House : Slytherin
Year : Prefect
Prompt : Founders Era
Category : Standard
Word Count : 964
Four figures stood, their bodies poised as if awaiting the comings of battle. Their wands held loosely in their hands. As nervous as they were the power that radiated of the four figures was almost visible. Their names not yet known to the world would go down in history, Godric Gryffindor, Rowena Ravenclaw, Salazar Slytherin, and Helga Hufflepuff, the founders of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.
Today was the day. The excitement in the air was palpable amongst the four of them. Even Salazar couldn't keep the stoic mask he held from slipping every so often.
"You ready?" Godric asked them, his voice shaking with nerves.
His three friends could nothing but stare at him incredulously.
"You're joking?" Salazar asked voicing what they were all thinking.
They were not ready, not in the least and they were never going to be ready for this outrageous idea they came up with, but here they stood, their back to the entrance gates of Hogwarts, a school for magic children that they had built with their blood, sweat, tears and magic. They had done what they were told was impossible, and now here they stood, waiting for the very first students to grace the halls of their wondrous creation.
"Well aside from the nerves I must say, I am quite excited." Helga offered, earning a snort from Rowena.
"Excited? I think I may just lose my breakfast." Rowena stated dryly earning laughs from her friends.
"For something like that to slip past your lips Row, means we're definitely in above our heads," Salazar stated.
"Don't be such a pessimist Zar, if we could survive our first meeting, then this will be a walk in the forest." Helga quipped thumping her friend on her back.
"She's right, that was a wonder," Godric stated with a grin.
And what a wonder it was, the four of them had met nearly five years ago, trying to outrun their own monsters, literally. They had all found themselves in a forest trying to stay alive when they stumbled upon one another. What happened thereafter would remain a blur to the four as they ducked, dogged and attacked the various monsters that they had accidentally infuriated.
The Forbidden Forest was the name they gave the forest that they tumbled out of, and it would remain out of bounds to their students until such a time as when they figured out exactly how the forest worked. For you see, the forest was a magical entity of its very own that seemed to move. The four of them were from different parts of the magical world and yet they had all somehow ended up in one area.
Helga thought it was scary, Salazar thought it was fishy, Godric thought it was fate and Rowena wanted to study it and so they did and, in that process, did what no other wizard or witch ever thought possible, they stunned the forest.
A beautiful friendship was forged that day. As the days turned into months, they began to explore their surroundings when they came across a very intriguing muggle idea, schools.
They worked tirelessly for weeks on end. Creating the perfect school for witches and wizards and after three years they had finally done it.
They had opened the first school of magic to grace the earth.
"I suppose there is that." Salazar acquiesced.
"We survived a Manticore, Nundu, Pogrebin and Chimera at seventeen, I'm sure a bunch of children will be much easier to handle," Godric answered optimistically.
"If you think that's going to calm our nerves, Godric allow me the pleasure of correcting you. I'd rather go up against the manticore again." Rowena stated.
"You know, we've opened the school and we have no idea how we're going to divide the students yet," Helga whispered.
With Helga's whispered words the nerve were forgotten as the four friends put their heads together to come up with an idea to dive their students.
"A quiz?" Rowena asked.
"On what?" Salazar snapped.
"We could just divide them by gender," Godric suggested.
"Wonderful idea, Godric, but we don't know if there are both girls and boys," Helga said sarcastically.
Sighing the four slumped as they noticed the tiny dots cresting the hill, marking their future students impending arrival.
"Well, any other ideas?" Godric asked.
"Why just divide the students amongst the four of us?" Rowena offered.
"How? By saying 'I want that one!'" Helga asked curiously.
Snorting Salazar offered. "Might as well charm Godric's hat to sort the students."
The ludicrous idea seemed to hold merit as the three stared at him in awe.
"Oh no, you guys cannot take that seriously." Salazar groaned.
"That's Brilliant Zar!" Helga exclaimed as Rowena pulled of Godric's hat.
"So how is this going to be done then?" Salazar asked giving in.
"Hmm, how about houses?" Helga asked.
"We'll have to name them," Godric said with a nod.
"No time to be creative, Godric, we'll use our surnames." Rowena agreed.
"That's agreeable, we're going to need to make it child-friendly though," Salazar added.
"True, I call yellow!" Helga grinned.
"Green!"
"Blue!"
"Red!"
Grinning at each other the four gave each other high fives.
"Right so we're sorted," Rowena smirked.
"That was terrible Row." Godric chuckled.
The children were almost upon them and with a quick bit of magic on their part, they created the Hogwarts sorting hat.
"The sorting hat at your service!"
Prided swelling in their chest the four friends allowed themselves to bask in their glory, their school was now fully functional.
The excited chattering brought the four friends down from their high and just as his house dictated, Godric bravely stepped forward to address the first-ever students of their school.
"Welcome, children to Hogwarts school of witchcraft and wizardry!"