Hourglass (rewritten as of 16/05/2018)

Chapter Three:

CHAPTER THREE:

"Magic is real," Richard Granger said weakly, looking up at the Scottish professor with wide eyes. Hermione tried not to smile as she took in the sight of Minerva McGonagall. The stern, black-haired witch was one of the few who had survived the Final Battle, and one of the even fewer Hermione had kept up correspondence with.

Like last time, it was Minerva who visited her and her parents to tell them what was happening. Hermione had, though, made a rather erroneous miscalculation, because Minerva wasn't just coming for her— Cordelia was a witch too and because she'd been born only eleven months after Hermione, she'd be joining her at Hogwarts which had definitely not been Hermione's intention. In fact, she was rather miffed about it.

The nine years that had passed since the Halloween had only been met with a moderate amount of success in regards to her mission. The soul fragments in the Ring and Locket were destroyed, but all of the other Horcruxes lay frustratingly out of reach. Her research had uncovered that with both Lestrange brothers dead, the currently imprisoned Bellatrix, was in control of the Lestrange vault. When Bellatrix died ownership would go to Sirius, which meant the easiest way to get the Cup would be to kill Bellatrix.

Hermione wanted to avoid bringing others into her hunt for Horcruxes, but it looked increasingly like that was going to be her only option, unless she planned on breaking into the bank again— not an idea she was a fan of, breaking into Azkaban to kill Bellatrix was a much more appealing thought and it would be a simple(ish) matter to then accompany Sirius down to the vault and recover it.

The Diadem she would be able to retrieve when she arrived at Hogwarts, so she wasn't worried about that one. The Diary she suspected she'd have to wait until her second year, when Lucius gave it to Ginny, to retrieve, though if he didn't in this timeline then she'd have to break into Malfoy Manor, something else she was hoping to avoid.

And finally, there was Harry.

One of the very first things she'd ever researched when she'd started out in the Department of Mysteries was the process of transferring immensely powerful spells anchored on a single artefact to a different object. While she hadn't known for certain before travelling back in time that it would work to transfer Horcruxes from their 'soul jars' into other objects, a process that would have saved Harry's life in her original timeline, her calculations had indicated that it would— and when she'd tested the process on the Gaunt Ring and Slytherin's Locket, she'd been successful on her first attempts with both.

When Voldemort was permanently gone, Hermione was considering either auctioning off the Founders' heirlooms to the highest bidder to build herself up a nest egg or donate them to Hogwarts. She'd probably sell them— she wasn't the moralistic little Gryffindor she'd once been and she'd never be that girl again.

"My daughters are witches?" Helen said faintly, drawing Hermione back from her thoughts and into the present. Her parents and Cordelia all looked mind-blown and Hermione hoped that she appeared similarly shocked.

Apparently she didn't, because Minerva turned to her, apparently surprised. "You don't seem very surprised, Miss Granger." She observed.

"Please call me Hermione, ma'am, and I'm not," Hermione answered truthfully. "I realised there was something... different about me a while ago and while I admit the idea of a whole separate society never dawned on me, but I did suspect that I would be contacted one day by someone with knowledge of my unusual abilities."

"You knew?" Cordelia asked with all the indignation of an eleven-year-old child. At just eleven years old to Hermione's twelve, Cordelia was shorter then her and slightly round-faced with the same bushy hair, though hers was cut to her chin, making it far more manageable. She and Cordelia also shared the same button noses and chocolate brown eyes, but Hermione's eyes were older, tireder (haunted), her face thinner and she kept her hair long, down past her mid-back.