3,778Chapter 3: Train to Hogwarts 1971
Chapter 3: Train to Hogwarts 1971
Hermione grinned with her brothers as they posed for the picture. Their parents looked stoic as the public image demanded of them, but Hermione, Sirius, and Regulus were hardly going to step up the formality of a public face at the age of ten and eleven with all the excitement running through their veins.
She kept waiting for the panic attack. She kept waiting for the truth to sink in and have a tried and true emotional breakdown. She'd been erased off the face time and injected into the House of Black. Wasn't that deserving of a little freak out session and not just a fainting spell? But something was keeping her from it. Something was making her eerily calm. Was it part of the cursed wish that did so? Or was it something else? She had become, after the years, quite unflappable, but surely whatever had happened to her was something significant enough to deserve an equal amount of distress. Yet, the distress never came, and that baffled her more than the displacement of herself.
Regulus pouted that he wasn't able to go with them, but Hermione and Sirius promised him that they would ride together next year. Regulus hugged his sister right, smiling at her. "I'll miss you, sis," he beamed at her.
"I'll miss you too, little brother," Hermione said.
"You'll send me owls, right?" Regulus begged. "You'll remember?"
"Of course, Reg," Hermione grinned at him. "I'll send Sagacity at the oddest hours I can manage, okay?"
"Okay!" Regulus nodded. "Don't forget, sis!"
"I promise to write," Hermione hugged him tight.
"You'll send me something Slytherin, right?" Regulus begged. "A goblet or a quill? Maybe a scarf?"
"Regulus Arcturus Black!" Hermione scolded.
Her brother grinned impishly at her, kissed her on the cheek, and stood by his mother with an innocent look upon his face.
Hermione didn't believe it in the slightest. She'd grown up with the Weasley twins. He had nothing on them for mischief.
Walburga lifted her chin imperiously, waiting for her hug. Hermione put her arms around the elder witch and hugged her tightly, and Walburga wrapped her arm around her Hogwarts bound daughter. "You will make us proud, daughter," she said imperiously.
"Yes, mother," Hermione answered, averting her eyes in deference.
Walburga released her, stiffly, but Hermione saw something flash across the Black matron's face. She was torn emotionally that her children were leaving the nest for the first time.
Orion's face was more warm, despite the attempt to be detached in public. He embraced his daughter, whispering in to her ear. "Good luck, my phoenix," he whispered into her ear. "I love you."
Hermione felt the warmth from her father and grinned at him. "I love you, Pappa!"
Hermione grabbed her trunk, making sure Sagacity's cage was put on top safely. The eagle owl hooted softly, excited to be on the move.
"Come on, sis!" Sirius yelled at her, waving her onto the train.
Walburga huffed, averting her eyes, but Hermione dashed off to board the train, allowing Sirius to pull her and her stuff onto the train with an excited whoop.
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It was automatic, Hermione realised, to go to the same car she always did. Six years of riding the Hogwarts Express both towards and away had the phantom past muscle memory letting her feet do the walking without conscious thought. All seemed perfectly normal until her feet brought her to a car that was already full. Baffled for a moment, she slunk further down the car and into the next, unsure where to put herself. She realised, suddenly, that she had expected Harry and Ron to already be there waiting for her. Whoever it was that was there was not, nor would it have been for another twenty some years. That should bother her, she realised. Why didn't it?
The Hogwarts Express seemed to inspire a certain amount of cliquishness that centred around year and House, with those who were not affiliated being left to fend for themselves, usually ending up huddling together in a random car together. Even then, groups formed within groups.
Sirius, self-proclaimed social butterfly, started fluttering about the moment his things were shoved up into the luggage racks. Hermione shook her head as her brother trundled off to do his thing.
Hermione sighed and looked out the window as the train began to move out of the station.
There was a rattle of the sliding door latch, and it slid partially open.
"All the other cars are full, Sev," a red-headed female admonished. "We can at least ask if the seats are taken."
A bushy haired red-headed girl poked her head into the compartment. Her bright green eyes—Harry's eyes— stared into Hermione's pale grey ones. "Hi, um, my name is Lily. This is Sev. May we join you? The other compartments are full."
Hermione was silent at first, but managed a smile. She gestured to the empty seat. "I'm Hermione," she said softly. "Please, sit."
Lily pulled her companion in behind her like a piece of temperamental luggage that did not want to fit through the door. She stuffed her bags up into the luggage rack and sat down awkwardly.
Sagacity hooted softly from his cage.
"Oh my! An owl! Is he yours?" Lily gasped as she peered into the cage. "She's beautiful!"
Hermione chuckled. "Don't let him know you just called him a female," she said with a smirk. "I won't be responsible for lost fingers."
Lily's eyes widened until she saw Hermione's smile. "Oh!" she began to laugh. "I'm sorry, it's just… all of this is so new to me."
Severus shot Lily a worried look as his eyes flicked from her to Hermione. He was clearly trying to evaluate something.
Hermione reached over and undid the latch on the cage door, letting Sagacity step out onto the opening. He hooted softly and fluttered his wings. "His name is Sagacity. He's an Eurasian Eagle Owl."
"He has such beautiful eyes," Lily said.
"I thought so too," Hermione replied. "His claws are sharp, but here," she said as she tossed her a falconry glove. "If you put this on you can have him step up onto your fist and you can pet him. He likes to be scratched on the feathers above his legs."
Sagacity, to his credit and experience, was completely aware of where he put his talons and how not to draw blood, but he was a predator with equally predatory talons, and the glove proved to be a good way to let the owl, himself, relax a little. Hermione had a feeling the glove would make Lily feel better as well, considering one of Sagacity's talons was half the length of her face.
Lily, wide-eyed, put on the glove and made a fist, setting it in front of the huge owl.
Sagacity turned his eyes towards Hermione as if to ask permission to stand upon someone else's hand, and Hermione nodded to him. "Go on," Hermione encouraged.
Sagacity stepped up onto Lily's fist and the girl practically fell over due to the huge birds added mass.
Hermione held out a owl nut. "Here, he likes these too."
Lily struggled to keep her hand up, but managed. She took the owl nut in her opposite hand and held it out to Sagacity, who, in turn, made it disappear in record time.
Lily turned to Severus and smiled hugely, and the black-haired wizard shifted uncomfortably.
Hermione recognised less than practised social skills all too well. It was like watching herself her first year… well what had been her first year. Future first year? Oh, she was never going to get that right in her head.
Hermione turned her grey eyes to Severus. It was disconcerting to see such a young and vulnerable Severus Snape. Young, awkward, and socially ignorant. At least Lily knew how to break the ice.
"Lily called you Sev," Hermione said conversationally. "Is that short for something?"
He fidgeted again. "Severus," he replied. "Severus Snape."
Hermione held out her hand. "Pleased to meet you, Severus Snape," she said with her fully drilled Black manners in high gear. "I am Hermione Black."
Severus seemed unsure of what to do with the offered hand and awkwardly took her fingers and shook them then releasing them.
Hermione's flattened lips curved upward into an amused smirk. Lucius Malfoy he was definitely not.
"I'm Lily Evans," the red-headed witch said, still stroking Sagacity's breast feathers with fascination. The eagle owl seemed content enough to allow her such things.
"Pleased to meet you as well, Lily Evans," Hermione said formally.
Harry's future mother seemed, at least from first impressions, a kindly enough girl. She obviously thought the world of Severus Snape at this moment in time, and part of Hermione wondered how their friendship had soured so significantly from such ease to repudiation.
Snape and Hermione had conversed quite a bit, or as much as a witch and a portrait could converse. Hermione had spent countless hours in Minerva's Headmistress' office doing even more countless tasks for the busy Scottish witch. Severus, the portrait, had actually been the only portrait that seemed to sense Hermione's loneliness. He had, in his own way, provided a sort of companionship that had made her wish wistfully to have gotten to know the real man. They discussed theory for hours at a time, argued over spell casting nuances, and he had even offered pointers on certain spells. However, when Minerva returned to the office, Severus clammed up, turning his back to the room. Minerva and Severus' falling out had never been resolved while the man was alive. His portrait, unfortunately, still held a grudge.
The candy trolley was coming around, and a cheerful elderly woman poked her head in. "Sweets of the trolley, dears?" she asked.
Hermione couldn't help but notice that both Lily and Severus were looking forlornly at the sweets, but both seemed saddened.
Hermione tilted her head slightly, and rustled in her robes for a couple of coins and handed them to the kindly woman. "Whatever that will give us, if you would please," Hermione said.
The woman grinned at her and picked a little bit of everything off the cart and piled it on the nearby seat. "There you go, dears. Enjoy."
"Thank you, ma'am," Hermione said, and the lady closed the compartment door and moved on down the line.
"Well," Hermione said, picking up a chocolate frog box. "Help me eat it, won't you? I can't very well eat the entire pile by myself. It would be unseemly."
Lily grinned at her and dug right in with a pumpkin pasty after transferring Sagacity onto his cage to perch. Severus seemed to be conflicted, but finally couldn't take it anymore and snatched a box for a chocolate frog.
"Thank you!" Lily exclaimed in between bites.
Severus stared at her with his black eyes. "Thank you," he said softly before biting into his chocolate frog.
Hermione let a smile creep over her face. "You're welcome." She looked out the window to watch the landscape zoom by. Hogwarts. She was coming home again. She kept waiting for that other foot to drop and the hurricane of emotions connected with her current situation to sweep her up and convince her train car mates that she was completely and utterly mental, but there was none. Perhaps, at Hogwarts, she would have time to figure out why. It wasn't like she needed help remembering how to turn a mouse into a matchstick anymore. She was going to have a lot of free time to brood over it.
A new part of her perked at the thought of having time to do something other than study, and the part of her that was Hermione Granger stifled that chain of thinking quickly. The nagging that was an eleven year old Hermione Black, however, was excited for the chance to make new friends.
Hermione looked towards the young Lily Evans and Severus Snape. No time like the present, right? Whatever present that may be.
"Would you like to be friends?" Hermione spilt out at once. Way to be blunt, Hermione, she chided herself.
Lily's broad smile was all Hermione needed, however.
Severus looked absolutely terrified.
"Of course!" Lily gushed, she elbowed Severus with a widening of her eyes.
"Y…es," the boy managed to say.
Hermione leaned over and tossed Lily and Severus some candy from the pile. "Excellent."
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A/N: Just a quickie for all you wonderful reviewers. I needed a distraction from my exam, which I passed by the skin of my teeth. (Odd expression, considering teeth do not have an epidermis… but I digress.)
In response to a guest commenting on Hermione not having an emotional response about being temporally displaced, she's fully aware there SHOULD be something of a response, but it is not coming. Perhaps, in a way, it is shock. Perhaps it is something deeper. She is, now, blood bound to the Black family. What brought her here was heavy magic, sealed in her blood and Ron's very dire intent. It was heavily implied that Ron wished her dead in that angry moment, but life and the fabric of magic, perhaps, had other ideas for Hermione. Also, she is a phoenix. She is fated, ever since she came into her form, to be reborn and rise from the ashes of her past—something she may learn as time goes on is that she cannot escape that aspect of herself. We shall see, yes?