A Tale of Two Grangers

When Hermione followed Dumbledore and Severus into the headmaster\'s office, she was at once serenaded by Fawkes, Dumbledore\'s pet phoenix. The majestic bird seemed quite excited to see her, much to his master\'s amusement and Severus\'s annoyance. Hermione was flattered and petted the phoenix for a moment before sitting in one of the chairs in front of Dumbledore\'s desk.



As he conjured a set of tea things and began to prepare them, the headmaster spoke. "We have many important things to discuss, but before we begin, I will answer the questions I\'m sure you are anxious to ask, Miss Granger. First, how I know who you are and how you came to be here."



"Yes!" Hermione, sounding panicked, cut him off immediately, "If you know, who\'s to stop anyone else? The Ministry will lock me up for illegal time travel, not to mention the interrogation about—"



Dumbledore stopped her. "Not to worry, my dear." He handed them each a cup of tea and dumped an enormous amount of sugar into his own. "Unless I am mistaken, and I doubt that I am, I am the only person at the moment with access to this information. Partly because one of my sources is Hogwarts property, and partly because half of my knowledge is simply guesswork which you have affirmed."



He took in their confused expressions, clearly enjoying the moment, before moving on. "Each year, the deputy headmistress reviews the Hogwarts enrollment book and uses it to send acceptance letters to new students. We have a quill that detects the birth of magical children and records their names in this book. Quite a handy bit of magic, if I say so myself. This year, Minerva was unable to complete her final check to ensure all letters were sent as she is away at a transfiguration conference. She asked me to finish the task in her absence."



The answer seemed to dawn on Hermione as soon as he mentioned the enrollment book (Of course! It was in Hogwarts: A History, chapter five!), but she didn\'t interrupt him this time.



"I noticed an odd error, or what I first thought was an error, when I checked the book this morning. It appeared that one child had been born twice: once in 1979, and once just last night. However, her projected enrollment and graduation dates were blots of ink rather than numbers—it seems you managed to stump our quill, Miss Granger." He smiled and sipped his tea.



"But how did you know what happened, sir?" Hermione was thrilled at the clever way he\'d found her, but still hungry for the rest of the mystery.



"Ah, that was where I began to guess. I didn\'t detect any foul play with the quill, and a quick check at your family\'s residence didn\'t reveal anything out of the ordinary. I began to think that perhaps our quill needed a reapplication of its charms, but I decided to wait and see. That\'s when the wards around the school notified me of an unknown visitor, and I suspected that Severus may have brought the answer right to my doorstep, coincidentally. My only idea was that perhaps time travel was involved, and I was proved correct when one of Madam Pince\'s paintings informed me of your visit. I asked him to watch what sort of research you performed, and I was lucky enough to catch you on your way out after he made his report."



Dumbledore sat back, looking quite pleased with himself. Hermione was stunned for a few moments, reviewing in her mind everything he\'d said. Severus had simply listened to the entire story in silence, and even now did nothing more than sip his searing, undiluted tea.



"We always wondered how you knew everything, sir. I\'m impressed."



Dumbledore smiled. "Thank you, my dear. I\'m flattered. That brings me to my next topic, however. Normally I might ask who you mean by \'we,\' but under the circumstances, I think it might be best that you didn\'t tell me anything at all about the future. For that matter, you should avoid telling Severus anything as well."



Hermione blushed, confused by his reasoning but fully aware that she had already spoiled some unpleasant surprises for the potions master. "But sir, shouldn\'t I warn you about—"



He stopped her again, his face and tone more serious now. "It is best that you don\'t even finish that sentence, Miss Granger. I have only two questions for you, and beyond that, the future is much safer if it remains unknown. As for anything you may have already told Severus, I trust that he will be vigilant in his attempts to completely forget it."



The potions master nodded, and Hermione suspected that either he did not believe her, he was quite happy to forget what she\'d told him, or both.



"All right, sir, I don\'t agree, but I suppose I can trust your judgment."



The headmaster chuckled. "Even that you trust my judgment is too much information, Miss Granger. Now I know that at least one of my future students doesn\'t think I\'m quite as foolish as I am." His eyes twinkled. "But, on to my first question. I suspect that Lord Voldemort is even now plotting his return. Will he be finally defeated?"



Hermione wanted to say so much more, but she couldn\'t. The tantalizing thought of what could be done now, and who could be saved, was almost too much to bear. Her eyes watered a bit, but she used all of her self-control to answer only the question at hand. "Yes, Voldemort is finally defeated."



Dumbledore nodded and pondered her answer for a full minute before continuing. "And second, will I die before he is defeated?"



The tears finally rolled over her lower lids and down her cheeks, one by one, warm and salty when one slipped inside the corner of her lips. "Yes, you do, but you don\'t have to if you\'d just—"



"Please, Miss Granger, don\'t continue." He conjured a soft, cotton handkerchief from a piece of parchment on the desk and handed it to her. "I don\'t ask you this because I am afraid of death. I only ask so that when the time comes, I am not afraid to leave the world in the hands of Tom Riddle. Forgive me for placing too much importance on my life, but it is the curse of old men."



He smiled and waited for her to stop crying before offering her a biscuit and continuing. "Now that I am reassured in that matter, we can move on to addressing your time dilemma. I assume by your continued presence that you are unable to return to the future?"



She nodded, munching on the offered biscuit. "My time turner broke." Severus glanced at her, irritation on his face. "I don\'t know where to get another one, and nothing in the library helped."



The headmaster sat back in his chair and nibbled his own biscuit. "That is quite a problem. The Ministry is very protective of their time turners, and your lack of a background for them to check prevents you from borrowing one. I would procure one myself, but they wouldn\'t be happy with my inability to return their property. I can help you while you stay in this time, but I don\'t know how we can return you to your own."



Severus finally spoke. "I hope your \'help\' involves removing the witch from my house. I don\'t run a homeless shelter."



Hermione bristled at his comment. "You\'d never know it from the condition of the place!"



Dumbledore defused the imminent shouting match with a chuckle. "Don\'t worry, Severus. I\'m sure I can find a place for Miss Granger that is much more comfortable for both of you." He opened a drawer in his desk and pulled from it a gigantic tome, thicker than almost any book Hermione had ever seen, and probably older than the headmaster himself.



"This book contains the O.W.L. and N.E.W.T. scores of every Hogwarts student for the current century, and it updates itself much like our enrollment book but for the use of a quill." He opened the book and turned to a few different sections before finding what he was looking for. "Ah, here we are. Hermione Granger, graduated 1999. Excellent scores, my dear, congratulations." Hermione blushed again as he continued. "It seems you scored an \'O\' in Arthimancy. Would you feel confident in teaching the subject? We happen to have an opening for the coming year and qualified professors in that field are scarce."



Hermione was shocked, and her mouth hung agape for the second time that day. Severus frowned and objected before she could answer. "That\'s preposterous. She\'s little more than a girl, and we don\'t know anything about her. She could be a mass murderer for all we know!"



She was startled out of her silence. "I\'m the same age you were when you got hired, and I\'m not the one with the Dark Mark!" She immediately regretted her outburst, but hid behind as fierce a glare as she could muster.



"She has a point, Severus," Dumbledore said, again stopping an argument before it began. "Hogwarts has a long history of finding the best teachers in the inexperienced and distrusted, which you are well aware of. Judging by her school record, she will be a fine addition to this staff. That is, if she accepts my offer." He smiled benignly at her, waiting for an answer.



She sniffed at Severus, whose face was a portrait of barely-controlled fury, and nodded to the headmaster. "I would be honored to take the position, sir." A thought suddenly occurred to her, however. "But, wait, what about Professor Vector?"



Dumbledore pondered her question for a moment, then turned through pages of the grade book again. "I assume you mean that a Professor Vector taught the subject during your time." He stopped on a page, scanned it, then shook his head. "He or she has no record in our grade book. Did this teacher attend another school of wizardry?"



Hermione thought for a moment, then shook her head. "She never mentioned anything about her education that I can remember, but she was a Ravenclaw, so I assumed that she\'d gone to Hogwarts. Are you sure there\'s no entry for Septima Vector?"



The headmaster checked again. "No, no student by that name attended this school. Interesting." He leaned back in his chair, his fingers forming a point together under his chin, eyes lost in thought. "Perhaps... Well, I won\'t speculate just now. Miss Granger, I suggest that you take that name for the moment. I will perform a search over the next few days and, if I can\'t find anyone with that identity, you may remain Septima Vector during your time here. You must also find a way to substantially alter your appearance. I trust that you understand the difficult situation you might find yourself in if it were discovered that two Hermione Grangers now exist."



Hermione smiled to herself, thinking that it certainly wasn\'t the first time such a thing had happened. "I understand, sir. I\'ll work on it this evening. In the meantime, where should I stay?"



"I need some time to prepare Hogwarts for your arrival. The other teachers must not know about this, and Minerva has quite an eagle eye for subterfuge. Severus, might I ask that you allow your colleague to stay with you for a few days more?"



The potions master might have fit under a dictionary entry for \'righteous indignation,\' the scowl he wore more furious than any Hermione could remember. "It seems I have lost the right to protest trespassers in my own home. You\'ll do as you wish regardless of my answer, Albus," he said tightly.



Dumbledore beamed as though Severus had just welcomed Hermione to stay at Spinner\'s End forever. "Excellent, thank you Severus. If I could intrude on you for one last favor, might you allow me a moment alone with Miss Granger before you go?"



The potions master stood and stormed out of the office without another word. His rage was almost tangible in the air, and they both jumped a bit when the office door slammed.



"Don\'t mind him, my dear. I\'m sure you\'re familiar with his occasional bouts of restlessness."



That\'s a funny way of putting it! Hermione thought, but she just smiled and nodded, curious about what the headmaster wanted to say in private.



"Before you leave, I want to impress upon you the importance of keeping your secrets. I don\'t normally put much stock in tales of time travel disaster. Alterations in reality can be horrible or wonderful, and a fear of changing history via time travel would be as realistic as complete inaction in a life without time travel. However, I must ask you to do your absolute best to avoid changing the course of the battle ahead. The most important thing in our world now is that Voldemort be defeated. Now that I know his death lies ahead, the possibility that your appearance could change that must be avoided at all costs. I\'m not sure what it means that Septima Vector does not exist as you know her, but we cannot risk assuming that you are meant to be here. Do you understand?"



Hermione considered what he said before answering. She hadn\'t had time to think about what Professor Vector\'s absence meant yet, if she really didn\'t exist. But the headmaster was right, it wasn\'t worth risking the loss of the war to reveal herself to anyone. She knew it would be easy to promise now and hard to watch her friends die again later, but she agreed. "Yes, sir, I do."



Dumbledore nodded and rose to escort her out of the castle. "Excellent. Perhaps we will discuss this again when we have more knowledge of the meaning of your appearance here. I will contact you as soon as possible with my findings and with further arrangements."



She surprised herself then, as she stood before him, and shook his hand. It felt awkward but right, as though she were out of place, but sealing both her employment and her new status as... what? A colleague? A fellow soldier? A friend?



"I don\'t know what it means, but I\'m glad you\'ve come, Hermione." The twinkle in his blue eyes was the first real thing in this time that felt welcoming, and like she was home.

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Whoo! That felt really long. I\'m getting into chapters where I have to start doing substantial research, so updates may be a tiny bit longer in coming. It\'s going to get exciting though! This is the first story I\'ve ever written where I have so many ideas and actually know where it\'s going to go. It really helps to have a lot of the plot and all of the characters premade. ;)



In case you were wondering, I made up the grades book, but the enrollment book is from J.K. (I don\'t know if there are dates in her book.) Here is her quote about it: "The Ministry of Magic doesn\'t find out which children are magic. In Hogwarts there\'s a magical quill which detects the birth of a magical child, and writes his or her name down in a large parchment book. Every year Professor McGonagall checks the book, and sends owls to the people who are turning 11."



Thanks again to all of the readers and reviewers. You\'re so encouraging! :)