"What time is it now?" Hermione asked tentatively, looking at the unfamiliar girl before her.
"You've hit on the key question. It's June ninth, nineteen ninety-seven. It's nine in the evening... hmm, ten already." The girl glanced at the watch on her wrist.
"The end-of-term feast just ended."
"Nineteen... ninety-seven?" Hermione and Harry were both dumbfounded.
Neville's brows knitted tightly.
Ron: "Mmm, mmm, mmm, mmm."
His mouth was still sealed, so he couldn't speak.
Hermione and Harry exchanged a look, which was rather difficult. Both were held fast by petrified vines and couldn't even turn their heads. If the angle hadn't been just right, they wouldn't have been able to see each other at all.
"So, where did you come from?" the black-haired girl asked.
"June ninth... nineteen ninety-four..." Hermione murmured.
"How strange. Professor McGonagall must have given you your Time-Turner too, right? Didn't she tell you that you couldn't travel into the future?" the black-haired girl asked with interest.
"She did. I didn't turn it forward either. It was Peter..." Hermione said rather hesitantly. Her gaze was somewhat unfocused; clearly, she still hadn't recovered from the fact that she had actually arrived in the future.
"Wherever you came from, it's far too dangerous here." The black-haired girl shook her head and waved her wand, and the magic restraining the four of them vanished.
The seal on Ron's mouth was lifted too. Yet Ron, whose mouth always worked faster than his brain, actually didn't blurt anything out this time. Instead, he watched the black-haired girl warily.
"Potter... ah, I really can't get used to seeing you like this." The black-haired girl looked at Harry and shook her head. "You brought your Invisibility Cloak, didn't you?"
"Yes." Harry nodded. Although he still had no idea who the girl before him was,