Here's a little HG/LM story to tide me (and possibly you, dear readers) over until DH is released. I hope you all enjoy it. It's my first foray into the possibilities of this pairing. There will be a bit of crossover from my 2003 fic trilogy, only 1/3 of which is available on at this time. It's not HBP-compliant (if that sort of thing matters to you), but I will be borrowing some of my own characters and characterizations…most of which should be rather self-explanatory.

STANDARD DISCLAIMER: Attention, all fanfic personnel! You should all be aware that I'm not J.K. Rowling and don't own any of these characters. That is all!

THE ROAD LESS TRAVELLED

Chapter 1 – Perchance to Dream

Hermione Granger was having disquieting dreams.

This was not surprising; as the Wizarding world was currently in turmoil, and she and Ron had promised to help their best friend, Harry Potter, find the remainder of Voldemort's Horcruxes (or was it more properly Horcruces, or Horcruxen, she wondered), so that the Dark Lord could possibly be destroyed. Then, maybe, if all went well, they'd get back to school where there would be NEWTs to worry about. Before that, though, they were all going to the Burrow for Bill and Fleur's wedding, which would doubtless be interesting, as Harry had broken things off with Ginny just before they'd left school, and likely she and Ron would be running interference between the two. Oh, and then there was the sort-of-relationship that she and Ron were starting to have, even though the young wizard in question had yet to write her a single owl since she'd returned home.

Frankly, Hermione thought, as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes, it was a wonder that she actually managed to get any rest these days.

Reaching toward her nightstand, she grabbed the leather-bound blank notebook that she'd been using as a dream diary. "That old fraud, Trelawney, would be proud if she could see this…of course, I'll never show it to anyone…" mused Hermione, as she took up her pen to record the latest nighttime sojourn.

The dream was part of a cycle, a recurring scenario that was as confusing as it was intriguing. A man, whose face she couldn't see, promised her a wonderful, fairy-tale drudgery-free life, which nonetheless included lots of knowledge and learning. Sometimes, she'd dance with the man, in a room with indistinct furnishings, a pale, high moon shining through the large, archaic-looking window. Other times, she'd see herself in a mirror, wearing baroquely overdone clothes, her hair arranged in the manner she'd had it for that long-ago Yule Ball, when all she'd really had to worry about was whether Viktor would get her back to the Gryffindor dorm before the Sleekeazy's hair potion dried out.

And sometimes there was more. Hermione blushed as she remembered what had happened in the previous night's dream.

Quite honestly, the whole thing seemed rather more suited to Lavender Brown, who was a voracious reader of lurid novels with titles like Wizard of her Desires, featuring empty-headed blonde witches wearing low-cut dress robes, being embraced by impossibly muscular wizards, all of whom seemed to have long flowing hair and missing shirts. Although she and Lavender had been romantic rivals for Ron's affections last term, by the time the Gryffindor sixth-year girls had packed up their trunks after Dumbledore's funeral, apparently Lav had moved on and set her sights on a very promising fifth-year Ravenclaw. Thus, during the course of a very teary good-bye session, she'd lent Hermione some books to read over break. "You need to branch out from schoolwork once in a while!" she said, in a slightly judgemental way. Wanting to preserve the peace, Hermione had dutifully stashed the novels in her trunk, thanked Lavender, and promised to read them. So far, though, she'd only made it through a half of one treacly tome—could that account for weeks of nightly elaboration on a fairly repetitive theme?

Naturally, using her Arithmancy skills, Hermione had attempted to analyze the dreams, but the sums made no sense and the equations wouldn't balance. One night, in sheer desperation, she'd actually turned to a book from Trelawney's class on dream interpretation, but it was as useful as the teacher who'd recommended it.

Hermione's mother, Grace, looked up from the table as her daughter walked in the kitchen doorway, obviously intent on reaching the teapot as soon as possible. By mutual agreement, she and her husband John had taken time off (on alternating weeks) from their dental practice to stay at home with Hermione until she was due at the Weasleys' for Bill and Fleur's wedding—in about two weeks.

"Did you sleep well, dear?"

"Er…yes, Mum," Hermione answered, attempting to wipe all traces of dream-confusion from her face, as she got down her favorite mug from the cupboard. Crookshanks wound around her ankles and purred. It was very difficult to reconcile the normality of her life here in the suburbs with her dream-life…or, for that matter, her life in the wizarding world. It was for this reason that she'd always relished the summer vacations, feeling that they grounded her in reality. Who knew if she'd spend the rest of her life using magic in her career? If He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was successfully killed, there would likely be much less of an urgent need for Aurors. There was still plenty of time to go to university, and get an advanced Muggle degree, after all, although she wasn't entirely sure if her credits at Hogwarts would transfer to Oxford or Cambridge.

"Well, I thought perhaps you'd want to go shopping today for wedding clothes. I know you'll want a different sort of dress, of course, but we could look at shoes and handbags," said Grace.

Neither she nor John had liked what their daughter had told them about the war, or this Dark Lord character, or how that polite little boy with the glasses, Harry, (who likely was not so little now, because boys grew so quickly, you know) was apparently in mortal danger from him and his followers. It all sounded so lurid and unreal, like something out of a bad American film, but she'd seen the witches and wizards with her own eyes, at the train station, and at that odd hidden shopping district, where they'd gone to a bank run by goblins and a pub that looked like it belonged in a museum.

Further, neither John nor Grace was sure where Hermione's magical talents had come from. When Grace was young, her mum had told her funny stories about a batty old great-aunt from Wiltshire who'd lived in a cottage full of cats and mostly kept to herself. Perhaps she'd been a witch. It was a shame that the old family photographs didn't include any of her. Grace had, in fact, completely forgotten about her distant relation until the morning, six years ago, that the great barn-owl, two letters clamped firmly in its beak, had tapped on the window while she and John were having breakfast and discussing a root-canal procedure that he'd be performing later that day.

"Oh, yes, please!" Hermione said. Anything to get out of the house and away from the dream diary, which was getting fuller and fuller of writing every day.