Hermione woke up on September 19th with a grin already stretching across her face. She shoved her blanket back, scrambled upright, and leaned over the side of her bed to reach. The box was exactly where she'd anticipated, tucked near her midnight light read.
She dragged the box out, heart thudding in that stupid way it always did on birthdays. Not because she expected anything dramatic, but still, part of her brain never quite ruled it out.
First thing on top, Ron's. He'd stuffed a sugar quill and a frog card inside a balled-up sock. The card was Godric Gryffindor. She laughed.
Beneath it, a paper-wrapped bundle with a slightly crushed bow, Neville's, clearly. She peeled it open carefully. Inside, a pressed daisy in resin and a handwritten card. "From my mum's garden. She liked daisies too." The handwriting was uneven, but the spell that had preserved the flower was solid. She touched the edge of the resin, oddly moved.
Harry had left a box marked "DO NOT OPEN UNTIL BREAKFAST," which of course made her open it immediately. A music box. Simple wood, carved clean, with a softly ticking tune when she twisted the knob. It played something close to a lullaby, something familiar. She wasn't sure how he'd known, but it sounded exactly like the tune her mum used to hum when she couldn't sleep.
There was no note.
Hermione sat there a long moment, box turning slowly in her hand.
She set it aside gently, then reached for the last two at the bottom of the pile.
One, plain parchment, sealed with McGonagall's wax crest. The other, black as ink, marked with silver. Cassian's.
She opened McGonagall's first. A folded square of parchment, neat handwriting as precise as always,
Miss Granger,
Happy birthday. I believe this year's reading list is slightly less unbearable. Do not prove me wrong. You will find an extra credit essay enclosed. Please ignore it until tomorrow.
M.M.
Hermione grinned and tucked it into her nightstand.
Then she opened Cassian's.
Inside, a folded square of parchment and something harder. She tipped the envelope and caught a flat stone as it slid into her palm. Smooth, polished. Etched with tiny script along the edge. She turned it over. A rune she didn't recognise, shaped more like a question mark than anything she'd seen in class.
Hermione squinted at it, then flipped open the note.
"Miss Granger,
I'd write something soppy, but then you'd cry and blame me when your quill ink smudges. So, happy birthday. You are fourteen and therefore legally allowed to continue being annoying.
The stone is a Sumerian thought-marker. It's old. Very, very old. You can't buy these anymore. They were carved by archivists when they wanted to record a line of thought they weren't finished with. Keep it close. Think into it.
And if it cracks, don't panic. It just means your idea's too big for one rock. Which is fair.
P.S. Do not lick it. It's been inside a tomb.
C.R."
Hermione laughed, pressing a hand over her face. A tomb. Of course it had. The man probably kept cursed bookmarks and napped on coffins.
She turned the stone over again. The rune seemed to shimmer slightly when the light caught it. Like ink suspended in water. She closed her fingers around it and sat still.
She tucked it carefully into her pokket.
When she stepped into the common room ten minutes later, Crookshanks was chewing on someone's sock, and Ron was trying to rescue it with a broom handle.
She lunged for Crookshanks before he could take another bite out of Ron's sock. She wrestled him off with a muttered, "Honestly," but before she could launch into the obvious counterargument, she caught sight of Ron's awkward expression.
The frog card. Gryffindor. Sock and all.
She swallowed the words and said instead, "Thanks for the gift."
Ron cleared his throat. "Happy birthday."
That was it, but it worked. Tension vanished.
Harry and Neville wandered over a second later, arms half-full with books and sleep. Together, they headed for the Great Hall.
Breakfast was mostly quiet. A bit of chatter from the Ravenclaw table, someone down the Hufflepuff end debating whether toast counted as a full meal. She finished her plate and leaned back just as a single cupcake popped into existence on top of her empty dish. Vanilla. Sprinkles. One little candle, already lit.
She smiled.
She loved how thoughtful Hogwarts was. A cupcake at breakfast, another one queued up for lunch, and a full cake waiting after dinner, like the castle itself had memorised her birthday routine. She'd never read about the charm anywhere. Maybe she'd ask Professor Rosier.
From her right, Harry leaned in. "Are we visiting Professor R. tomorrow?"
Neville nodded, wiping crumbs off his sleeve. "Yeah. Thirteen sharp."
Ron let out a noise halfway between a groan and a yawn. "I don't know why you lot want to spend your weekend learning an advanced charm."
Harry shrugged, poking at his eggs. "Better than getting hexed unprepared."
Hermione stayed quiet, nibbling toast, but she was tempted. Her schedule was packed. She'd already rewritten her planner three times trying to fit everything. Still, a private lesson? From Rosier? That was hard to turn down. She could always drop something. Maybe Divination. Ugh. Divination. Watching smoke patterns in a cracked teacup wasn't exactly a cornerstone of magical academia.
She was halfway through reorganising her imaginary timetable again when Ron added, "There's also Duelling Club this evening."
Right. That too. Which meant her Saturday was basically shredded unless she started cloning herself. Well, thankfully, Professor McGonagall gave her the right tool.
That night, standing in front of Professor Rosier, Hermione felt three very conflicting things at once...
One, annoyance. He always looked like he'd just stepped out of a catalogue titled Smug and Proper.
Two, awe. She hadn't yet caught him not knowing something. It was infuriating.
And three, something harder to pin down. Because sometimes, right in the middle of some impossibly sharp explanation, he'd say something utterly ridiculous. Something like "don't trust a rune that winks" or "spellcraft is ninety percent ego, ten percent not catching fire." And the way he said it, like it was common sense, some part of her had the nerve to find it funny. Even charming, in a wildly frustrating, shouldn't-be-charming kind of way.
Around her, the rest of the students had formed a loose semicircle across the empty classroom. Most looked excited. A few were clearly regretting their life choices.
Cassian clapped and the room hushed. "Alright, grasshoppers. Tonight's menu... Disarming Charm basics, clever use cases, and why you're better off using your brain before flinging it at someone's nose."
"Starting with the incantation, yes, Miss Granger?" he said, already turned her way before her hand lifted.
"Expelliarmus," Hermione said, proud and quick.
"Correct." He gave a small nod. "Also known as the single most overused spell in recorded duelling history. Practical, though. Gets the job done."
"Let's break this down. You're not trying to yeet the wand into orbit. You're forcing separation. Not destruction. You don't need flair. You need connection. Focus on intent, not noise."
He turned, pointed at a Slytherin girl near the front. "You."
She blinked. "Er... me?"
"Yup. You seem quite the person to attack the poor Professor."
She did. A little.
Cassian raised an eyebrow. "Name?"
"Verity."
"Verity. Lovely. Try to disarm me."
Her eyes widened. "What, now?"
"Yes, please. Missus is quite temperamental and I would rather not be late."
A few giggles broke around the room. Verity glanced around in mild panic, then back at Cassian.
He tossed his wand lazily from one hand to the other.
"Come on. You've got this. Aim. Say the thing. Believe in yourself."
Verity raised her wand. "Expelliarmus!"
A faint spark fizzed from her wand tip. Cassian's didn't even twitch.
He nodded, unfazed. "Alright. So that was the magical equivalent of politely asking my wand to leave."
More laughter. Verity flushed.
Cassian stepped closer, smiling to comfort her. "What were you trying to do?"
She shrugged, a bit helpless. "Disarm you?"
"No. What were you thinking? What picture was in your head?"
She frowned. "Er. You, without a wand?"
Cassian tilted his head. "Not bad. But not enough. Try again. This time, imagine you're yanking it out of my hand like it doesn't fit there."
She raised her wand, a little more solid now. "Expelliarmus!"
Cassian's wand leapt from his hand, spun mid-air, and clattered to the stone behind him.
The class let out a collective "Ooooh."
Yes. Hermione hated how good he was.
It wasn't fair how he could make a roomful of teenagers think disarming someone was as easy as flicking your wrist and imagining it properly. And worse, how he'd somehow made them believe it.
Walking back up to Gryffindor Tower, Harry and Neville were mid-rant about how their Expelliarmus actually worked this time, stronger, sharper. Neville kept miming a wand flying from someone's hand. Harry was grinning, telling him how he nearly caught his opponent's mid-air.
Hermione bit the inside of her cheek. First year. That's when Professor Rosier had first said it, "Think. Picture it. Magic doesn't come from waving, it comes from knowing what you want."
And still, somehow, hearing him say it again now, watching it actually work...
She shook her head. Magic really wasn't fair either.
***
"How was the Patronus?" Ron asked.
Harry and Neville both slumped a little.
"It's hard," Harry muttered. "Proper hard."
Neville nodded. "It's like... trying to hold onto a good memory, and it slips out before the spell finishes."
Ron shoved his hands in his pockets, unwrapping something that was probably meant to be food. "Sounds miserable."
"It is," Harry said. "Professor R. says it gets easier with practice. But it's weird. Makes you feel like you've forgotten how to be happy."
Hermione glanced sideways. That tracked, honestly. The idea of forcing joy into a shape just so it could fight a nightmare sounded absurd on paper. Useful, but absurd.
Neville nodded. "You have to think of something really happy. Not just sort of nice. Proper joy."
Ron chewed, thinking that over. "So, like, Christmas morning? Or beating Malfoy at Quidditch?"
Harry gave him a look. "Think bigger."
"I dunno," Ron said, swallowing. "Both those things sound pretty brilliant."
They turned the corner, and there was the Fat Lady, halfway through humming something off-key. She squinted at them.
"Password?"
"Everlasting Toffee," Ron said.
The portrait swung open.
Inside, the common room was warm and bustling. Someone had enchanted the cushions to hop when you sat wrong, a group of second-years were shrieking every time they got launched sideways.
Hermione veered toward the quietest corner, flopped into the armchair, and let her head thump back.
Ron collapsed on the rug. "He's mad, you know. Professor Rosier."
Neville dropped onto the couch next to him. "Definitely. But it works."
***
Hermione decided, somewhere between the cracked teacup and the professor's breathless ramble about "mystical inner eyes," that she officially hated Divination.
Properly, unequivocally hated it.
She'd been warned, of course. Don't bother with Divination, Professor McGonagall had said. Even Cassian had raised an eyebrow when she mentioned signing up. You're smarter than that, he'd muttered, flipping a page like it physically pained him to acknowledge the subject's existence.
She'd ignored them. Obviously. How could she not take every subject? That would be like leaving a riddle half-solved. But now, here she was, staring at a tea leaf that looked vaguely like an exploded spider and trying not to throw the entire cup at the wall.
"Grim," said Professor Trelawney, drifting past like a glittery puff of scented smoke. "Very ominous."
Hermione stared at the mess in her cup. "It looks like a squashed beetle."
"Oh, but you must see, dear. The long neck, the curved haunches..." Trelawney's voice dropped dramatically. "It's the Grim."
Harry just looked tired.
Hermione ground her teeth, then pasted on a polite smile. "And that's definitely in my cup, is it?"
Trelawney blinked at her behind those magnified glasses. "Unless you and Mr Potter have decided to share destinies..."
Ron choked on his tea. Harry turned an unfortunate shade of pink.
It was then she decided Divination was nothing more than fiction-writing with props. All smoke, glitter, and vague declarations of doom. Pick a shape out of the tea leaves, spin a tale, act dramatic. If the leaves failed you, stare at a wall and murmur something about an early death.
Still, she stayed. Of course she did.
It wasn't just pride, it was the principle of the thing. She didn't drop subjects.
So she held firm.
Then came 16th October.
Lavender burst into the common room mid-evening, sobbing so hard it sounded like someone had cursed her lungs inside out.
Hermione was halfway through reorganising her Arithmancy notes when Lavender threw herself onto the nearest couch and dissolved into noisy grief.
Hermione stood, tucking a quill behind her ear.
"What happened?"
Lavender hiccuped into her sleeve. "Binky... oh..."
The name meant nothing at first.
Hermione crouched beside her. "What's 'Binky'?"
"My rabbit," Lavender wailed. "He died! He, he just... he was fine this morning and now he's gone!"
She broke into a fresh round of sobs.
Parvati sat down beside her friend and patting her awkwardly on the shoulder. "It was really sudden," she said. "Her mum sent a letter. It was killed by a fox."
Lavender howled harder.
"She saw it coming!" Lavender wailed. "Professor Trelawney saw it! 'That thing you're dreading, it will happen on the sixteenth of October,' she said."
Hermione couldn't wrap her head around it.
The rabbit had died, yes. That much was tragic. But...
"But Lavender," she said carefully, "you weren't dreading Binky dying. Were you?"
Lavender sniffed loudly. "What?"
"You said Professor Trelawney predicted something you were dreading would happen today. But you weren't dreading that Binky would die. You didn't even know anything was wrong with him until the letter came."
Lavender blinked at her, face blotchy and mascara streaked.
"And," Hermione went on, the sentence pushing forward before she could decide if it was wise, "even if she had predicted something awful, Binky didn't die today, did he? He died sometime earlier, when your mum wrote the letter. Today's just the day you found out."
Lavender's expression flickered, hurt, defensive, confused, and for a moment Hermione felt a pinch of guilt. But the logic still stood.
From across the room, Ron's voice cut in, louder than it needed to be.
"Maybe don't, Hermione."
She turned. He was sitting on the arm of the opposite chair, arms crossed, face drawn tight in that way he got whenever Crookshanks came up.
"You don't think other people's pets matter very much."
The words landed like a slap. Hermione flinched.
"That's not true," she said, voice tight.
Ron didn't answer. Just looked away, jaw clenched.
Lavender sniffled again, quieter now. Parvati handed her a fresh tissue. Hermione pushed herself to her feet.
"I didn't mean—" she started, but no one looked at her.
She shut her mouth, turned, and walked.
Her bag was still by the fire. She grabbed it and headed for the stairs, taking them two at a time.
Up in the dorm, the curtains were drawn and the beds were empty. She sat on hers, dropped the bag, and stared at the floor.
The logic was still sound. Completely sound. You couldn't dread something you didn't know was coming. You couldn't say a prophecy was right just because it loosely matched the date someone sent a letter.
But it didn't matter, did it?
Because Lavender was crying. And Ron was furious. And apparently, being right wasn't the point.
Hermione pulled the Sumerian thought-stone from her pocket and rolled it between her fingers.
(Check Here)
In another universe you reacted instantly. Just saying, you have the choice.
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