Hermione wiped her eyes and began looking around.
It was her cave! Towers of books made walls on all sides, with book stalactites and stalagmites of literature creating an odd feeling of wilderness. Well, wilderness made of books.
Harry helped her stand up, and they began to wander, not really saying anything. In the back of the cave was more and more novels, books, stories.
She reached a hand up and touched the spine of one of her favorite books when she was seven. The book seemed to fall into her hand, and a new book showed up behind it with a new topic.
"This... Oh Harry, this is amazing."
Harry grinned. "No, I have a feeling what will be amazing is what is OUTSIDE the cave." Hermione followed Harry to the entrance... and stood stunned, mouth open.
Outside, a reading light was clearly acting as a sun. Her cave was part of a mountain, and before it was a huge forest... all made from books. Scrolls hung from the book-stack trees in vine form, a lake of loose-leaf paper was actually rippling from what appeared to be origami fish trying to eat paper folded flies.
Harry grinned. "Well, this place is... really neat. But I am not so sure you can get here when sleeping."
At Hermione's glance, he pointed downward. "See how your rope is connecting? Being here is using a good amount of your power. I would say you can spend about an hour or so of real world time here without a break. From what I can feel, time dilation isn't that much ether... two minutes here is about one out there, give or take. That may go up if you visit more often, like it did for me." She gave him a desperate glance. "So how much time do I have left?"
He shrugged. "Right now I am feeding this place power from my core too. I think that is how you ended up with those paper fish, bugs, and those folded cranes." He pointed at what looked to be a bird in a nearby tree. It however was busy watching the fish.
"Anyway, feel free to start organizing. Don't try and sort all the books out here, just build someplace safe, and you can duplicate ALL the information out here in your new home." He pointed at one of the trees that looked sickly. "You can also contain things like that. If I had to guess, that tree is a collection of some of your bad memories."
She nodded. Even from this distance, she could feel that tree's presence. There were several of those in this forest. Harry shrugged. "I personally built a room that represented the worst times of my life and placed all the bad stuff there, shrunken and marked with when and where it happened." He also pointed at one of the branches that seemed to be dripping. "You can also create containers and collect the goo from the really bad memories. That goo is emotions, and it lets you handle the memory without feeling anything once you wring the emotions out of the thought."
Hermione looked at her hands. "How come I can't see my threads here?"
Harry shrugged. "You could only seem them in my mind because I gave you guys access to my eyes while in my world. Your body doesn't have that skill... but you still have the ropes, just like always. You can practice control here just like in my head. It is more of a feeling thing here though." He watched with a grin as she began lifting random books (Although she kept missing the target more than a few times, since she couldn't see her work now).
"So... I am just going to relax here while you build a house or something. Could I borrow a book to read?"
Hermione gestured absently. "I got plenty of them."
He coughed. "Well, some of these are books, but many are memories. I would feel better if you just handed me so I would KNOW I didn't see something you didn't mean me to. Especially since you haven't had a chance to decorate, as it were."
Settling into a chair of books with a copy of "Hogwarts: A history (And comments by Hermione)", her memory of reading her favorite book, Harry relaxed and tried to ignore the sounds of construction going on. He didn't want to see what she was doing, as he knew the mind was a very personal place. If she needed him she would ask, and that was enough for Harry.
It was a half hour later, and Harry stood with a sigh. "Hermione, I need to get going. We have been here around 15 minutes."
"WHAT? No, I just got started." Hermione looked at the foundation she had created. She was going for a castle she had always dreamed of as a child, but she was NOWHERE near completed.
"Yeah, but I can't just sit here, I have to get the others started as well."
She got a look on her face that made him feel guilty inside... but he couldn't ignore his other friends. He paused... "Hey, how about we compromise? I could leave my connection here until you want to get rid of it, but leave mentally. That should give you power to keep on working until dinner-time, without me having to sit here."
Hermione gave him a HUGE hug. "Can you? Heck, could you just leave a connection to your mind in general so I could stop by if I have questions?"
He shifted. "Well, not permanently, I don't think. But I guess I could convert my body into a doorway, since one end of this rope is already in your mind I can just move the other one to my world." He gave her a surprisingly stern look. "Now, don't abuse this, ok? Leaving an opening into my mind... well, this is a big deal to me. I will be trusting you."
Hermione gave a subdued nod. She hadn't even thought about what she had asked for... and it made her feel good inside that he had accepted anyway. She had too much to do here anyway, since all the building blocks were made of books she had to use law texts and history books as bricks. Something really thick. Harry saw her dropping back into design mode as she again began duplicating and lifting blocks of books into what seemed to be a giant foundation. He grinned, and began focusing on himself.
Hannah was the first to realize Harry had started moving again. "Well how did it go? Everything was fine, right? Did it hurt?"
He laughed slightly. "Relax Hannah, breathe. It went perfectly, and Hermione is working on her mind right now. There was no pain, but we did learn some stuff." He held up a hand and began counting off. "First of all, if I am not there Hermione can only go into her mind world herself for about an hour. Then her magic reserves empty and she needs a break. Secondly, I can provide power for her to stay as much as she likes, and we just found out that I can leave a connection without sitting around doing nothing." He grinned at Terry. "As much as I like books, it was getting a bit dull waiting for OTHER people to finish stuff when I was not able to do anything."
Harry flicked another finger. "Thirdly, her world has changed slightly since she first made it. She already has at least three types of wildlife, although none seem to be Jim level intelligence." He dropped the hand and leaned back. "Finally, I can change my presence into a doorway in people's mind and connect it into my world. Jim is monitoring my end now, so if she stops by when I am busy helping you guys he can let me know about it."
Padma seemed really interested at this point. "So... can I go next? I really want to see my world."
Harry sighed as the remainder of his friends began arguing about order. Now that they knew it was safe, going second was a huge priority for them. Still, it was hard to not be a bit excited himself... it felt like he was closer to Hermione than before, and he looked forward to connecting with the rest of his friends.
Two boys looked over a huge stone floor, filled with sticks and hoops.
"So Terry..."
"Yes Harry?" "I notice you have a lot of Quidditch stuff here."
"Yes I do."
"Is that a Quidditch pitch?" "Which one?" "You know what, I am just going to head back. You good?" Terry reached out, a golden broom appearing. "Oh yeah." Harry and Padma were interrupted by an annoyed 'Quack'.
He paused, ducks falling out of his lap. "Uh... yes Jim?"
'Quack.'
He looked at Padma, who had wide eyes. "I have to go. Apparently I was in here for a while."
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