3 Chapter Two: There Is A Fire Inside Of This Heart.

August 2nd, 1993- Island.

"Come on, on your feet, girl," called the irritated voice of Halt.

Hermione groaned, blowing a stray lock of curly hair out of her face before climbing back to her feet and picking up the stick she was training with. Her right arm was out of its sling but was still in a splint, forcing her to use her non-dominant hand while Halt attempted to teach her to defend against a knife.

Her grip and posture seemed better than any of the other hand-to-hand styles he had been drilling her in; her practice in Lockhart's dueling club last year was showing to be of some use. At least she didn't need him to tell her how to stand properly to balance her weight, and he was even mildly appreciative of the fact that she seemed comfortable with the stick-knife in hand.

That, however, was where the similarities ended. After all, fighting with a knife was very different than casting spells with a wand. The most obvious difference was being that she could not stay at a distance from her opponent. Her malnourished and injured body was leaving her at a clear disadvantage against the far larger, muggle man.

"Now again," Halt instructed before darting forward, and in a few swift movements Hermione found herself back on the ground, stick ripped from her hand and clattering on the packed dirt a few feet away.

"I'm just no good at this," the young witch complained, getting to her feet again and walking over to retrieve her practice weapon. "You could at least go a little easier on me." She winced when her sore muscles protested as she bent over and retrieved the piece of wood that was giving her so much trouble.

"You won't get any better if I go easy on you," Halt snapped, folding his arms and tapping his own stick against his bicep, clearly agitated. "Your problem is that you are a little girl that lacks any strength or discipline."

"Well, thank you for pointing that out," Hermione muttered irritably, moving back into the practice area.

"You're not listening," Halt barked out, moving to pace around her. He looked her up and down like a person might evaluate a horse before deciding if it was worth purchasing. "You are a girl, and you're on the small side even for someone your age." He gestured at her body in one sweeping movement with his stick, continuing to circle her. He then jabbed the wood into her good arm to emphasis his next words. "You also lack any muscle; you may build up some later on, but you will be going up against full grown men. Which means you will most likely always be smaller and lack the physical strength it takes to fight them on equal ground. You cannot meet them head-on like you have been doing to me. They will simply overpower you." Returning to his original place, he settled into a stance. "Come, let's do this again."

Hermione reflexively brought her stick up in a defensive position to block the attack before she knew it was coming. Halt closed the distance between them in a few short strides, and then brought his weapon down to lock with hers.

Nearly buckling under the new weight, she tried to push him back with what little leverage she could without risking the use of her broken arm. Like before, Halt simply flicked his wrist, and had his weapon under her own with a twist before he wrenched it out of her hand.

Hermione yelped in surprise as he grabbed a fist full of her hair, yanking her head back painfully. "See, dead again," he scoffed, bringing his weapon to lay against her exposed throat; now Hermione knew just how serious it was. She swallowed reflexively as the wood dug into the underside of her jaw.

"You're trying to hold me off with strength alone. Strength you do not have." He stepped back to his starting place, and allowed the girl to retrieve her weapon again. "This time, do not try to hold me off; rather, use my larger size and strength against me."

"How?" she asked for what seemed like the umpteenth time, returning to her own designated place.

"Let us start simple; by redirecting my attack to the side like this," he said, showing her how to hold the stick so that it could be quickly maneuvered to the side in one smooth movement. Hermione copied the movements with ease; she was one who was used to cataloging new gestures, a task she had grown excellent at when it came to learning new wand movements.

With a stoic expression, Halt watched her go through the motions without comment before beginning the exercise again. This time she didn't try to hold him off as she had before; instead, she shifted her weight and pivoted her body slightly. When Halt attacked again, rather than letting him lock his weapon with her own and overpowering her, she shifted his angle of attack. It was only a slight misdirection with her own weapon, but it was so that he missed her without causing any undue strain on her body.

"There you go," Halt said, with what looked to be a small smile as he moved back to the starting position. "Now again."

They both moved through the drill again and again, gradually moving faster with each repetition. At one point he began continually to go on the offensive, attacking her without pause in between, and giving her no time to recover.

"Do not stand there like a rock, or else I'm going to overpower you again," he barked out, darting at her from a new angle and landing a bruising blow across her back. "Move your feet; you're lighter and faster than me. Use that to your advantage."

Finally, finally, Halt called for a break. Hermione had come out with far fewer bruises and scrapes than she usually did after one of their training sessions, a welcome relief to her battered body.

"Good, you are getting the hang of it." Halt nodded. "Soon we might even be able to move you up to a real weapon." He offered a smirk that made Hermione gulp nervously.

That was a training session she was not looking forward to.

__________

April 27th, 1993- Leaky Cauldron, England.

Hermione woke before dawn the next morning. After a moment of staring at the unfamiliar ceiling of the room, the events of the day before washed over her. Sitting up, she placed the previous day's paper that had remained clutched in her hand on the nightstand. She headed to the chair with her night's robe thrown across it, and sifted through the pockets until she found one of the many shrunken trunks. She placed it on the floor, and it returned to its normal size with a wave of her hand.

Pulling out a clean set of clothes, she headed for the shower. She took the time to enjoy the hot spray of water over her skin, having gone years without such a simple luxury as an excess of hot bathing water. It had left her not willing to rush through such things when there was no need to. Turning off the taps when she was at last finished, she stepped out of the shower and toweled herself dry before wrapping the garment around her as she headed over to the sink.

As she wiped the steam from the overhanging mirror, she was glad to see it wasn't enchanted to comment on her appearance. Unfortunately, it would have had plenty of things to choose from. She had changed a lot from the bushy haired, bright and quirky thirteen-year-old, that was, at this time, running about Hogwarts with her friends and enjoying not being petrified by a giant snake while preparing for a summer vacation. A vacation that would change her life forever.

Age had seen her grow. It would've been a surprise to Halt, had he lived to see her, that she had a height reaching about 5'10. Her body was almost overly thin- any baby fat she had possessed in her youth had been eaten away by starvation during her weeks lost at sea when the cruise ship her family had been taking to France had gone down in the storm. In its place, she had formed muscles from years of running and climbing over rough terrain.

Her bushy hair had become more manageable as she had matured; the once frizzy mass now hung in more manageable curls to her waist. Long exposure to harsh sunlight had lightened the color to a light brown, and in some places more so than others, giving her a few natural highlights. Her skin had suffered from the sun exposure as well, leaving it darkened to a nearly brown tan, and her face and shoulders were dusted with freckles.

All these things might have made her look perhaps pretty- in an exotic way-, had she not accumulated scars that ran across most of her body. From the barely visible white lines scattered up and down her arms from knife training with Halt, to other more noticeable ones like the bullet wound in her right shoulder that had become infected, or the large jagged bite mark that ran from belly to hip on her left side. Each one was a time she had nearly died and came through, sometimes only out of pure stubbornness.

Turning away from the mirror, she dried her hair off before dressing, and ran a brush through her tangled curls before pulling it into a rather messy bun. She went back to her room and pulled on her outer robes, digging around in her trunk until she pulled out a beaded hand bag with an Undetectable Extension Charm placed on it.

After closing the trunk, she shrunk it again before returning it to her pocket. She reached around in her bag, pulled out a pair of black rimmed glasses, and put them on before leaving the room.

"Good morning, Ms. DeVincent. Feeling better I hope," Tom said as Hermione came bounding down the stairs. The room was mostly empty, given the early hour.

"Bonjour, Monsieur Tom," she said, smiling up at the man as she came to sit at one of the tables. "Oui, much better now, merci. The trip here was rather hard on me, I'm afraid. I don't handle brooms well anymore."

Pulling out the newspaper from the day before, she began skimming through the contents and tried to get an idea of what was going on in the Wizarding World at the current time while waiting for Tom to bring breakfast.

Before attempting to come back in time, she had done everything she could to prepare, including coming up with a false identity and travel documents with the help of Bill Weasley. She even went as far as to give herself a crash course in French to manufacture a believable accent. So, as of right now, she was twenty-two-year-old Emma DeVincent of Piana, France. She was a young witch who was looking to go into selling antiques, specifically antique tomes of all topics, and had recently moved to England. She was in the market for a house outside of London.

"All the way from France, you said?" Tom chatted curiously as he served her food, the plate of toast and eggs floating after him as he poured her a cup of tea. "What brings you to London, if you don't mind my asking?"

"I needed a fresh start," Hermione said quickly. "My family didn't exactly agree with my career choice and I had heard London's Diagon Alley has quite a selection of rare and old antiques."

"Can't say I would know, but I'm sure one of the shops in the Alley has just what you're looking for. Just be sure to stay clear of Knockturn Alley. A pretty thing like you doesn't need to be wandering down a shifty place like that."

"I will be sure not to. Merci."

After having breakfast, Hermione asked Tom to show her the Alley entrance, making sure to act like the proper newcomer to London. As she walked into the Alley, she seemed to handle her memories of the past and present a little better, now that she had rested and built back up her Occlumency shields which had seemed to have been stripped away when she came through the Veil. She shoved the images of bloody bodies and broken buildings behind her walls, and carried on like the happy tourist she was playing.

The shops were bustling with shoppers and shopkeepers. She browsed a bit in each, but bought little. At Madam Malkin's, she had a new set of robes made; her current set was the only one she had, and it had been borrowed to begin with.

Her next stop was the main office of the Daily Prophet, where she signed up to get the paper. In the coming months, one unknowingly innocent serial killer was going to escape Azkaban. Her best chance at keeping him alive this time was to find him before the Dementors did. Once Black was safe, she could worry about dealing with Peter.

In the past she had only had Lupin's knowledge of the rat, the last living light Marauder. And he had not been willing to share much by then, either. Neither Lupin nor any of the other Order members had found out about Peter's true involvement until that night when the Dark Lord rose again, and by then it was far too late for Black, and it was too late for Harry as well.

The knowledge of Black's innocence and Pettigrew's betrayal had hit the werewolf hard, and adding Harry's death, it had left him in such a depression that he stopped talking all together. By the end, he had simply stopped leaving his house which made him an easy target for the Death Eater raiding parties. Hermione hoped that Sirius Black would know more on the matter, as he was already aware of the rat's dark affiliation.

The rest of her day was spent making small talk with some of the smaller stall owners as she browsed, before returning to the Cauldron for dinner.

__________

The next day, Hermione woke before dawn, as it was her usual routine. She left as soon as the shops were open. Heading for Gringott's, she went about the main reason for coming to Diagon Alley: finding a house. She had brought quite a bit of money with her, both from what she had inherited after her parents' deaths but also donations from Order members. It took most of the day, but by the time she returned to the Leaky Cauldron, she had picked out a small house that fit her needs. It was located in the small town of Hook Norton. The next day, she would be able to go look at it, and if everything went smoothly, she would be moving in before the week was over.

The house in Hook Norton was small, and it sat squashed between a small general store and another house about the same size. Most of the town's residents tended to ignore it, as the special anti-muggle charms kept them from wanting to approach the house, so long as it was up for sale. It was two stories high with three bedrooms, one bathroom and a basement, with an Expansion charm on it. Which meant it was nearly three times the size it should have been.

The front yard was overgrown with weeds, save for the small path leading to the door. The same could be said for what had probably been a small garden in the back yard. The house was in need of a good cleaning, as the walls and few furnishings left behind were covered in dust and grime. Almost every room was infested with Doxies. While troublesome to deal with, the Doxy infestation had been a mixed blessing. With her limited funds, she had been able to get quite a discount on the house because no one had been willing to deal with the problem of exterminating the pestful creatures.

All in all, it needed a lot of work, but it was just what Hermione was looking for. It could be made livable, and after adding a few more warding charms to the ones already on the house, it would make a great base for her to work in.

__________

On Friday, Hermione finally signed a contract for the house and immediately began working on ridding the main room and kitchen of Doxies. By the following week, she had gotten most of the rooms clear of pests, and clean of dust and grime. She had been able to transfigure some of the old broken chairs and tables into beds for the upstairs rooms, and bookshelves for the study on the ground floor.

For the study, Hermione immediately began filling the shelves with the multitude of books she had collected for research purposes. The books covered all subjects, magical and muggle, to dark and light.

The third bedroom, across from the study, was turned into an infirmary, though she didn't expect to get much use out of it any time soon. Hermione stocked it anyway with the large supply of potions and muggle medical supplies. It was better to be safe than it was to be sorry.

By the end of May, she had made it through the basement. It had had a storage room that she placed the most powerful wards she knew and could cast wandlessly on. She stored two of the trunks there that had been brought with her, filled with her most valuable and dangerous possessions. Next to the storage room was a lab of some sort, for potions most likely. She had gone about restocking it with the supplies from one of her trunks. Most of the ingredients were of the rarer variety, collected from Snape's own potion stores. A trip to Diagon Alley had been needed to get some of the more basic ingredients and instruments, which were not part of her Hogwarts supplies. But it was all necessary to get the lab ready for brewing.

The last area of the basement was the biggest, and it was across the hall from the potion's lab. Hermione left this room empty, and would eventually use it for her training room.

May was finally coming to an end, and Hogwarts would soon be letting out for the summer. Hermione spent the last few days of the month shut in her study, planning out the next step in her plan. She would only have a short window of time to save her family from an uncalled for death, and her younger self from spending the next three years trapped away on an island.

A island of nightmares.