As Oleandra had expected, her involuntary time-slipping did not cease occurring after just two occurrences. Theo's experiment had somehow unmoored her from her proper time, causing her to shift between the present and the past every time she lost consciousness. It was as if she existed in both time periods at once, though Theo could offer no explanation as to why or how that could be possible. He had no idea why sleep was the trigger, and neither did he have any clue why he hadn't been affected, even though his experiment had exploded in both their faces.
"From our perspective, you'll be ageing twice as fast as the rest of us," Theo had told her. "Until we find a way to fix this, you'll essentially be living two consecutive lives— one in the past, and one in the present. I'm far from an expert on Time Magic, so even though I'd rather keep our experiments secret for now… I wouldn't blame you if went and told Dumbledore about everything."
"I've found some help in the past, and I'm not worried about my lifespan," Oleandra had reassured him. "Unless the time-skipping somehow worsens, I won't tell anyone."
Just like Daphne, Oleandra's lifespan was no longer an issue for her.
While 'Muggle' Dusk-Elves were basically regular humans with pointy ears and paler skin, 'Wizard' Dusk-Elves possessed supernatural grace, strength, and longevity. They essentially converted most of their spellcasting potential into physique enhancement, so in other words, the older they got, the slower they aged. And since Oleandra's body was now half Dusk-Elf…
At any rate, while it was jarring at first to keep waking up in different places and times, Oleandra eventually grew accustomed to her time-slips.
In the present, Oleandra would continue living out her life as normal. She would go to her classes and do her homework, spend time with her friends and make out with Tracey in broom closets, pretending as if she wasn't being shuttled backwards through time every single day.
Eventually, Daphne and Tracey— as well as Pansy and Millicent, with whom she shared dormitories— began noticing that something was off with Oleandra. For now, it was only small details, like her showing up to breakfast with scratches on her face that hadn't been there the previous day or her going to the wrong classes in the morning. While Tracey knew Oleandra always somehow managed to insert herself into the strangest situations and accidents, due to her perpetual unlucky streak, it wasn't like her to be so clumsy and scatterbrained.
Still, Oleandra wasn't the only one to keep acting strangely this year.
For instance, Daphne felt more distant than ever, and Oleandra was increasingly convinced she was up to something. For some reason, she kept skulking about the dungeons, though Oleandra could never catch her in the middle of whatever it was she'd been doing. And another thing—during mealtimes, just before taking a bite, Daphne would always glance in the direction of the staff table. More often than not, she would then frown or click her tongue in annoyance, but Oleandra just couldn't figure out what seemed to be bothering her. There didn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to it.
On the Gryffindor side of the school, Harry was also acting strangely. He was convinced that Malfoy was doing something sinister at school on behalf of Voldemort, so he kept asking her about his movements after class… but Oleandra suspected Harry was just looking for pretexts to talk to her, seeing as it seemed like he'd fallen for her rather hard.
To humour Harry, and following Merlin's advice, Oleandra kept an eye on Malfoy whenever he was close by, but he really didn't seem to be up to anything nefarious. He just didn't have it in him to risk his own skin, in her opinion.
…
"What is it?" asked Oleandra, as Wanderer stopped dead in his tracks. "Another bear?"
They had crested a small hill, and before them stretched nothing but a few miles of forest. But beyond that, Oleandra could see flat land in the distance— civilisation.
"We've left Caledonia, which means we'll have to be careful from here on out," said Wanderer, his tone unusually serious. "According to my dad, the people who live in Cameliard— Muggles and Wizarding clans both— really don't take too kindly to outsiders."
Aside from magical creatures, there wasn't much in this land— or this time period— that could possibly threaten Oleandra, so she wasn't particularly afraid of being harmed by the locals. With her wand-based Roman magic and her Nordic runic spells that only needed a wave of her hand to activate, she could have easily taken down a small army, but she naturally refrained from doing such things.
She had already taken a big gamble by accepting her situation as fate, but there was no point going out of her way to shatter the timeline— either by showing Wanderer future magic or by harming someone she shouldn't have. A butterfly effect sent in motion over a period of more than two thousand years was bound to be devastating…
That being the case, Oleandra decided to let Wanderer take care of the threats they encountered— mostly lynxes, brown bears and wolves— and mostly played the role of a cheerleader. It was an arrangement that suited them both, since Wanderer enjoyed showing off in front of pretty girls and Oleandra didn't want to show off her own skills.
Just like Oleandra, Wanderer could use runic magic based on Nordic runes, but unlike her, he needed to write down his runes before using their powers, just like Professor Babbling. Seeing as it was rather impractical for a spellcaster to have to sit down and write before using their magic, Wanderer fought using his spear, upon which he had carved many offensive spells. If he ever needed to cast a spell that wasn't already engraved on his spear, he would use his set of twenty-four Dragon knucklebones, each one marked with a different rune.
…and speaking of runic magic, it had only taken Oleandra a single night to figure out why the stars had been refusing to lend her their magic— the night sky of two thousand years ago was slightly different than the one she knew, so the constellations representing the various runes were also slightly out of alignment.
With a few mental adjustments, she managed to resynchronise with the stars, but to further enhance her spells, she would need to get used to the different hand signs and stances…