The Dream Trilogy Book One: To Dwell On Dreams (A Harry Potter FanFiction)

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Thirteen

Harry only just caught her before her head hit the bed post. The racket and his wand bounced on the floor as he snatched her in his arms. What had he done?

"Hermione?" he said, stroking her hair from her face. "Hermione are you okay?" She refused to wake up, so he hefted her up and onto her bed, resting her head on her pillow. "Hermione?" he whispered. "Hermione please wake up." Her eyes fluttered, and relief swept through him. It only lasted a second.

She gasped and tried to pull away from him. "It's okay!" he cried. "I promise it's okay, I'm not going to hurt you."

She looked wildly around the room. "How did you do that?" she asked hoarsely. "With the racket, what was that?"

Harry leant over the bed and retrieved his wand. "It was magic," he said slowly. "Some people, they can do magic. The wand controls it, and when you don't have one sometimes it escapes in odd places, doing things uncontrollably. I'd guess that's what's been happening to you."

Hermione's lip trembled and her fists clenched.

"It's okay," he told her again.

"I..." she tried to start. "It..." Her face contorted, and unable to hold it in any more, she burst into tears. "I can't control it I swear!" She looked at him, scared and pleading. "I don't mean to do it!" Harry grabbed her and wrapped his arms around her whilst she sobbed.

"Sssh," he soothed her. "It's okay, that's normal."

"I'm not normal."

He pulled back and couldn't help but laugh a little. "Normal for a witch I mean. You're a witch Hermione Granger. And I'm a wizard." She hiccupped and wiped her hands on her eyes.

"I don't know your name."

"Harry Potter," he said kindly. He was both pleased and sad she didn't recognise it. He wasn't famous but neither was he her friend.

"How come you know about magic but I don't Harry Potter?" she asked. "How did you get a wand to control it?"

Harry rocked back and sat further down on the bed, giving her some space. "That is a good question, Hermione Granger," he said with a smile, but she just stared at him, wide eyed, and sniffed. "Erm," he thought about how best to explain. "Okay, there some witches and wizards who are born into Muggle families -a Muggle is a person who doesn't have magic - and it's like the magic's been hiding for a few generations. So they don't know they're magic until they get the letter inviting them to the magic school. Whereas other kids have magic parents so it's no surprise to them."

"So...it's like a gene?"

Harry raised an eyebrow. "I don't know what that means."

She waved a hand, the tears all but gone now. "That's okay - so I'm the Muggle kind of witch?"

"'Muggle-born' we call it," explained Harry. "And yeah, spot on. So..." Now it was going to get tricky. "It seems, in this place, there's a war going on for all the witches and wizards. I don't know how much the Muggles know, but back in the eighties apparently they decided it was too dangerous to be introducing new people into our world, so they stopped inviting the Muggle-borns to Hogwarts. To protect them I guess." He hoped he'd quoted his sister right.

"So," said Hermione, getting a bit incensed. "I've been a witch this whole time, and somebody else decided I couldn't go to a proper school! Do you know what I've been through?"

All Harry could do was shrug his shoulders and agree. "Yeah, no - you're right, it sucks. But that's why you don't have a wand - but you can do magic."

"I know I can," she snapped. "I turned my father's beard blue when I was seven because he wouldn't allow me on a school trip. Whenever I drop a plate it fixes itself and I...well...I sort of blew up the science lab a couple of years ago."

Harry reached over her shoulder and pulled a tissue from a box she had on her nightstand and placed it on the duvet between them. "Right, now, watch carefully." He cleared his throat. "Wingardium Leviosa." The tissue floated a foot or so upwards and then stayed there. Hermione's whole body tensed, but other than that she watched, taking it in. Harry twitched his wand and it floated back down again. "Okay," he said, passing over his wand. She took it carefully from him. "Now you have a go. It's not your own wand, so it might not work as well-"

But she didn't give him a chance to finish. Without protest or question, Hermione turned her attention to the tissue. "Wingardium Leviosa," she said, imitating him perfectly and trying to copy the wand motion.

The whole bed shook. "Whoa!" cried Harry in delight as Hermione dropped the wand and covered her mouth in shock. "It's okay," he said as she let out a deep breath and covered her heart.

"I'm a witch," she said thickly.

Harry smiled picking up his wand. "You're the best witch," he told her, leaning in. "You're the best witch in the whole of Hogwarts."

Hermione looked at him and frowned. "But how do you know that? You said I never had a wand. You said we went to school together, but now you've just explained that we didn't. I've definitely never met you before."

Harry sighed and rubbed his head. "I'm not quite sure how to explain it," he said. "I'm not really sure myself. What I do know, is that last night I was at Hogwarts, I got really angry, made a mess. Then there was this, I don't know, storm I guess, it went crazy, and I blacked out. When I woke up, it was like the world had been recreated around me, like there's a different history, I don't even feel like I've got the same body, not really." He pointed to his head. "I should have a massive scar there because of when my parents died when I was a baby. Today, my parents are alive and I have no scar." Hermione's mouth was hanging open. "Oh and," he added to sort of apologise to her. "When I got the scar and my parents died, I also killed an evil wizard. That didn't happen either so he's still running round and that's why you couldn't go to school. So, sorry."

Hermione blinked and formed a funny shape with her mouth. "No," she said, shaking her head. "No, I think you're definitely going to have to explain all of that right from the beginning."