"Are you okay?" I asked Merope as she threw up as we stopped turning back in time.

"What happened?" she asked weakly leaning into me as she tried to catch her breath. She was shaking slightly and her hand was resting on her stomach. Was that something pregnant women did?

"Umm, I think we might have gone back in time," I told her as I glanced around the room and took in the outdated furniture and the missing items that once belonged to Tom Riddle.

"What?"

"When you touched the necklace, I think you sent us back in time," I muttered, helping her into the chair beside the bed and looking around the room. "I'm not sure how far we went back. Are you okay to come downstairs? We can find out the date and get something to eat."

Merry nodded and took my hand as I bent down and grabbed her bag. I quickly slid it in the little cotton bag hanging around me and led her out the door. We managed to make it to the bottom floor and I sent her to a table as I went to the barman.

"Excuse me, sir, do you have a newspaper I could borrow? I was also wondering if I could order some food for myself and my sister," I said sweetly smiling up at the man. He frowned at me before grunting the price of the food. I quickly handed him the right amount, happy that wizarding money hadn't changed over the years. "Thank you," I muttered as I glanced down at the paper feeling myself get sick at the date that flashed at the top.

"Are you okay, Romy?" Merry asked as I stumbled into my seat and handed her the paper with shaky hands. "I'm so sorry." She was trying to keep her tears in but I could see how hard it was for her to hold them in. She flinched away as if she was afraid I'd hit her and I remembered what Papa had said. She was abused by her father and brother throughout her life.

"It's not your fault, Merry," I told her, resting my hand over hers and I bit my lip. There wasn't anything we could do about it now. The time turner wouldn't work until I completed my mission, it was a charm Hermione had cast to prevent me from moving through time. She must have forgotten to add a charm to prevent me from going further back.

"What are we going to do?" she asked, fiddling with the paper as she avoided my eyes.

"We need a plan." I nodded slowly as I started thinking of something in my head. "I told the barkeep that we were sisters. I think it's best we go with that story, it's more believable why we'd be travelling together. We're in the middle of a muggle war, too," I told her, running my hands through my hair as I nodded along with my thoughts. I was doing that a lot lately. "We can say you married a muggle and he was sent home due to an injury. Not long after his return home, you fell pregnant but when he found out he kicked us out. It gives us a reason to be wandering."

"No one would believe we're sisters," she muttered softly looking over my face and then turning hers away in shame.

"What does that mean, Merry?" I asked, reaching out and squeezing her hand.

"Well you're this beautiful red-head and I'm, well .. I'm me," she whispered, pulling her hand from me.

"I'm part Veela and a metamorphmagus, Merry. My beauty isn't natural," I told her, feeling disgusted at how self-conscious I had made her feel. "Do you want me to change my hair colour? I can go to your brown?" I gave her a soft smile and showed her my abilities by changing my hair from the Weasley Red to my natural strawberry blonde, which had more of a ginger tint to it.

"No, don't change it!" she exclaimed, her hand clamping down on my wrist. "Your hair is beautiful."

"This is my natural colour, I'll leave it like this," I promised, twisting one of the tight curls around my fingers as my hair fell down my shoulders.

"You're very beautiful," she muttered, giving me a beautiful smile of her own.

It saddened me that she had been abused in such a way that she couldn't see her own beauty. Her smile was amazing and her skin was a lovely ivory colour. Pregnancy was giving her a glow that made her shine with beauty.

"You're beautiful too, Merry. You're glowing and I can't say the same thing," I told her, leaning back as two plates of food floated over to the table. "I think it's best if we head to Gringotts after this. I know the goblins can do a blood locator to find any family members we have. I think I've got a few great-aunts or something here." I knew I did. After all, I was related to the Black family, the Weasley's, the Prewett's and Grandpa Remus had a family too. There was bound to be someone I could turn to for help.

***

His name was Harry Fenton.

His sister, Alice had given birth to a daughter, Lydia in 1902 who would go on to have a daughter of her own, Elizabeth in 1920. Elizabeth would then have herself a daughter, Hope, who would then marry and have a son she called Remus John Lupin.

And we all know the story from there.

The goblins couldn't believe what the blood locator had revealed. They had never had something like this happen to them before but once I explained that I had been sucked into the past, they understood and promised to keep it to themselves.

They had told me about this Harry Fenton and explained that he was a squib. It didn't really matter to me, not when I found out that his sister, Alice was a witch and had gone to Hogwarts. Not when his niece, Lydia was currently at Hogwarts herself. It meant he knew about magic and that was all I needed.

The only thing was, he lived in Birmingham. Small Heath to be exact and I had never been there. To get to him, we had to travel via the train and I wasn't sure if that was appropriate during these times, what with the war going on.

"Why don't we take the Knight Bus?" Merry asked as she followed me around Muggle London, clutching onto my arm.

"Is that a thing in this time?" I wondered, not knowing and kind of feeling she didn't know either.

"Only one way to find out," she muttered and I nodded in agreement. I pulled us down a deserted road and double-checked before pulling out my wand and sticking my arm out into the road.

To both of our surprise, the big purple bus came round the corner within seconds and we were greeted by a plump man asking us where we wanted to go. I was surprised it even existed in this time period, it wasn't the same bus as the new modern ones, but it was still purple and three-stories.

"Umm, Small Heath, Birmingham," I told him, helping Merry onto the bus and shoving more than enough money into his hands.

"It'll take a while, love, got a few drop offs first. Should be there by nightfall," he said smiling brightly at the extra coin he'd earned.

I gave him a wave of dismissal before turning to Merry.

"Let me handle all the talking with this Harry Fenton, okay. I'm not too bad at memory spells so if need be I can help us out a little if needed."

"Why can't you just explain everything to him the way you did to me? If he's family, he won't turn us away?"

"We're in the middle of a war, Merry. Not all people are as understanding as you. Plus, you have little Tom to think about."

"How did you know I was going to call him Tom?" she asked, her eyes widening before she chuckled to herself. "Right, you're from the future."

"Let me see what he's like first, Merry, and then we can decide what to do."

We came into Small Heath just as it was getting dark. The bus driver directed us towards something called the Cut and told us to head on past that and we'd reach the town.

Just our luck that as soon as we made it to the cut, which was actually just a canal with a path leading into the little shopping area, why was it so hard to describe places like this? It wasn't a village, more like an area in the town that I would refer to as a village because of how old fashioned it was.

God, I was letting my thoughts get away from me.

The point was, as we walked down the canal path it started pissing it down. By the time we made it to the church, we were both drowned rats.

"Here, Merry, sit down," I told her, helping her into the pew as I glanced around the church. There was a woman dressed in black prying on her knees a couple of pews in front of us. She didn't bother giving us the time of day, but perhaps she'd be able to help. "Excuse me, miss. I'm sorry to disturb you but I was wondering if you could help us?"

I was sounding overly posh as I tried to adapt my speech. I didn't want to draw attention to myself because I was too common with the modern language. God, this shit was hard.

"You're not from Birmingham," she said, turning her head up to look at me. She looked slightly startled by the sight of me before shaking her head and glancing to Merope. "What are two young girls doing in Small Heath?"

"We're looking for our ... umm, our uncle." It seemed like the only possible answer. People would have known Harry had a sister and seeing as she moved to London after marrying, no one would know how many children she had.

"How old are you, girl"? I wasn't sure I liked the way she called me girl.

"Seventeen, ma'am," If I was going to get anywhere I had to be polite. I caught her eyes drift over to Merope and noted the way her eyes settled on her stomach. I could already see her trying to come up with a reason to why we'd be running to Small Heath. It didn't seem the sort of place people would be running to. "That's my sister, Merope, she's nineteen. Her husband came back from the war about five months ago." I shrugged not understanding why I was telling her, but I felt like I had to. "He wasn't the kindest of men. He wasn't right after what he'd seen. She found out she was pregnant and he kicked us out. We have nowhere to go but to our uncle," I explained, keeping the story as simple as possible.

"Who is it you're looking for?"

"Harry Fenton? All I can remember is he lived in Small Heath, Birmingham. I'm not sure if he's still at war or not?" I was aware I was phrasing everything like a question. I knew, on behalf of the goblins that Harry was in Small Heath, but I couldn't outright tell this lady I knew he was here. "We have nowhere else to go."

"Aye, he's here. He lives on top of The Garrison pub. It's not too far from here, I'll walk you," she said, raising from her resting place and doing that cross-thing as she pressed a kiss to her rosary beads.

"Thank you, miss. I really appreciate it."

"Stop calling me miss. It's Polly." She gave me a look that could have revealed Nanna Gin and I almost shuddered in disgust. "And what of your name?"

"Oh, umm I'm Andromeda, but everyone calls me Romy," I told her, feeling like an absolute idiot for not mentioning it before.

"Right, come on then." She moved down the aisle, stopping at the door as I helped Merry to her feet, linking her arm in mine as we followed Polly out of the church and into the rain.

Polly wasn't lying when she said the pub wasn't too far from the church. As we approached the pub, Polly knocked on the door and gave us a strained smile before walking off down the road.

It seemed strange that she didn't seem to want to know every detail of our lives, but I also had a feeling that this Polly lady knew how to find out whatever she wanted.

The door opening took my thoughts away from Polly and I glanced at the man inside as he frowned upon the sight of us.

"Harry Fenton?" I asked, leaning closer to him and flashing my wand at his nod. "Do you mind letting us in?"