Chapter Text
January 5th, 1999
“Honestly,” Hermione muttered, shining her wand into yet another suspicious crack in the stonework, “if there was ever a place hiding a secret chamber, it’s this one.”
Crookshanks, sprawled on a dusty trunk behind her, opened one eye. His expression suggested she was embarrassing herself. Hermione ignored him.
The deed listed the structure as dating to 1632. The village records claimed 1681. A half-burned parish ledger from 1724 insisted the property had stood “since before the old queen.” None of which explained the sealed archway currently occupying the entire section of her cellar. Nor did it explain why three separate historical accounts connected the property to Morgan le Fay.
A connection every reputable historian dismissed as complete nonsense.
Naturally, Hermione had become obsessed.
When the Ministry offered Hermione reparations and a financial reward for her role in Voldemort’s defeat, she knew exactly what she wanted: a home of her own.
With her parents safe in Australia but unable to remember who she was, the need to put down new roots has become impossible to ignore. She had spent months searching before stumbling across Foxglove Cottage, a four-hundred-year old stone manor nestled in the heart of the Cotswolds and burdened with enough contradictory history to make any researcher salivate.
Naturally, the first thing she’d done after purchasing it was crawl into the cellar with a flashlight and a crowbar.
Three weeks later, she was still finding dirt in her hair. And splinters in her socks. And bruises on her knees from crawling through spaces no sane person would willingly enter.
Hermione considered all three a reasonable trade-off.
The cellar stretched beneath nearly the entire cottage, a maze of uneven stone walls and narrow alcoves that seemed to have been added over centuries without any coherent plan. Some sections have appeared untouched since the seventeenth century. Others bore evidence of renovations, repairs, and at least one attempt to wall off an entire corner for reasons she had yet to determine.
The house, infuriating, refused to make sense.
She had measured every room twice. And then three times. The exterior dimensions exceeded the interior by nearly four feet.
Four feet.
It was impossible, even by magic standards, unless someone had built exceptionally thick walls. Or there was something hidden between them.
Hermione preferred the second option.
“Don’t look at me like that,” she said. Crookshanks yawned.
“You’re supposed to be helping.”
The kneazle responded by turning his back to her entirely.
Traitor.
Hermione sighed and returned her attention to the sealed archway. It occupied the farthest wall of the cellar, partially concealed behind a row of dusty shelves she had spent the better part of an afternoon dismantling. Time and moisture had worn away most of the mortar surrounding it, revealing the distinct curve of an older doorway beneath.
Older than the cellar itself.
Which, again, should have been impossible.
She crouched and ran her fingers over the stone. The arch was constructed from a darker material than the surrounding walls. Black-grey stone veined with silver that shimmered faintly beneath the glow of her wand.
A chill crept up her spine.
Not fear; excitement.
The sort of excitement that had gotten her into trouble more times that she cared to admit.
Slowly, she brushed away another layer of dirt and something emerged near the base of the arch.
A marking.
Hermione’s breath caught, it wasn’t a mason’s mark or a family crest. It was a rune.
A very old rune; one she recognized immediately.
“No,” she whispered.
Crookshanks’ ears perked.
Hermione leaned closer.
The symbol represented protection, more specifically, concealment. Someone hadn’t merely sealed this doorway; someone had hidden it. Deliberately.
Suddenly, the stories about Morgan le Fay seemed a great deal less ridiculous.
January 30th, 2003
Five years later, she was still finding reasons to postpone opening the archway. The mystery remained unsolved.
Not for lack of effort.
Hermione had spent the better part of five years researching Foxglove Cottage and its connection to Morgan le Fay. She had accumulated seventeen journals, four filing cabinets, and an entire bookcase dedicated solely to theories regarding the sealed doorway beneath her cellar.
Unfortunately, none of them explained how to open it.
Which meant the archway remained exactly where it had always been, lurking beneath her home and mocking her. She was seriously considering consulting with a curse-breaker.
She frowned at the parchment spread across her kitchen table. The latest translation of a twelfth-century manuscript had yielded precisely nothing useful.
Again.
She scribbles a note in the margin, cross-reference with Welsh sources.
A translucent silver raccoon burst through the kitchen wall.
“Hermione!”
She jumped, splattering ink across the page. The Patronus glared at her. Or at least, it somehow managed to convey the distinct impression of disapproval.
“You are twenty-three minutes late.”
Hermione stared as the raccoon crossed its tiny silver paws.
“The Undersecretary has already arrived. Madam Whitmore is asking questions. Minister Shacklebolt is attempting to stall.”
Hermione’s stomach dropped. She glances at her watch, “Shit.”
“The Minister asked me to remind you that being the brightest witch of our age does not exempt you from attending your own meetings.”
The raccoon’s nose twitched.
“Personally, I think he’s losing faith in that argument,” and then the Patronus vanished.
Hermione closed her eyes, counted to three, then immediately began shoving parchment into the nearest satchel.
“Crookshanks!”
The cat did not move.
“Do you have to plop yourself in the most inconvenient of places?”
One orange eye opened.
“Not helping.”
Crookshanks yawned.
Hermione grabbed her robes from the back of a chair, nearly knocked over her tea, and sprinted toward her Floo.
Some things, it seemed, never changed.