Time Travel:- The Emerald Eye King

3. The Revival Of Winter Queen

Harry opted to skip the feast so that he could be present near Hermione to welcome her when she was revived after their school nurse administrated the Mandrake restorative draught to the petrified student. As Madam Promfey prepared the final step, Harry sat down on a nearby stool and proofread the animagus transformation notes he had prepared for Hermione.

"I told you a hundred times to get lost but it's like you can't hear me, Potter," Madam Promfey snarked after she was done administrating the draught to Hermione.

"Sorry Poppy," Harry gave her a charming grin which gave her flashbacks of a certain marauder, just a bit taller with caramel-coloured eyes, "But I have to be there for my best friend when she wakes up with her beauty sleep otherwise what kind of friend would I be?"

The school nurse grumbled before her eyes fell on now her patient's and visitors' connected hands, "Yeah! Just best friends."

Harry blushed but didn't let Hermione's hand go and Pomfrey spotted a smug grin on her face, counting it as her win.

"Uggh..." Hermione whimpered in a dry voice which sent Harry scraping to get her water while Madam Pomphrey watched with amused eyes.

Harry brought the glass of water to Hermione's lips and she drank the water gratefully. As strength returned to her limbs, she looked around rubbing her eyes.

"Harry", she whispered her eyes wide as she saw the teary eyes of her best friend.

"Welcome back, my winter Queen," Harry said as he climbed on her hospital bed to give her a tender hug which was filled with feelings, "I have missed you."

Hermione was surprised as she saw Harry being affectionate. Her best friend, from what she knew, was shy, and awkward and never started physical contact. Her eyes widened as she remembered seeing scary yellow eyes in the compact mirror and she started rambling, "Harry... I found the Slytherin's monster. It's a basilisk and is using the plumbings to move around. We have to tell-"

Harry shushed her by placing a hand on her lips and chuckled when he saw her blush. He then sniffed pompously and spoke "Don't worry about it, my lady! Your knight in shining armour had recognised the beast with your help and had avenged you."

Hermione started giggling at his tone before she processed what he said.

"What! Harry James Potter!" Harry needed at the use of his full name, "Don't tell me that you fought the Basilisk alone without the help of any teacher. I might have not seen it clearly in reflection, but I saw enough to guess its bloody size and guess what? It was bloody huge!"

Harry rubbed the back of his head and said, "Well we tried to rope pompous Lockhart into hunting it after the heir took Ginny to the chamber of secrets. Unfortunately, he decided to Obliviate us and tell the whole world about how he saved us from the snake but couldn't save Ginny. Thankfully, Ron's broken wand backfired and we were safe. And guess what? Do you remember the book we saw Malfoy putting into Ginny's cauldron, it somehow stored this shade of 16-year-old Voldemort and it was possessing her to let the Basilisk loose? When I got there, alone because Ron had been separated due to a cave-in from a backfired spell, though I am glad because if he had been there he probably would have died. So when I got there, the shade was standing over unconscious Ginny and listen to this, it was trying to somehow come back to life by absorbing Ginny's life force and magic. It gloated about those things and then disarmed me when I tried to attack him. After that he set the Basilisk on me and let me tell you it was huge... almost 20 meters," Harry winced as Hermione's strong grip on him started to hurt but he continued, "Then suddenly, Fawkes was there with sorting hat and I am pulling the sword of Gryffindor out of it, yes it was our founder's sword. Riddle...that is Voldemort's real name... then taunted me about how some flaming chicken and a sword weren't going to stand a chance against the king of serpents, but then Fawkes blinded the Basilisk removing its most lethal weapon. Then Riddle started throwing spells at me and suddenly I knew how to use the sword while I had never been trained in it last 12 years of my life," Harry mused while thinking 'yes, I have trained with it in the coming 5 years' and continued, "I batted away Riddle's spell and then I got this crazy idea," Hermione snorted at that but Harry ignored it, "And I asked Fawkes to teleport me on top of the Basilisk's head, from where I used the sword to stab it through its head, thankfully ending it. But then again Riddle started monologuing and throwing spells at me, so I used the smoke screen spell the twins taught me to blind him and then stabbed that book with the sword. It started oozing black ink and from the scream and absence of the shade I concluded, that Riddle was quite dead... er at least the Riddle from possessing the book."