Chapter Text
Letter II
Hidden inside Hermione’s Arithmancy textbook
---
Granger,
If you are reading this, then this timeline has progressed further than most.
Congratulations.
It means you have already shouted at me at least once this week.
I do enjoy that phase.
---
Today you trusted me.
Not fully.
You never do at first.
But enough. Just enough.
Enough to follow me.
Enough to listen.
Enough that when I told you someone was manipulating probability threads in magical events, you didn’t immediately hex me.
That alone puts this timeline ahead of eleven others.
You may feel proud of yourself.
---
You cornered me outside the library staircase.
Your wand was already drawn.
You regarded me with suspicion, your eyes watchful and calculating.
My beautiful witch.
The smirk on my face offended you.
“You knew I’d be here,” you said, accusing.
I crossed my ams and leaned against the wall, because you always dislike it when I look relaxed while you are angry.
“I know many things about you, Granger.”
You narrowed your eyes.
“Like what?”
And here is the dangerous thing about you.
You always ask the questions that matter.
---
I could have told you everything.
That I have watched you grow up across timelines.
That I know the way your voice changes when you’re excited about a theory.
That when you are tired you rub the side of your nose with your sleeve.
That when you are nervous you talk faster.
And that when you look at me with suspicion, it is usually the beginning of you trusting me later.
But instead I said,
“You solve problems faster than anyone I’ve ever met.”
You blinked.
You hate compliments.
They disarm you.
---
You asked why I believed someone was altering magical events.
So I told you part of the truth.
I told you that certain moments keep changing.
Battles that should be winnable suddenly becoming impossible.
Alliances breaking at precisely the wrong moment.
People dying who should have lived.
You listened very carefully.
That is another thing I adore about you.
When your mind begins to work, the rest of the world disappears.
Even me.
Which is irritating.
But impressive.
---
You said something interesting then.
Something you have said in six timelines now.
“If someone were altering probability across time,” you said slowly, “a Time Turner wouldn’t be enough. They would need both Legilimency and temporal magic.”
Correct.
Extremely advanced Legilimency.
The kind capable of breaking minds.
The kind capable of pushing a memory into someone’s head until it feels like truth.
Combined with powerful temporal magic, it becomes the kind of Legilimency that alters reality and erases memories.
You shivered when you said it.
I wondered if some part of you remembered the first time you realised this, half a dozen timelines ago.
---
I should mention something else.
You have started spending time with Weasley again.
I noticed.
Of course I noticed.
In this timeline you were sitting with him at lunch when I walked past.
You were laughing.
Your head tilted back slightly the way it does when something genuinely amuses you.
Weasley looked very pleased with himself.
I had to stop myself from hexing him.
---
You once asked me, in a different timeline, why I was so possessive.
You said it like it was a flaw.
Let me explain something properly.
When a man has watched the woman he loves die repeatedly, he becomes protective.
When that same man has lived dozens of lives loving her, he becomes territorial.
And when he knows that in every possible future she eventually chooses him anyway…
He becomes patient.
Maybe if all those were potion ingredients then the end result would be this... this possessiveness.
This burning desire to lock you away in a tower where no other man can touch you, and this equally burning need to protect your freedom to be.
---
Tonight I will prove something to you.
You do not know this yet.
But tomorrow evening you will follow me to an abandoned corridor near the Astronomy Tower.
You will accuse me of manipulation again.
You will threaten to report me.
And then I will show you something impossible.
I will perform wandless magic powerful enough to break the locking charms on the hidden door there.
You will stare at me like you cannot decide whether I am dangerous or fascinating.
You will eventually conclude that I am both.
---
That door leads to a room that I have placed under temporal stasis, a room that the time loops cannot touch.
It is filled with old war records.
Records that should not exist yet.
Records from timelines that have already happened.
You will read them for hours.
And when you finally look up at me, your voice will be very quiet.
“Draco… how do you know all of this?”
I will tell you the truth then.
Or at least the part you can handle.
I will tell you:
“Because I’ve lived through them.”
---
You will not believe me immediately.
You will test me.
You will ask questions about events that have not happened yet.
And I will answer every one of them.
That is usually the moment when you begin to trust me.
It is also the moment when I begin to fall for you again.
---
There is one more clue you will discover, a clue in those records that you should consider.
In every altered timeline, one person is always present.
Always watching.
Always whispering in the Dark Lord’s ear.
Your first instinct will tell you she is simply mad.
Your instinct will be wrong.
Mad people do not manipulate time.
---
For now, you are still safe.
You are sitting in the Gryffindor common room pretending to read while Potter and Weasley argue about Quidditch.
You are not thinking about me.
That will change soon.
It always does.
---
Because tomorrow night you will look at me differently.
Not like an enemy.
Not like a nuisance.
But like a mystery.
And Hermione Granger has never been able to resist solving a mystery.
Especially when the answer is me.
Yours — still watching,
Draco