Title: Gelosaþ in Écnesse
Chapter: 3 of 18
Author: Batsutousai
Rating: Teen
Pairings: Harry/Salazar, Harry/OFC (Original Female Character)
Warnings: OCs, OoC, original character death, minor cliché-age, homophobia, racist actions and slurs (from secondary character), time travel
Summary: Caught in the backlash of Voldemort's Killing Curse, Harry is thrown through time to a world so very different from his own.

A/N: So glad everyone seems to be enjoying the phoenix theme. :D

-0-0-
Breaking Inside
-0-0-

The next couple weeks followed very similarly to that first day at Hogwarts: The mornings were filled with quiet study, the six children sitting in the Great Hall and reading whatever book their parents or – in the case of Harry and Duana – their quasi-guardian gave them. After lunch, Harry, Duana, Kenric, and Conrad ran off to explore the castle while the other two girls followed in their mothers' footsteps. While the children had free time, Harry found out from Kenric the third day in, the four Founders would take turns wandering the Isles, looking for students to invite.

When Harry thought about it, he asked Rowena to teach him Pictish and at least one Gaelic dialect. She'd sent him a cool, knowing smile, and agreed. In the end, Harry ended up learning Pictish, as well as two versions of Gaelic. He'd also, with some difficulty, dodged all requests to teach her his native language, uncertain if various future concepts would transfer with the words that didn't have a basis in this time. (According to Salazar, she'd been after him to teach her Parseltongue for almost a year. He'd finally agreed, then purposefully screwed up the spell when casting it. If she suspected the foul play, she'd never said, though her upset over being unable to learn the snake tongue had made Salazar feel a little guilty.)

One morning, a little over two weeks since Harry returned to Hogwarts, he woke with a strange sense of expectation. He was mulling the reason over in front of one of the windows when Salazar finished his Occlumency and walked over to stand behind him. "Breakfast?"

"Hm? Oh, sure."

Out in the dungeon hallways, Salazar asked, "Something wrong?"

"Not wrong," Harry replied, shaking his head. "Just... I don't know."

Salazar snorted. "Well, if you ever figure it out, let me know."

Harry flashed a smile. "You say that like you believe me to be capable of hiding things from you."

"I'll discover all your secrets eventually, my sneaky little serpent, make no mistake."

"Of course you will," Harry agreed solemnly before grinning and dashing off to catch up with Kenric, who was telling Duana all about some great adventure his father had gone on before Kenric had been born.

Harry was distracted all through breakfast and his reading, though Salazar seemed to be the only one who noticed it – he lightly swatted the back of Harry's head at one point when he was staring at the opposite wall instead of reading. About half-way through lunch, Harry's unconscious finally unburied the reason for his morning expectation: Today would be July thirty-first, were he in his own time; he'd been expecting gifts from his friends.

"Oh," he whispered before he could stop himself, closing his eyes against a rush of homesickness.

"Harry, dear, are you well?" Helga asked after a few minutes, always quick to see when someone wasn't enjoying the food she'd made.

Harry shook his head and rose from the bench. "My stomach's a bit upset," he offered with a smile he didn't feel. "I'm going to go lay down, I think. Excuse me..." He turned and left the Great Hall. Instead of heading down to the dungeons, however, he made his way outside and towards the lake, unbothered by the late October chill. He found a spot relatively close to where the tree he'd often sat under with Ron and Hermione would one day stand and curled in on himself there, watching the ripples of the lake with tears catching at the back of his throat.

Salazar found him almost an hour later, draping a blanket around Harry's faintly shivering form and sitting next to him. After a moment of silence, he said, "Helga was worried you'd eaten something that made you sick. I told her you were feeling a bit off when you got up and it's probably just a cold."

"Thanks," Harry whispered, hugging the edges of the blanket closer around himself.

They fell, again, into silence, both just watching the lake.

Finally, Harry said, "I'm fifteen today. Or, well, if I was back home, counting the days, it would be my birthday. And I–" His voice caught and he shrugged the blanket higher, so it was almost hiding his face from view. "I miss my friends," he whispered, and the tears he'd barely kept at bay started to fall.

Salazar closed his eyes for a moment in sorrow, then reached out and carefully drew Harry into a half-hug, brushing his fingers through the wild hair as Harry pressed his face against Salazar's shoulder.

When Harry's quiet sobs had lessened to the occasional sniffle, Salazar said, "My mother died two days before my thirteenth birthday. Someone had noticed some of my accidental magic and the villagers assumed it was her. They stoned her in the village square while a nearby wizard – my first master – snuck me away. I was furious with him for not saving her."

"I'm sorry," Harry whispered, unable to imagine what it must have been like to be taken away while your own mother was murdered by the people you'd grown up with. At least Harry knew his friends were still alive. For the moment.

Salazar shook his head. "I believe she's in a better place, now. One where she doesn't have to raise a child with a power she can't understand, alone."

"You didn't have a father?" Harry wondered, peeking up at the Founder.

Salazar debated between keeping his personal history to himself, as he'd always done in the past, and sharing it with the lonely boy next to him; it wasn't really much of a choice, though. "My father, Silvanus Slytherin, is known for travelling from small town to small town and catching the eye of every unmarried maid he can find. At times, he beds one and leaves them in the early morning, to avoid the rage of their fathers or betrothed, supposedly. I have never had the displeasure of meeting him."

Harry rubbed at his nose, straightening so he wasn't leaning against Salazar. "You've got his name, though."

Salazar nodded. "When Mother discovered my magic, she guessed – correctly, I later learned – that it had come from him. She suggested I bear his name, so if I made a name for myself I might have a father to be proud of me." He scoffed. "I have no interest in providing even a moment's pride for a man who left my mother with a child and no way to support herself, but she had no family name to give me, so I've kept it."

Harry thought about how Slytherin House was known, in the future, as the breeding ground of back-stabbing, nasty people who were more interested in their own gain than how their actions affected others, and how well that stereotype fit Salazar's father, for all that it didn't seem to fit the Founder himself.

Salazar sighed. "Come. Let's get you back inside before one of us really does catch ill."

"Oh. Sure," Harry agreed and they both stood and turned back towards the castle.

"Why the lake?" Salazar asked about halfway across the grounds. "Or, really, why outside next to the lake?"

Harry smiled a bit sadly and glanced back over his shoulder at the spot he'd been sitting in. "In the future, there's a tree there that we'd always sit under. And, well, the common is nice, with the water and all, but it's not quite the same as being out here." He pulled the blanket closer around his shoulders as he felt a chill. "Despite the weather."

Salazar snorted. "Well, next time you feel the urge to sit out by the lake in the cold, bring your cloak."

"Yes, sir," Harry agreed meekly, then smiled when Salazar snorted again.

Once back in the dungeons, after Salazar had poured a couple potions down Harry's throat and taken one of his own, Harry said, "Hey, Salazar?"

"Yes?"

"Thanks."

Salazar smiled and ruffled Harry's hair. "Of course."

-0-

The rest of the time until Yule went by quickly enough, following the same pattern as those first couple weeks. Helga and Rowena both brought in their own student to stay at the castle for their own protection, but both of them were more interested in books than exploring the castle, so Harry had very little to do with them.

The last week of November – by Harry's calculations – the four explorers came across a room that could turn into anything they wanted. It took them a bit to figure out how it worked, but once they'd sorted it, they spent almost three weeks playing with it, creating the wildest places and exploring them for a few hours before making the room change shape again so they could explore some more. The other three would often create places that they knew from their home, but Harry always refused to change the room into something, wary of it creating a place or object that didn't yet exist.

Playing with the room was put to an end when they got lost in a forest that Duana had created and didn't hear the dinner gong. The adults had all been quite firm about the fact that the children were no longer allowed to play in there, in case they created something dangerous. (Salazar told Harry later, however, that Godric had made his own plans regarding the use of the room, and Rowena had wondered about the possibilities of taking texts from a library made by the room.)

No longer allowed to explore the upper floors – "They just want to play with that room without us," Duana griped – the four kids turned to the dungeons. The first afternoon they got ridiculously lost and only found their way out again when Harry thought to cast Point me. The second afternoon, after Harry had given the other three a crash course in the Point me spell, they returned to the dungeons and got lost again, only barely making it back in time for dinner.

The third day, they came across a corridor of closed doors – Harry recognised it as being the hallway Snape's classroom and office were on – and split up to poke their heads in the various rooms.

Harry was just considering defiling Snape's future office in some way when Conrad let out a terrified scream down the hall. Harry ran back out into the hall in time to see the boy falling out of a room at the far end and scrambling backward. An ashwinder followed him, hissing threats of fire and death.

Before Harry could hiss the snake down – there was no way he'd worry about keeping a secret if it meant the life of a friend – Kenric had run forward to get between Conrad and the ashwinder. "Kenny, n–!" Harry started before the ashwinder blurred and turned into a tiny blue bird. 'Jobberknoll,' part of Harry recognised even as the larger part knew, 'Boggart.'

Duana hurried forward, then, and grabbed Kenric's arm. "Come on," she snapped, tugging. "It's just a bird. Let's go." Behind her, Conrad was already stumbling along the wall, pale and shaky.

Kenric shook his head, face white with terror. "It's a jobberknoll," he whispered, as if expecting the girl to know what he meant, even though he knew she'd not known about magic until Godric collected her.

"It's a pretty bird," Duana retorted and gave a sharp tug to get the boy away from it.

The boggart turned its attention on its newest prey and quickly formed into a pole surrounded by kindling. Duana let out a whimper of fear.

Then Harry was there, green eyes sharp with anger as he stepped between the younger kids and the Dark creature. It shifted into a dementor, the chill of fear filling the air around it, and Harry raised his wand to point at the hooded form. "Riddikulus," he intoned, and the boggart vanished in a wisp of smoke, just like the one Harry'd faced in the maze. Once certain the boggart was gone, Harry turned to the younger three. "Hey. You three okay?"

Conrad immediately attached himself to Harry's free arm, shaking like a leaf, and Harry pulled him into a proper hug.

"What was that thing?" Kenric breathed, still pale. Next to him, Duana looked rather like she wanted in on the hug Harry was giving Conrad, but thought herself too proud to ask for it.

"It's called a boggart," Harry explained, slipping his wand away and motioning for Duana to join him, which she did. "They show the worst fear of the person nearest to them. Come here, Kenny."

Kenric looked uncertain for a moment, but then he gave a shudder and hurried forward to join the group hug, squeezing in between Duana and Conrad. Duana slipped one arm around Kenric's shoulders and he sidled a bit closer to her.

Harry sighed to himself and wished chocolate existed, remembering well the calming effect it had on those who'd faced a dementor. He figured they could all do with a bit of an anti-depressant, and cheering charms – he knew from Lupin – didn't work in quite the right way. "Hey," he said softly. "How about we take a break from exploring for the day and head back upstairs?"

"Good idea," Duana agreed, stepping back from the embrace and straightening. Kenric followed her, clutching at her hand, and she smiled shakily down at him.

"Come on, Conrad," Harry whispered to the boy still clutching at his shirt. "Maybe Salazar or your mum have something that'll help."

Conrad nodded and returned his grasp to Harry's arm, rather than his shirt, which gave Harry the freedom to walk.

Harry led the way out, familiar enough with this part of the dungeons that he didn't need the Point me spell, and less bothered by the boggart than the others, having faced them before. Also, boggart-dementors were never quite as terrifying as the real thing.

Godric, Rowena, Helga, and Ramona were all missing when the four kids entered the Great Hall. Bernia saw them first, of the group at the table, and she stumbled out of her seat, calling, "What happened?!"

"We came across a boggart," Harry explained as Kenric ran past him and to his mother. The other adults were rising around the table, concerned. Harry half-expected Conrad to run to Roscoe, as Kenric had done, but the youngest Hufflepuff remained at Harry's side. Behind him, Duana had closed in, having no one to run to for comfort.

Salazar made a sharp gesture with his wand, then asked, "Where is it?"

Harry shook his head. "Gone." At the Founder's raised eyebrow, he explained, "I've run into them before."

Godric ran into the Hall then, Rowena and Helga not far behind him. "What's wrong, Salazar?" the redhead asked as Conrad finally let go of Harry and ran over to his mother.

"The children came across a boggart," Salazar explained and Helga let out a horrified sound before focussing all her attention on her son. Next to her, Rowena's lips had thinned with displeasure.

Godric let out a growl. "We need to get rid of it."

"I already did," Harry explained.

"Harry's acquainted with boggarts," Salazar commented before Godric could debate the validity of that statement.

"Helga," Rowena interrupted, "perhaps something sweet for the children?"

"Oh, of course!" Helga pressed a kiss to Conrad's forehead. "Sweetheart, why don't you go sit with Daddy while I get you something to help calm you down?"

Conrad looked more than a little uncertain, so Harry stepped forward and brushed the boy's hair. "Come on. I'll walk over with you," he promised and Helga shot him a grateful smile as Conrad took Harry's hand.

Once Conrad had been left with his father and Duana had been drawn down to sit between Bernia – with Kenric on her lap – and Godric, Harry made his way over to the cleared spot next to Salazar, who was watching him with a troubled expression. "What's wrong?" he whispered.

Salazar shook his head. "Nothing."

Harry frowned at him, but was distracted as Helga rejoined them and, with a wave of her wand, sweet buns and tea appeared on the table in front of everyone. "Go on," she pressed them. "I think everyone could use something sweet."

"You're just trying to fatten us up for some dinner idea or another," Salazar snarked before picking up one of his sweet buns and taking a bite.

"You'd be far too scaly, Salazar," Godric retorted.

"Good to know I'm safe," Salazar said. "You, on the other hand, would make a fine main course."

"Stop it, both of you," Bernia ordered, smoothing a hand through Kenric's hair as the boy started in on his second sweet bun. "You're worse than the children."

Ramona glanced around Helga at her brother and commented, "Daddy always says talking about things that frighten you helps."

Conrad considered that for a moment before saying, "Remember when the snake almost burnt the house down?"

"Ah, the ashwinder," Roscoe said, nodding and hugging his son. To the rest of the table, he explained, "Conrad found the eggs just before they lit the house on fire. Helga managed to stop it before it got too far, but it destroyed Conrad and Ramona's bedrooms."

"As well as part of my flower garden," Helga complained.

"Well, there won't be any ashwinders burning down this castle," Godric promised the boy. "And if one does show up, we'll have Salazar talk it into leaving peacefully."

Salazar let out a snort. "It'll be leaving me some eggs, first. Do you know how hard it is to come by those eggs? Some of the best healing potion–"

"Yes, Salazar, we know," Godric interrupted before turning to Kenric and Duana. "What about you two, then?"

Duana shuddered. "I saw the stake they burned the last witch they found in my village at," she admitted. Everyone around the table winced.

"Well, there won't be any of those here," Bernia promised, hugging the girl around the shoulders. "What about you, Kenny?"

"I saw a jobberknoll," the boy said between bites of sweet buns; Bernia had switched his empty plate with her untouched one, so he was still going strong.

"Oh, dear," Bernia murmured, hugging her son tightly.

"Mum!"

"When Kenny was four, he came upon a jobberknoll the moment it died," Godric explained to the rest of the table. "Best I could tell, it had been on a battlefield at one point in its life, because there were sounds of swords clashing and men screaming."

Everyone around the table winced again.

"What about you, Harry?" Helga asked the eldest boy.

Harry choked on the tea he was sipping at and quickly set his cup down. "Me?" he whispered before coughing again.

Salazar tapped Harry's throat with his wand and the fluid cleared from his trachea. "Deep breath," he ordered and Harry did so.

"Thanks," he murmured, thinking fast. Did dementors exist in this time? What other terrifying thing could he say his boggart was? 'Oh. Voldemort,' Harry realised, remembering Lupin's concern the first time Harry faced a boggart. "It was the man..." Harry waved towards his back, cringing.

The adults seemed to understand who he was talking about, as Salazar always had, and winced in sympathy. "Well, he's gone now," Godric soothed. "And if he shows his face in the Isles again, we'll make sure it isn't for long."

Even knowing Voldemort would never appear in this time period, Harry felt a well of gratitude and smiled at the large man. "Thanks, Godric."

Godric smiled back, then the talk turned to hunting down any other possibly dangerous creatures in the castle in the time they had left before students started arriving. The children remained fairly quiet, other than the occasional comment about any magical creature they'd found during their explorations which hadn't been mentioned previously. (Other than the boggart, none of them had been a problem. The ghoul was the closest thing the children had come to trouble before, but ghouls weren't really harmful, so no one had been worried about it.)

After dinner, when Harry and Salazar were down in the Slytherin dorms, working on making the rooms Salazar thought they'd need – he'd spent a week teaching Harry the spells required, since the teen had wanted to help – the Founder asked, "What was your boggart? Really?"

Harry finished up his spellwork on the bed he'd been working on, then leaned back against the door frame to look at where Salazar was forming another room just across the hall. "What makes you think it wasn't him?" he wondered.

"You're far too calm about him for a boggart to consider that your greatest fear," Salazar replied. He gave the room one last flick of his wand, then turning toward the boy. "And I felt your emotions the first time you mentioned him."

"Hm. Cheat."

"Indeed I am," Salazar agreed without a hint of guilt.

Harry smiled faintly, then explained, "I don't know if they exist in this time, but my boggart has always been a dementor."

Salazar frowned in thought for a moment, then shook his head. "I don't know of them, but I'm no expert on magical creatures."

Harry nodded. "Well, they're quite dreadful, really. They exude an aura, of a sort, that sucks the warmth and joy out of you. If they really want to, they can suck out your soul, using what's known as the Dementor's Kiss. One of my professors called them fear itself." His smile turned grim when Salazar shuddered. "After them, Vol– He really isn't all that bad."

"Bit like putting an ashwinder next to a dragon, then?" Salazar suggested with false humour. "Both of them are plenty dangerous, but you're going to be far more concerned about the dragon."

"Quite," Harry agreed before turning back to his spellwork. "What about you, then?"

Salazar grimaced. "If it's all the same, I'd rather not say."

Harry shrugged. "I'll find out eventually."

"Perhaps you will," Salazar agreed. :And, perhaps if I'm very lucky, you won't.:

Harry smiled to himself and focussed on turning a conjured block of wood into a desk.

-0-

The day before the winter solstice – the first day of Yule – the children were told at breakfast that their lessons were on holiday until classes started after Yule. Instead, they were expected to spend the day helping to decorate and collecting the tree and a Yule log from the forest. Kenric and Duana immediately offered to help with the collection of the tree and Yule log, while Helena, Conrad, and the other two children Helga and Rowena had brought all agreed to help with the decorating. Ramona insisted she'd be helping Helga in the kitchen and, when everyone turned to Harry, he asked if he could do the same.

"You know how to cook?" Helga wondered; she wasn't the only one surprised.

Harry shrugged. "Some, sure. I can make more than soup, that's for sure," he added, shooting Salazar a smirk.

Salazar sneered. "Of course you can," he agreed snidely.

"Well," Helga interrupted before they could start throwing insults back and forth like Salazar and Godric always did, "I won't refuse a third pair of hands in the kitchen, not for such an important feast. We'll see how you get on, and if you have trouble keeping up, I'll send you up here to help with the decorating."

Harry smiled. "Certainly."

Harry, of course, had very little trouble in the kitchens. Helga had to take a few minutes to teach him some of the spells she used – "I've only ever cooked the non-magical way," Harry explained – and he had to learn a couple recipes, but he was never in the way. He was familiar enough with cooking large meals – never quite enough for a dozen people, but Vernon and Dudley could each surround enough for three or four people, and Marge wasn't far behind – that he didn't have a single problem keeping up with the two witches.

At lunch, Helga informed Salazar, "You can't have him back; I'm keeping him."

"I saw him first," Salazar replied with a sniff.

"What am I, a favoured toy?" Harry wondered, rolling his eyes. "Helga, honestly, I'm okay to help with feasts, but I don't much care for cooking."

Helga sighed. "Oh, I know." At Harry's raised eyebrow, she said, "You weren't really enjoying yourself. I do appreciate the help, though."

Harry smiled. "Just because I don't care to cook doesn't mean that I won't help if you need it. And spells certainly help, I have to admit."

Helga smiled back. "I'm glad. I can't imagine cooking without magic all the time."

Harry shook his head. "I hope you're going to find more cooks, though."

Helga sighed, looking more than a little upset. Ramona, next to her mother, explained, "We're having trouble finding people. Cooks aren't common in the magical community, most people preferring their flashy spells and smelly potions."

"See if I cure your next cold," Salazar snapped, but there was no bite to it and Ramona rolled her eyes at him.

Harry had a vague recollection of something Hermione had said during one of her S.P.E.W. lectures, and asked, "Couldn't you hire on some house-elves?"

Helga sighed and shook her head. "And force them to do all the work for us while we laze about all day?"

"Laze about?" Godric asked with a laugh. "Helga, my dear, do you think teaching all these children will be easy?"

"You can't serve meals and teach at the same time, love," Roscoe added, smiling at his wife. "You'll need the help from somewhere, and these elves won't have to attend classes on the side."

"I'm sure there are some house-elves in bad homes," Harry commented neutrally between bites of bread. "You could find those ones and give them a better place to live."

"We'll help you beat their owners until they see sense, if need be," Godric agreed.

"Not everything needs to be handled with brute force, Godric," Rowena interrupted and the two fell into a lively debate about whether words or magic were the better course to take in regards to getting the assistance of abused house-elves.

"I take it there are still house-elves in Hogwarts," Salazar said in a quiet voice to Harry and the boy flashed him a grin.

The next day was spent with everyone curled up on poufs and overly-fluffy chairs in front of the fireplace in the Great Hall. Helga kept them supplied with tea or juice and biscuits while the four Founders told them stories about how they met and found the abandoned castle to fix up. Ollivander was pestered until he regaled them with a story of how he'd travelled, on foot, across Asia for two months hunting down a re'em for wand ingredients.

Dinner was served in the early evening and they all enjoyed the meal, the praises to the three chefs becoming more and more boisterous as the pitchers of mead emptied.

Following dinner, they returned to the fireplace and laughed uproariously as Godric used a sprig of holly – Bernia had confiscated his sword before dinner – to re-enact some of his favourite duels. After the first one against an imaginary opponent, he dragged Kenric up off his pouf next to Duana and they pretended to duel while their audience cheered them on.

After a light supper of calming tea – thanks to Salazar – and some soup that Harry only made a token complaint about, everyone shuffled off to bed, Rowena's irritated snarls for Godric to cease singing drinking songs following them all to their separate commons.

"That was the best holiday celebration ever," Harry declared as he dropped onto the pile of blankets he and Salazar had continued to share in the main room.

Salazar laughed, more friendly and open with the excess alcohol in his system. "Godric certainly brings life to a party," he agreed, stretching out next to Harry and slipping an arm around the boy's shoulders. "That really was an excellent feast you three put together."

"Shut up," Harry ordered, flushed with mead and pleasure. He shifted closer to the older man, not yet too hot. After a moment, he allowed, "It wasn't too bad. It's the first time I've cooked a holiday meal and been allowed to eat it."

Salazar's fingers tightened on Harry's shoulder. "Why?" he asked, making a great effort to keep his fury at Harry's comment from his voice.

Harry closed his eyes. "My aunt and uncle were anti-magic. They tended to treat me like a servant." When Salazar's finger's tightened enough to hurt, Harry reached up and gently pried them loose. "Salazar, they're gone. Good as dead."

"They're just not born yet," Salazar muttered, soothing his fingers along Harry's shoulder. "I'm sorry."

Harry shook his head. "It doesn't matter," he said. "It's not like I'll ever see them again."

Salazar's heart ached for the young wizard in his arms and he pressed a kiss to the top of Harry's head. "Go to sleep, Harry," he whispered.

Harry sighed, but nodded and settled in to fall into his Occlumency and sleep.

Salazar remained awake for a while longer, staring at the patterns of green light on the ceiling and promising himself he'd start looking for ways to get Harry back to his own time after the holiday. He could put his research on hold for a while; it would still be there once Harry was gone.

And, somewhere in the deepest corners of his mind, where Salazar shoved all those thoughts he didn't dare think, he wondered if he wouldn't need the distraction to keep on after Harry was gone, because he'd become far too used to having the boy in his life already.

-0-

-0-

A/N: Bit of a short chapter, but that seemed a good place to stop it.

~Bats ^.^x

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