A QUARTER OF A WHOLE.

The castle should have been filled with laughter and learning and light. That was what drew you to its creation, after all: the making of light. You knew as well as anyone how dark everything was outside; there had been talk of a storm brewing, bigger than anyone's gods could imagine. You were a witch and didn't believe in any of the gods that the Muggles picked and chose from, but you knew they were right. Something would change - and soon.

Inside the castle, regardless of your dreams of light and learning, it was not much better. Up above, you could try to disguise it with heat and flame and teaching, but in the dungeons it seeped through the walls, dripped off the ceiling and clamoured for space in your lungs as you took one reluctant breath after the other. You, of course, had been opposed to all of this from the moment the idea came into being. Equal opportunity. No exclusion. They didn't listen, and this was what came of it. In a perverse way, you thought it might have been all your fault from the beginning.

You would never let him know, of course. You had had half a mind to apologise, but you left it too late.

Despite the fact that your own house was underground as well, you could never stand the atmosphere of the dungeons. The Hufflepuff quarters were bright and welcoming, whereas you sometimes thought Salazar made his corner of the castle as horrible as possible so he would not be disturbed. He may have been a teacher and the founder of a school, but he was no socialite. With the students...well, it all depended what their last name was. And that was what you hated.

The door to his private rooms was disguised, but you knew what to look for. You had discovered a spell to conceal something unless you were looking for it part-way through the building of the castle. It had seemed genius at the time...just like everything had. Your quarters had a little brass plate with your name on it, and a door handle - Salazar's had neither, so you used your wand to gain entry. He never answered when you knocked.

The tall, dark-haired man had been dipping his quill in ink as you entered - the feather lay on the parchment he had been writing on, the green ink he favoured bleeding into the page. He snapped at you, mentioning how you should respect his privacy and knock for a change, but it wasn't worth listening to. It had been said before, and it was just as meaningless then.

"If you ever answered--"

"If you ever bothered to find out if I would--"

You acknowledged that it was not a good start. Sadly, you wonder how you had become friends - how had the founders four built an entire castle together? The four of you were falling apart, and no matter how much you tried you could not hold it together.

"Salazar," you began, but he cut you off, standing as he did so and impressing upon you how different you were - one short and plump, the other tall and lean in a way that was not entirely attractive.

"If you're here to try and force me to change, Hufflepuff, then don't. You take care of your students and I'll take care of mine!" You did not shrink from his words, though a lesser witch would have. His voice was thunderous enough to scare anyone, but you did not fall for it - you had had enough.

"They're not just your students, Salazar! They're our students - we're all together in this. We're the four of us, not Slytherin and the rest. I know we all have our differences and our faults, but perfection is not attainable - we cannot lock ourselves away waiting for it." That was what you had heard he was doing, holed up in his quarters – searching for perfection. You were not sure you believed it.

"You say that because you know you will never be perfect," he said haughtily, as if you weren't worth his time. "I strive for it - and I will attain it, no matter what you say. My students will be almost as perfect. I don't settle for mediocrity, like you. Even Gryffindor is weak, with his fondness for heroics. We are not all together in this. We never were. You were never going to get anywhere outside of Hogwarts, but I was. I was in line for the throne - for great destinies you could not even imagine. If you want to tell me that I cannot even pursue them - to tell me that I'm a mere quarter of a whole - then you're wasting your breath."

And with that he turned away. You allowed a flicker of sadness to show on your face, but when you spoke again there was nothing but stubborn defiance. "Salazar, it wasn't...it wasn't always like this. You were different - and I don't know what's changed. We were friends once, remember? We built a castle and called it Hogwarts, envisioning the greatest institution ever known throughout the entire discovered world... And for a time it was. Do you remember that?"

"The fact that it would be renowned was the only thing we could ever agree on. Do you remember that?" His words were sharp, but his tone no longer matched. He let out a breath that, with anyone else, might have been termed a sigh. "We were different. And sometimes that was the beauty of it, but most of the time it wasn't. You only remember the good things, is that it?" It wasn't it at all. "You don't remember how bitterly we fought about the Houses, or even the location? Hogwarts was not the product of the four of us - it was the product of the victor of whatever battles we were having at the time."

He spoke the truth, and you saw it - but you refused to believe it, so you stood stubbornly next to him. He sank back into his chair, picking up his quill and giving the impression he was ignoring you. You knew, though, that he was listening for what you would say next, and he did not write as if all his attentions were on the task. You were silent, trying to see the good in the end they had come to. You were failing, and that terrified you. You could not fail.

"Salazar, I know you've stopped calling me Helga but you don't understand. You seem to think mistakes are forever, but they're not. I am more than willing to forgive."

He did not turn, but kept writing.

"With a bit of persuasion, I'm sure Godric and Rowena would be too - we all made mistakes in the making of all this. But hiding from everyone and burying yourself into your secrets and your schemes is not the way to go about life. It isn't right. Mistakes can be undone."

"You still think that?" He was still writing, but you knew you held all of his attention.

"Yes, and if you did, life might be easier. Since the first year all you've done is retreated, but if you would just...you have to meet people halfway, and make allowances for their faults just as people have to do for yours. You have to acknowledge your own faults, indeed, to begin with - I can help. We all can help. But we can't if you don't want us to," you implored, and despite his next words you knew that the way his eyes flickered sideways was a good sign.

"Well, I don't."

You almost getting to him had made him draw further away, and you thought of giving up. It wouldn't be too hard - but you were Helga Hufflepuff, and you couldn't do that. "Salazar, what could you have done that is so terrible? I hate to see you like this." Your voice cracked in your last sentence, and the dark head looked up sharply.

"Hel-- Hufflepuff, give up. You're not going to succeed. Allow me to do for my students what I think best, and you can teach yours stories and happy endings all you like. I will have success - and I won't let a dumpy youngest-daughter-of-a-poor-lord get in the way of it," he snarled, attempting to conceal the fact that you had gotten close to breaking him.

And so you left, keeping in the sob that rose until you were in your own bed.

*

As soon as you were safe in your own chambers, you were wishing you hadn't left. You shouldn't have let him get to you, but it was too hard to ignore - you were lowlier than he, and that would never change. Equality and fraternity had never been foretold for the quartet. Godric spoke to you at breakfast, asking why you seemed so subdued, but you said you just hadn't slept well, and you would be right as rain tomorrow.

After classes ended (some of the Seventh Years had noticed your distracted nature and attempted not to act up as badly as normal), you went back. This time you knocked, but he didn't answer, like you knew he wouldn't.

"Salazar, I'm not leaving. You need to...you need to tell me what is wrong -- regardless of whether I'm the youngest daughter of the lord of one of the smallest manors in Christendom. That didn't matter to you before, so why has it suddenly started to matter now? Godric was a knight, Rowena a noblewoman. But you can't say I didn't hold my own. I am just as intelligent as you, and just because I can see the good in everyone and you pick and choose, it does not make me any less than you. You think you can get by in this little hideaway of yours, basking in the glory of only having pureblooded witches and wizards adorned in your green and silver but you won't survive. I've tried to help you, but if you don't want my help, then don't come crawling back to a fat, lowly, mediocre woman."

You hoped that would help things - if that was what it would take to force him to come out with it, then that was what you would do. It was a worrying revelation that everything you had said was true - and it stung as you glared at the back of Slytherin's head.

"If I tried to make you listen, to be 'equal', you wouldn't hear it. You three think I am not just – but there's a difference between being just and being right. You just haven't learnt it yet. If that is your last offer of help, Hufflepuff, then don't waste any more time. You have mud to deal with, don't you?" Mud was what he called those who had been born to parents without magic, but had magic in their own veins. Mud, dirt, filth.

"Is that what I am?" you asked quietly, all the venom that had rose up in your voice before gone. "Mud?"

He didn't answer for a moment, his body completely still. You and he knew perfectly well that whatever he said would make or break everything. The storm brewed, and although you could not hear it, up above the wind whistled and battered the windows of the castle.

"You sympathise with mud," he said, not answering the question. He had deflated too, and didn't seem to want to insult you. He never had made much sense. "If we all do that, Hufflepuff, what will be left of us? Will we be nothing? If we marry Muggles, have half-blood children, what will become of the wizarding race? There are less of us every year. We need to protect ourselves somehow. That's why I was so against all this in the beginning – I don't want to see us die out."

"But we won't," you answered, conjuring a chair. You had a good feeling about this – perhaps everything would resolve itself. Perhaps everything would become as it was before. "We can never die out – no one understands why magic manifests itself in some but not others, but magic is always there. It can't die. That's what this school is for, is it not?"

"Is it?" he asked, putting down his quill. You couldn't help but notice the precision with which he did it – and contrast it with yourself. "Do any of us know what the schools if for, anymore? Hel- Hufflepuff, you won't understand me when I say that I know this will not come to a good end. You have the gift of always seeing positive things – but you ignore the negative. When was the last time the four of us even looked like we were united?"

You couldn't answer that, and he knew it.

"Was it when we first thought of the school? When we eagerly drew up plans? When we opened that first night?" You were still silent. "Or was it none of those times? Was the only occasion that we were united the time before we heard each other speak?" His words were quiet and bitter.

For a moment your thoughts went back to what he described – the half a minute where you each wondered what the future would hold, and whether your naive, extravagant dreams could be realised. You all had been united in that moment, but never again.

"It doesn't have to continue that way," you insisted, though your tone was subdued. "We've come so far. You don't have to give up on us." The tall, dark man before you had abandoned you, left, you betrayed you. The bitterness was unfamiliar.

"What else is there to do? There has never been such a thing as compromise. Only defeat."

"Then be defeated!" you pleaded. But that had never been his way.

"No."

"Do you want the castle to crumble? Do you want all we've worked for to be destroyed? If you regret embarking on this journey, regret it, but you can't turn back. It doesn't work that way." The cold, damp air had infected your soul, and despair grew there like mould.

He stood, a sudden movement that caught you off-guard. You rose to your feet as well, though you did not know why – there was a sense of foreboding in the pit of your stomach. The look in his eyes – desperate, almost fearful – would haunt you until you died.

He took your face in his hands, seeming to run over every detail. "We are going about this the wrong way. None of you will listen. I'm... I'm sorry, Helga." The moment was shattered as his hands returned to his side, and he turned away. "I would rather stand and see the castle fall than go down with it."

*

That was the last you saw of him. The next morning, while you were preoccupied with a disaster involving an experimental hex and an alarming amount of moleskin, he walked out of the castle gates.

Rowena said he and Godric had had a row, which was nothing new. Wands had been drawn, and it was surprising no one had died, she said. Helga knew no one would have – Salazar wanted to watch the castle's collapse, not be crushed by the first stone.

He would walk out and watch his dream crumble, until he crumbled himself.