The Grey | Hermione Granger

|12| Chapter Twelve

T W E L V E 

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Then she saw herself. Or at least she thought it was herself that she was looking at. 

Amidst the grey, Saffron saw herself walking walking towards her and all she felt was confused. Where was she? What had happened to her? Was she dead? Her mind was racing and Saffron tried to put her confusion to one side as she focussed on the body she was in rather than the girl walking slowly towards her. 

She lying flat on the ground. Once she realised this, she let out a small yelp as she was not entirely sure that she was on the ground. The surface beneath her was not completely solid, it looked as though if she moved an inch it would collapse underneath her weight. Yet, the girl continued to walk so it must be okay, surely? She could not make sense of the world around her. The only thing to make sense of was the two people existing inside of it as besides that there was only an endless expanse of grey, stretching out in every direction. It was as if she had woken up in the middle of a cloud, no warmth, softness or fluffiness. Just a cold nothingness that unsettled her that seemed to pulse with a life of its own. 

Her fingers twitched, but she was too afraid to move them any further. The fear was bone-deep and Saffron was terrified. She felt if she moved anymore she would plummet straight down into the depths of the grey, swallowed by the matter that showed no sign of form. The idea of falling endlessly was one she had never considered before and yet here she was. With the idea feeling like the reality and her having no idea how she had managed to get herself into this situation.

She stared upward—or at least what she thought was upward—but there was no sky, no horizon. The grey was the same in every direction, a blank canvas stretching on forever. Again, the only difference was the girl who Saffron was convinced was herself. 

She looked exactly like Saffron — the same dark hair, the same olive skin, the same warm brown eyes. Moreover, the same ruby red ribbon that Saffron had in her hair. But there was something different about her, something that made Saffron's heart skip a beat. The girl's eyes held a depth of sorrow that seemed far too heavy for an eleven-year-old to bear.

Saffron froze, her breath catching in her throat. She had to be dead. Was this herself as a ghost? The girl walking towards her's movements were slow and calculated. Saffron focussed on her as hard as she could and that was when she realised that there was a strong chance that the girl was not herself. 

"I... I know you," Saffron's voice trembled. It could not be true but yet here she was. "You're my mother, aren't you?"

The girl did not seem overly pleased to be told that and Saffron frowned, still remaining still. What she missing? 

"My name is Prina Adhani," The girl spoke softly, taking another step towards Saffron before crouching down next to her. "I am your mother, yes, but to call myself your mother in the form I am in currently would be a disservice to her. I am but eleven, the same age as you,"

"But you're dead," Saffron blurted out. She was in complete denial of what was happening. It could not possibly be. "How can you be here?" Saffron then paused and considered the matter. She did not have any grounds to tell anyone they could not be somewhere when she did not even know where she was herself. "Where even are we? And why are you a girl? My mother was a woman,"

Prina's expression softened, her eyes glistening. "Time doesn't work the same way here in The Grey," she explained. "I am here because this is where all from my blood exist beyond the grave. The line runs back centuries, but from his blood came the Grey and I appear as you see me now because I am the same age as you in the Grey. I don't have the same wisdom as the woman I would become, the woman you knew me as,"