Reaching across time

Chapter 35: The Patronous

"I feel like a frikking house elf!" Dorcas exploded. It was three weeks into the school term and the seventh years were drowning in the extreme work load.

"At least you have the hour off to finish all the work" Alice sighed.

"Yes, bless the person that jinxed the DADA post." The raven haired beauty mumbled sarcastically.

"Only we need to right a two and a half foot long essay and figure out how to do the charm all by ourselves because the man couldn't even give any instructions!" Marlene muttered annoyed.

"He should have given us something to go with, I brought all the books with instructions but none of them are really helpful" Lily said, entering the common room with Remus and dumping a cart load of books on a seat beside her.

"We have to go through all that?" James groaned as he and Sirius came up behind the red head.

"If you want to finish anything then yes, now here" Lily commanded as she shoved one of the thicker tomes into his hands.

"Why are there so many books again?" Hermione asked cheerily as she came down from the girls dorm, the only one who was in a good mood the entire term.

They all glared at her, annoyed that she actually enjoyed having so much work to begin with. Generally Lily did too, but she had been falling behind a bit and was starting to get nervous and snappish. The brunette studied a couple of lines over the head girl's shoulder before sighing.

"That's all rubbish" she said easily, pulling the book away and snapping it shut.

"No, its not that's the standard-" Lily began to argue, reaching for the book but Hermione simply rolled her eyes and held it farther away.

"Trust me; a patronous charm is actually quite simple. You don't need any of that nonsense" Hermione stated calmly.

"You know how to do it?" Dorcas asked as she sat up straighter and smiled brightly.

"I had a brilliant teacher who made it really simple" Hermione said with a happy smile, and immediately Dorcas flung herself into the girl, the worry already gone from her person.

"Wait, when did you learn it?" Lily asked in surprise.

"Third year, but it did take me a while to actually master it" Hermione replied to a shocked head girl.

"Third year?" Remus asked, his jaw hanging open. "You were taught this in your third year?"

"Not the whole class Remus, just my friend and well I sort of learned with him" Hermione mumbled. When she saw the shocked faces around her, she continued "Anyway I've taught this to a few people myself, so we can actually get this over with soon and start on the other essays"

"Get this over with and take a break you mean" Sirius corrected even as he sunk into the couch and pulled her down with him.

Hermione ignored him and began to give them the simple instructions, trying her best to avoid Remus's eye as she explained.

"So each person has a different animal? Cool! What is yours?" James asked curiously.

"An otter" Hermione replied, drawing her wand to demonstrate.

"Why an otter?" Marlene asked but Hermione shrugged and focused on the spell instead.

She thought of some of her happy memories from the burrow and the times spent with her friends and some with her parents before wordlessly waving her wand. When no silver otter burst from the end of her wand, she frowned and tried again.

"That's strange" Hermione muttered, before she turned to Remus with a slight frown.

"Mione?" The sandy haired marauder asked, a little surprised at the look. She didn't say anything but held his gaze for a moment longer before trying again.

To her utter surprise, a silver animal burst out from the tip of her wand but there was no sign of her otter. Instead there was a slightly smaller version of Sirius's grim.

"Padfoot?" Hermione called almost softly as she reached out towards the silver animal. The marauders looked stunned and the girls looked confused.

"The memories I was focusing on were not happy enough" Hermione explained quietly, still in awe of the silver creature in front of her.

"But that's no otter" Lily pointed out, also reaching for the silvery creature.

"Sometimes when you have an incident that drastically changes your life, your patronous tends to change. It is very rare but not unheard of" Hermione said, smiling slightly at the animal.

"So your patronous changes with the memory?" Alice questioned. Hermione shook her head in a negative.

"Initially I thought of my previous life, none of the memories were strong enough to create a proper patronous so I focused on my time here instead and in my head, they are two different lives and so my patronous changed according to my new life" She explained with a shrug.

"So you can produce an otter if you try hard enough?" Marlene questioned.

"I don't think so. The memories are too far away, too weak. The happiness I felt then isn't whole enough now to help me out anymore" Hermione replied, her eyes still set on the silvery creature.

"You called it padfoot?" Dorcas asked finally as she too inspected the animal. The question brought a little life back into the frozen marauders.

"It reminded me of Sirius. Somehow I related padfoot to a dog I suppose" Hermione replied with a smile. "Anyway your turn"

All of them were by now curious and extremely eager to try out the new spell that they instantly set to work. But the initial enthusiasm turned into annoyance at the sight of silver wisps of smoke and no real animal.

"It takes time and it is actually harder in the presence of dementors" Hermione said as she watched them try.

James was the next to manage it, a proud stag flying out and landing neatly next to her grim. She smiled at the familiar sight of the stag.

"Hello Prongs" Hermione muttered low enough only for the marauder to hear.

Dorcas was the next, a large silvery tiger shooting out and prowling around the other two animals. The real shock came when Sirius's grim shot out of his wand.

"I thought each Patronous is unique?" Remus asked in surprise.

"It is. There are a few exceptions to that too. Sometimes when two people are connected in a soul level, their patronous tends to reflect that" Hermione said, repeating the werewolves own words to his younger self.

She thought of Remus and tonks, both their familiars had been a wolf. She wondered if that would happen again, she wanted it to. She couldn't ever imagine the two with anyone else other than each other. James was a stag and she knew Lily's was going to be a doe, just like Snape's. Now only if she could get Lily to see that...

She moved towards Sirius, pulling him away from the others who were still trying before leaning into his warmth. His hands came up around her waist as he held her closer.

"I believe that soul mates will find each other regardless of anything else" Hermione mumbled. It was something she honestly believed now that she had Sirius and as she turned her gaze to Remus's wolf, James's stag and Lily's doe, the gut feeling only increased a manifold. Sirius simply nodded and pulled her closer as they watched the silver animals in silence.