As my computer hates me (heavy sigh while shaking head) it wouldn't let me upload. So to be nice, I worked extra hard on these two chapters. That's right. For my delay I put up two chapters for my readers. I love you guys for sticking with me so long. I know I take forever to post and everything but thanks. So here it is.

Chapter 14

Do You See What I See?

Helga sat in her room, braiding her very long hair with long green and red ribbons. Even though the party had been a total ruin, Christmas was still tomorrow so the castle was trying to remain in a cherry mood despite the very sour start to it all. But they were really going to have to work on it.

She was wearing a dark green dress with jeweled flower patterns and fur hemming. Standing up, she walked out the door and into the hall, her boots clicking on the cold stone floor.

Even she was a little depressed after all that had happened last night and in the past few days. This wasn't the first threat that they had received to take over the castle, a major powerhouse of a bunch of magic, and it certainly would be the last. But this was the first one that had managed to actually enter the castle without their notice.

The castle was a prime target for evildoers that wanted a place with a lot of power built in. After all, every teacher in here had put a touch of their own magic to make it so the school was a perfect place to teach young defenseless wizards and witches.

Helga couldn't help but be worried about the kind of power the messenger's master actually had. He obviously was either very stupid to be messing with them or had a very good plan for taking them down. Shaking her head, she turned into the Great Hall where all the other's sat, eating and talking amongst themselves.

Hermione waved from her seat next to Salazar and motioned for the empty seat next to her in-between Isva who was conversing with a gloomy looking Godric. All of them wore the same festive colors of gold, silver, green, and red but none of their faces showed the same festivities.

Helga sat down between the girls and started helping herself to the food. Her green eyes locked onto Gavi's across from her as the blue-eyed girl started eating a croissant. She could see that the same question was in her eye that was in Helga's mind.

"As I'm usually the one to break the proverbial ice, I shall go ahead as I do best," Isva said finally. Helga knew that there was no way the girl was going to let it be that quiet. "We all have thoughts on the matter and we all need to share them whether we like to or not. So best let ye thoughts out fore we make ye."

--

After the very dreary breakfast, Gavi sat in her office, reading a book on new inventive spells that Rowena had lent her. She was finding some of them very interesting, particularly the one about enlarging objects.

"Mistress?" said a small voice. She looked over from her light red chaise, with a side table connected, to see a house elf with large blue eyes.

"What do you want, Lilly?" she asked the elf, putting the book to the side. Lilly was the only elf of hers that refused to speak her mind. All the other elves freely spoke to her and amongst themselves.

"Would you care to have a drink, Mistress?"

Gavi smiled lightly at her. "That would be perfect. Something sweet sounds excellent."

The elf beamed at her before running away to fetch the drink. She was not sure why she had bought the elf in the market the day she had gone but something about those big blue eyes looked so innocent.

A knock at the door came and she heard three elves squeak in surprise. Each of the teachers here had about seven or eight elves in their service, so squeaks were kind of common. Apparently one of the elves had let the guest in and was escorting him or her in. Looking over, she wasn't surprised at who she saw.

Isva stood at her door, her hair pulled up in a ponytail with hundreds of tiny braids falling down from it with dark red ribbons tied to the ends. Her dress was a dark festive red with ruby and emerald poinsettias on it. Isva always wore dark red, Godric royal red, and she wore light red.

"To what do I owe the honor?" she asked, slipping a bookmark into her book.

Isva sat down on the chair across from her, arms crossing automatically. "No honor, sister-mine. Just a new spell I want you to offer your opinion on. I think it may be our new secret weapon."

"As if you're being a Pyrodenator isn't enough," Gavi sighed, but her interest was perked, "You must venture where you know you shouldn't be near, sister." Isva flashed a big grin as she crossed her legs and put her hands on her knees.

Lilly came in right at this moment carrying two drinks. Obviously the elf had been expecting Isva to come. Now Gavi was really interested. She sat up straighter as her sister pulled out a small leather notebook. It was a notebook that Isva made all her inventive notes jotted down in one place. She rarely let other see it so Gavi was getting really interested.

"Kindly look at the thirty-forth page," Isva smirked.

--

Godric walked down the hall, headed towards the library where he was pretty sure he could find Isva. She used to take to hanging around with Jarvice in the book sanctuary. She might be there now.

Walking through the doorway to the library, he spotted Jarvice lying on a couch, book open on his chest, sound asleep. His silver robes were spread all over the couch and he was snoring lightly. The poor man was so tired from helping to get the Great Hall cleaned last night he deserved the rest.

Godric made to back up quietly, but much like most things, he didn't do it so smoothly. He hit a bookshelf and sent one of the wailing books off. It started screeching it's cover off as his eyes went wide. Quickly silencing the book, he turned to see a grumpy looking Jarvice glaring at him.

"Godric," he grumbled, "Tis had better be of the up most importance, my friend. I'm most tired." He ran a hand through his slightly gray hair while turning his dark green eyes towards Godric. It was obvious that he really wasn't happy about being awakened so abruptly after so little sleep.

"I t'was wondering if my cousin was in here, but it appears she is not here. I shall take my leave. My up most apologies for disturbing you, my friend."

Jarvice sat up a bit more, eyes piercing. "Isva has not come to call upon me for the past two months. I do believe she is avoiding me. Do you know the reason why?"

"Avoiding you? Isva? Nay, she's just been…busy," Godric hedged. He had noted that too. Isva and Jarvice had always been close but lately his cousin had been avoiding the elder looking man. She preferred to just avoid the library whenever Jarvice was in there.

Jarvice looked downcast as he lay back down on the couch. He put his hood over his face and put the book on the table. "She's in Gavi's room. Good-day to you, Godric."

"Jarvice…are you feeling all right?" Godric asked. "You seem to be not at your best."

The hood moved back to reveal Jarvice looking at Godric with a very annoyed angry look. His emerald eyes were narrowed as he sat up straight. "Just what makes you say that, Godric?"

A shiver went up Godric's spine at the cold look. He had to admit. The older man was starting to scare him senseless and that was kind of hard to do. He shrugged before saying, "Its just that you look kind of down."

"I can assure you that I'm a quite fine." Jarvice returned to the same laying down position with the hood back over his head. "Good-day."

--

Rowena tapped the point of her quill against her desk, thinking about how to word the notes she was writing. She was making notes on all the previous threats made towards the castle, based on letter, and other threats they'd ever received.

She was staring to get a headache from all the notes in the past four years the school had been opened. Honestly, did people have nothing better to do than try to take over something that wasn't theirs but somehow decided was?

Putting down the quill she decided that this could wait until after Christmas. For the next two days she was just going to try and relax. For God sake, it was Christmas Eve and all of them looked like it was suddenly the worst day in the world.

Course, having someone threaten to take you over, crashed your party, and insult you wasn't exactly the nicest way to get the spirits rolling. Sure put a damper on her own spirits.

By damn, she was going to have to get every one in the mood for Christmas even if they didn't want to be. This was no time to be a depressed grumpy and sad group of people. They could do that later.

She wasn't sure she was going to go about this but she was going to try. Standing up she walked out of her office, robes billowing around her as she stormed towards the massive kitchen.

What better way to get through to people then with their stomachs? First she was going to have to see that they were going to come.

--

Hermione sat curled up in Salazar's lap, curled up in fur-lined robes, watching the flames flicker in the fireplace. It was getting on to evening so everyone was settling down and getting ready for Christmas Eve dinner. She hadn't remembered that it was Christmas Eve until Rowena had reminded her.

The elder witch had summoned everyone out of their room to tell them to get out of the slump and cheer up before demanding that they come down for a festive dinner. And she hadn't offered a chance to argue before storming away towards the kitchen to tell the elves to prepare a lavish feast.

Salazar had his arms wrapped around her waist as he nuzzled into her neck. She had her hands on top of his. She felt him start kissing her neck as she felt his hands start to rub her stomach.

"What are you doing?" she asked quietly. The whole mood just made it seem like she had to whisper to be proper.

"Trying to get in the Christmas mood," he said in a husky voice against her neck.

"And just how does this do that?"

"I am not quite sure but it is making a very good point of doing it." He turned her so that she was straddling him. He put his lips on hers and she sighed into the kiss. His lips were so smooth and soft they were almost too perfect. He ran his tongue ran across her bottom lip, asking for entrance. She let him in. His tongue slipped in and started exploring her mouth.

They dueled for dominance, which Salazar came out winner. He smiled as they pulled away for a breath. "See? Does that not get you in the spirit?"

"You were right," she grinned.

--

Smiling, a man turned away from the crystal ball he had been looking in. He could almost laugh at how stupid the Founders were at thinking they were safe. The stupid Seers only saw it as a way to see into the future but they had yet to discover that they could use it, with a few complex spells, to watch people through any other crystal ball. All it required was that the other person have crystal ball in the room.

He walked down the huge hall, his dark robes billowing out behind him as he headed for the meeting hall. Gold glistened all over him, giving him a royal look that he should have. He knew his servants would be waiting for him, to disclose parts of his plan that they would need to know and act at.

And things were falling into place.

He immensely enjoyed watching the stupid Hogwarts peons running around like they mattered. Well like some of them thought mattered. Some of them were actually important to part of his plan, after all.

One certain little ritual did need one certain little virgin and four royal blood sacrifices to complete. And they had so nicely put themselves in one place together. All he had to do was wait for the Second Full Moon of the next month.

"Master?" asked Kindaria, his favorite servant. She had long blonde hair, large blue eyes, and a perfectly body and face. Just as he had wanted her to look like. And she could blast spells off like the world was coming to an end. Killing without batting an eye, inflicting pain with a smile on her face.

"Yes?"

"The circle is ready."

"Perfect," he smirked. Things were falling perfectly into place.

I was really happy to introduce the baddie. And FYI Kindaria is the messanger with the ooky-spooky message from the last chapter. Just thought you might want to know. Other than that this chapter just gets the plot really rolling.