Set a reminder on your wand to take those potions,” he says, gesturing to the crate in her arms. “I’ll not have you trying to die of self-pity, and this is my attempt to head you off before you wander into the metaphorical forest.” 

“Does that mean we’re friends?” she asks, before she can help herself.

“I haven’t done what we’ve done with any of my friends,” he says, his voice smooth and deep. For a moment, he sways just half a step closer toward her, and then in a whirl of black, he’s gone.

His words linger like a ghost of breath across her ear all through the walk to Hogsmeade, phoning her parents, and being Apparated back to the Burrow. 

She almost misses Fleur handing her a glass of wine, and they only barely dodge Molly to sneak up the stairs to Hermione’s room.

“What did Molly say was for dinner? Some sort of bland, British perversion of cuisses de grenouille?” Fleur asks, taking a delicate sip from her glass.

Hermione is torn between offense and amusement. “Er—toad-in-the-hole. It tastes better than it sounds.”

“I am yet to be convinced. I still think it is all of the British food that is making Tonks so sad.” 

“I heard you were going to cook for her sometime?” Hermione offers, biting her lip. She’s had this conversation half a dozen times before, and yet, somehow, she’s nervous this time. 

“I’d like to, but it is silly. Molly said I shouldn’t. That I do not understand. But I think she is the one who does not understand.”

“You’re right. You should have Tonks over; cook for her. I’m sure the gesture alone would help her feel better.” 

“What if she doesn’t like it?” Fleur asks, then more quietly, “What if she doesn’t like me?”

“Then that’s her loss.” 

They head back down for dinner, and after, Hermione lets Fleur walk her through all the different options for the menu as they finish the bottle of wine. Fleur writes a drunken owl to Tonks, and Hermione sends it before she can change her mind. All in all, this timeline is looking good so far.

Best not get too attached.

In the middle of the night, Harry arrives, and Hermione tells him everything. (Everything except her feelings toward Snape, beyond the fact that she trusts him.) She even tells him things she probably shouldn’t, like getting Katie and Ron killed during her first timeline back, and things that don’t matter, like those love potion chocolates and the Quidditch match outcomes and her brief, stupid fling with Cormac McLaggen. He takes a moment to notice how long her hair has gotten (she really should get it cut), and then the next few minutes are spent answering the same questions as last time—about Sirius, about what had happened during the final battle—until Harry asks, “So what happened the last time we tried this?”

“Er”—Hermione swallows—“you sort of—well we all sort of—”

“Died?”

“...Yep.”

“Oh.” He nods. “Cool. Well. I’ll try not to this time, I guess.” 

“Erm. Thanks?” 

“Anytime. Hey, for real though, it will be any time, since you can just start over—”

“Oh my god,” Hermione says, fighting off her laughter, but it’s easy to fall back into stride with one of her best friends. They’ll find their way like they always do. 

The train ride back to Hogwarts is the perfect time to loop Ron and Luna in like usual, and with Crookshanks in her lap, Hermione feels her hope renewed. It’s strange, not having the usual questions about boom berries and potions ingredients swirling around in her head as she stares out the window, but instead ones of the battle at the DOM and her broken Time Turner, and wondering how to access a memory of something her consciousness can’t quite reach; how to grasp a concept her mind can’t quite observe from any useful angle.

“The Dark Arts are many, varied, ever-changing, and eternal,” Snape begins as he strides into the classroom. Hermione tries in vain to quell the rush of blood to her face as she watches him. 

“The moment you’re convinced of your ability to fight them, of your understanding of reality, of your very existence, they will snatch it away and leave you reeling.” 

She freezes, finding his dark eyes flitting to hers for the briefest moment. 

“How does one adapt?” he asks, stalking around the room. “How can one develop defences that are as flexible and inventive as the arts one seeks to undo?” He stops in front of Hermione. 

She squares her shoulders and says, “We keep trying.”

“Exactly,” he responds, as if they’re the only two people in the room. “We make our own destiny.”

The first week of classes feels like a familiar, nostalgic dream, and Hermione waits until the weekend to revisit the Chamber of Secrets again with Harry, telling him the details of the failed topical potion from the last loop as they descend. 

“I don’t think we should try modifying it again,” she says firmly, opening her bag to collect the fangs. “If the Basilisk venom didn’t eradicate the horcrux when you were bitten during our second year, it probably won’t do anything now.” 

Harry sets his jaw. “Dumbledore told me about the prophecy—that we’d have to face each other—but if part of his soul is attached to me, then… that means I still have to let him kill me. Like the first time.”

Hermione nods, then catches herself and amends, “Maybe not though. There might be another way to remove the horcrux from inside your scar—” 

“No. If what you said is true and the timeline will restart after you die anyway, then I might as well try something different. It’s easier that way. Let him kill me. Let him think he’s won. And then you can see if I come back like I did the first time.” He grins at her, tossing in a fang with a deft hand, as if the whole thing is just so simple. 

“And then what?”

He blinks.

“If you come back like the first time, then you’ll still have to face him again. But beyond that… You’ll have to kill him, Harry. What happened with the Elder wand, it was… I don’t think we can recreate it. Not without other people dying,” she says, thinking of Snape and how Voldemort had killed him over the wand. 

Harry’s face is pale in the dim light, and she suddenly feels like she should have softened the knowledge, somehow. “But hey. We have virtually infinite time to figure it out. You know I won’t let anything become permanent unless we’ve saved as many people as we can—”

“Don’t,” Harry says quietly. “You don’t have to placate me like that. I can figure something out too; you’re not the only one responsible.”

Startled by the strange way his words seem to mirror Snape’s from the last timeline, she bites her lip and doesn’t protest. She hopes he’s right. 

Snape adds Hermione to his lab wards again when she visits him for office hours. Her hand lingers on the cold stone for just a moment longer than necessary as she studies his own pale fingers in the dim light. 

“Thought you might like these again,” she says, dumping out the Basilisk fangs onto the counter after they step inside. 

“For the sleeper agent poison,” he confirms. “It’s odd that I’ve brewed it before. Right now I’m still hung up on the fourth stage and how long to let it simmer—” 

“Forty-three minutes,” Hermione says automatically. “Er—sorry if you wanted to figure that out on your own”

“It’s fine,” he says stiffly, beginning to set up the equipment to extract the Basilisk venom. 

“I don’t know how to be less… irritating about the whole thing,” Hermione says. “It’s impossible sometimes, knowing the outcome before we even begin, and yet it’s still exciting to notice all the little ways things are different.” 

“I’m surprised you’re not bored of the whole endeavor,” he says, picking up one of the fangs.

“Sometimes,” she admits. “Classes, for instance. I don’t even waste mental energy thinking about them anymore, since none of it matters. But other things. Things like…” 

‘Things like you’ almost comes out, but she veers away. “Things like Fleur. At the Burrow. She’s having second thoughts about the wedding—about her relationship with Bill, even. And I think she might have a… situation with Tonks, but I never get enough time to get the details.” 

Snape pauses, setting the fang aside carefully. “With Tonks?”

Hermione nods. “She invited her over for breakfast, and I never found out what happened. I suppose I could owl her about it, as long as I find a way to keep Molly Weasley from intercepting—”

“There’s no need.” 

“What?”

“There’s no need for the owl,” he repeats. “Breakfast was a success.” 

“How do you know?” she asks, incredulous. 

“Apart from spending years as a double agent,” he says smirking, “Tonks told me.” 

“What?”

“And the ‘situation’ you describe is exactly what you’d expect. They had—Salazar, I can’t believe I’m saying this”—he grimaces—“a... ‘moment’ after a stakeout, as Tonks described it. And then somehow, probably because I was the only one awake and sober at Grimmauld at the time, she proceeded to subject me to every agonizing detail of her conflicted emotions—” he breaks off and shrugs. “And now I’m the lucky recipient of updates.” 

“You’ve been holding out on me all this time!” Hermione accuses, dropping her fang and throwing her arms up in the air. “You knew this happened and never told me?”

“I’m telling you now, aren’t I? You can’t possibly blame my past iterations for not disclosing personal information that didn’t involve you.”

“Oh gods, I could have set them up ages ago!” 

He squints at her in confusion. “You’ve been spending whole timelines trying to set them up?”

“Not entire timelines, no. Just… every time I go back to the Burrow, I just know something wasn’t the same with Fleur. And I know it probably makes me a terrible person to try to split up her and Bill, but she’s not convinced he loves her. Or loves her for the right reasons. I guess I never thought about what it must be like, being part Veela and always having that question in the back of your mind…” she trails off and shrugs. “I suppose the older I get, the more I doubt the things I used to take for granted.”

She thinks back to the time they posted up at Shell Cottage, of the tireless way Fleur tended to all of them, the way she cooked and cleaned and healed and cried and never once stopped to rest. Where had Bill been? What would it have been like, having Tonks there instead?

Snape reaches for another fang in silence, and Hermione watches him work, wondering what she’s been taking for granted with him as well.

The first Hogsmeade trip goes off without a hitch, and Hermione, Ron, and Harry successfully destroy the locket and the cursed necklace in an abandoned classroom without involving Dumbledore. They leave the diadem alone for the time being, unsure how long they’ll need its interfering influence over Draco’s attempts to repair the vanishing cabinet. 

They leave the Elder Wand alone as well. 

“I still think the hallows are all just smoke and mirrors,” Hermione grumbles, still bitter over her experience having them in her possession. “I can’t believe that Voldemort thinks they’ll do anything for him.”  

“Do you think it would have worked?” Harry asks. “Without the wand? The first time, I mean.” 

Hermione thinks back to the battle and then even earlier, to when Harry had told her and Ron about the strange connection between his wand and Voldemort’s after the Triwizard Tournament, and says, honestly, “I’m not sure.”

What would it mean for their two wands to face off again like the first time? Wouldn’t an even match like that make more sense than some fairytale? Who decides a wand’s “rightful” owner anyway? The questions gnaw at Hermione’s thoughts the rest of the evening.

Vault has been emptied. Sleeper agent potion making steady progress.

Between the classes that seem to last entire eternities in themselves, Hermione burns through the rest of the library’s references on the nature of time. 

None of it makes any sense. She can’t find any record of anyone else who’s experienced something like she has. And, she realizes, even if they did, who would have believed them? What’s more, if word got out, how many others would attempt to emulate the situation themselves for personal gain—for immortality? No, it’s too risky to put in writing; to share with anyone in whom she doesn’t possess the utmost trust.

The weather turns grey and cold outside of the library window.

She misses every Quidditch game and doesn’t even feel guilty about it.

She watches Ron and Luna grow closer without her interference and a comforting peace takes the place where her nostalgia once lived. 

All the while, she wonders why she keeps coming back if not for Dolohov’s curse. Is there some task she’s supposed to fulfill? Some hoop she’s supposed to jump through to be granted a normal existence? 

And how does Snape factor into all of it?

“The potion is nearly complete,” he tells her as she visits his office hours at the start of winter. “It seems like last time, I was able to dose Nagini as well as several others at the Manor with it before we broke in.” 

Hermione nods, wishing he’d told her who, exactly, he’d managed to poison so that she had more details to wield against the constant drag of worry. She can’t help but remember how he ended up dead when he went after Bellatrix—can’t help but fear something will happen to him again. 

Or Harry. Because Godric knows he’s at an even higher risk of doing something reckless.

“Harry wants to try to willingly sacrifice himself this time,” she says, slumping into the chair in front of his desk. 

He rests his head on one hand and grumbles, “Ever the martyr.” 

“I don’t know if it will work.”

“It worked the first time, didn’t it?” he asks, rising to a stand. He spells open the door to his quarters and gestures for Hermione to follow. 

“Yes, but he didn’t know that he’d come back. Dumbledore seemed to have been convinced that a total willingness to die was the necessary component. Like with the Sorcerer’s Stone. Sort of like a paradox.”

“The Headmaster does love his thought experiments,” Snape says, shifting the messy stack of parchments off of his couch to take a seat. 

Hermione hesitates, staring at her familiar armchair across from him, which is still covered in books. In another timeline outside of their current circumstance, a version of her probably goes over to it and takes the familiar seat by the fire. 

This Hermione squares her shoulders and makes her way to the couch. 

“I’m sure he has knowledge we lack,” she says, continuing the conversation as the hem of her robes brushes against him—as if some fundamental shift in the universe hasn’t just occurred when he turns toward her, his knees now inches from hers. 

“But the longer you go on, the more knowledge you gain as well,” he says. 

She nods, throat suddenly dry, and says, “Speaking of which.” 

He raises a brow in question, and she plows ahead: “When you were in my memories, what did you experience? How much of my thoughts were you able to see?” She forces herself not to hunch her shoulders or turn away in embarrassment, even as blood rushes to her face. 

“It’s not that I know for certain. It’s more just… glimpses. Of how you’re feeling. And when I catch sight of myself, it’s easier for me to read what I must have been thinking…” he trails off, looking down. 

“What were you thinking? The times when we got close?” she asks, shifting closer. Her heart beats frantically against her ribs. 

“That you were a bad idea,” he says. He meets her gaze then, and she can see the faint lick of flame reflected in his dark irises. 

“I’m full of bad ideas,” she whispers. 

“You can’t mean—”

She cuts him off, suddenly unable to bear another moment of reasoning, and leans forward. “Tell me to stop, and I will.” 

He must remember seeing those words fall from his own lips in her memories, she thinks, as she watches his stunned expression. What must it be like, knowing that she remembered, knowing she had to have replayed them again and again and again in her mind? 

He doesn’t tell her to stop. 

Gathering her courage, she touches her lips to his. 

For a moment he remains frozen, and she wonders if she acted too soon, but then he lets out the softest of moans as he begins to kiss her back. His hands find their way to her hair and he gathers a gentle fistful of it, the tingle in her scalp making her gasp and open her mouth to him. His kisses grow more urgent against her, and she can feel the sharp, shallow breaths he takes each time their lips part, as if he’s trying not to steal her air.

Take it, she wants to say, but the words are lost somewhere in her throat as she moans, gripping his shoulders and pulling him toward her. They tumble backwards, and for a moment she feels the full, warm weight of him against her before he lifts up on his elbows to kiss her again, sliding his tongue along hers as he strokes one hand down her waist to her hip.

She clutches at his shoulders, her back arching as he moves to begin kissing across her jaw, down her neck. There’s something slightly unhinged about the way his mouth roves across her skin, as though he somehow thinks it’s the only chance he’ll get—

And it might be, she realizes, before she shoves the thought away in favor of unfastening her robes and beginning to unbutton her blouse. 

Snape sighs against her collarbone as she pulls the fabric aside, teeth nipping her there gently and sending a jolt of want straight to her core. She shifts her hips underneath him, freeing one leg to wrap around his waist. The hard length of him presses against her stomach now, and she writhes against it, seeking more friction. 

His breath catches on a strangled groan, hips pressing back against her instinctively. She glances up to see his eyes closed, his usually pale lips flushed. She reaches up to kiss him again, dragging her nails up his spine and feeling him shudder against her. 

Then she slides her hands to the buttons on his shirt.

“We shouldn’t,” he says gruffly, breaking away for a moment, but then he hovers closer. 

She bites her lip, unsure of what to say to make him cast his hesitation aside, and he stares at the motion like he wants to devour her. Her breath is shaky, and she tries to calm it, afraid to disturb the precarious balance in the air between them. 

“We shouldn’t,” he repeats, more firmly this time. He shifts off of her, and she feels the loss of him. “Her—Granger, we can’t. I can’t.” Suddenly he’s pushing himself upright, then scrambling off of the couch and backing away from her.

“Why not?” she asks, her voice small. The cold air of the dungeons hits the strip of exposed skin across her abdomen, the spot on her collarbone that had felt so hot moments ago under his lips.

“You know why,” he snaps, raking a hand through his hair. He’d washed it, she notes belatedly. She wishes she’d had the foresight to run her own fingers through it when she still had the chance.

“Get out,” he tells her, gesturing sharply to the door, which opens forcefully, striking the opposite wall. “Please,” he adds, and the way his voice cracks on the word makes a sob threaten to burst from her chest.

She gathers her things, refusing to let herself cry in front of him and his harsh dismissal, and storms out, letting the door slam closed behind her.

Later, in the dark of her dorm with her duvet around her shoulders and Crookshanks making biscuits against her legs, she replays his words.

“You know why.” 

And she does. 

She knows that it’s selfish to want to steal these moments for herself when he can carry nothing forward into the next loop. But another part of her wonders how much self-denial forms a part of Snape’s pride. Would it be so awful to let go, even for just a short time?

She wishes she had thought of one last barb to fling at him on her way out. Something biting that would cut him as deeply as he had wounded her. Something like, ‘I don’t know why you’re such a coward.’ 

The next morning, Snape is absent from breakfast. He's gotten McGonagall to cover all his classes for the rest of the week.

Hermione stabs at her sausages with her fork and seethes. Of course he’d leave now. When he knew she still has classes and exams and can’t follow. Some sick part of her wonders if he’s going off to get himself killed just to avoid having a real conversation with her. She shoves her plate back and folds her arms. Either that or he’s giving her an out in some faux-noble act of self sacrifice. 

All the same, it’s up to her to figure out how this timeline ends. 

She skips her morning classes and wanders the halls, no longer caring if anyone catches her. Her anger fades, and in its place, the questions she’s been forcing down rise to the surface of her thoughts. 

What has been triggering the time loops? Why is she stuck? And what happened back at the DOM?

A sudden idea strikes her as she passes by the gargoyle by the Headmaster’s office. 

“Sugar quills,” she says, and makes her way up the staircase.

“Oh. You’re here.” In hindsight, she shouldn’t be startled to see Dumbledore in his own office, but the sight of him and his blackened, cursed hand still takes her by surprise.

“Good morning to you too, Hermione,” he says mildly. “If I’m not mistaken, classes are currently in session.” 

“I’m aware. I need to borrow the Pensieve. It’s rather urgent, I’m afraid,” she responds.

“Of course,” he says and doesn’t move. “While you’re here, there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you about.” 

She freezes, suddenly nervous. 

“I know you and Harry have been discussing the prophecy, amongst other things,” he begins.

She feels the brush of Legilimency against her mind and shuts her eyes tightly. How could she so easily have forgotten about Harry’s private lessons with Dumbledore? She had been so fixated on everything else—

“And while I applaud your efforts, some aspects of his duty are not to be shared with you and Ron just yet. You must understand that he must fight some battles alone.” 

“Of course I understand,” she says evenly, wondering what he’s getting at. Wondering what Harry’s told him—either intentionally or inadvertently through Legilimency. 

“He must go willingly to face Lord Voldemort,” Dumbledore explains, his voice suddenly cold. “You cannot coax him into believing some myth that he might yet survive; losing hope might be the necessary condition for his success.”

A beat of pointed silence, then she hears him rise and move toward the cabinet. Opening her eyes finally, she finds him gesturing for her to approach the Pensieve. She swallows down her dread and steps forward.

“Tread carefully, Hermione.” And with that he turns away, leaving her to her thoughts. 

Inside the stone basin, the mist shifts, dimensionless, and it reminds her of a tiny trapped galaxy—like the Space Room in the Department of Mysteries. She summons everything she can remember about the battle there and touches her wand to her temple.

Diving in does feel briefly like floating in the Space Room.

All around her, the Pensieve mist swirls. It reminds her of the grainy static of a TV whose antennae have been knocked to the side, or one of those dust storms she’s read about that happen in the desert. Of course her memory of this would be a formless haze, she realizes. She’d nearly died and spent Godric knows how long unconscious on the ground. Still, this is one dead end she needs to confirm for herself. She peers through the coarse fog, spinning around to try to get her bearings, but it’s no use. There’s nothing she can see; no concrete image of what transpired; only the drifts of grey and a rush in her ears that sounds like she’s caught in a windstorm—

“Granger.”

The voice sounds so distant, she’s not sure if she’s just hallucinating, but she rewinds the memory back in time several moments until she hears it again. 

Peering through the dust and murkiness, she sees nothing other than a dark shadow. 

She tumbles out of the Pensieve and smooths her hair before dashing out of the office. 

It can’t have been, she thinks, her pulse quickening as she descends the spiral steps. 

It only sounded familiar because I’ve been thinking about him.

Her feet pound against the ground as she rushes down the hallway. 

If he knew anything about the DOM, he would have told me.

She rounds the corner and trips in her haste—

Or maybe he did tell me. 

She’s been avoiding the lab all day, afraid of what he might have written to her—and perhaps more afraid of the fact that he might not have written her anything at all. But there’s too much at stake now, and she sets her jaw and lets her feet carry her down the stairs, through the dark corridors, and into the hall by Snape’s office. 

She reaches the cracked stone wall and places a shaking hand against it. 

Time to find out.

The note is longer than any other she’s received from him. Her hands still tremble as she lifts it up to read.

I owe you more of an explanation than this, but this is all I can manage.

I know, somewhat selfishly, that I can’t keep you indefinitely here. This timeline isn’t the one destined to last, and that knowledge has grown harder and harder to bear the longer we’ve gone on together. 

Here are my notes on how to solve a portion of your temporal displacement. I’ve avoided sharing them because I couldn’t get your hopes up—or my own—as this will require another batch of ingredients worth your life savings, and thus necessitate another try at the beginning of the next loop.

By the time you read this, I will have destroyed the diadem and the goblet and given the sleeper agent potion to Nagini and Bellatrix. I know how you feel about my dealing with Bellatrix, but please know that you’re reason enough to risk everything I would be capable of risking. 

All her previous ire leaves her in a rush, and guilt settles into place. So it wasn’t about the DOM, but about fixing the time loop. About helping her. She reads the letter again—and again—and then leafs through the stack of notes he’s left her. Boom berries. Elderflower. Moonstone. Everything that had never quite worked in the past. So why would the next time be any different? She flips to the second to last page, scanning his writing, searching for any clue—

“Hermione!” 

She whips around to see the silver glow of a Patronus, a small terrier scurrying toward her feet. 

“Harry’s scar has started acting up again,” it says in Ron’s voice. “He thinks something’s happening at the Manor.” 

“Shit,” she utters under her breath, shuffling Snape’s notes back into a stack and snatching them up. She tries to steady her breathing as she raises her wand, racking her mind for a happy memory. All those pure moments from her childhood seem to belong to someone else now, she realizes. Casting her first spell, seeing the great hall for the first time and experiencing the newness, the joy—now all she feels is trapped whenever she sets foot back at Hogwarts, only more aware of the futility of her situation. She thinks of Snape, of how he managed to hold onto those innocent moments enough to have a matching Patronus with his best friend, even though the fence in his memory was broken and falling apart—

She thinks of how he kissed her, knowing that version of him wouldn’t get another chance, of the smile he gave her back at the hospital wing this time, of all their morbid jokes about immortality and death—

“Expecto Patronum!” she shouts, and from the end of her wand bursts a thestral, galloping around in a swirl of silver. 

“Get ready to break in. I’ll be there soon.”

She arrives back at Gryffindor Tower panting and still clutching Snape’s notes, unable to read the rest during her sprint through the castle. 

“We have a plan,” Ron tells her as soon as she tumbles through the portrait hole. Beside him, Harry grins, one hand pressed against his forehead and the other holding up the invisibility cloak. 

With Hermione and Ron under a Disillusionment and Harry under the cloak, they sneak back through the halls, peering around the corners to avoid detection. It’s surprisingly difficult during the middle of the day, especially between classes when the rush of students forces them to press up against the walls. She didn’t have time to change back into her robes from the DOM, and she clutches the Time Turner tightly in her pocket, praying she can still take it with her this way. They make it, finally, to the grounds, and Hermione almost breathes a sigh of relief, when a voice from the side calls out, “Oi! You there!”

They freeze in place.

A tall girl in Hufflepuff robes approaches. “I dunno where you think you’re off to, but the greenhouse is that way, since afternoon classes started up ten minutes ago,” she says, and it takes Hermione a moment to register her voice as she draws nearer—

“Fuck,” Hermione mutters. Leanne Baker. Hufflepuff and Head Girl. Katie Bell’s friend and the one who can always somehow detect when someone is hiding under a charm. The one who’d asked if she was okay—and genuinely meant it—when she’d noticed Hermione skiving off every prefect meeting this year. The one who actually cares about student safety and wouldn’t hesitate to go to Dumbledore himself with any concerns. Which is the last thing they fucking need. 

“Time for the backup plan,” Ron says beside her, and even though he’s still Disillusioned, Hermione knows the wink he must have given her. The same one as Fred and George. The one that means he’s got something devious and morally questionable up his sleeve.

“Leanne,” he says, canceling the Disillusionment and stepping away from her and Harry. “Er, sorry you had to find me like this. I was just going to try to sneak a few minutes of Quidditch practice in.” 

“But Ron, you’re a prefect. You should be setting an example…”

As they continue talking, Hermione and Harry start to edge away, hoping Leanne won’t notice the flutter of movement as Hermione ducks under the cloak. They carefully tiptoe to a nearby tree and hide behind it, glancing over to see Ron leading Leanne back toward the castle. 

The last thing Hermione catches before she and Harry make for the Apparition point at the edge of the grounds is Ron’s friendly tone asking, “Would you like some chocolate?”

They land with a thud outside Malfoy Manor, Harry bending over with his hands on his knees as if he might be sick.

His scar must really be bothering him, Hermione thinks. She braces an arm around his shoulder and leads him to the secret entrance at the side, when he stops and shrugs her off.

“You take this way in,” Harry says, stepping back.

“What?” Hermione pauses, momentarily blindsided by the change in plan. They always go in through the hidden house elf entrance—well, she always does, and Harry did the last time, she amends, but… “Where else are you going?” 

“I have to face him this time. No more sneaking around. I’ll send you a Patronus if it works.” Harry nods and starts to turn away, tossing out over his shoulder, “I’m going through the front door.” 

“Rash, impulsive, idiotic, completely disruptive, foolhardy, dangerous…” 

Snape’s words from a previous timeline ring in her ears with every step through the treacherous cursed halls. Of course Harry would do something like this. When does Harry ever not do something like this?

And worst of all, it makes sense this time. He’s right. He has to face Voldemort head-on if they’re to test the prophecy again. She prays that Dumbledore’s theory is wrong—that Harry doesn’t have to remain ignorant of the possibility that the horcrux might be killed instead of him; that he might come back after it’s destroyed. 

Her thoughts swarm around her as she tries to steer clear of whoever is inside, remembering to avoid the doorknobs, the latches. It’s so much more challenging this time, not having a mission to accomplish, but simply waiting.  

Waiting for Harry to die. 

Waiting, anxiety roiling in her gut, for him to come back to life. 

She hesitates, one foot poised, in the hall that leads to the east wing. If Bellatrix isn't away in France like usual, it's a risk to explore any area of the manor at all. And Snape had already said he would have destroyed the goblet by now. And if she’s learned anything, he’s a man of his word. And yet… 

And yet, she still selfishly clings to the hope that it might all work out this time. That she’ll break through the wards of the room to find him waiting for her, whisky in hand.

It’s completely fucking stupid. 

She goes anyway. 

A low rumble shakes the manor just as she’s opening the door to find the room empty.

She shuts it and replaces the wards, fear churning in her stomach as she wonders what it must mean. She forces herself to focus instead on the silver box with the goblet, painstakingly disarming the spells around it to check if Snape had indeed destroyed the horcrux. 

Shouts and cheers reverberate from below, and her breath catches as she hears the piercing, cold words, “Harry Potter is dead.” 

Dread settles low in her belly as Hermione replaces the box on the shelf and curls up in the corner of the room to wait. 

Seconds bleed into minutes, and clutching her wand in her hand and staring at the door is proving more difficult with each passing breath. 

She reaches one hand into her pocket and traces the sharp metal of the broken Time Turner, letting the sensation of it ground her in space and wishing for something to read. She briefly contemplates breaking open The Complete Works of John Milton from the shelf, when she realizes her remaining moments here are better spent memorizing the rest of Snape’s notes that he left her. 

She reaches into her other pocket, trying to remember where she had left off on the second-to-last page—

Fuck.

It’s empty. 

She frantically searches the rest of her clothes—she had them, back at Hogwarts, right in her hands—there’s no way she could have left them behind—

Voldemort’s voice interrupts her thoughts. “Welcome back, Hermione Granger.”  

The hairs on the back of her neck stand up, and she scrambles to rise, wand out. 

“Your friend, who I just killed by the way, seemed to think it wise to share your presence here.” 

What? There’s no way Harry would—

“Oh, you’re right, there’s no way he would intentionally share anything.” 

Of course he’d tear through Harry’s thoughts. Belatedly, Hermione realizes he has to be using some strange extended form of Legilimency to communicate. She swallows, squaring her shoulders. She’s been here before, and she’ll likely be here again, and she’s not going to let her fear take her back to the hospital wing until the last possible moment. 

“And that’s the intriguing part. You have been here before,” Voldemort continues. 

“I have,” she confirms. “And wouldn’t you like to know how?” Stalling always seems so obvious, but perhaps he doesn’t think of it as stalling—he wouldn’t know that Harry could—

“I’ll save you the trouble of torturing me to find out,” she blurts, veering away from Harry and the horcrux before her thoughts can become too apparent. “It happens whenever I die.” 

“Well then, it should be fun getting to kill you repeatedly.” 

“Hardly. It’s not as if you’ll remember. You know the last time I died simply out of carelessness? It doesn’t matter that my own regard for my life is likely less than yours; I came back. I could jump off of the Astronomy Tower and wake right back up a few floors down and several months back and no one would be the wiser.”

“There are ways—”

“I’ve told you already. I’ve seen it happen. I’ve seen you die. I’ve burned and stabbed and cursed the pieces of your soul across time, and I’ll do it again, and still: none of it matters.” 

Shouts sound from the hall, and Hermione realizes her moments are numbered. Just like the last time, using herself as bait means eventually getting caught. 

She traces her tongue along her tooth capsule and braces herself.

None of it matters.

Not now, not without an answer to the time loops, not without Harry, not without Snape—

A silver stag bursts through the door, just before it explodes. Hermione can’t hear the words from Harry’s Patronus over the ringing in her ears, but its mere presence boosts her spirits; Dumbledore was wrong. Harry can face death and know that he might have another chance. 

Just like her. 

Her triumph evaporates the moment the smoke clears.

A group of Death Eaters stands in the doorway, wands raised. 

For a moment, all Hermione can do is feel her stomach sink. This could have been it—could have been the timeline where they defeated Voldemort and had the rest of their lives to figure out how to break the loop. If she could just get to Harry—if she could just find Snape and the rest of his notes—if she only had a bit more time—

As it stands, she only has a fraction of a second to raise her wand in defence—

“Incarcerous—”

“Stupefy—”

“Avada Kedavra—”

“SECTUMSEMPRA!”

Hermione dives to the side of the room, just barely dodging the flash of green, one thick black rope catching on her ankle and tugging her sharply so that she lands with a sickening crunch on her side. Wincing against the searing pain in her ribs, she sits up, wand still in hand, to find three bodies in Death Eater robes collapsed on the ground, one stunned by her spell and the other two bleeding and unconscious, covered in large gaping wounds.

And Snape in the doorway.

He’s bruised and bloody, one eye purple and swollen shut, his usually immaculate robes torn and singed, and he’s never looked more glorious. 

“Nagini’s dead,” he says, panting. “And so is Bellatrix.” 

“Are you alright?” Hermione says, staggering to her feet. What a senseless thing to ask—of course he isn’t alright, and neither is she, she realizes, swaying and hunched over against the pain flaring in her side with every breath. She pulls him quickly down the hall and into another room, slams the door, and locks and wards it shut.

In the distance, more shouts ring out, and a high, hair-raising scream: “What have you done—”

“Granger,” Snape rasps, stumbling as he grips both her arms. “I only found you to tell you: you need to make a checkpoint.” 

“A what?”

“A checkpoint—a place to tether yourself so you reset at a good spot—so that we reset—”

'So that we reset—'

Something about that statement tugs at Hermione’s panicked thoughts, but they’re shattered when someone fires a spell against the door, no doubt finding it warded, and moments later a chunk of adjacent wall blasts apart, showering them with plaster and dust. 

“I don’t understand—I read your letter, but I never made it through all your notes—”

“Use the time sand—when you’re ready—to save your progress, and add three drops of—” Snape breaks off as a spell strikes his flank and flings him to the rubble-strewn ground. 

She blindly fires a wordless stunning spell into the jagged hole in the wall and falls toward him, landing hard on her knees, just barely grasping the hem of his robes and dragging him toward her with all her strength. Her hands come away drenched in his blood.

More shouts sound in the distance, growing nearer.

“Three drops of cypress sap, and the moonstone should be the same grit level as the time sand"—he winces, coughing and slumping backward—"Granger, you need to reset now—” 

So that we reset—

“I will,” she promises.

So that we—

We—

“Just first you need—” she frees one hand to snatch the broken Time Turner from her pocket and, scrambling, shoves it at him forcefully, not caring that it slices open her fingers and then his when he manages to grab hold.

“What—” he begins, but his words are cut off when she grips his jaw with her bloodied hand.

Lunging forward, she bites through her tooth capsule and crashes her lips against his, a desperate shred of hope catching fire as her whole world darkens.

Chapter Text

There’s a searing pain in her chest like always. 

There’s darkness, like always.

There’s a shadow leaning over her, calling her name—

“A checkpoint!” Hermione says and sits bolt upright in the hospital cot. “Of course.”

“Granger, you’re awake. I have your next dose of healing potion almost ready,” Snape says from across the room.

Her heart races as he approaches, his expression blank and devoid of any clues.

“How long have I been unconscious?” she manages to ask, nearly choking as she swallows the potion, clinging to their strange routine as though it can protect her from the inevitable point when she realizes that everything is back exactly where it was—when she’s forced to confront the next version of Snape who doesn’t remember her—when she’s forced to confront yet another failure—

“Two weeks. Aside from delirious raving about ‘saving our progress’ with time sand.” 

“Time sand?” Desperately, she searches his face, rising up onto her knees on the lumpy mattress and clutching the empty vial so tightly that she can feel her own frantic pulse in each of her fingertips. 

A slow, almost imperceptible smile catches one corner of his mouth. “I believe I meant your progress, Granger; not my own. But I suppose dragging me along might help you in the long run.” 

She leaps out of bed and flings her arms around him, scarcely daring to believe.

It’s him. 

Him from before.

He catches her, arms clutching tight as his breath leaves him in a rush. 

“Is it really you?” she asks, wondering if he can feel the beat of her heart through the thin hospital gown as she presses herself against him. 

“Yes,” he murmurs into her hair. He gives her a gentle squeeze and then pulls back, as if suddenly embarrassed.

She grins up at him, knees threatening to buckle, and says, just like the first time, “You’re not dead.”

His mouth twitches like he wants to smile before he replies, “I seem to recall you killing me.” 

“You’re welcome,” she says and laughs. Then, biting her lip, she adds, “I’m glad it’s you.”

He crosses his arms and turns away toward the little counter with all of her healing potions, and with more emotion than she’s ever heard infuse his tone, he says, “Thank you.” 

Hermione settles back against the metal rungs of the headboard, head still reeling. After Snape had set her up with her healing potions, he’d slipped away under the gentle admonishment to ‘rest.’ 

But how can she? The recklessness of her actions sinks in further with each heavy breath. She killed him—much to his apparent amusement—but more than that, she took him back with her. And quite possibly trapped him here. Long ago, wasn’t that something she would have never wanted to burden him with? And yet, the hope she had heard in his tone, the gentle way he held her against him, if even for the most fleeting of moments, makes her feel as if he wanted it. 

Still. She should have asked. She begins to vow to herself to ask him next time, but she realizes with a cold dread that it might no longer be a choice. She pierced him with the Time Turner—does that mean that he’s stuck forever in the loop with her? Or, quite possibly worse, was it just a one-off occurrence? If so, then the next time she dies, the odds of her taking him back a second time are next to nothing—she’d have to perfectly synchronize their deaths again, and there’s no telling how the Time Turner even works, let alone if it would work again.

“How are you feeling?” His voice startles her out of her thoughts. How long had he been standing there beside her bed?

Inescapably confused, she wants to admit. Terribly sorry for what I did. “I have questions,” she says instead.

Sitting in the bedside chair, Snape gives a small huff that almost resembles laughter. “I figured as much.” He reaches into his pocket and withdraws the Time Turner, setting it gently on the table beside her.

“I can take you with me,” she begins, studying it. 

“You did, once. Perhaps you can in future loops too, but perhaps not.” So he was thinking the same thing as she had been. “Moreover, you shouldn’t,” he adds with a finality that scares her. 

“I’m sorry,” she says, “for leaping to that choice when I should have asked you—” 

“You acted in the moment. It’s understandable.” The gentle softening around his eyes makes it clear he doesn’t hold it against her, and it feels like his version of forgiveness.

“But how? How does it work?” she asks, staring at the cracked glass and twisted metal. She takes it from the table and holds it up to the light, the tiny grains of sand inside shifting and glittering. 

“I’m not sure exactly,” Snape says softly, “but I’m not convinced it will work like that again.”

Her eyes dart to his. “Why not?” What is it you know that you haven’t told me?

Her suspicion is extinguished the moment he smiles. 

He places her wand in her hand and gestures to his temple. “Perhaps it would be easier to show you.”

Scarcely believing he’s about to let her into his mind, Hermione takes a shaky breath and murmurs, “Legilimens.”

Being on this side of things is disconcerting. Snape’s mind is smooth and dark on the surface like glassy obsidian, the same deep shimmer as his eyes, with which her gaze is currently locked, and it feels like she’s tumbling deeper and deeper until—

With a jolt, she’s sprinting down the halls of the Department of Mysteries, skidding to a halt in the Room of Doors amidst the distant rumble of crashes and shouts. The cool trickle of a Disillusionment, the cold press of hand against the heavy black door, the sheer force of will it takes to shove the terror deep beneath an icy lake—

There. Her body lies bloody and limp on the floor of the Time Room, broken glass and sand scattered everywhere. It’s surreal, seeing herself like this; feeling the strange flutter of terror and fondness that Snape shoves aside in favor of practicality as he approaches—is he Occluding now? Or was he then? It hardly matters, she thinks, as the memory shifts to a view of her pale face, blood at the corner of her mouth and pouring out of the gaping wound in her chest. A low, steady chant surrounds her as Snape begins to heal her, waving a steady hand over her form as internally a voice asks, Why isn’t it working?

Why isn’t what working? Hermione wonders, and the Snape in the memory answers her: 

The spell worked the first time—

Then, suddenly, as if struck by a bolt of lightning, phantom pain shoots up her arm as she watches the Snape in the memory crushing the glass of the Time Turner over her unconscious form, sand raining down into her wound.

She breaks away, gasping for air. 

He saved her. 

All this time…

“How?” she breathes. It shouldn’t have been possible. There’s no way it would have worked unless he was there the first time—

“I had it with me, in my hand—”

“How?” she asks again, still shaken by the vision of herself so close to death. 

Snape doesn’t answer, but hands her one of her healing potions, motioning for her to drink. 

She does, shakily and with small sips, and when she’s finished, he rises and paces the length of the room. “You gave it to me,” he says simply, “in the Manor.” Then he returns to sit beside her. “I should probably show you the rest.” 

“Rest?”

Back in Snape’s mind, the version of her on the ground shifts in and out of focus. 

In the background, the Death Eater trapped inside the bell jar grows older and younger, again and again. Behind him, through the open door, prophecies smash and rise, their words lost to the buzzing air, their images overlapping and merging.

The air swirls with dust, grainy then clear.

Hermione’s hair grows longer and then shorter. Her scars break across the surface of her skin, then fade. 

Again and again. 

She feels the weight of herself as Snape scoops her up, the panic simmering in his subconscious—no matter how hard he tries to shove it down—and when they reach the door to leave—

Bear with me, Snape’s voice says, as the version of him in the memory steps back into the Hall of Doors.

Directly opposite, the door to the Space Room open behind her, Luna Lovegood floats upside down, her hair swirling around her and her eyes glazed completely over. 

“The one who drifts, untethered by time, will tie herself to another. She will save, and be saved, but to end the war will need to sacrifice her path.” 

The axis tilts, and Hermione falls into Luna’s eyes, spinning. 

Images flit across: dust swirling, Snape bleeding out on the floor of the Shrieking Shack, her cursed scar, freshly carved, dripping blood, an hourglass turning upside down, right side up, her face in the mirror, fuzzy around the edges, her cells springing into existence in an empty petri dish, the hourglass again, its glass surface cracked then smooth, broken then whole, upside down, right side up—

Suddenly, Luna’s standing, back turned, closing the door. “Pick a tether,” she says. “The one you want to keep.”

“What,” Hermione gasps, checking her limbs to find herself whole and still sitting in her hospital bed, “the fuck.” 

Even Snape beside her seems a bit shaken. “A prophecy.” 

Hermione gathered as much, but then realization sets in: “A prophecy can’t be changed by going back in time again.” 

Snape hums, picking up the Time Turner again and tilting it idly. The sand shifts one way, then the other inside. 

“Pick a tether. The one you want to keep.” 

Those words sounded so commanding—so final. Hermione’s been searching this whole time for a way to ‘sacrifice her path,’ but the daunting prospect of giving up her failsafe makes her nervous. 

“How did she know?” she asks, still trying to process how Luna’s prophecy fits into everything with her time loops. “Did she do anything like this before?”

“No,” Snape says. “At least not that I witnessed.”

“So this was the first time she made a prophecy, and also the first time you saved me, even though I’ve been coming back this whole time, and even though Luna’s been building her theory this whole time?”

“I don’t think you can use phrases like that; ‘this whole time.’”

“What do you mean?”

“Time doesn’t work that way. It’s not ‘whole.’ It’s not a straight moving arrow. People think it has this direct correlative cause and effect pattern, but your experience alone has told us that’s not true. It’s not that simple. Or perhaps it is that simple, but it’s our experience of it that complicates things.” He shifts back, as if aware how he’d been leaning closer and closer during this explanation.

“So you could save me, but in the future, and because you saved me in the future, I stayed alive in the past?”

“What future, and what past? For the time sand—for the Time Turners—existence is a steadfast consistency throughout time the way other things have consistency throughout space.” 

“My head hurts,” Hermione groans. 

“You just took a dive into a shared hallucination with Luna Lovegood via Legilimency—I’d be worried if it didn’t.” He rises, seeming to take pity on her. “Rest, for now. I’ll be back later.” And then he leaves her to her questions.

Sleep only makes it worse, and she awakens several times to a sharp burst of fear—the same fear she felt when she was in Snape’s mind. The knowledge that he was worried about her does nothing to calm her racing heart. 

And there was also that off-hand comment he made: “The spell worked the first time.” So he was there the first time too? She vaguely remembers Harry acting as though Snape couldn’t care less about what was happening in the DOM, but now she knows he was likely just putting on an act. And he’d saved her before. Why does that give her some strange sentimental ache?

The phantom memory of his terror rises again in her body, and she leaves her bed to pace the halls, an extra healing potion in her pocket for good measure. 

The next morning, she turns her shadowed eyes to the door as Snape enters in a swirl of black.

“Thank you,” she says in greeting. It will never be enough, but she feels the need to tell him all the same. 

“Whatever for? The prophecy essentially guaranteed I’d have no say in the matter,” he says, settling beside her. He might be brushing her gratitude aside, but the faint points of color in his cheeks say otherwise. 

“What else do you think it meant?” Hermione asks. “The part about saving and being saved we’ve got covered, and I suppose tying myself to another meant bringing you back with me—" She pauses, face warming when she considers the other possibilities. But soul bonds, marriage, and the like can surely wait until later—until after she’s at least managed to kiss him again, right? 

She blinks to find Snape staring at her expectantly and swallows. “But what does it mean to ‘sacrifice my path?’” she adds.

“Who knows? Prophecies are always such vague fuckery,” he says shrugging. “It’s not as if we have a choice; we’ll discover the result eventually.”

She supposes he’s right, but like always with her, the not knowing eats away at her.

They sit in silence for a beat before Snape says quietly, “Last time, I left you that letter.” 

Her breath catches in her throat.

"Please know that you’re reason enough to risk everything I would be capable of risking."

Those words—for him to reveal so much—it's almost too much to revisit, acknowledging the depths of her feelings now that she has the time and space to process them. At the time, she'd been so focused on his research notes—

“The notes! I lost them before I could read the last two pages—”

“I figured it out. How to make the checkpoint.”

Of course he did.

“We can start working on it when you’re recovered enough to accompany me to the lab.” He must sense her hesitation, because he adds, “It’s easier than trying to perfectly synchronize our deaths like last time—and gambling that there’s even still a window open for me to go back.”

“I suppose that was a bit of a fluke,” she admits. 

“Reckless,” he chides, but his voice lacks any real heat. In fact, it’s almost as if he’s recalling the memory of an early loop—a memory of a memory, she realizes. Seeing himself that way through her eyes must have stuck with him, even if he never experienced it. What had he been feeling then? Was it anything like the stirring warmth in her belly, the slight restlessness in her limbs when she wondered what possibility lay in wait?

“Reckless,” she agrees, meeting his dark eyes. 

Slowly, Hermione recovers. She drinks her healing potions and stares at the Time Turner and watches the sun chase its way across the grounds outside of her window, and then blinks to find Snape’s healing ointment on her bedside table. When the day finally comes when he summons her to the lab, her whole body thrums with anticipation. 

Like always, she places her hand beside his on the stone wall, and like always, his magic sends a shiver down her spine.

When they step inside, she’s surprised to discover that things have been reorganized, with an additional work table set up to the side, already half-covered in notes. She approaches, eyes darting across it in awe as she recognizes so many of the same ingredients from her research. So she had been making some progress, even if it felt like dead end after dead end. She stops at the sight of something else familiar:

• Don’t take the vow.

• Give Granger the healing ointment.

• Give Granger access to the lab.
  • Tooth capsule

• Destroy the locket and the cursed necklace.

• Steal the poisoned mead.

• Plant the sleeper agent.

• Destroy the goblet.

• Destroy the diadem only after coming up with an alternative to the break-in. 

Snape reaches past her, his arm brushing against hers as he crosses off the third item on his list. Something about seeing his writing—so familiar, full of such familiar steps she’s taken all on her own—warms her chest.

“I took the liberty of going ahead with this while you were recovering,” he says, reaching up onto the shelf for the familiar vial of concentrated poison. “I still think it wise for you to have a backup option in case you end up dying in some freak accident when Longbottom explodes another cauldron.” 

“He doesn’t even take Potions this year,” she protests.

“Hence why it would be a freak accident,” he counters, setting up the supplies to take the mould of her tooth. 

“Fine,” she says, “but you know I’m going to try to take you back with me again if I have to use it.” 

Snape nods, and then holds out his hand. “Deal,” he says, when she shakes it. She has to force herself to let go, the sudden impulse to pull him against her nearly overwhelming. It’s not helped by the way he cradles her jaw during each step of the capsule’s creation. Only the highly lethal concentrated poison being placed in her mouth stops her.

When he’s finally finished, Snape steps away abruptly and clears his throat, turning away to cross “Tooth capsule” off of his list.

“Here,” he says, turning back. “The last two pages.” 

Hermione blinks as she registers what he’s offering her—the final notes she’d failed to read the last time, the final steps to brewing the potion that might help her save her progress, one ingredient standing out beyond all the rest:

Time sand.

Back in the hospital wing, Hermione begins her own list: 

• Avoid joining the Slug Club. 

• Set up Fleur and Tonks.

• Destroy the love potion chocolates.

• Find Lucius Malfoy’s whisky (again) and drink it this time.

“Interesting goals you have there,” Snape says, and she clutches the list to her chest. How did he sneak up on her like that? 

He’s a spy, she reminds herself. “Yes, well,” she says, “I need to have something to entertain myself this go round.”

“Office hours aren’t entertaining enough for you?” he asks, and there’s something rich and dangerous in the way his eyes are glittering. 

Hermione feels her lips part involuntarily. 

“Well, you can certainly get a head start on at least one of those endeavors at the Burrow,” he continues, all the previous heat in his expression vanished into the featureless mask that signals he’s Occluding. 

“I suppose so,” Hermione concedes. She pockets her list and tries to follow his lead, calming the fluttering in her belly. “Ready to get started brewing the checkpoint potion?”

Brewing does nothing calming whatsoever. The steam from the cauldron makes her face flush, and the constant light touches from Snape as he directs her are more distracting than helpful. More than once, she catches herself staring—at his nimble fingers, his angular jaw, his thin lips, also flushed in the heat of the lab—and has to tear her eyes away. 

The deserted hospital wing is both better and worse. Away from him, she can finally breathe, but every time she drifts into sleep, she’s tormented by the memory of his hands on her body, his teeth nipping her collarbone, the cold shock of him pulling away mirroring the feeling she gets whenever she wakes, alone and consumed by unfulfilled want.

If he notices—if he even gathers a hint at her emotions—he says nothing, and the rest of the hospital stay passes much more quickly than Hermione would like.

“Be careful,” he tells her, when he hands her the usual crate of healing potions. “I’ll not have you dying for some idiotic reason in my absence.” His words may be harsh, but the way he seeks out her face, as if to memorize it, makes her feel like maybe he wants her truly alive.

Getting out of the castle feels at once exhilarating and daunting as Hermione makes her way to the gathering of Weasleys waiting for her. Not for the first time, she marvels at how young they all look. Younger than her. She ducks away to call her parents and wonders where she should even begin. Something about this time feels different than the times before; like it has more weight somehow.

Her mum answers midway through the second ring. 

“Hermione! They sent us one of those owls about you, but I was a bit distraught as you’re usually the one to write us—hold on, your father’s coming, let me put you on speaker—”

“I’m sorry for making you worry,” she says, when she can sense her dad’s presence.

“It’s like that school of yours thinks we’re idiots simply because we don’t have magic,” he jokes in response. “As though they can lie to us without us knowing.” There’s another layer beneath his humor that tugs at Hermione’s resolve.

“They don’t even know the extent of what happened,” she begins, her voice cracking. 

“Hermione, are you all right, love?” he asks.

“Yes. I just… miss you.”

At the Burrow, Hermione hides the boxing telescope in a drawer and smiles when Fleur enters the kitchen, temporarily pulled out of her melancholy by the prospect of matchmaking.

“We are going to need this,” Fleur says, popping open the familiar bottle of wine. “I have to tell you something, and I heard you would be a good confidante.” 

This is different, Hermione thinks, following her upstairs. They hide in Hermione’s room again, and she remembers to cast a Muffliato before they sit side by side on her bed.

“So,” Fleur says, sipping her wine. “Bill and I ended things.” She smiles, excitement tinged with a hint of remorse. “It was for the best, and we are still friends.”

“Oh,” Hermione murmurs, dumbstruck and searching for what to say. Congratulations? Condolences? 

As if Fleur senses her internal conflict, she continues, “There is someone else. For a while now, but I was trying in vain to push it aside. I may be a quarter Veela, but that does not render me without a moral…” 

“Moral compass?”

“Exactly. And despite what people may think, I do not move from one amourette to the next without any cares.” 

Hermione nods, unsure of how to make this Fleur know that she believes her; that she trusts her; that she might know who that "someone else" is.

“Anyway, the wedding is off. I have not told Molly, but I will. A selfish part of me will tell her when she finally ‘discovers’ the bridesmaid dress fabric samples that she hid from me, but… I could also just wait until tomorrow morning when I leave.” 

“You’re leaving tomorrow?”

Fleur nods, sipping her wine. “But do not worry. I will keep in touch and tell you all about it another time. For now, let us go and brave this British food—I think I have had enough alcohol to numb my taste buds.”

Maybe it's because of Fleur, but Hermione is now overcome with the strange sense that events have been sped up this time, somehow. She decides to tell Harry and Ron about her time travel early the next morning before breakfast, finishing up her summary just before Fleur sneaks out at the break of dawn. Later, she ignores the letter with her OWL results, which earns her a couple of shocked looks until they realize it’s only confirmation that she’s been through this before.

“You must be really mature if you’ve stopped caring about school,” Ron marvels.

”This will require another batch of ingredients worth your life savings, and thus necessitate another try at the beginning of the next loop.”

During the rest of the summer, Hermione empties her Gringotts vault (again) and stocks up on everything on Snape’s list (again), marveling at the exotic assortment of ingredients. 

Why does this time feel so final?

She struggles to stay present with Harry and the Weasleys, telling herself repeatedly to enjoy this time she has with them, when all of her thoughts keep straying toward Snape. 

On the train back to Hogwarts, Hermione runs into Luna Lovegood, who stares at her with wide eyes, blocking her path in the narrow corridor. Her words from Snape’s memory of the DOM echo in Hermione’s ears.

“Pick a tether. The one you want to keep.”

“Something seems different about you,” Luna says in greeting. Her eyes trace the length of Hermione’s hair all the way down to her waist, and with a burst of surprise, Hermione realizes she can see how long it’s gotten. “I feel like I have a memory of you that’s just out of reach.” 

“I’ll explain in the compartment,” Hermione says, leading her back to Harry and Ron. As she recounts everything, recognition takes over Luna’s expression, as if she’s remembering something she’s already seen—and in a way she has. 

It’s only after Harry and Ron duck out for snacks that Luna whispers, a repetition of something she’d once said long ago, “Tethered by something stronger than death itself.”

That night, she and Harry sneak into the chamber to harvest the Basilisk fangs, and Hermione wonders if Snape is still awake—if he has the same questions she does. 

"We'll just have to wait and see, won't we, Crookshanks?” she says just before drifting off under the familiar comfort of his purring.

The first day of classes still holds a special significance, Hermione thinks, as she waits with nervous anticipation in the DADA classroom. It’s silly, this excitement at seeing Snape again beyond the brief glances in the great hall, but she can’t help but hang on his every word.

“You are fighting that which is unfixed, mutating, indestructible.” 

Hermione watches Snape’s rigid posture as he lectures them, gooseflesh breaking across her skin as his voice sweeps over her. She wonders if he’s also recalling last time—the way he met her eyes and told her they could make their own destiny. 

Office hours are strange now that they both remember. Hermione bites the inside of her cheek when she catches sight of the closed door to Snape’s quarters, the memory of what happened the last time they’d been inside rising unbidden to the surface. It feels distant, like someone else’s experience, and, chastened, she realizes that’s what it must have felt for Snape every time he dipped into her mind in the hospital wing. 

“I’ve cleared some additional space in the lab for the next brewing stage of the checkpoint potion,” he says from behind his desk. If he noticed her errant glance, he refrains from commenting on it. “And I’ve begun the sleeper agent poison that worked so effectively the last time.” 

“How did it work before? We didn’t exactly have time to recap.”

Snape clears his throat, cheeks tinged faintly with color. “Well it certainly wasn’t my best work, but I was a bit preoccupied.” 

Hermione leans forward, elbows on the opposite end of his desk. “Preoccupied with what?”

His expression shutters. “The Dark Lord summoned Bellatrix back from France when you and Potter broke in,” he says, ignoring her question. “He can sense Potter in the Manor and wants his entire team there to witness everything. I cast the activation spell when everyone was distracted. It wasn’t exactly a performance.” 

Then why was he so closed off about it just now? 

“You know, I thought it’d be easier grading the same essays again, but it’s that much more tedious suffering the idiocy of your classmates a second time,” he says, rifling through the parchments on his desk and ignoring her gaze. A complete subject change. Interesting.

“You could just give everyone the same grade as the first time,” Hermione reasons. 

“Unless there have been some micro shifts in the cosmos that suddenly yielded genius to Vincent Crabbe, I suppose you’re right,” he concedes. “Although I’m finding it mildly suspicious that you’re not all up in arms about the injustice of it all.”

Hermione shrugs. “Perhaps as a student I would have been.” 

“You’re still a student for all intents and purposes.” Somehow the meaning of these words sinks deeper this time. Is she a student? Or is she now no more than a glorified actress, playing the role of teenager? Surely Snape doesn’t still see her that way. Or does he?

“If I don’t get an honorary degree after all of this, I’m quitting and fucking off to the beach somewhere,” she says, rising. She wordlessly places the bag of Basilisk fangs on his desk.

Snape only smirks, his dark eyes tracing her figure as she saunters out.

When Hermione gets back to Gryffindor Tower, a disgruntled Crookshanks eyes her from Ron’s lap as he says, “I made keeper!”

“Congratulations,” she tells him, scooping Crookshanks up. “I knew you could do it.” 

“Oh, did you?” he asks, grinning. “Well I’m not sure you know this next bit, but Luna kissed me on the field when I landed and now Lavender’s dead set on using us for a couples’ Divination project.” 

Hermione blinks, a smile breaking across her face as Crookshanks purrs against her. There’s always something new each loop; something green and stretching toward the light.

Classes feel like a mindless blur as usual, and Hermione marks time by her visits to the lab and office hours with Snape. The door to his quarters remains closed at every meeting, but somehow this gives her a sense of comfort—she won’t be able to risk exposing so much of herself this way or risk jeopardizing the precarious balance between them.

They make progress on both potions—the sleeper agent poison basically pure instinct for Snape now that he’s brewed it once before (Hermione tries not to feel jealous at his abilities), and the new checkpoint potion simmering away to the side. Every few days, Hermione checks on it to see how many of the boom berries have fully dissolved, adding a faint dusting of powdered moonstone to the surface and double checking the ingredient stores. It wouldn’t do to run out after so many loops emptying her Gringotts vault. Logically she knows that it’s really only the once, but the thousands of galleons she’s cumulatively spent feel more in line with the value she assigns to the potion; the value she assigns to their lives this time around.

The Hogsmeade trip approaches, and the entire time, Hermione’s anxiety is triple the usual. This time, the weight of it all feels more solid—more real. If she screws this up—if she accidentally touches the necklace or lets Mundungus scramble away before snatching the locket—she’ll be thrown back in time with no reassurance that Snape will come with her. What if she awakens again in the hospital wing only for him to have no recollection of the previous loop? If she has to bare her soul again and risk the inevitable rejection when he realizes she’s in far, far too deep for anyone’s comfort?

No, she tells herself. He didn’t react that way last time—he probably realizes there are things I’ve experienced that could lend him to trust me.

But then again, he was probably only so impassioned—so unguarded—with her in his quarters because he was convinced he was going to die and never see her again. 

Her head spins with her warring speculations. The only thing she knows is dying again is a risk she’d rather not take. Not until they’ve made the checkpoint.

She grits her teeth and barrels ahead through the icy rain, Harry and Ron at her side. And when they snag the locket and the necklace, she doesn’t lose a single moment taking anything for granted before they’re destroyed, Basilisk fangs clattering to the ground, in an empty classroom. 

It’s only when she gets back to her dorm that she realizes she’s bitten her cheek hard enough to draw blood.

You can cross the locket and the necklace off your list now.

Well done, Granger. 

Checkpoint potion in stasis. Sleeper agent ready.

Hermione’s nerves claw away at her insides with every passing day. Was it like this the first time? Admittedly, she spends as little time as possible dwelling on those months on the run, hiding in the forest in the tent, but she feels like somehow this is worse. Or different at least—because this time everyone else is blissfully unaware of the all consuming turmoil churning inside her. 

What if things fall flat?

Or what if they succeed, only for the checkpoint potion to fail? How many other times have her brewing experiments failed?  

She bites her nails to the quick and tells everyone it’s stress over the upcoming exams, and even Harry and Ron are hesitant to ask her if that’s really all it is. And it’s just as well—she can’t exactly tell them how she’s feeling about Snape. 

“I think we should destroy the goblet at the usual time during winter break,” the man in question says in greeting the next time they encounter each other in the lab. The sleeper agent poison’s cauldron is conspicuously missing. As if sensing how she notices, he adds, “I’m going to see how successful I am at the next meeting at the Manor, and perhaps that will also be in order before we create the checkpoint.” 

“Be careful,” is all Hermione can say in response. She can’t risk losing him—not this version of him.

Not yet.

Although… “If you’re not careful, and things aren’t in order, you should have some method of summoning me so I can off us both like last time.”

He narrows his eyes. 

“Right?”

“Wrong.” 

“If it’s a simple matter of getting time sand in a wound and then dying at the same time as me—”

“It’s not such a simple matter.” 

“But you said so yourself, the sand doesn’t keep to our ideas about time’s path.”

“It’s more than that. You only came back because of a future action—my future action, to something that occurred to you in your past; you orchestrated your own recovery. I’m not a subject here in this situation so much as an instrument.”

“I don’t understand,” Hermione says, her irritation rising. 

“Then why are you banking on this theory as though it could work?” Snape demands. Something must have set him off, for his eyes glint strangely as he stares her down. 

“Because it did work—it already worked—”

“There is no ‘did’ and no ‘already;’ not for the time sand—don’t you see? It doesn’t operate within the bounds of cause and effect we use to categorize the events of our lives. We can’t rely on it, not like—” he breaks off, clenching his jaw. 

“Not like what?” 

“Not like we rely on each other,” he grinds out, avoiding her gaze. His knuckles are white where he grips the edge of the work table. 

“So it’s not me you don’t trust, but the method?” she asks softly. 

He pauses for a long time, then says, “It’s not worth the risk. There’s a finite amount of sand left in the Time Turner.” He smiles ruefully. “I don’t think I can go back again.”

Exams pass, and Hermione watches the chaos as everyone begins packing for the winter holidays. She manages to stop Romilda Vane in the dorm stairwell and cross “Destroy the love potion chocolates” off of her list with a satisfying scratch of her pen. 

All the while, she tries to shake off her anxiety about the upcoming trip to Malfoy Manor with Snape. He had told her he didn’t think he could go back again, but why? Was it yet another noble, self-sacrificing reason, or something technical? 

The final item on her list, “Find Lucius Malfoy’s whisky (again) and drink it this time,” doesn’t seem like something that should be risked with the checkpoint hanging in the balance, so she folds the list up and shoves it in the pocket of her cloak in favor of the backup plan. She’s only ever dared to think about it on occasion, but ever since that first time, so many loops ago, she can’t help but wonder how Snape might react.

Before she can question herself further, she sneaks away and heads to the liquor store in Diagon Alley, searching the aisles for the familiar bottle of scotch. 

Buying it again feels strangely nostalgic. As does wrapping it in the same nondescript silver paper. She contemplates writing a card, but the only things likely to spring forth from her pen are overly sentimental and mortifying, so she ties it with a simple black ribbon instead and addresses it For Severus.

And then loses her nerve and shoves it in the bottom of her trunk where she hid it the last time. 

In the morning, she rises before dawn, pockets the Time Turner and a Basilisk fang, and meets Snape—Severus, she thinks, and then immediately chides herself—at the castle entrance. Maybe if they don’t get themselves killed in the Manor, she can revisit the idea of first names, she reasons, as they crunch over the frosted grass to the Apparition point. 

They spin away, landing in the familiar spot on the Manor grounds, each reaching out to cast a Disillusionment spell on the other. The sensation of his magic on her skin sends a shiver through her frame, and she suppresses a gasp. 

“It’s odd knowing we’ve both done this before,” she says, crouching to enter at the hidden house elf door. “Should we race to keep it interesting?”

“You’d lose,” Snape says tonelessly, but when she turns, there’s a small smirk in the corner of his mouth.

“Maybe next time then,” she says. “If there is a next time.”

“Let’s hope there isn’t.” 

They sneak through the halls, avoiding the door handles and window sills, feet as silent as possible over the varying textures of the floor. Hermione feels hyper aware of every sound, every breath that Snape takes beside her. When they finally reach the east wing and begin dismantling the wards, the combination of their spells works in record time. It shouldn’t make her feel so giddy that their magic blends together so well—she shouldn’t be thinking about compatibility as if it’s any indication of how well they fit in other areas—but she allows herself a small smile of satisfaction as they enter the room and quickly remove the rest of the wards on the silver box.

“Would you like to do the honors?” Snape asks once the box is open. He casts a Muffliato on the room as he awaits her answer.

Hermione slowly grasps the Basilisk fang in her pocket and asks, “Should we do this part together too?” It’s soppy and ridiculous, but after a moment, Snape nods, wrapping his fingers around her own. 

Heart beating rapidly, she raises their joined arms and then drives the fang into the goblet, its shrieks eclipsed by the feeling of his hand on hers. 

Eventually, they break away, panting, and Hermione securely stashes the fang while Snape begins repairing the cracks in the goblet. So far, this is the only task she hasn’t bustled her way into helping with, and something about the way he seals and mends every imperfection tugs at the fondness nestled in her chest. 

“I had a lot of practice repairing broken dishware as a child.”

In so few words, he’d given her a glimpse of his past, and she knows she should respect even the smallest revelations.

When he’s finished, he sets the box back in its hiding place and pauses, back toward her and one hand resting on the shelf. “I know you’ve done this before with me, but…” he trails off, his shoulders hunching.

“It feels like we should celebrate or something?” she asks, hope rising in her chest. 

He nods brusquely, turns toward her, and clears his throat.

“Did you—how did you want to—” she begins, just as he says “If you wanted to maybe—” 

She takes a shaky breath and then says, “Have a drink with me.” 

He gives the smallest grin, and says, a bit shy, “It’s probably not the type of drink you had in mind.” 

They sneak out in silence and Apparate back to the Hogwarts grounds, all while Hermione’s pulse rises along with the morning sun. 

He finished it. The potion. She’ll have a checkpoint. One with him.

This version of him.

“Only one more step and then it will be complete,” he says beside her, as if reading her thoughts.

She looks up at him and smiles at the way the mist clings to his smooth hair, the faint redness in his nose and ears in the cold air. For the first time in a long time, she feels truly lucky. 

They reach the lab in companionable quiet, the few remaining castle residents still asleep. Inside, the cauldron simmers, sending the occasional swirl of steam up to the glowing lights above. 

“It’s beautiful,” Hermione murmurs, peering inside. A warm amber, like honey, tiny bubbles dancing back and forth.

“The only thing left to do is add the time sand,” Snape says softly beside her. 

Oh.

Of course.

She swallows, pulling the broken Time Turner out of her pocket and setting it on the work table. “How much time sand?”

Snape clenches his jaw. 

Oh.

“If you want to wait—”

“No,” she says, surprising herself with the emphatic nature of her tone. “This will at least tether us to a new point—to a point further along where more things have gone right. Right now, I… I don’t have any regrets about anything.” Especially not with you.

“Are you sure? I don’t mean to tell you what choice to make. If you don’t want to take the risk, I understand—”

She’d risk anything to keep him here—this version of him. The version that’s risked everything for her; that’s kissed her and saved her and died with her.

“I’m picking my tether,” she says firmly. She nods toward the Time Turner and watches as Snape carefully lifts it above the cauldron. 

“Last chance,” he says. Both his voice and his hands shake. 

“Do it,” she commands, and he breaks it open, letting the sand cascade down.

The potion hisses, growing increasingly formless, its steam indistinguishable from the liquid beneath, until finally it settles, back to its original warm color, faint crystals of sand glinting within. 

Silently, Snape decants it into a small vial, his fingers gripping it so tightly that Hermione wonders if she’ll need to pry it away. But then something within him seems to break, and he hands it to her without a word. 

“Thank you,” she says, her heart beating frantically as she’s suddenly confronted with the fragility of the moment. 

“No need to thank me before we know if this will even work.” 

“Fair point. But still…” She searches for what to say, but her words fail her. Her gaze seeks out his, pleading, willing him to understand, her thoughts flayed open before him if he’d only dip into her mind.

But he doesn’t. With a great shuddering breath, he closes his eyes. 

Slowly, she reaches one hand up to trace his brow, cup his cheek, stretching up on her tiptoes as she grows closer…

His eyes fly open. “Granger—” he says, anguish evident in his tone. His hands hover for a brief moment as if to touch her face before he jerks them away. 

She clutches the vial to her chest and tilts her chin up anyway. 

“We shouldn’t make anything permanent, in case you change your mind later,” he says hoarsely, staring at her lips as though unable to stop. "This way you'll have a fresh start each time."

“You say that like this is going to work as intended,” she replies, grinning nervously.  

He doesn’t return her smile. 

But he doesn’t move away either.

A burst of impulse travels up the length of her spine, and she lets it carry her even closer. “I haven’t changed my mind in years,” she murmurs, closing the distance between them and pressing her lips to his.

It’s different this time; different than the transient rush of stolen moments like before. This time, he cradles her face as if she’s fragile—as if she hasn’t been virtually indestructible for years—and something about the overwhelming fondness in this gesture threatens to break her, a paradox of softness.

Slowly, between featherlight brushes of lips, she pulls away to find him smiling gently. 

She toasts him with the glittering vial.  “We make our own destiny,” she says. 

And then she drinks it all, letting the potion sear her throat, her chest, her very being.

Chapter Text

She wakes in the hospital wing with a throbbing headache. 

“Did it work?” a familiar deep voice asks, suddenly at her side, his expression searching her face with something strangely candid. 

“Did what work?” she asks, bewildered. She sits up and winces, head heavy and limbs weak.

“The potion! The checkpoint!” he says, bracing her shoulders and peering into her face.

“Oh. I… I don’t suppose it works that way. I mean, I don’t think I’ve died again, if that’s what you’re after. Well, yet, at least,” she amends. “Oh hey!” She gestures to her mouth, where the poison capsule is still firmly affixed to her molar. “Want me to try and see?”

Something strange flashes across his face—

“No! Gods, Granger, are you absolutely insane?” 

—Panic. That’s what it is. She’s never seen him truly panicked before. 

She freezes, her jaw dropping open reflexively. Severus grasps her chin without hesitation and presses his wand against her cheek. Out pops the tooth capsule. He catches it with deft fingers and pockets it, eyes once again trained on Hermione’s face. The image of him begins to swim before her, and she feels herself struggle to remain upright.

“How are you feeling?” he asks, an urgency still present in the faint waver of his voice. 

“Tired,” she manages, sinking back into the pillow. “Cold.” Her eyes are impossibly heavy. “It’s alright, though. I’ll see you back at the hospital wing,” she murmurs, feeling her consciousness start to slip. 

“We are in the hospital wing, Granger—what are you—you need to—Hermione!”

She doesn’t hear the rest.

Chapter Text

Granger is clearly insane. As evidenced by the fact that she could have offed herself—quite possibly for good this time—right in front of him moments ago. Gleefully. As if trying a new flavor of cupcake icing. Before promptly passing out again.

Like he said: insane. 

Severus pulls the tooth capsule out of his pocket and examines it once again, ensuring that not even the most miniscule amount of poison could have escaped. He places a rudimentary shield charm around it just in case. It wouldn’t do to lose her to something as ironic as that.

Losing her. Such a heavy concept to consider. But consider it he must, knowing now what he’s witnessed:

Something happened when Granger took that potion. 

Something that affected him too. 

It was subtle—so subtle, in fact, that he’d failed to notice it at first, too preoccupied by her trying to die in front of him. A record that skipped. A crackle in the wireless as he adjusted and recalibrated. Until everything settled once again, normal to a fault. So why is it at the edges of his awareness, he can sense something deeper than his current experience?

He rifles through the parchments at the foot of her bed. It’s the same hospital cot she’s woken up in countless times before, but nothing about this time is routine. He reviews all of the tests that he’s spent all day and all night running, searching for some kind of explanation. 

Granger had just finished drinking the potion in the lab when her whole body had been wracked with a spasm that had felt like it was shaking him too. A strange pulse in the air around them had sent a rush of static running like a current through them where he’d grabbed her. And then she had collapsed into his arms.

For a moment, he was convinced he’d lost her completely. She was cold and limp with no signs of breath—of life—and he cast every reviving spell he knew in between summoning and pouring healing potions into her mouth with a trembling hand. He nearly cracked her tooth capsule with the bezoar he tried to use next, but then she took in a ragged breath that sounded like hope itself. And he rushed her here. 

He glances up, watching the steady rise and fall of her chest from beneath the thin sheet. That she’d woken—even if only for a moment—floods him with relief. 

She’s alive. 

And for a man who had once taught other versions of himself to be so nonchalant at the idea of her death, he’s fiercely glad that he’s the one who gets to see this through.

Gently, he lifts the sheet and withdraws one of her arms, fastening a tourniquet around it. 

“I’m going to need to take some blood samples to test in the lab,” he tells her, unsure if she can hear him. He hesitates briefly before seeking out a vein and piercing the skin of her forearm with the needle, drawing off two small vials. She doesn’t wince or give any acknowledgement of the intrusion. Pocketing the vials, he quickly removes the tourniquet and seals the small wound with a wave of his wand. 

Then he pauses, staring at the faint, irregular texture of her skin. He’s seen her memories—seen the cursed knife carving the slur into her that was meant to be permanent. But with his ointment—with time—it’s been healing. The letters are nearly unrecognizable. Nearly. He wonders if he should continue the treatment while she’s asleep, but something about the idea of spreading the ointment over her skin feels like a step too far. Taking blood for necessary tests is one thing, but something so intimate—

He clenches his jaw and steps away. No. There is nothing intimate about helping Granger heal, and if he can’t be unbiased enough to handle it, then he has no business inflicting his embarrassing infatuation upon her unconscious form. 

He casts another monitoring charm over her bed and strides away, letting the cold air of the castle halls ground him as he makes his way to the lab. Once inside, he spins one vial down in the centrifuge and, while he waits for the machine to finish, begins to clean the disastrous mess left strewn across the room in the wake of Granger’s collapse.  

Has he ever made such a mess of things? He ponders this as he shields the shattered glass, vanishes the spilled drops of the remnants of healing potions, sends the dirty cauldrons to the sink to be scrubbed. Like with anything, he always manages to hurt those he cares about the most. It’s as if the very fact he cares for something will render it harmed. His mother. Lily. Gods, even the ridiculous DADA position has been cursed from the very beginning. 

And now Hermione Granger. 

He runs a hand over his face and stares down at the centrifuge as its spinning finally slows. For some reason, he has the strange impulse to catalog his antivenin stores while the machine finishes running. It’s like the static has returned around him if he could only see through it—

The centrifuge chimes and opens. Carefully, he removes a vial of separated blood and plates her cells onto a microscope slide. He thinks of how many times she’s done this in her various loops back, staring down and watching the cells vanish one by one, knowing the only constant was her placelessness. 

Except this time…

He blinks, then focuses down into the microscope again. 

…This time, her cells stay put.

He backs away until he stumbles against the adjacent workbench. Waits. Approaches again, only to find the same result. Nothing is disappearing. Could this mean…

He scarcely dares to hope, darting over to repeat the experiment with the second vial of blood while his mind replays the events that happened after Granger took the potion. 

Cold and limp with no signs of breath—of life—

The cells still remain. 

Had he in fact watched her die—briefly, mind, before he brought her back—without the timeline resetting? Would that then mean that the checkpoint failed—that she’s actually no longer able to jump back in time? And what could that mean for her—for the myriad tasks that still lie ahead?

He runs a shaking hand through his hair, grimacing as he feels how greasy it’s gotten after hours of nonstop activity.

Fucking time sand. 

It complicates literally everything. 

There’s a reason no one had ever made much progress researching it as a Potions ingredient. And yet his inflated sense of grandeur—or the pathological need to impress Granger—or any number of other idiotic habits or character failings—had made Severus convinced of its use in this setting. But then again, aren’t all great discoveries the result of some bumbling accident? Antibiotics. Smoke detectors. Dynamite. The Anti-Paralysis Potion. How would this be any different? 

Severus grips the edge of the work table to steady himself. He shouldn’t jump to conclusions—especially not ones where he’s managed to miraculously solve Granger’s issue, as that only reinforces his deluded wishes. If the checkpoint potion worked as intended, she’d still have residual elements of time sand in her system, plus the confusion around her age… 

He compiles a list, jotting his theories down on a spare sheet of parchment that he then snatches up to take back with him to the hospital wing. He’ll have to wait for Granger to wake up (and he refuses to acknowledge the prospect of her not waking up), but then they can discuss everything and come up with another series of tests to run. 

As he races down the dark castle halls, his thoughts turn back to how similar this feels to the Department of Mysteries. How he’d felt like he’d been slammed back into his body mid-step during the tail end of the battle there. One moment about to die in Malfoy Manor, and the next about to save Granger in the DOM. And how he’d known, instinctively, that he had to do something with that Time Turner. He tries not to let the memory of his fear resurface with every strike of his heel upon the ground as he makes his way back to her. 

He has to see this through. For her.

When he bursts through the doors to the hospital wing, he’s greeted by a familiar discerning frown.  

“Care to explain any of this?” she asks, gesturing to Granger’s sleeping form, monitoring spells flickering above it. 

“No.” 

One of the things Severus likes best about Poppy Pomfrey is that she doesn’t ask too many questions. Years of being lied to has probably taught her it’s not worth the risk to trust what anyone says when they turn up on her doorstep at three in the morning. 

(“Fell down the third floor staircase.”) 

(“Potions accident.”) 

(“Peeves.”)  

“I see,” Pomfrey says, just like she did when caring for him after yet another one of the Marauders’ pranks. She smooths Granger’s hair, tracing the length of it to the end of one long curl, and then looks pointedly between it and Severus. 

Her hair—it’s been getting longer each time—

“I have a feeling Ms. Granger won’t be sharing much about what happened when she awakens, even if the hospital wing is a completely confidential environment,” Pomfrey says diplomatically. “From a healing standpoint, other than suddenly aging to twenty-four years old, she’s stable.” 

Pomfrey knows.

Severus nods, not trusting his voice yet. 

“Whatever happened, when she awakens, I recommend some secrecy until you two do… whatever it  is you plan to do.”

Severus lets out a shaky breath and thanks her, eyes not leaving Granger’s face as Pomfrey steps away. 

“Against my better judgment,” she calls from the door, “I’m not informing the Headmaster about any of this. Don’t make me regret it.” 

The door closes softly, and Severus sinks down into the chair by Granger’s side. The sky outside her window begins to lighten, and he realizes he’s been awake for over twenty-four hours. 

“Twenty-four years…”

Granger has spent so many years trying to dig herself out of this mess, and here he is, swooping in like some overgrown bat and nearly killing her in his selfish attempt to fix things. He glances down at her face, her brows drawn together as she sleeps. Her hair truly has gotten long, dark brown curls spread all over the pillow, some concealed beneath the sheet, and he recalls how soft they’d felt under his fingers; how she’d gasped and opened her mouth to him when he’d gathered a selfish fistful in his hand; how she’d arched her back and ground against his throbbing erection, wrapping her legs around him as though, beyond all reason, she truly wanted him—

No. That shouldn’t happen again. No matter how foolishly he might want it to. Not until he’s figured out what exactly his potion did to her. 

He glances anywhere but Granger’s face while he takes control of his Occlumency again, memories of that encounter buried once more and the pounding of his heart slowing. 

On her bedside table is a charmed spill-proof cup of water with the straw pointing toward the bed, along with a small stack of various parchments with the characteristic organization that signifies Pomfrey’s presence. The bottommost visible is an unopened letter from Fleur Delacour that must have arrived by owl during his excursion to the lab. 

He feels the corners of his mouth lift slightly when he recalls Granger’s convoluted multi-loop plan to set her up with Tonks. Then feels the corners of his mouth fall when he recalls Tonks’s original, emotion-laden rant at Grimmauld about the complexities of trying to date someone who was already engaged. Out of all the Order members, why had she possessed the delusion that he'd be the most appropriate one to offer advice? But, then again, during this timeline, Fleur called off the wedding early on. And if the most recent Grimmauld update from Tonks was accurate, the two had begun an official relationship. Severus’s head pounds trying to piece together the various occurrences and sort them out between the two timelines. Is this how Granger feels every time? How does she even begin to remember?

Perhaps this is how, Severus thinks, eying the crumpled list on top of the little stack. He can barely make out the writing:

• Avoid joining the Slug Club. 

• Set up Fleur and Tonks.

• Destroy the love potion chocolates.

• Find Lucius Malfoy’s whisky (again) and drink it this time.

Something clenches in his chest when he reads the last item. When she’d shown him her memories, he could sense an attachment there that he couldn’t quite place. What does any of it mean? He wishes, desperately, to ask her.

Instead, he settles for leaning back in the rickety chair and taking out his own series of lists, intent on keeping vigil until she wakes.

It happens sooner than he thinks, the rising morning sun streaming into the room and lighting up her warm brown eyes as she seeks him out. 

“Severus,” she murmurs, rising up slowly to a seat. 

His breath catches in his throat. 

Her cheeks darken the faintest bit when she realizes what she just called him, and she bites her lip. Does she remember him calling her by her first name too? At the time, he’d been desperate, and it had taken no small bit of effort to abandon the idea of continuing, but the way she looks now with the flush spreading down her neck… He swallows, watching as she smooths her hair, his own hands itching to feel the soft curls, his body unconsciously leaning toward her—

“Granger. You’re clearly insane,” he says, crossing his arms and leaning back.

Her brow furrows in confusion. 

He sighs, wishing he were less of an arsehole, and pulls the tooth capsule out of his pocket to show her. “Sane individuals do not cheerfully offer suicide as a method of testing out a research theory,” he explains.

“I’m not sure I quite remember…” she responds, pressing her fingers to her temple and squinting.

Perhaps he’s been too harsh. Too besotted and too harsh. “Nevermind. I’ll explain it all once we’re in a more secure location.” 

And if the prospect of a ‘more secure location’ doesn’t make his throat even dryer, he has no excuse for suggesting it in the first place.

Slowly, he waits for Granger to sip the water at her bedside table and gather her belongings as he explains what Pomfrey had told him. 

“So she knows,” Granger confirms, slipping her arms into the cloak Severus hands to her. “And you’re sure we can trust her?”

(“Fell down the third floor staircase.”) 

(“Potions accident.”) 

(“Peeves.”)

“Yes.” 

They wind their way carefully through the empty halls and back toward the dungeons, stopping several times at Severus’s insistence so that Granger can rest. When they finally cross the threshold into his quarters, she collapses onto his couch in exhaustion. 

Severus lights the fire, his glance landing briefly on the small wrapped box on the mantle that he'd owl-ordered last week. 

“When did you take out my tooth capsule?” Granger asks, still catching her breath. 

“Shortly after you woke for the first time in the hospital wing," he says, turning back and hoping Granger hasn't noticed the gift yet. It wouldn't do for him to embarrass himself with something as trivial as this when she'd almost died. "I mean, the first time you woke after you took the potion; not the first time you woke up back in this timeline,” he adds.

“What happened with the potion?” she asks.

Severus pauses, images flitting through his mind when he considers it: Granger’s face drained of color, the stillness of her chest. He opens his mouth, but then something else suddenly rises to the surface from somewhere deep: a pool of blood around him, a gaping wound in his neck, Granger beside him holding a little vial of silver—

“Did it work?” she prompts.

“Perhaps,” he says cautiously, “although perhaps not exactly as intended.” He takes a breath, sits next to her on the couch, and tells her everything he’s theorized; how Pomfrey could suddenly figure out her age, his findings in the lab with her blood cells, even that brief, horrifying moment where he’d thought he’d lost her completely. What he doesn’t tell her is the growing anxiety that if it truly worked, they only have one chance left to defeat the Dark Lord and prevent all those deaths.

“We have to find a way to test what happened. Safely,” he adds, thinking with an internal shudder of how close she’d come to breaking the capsule when she awoke. He draws out the hastily scrawled list from his pocket and reviews his theories on what they could do. In addition to checking for residual time sand in her system and a battery of more labs, they could conduct surreptitious interviews of those they can trust to evaluate her age or question for any placeless memories like his own with Nagini. Or, his least favorite, he could perform a temporary curse or potion to arrest her pulse and breathing, like Draught of Living Death. 

She listens with rapt attention, her eyes wide and her frame leaning in toward him until he’s forced to shift backward against the stiff armrest as he finishes. 

“So you think you’ve solved the issue entirely?” she asks, still leaning forward, eyes alight with hope.

“It is the best working hypothesis at the moment. We’ll have to wait and see what happens to your cells after more time in the lab—”

“Thank you,” she breathes, closing the distance between them and encircling him in a gentle hug. 

The warmth of her surrounds him, and for a moment he can only freeze, letting it seep into his skin, still shocked that she holds any regard for him after he almost got her killed. Another version of him had crossed that initial insurmountable barrier and kissed her the first time; another, still, had the sense to maintain distance. And yet here he is, enveloped by her affection, wistful, undeserving.

“We hardly know if it won’t kill you on some time delay like the sleeper agent I planted in the kitchens at Malfoy Manor,” he croaks, selfishly returning the embrace. He can feel the subtle ridge of her spine under her clothes and can’t help but wonder what her bare skin would feel like. “Granger, seriously, don’t thank me yet.”

She merely sighs against him, shifting so that her head rests on his shoulder. Her hair smells like lavender. He should pull away, reestablish some space between them; that would be the sane thing, the responsible thing. But, as evidenced multiple times, sanity is a quality that eludes Granger, and Severus has developed a terrible habit of becoming irresponsible. He rests his head tentatively atop hers, deciding he’ll allow himself just one more moment of closeness. Perhaps this is the better way to move past the last time they were together on the couch. Perhaps now he’ll have this memory to revisit instead of the one that has tortured his sleep for months, always leaving him with a rush of embarrassment and longing upon awakening. Perhaps this closeness, this small sliver of comfort and peace, is what they both need. He chances a glance down, only to find her eyes closed, lashes fluttering softly in slumber. 

He draws her gently closer against his side. Perhaps another moment, then.

Chapter Text

Hermione awakens slowly, wrapped in the scent of something earthy, darkness surrounding her in a warm embrace. She takes a moment for her eyes to adjust before she registers—

This is not the hospital wing. 

She sits bolt upright, reaching instinctively for her wand, which clatters to the floor from an unfamiliar table.

“S-Severus?” she calls, immediately regretting it when she hears the weakness in the cracking of her voice. She quickly catalogs the scene: dark covers, deep emerald bed curtains around a mahogany frame, thick windows with a murkiness behind them that suggests they look out onto the lake. The last thing she remembers is falling asleep beside Severus on the couch—had he moved her to his bed?

Footsteps sound nearby, and she winces at the sharp beam of light that pierces the room as the door opens. 

“Granger,” he says, striding to her side. He reaches out to touch her, but then lets both hands drop, settling for fetching her wand for her instead. “Are you alright?”

“I think so,” she says. “Erm. How long have I been unconscious?”

“How many times have you asked me that damned question? Gods, I was half wondering if you’d ever wake up.” He scrubs a hand through his hair and slumps onto the bed beside her. It looks freshly washed, still damp, and for a traitorous moment she considers the image of him in the shower, water streaming over his lean form.

Then memories of the previous day return within her grasp. The potion. The checkpoint. Which might not even really be a checkpoint at all, but the answer.

“We should head to the lab,” she says, sliding out from under the covers to stand. Her head pounds, and her vision begins to fade for a moment before she flexes her calves and wills herself to stay upright. 

“Perhaps after you’ve had something to eat and drink,” Severus says, eyeing her keenly. 

He’s right, like usual, and she can’t even find herself irritated when he summons Dobby with instructions to prepare lunch—is it lunch time? And what day is it?

While they wait, she lets herself rest on his couch as he casts several other diagnostic spells to check on her. All clear. For now.

“When we get to the lab—”

“Granger, perhaps we can give you at least the next hour to partially recover.” 

“Alright,” she concedes, folding her hands in her lap. 

Severus pauses beside her and then clears his throat. “It’s been a few days, and I don’t want your progress to be delayed,” he says, not meeting her gaze but summoning the little jar of healing ointment for her scar and gesturing to her forearm. 

“Of course,” she says, starting to roll up her sleeve. Her fingers feel clumsy as he watches her. When she’s finally finished, she looks up to find him with the jar still in his hands, making no move to hand it to her. 

“If you need any assistance…” he begins, still looking at the jar in his hands. 

“Yes,” Hermione says, the moment she realizes what he’s offering. 

Slowly, he unscrews the lid and sets it on the table, then takes her wrist and places it gently across his knee. The fabric of his trousers is soft against the back of her hand, and she tentatively shifts closer, until the heat from his body reaches her. He dips two long fingers into the jar, then pauses, meeting her eyes to seek permission. She nods, swallowing as his fingers brush the surface of her skin, sending goosebumps up her arm. He slowly spreads the ointment over her scar, pressing more firmly to work it into the worst parts, then gliding up and down. Her heart begins to pound in her ears as she watches, and she tries to keep her breathing slow and steady. His fingers glisten in the light. She can’t help the growing heat radiating through her. She should be mortified, and surely that’s the reason for the flush creeping up her neck.

He finishes, pulling away to place the lid back on the jar. 

She’s dying to know the expression on his face. She can’t look at him. She bites her lip, wondering if she were to flip her hand over and slide it up his leg, would he—

Pop! 

Dobby appears on the other side of the table, giving a little bow.

Hermione snatches her arm back and exhales sharply. 

“We’ve got sandwiches and a fruit salad and some tea,” Dobby begins, listing the rest of the menu as an overwhelming array of dishes pop into existence. Beside her, Severus is still, listening politely, and she’s finally grateful for Dobby sparing her the humiliation of yet another rejection—what had she been thinking?—until he chirps, “Happy Christmas by the way. Would Miss like Dobby to fetch the Potions Master’s gift from her trunk?”

Hermione wishes she could die again. “Erm, perhaps later, Dobby. Happy Christmas to you too,” she adds at his crestfallen look. 

He pops away, and Severus wisely refrains from commenting on anything. 

Hermione quickly shoves a bite of cucumber sandwich in her mouth.

The rest of lunch goes about as awkwardly as she’d expect.

The lab is at once familiar and comforting when they finally step inside.

Hermione inspects the microscope, breathing out a sigh of relief when she sees her cells still present on the slide. Around her is evidence of Severus’s other experiments, which quickly expands as he begins setting up a number of other ingredients and equipment. 

“First, we should check to see if there’s any residual time sand in your system,” he says. 

“Shouldn’t there be? If you poured it in my wound and then I drank a potion with even more?”

He hums noncommittally and lights a flame under a little cauldron. 

“And on second thought, shouldn’t there be some in your system from the broken Time Turner?” 

He blinks, pausing.

“Shouldn’t we be running all these tests on you too? What if you’re the one stuck in the loop, but now there isn’t enough time sand to end it?” Panic begins to rise as she hears herself utter the words. 

“I doubt that’s the case,” he says, but his voice isn’t as firm as she’d expect. He sighs, turning to prepare some ingredients. “I suppose we can test everything on me too.” 

Several minutes later, Hermione’s holding out her arm and tightening the tourniquet, bracing herself for the sting of the needle. 

“You won’t need that,” Severus says, loosening the tourniquet and slipping it free of her. “I recently acquired a more comfortable alternative.” He opens a small box to reveal a different syringe. “It’s got some vein-seeking charms and a slow-release anesthetic built into the needle tip,” he explains. 

“Oh,” she says in amazement, watching it slide effortlessly into her forearm. 

“I figured it would help you with your research.” He clears his throat. 

“That’s very thoughtful.” The syringe fills, and the needle slips out. 

“Yes, well.” He turns away, blood samples in hand and a faint blush on his cheeks. “It’s yours if you like it.” 

“Thank you,” she says. Hers? Was this something he planned? Did this mean—

“When the potion is finished, we’ll combine it with your blood sample and try to precipitate out any remaining time sand.” 

“Right. What else can I help with?”

They work in silence until the small cauldron is cooling, flame underneath it extinguished. Severus siphons off the clear potion into identical flasks on the work table. He adds her blood to the first, then pauses.

“Your turn?” Hermione asks, holding up the syringe.

He nods, rolling up his sleeve. His wrist is delicate and pale with blue veins that stand out harshly against his skin, peppered by the occasional faint scar. Hermione fights the urge to trace it with her fingertips, instead poising the syringe over the surface of a vein.

“Having second thoughts about needle sharing? I know we haven’t talked about taking that step in our relationship,” Severus says drily, mistaking her ogling for hesitation.

She presses the needle forward and bites her cheek. Relationship? Surely he couldn’t mean—but then again, he was always deflecting with sarcasm—

The syringe is full, and Hermione pulls it back.

Severus hastily tugs his sleeve back down. Carefully, he adds his own blood sample to the adjacent flask, and they watch as it swirls into the potion, both flasks growing a deep fuchsia color.

“How long will it take?”

“Ten minutes.” 

Ten minutes feels like an eternity when it’s spent watching Severus expertly clear the work table, reorganizing all of the jars of ingredients with a swish of his wand. Hermione does her best to be useful, cleaning the cauldron and knives, unsure if letting her thoughts center on the outcome of the potion or on the memory of Severus’s lean forearm is going to drive her more mad. She carefully cleans the syringe next, placing it back in its box and wondering if he always intended for it to be a Christmas gift. Perhaps all of this uncertainty is why he was offering her some time off to partially recover.

Reassessing the flasks, they find that neither has changed color, and nothing has precipitated out of the solution. Severus runs each through a thin paper filter just to make sure.

“Nothing?” Hermione asks, eyes searching the test equipment again just to be sure.

“Nothing,” Severus confirms. He looks visibly relieved. “The time sand is gone.” 

“Thank fuck.”

“Indeed.” 

For a moment, Hermione wants to fling her arms around him in celebration. The only thing stopping her is… “Where would the time sand have gone, then? If it’s as you said and it holds consistency through time rather than space, it should still be here—inside my body—right?”

Severus ponders her question for a moment, then winces. “Don’t hate me—”

“I could never—”

“—I believe it’s now gathered somewhere in our past.” 

Hermione can’t help but glare. “For Godric’s sake.” 

“Indeed.” 

“You know what? Don’t tell me anything more,” she says, holding up a hand. “I’m going to cling to the hope that you fixed the issue entirely. At least for today,” she says, her voice softening at the end.

“If that’s what you want, Granger.” 

She does want. She wants a lot of things that she can’t yet voice. 

When they finally leave the lab, Severus heads to the Christmas dinner alone to keep up appearances while Hermione waits in his quarters, a small feast prepared by Dobby featuring her gift to Severus as the centerpiece on the table. She snatches the wrapped bottle up and wonders where she can hide it—if she has enough time to dash back up to Gryffindor Tower and shove it back in her trunk before he returns. 

But something about repeating the same action over again has lost its appeal. She presses her lips together, eyes darting around his quarters as she searches for any out-of-the-way places to stash it. The only problem with that is she really shouldn’t be invading his space. It was kind enough for him to let her stay here while they figure out what to do about her suddenly appearing her age; she shouldn’t jeopardize that for her own cowardice. 

In the end she settles for leaving it on the table.

Then she stokes the fire, curls up on his couch, and finally opens the letter she received from Fleur.

Dear Hermione,

I suppose I was rather cryptic when we spoke over the summer, but Tonks assures me I can speak freely with you. Yes, that is right: Tonks. We are living together now in a little flat a few blocks from Diagon Alley. It is… It is everything I had not known I was missing in a relationship. 

I know Tonks had been given a push to talk to me at the start of summer. It was by someone at Hogwarts, and I had assumed, for whatever reason, that it might have been you, only to find out… It was Professor Snape! Apparently he and Tonks have become somewhat of friends. I think he must be a secret romantic. 

Anyway, I thought you would find that humorous. I hope school is going well. 

Bisous,

Fleur

Hermione can’t help but smile. Bringing Severus back with her really was the key to getting those two together. 

“I think he must be a secret romantic.” 

But there’s no way he—

The door opens, and the man in question strides into the room, a scowl on his face. It softens when he sees Hermione by the fire. 

“You set up Fleur and Tonks,” she says, grinning. 

He hums noncommittally, turning from her to inspect the arrangement on the table. His expression doesn’t change when his gaze lands on the wrapped whisky, but Hermione’s a Gryffindor for a reason. 

“It’s for you,” she says, rising and crossing over to him. She takes a deep breath and picks it up from the table, handing it to him.

“Granger, you didn’t have to get me anything.” 

“And you didn’t have to get me that syringe kit,” she counters. 

In the dim evening light of the fire, she can’t tell if he’s blushing, but she can see the way his Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows. His long fingers untie the ribbon at the top, and he carefully unfolds the paper to reveal the glass bottle. 

“I wasn’t sure what type you liked,” Hermione says, realizing now that she knows virtually nothing about whisky—or liquor in general—only that she hopes her choice compares favorably to Lucius Malfoy’s.

“Thank you,” Severus says. He summons two glasses from the cabinet to the side of the room and uncorks the bottle, pouring them each a good measure. 

“Happy Christmas,” Hermione says, lifting her glass. 

He clinks his own against it and downs it in one go, Hermione knowing better than to attempt to follow suit. Instead, she takes a large sip, letting the heat sear through her chest on its way down, willing herself not to cough. 

“Alright?” Severus asks.

“More than,” she says, taking another drink, emboldened. “Do you like it?”

“It’s delicious,” he says, pouring himself another small measure. “If it weren’t for that cursed Christmas dinner, I’d have savored the first drink too, but I needed it, as it were.” 

“I can understand. I’ve been there. Literally.” 

He chuckles softly and rests his hip against the table. “I don’t think anyone at the school other than Poppy currently suspects your predicament, and I’d like to keep it that way, for the time being.”

Does that mean—could he be implying that—“You want me to hide out here?” She shouldn’t be so nervous at the prospect, and she takes another large sip of whisky, this time coughing as it hits the back of her throat. 

“Unless you’d prefer one of the unused Order safe houses—”

“No!” Her face grows hot. The alcohol must be working its way into her system, because next she adds, “Here would be lovely. I’d love to stay close to you.” 

“Right.” He finishes his drink and sends his glass to a small sink to the side of the room. Clears his throat. Adjusts his cuffs. “So you’ll take the bedroom then, and I’ll Transfigure the couch.”

“I’m not commandeering your room. If anything we could share, or I could take the couch; I spent months sleeping on the ground in a tent.” 

Severus completely ignores the invitation to share, summoning several blankets and beginning to clear off the couch. “Exactly, which is why I’ll not have you comparing the experience to my mediocre Transfiguration skills.”

“I’m sure you’re more than skilled at that and other things.” Other things having to do with that couch.

He clenches his jaw and turns back toward her, taking one step forward. “You’re recovering from—what is it now—twelve? Thirteen deaths?”

“Yes but you’re—”

“Don’t you dare finish that sentence with ‘old,’ Granger, or—”

“Or what?”

His nostrils flare, and he looks as if he’s about to lunge at her. Heat pools low in her abdomen as her mind supplies her with what could happen next. 

His hands brace her shoulders, his face looming closer. “Go to sleep, Granger.” 

In the morning, she tentatively steps out of Severus’s room to find him already awake, fully dressed, an empty cup of tea beside him.

“So, now that we’ve confirmed there’s no residual time sand, should we try some potions to, erm, temporarily kill me today?” she offers. Perhaps ‘good morning’ would have been better.

“No.”

“I thought that was one of the options—”

“It’s the last option. Before that, we should try to talk with some others we trust to see if you appear your age to them.”

“Alright,” Hermione says, one hand unconsciously reaching up to smooth her hair. The permanence of her appearance suddenly fills her with dread. She’d been skating by with the blurry uncertainties, uncaring for the makeup and hair regimens that may have once aided her, and now she’s left with whatever havoc thirteen deaths have wrought on her physical form. “In that case, perhaps I should…” She gestures vaguely to the bathroom. 

“Of course,” Severus says and clears his throat.

Hermione summons some robes to change into and then shuts herself inside, leaning on the door for a moment to gather herself before she turns on the shower. When she finally shucks off her clothing, she studies herself in Severus’s mirror: dark circles beneath her eyes that never seem to leave, the faint bruises from drawing her blood over the fainter scar on her forearm, the rest of her skin dull and blotchy. She looks like she’s in the midst of a war, which, she supposes, she is. Only her hair seems to have retained some of the spirited fire that used to infuse her. She nods to her reflection and then steps into the steam of the shower, letting the water cascade over her for several minutes, just coming to terms with herself. As she is now.

Eventually she has the wherewithal to open up and sniff all two of Severus’s bath products, surprised how immediately she’s drawn to the scent of his shampoo. For an idle moment as she works it into her hair, she imagines what his fingers would feel like massaging her scalp, then quickly shuts that thought away before any others follow it. 

Now that she’s staying in his quarters for the foreseeable future, she should at least maintain some respect. The weight of their situation hits differently when she realizes how much both of them now have at stake; kissing him will be remembered. Rejection, too. Which is why, she tells herself as she towels off, she’s going to be cautious. 

Even if it kills her.

When she emerges, she finds the door to Severus’s office open and crosses through to find him compiling a list of names. 

“I think it would be the most efficient to start at the Burrow,” he begins. “And that way you can update Potter on everything that’s transpired.” 

Her heart sinks. Harry. Of course. The flashbacks of him dying in previous loops threaten to consume her before she shakes them off. “You’re right. And then I suppose we could check in with Molly and Arthur and Bill.” The other Order members. 

Severus nods. “Perhaps you can visit after breakfast, then.” 

“You’re not coming with me?” Hermione blurts before she can stop herself. 

Severus looks surprised for a moment before his expression returns to its neutral baseline. “And be forced into some horrid knit jumper whilst everyone wishes me gone? No. Thank you, I’ll sit this one out.” 

“They don’t all wish you gone,” Hermione begins, but he silences her with a raised hand. 

“There are other things I need to take care of in the lab, besides,” he says, rising. And with that, Hermione’s once again alone.

She’s able to leave the grounds without anyone noticing, and she Apparates to the Burrow just after eleven in the morning. When she arrives, she sends a quick Patronus to Harry and Ron, bidding them to sneak out and meet her over by the back shed to avoid any additional attention for the time being. She’s getting used to the image of her thestral, its papery wings as light and dimensionless as she’s felt recently. 

The frosty air seeps into her skin as she waits, and it takes three refreshed warming charms before they meet her, bleary-eyed and yawning. 

“What’s all this about?” Ron mutters, wrapping his arms around himself. 

Hermione casts another warming charm around them. “I think we might have fixed the time loop,” she says. 

“That’s brilliant!” Ron exclaims, just as Harry asks, “Who’s ‘we?’”

“...Severus and me.” Hermione bites her lip. 

Ron’s eyes go wide while Harry frowns, apparently trying to process what to do with that information, when a dreamy voice behind them suddenly says, “I figured as much.”

“Luna?”

“Hello, Hermione. I notice your Patronus changed.” 

At this, Harry does a double take, glancing between Luna and Ron, whose cheeks begin to redden. 

“Don’t worry. Your mum didn’t see me sneak out,” Luna says cheerfully. 

“Anyway,” Harry says, clearing his throat. “Are you sure we can trust him? Snape, I mean?”

“Yes,” Hermione says firmly. “He’s really the one who’s made the most progress with all of this, and he’s the one who suggested I start to test who else can see me as I am.”

The other three nod, each absorbing the information at different speeds, until Luna says, “But all of us can already see you as you are. Who else are you going to test?”

“We’re starting with the most trustworthy Order members,” Hermione explains. “Perhaps your parents and Bill first,” she says to Ron, “and then from there we might reach out to others. Of course it’s all moot if only one person sees me at age seventeen again.” The thought chills her more than the cold air; even if everyone she asks can see her, there’s always that possibility that things aren’t quite fixed; that she’s not quite fixed onto the quilt of spacetime. She swallows. 

“Right, well. Should we head inside then?” Ron asks, rubbing his hands up and down his arms. 

Hermione steels herself and nods, marching toward the back door. Behind her, Harry jogs to catch up while Ron and Luna say goodbye. When Ron steps into the kitchen behind them, he’s cradling a small golden flower in his palm. 

It turns out that both Molly and Arthur can see Hermione at her current age, and so can Bill, although he doesn’t have as sharp a mental picture. All of them can clearly see her hair, though, its length becoming an odd barometer of her permanence. 

Relief washing over her, Hermione settles in for lunch, updating Harry and Ron on the progress with Severus’s sleeper agent potion, the horcruxes (of which only the diadem, Harry, and Nagini remain), the need to be ready to break into the Manor at a moment’s notice, and the most important task: 

“Under no circumstances are you to speak of any of this to Dumbledore.” 

“But Hermione, if you’ve been traveling in time—”

“—then I know the outcome of that action,” she says sharply. Then, taking in their shocked expressions, she gentles her tone. “At least let me be the one to discuss all of this with him. We need to time everything right to avoid the Death Eaters entering the school. To save as many people as possible,” she adds for emphasis. 

Eventually everyone concedes, and Hermione wishes she trusted things more.

Before she leaves, Harry pulls her aside and asks, “And what about me… killing Voldemort?” His eyes are bright and determined. He shouldn’t have to get blood on his hands so young. 

Hermione places a hand on his shoulder and says, “I’ll help you. I’ll think of something.” 

When she returns to Hogwarts, she beelines for the lab only to find Severus absent, several small cauldrons under stasis. Anise, feverfew, what looks like powdered bezoar all rest in little beakers to the side. 

She sets up her own equipment to experiment and peers into the microscope again, just to check, feeling at once comforted by the continued presence of her cells. Eventually, she realizes, they’ll die of natural causes. Old age. She can only hope the same fate awaits herself. 

It’s after dusk when Severus finally returns, pausing in the doorway. Something about his gaunt expression makes her cut the lights to the lab and lead him wordlessly back to their quarters. Now that nightfall blankets them securely, hidden in shadow, Hermione can see the blurred outline of his shoulders finally relax. 

“Everything went well at the Burrow,” she tells him softly, once they settle on the couch, the fire burning down to its embers. 

“I suppose Fleur and Tonks should be next on the list,” he says. “They’re perhaps the least likely to go to Dumbledore with news of your time travel. And besides, I know you’re probably dying for a chance to inspect your handiwork.” 

“Our handiwork,” she clarifies.

“Ours,” he agrees, turning toward her. 

She leans forward, unable to stop her eyes from tracing his thin lips in the dimming light.

“You should get some rest,” he says, one hand briefly touching her knee and then retreating. 

“Good night, Severus.” She takes a chance and brushes a soft kiss to his cheek before rising and heading to his room.

Sleep isn’t easy, the scent of him surrounding her and the knowledge that he lies, just out of reach, on the other side of the door.

She finds him the next morning in his office, pouring them both tea, a little tray of pastries from Dobby resting on the surface of his desk. 

The lemon ones appear to be his favorite.

“I just keep wondering,” she says, “about what we should do once term resumes again. Do I keep hiding here? Try some glamour charms? Or just go back to classes and tell everyone, ‘Sorry, must’ve hit the eggnog a bit too hard this year?’”

Severus snorts and snatches up another pastry. “Given the way you handle your whisky, that last one might be the best option.” 

Her face flushes. 

“But anyway,” he continues, “I’m hoping it won’t be necessary.” 

“What?”

“It would be ideal to solve all of this before term even starts.” 

As quickly as it had come, the color drains from Hermione’s face. “Before?”

The horror settles deeper when she realizes how dangerous everything will be. This time, she could die for real. And so could Severus, and Harry, and countless others. Suddenly the reassurance that she’s been there before is not so reassuring—not when she’s seen it all go pear-shaped in myriad ways. 

Severus seems to notice her hesitance and slides the plate of pastries forward. “I know it must be jarring, having all the time in the world for so long and then suddenly only a fortnight.”

“I know it must be worse, knowing you could die any minute during a Summons,” she replies. 

“It’s not a competition.” 

“Isn’t everything with you a competition?” she teases, taking a pastry. 

“Only when I’m winning.” He crosses his arms. “Speaking of which, we should probably discuss if and when we’re going to approach Albus about all of this.” 

“I thought we weren’t going to tell him at all.” 

Severus presses his lips together and slides open one of the large bottom drawers of his desk. Then he pulls out a large bottle and sets it on the surface with a thunk.  

The poisoned mead.

Hermione blinks.

From his pocket, Severus withdraws a folded piece of parchment that he hands to her.

• Don’t take the vow.

• Give Granger the healing ointment.

• Give Granger access to the lab.
• Tooth capsule

• Destroy the locket and the cursed necklace.

• Steal the poisoned mead.

• Plant the sleeper agent.

• Destroy the goblet.

• Destroy the diadem only after coming up with an alternative to the break-in. 

“You’re actually going to poison him with it?” she asks incredulously.

“I’m hoping we won’t have to; its effects are not exactly… pleasant.” 

“Then what?” Hermione eyes the mead warily.

Severus rubs a hand over his face before straightening in his chair. “We need to find a method for gathering all of the Death Eaters at Malfoy Manor. One that isn’t,” he adds quickly, “Potter’s presence alone; that was too chaotic. It didn’t allow us enough time to station ourselves and plan.” 

Hermione leans forward, nodding.

“This whole time, Draco has been tasked with murdering Albus. No one believes him capable. But if he were to succeed… It would be cause for celebration.” Severus frowns as though trying to access a memory. “Guards would be as loose as they ever are, people would get sloshed, and we’d ensure Bellatrix and anyone abroad would be called back.”

“We’d have everyone gathered.” 

“All the loose ends present to be tied up when I activate the sleeper agent.” 

“But wouldn’t that be risky?” Hermione can’t help but ask. “We’d have that many more people to fight.”

“Yes,” Severus says gravely. “But we’ve managed some aspects of it before, and it ensures no one will be able to go into hiding or attempt to carry on the Dark Lord’s legacy after his death.” 

Hermione nods, aware of how easily darkness can spread. 

“How did you come up with all this?” she asks, still in awe of how he’s managed to keep track of so many moving parts.

At this Severus hesitates, eyes darting across her face for a moment before he says, “It’s absurd. But. I seem to have bits and pieces of what happened before. During the other loops,” he adds. 

Hermione feels her eyes widen. 

“It’s not much—not like possessing a full memory, so much as instinct, intuition. Feelings.” He swallows. “What might work and what should be avoided.” He pauses, taking a long breath in and out slowly through his nose. “I believe it might have something to do with the broken Time Turner; with our… connection.” 

“Oh,” Hermione murmurs softly. That would explain the strange sense she’s had that he’s remembering things from previous loops. 

“I don’t know how much we can trust it—” he begins.

“I trust you.”

He huffs. “Well I suppose this plan is better than going through the appropriate legal channels and summoning anyone from the DMLE. Setting aside how corrupt the whole department is, war criminals are historically not shown much mercy.” 

Always a pivot away from intimacy. A distraction. A dash back to safe territory. 

Hermione smiles. 

“And speaking of the DMLE,” Severus says, smirking back just as a knock sounds on his door, “perhaps our guest will cheer you up.” 

“Tonks!” Hermione exclaims in surprise. She jolts from her seat and crosses over to her.

“Wotcher, Hermione.” Tonks steps through the door, hugs her briefly, and then pauses, stepping back to survey her. “Your hair got long.”

Hermione grins. “About that…” She explains as best as she can once the door is shut, concluding with, “So we’re around the same age now. If you can believe it. I’ve spent literal years going back in time and trying to set you up with Fleur. Well. Trying to get her to realize her feelings for you. Among other things.” 

“Er, not sure I follow… all of that, but—I hope we weren’t the only reason you were going back in time.”

Hermione catches sight of Severus, head bent over his parchment as though he hasn’t been listening in. “You weren’t.”

• Don’t take the vow.

• Give Granger the healing ointment.

• Give Granger access to the lab.
• Tooth capsule

• Destroy the locket and the cursed necklace.

• Steal the poisoned mead.

• Plant the sleeper agent.

• Destroy the goblet.

• Destroy the diadem only after coming up with an alternative to the break-in. 

Later that night, they head out in the eerie stillness of the castle to destroy the diadem. 

Now that they’ve placed limits on their time, it makes the most sense to get it out of the way before the riskier aspects of their plan are set in motion. Still, Hermione is nervous. Of all the horcruxes, this one is what beckons her the most; what calls her to seek it out, the knowledge it might offer, to reach for it, to succumb—

“Granger, we’ve done this before,” Severus says beside her. 

“We have,” she responds. “And I’ve also worn it before. This is one case where past exposure is the opposite of comforting.” Unbidden, the memory of the cold biting metal against her skull sweeps over her, the buzzing, frenetic energy, the hallucinations taking her by storm—

A gentle brush against her hand brings her back. 

Back to the vast halls of the castle, darkness all around, and Severus by her side. 

She reaches for him and takes his hand. 

Together, they enter the room, approaching the familiar diadem and vanishing cabinet. For a moment, Hermione hesitates, the familiar call of the diadem tugging at her impulses. But then she grits her teeth and pulls out the Basilisk fang.

“Steady on, Granger,” Severus says, placing his hand over hers. 

Together, they raise their arms and plunge the fang down, the ear-splitting shriek of splintering metal surging all around them until finally, everything is still and the only sound is the fang clattering to the floor.

Severus’s hand is still clutching hers. She glances over to see him panting, a dark lock of hair stuck to his forehead, his lips parted—as if he’s just as bewildered as she is that they really did it—that it really could be that easy. 

And she can’t help it—she kisses him. 

He gives a surprised little mmph! at the force of it, her free arm around his lean waist, tugging him impossibly closer as if she can steal his air. Then he recovers, pressing back against her, one hand now buried in her hair and tugging just firmly enough to tilt her head back so that he can pepper kisses along her jaw, down to her neck. 

Her toes curl in her boots, and she gasps, grabbing a fistful of his robes. 

Please, she wants to whisper. Please don’t push me away this time.

His kisses move back up across her cheek, to the corner of her mouth, and then to her parted lips again, his tongue sliding forward to meet hers and sending a violent wave of longing through her veins. She moans, stirred by the way his breath catches in response. His kisses are urgent and unrestrained, each more dizzying than the last, pausing only for the occasional heated, shared breath. Her skin feels on fire, her core beginning to throb with want as he backs her up until they stumble against the broken ottoman. 

And then he pulls away, his hair mussed, two splotches of color on his cheeks. 

Hermione tries to calm the frantic beating of her heart, summoning the Basilisk fang with a shaking hand and stashing it again just for something to do. 

“Granger—” 

“Hermione.”

“Hermione,” he says, and it sounds more like a strangled groan than her name. 

She braces herself for yet another noble speech about how they shouldn’t, how it’s an unnecessary risk, how their objectives should come first—

“Come with me,” he says, taking her hand, “back to my quarters.”

Chapter Text

Severus wills his hands not to tremble as he closes the door to his quarters and wards it shut. Still half in disbelief that Hermione hasn’t changed her mind on the tense walk back from the Room of Requirement—several heated kisses and a hand trying to work itself under his robes thankfully confirmed it—he’s now completely at a loss for what to do next. Should he offer her a drink? Light the fire again? Or perhaps he should—

A hand on his shoulder jolts him out of his panicked thoughts. The next thing he knows, he’s being tugged away from the door, Hermione leaning up to kiss him, her arms already beginning to clutch at him with the same urgency as before. As if no time has passed.

He returns her kiss, trying to keep from pulling her hair too hard, though he’s given up on keeping his hands out of it. Every part of her that he touches is so soft.

Slowly, they make their way around the furniture toward the bedroom, slipping off their shoes and outer robes, lips and hands never leaving each other, as if losing contact would lose the heady spell of finally being able to touch like this. It’s surreal, having her in his arms. How many nights had he woken up with the fleeting image of her just out of reach of his dreams, hips pressing into the mattress, shame burning through him when he realized she could never be truly his? Another version of him could hold her. Another could kiss her awake in the mornings, and another could solve her placelessness in time. But never him. 

Severus lets himself run his hands along Hermione’s sides, the heat of her skin sinking into his fingertips. Her hair tickles his neck as he kisses her again, still scarcely daring to believe he can. 

“I’ve wanted this,” she murmurs as she breaks away, her legs hitting his mattress. 

Severus can’t answer—can’t begin to describe how fiercely he’s wanted this too, but he doesn’t have to, because she’s already drawing him forward. She kisses his jaw and then trails her lips down the side of his neck, nipping and sucking lightly and sending a shiver through him that he tries to fight off. It’s been so long since he’s been kissed like this… Her hands slip under his shirt to stroke his abdomen, and he feels his muscles tense there as blood begins to rush south. 

“Take this off?” she asks, tugging at his shirt, and his fingers fumble with the top few buttons before he gives up and pulls it over his head. It’s only after, when the shock of cold from the dungeon air hits him, that he realizes what she must be seeing: scars, a few still pink-tinged against the sickly pallor of his skin, the stark reminder of what he’s done. What he’s been. 

But Hermione only smiles, soft and private, and returns to kissing him, running her hands up and down his bare chest and letting out breathy little gasps as he begins to touch her back. One of his hands smooths down the length of her spine, and the other grasps her hip as he finally allows himself to melt against her. Slowly, they sink backwards onto the mattress, Hermione drawing him on top of her, their legs intertwined.

He reaches for the buttons on her blouse, and before he can even ask, she’s nodding and arching her back. He unbuttons her with as much care as he can manage. Every inch of flushed skin that becomes visible threatens to send him into a frenzy, and when he’s finally done and he peels apart the garment to reveal her lace-clad breasts, he can’t help but groan at the sight. 

Hermione shifts up to a seat, blushing further as she removes her blouse and then reaches for the clasp of her bra. 

Beautiful, he wants to say, when she finally slips the straps off of her shoulders. But what comes out instead is another strangled groan as he leans forward to kiss his way down her sternum, a trembling hand softly caressing one breast as his mouth reaches the other, gentle, careful kisses spiraling inward until she grasps his hair and whines. 

“Can I—”

“Yes, gods, Severus,” she moans, arching her back.

He swirls his tongue around her nipple, drawing it into his mouth to suck. Her little whimper in response travels right to his cock, which strains against his trousers. He takes his time with her, lips and tongue moving slowly between her breasts as his hands trace up and down her body, pausing every so often to bury themselves in her hair. Every sound Hermione makes—every hitch in her breath, every moan—makes him burn hotter, kiss more greedily, until she suddenly shoves at him and undoes the button on his trousers.  

He freezes, sudden shame washing over him for a moment before he reminds himself that it’s Hermione. Not someone who will judge him or mock him or hang him upside down in the air. Hermione, biting her flushed lip and panting; Hermione, noticing his hesitancy and reaching a hand up to his face; Hermione, murmuring against his mouth, “Sorry, I was just worried I might actually physically combust if you kept teasing me like that.”

Teasing? 

“In that case,” he says, his confidence slowly returning, “lay back.” 

She immediately does as instructed, nodding vigorously as he reaches for the button on her trousers, shifting her hips up to let him drag them down her legs. He kisses his way back up one thigh, a hand gently tracing the edge of her underwear as she shudders under his touch. When his lips reach her hip, he lets his hand tentatively press against her core over the damp fabric. 

“Oh,” she gasps, grinding against him.

Tentatively, he kisses across her lower abdomen, watching the rise and fall of her breaths. The hint of her scent is intoxicating, and he chases it, lowering his mouth as she gasps. 

“Severus, I want—I need—” she breaks off and reaches down to tug at her underwear. 

Together, they slide it off, and this time he remembers to tell her she’s beautiful out loud—and she is, smiling shyly under his praise, spread out on his bed with her wild hair. He trails a hand up her leg, mirroring the path his mouth had taken before, and watches in awe as she parts her legs for him, her folds flushed and slick with want. 

“Please,” she whispers, as he begins to trace gentle circles around her clit. He’s desperate to taste her, to watch as she falls apart for him. Slowly, he lowers his head. Her eyes go wide in that moment of realization of what he intends, and she bites her lip before finally nodding. 

The first touch of his tongue on her clit has her cursing and arching up against him. The second has her hands clutched in his hair, the pleasant sting and scrape of her nails making him moan against her. He swirls his tongue in tight little circles, pausing to suck gently. Above him, Hermione gasps and writhes, the sheets beneath her growing wetter. 

“Would you—your fingers—” she asks, and he shifts to slide one inside of her. She clenches around him, hot and tight, and his cock twitches in response.

“Oh gods,” she whimpers, releasing his hair to take fist fulls of his sheets. “Please don’t stop.” 

He keeps his pace, the flat of his tongue pressed against her clit, his finger curling forward, until he feels her begin to tremble. She comes with a loud gasp, head thrown back, eyes tightly shut, riding out her orgasm with abandon. Selfishly, he watches, slowing his touches slightly but still trying to wring out as many aftershocks as he can, his own body thrumming with a wave of desire every time he watches her crest another wave of bliss.

Finally, she pulls him up and away, and he nips at her collarbone before glancing up at her face. She’s staring at him with something akin to awe that makes him swell with undeserved pride.

“Fuck,” she says, still dazed. Then, “I’m on the potion by the way. Take off your pants.” 

This time, he can’t help but comply, nearly stumbling in his haste. When his body turns towards hers again, clad in only his underwear, Hermione reaches forward to run her hand down his chest, his stomach—his breath hitches—and settles to rest over his cock. She rubs slowly up and down over the fabric, her brows drawn down ever so slightly in concentration, and it strains up against her. Severus is completely still, afraid that saying or doing anything will suddenly make her see reason and kick him out of his own bedroom.

She slips a hand past his waistband instead.

His brain short circuits. 

His cock is already hard and aching, precome leaking from the tip, and he knows he won’t last—not with her small hand working him up and down, pausing every so often to swirl the next bead of moisture around the sensitive head in a teasing circle. He gently takes hold of her wrist to stop her. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispers, “if that didn’t feel good.” 

He kisses her hand before he admits, “It did. Perhaps too good,” then laughs when she immediately begins to pull his underwear all the way off. She draws him on top of her again, wrapping her legs around him and swallowing his responding moan. 

He breaks away to lift up and meet her eyes, still finding it hard to believe she’s looking at him with such unguarded warmth. 

“I’ve waited a long time for this,” she says softly. 

He kisses her, then, as if he can somehow express the way his longing has outstripped his fear; as if his gratitude for her waiting can ever be fully rendered.

He guides the leaking tip of his cock toward her entrance and clenches his teeth as he sinks inside, trying to adjust to the all consuming wet, tight heat around him.

“Oh,” she moans, circling her arms around his shoulders. “You feel so good.” She grinds against him and arches her back, her walls gripping him, and he clutches tighter to the last threads of his self control. 

“Just,” he grits out, “give me a moment. Please.” It’s humiliating how desperate he sounds, the tremor in his voice and the way he has to take slow, even breaths, determined not to come too early.

Hermione waits, her own shaky breath mirroring his until finally, he’s ready to begin moving. 

Beneath him, the sounds of her gasps fill his ears, and he relishes the bite of her nails in the skin of his back. He thrusts deeper, gently at first, then more firmly when she moans at the change in sensation. Every time he’s fully sheathed within her, he feels dangerously closer to the brink. 

“Is that—are you—” he asks, panting, his body burning with the need for release. 

“I’m already close again,” Hermione murmurs, kissing him urgently. 

Thank god, he thinks, one hand reaching down to circle her clit. She gasps in response, throwing her head back and digging her heels into his back. Her plush lips part as she whines, just on the precipice, just like him as he feels a tightness coiling at the base of his spine, until she comes again with a long keen, walls fluttering around him.  

He only manages a few more thrusts and then he’s coming hard, jolts of pleasure shuddering through him as he watches Hermione’s face, her eyes wide and locked with his.

Shaking, he slips out and lowers himself beside her, grateful that in the haze of feeling he’s somehow managed to remember a cleaning charm. It’s only a moment later and Hermione is reaching for him, one arm over his abdomen and her head shifting to rest on his shoulder. Her breath settles into a slow, easy rhythm, and he finds himself mirroring it, wrapping one arm protectively around her shoulders. Slowly, mind drifting toward that place in between sleep and aimless thought, he breathes in the scent of her, nose buried in her hair, and wonders if any of this can last.

“Severus?”

He blinks, looking down to find Hermione’s warm eyes searching his face. The light from the window has gone murky and cold. There must be only a sliver of moon above the lake. How long have they been lying together? How long has she been awake? 

“Severus, how—how do I know if this is real?" She shifts up onto an elbow. "That if I keep going, I won’t end up back at the end of fifth year again when I finally die? What if—what if I go through whole lifetimes like this, and it never gets any better?”

“It’s real,” he says after a breath. And it startles him how surely he knows it. Somewhere deep down, what he once thought was merely a foolish desire, he’s beginning to trust more and more.

He’s silent for a long while, seeking a way to explain this strange certainty to Hermione. “If it happens again—if the timeline restarts—and I’m saying this out loud in part so you’ll have proof for the next time you see me and use Legilimency to bring me up to speed—I’ll go round up another broken Time Turner and join you, and we’ll figure something out.”

She leans over to kiss him and smiles.  “What if we get sick of each other after a few hundred years?”

“Then you’ll have additional motivation to break the loop.”

“Just so you know. I’ve spent a lot more time with you now than you have with me, and I’m not sick of you yet.”

“You’re clearly not as bright as I once thought.” He sniffs, hoping it sounds like his typical disdain and not sentimental longing.

“You once thought I was bright?”

“And overly preoccupied with seeking validation. Neither has changed.” 

Hermione laughs softly, letting her head fall back onto Severus’s shoulder. “I don’t think I could ever get sick of you.”

Chapter Text

She wakes slowly, the gentle sound of the shower running in the background. Her back is cold—no doubt Severus’s absence—but her chest warms at the sight of their clothes still scattered about the room. 

When he returns, sporting a worn black dressing gown and toweling off his hair, Hermione smiles shyly and reaches out a hand.

This time when they kiss, his words echo inside her head like a reassurance: It’s real.

Somehow bolder in the dim morning light, she pushes him onto his back and straddles him, moving her lips across his jaw and down his pale throat.  

He makes a muffled sound in response, shifting underneath her and running his hands up her sides. 

Gooseflesh spreads across her skin. She moves lower, kissing the faint scars on his chest, slowly opening the front of his dressing gown to reveal more of his body. 

He moves as if to draw it closed again before surrendering, lying back with a shaky sigh. It feels empowering, to be able to touch him like this; to be able to earn his trust, inch by inch, as her hair brushes his lean abdomen. She gently grasps his hip as she parts the garment fully to expose his erection, and before either of them can overthink this, she lowers her head. She licks tentatively along the underside and glances up. His jaw is clenched tightly, both hands gripping the pillow in fists. 

“Hermione, I—” His words are cut off as she circles her tongue around the tip, and he lets out a strangled gasp as she slowly draws him into her mouth, her hand tightening around the base. Gradually, she works him deeper into her throat, up and down, the faint musky taste of him sending a throb to her core. 

Severus is mostly silent, his breathing shallow and erratic, his body strung taut. For a moment, she wonders if it’s even enjoyable to him—she hasn’t exactly had much practice with this act—but then a sudden shiver runs through him.

“S-stop! I’m—” he breaks off, wrenching his head to the side, eyes shut tightly. The tendons on his pale neck stand out, tension wrought throughout his entire frame, even as she eases herself off. In her gentle grasp, his cock twitches, straining upward as if begging for release. She watches, transfixed, as his stomach trembles through three deep breaths, relaxing slowly through great effort. 

“Please,” she murmurs, kissing his hip lightly. His pelvis jerks involuntarily in response. “Let me?”

Would he not allow himself this?

“You don’t have to—”

“I want to.” 

Finally, after a long moment, he turns back to look at her, dark eyes on fire with longing and a hint of disbelief. 

“I want to,” she says again, more firmly this time. 

He gives the slightest nod. 

Slowly, she shifts, making eye contact as she opens her mouth once again, pressing her tongue against the ridge at the underside before enveloping the tip with her lips. His eyes widen as if frightened, and she feels his body tense again. She moans around him, sinking deeper, taking more of him into her mouth, relaxing her throat, and feels a flare of pride when she hears his responding gasp. She hollows her cheeks and sucks and watches his face as she pulls up. 

He shuts his eyes. “Gods, I can’t—I can’t watch you like this,” he pants, “or I’ll—” 

Hermione moans around him as she bobs her head, feeling his lean thighs tighten and begin to shake under her hands. She knows he’s holding back, unable to let himself fall over the edge. She pauses, tracing one thick vein up and down the shaft. 

“Severus,” she murmurs gently, “I want to taste you.” She redoubles her efforts, taking the flushed tip into her mouth and swirling her tongue around it before beginning to move again.

“You can’t mean that—no one has ever—oh gods, Hermione, I’m—I’m—” he breaks off again, his voice deepening to a low growl as he writhes beneath her. His eyes fly open to meet her gaze, and his cock suddenly pulses over and over, flooding her mouth with hot come.

She swallows convulsively, surprised at the flare of want spreading up from her core as she watches him fully undone.  

He only gives himself a moment’s reprieve before he’s pulling her up, smoothing her hair, and offering her water with a shaking hand. 

She declines it, pressing her mouth against his instead, hoping he can taste himself and know how much she wanted it—wanted him—because how many more chances will she have to really show him? She knows she’s stalling, selfishly holding onto as many of these moments as she can, because this time they really could both die. This time really could be the last.

Severus kisses her with the same urgency she feels before suddenly breaking away and whispering in her hair, “Let me take care of you.” 

The next few days are spent in bed as much as possible—as much as Hermione can make possible. It seems foolish, perhaps, but it’s all she cares about remembering with so much at stake. 

The way his hands always find their way into her hair. 

The way the tendons on his neck stand out the closer he nears the edge. 

The way he whispers her name as he trembles, his resolve finally breaking.

It’s after one of these encounters that he gathers her in his arms and tells her they need to finally talk to Dumbledore. 

She always thought she’d be the one to push them forward down that path, but the more selfish parts of her had wanted to linger, to soak up as much connection as possible before it all came crashing down. But all good things are transient, she’s realizing. 

“Okay,” she says into his shoulder. Then, “I’ll do it. It should be me.” 

It shouldn’t make her chest ache to see Severus retreat to the lab—not when he kisses her softly goodbye, twice—but she can’t help but feel like each step toward the headmaster’s office is a step closer to staring her fate dead in the eyes.

“Sugar quills.”

The gargoyle springs aside, and Hermione slowly ascends the spiral staircase, wondering why it seems so much like she’s climbing up to the gallows for her own execution. 

Dumbledore greets her from his desk as though he’d been expecting her. His shrewd eyes trace the length of her hair, but he says nothing, waiting for her to speak first. 

“I’m sorry,” she begins, surprising herself with the emotion in her voice, “for what I’m about to suggest.” 

He raises his eyebrows mildly. 

She takes a breath and sets her jaw. “You’re going to have to poison yourself and let Draco Malfoy think he’s murdered you.” 

“Whyever would I need to do that, Hermione?” he asks. He seems neither particularly surprised nor disturbed at her sudden command. 

“Because the Elder Wand and whatever you intend with it will fail, first of all. Something about devising some convoluted chain of ownership from beyond the grave is a recipe for failure. At least it failed the first time,” she amends.

Dumbledore folds his hands together on his desk, pale crinkled skin atop blackened scar. “The first time,” he repeats. 

“Second of all,” she continues, “because we need a reason to have the Death Eaters all convene at Malfoy Manor.” She sighs. “Look, I know it’s obviously a lot to ask. I’m sure there are things you need to do before you’re ready to…” she trails off, unable to bring herself to say the word ‘die,’ even if it’s an act she’s performed nearly countless times. 

“I’ve already had months to prepare for my death,” Dumbledore says. His voice is still so calm.

“But can one ever really be truly ready?”

“I suppose we’ll find out soon enough.” He smiles. “I suppose you have your ideas as to the method?”

She reaches into her bag and pulls out the bottle of poisoned mead. Eyeing it, she frowns. “It’s, erm, not the most painless way to go.” 

“Oh?” Dumbledore asks mildly, no fear betraying his expression.

“If I may…” Hermione reaches into her pocket and pulls out her tooth capsule from where she’d stashed it earlier. “This method is much more effective. Quick, painless, easy. Well, as easy as suicide can be, I suppose.” 

Dumbledore takes it and holds it up to the light. “How are you so sure?”

“Because I’ve used it.” 

It takes less time than she’d anticipated, filling Dumbledore in on her journey through time. She wishes he’d show any surprise, but the whole time he just listens, nodding slowly, hands neatly folded. Resigned. 

Or, perhaps, at peace. 

“So everything is nearly prepared, ready to be set in motion by my death,” he concludes.

Hermione nods. Suddenly the weight of responsibility descends upon her—after all, it was she who destroyed the diadem, forcing their hand with the current timeline, knowing that everything needed to happen before the Death Eaters could break into the school. What if she had stalled? What if they had found another way? What if, instead of all the time spent researching her own predicament, she had given some thought to Dumbledore and his cursed hand? Could she have cured him? Could Severus?

“In that case,” Dumbledore says, bringing her back from her racing thoughts. He studies the tooth capsule once more before placing it in his own pocket. “I hope you can forgive an old man his mistakes.” 

“Er, what do you mean—”

“I’ll have your honorary Hogwarts degree drafted before I go.” 

She blinks. 

“I think six additional years of schooling is quite enough, wouldn’t you agree?” He smiles at her, warmly this time, and exits through the back of his office.

Strangely shaken, Hermione descends the spiral stairs slowly, realizing how, despite the number of times she’s managed to die, she’s never been able to find such peace.

Maybe one day she will.

Until then…

“I know I’m an official adult now, but I’m kind of freaking the fuck out.” 

“What’s wrong, Hermione?” Harry asks with concern. 

She frowns, unsure where to begin. After leaving Dumbledore’s office, she’d Apparated back here to the Burrow in a fit of impulse, suddenly aware of how little time she has to prepare Harry for the inevitable trip to the manor.

She takes a deep breath and explains what will happen—pushing past Harry’s shocked gasp and trying to recenter him on the task ahead.

“But the prophecy—”

“I know. I told you, I’d figure something out.” And she will—she has to. She’ll not be the one responsible for making Harry a murderer in this timeline, if only she could think.

“How much time do I have?” Harry asks and swallows. 

“Not much,” she admits. “Days. Maybe a week.” 

“Then you better start planning with Severus instead of worrying about me,” he says, firmly this time.

Back in Severus’s quarters, Hermione paces, ignoring Dobby’s entreaties to have some lunch. 

“Days. Maybe a week.” 

All those years hopping around in time and she still hasn’t figured out how she can help Harry. 

“And either must die at the hand of the other…”

Is it worth it, making him kill Voldemort in order to save so many others? Dumbledore hadn’t thought so; or at least hadn’t realized the extent of sacrificial deaths that would be traded for Harry’s purity. She would gladly take his place and kill one person in exchange for so many lives. A scrap of memory floats before her—of Molly Weasley dueling Bellatrix in the original final battle at Hogwarts—and she realizes, now, how different it is to be willing to kill for something rather than simply die for something.

“Have you eaten?” Severus asks as he stalks through the door. His hair is lank and stringy, his eyes shadowed, as if the noxious steam from the potions he’s been working with have refused to lease their hold.

“No,” Hermione admits.

“Good.” He casts a stasis charm over the food. “It’s better to have an empty stomach for what we’re about to do next.”

Back in the lab, the fumes are even worse, clouding the air and making Hermione’s head feel foggy. Scattered vials and discarded beakers with congealed contents litter the surface of the work table. Empty jars of anise and feverfew shoved to the side, and what looks like powdered bezoar dusting the surface of the work bench. Has the space ever been this disorganized? 

“What have you been working on?” she asks, tentatively scanning the equipment for any clues. 

Severus grunts in response, decanting one potion in the corner into twin bottles. One, he caps. The other, he grips tightly, making his way toward her. 

“Oh.” A weight plummets deep in her gut. “Of course.” 

The potions to test if the time loop really has stopped. The potions to temporarily kill her. 

“If you’re not ready—” he begins, but she silences him by placing her hand over his on the bottle. 

“It doesn’t matter anymore. If I’m ready. Time waits for no one.” 

“I’ve used the minimum amounts of the most toxic ingredients and triple-filtered it at each stage of the process… I’ve tried to make it safe.” He gives a sharp laugh. “As if there’s anything that can be safe about temporarily stopping your heart and all functions of life… I’m sorry, Hermione.” He scrubs a hand through his stringy hair. “You deserve better.” 

Something shifts inside her at these words, clawing at her chest.

“I trust you,” she says. 

He leads her back to his quarters in silence, gathering a host of other ingredients as they depart the lab—all the things necessary to resuscitate her if needed—and then clears the area around his couch. 

She lies down, heart picking up speed. “If this doesn’t work—or perhaps, if this works too well—where will I end up? At the checkpoint? Or at… at the beginning?” 

“You’ll end up right here,” Severus replies gruffly, kneeling beside her. “I won’t stand for anything else.” 

She gives a nod. She hopes he’s right. 

Gently, one thumb on her lower lip, he tips the bottle over her mouth.

She wakes with a ragged gasp.  

Frantically, her vision swimming, her eyes search beside her and land on Severus, his face hovering above hers. 

“Welcome back, Granger,” he says, the faintest tremor in his voice.

“Hermione.”

“Hermione,” he repeats, gathering her in his arms and burying his nose in her hair.

That night, Severus doesn’t let go of her. His hands never stop touching her, his body never breaks contact, and even after, when they drift into a restless and uneasy sleep, he clutches her close against his chest. Tethered.

When they wake in the morning, it’s with a nervous dread—they still need to test the potion on Severus.

Hermione wishes they could stall more—wishes the slew of antidotes and backup options weren’t still laid out neatly on his table from yesterday—wishes she wouldn’t have to see his limp frame again, like back in the Shrieking Shack, a cruel reminder of what she’d lost the first time.

And what if, this time, like the first time, she doesn’t save him?

“Enough,” Severus says sharply. “You’re practically radiating doubt, and it’s not exactly helpful.” His tone is harsh, but his eyes are soft, and he places a gentle hand on the small of her back as they step closer to the couch. 

Together, they sit. 

“I don’t want you to die,” Hermione says softly, ashamed of how frail her voice sounds. 

“Then don’t let me,” he fires back, a boyish grin on his face. He toasts her with the little bottle and prepares to lie back—

Suddenly, a look of pure terror flashes across his face, so briefly that Hermione wonders if she merely imagined it. Then his face shutters, and he smiles at her again, this time softly; ruefully. 

“I’m being summoned.”

Shit. 

Shit shit shit. 

Hermione paces the empty room, heart pounding in her throat as she tries to rehearse the plan once again in her panicked mind. If “plan” is even the appropriate term—it’s basically just a list of orders from Severus on his way out the door, convinced that Dumbledore was dead and that Draco Malfoy was being given credit, for why else would a summons occur now, when it never had before in any of the other timelines?

“Wait here. For much longer than feels comfortable. Then go inspect the Headmaster’s office under a Disillusionment.”

Did Severus know that any length of time would feel like pure torture? Was he still at the manor? What was he doing? Could anyone have found out about—

“Don’t you dare worry about me, Hermione. Worry about literally everything else.” 

Ha. She’ll worry about him all she fucking wants.

“Trust me. I have a hunch about something and—” 

His mark had burned again, and he’d broken off to kiss her once more—one last time before he left.

What would he have said? The question gnaws at her just as she gnaws at her own nails. She tries to focus on what she needs to do next—after waiting as instructed—and plots her path to the Burrow to fetch Harry. She’ll need to find some way to convince the rest of the Weasleys and Luna to stay behind, not to mention figure out how, exactly, she's going to kill Voldemort while Harry still fulfills his end of the prophecy—fucking prophecies!—and what about the hallows after all? 

As if in a bid to answer her questions, Dobby pops into existence right in front of her. 

She stumbles to a halt.

“Where is the Potions Master?” he asks, looking around, clutching his large ears. 

“He left,” Hermione says tentatively, wishing her voice didn’t shake. 

“But the Headmaster—he—” Dobby breaks off and bursts into tears, sinking down on the worn carpet beneath their feet. 

“It’s alright,” she says, kneeling and awkwardly patting his shoulder. “I know he had limited time left, and he told me he was ready…” 

At this, Dobby wails harder, clinging to Hermione’s ankle. “But he’s gone! Dobby thought”—he hiccups—“Dobby thought he was going to live forever! Or at least try to find a way to fight the curse. But the young Malfoy poisoned him somehow, and then took him away before he could fight. He even snapped his wand—”

“He what?” Hermione asks in shock. 

Dobby removes one of the hats Hermione had knitted him and blows his nose into it. 

“Someone snapped Dumbledore’s wand?” she asks again, gripping Dobby by the shoulders. 

Sniffling, he nods. 

“Listen, Dobby, I’m really sorry, but you need to stay here and don't come anywhere near Malfoy Manor for the foreseeable future…” she trails off and stands. 

Then she takes off through the corridors to see for herself.

The office is eerily silent. Even though it’s only been a day, it somehow feels like a lifetime since Hermione had spoken, face-to-face, with the man whose body is now conspicuously absent, no doubt dragged off by Malfoy as proof of his completed assignment. 

The desk is a mess of shattered magical objects and toppled ink and quill stands. Hermione steps carefully, inspecting the room for anything potentially out of place—any hints that might let her know what had been going through Dumbledore’s mind as he reached for his own death. 

As he snapped his wand.

Because surely he did that himself. It couldn’t have been anyone else. She spots the item in question cast off to the side of the room by a small waste paper bin.

“Because the Elder Wand and whatever you intend with it will fail, first of all.”

Her own words echo back as if mocking her. Fail, indeed.

She crouches down to study it, the faint silver of thestral hair glinting from where it curls across the ground beneath the splinters of wood. He must have snapped it himself just before he—

She blinks, surprised to find the prick of tears in her eyes. 

She forces herself to finish her thought: just before he bit into the tooth capsule and killed himself.

She sighs, gingerly picking up the wand and stashing it in her pocket, perhaps for no reason other than proof that the hallows will no longer haunt her. She’s about to rise when the sight of her name catches her from the parchments in the little bin. She inches closer.

Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry 

Upon recommendation of the Faculty, the degree of 

Master of Wizardry 

Has been conferred upon

Hermione Granger

Who has honorably fulfilled all requirements in the study of Ancient Runes, Arithmancy, Care of Magical Creatures, Charms, Defence Against the Dark Arts, Divination, Herbology, Potions, and Transfiguration for this degree together with all the rights and privileges thereunto.

Her vision blurs again, and this time the tears spill over, running down her cheeks and onto her robes. She gathers up the parchment and makes to rise, when a series of small clatters startles her. 

There, scattered around the bottom of the bin, are small black fragments: the remnants of the Resurrection Stone.

The Burrow’s windows are lit up with an orange glow, cheer in the face of rapidly descending darkness all around. Hermione almost feels guilty approaching it—how can she violate something that still burns bright with the coziness of Christmas?

She hesitates on the perimeter of the lawn, until a figure suddenly appears in the door, a burst of laughter and noise rushing out before it shuts once again.

Harry.

“Thought I’d run into you soon,” he says, jogging a bit to meet her at the edge of shadow. “My scar started hurting, and I thought it might be time.” 

Hermione’s throat burns, and she nods, unsure how to tell him about Dumbledore—

“So he’s dead,” Harry says, as if reading her thoughts. 

She nods again.

“And now we’re off to the manor so Voldemort can kill me.” 

“Godric, Harry, you’ve gone dark.” 

He grins at her and holds out his arm. “Maybe if I survive all of this, I can learn how to Apparate.” 

Something presses heavily on Hermione’s chest at these words—she remembers Apparition classes, those times on the run when they’d reach for each other—and she wonders if, by accelerating the timeline like this, she’s robbing him of a chance at all the mundane things in his future. Simple things he deserves, like failing an Apparition exam or getting another detention with Snape.

But she’s made her choice this time. And she takes his arm, whirling them away into further darkness.

Their feet land steady on the crisp grass of the Manor grounds.

Hermione hesitates, then grasps Harry’s arm tighter. “Harry, this isn’t something you have to face on your own.” 

Harry swallows and nods, green eyes determined yet unconvinced. 

“Whatever Dumbledore told you—whatever you’ve been telling yourself—isn’t prophecy. All you have to do is fulfill what Trelawney said, and you don’t have to do it by yourself. I’m here. I’ll help.” 

“I can’t have you—I can’t make you responsible for this—”

“You’re not making me responsible for anything. It’s a choice I’m making. You’re the one who shouldn’t have been made responsible for any of this.” She stops herself before adding ‘as a mere child,’ because the young man standing across from her has grown up quick, just like her. “We make our own destiny,” she concludes. 

“Right,” Harry says. “Sod the Deathly Hallows. And Dumbledore’s original plan. And the prophecy—well, not the prophecy apparently, but—we can do this ourselves.”

“We can,” she agrees, and wraps him in a tight hug. 

They break apart and head inside.

Avoid the window latches. Don’t brush against the doorknobs. Don’t think about the last time you were here, destroying the goblet with Severus and asking him to have drinks.

And certainly don’t think about all the times you’ve died here.

Hermione swallows, glancing behind her on instinct to check on Harry. But he’s hidden beneath the invisibility cloak, feet muffled and not making a sound. 

In the distance, the shouts and cruel laughter ring out. Hermione forces her thoughts away from how, exactly, the Death Eaters are celebrating, what might be happening to Dumbledore’s body, what Severus might be doing—

He still has to activate the sleeper agent. And in a way that avoids enough suspicion for her to swoop in with Harry—or should that happen first? 

“Shit.” She stumbles on the edge of a carpet and rights herself, feeling Harry nearly collide. 

Slowly, she takes a breath in and out, attempting to clear her thoughts. She knows from previous loops that Voldemort can sense Harry’s presence in the manor, and she knows it’s a gamble to capitalize on Dumbledore’s death like this. It might divert his attention, but how much, and for how long?

“We need to get closer to where they’re gathering,” she murmurs. “Scope it out until as many are here as possible.” Then Severus can activate the sleeper agent, while Harry can… 

Harry takes her arm and nods, throwing the cloak over her and drawing her against him. 

They creep more slowly along the corridors, following the gruesome noise of celebration, and all the while Hermione wishes it was Severus by her side. 

Closer to the drawing room, the house elves scurry back and forth across their path, bearing large trays of food and liquor. The smell of smoke and dark magic clings to the air.

The roar of noise swells as they round the corner, and Hermione bites her cheek when they see the large oak wood doors. 

Behind them is Voldemort and all of the Death Eaters he’s summoned.

Behind them is Severus.

Hermione draws a slow breath and guides Harry to the side, keeping watch of who enters and exits. With each opening of the doors, a rush of fear fills her, and with each closing, a cold dread trickles down her spine. 

She’s just about to inch closer when a high-pitched cackle stops her in her tracks. 

Bellatrix stalks forward, fresh from the fireplace, a satisfied gleam in her eyes, her tall boots snapping across the marble floors. 

For a moment, Hermione can swear she sees her—that her laughter can only be delight at having caught her, once again—that she’ll whip her cursed knife right out of her sleeve and carve her forearm open again, dripping letters as if Severus had never healed her—as if—

Harry tugs her sharply back, and she just manages to avoid brushing the hem of her cloak as Bellatrix wrenches the doors open and strides inside.

“Are you alright?” Harry mouths, and she tries her best to look reassuring as she nods. 

But the question lingers, and Hermione needs several more minutes to steel herself before they make another attempt at entry. 

Finally, another Death Eater in full regalia steps out, and they just manage to slip inside before the heavy doors close. 

The noise surrounds them, and the cloying scent of liquor and death is stifling. They’re jostled a bit as they make their way to a free space by the wall, but everyone is too intoxicated or preoccupied to notice.

Hermione presses against Harry, eyes darting around the room in search of Severus. How can she signal to him that she’s here? Should she try to get a message to him somehow? And how, in all these years of going back in time, has she not thought of some more secure method of communication than scraps of parchment left about his lab?

She tries to scan the room, eyes tracing the distant, twisting silhouette of Nagini by the opposite door, the crowd of Death Eaters gathered around a mutilated body—she shudders when she realizes it must be Dumbledore’s—Draco Malfoy seated, surrounded by congratulations and looking sick to his stomach, and Voldemort in a high-backed chair at the head of a large table, Peter Pettigrew by his side. It’s everyone. 

Everyone who’s killed her friends—and her. 

Everyone who will die tonight, if all goes according to plan. 

Hermione swallows, her throat dry. Is she ready for that? How are they going to manage to get Harry out alive—if he even survives the first death to eliminate the horcrux in his scar? 

And on top of that, how are they going to manage to fulfill the prophecy?

“He will have power the Dark Lord knows not… And either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives…”

She lets the words churn in her mind until something else nags at the edge of her thoughts, and she realizes:

There was a prophecy about her too.

“The one who drifts, untethered by time, will tie herself to another. She will save, and be saved, but to end the war will need to sacrifice her path.” 

What path is she going to need to sacrifice? She had thought it was her path through time, but something still doesn't quite sit right about that. Will it be her own life? She’s more than prepared if it will save everyone else, but—

In the periphery, Bellatrix laughs again, cruel and uninhibited. Hermione instinctively snaps her head around to locate her. 

Her heart stutters in her chest. 

There, pouring her a glass of wine with a smug, relaxed smile on his face is Severus. 

Severus. 

“He’s here,” she whispers, more to herself than Harry.

Even through the noise of the room, she can sense Severus’s deep laugh, the way he doesn’t flinch when Bellatrix grips his arm, sharp talons digging into the thick fabric. She’s forgotten how talented of a spy he is, having seen him at his most unguarded. The thought warms her, and she has to will her feet to stay planted to avoid running straight to his side. 

Because he’s alive and he’s here. 

“He’s here, and everything is going to be alright, Hermione.” 

And before she can say anything else—before she can even begin to register his words—Harry steps away from her.

Out of the shadow of the cloak.

Toward Voldemort.

It takes all of Hermione’s willpower not to fling the cloak off and chase after him, hauling him back to safety. But where is safe? And how can she delay the inevitable?

She clutches the cloak tightly around herself and grits her teeth together as she watches. 

It’s a moment before anyone notices him, but then a disbelieving hush falls over the room. 

Harry, to his credit, never falters. 

“So you’ve come to avenge the death of your mentor,” Voldemort says, a dark amusement leaching into his tone. “Arrogant as ever.” 

The irony isn’t lost on Hermione, but she slams the vault shut on her thoughts, willing away the memory of the last time she discussed arrogance with Voldemort. On the image of the elder wand snapped and discarded on the floor of Dumbledore’s office. She hopes, completely desperately, that in this timeline, buoyed by the success at killing Dumbledore and not yet fully consumed with the obsession over the Deathly Hallows, Voldemort won’t be so hesitant to duel Harry.

And yet she also hopes he’ll let him go. Because she’s still not ready—will she ever be?—and Harry’s certainly not ready—

“Avada Kedavra!” Voldemort cries without preamble. 

And just like she’s watched before, just like she’s seen in countless nightmares, Harry collapses to the ground.

There’s a long pause before an unhinged, joyous shriek pierces the air. Bellatrix flings her head back and laughs, the horrid sound of it making Hermione wince. All around, cheers begin to rise up, and people inch closer toward Harry. 

Hermione stays frozen, hidden under the cloak, praying that Harry has enough time to come back into his body before it’s mauled for entertainment or fed to Nagini. How long had it taken before? How many minutes had she stalled, creeping from room to room in the cursed manor with Death Eaters on her tail?

Too long, she realizes, as Voldemort flings Harry’s limp body up to hover in the air above the table amid jeering shouts and whistles. In the periphery, she watches Nagini writhe closer, forked tongue flickering. 

Severus is on the opposite side of the table, sidling closer as if only mildly interested, his wand hand hidden in his pocket. If she could only reach him—

A harsh syllabant whisper raises the hairs on her arms, and she registers with sick dread that Voldemort is speaking Parseltongue. He abruptly slams Harry’s body onto the table, shattering several plates and knocking over the large carafe of wine, which spills across the table like blood. 

And then Nagini is sliding up to the foot of the table, unhinging her jaw—

No!

Before Hermione can fully register what’s happening, she’s dragging Harry’s body away, onto the ground, flinging the cloak over him and then sending him away to the side of the room with a push of intent from her wand, not caring where he ends up so long as it’s away—from Voldemort, from Nagini, from the crowd gathered around the table—just away—

And it’s only then that she realizes, crouching beside a toppled platter, one hand leaning on an ornately carved chair, that everyone is now very much aware of her presence.

“Come to join the fun, mudblood?” 

Somehow it’s Bellatrix who recognizes her first. Her eyes glint sharply, and she jerks her arm forward. 

Instinctively, Hermione steps to the side, a shield charm already shimmering in front of her. 

But Bellatrix only laughs. Because it’s not her wand that she’s brandishing.

It’s the cursed knife.

For a split second, Hermione falters, her shield flickering. And in that moment, she’s hit with a curse from the side, dumping her into the nearest chair and freezing her in place—paralyzed. 

"Thank you, Antonin, but I can manage quite fine on my own," Bellatrix says sharply. “It’s a surprise you even managed to get inside,” she continues to Hermione, as if they were sitting down to tea. “I suppose you were clever enough to avoid the curses somehow. And that’s lovely, truly, because it means you have more time to enjoy my own special menu.”

Hermione struggles in vain, all of her muscles unable to cooperate. Only her heart, frantic inside her chest, and her eyes, searching the sea of masked faces for Severus, are able to move. 

Bellatrix takes another step toward her, and for the first time, she starts to believe that this time, she’s actually going to die. 

Has it always been Bellatrix? Has it always been the knife?

Her eyes finally land on Severus, far to the side, pointing his wand not at her like she’d been pleading for him to do but at—

“Incarcerous!” he calls out suddenly. 

Ropes spring from his wand, wrapping smoothly and unforgivingly around Voldemort, binding him to his chair. An instant later, and his wand is in Severus’s hand.

The room pauses in a moment of shock, Bellatrix still poised with the knife, turning toward Severus in disbelief. 

Behind him, Nagini is rearing up—

Severus shouts an incantation that Hermione can’t quite understand, whirling his wand above his head—

But in that split second after he utters the words, Nagini bares her fangs, and Bellatrix takes another unconscious step forward, and Hermione’s vision narrows to the glint of cruel metal advancing toward her, fear flooding her senses, because what if Severus was wrong? What if something has gone wrong at any of the numerous stages of brewing the sleeper agent, or planting it, or activating it, or—

The long nails grasping the hilt of the knife loosen ever so slightly, and then Hermione knows she should never doubt Severus, even when they’re both balanced on the knife’s edge between life and death.

Because before her, slowly, a hint of surprise in her features, Bellatrix falls. 

Hermione can only stare. Her heart refuses to slow, the wild pulse rushing in her ears, as she watches the still form on the ground, fingers still clasped loosely around the cursed knife. 

“Always the knife,” a voice murmurs beside her.

“Harry!” she gasps, suddenly finding herself wrapping her arms around him, no longer paralyzed, overjoyed to find him alive and breathing. And it takes a long moment before she realizes the significance of his words and pulls sharply back to look at him. 

“The knife?” she asks.

“It’s what you said when—when I saw you. Just now, when I was almost dead—I know it sounds crazy. Nevermind.” Harry shakes his head as if to clear it, and bends down by Bellatrix’s prone body.

And then, he takes the knife. 

When he rises, his expression is one of wide-eyed uncertainty—like he can’t believe his own actions. Like he needs someone to—to guide him. 

And Hermione might not remember what she had said to him before—or what he was about to reference just now—but she knows with certainty that: 

“I said I’d help you.” She steps forward, wrapping her hand around Harry’s on the handle of the knife. “And I will.”  

“For each must die at the hand of the other…”

Together they move toward Voldemort, bound to the chair under Severus’s steadfast and unwavering magic. 

Hermione forces herself to meet his gaze, the whirlwind of her journey through time at the front of her mind like words on the tip of her tongue, ready to unleash it all, an onslaught of choice and consequence; ready for him to know.

But Voldemort only glares and shuts his eyes. 

Hermione tightens her grip, moving the knife closer, calculating the force of it, owning that she’s the one moving the tip toward his throat; Harry’s hand is on the knife, and he’ll be the one to fulfill the prophecy, but she’s the one taking the sharp inhale before deciding to plunge it into the ashen skin and slash ruthlessly across. 

Dark blood pours from the wound, and Voldemort gives one harsh, gurgling exhale before his body goes limp. 

Harry’s hand slackens. Hermione carefully takes the knife from him and brandishes it at Voldemort’s body, unwilling to accept the image before her. 

Not yet. Not until—

“It’s done, Hermione,” Harry says gently, and she wishes the words were Severus’s—

“Where’s Severus?” 

Any relief at having killed Voldemort has quickly evaporated, leaving Hermione frantically darting away to check on him. She ignores the numerous other collapsed bodies in Death Eater robes, no doubt also killed by the sleeper agent; there'll be time to process all of that later. The room is quiet enough for her to hear her thoughts. She searches for the most recent memory of him—he had been right there by Nagini, also now motionless, tail curled around a heap of dark robes on the ground—

Blood reaches her feet from the figure. She falls to her knees and flings the cursed knife to the side of the room, where it spins to a halt against the wall. Broken glass slices into her skin, but she barely registers it.

“Severus?” She reaches for him, but he doesn’t respond. 

“Severus!” She drags him onto her lap, fingers searching for a carotid pulse but finding only the slip of warm blood. 

No.

He can’t have been bitten again—he had activated the spell, hadn’t he? But the wound from his neck looks strangely identical to the one he’d had in the first timeline. 

Points on the tapestry, tethered with something needle-sharp and unforgiving. 

She presses her other hand to his chest, feeling for any sign of life—he has to be alive—his magic had held Voldemort’s binds, so unconsciously she felt she had known—

But what does anyone know, truly, of death and magic?

“Severus,” she pleads, more quietly this time, grabbing his wrist to check for a radial pulse, leaving her bloody fingerprints on his pale skin just below a faint bruise from where they had drawn his blood in the lab. The wound on his neck isn’t even actively bleeding anymore—as if he’s already long since lost his entire blood volume.

“I’m sorry, Hermione,” Harry says softly from behind her. 

No.

“He can’t be dead,” she insists, sounding delusional even to her own ears. 

If he’s truly dead, then this timeline is the one in which she’s managed to save everyone else—everyone but the one man she vowed to save. Clutching his face in her hands, Hermione wants to hate him. Wants to scream at him that sacrificing himself was the most asinine, fucking dunderheaded decision he’s ever made. That he’s wrecked her—heart and soul. Because how could she live in a world that doesn’t have him? 

But again, how could she start the time loop over again, sacrificing all of their progress—all the other lives saved, the suffering avoided, the destruction of the horcruxes and the elimination of the Deathly Hallows as a source of power, the bond they've formed—the progress they’ve made together—just for another chance with him? 

It’s the cruelest paradox. 

“You can’t be dead,” she whispers, as if the fierceness of her words can will his being back to life. She thinks of all the times she kissed him. Of the times he pushed her away. Of the times she came back, again and again. Of their conversation after the first night they spent together—how she told him she couldn’t ever get sick of him—and how she wishes beyond anything that she could go back and tell him she loves him instead. 

“Because you wouldn’t do that to me,” she continues, flinging her tears away with an angry dash of her head. 

There has to be something else—something more. He had been about to tell her something, just before he was summoned; what was it?

Shoving him back, she ruthlessly begins to strip apart his robes, her hands somehow steady as she shoves them into his pockets. 

Anise, feverfew, powdered bezoar.

Hadn’t she seen him working with those ingredients? 

Adenosine, boom berries, delayed release microspheres.

And hadn’t he himself told her that he’d somehow seen visions from past timelines? 

“It’s not much—not like possessing a full memory, so much as instinct, intuition. Feelings.” He swallows. “What might work and what should be avoided.”

So could that mean, she wonders, as she reaches into his breast pocket that he might have—that he—

Antivenom, antivenom—

Her hand meets the cool glass of a vial.

Chapter Text

Weightless. 

Something should feel wrong about it, but Severus is only focused on the agonizing fire abruptly subsiding from his throat.

…And something should be wrong about that too, since he can vividly remember Nagini sinking her fangs into his neck, but he can hardly get his bearings…

Directionless.

For someone whose whole life has been spent leaping from one responsibility to the next, floating aimlessly in the sea of semi-awareness seems… Well, it seems rather lazy. Shouldn’t he just die already?

Apparently not, as his consciousness seems to still be clinging to something he can’t quite remember. There’s still something he needs to do. Someone he needs to see. But it’s like his body is suspended somewhere, outside of the physical realm.

Outside of time.

“Pick a tether. The one you want to keep.”

With a rush, he realizes: there’s only one thing he wants to keep—

He wakes, gasping for air, in a hospital bed. 

His throat is parched, and scratchy thin sheets cover his frame. 

“Welcome back, sir.” 

Severus opens his eyes to the familiar voice and then glares. “What do you want, Potter?” he spits, wishing his voice weren’t such a weak rasp.

“Just giving Hermione a much needed rest,” Potter says gently. 

At the mention of her name, Severus feels his heart rate spike. Humiliatingly, one of the magical monitors above his bed begins to alarm. 

“Woah, relax, she’s alright,” Potter says. He reaches for the glass of water at Severus’s bedside and hands it to him—cautiously, like he’s trying to appease him. 

Severus ignores it. 

“She’s been here by your side for three days nonstop. I doubt she’s slept,” Potter says. 

Foolish chit, Severus thinks, feeling his face heat. There was no need for her to waste so much energy on him; not when she herself must need to recover. 

Potter sits down beside the bed, setting the water back down. “Look, I don’t know how much you remember—” 

A flood of memories washes over him; diving into Hermione’s thoughts, saving her in the DOM, the months of brewing together, those brief, blissful moments of her in his bed, the never-ceasing sinking feeling that they were running on borrowed time, watching her wide-eyed and terrified at the end of Bellatrix’s knife—

“Enough,” Severus says hoarsely. “I remember enough.” 

“Then you know that she—we killed Voldemort.” 

“I know that she did,” Severus says. His heart fills with a strange mix of remorse and pride when he hears the words. All this time, he had been prepared to be the one who killed—the one who died. All those people he had thought he’d once known in the haze of rash mistakes of his youth; all of them poisoned and murdered at his hand. He’d been ready to kill the Dark Lord next, ready to drag himself over, bleeding and reckless, to somehow try, prophecy be damned, but Hermione had been there first. 

And she’d sacrificed her own bright, untainted soul—all because he’d failed. 

A wave of disgust rises up inside him. How could he have been so careless? He’d meticulously poisoned everyone who could have been a threat; everyone who had murdered his friends and colleagues in the original final battle; everyone he’d seen murder innocent muggles during his time as a Death Eater. And he’d still been sick with guilt, because what must Hermione think of him, then? Cold, calculating, plotting dozens of deaths as though he scarcely cared? 

But the one death that mattered, he’d failed to achieve. 

And she’d had to clean up his mess. Step in to cover his inadequacies. 

He could blame the prophecy, but he knows that would just be a convenient excuse. 

Like with everything else, he blames himself. 

Potter leans forward. “So then you know that it’s over,” he says. “The war.”

At this, Severus frowns. 

How can he know that it’s truly over? He understands, now, what Hermione must have felt; that constant doubt that anything they’d accomplished could be concrete; fixed. That at any given moment, he could be swept back to that uncertain time when darkness surrounded him, be forced to attempt it all again, and fail.

“How did you do it?” Potter asks, oblivious to his musings. He must have scowled again, because Potter clarifies, “How did you survive the bite? Hermione said that in another timeline, you didn’t—that you…” 

“Indeed.” Severus takes a long breath. Mustering the energy for sarcasm usually isn’t such a struggle, but he blames his recent near death. “Time travel has its advantages. Do you truly wish to know the details of the brewing process for the various potions I took?” He pauses, regarding Potter’s expression. “No, I didn’t think so.”

In truth, though, he’s still not quite sure how he survived. 

Something had shifted after he’d come back to the start of the timeline with Hermione in the DOM, broken Time Turner in hand. Fragments of memories that shouldn’t have been his, like broken glass, had pierced his thoughts at odd hours. Visions of the war, of other timelines Hermione had lived and died within, sliced their way into his dreams until he wasn’t certain they weren’t visions of a potential future. 

And somehow, he knew he’d need to create an antivenom. At first, he’d blamed the flashes of memory he’d seen from Hermione; from the first few loops back when she’d been the one researching a possible antivenom on the side. But he knew that it ran deeper. And when he’d been clutching the modified Draught of Living Death in his hand to test the checkpoint theory…

Instinctively he knew he’d need both before answering the Summons and heading to Malfoy Manor. 

And it was serendipitous, really, the way the one potion suspended all of his faculties, giving the antivenom a chance to set in before he bled to death. Or worse—before he woke up back at the start of the timeline. He hadn’t known it would work, but he’d known he had to try, watching Hermione and Potter approaching the Dark Lord, knowing that if he’d called out to her, she could have rushed to his side in that brief instant when her misguided affection for him took over her reason. The end of the war would have surely been worth his death. 

Is that what it had really meant; becoming the master of death? Going willingly to meet one’s own? Is that what had then, ironically, saved him in the end? Perhaps fate, or time, or some other unseen force had compelled him; perhaps one day he’ll find out exactly which—

“Glad to have you back, sir,” Potter says, grinning, tugging him free of his thoughts. “I’ll wake Hermione and let her know you’ve graced us with your pleasant conversation once again.”

“Wait—” 

Severus forces his breathing to remain even. 

Even though he wants nothing more than to see her again—hold her again—hear her say she’s glad she came back for him, that she’ll never get sick of him, things he doesn’t deserve to hear—he shouldn’t force those desires onto her. Not now, if Potter’s right and the war truly is over; not when she has her whole life ahead of her, free and untethered from the grim circumstances that brought her to him in the first place. She should have the space to make a better choice for her future. 

She should have time.

“Don’t wake Hermione yet. Let her rest.”

Harry nods, smiling softly as he rises. “It’s nice, by the way,” he says, just as he turns to leave. “Hearing you say her name.” 

The next several hours are spent drifting in and out of restless sleep, choking down a few sips of water, and trying (and failing) to wave away the stream of healers insisting on tending to him. St. Mungo’s could learn a few things from Poppy Pomfrey about beneficent neglect, as far as he’s concerned. And so when the door opens again, jolting him out of yet another tortured, nebulous dream, he nearly growls at the intruder to leave him the fuck alone, only to promptly choke on his words when he sees her. 

In an instant, Hermione is by his side, her cool hand against his cheek. 

He gives himself one quiet, blissful moment of letting her touch sink in before jerking his head away and reaching for the familiar shield of Occlumency. “It seems you have recovered,” he says curtly. 

“Yes. I really only had minor injuries. Which is ridiculous that I left your side here at the exact wrong time—if I had known, I would have never let Harry take over watch—but I suppose that’s beside the point now, and oh gods. I’m a complete idiot. How are you? How are you feeling? Do you need me to fetch you anything or—”

“No,” Severus cuts in, channeling his shock at her concern for him into something more familiar and harsh. Because his earlier instinct still stands; he should give her more time. A little more distance, perhaps. To realize there’s no need to saddle herself with him. Not after all she’s been through; all she’s done to make up for his failures. 

But she doesn’t seem to share the same logic, as she takes his hand gently in hers. “Thank you,” she says softly. “Thank you for… just… everything.” The affection in her tone threatens to break his resolve.

“I should be thanking you for killing the Dark Lord and tricking whatever prophetic magic into thinking Potter did it,” he says flatly, hoping the deflection is enough to buy him time to compose himself.  

But Hermione only laughs, free and unabashed, and the warm sound of it has the corners of his mouth turning up. 

Suddenly she stills, apprehension creasing her brow. “You’re not… disgusted by me? By what I did?”

“Of course not,” he says sharply. How can he even begin to tell her how deeply his own gratitude runs for everything she’s done? “The war is over, because of you. You have nothing to be ashamed of. The war is over, and…” 

And she deserves better, doesn’t she? Better than him.

“It’s over, and you’re… free to do as you wish, now,” he manages to utter. 

“Anything I wish?” she asks, shifting herself closer so that her hair tickles his face.

“Her—Granger”—he clears his throat—“you must not be fully understanding. You’re free. You don’t owe anyone anything anymore. Especially not me. You could go anywhere, do anything—spend a month harvesting boom berries in Central America or fuck off to Brighton for all anyone cares—” 

“Come with me,” she says firmly. 

“What?”

“Come with me, this time.” It’s a simple request, but it holds the layers of all the times she’s asked before. Of all the times all the versions of him have said no. Of all the times she tried again anyway. It’s a sign; a message; a tiny nod to their shared experience. 

When she says it, what he hears is I’m not giving up that easily. 

When she says it, what he hears is I’ll keep asking; this time, and the next, and the next.

And suddenly, he realizes how utterly thoughtless it would be to deny her anything. Even if that something is him, deserving or not. 

His heart beats frantically in his chest, but he forces himself to take a long, slow breath and school his expression into something blank and featureless.

“Where? Hypothetically, of course,” he chokes out, still clinging to the edge of his Occlumency, unwilling to let himself fall into the depths of possibility.

But she knows him. And she’s learned that he’s usually the most guarded when he’s afraid of showing emotion. 

“The beach, maybe. Or Malfoy Manor again—we never did try that whisky.”

“You’ve spent enough time in that cursed manor for several lifetimes.” 

“I’d go back, you know.” She bites her lip. “For you.” 

“Then you wouldn’t be as bright as I once thought,” he says gruffly. As though their earlier conversation back in his quarters hasn’t been swirling around in his every thought ever since.

“You once thought I was bright?” she asks, playing along, smiling through the tears in her eyes.

“And overly preoccupied with seeking validation. But…” He swallows, the pounding of his blood in his ears near deafening. He hopes that when he says these next words, what she’ll hear is I love you: “I don’t think I’ll ever get sick of you.”