The Founding of Pigwarts III – Chaos Is Served

Chapter 49: Tradition Continues

Up in their tower's round room, three students were getting ready for the Haa Day. A boy with aquamarine eyes and messy black hair sat on the carpet before the fire, surrounded by more books than seemed possible – a dozen of them were on his lap and on the carpet, all open and on top of each other, a dozen more were floating in the air around him, slowly circling his head. The boy tried to read them all at the same time, his eyes darting from one to another, barely staying on one page long enough for him to grasp a single word. This technique could not have been working, yet unlike his companion who had given up on last minute revision in favour of last minute rest and was now peacefully dozing on the sofa, cuddling a book in his arms, he kept it up for a long while, until stopped by a reproachful cry.

"Darry!"

He let the books drop then and flinched as the heavy tomes landed on top of him. He turned to her with sheepish desperation.

"What? What? I'm awake," the sleeping boy suddenly jerked up into a sitting position and looked wildly around the room. When he saw no one by the girl, he relaxed.

"Oh, it's you."

"Yes, Bron, it's me," the girl spoke sharply, "and unlike you, I'm prepared for the Haa Day."

Bron snorted, "Really? Because last week when I asked you about the seventy uses of a Snorcack's horn, you were only able to name sixty-eight."

The girl let out a cry of anger mixed with horror, and whipped out her wand. Darry threw himself to the floor as several of the heavy tomes that had already hurt him once would have now shot through where his neck had just been. He loved his friends dearly, but when they fought – and they fought a lot – he somehow always got caught in the middle, and that was not a good place to be.

"Leave her alone," he told Bron, moving to sit next to him on the sofa. "We're all nervous about the Haa Day."

"Well, she shouldn't have said what she did," Bron snapped, and turned away, sulking.

Darry looked from one friend to another and sighed. It was obvious there was something going on between them, and they were both industriously denying and avoiding it. Maybe once they got through the Haa Day, Bron and Merryone might finally come to an agreement. He frowned at the thought; first they had to survive the Haa Day, which despite its name, lasted two months. Two months filled with hundreds of exams, demonstrations, and obstacle courses, which were supposed to make them ready for the real life that would follow. And make it seem like a piece of cake, was Bron's theory, because everything looked a piece of cake compared to the Haa Day.

Merryone argued with that, of course; she said that the tradition of the Haa Day had begun many centuries ago, and its purpose was to prepare the young magic folk for the many hardships and responsibilities of adult life. To Darry that sounded exactly the same as Bron had said, but Merryone had then shoved several books to his face, and said that it was thanks to the Haa Day that the notorious dark wizards and witches such as You Know Two, You Know Better, He Who Cannot Remember His Name, and Kate had been vanquished with minimal loss of life.

Darry had then snapped at her that he knew exactly what that minimal loss of life meant. Merryone had fallen silent, gone red in the face, and apologized profusely. Darry had ignored her a little while, but then let it go, on the condition that she wouldn't shove the books into his face again.

Yes, he knew too well about the causalities of Kate, the dark witch who tried to break the series of failures of dark witches and wizards before her by making sure no one called her anything else but Kate. In the end, the name had not been able to save her, just like little could be done to help Darry's parents, who'd been cursed by Kate into a hundred years of sleep. The Healers had told him not to lose hope, that recovery was possible, that his parents may wake up any day now. But Darry knew that the only true cure were the leaves of the yuckamore tree, which had been extinct for half a millennium.

He shook off the morbid thoughts, and returned to the present. Merryone was muttering under her breath, probably recounting all the uses of a Snorcack horn, or something similar. He looked into Bron's pale green face and saw that the pout was still there. He sighed again, almost ready to wish that the Haa Day would already start, when an idea suddenly struck him.

"Hey!" he called for attention. "I know what we should do. We should go to the Off-Limit Corridor and take a look at the Time-Turners."

Bron brightened up, growing lime in the face, "Yeah! And we could use one of them to go two months into the future, right to the end of the Haa Day."

"No! I've been studying for this for years!" Merryone squeaked in horror, then, as if realizing what she had done, covered her embarrassment with disdain and sarcasm.

"And what good would that do? You would have no diploma to show, no results, no licence. You'd just have to wait another seven years to retake the Haas, how delightful."

Bron glared at her and returned to sulking.

"Besides," Merryone added, "you can't use the Time-Turners to go into the future anyway."

"What's the point then?" Bron wondered, "Why would anyone want to go into the past? It's just like another boring history lesson."

"Oh, I don't know," Merryone glared. "You might want to go back a few years and start preparing for the Haa Day."

"We are not going to use the Time-Turners," Darry said, before his friends could start another argument, "we'll just have a look at them. C'mon Merry, you know you want to. They have a few of them historical ones, too, from the time of hundreds, maybe even thousand years ago."

"The Off-Limit Corridor is off-limit," Merryone snapped, repressing her curiosity. "And don't call me Merry."

"Sorry," Darry quickly said. "But just for a peek. You know we can get there without being discovered."

Merryone hesitated.

"I heard they were going to move the entire collection in a week," Darry added, "so this could be our last chance."

"I don't know, I have to study…"

"Tell you what," Darry quickly offered, "We'll take the book and I'll quiz you on the way."

"I…" Merryone began, realized she had run out of excuses and gave Darry a sour glare. "Fine. But only for a peek."

"Bron?" Darry turned to his other friend.

"Fine," Bron spat, his expression saying why-did-you-have-to-invite-her, but Darry knew it was all for the show. "But I'm not going to quiz her."

"Wouldn't want to be quizzed by you," Merryone snapped back. Darry left the two glaring at each other as he hurried into his room to fetch his Mother's Invisibility Cloak.

o.o.o

They arrived at the Off-Limit Corridor without incident, except for Merryone claiming Darry to be the worst quizzer ever. She was still worrying about the Haa Day,

"We can't stay long. We have to be in the Monstrous Hall in five hours, and I want to revise the material before the start of it."

"You've been revising the material for the last three years," Bron said, "you know you are going to ace everything, you're annoyingly smart."

"Err… thanks," Merryone said, blushing pink and looking awkward. Realizing the meaning of his words, Bron blushed as well, growing teal. Darry sighed and rolled his eyes,

"C'mon, they're right here. Look, aren't they cool?"

Merryone and Bron turned to examine the Time-Turners, glad to leave the awkward moment behind.

"Look at this, it's five hundred years old!"

"Look at the size of this, it must be ancient!"

"This is wicked, I'd like to have one of those!"

"What for? To have another boring history lesson?"

"You wouldn't go into the future even if you could."

"Of course not! I've been preparing for the Haa Day half my life. I'm not going to miss it. I'm going to show everyone that elves have as much right to study magic as everyone else!"

Darry and Bron stopped, and looked down at their friend. Merryone might have been little in her appearance, but she had a great mind. She was one of the best, smartest, most brilliant of the students of Pigwarts. At first sight, it was easy to dismiss her. But when she gazed with her big round green eyes and opened her mouth, no one found fault with the Racial Equality Law the Ministry had forced through. Well, almost no one.

"You don't have to prove anything," Bron said after a while. "We all know you belong here with us."

"Not everyone thinks that."

"Don't listen to Butterfly! He's nobody!" Bron exclaimed with vehemence. Darry nodded in agreement. They had been on opposing sides with Butterfly from day one. It didn't much matter which sides those were, as long as Butterfly was on one and they on the other.

"He comes from a powerful family," Merryone said, shaking her head. She didn't approve of the feud going on between the two sides, but it was impossible to stop Butterfly once he'd decided to be your enemy. She had tried a few times, and always ended up with a near disaster.

"He's nargles, and you know it," Bron said, contemptuous. "He walks round the school as if he owns it. You know, he actually thinks he's the Heir of the Weasley, can you believe it?"

"He might be," Merryone said, though in a tone of doubt.

"Oh, please," Bron laughed, "him, descendant of a founder? He's just a spoilt arrogant chap who thinks way too much of himself. He's a fool and a coward. He's stupid, too. Don't you beat him in every test you take? That's why he tortures you, he's just jealous."

"He says an elf's place is in the kitchen," Merryone muttered. "Cooking for him, cleaning for him, obeying his every order, even if he tells them to jump out of the window or into the oven."

"Butterfly's a bastard!" Bron cried out. "You are a free elf. The law—"

"Laws can be changed."

"Not by the likes of Butterfly."

"Why not? Both his parents work at high places in the Ministry, they have money and influence…"

"We won't let anyone happen to you," Darry suddenly spoke, looking serious. "Either of you. I might not have as much money or influence as the Butterflys, but I have something they don't – I have friends. The Butterflys are nothing but bullies, and nobody likes bullies."

"Yeah," Bron agreed, "no one likes the Butterflys. And you should not listen to what he tells you, Merry. He calls me Fish, and tells me to flap away, but he won't do anything to me, he's too scared of my family."

"We all are," Darry said, snorting.

"Mum will not like you saying that. She thinks of you as her son."

"Your Mum's scary."

"Yeah, she is," Bron grinned, then sighed. "I do wish she wouldn't live here all the time. She expects to see me every day, and she asks me about school, and my grades and everything. It's so damn embarrassing to have her fussing about me in front of everyone."

"She only wants good," Merryone said, "She loves you very much."

"I know that. I just wish she wouldn't show it in front of everyone."

"You'll get away from her soon enough," Darry said bitterly. "You graduate, and leave the castle, and leave her behind."

"She'll probably find a way to come with me. Even if she has to live in my bathtub."

"You don't have to tell me how terrible it is to have your parents by your side, awake and well. To talk to them, to hug them. Terrible, terrible."

Bron turned teal again. "Darry, mate…"

"Poor Bron," Darry continued, his tone acid. "He has to suffer his mummy telling him every day how much she loves him."

"I didn't mean—" Bron began, angry with himself, but a cry from Merryone stopped him.

"I— I thought I saw someone," the elf explained, staring at an empty stretch of hallway. Bron and Darry strained their eyes, but saw nothing out of the usual.

"There's no one there."

"Funny, I could have sworn I saw something."

They waited for another moment, but when nothing happened nor appeared, the boys returned their attention to the display of the Time-Turners, carefully avoiding any further conversation. Merryone shook her head at their behaviour, but let them have it their way. She, too, examined the Time-Turners for a few more minutes, then sat down on the floor and opened the book in her lap.

Suddenly a subtle yet persistent noise broke through her concentration. She looked up; the boys were exchanging a glance of similar confusion. Darry took out his Invisibility Cloak, and gestured his friends to get under it. After all, they were in the Off-Limit Corridor. Slowly, carefully, hidden by the cloak they moved toward the source of the noise, unsure of what to expect. Before they managed to turn the last corner and arrive at the stairs, however, the noise stopped, just as suddenly as it had begun. They exchanged looks, had a voiceless conversation, and then, more carefully than before, they turned the corner.

There were two things that met their gaze. One was the figure of Bretty Butterfly, a cruel and satisfied expression on his face, as he turned away and marched off the hallway down a flight of stairs. The second thing they noticed was the lack of the flight of staircase between the Off-Limit Corridor where they stood and the one Butterfly had disappeared into. The very prominent, glaring lack of a staircase.

"But… but this staircase shifts on Fridays," Bron was first to break the silence. "It is not—"

"It was Butterfly!" Merryone exclaimed. "I thought I saw something before. He must have sneaked up on us."

"Could he make the stairs move on the wrong day? Is it possible?"

"I don't know. But if he really saw us… he must be going to—"

They looked at each other in horror and exclaimed together,

"To fetch a teacher!"

"Oh no, oh no, oh no, oh no!" Merryone panicked as only she could – her voice turned into a squeaky shrill tone that hurt the ears of anyone nearby, and the words fell out of her mouth in such a rapid succession that it almost hurt to follow them. The result of this caused Bron to sigh, because this was almost exactly like his mother's voice out of the water, and Darry to cringe, because this was almost exactly as bad as Bron's mother's voice out of the water. It was a lucky thing indeed that Bron had got his voice from his human father, and not his mermaid mother.

"And we will be banished from the Haa Day… we might get expelled from the school… and Dumbledore knows how it may impact the Elf Equality laws…"

"Calm down, Merryone," Darry tried to calm her, his hands on pressed against his ears. "They won't expel us just because we broke one rule. And they certainly won't change the Magical Laws because of our little mischief."

"But they won't let us take the Haa Day!" she screeched as if this was the worst consequence. "I've been preparing for this for years!"

"Well, now you can prepare for it a few more years," Bron grinned, pointing out what he thought was the silver lining. "Think how prepared you will be the next time you take the Haa Day!"

Merryone replied with a glare that made Bron take several steps away from her, followed by a screech of fury that was abruptly stopped by Darry's hand on her mouth.

"Shh!" he cautioned them. "We have to be quiet. We might still get away from here before anyone arrives."

"How?" Merryone despaired into Darry's palm. "The stairs are gone."

"Well, we could Levitate each other?" Darry suggested.

Bron, whom Darry had counted on agreeing, surprised him by shaking his head, "Won't do. It takes too long. Besides, would you really trust to my skills Levitating you over a drop of a thousand yards?"

Darry opened his mouth to reply in the affirmative, but Bron continued first,

"No, I've got a much better idea," he said, pointing toward the direction they'd come from.

"You mean…"

"Of course. That's our best chance."

"No, no, no!" Merryone protested, pushing Darry's hand away, "we can't use the Time-Turners. Think how much trouble we'll get into if we actually use them!"

"We won't get into any trouble," Bron said, excited about his plan. "Think about it, it's perfect. We go back some fifteen minutes, maybe half an hour, we'll find ourselves and tell us to get the hell away from here before Butterfly comes, and when we do that, we get out of here, and we have no need to use the Time-Turner, so no one can accuse us of using one."

"It's still risky business, messing with time," Merryone said, "you never know where exactly you may end up and what exactly you may cause."

"Alright," Bron said, giving her a stare. "You are absolutely right. It is too risky. In fact, it's too risky to do anything. I think we'll just stay here and wait for the professors to find us. We'll turn ourselves in, and accept the punishment, and wait another seven years to retake the Haa Day. It's good, isn't it? More school. It exactly what you want, no?"

"No!" Merryone cried. "It's not what I want. Oh, I never should have listened to you. I never should have come here with you. I should have gone straight to Monstrous Hall, and all would have been well then."

"But you did listen to us," Bron said, "and now you'll just have to listen to us again. Trust me. I know what I'm doing."

"I don't know," Merryone said, hesitant. She didn't like the plan. But she liked missing out on the Haa Day even less. And oh, how Butterfly would gloat. She wasn't sure she could take it. And her parents, her devoted parents who expected so much of her, talked so much of her, their daughter gone to a wizarding school – they were so proud of her. She couldn't stand their disappointment at her being expelled.

"Oh, all right," she reluctantly agreed. "But make sure you do it right."

"You can count on me," Bron insisted and they walked back towards the display of the Time-Turners. He bent over them, choosing the one to use. When he stretched out his hand, however, Darry knocked it away.

"Don't," he said.

"Darry!" Bron exclaimed, surprised at being stopped by his best friend. "This is our best chance—"

"I know," Darry said. "But we have to be careful. These Time-Turners here, they are probably protected by many wards and spells. You can't just pick them up by hand."

Bron swallowed. "There's no time for being careful. You know I'm more resilient to spells and jinxes, because of my origin. I think… I think I'm able to pick it up and use it before it does me any harm."

"You think?"

"Look," Bron said, bowing closer to Darry and lowering his voice so that Merryone couldn't hear him, "this is our fault. We convinced her to come with us. And it wouldn't matter much to us if we were caught and had to miss the Haa Day, but it would devastate her. We can't let that happen. I can't let that happen."

"I don't like this," Darry said, frowning. "Let me take the Time-Turner instead."

"And a lot good it would do to us with you knocked out cold or worse," Bron snorted. "No. It has to be me."

"Oh no!" Merryone squeaked. "Someone's coming. I can definitely hear someone coming."

Darry and Bron exchanged a look.

"Half an hour?" Bron asked, eyeing the little golden Time-Turner he had chosen for the task.

"Make it one hour," Darry suggested. "We have no way of knowing how long Butterfly knew we were here. He might have followed us all the way from our tower."

"One hour it is," Bron said, took a deep breath, and snatched the Time-Turner. Sirens went off around them, louder than Merryone's panicky voice. There were flashes of bright, blinding light from all directions, and Bron was certain the corridor had been sealed off. Well, it didn't matter now. The Time-Turner was slightly hot and felt heavy in his hand – it must have been scorching to a skin less resilient than his. He acted fast. He crouched down till he was level with Merryone, luckily Darry had done the same on his own; he threw the chain of the Time-Turner around the three of them, and then spun the little hourglass just once.

He heard running steps and screaming voices, but they were gone before anyone could reach them – now the whole world was spinning around them, round and round, round and round it went until Bron felt he couldn't take it anymore. He felt dizzy, he felt like he was falling, and then he really was falling, and it must have been down a bottomless pit because the falling went on for what felt like forever, and just when he had finally grown comfortable with his uneventful yet painless fate, something slammed into him hard and everything around him went dark, even though a moment ago it had already been dark.

He opened his eyes to the worried expressions of his friends. He saw Merryone's face relax into relief and the kind of smile on her lips that would have normally stolen his breath away. Right now, however, something had already stolen his breath away. He gulped for air, and wished it was water instead. His heritage allowed him to survive both water and air, but he was always a lot more comfortable in water. With effort, he sat up and looked around. They were in a corridor, only it wasn't the corridor, he noticed with alarm. It was not the same corridor they had been in before. Could the Time-Turner have brought them to another location, as well as to another time?

"Where are we?" he asked, gazing around. He didn't recognize the place right away.

His friends started at the observation. They hadn't noticed it before, they had been too worried about him. But now that they did notice it, their alarm grew.

"I don't recognize this place," Darry said.

"There's a window," Merryone pointed. "See if you can make out at least in which part of the castle we are."

Darry nodded and walked to the window. He looked out of it, and kept on looking in silence.

"What is it? Darry?"

"I think you better see this for yourself, Bron," Darry said, his voice sounding funny.

Reluctantly and somewhat painfully, Bron stood up. He noticed Merryone's concerned look on him, and tried to give her a smile of reassurance.

"Let me see that," the elf asked, pointing to his fist, which was closed around the little Time-Turner. It was cool to his touch now, and the spells and jinxes on it must have exhausted themselves. Still, he held his breath as he handed it to Merryone, then let it out in relief when it did her no harm. He moved towards Darry standing at the window.

"What?" he questioned, but there was no need for an answer. One look out of the window told him everything.

The scenery was just as unfamiliar as the corridor.

"The lake!" Bron gasped in horror. "There's no lake. The castle stands on solid ground. Where's the lake? What happened to the lake?"

Bron had reason enough to panic. His whole family, except for his father's side of it, lived in that lake. His many brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews, cousins, grandparents and a hundred more of his relatives all lived in the lake on which the castle floated. They hadn't moved here on his behalf, or on the behalf of the other members of his family who, too, attended the school. This was their home; they had lived here, in this lake, for hundreds of years. And now the lake was gone. Gone as if it had never been there in the first place.

"Bron," Darry said, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder, "I don't think we're in the castle any more. I don't think we're in Pigwarts."

"No," Merryone spoke from behind them, "we're exactly in Pigwarts."

"But the lake? The strange scenery?" Bron asked, turning towards her. Merryone usually had all the answers, and she looked as if she had them now as well. She also looked as if they wouldn't want to know what the answers were.

She held up the Time-Turner, "How many times did you spin it?"

"Once," Bron replied. "Only once. One hour."

"Why did you think one spin equalled one hour?"

"Well, there was the letter H written on it. H for hour, right?"

"That's not an H," Merryone said, "it's an M."

"Minute?" Bron frowned. "But that doesn't make any sense, if I only turned back the time one minute…"

"No, it's not M like minute. It's M like…" Merryone stopped and took a deep breath. "M like millennium."

Minutes – not millennia – ticked by in silence. Bron was the first to break it, with a bout of incredulous laughter,

"What? You don't mean that we… that we…"

"That we've gone a thousand years into the past? Yes. That's exactly what I mean."

"Oh. Oh! Oh. Bloody hell!"

o.o.o

It took them some time to come to grips with their situation. It might have taken minutes, it might have taken hours. After travelling a thousand years in time, minutes and hours had very little meaning. They had each had their turn to panic; now they were sitting in the same corridor, under Darry's Invisibility Cloak, trying to figure out their plans for the future. For the next millennium.

"We have to go back!" Merryone insisted.

"If we go back now," Bron reasoned, "they'll know it was us breaking into the Off-Limit Corridor and using the Time-Turner."

"This is bigger than getting into detention," Merryone squeaked. "We can't stay here. Dumbledore knows what we might do to the future by our mere presence here."

"Dumbledore knows," Darry repeated under his breath. "Maybe Dumbledore does know. Maybe we can go to him and ask."

"Dumbledore is dead, Darry," Merryone said. "Haven't you read, Pigwarts, A History? Dumbledore died before Pigwarts was founded."

"But the five founders, they're still alive, aren't they?" Bron said, "Maybe they can help us."

"We don't need their help!" Merryone hissed. "We have the Time-Turner. We have to go back to our own time. Before we ruin something crucial."

"We won't ruin anything by sitting invisible here, in this deserted hallway," Darry pointed out. "You know the rules of time travel. Don't be seen, don't be heard, don't leave anything behind."

"We have to go back!" Merryone cried out, breaking rule number two.

"Maybe we should go back," Darry said. "She's right. We don't know what we may do by simply sitting here invisible."

"But we should at least leave some message for our future selves," Bron claimed. "Something to warn us against going to see the display on Time-Turners on the morning of our Haa Day."

"Yes, we should," Merryone said, narrowing her eyes. "We could write a letter, give it to an owl, and tell it to deliver it. In a thousand years!"

"Oh," Bron remembered. "That might be a problem."

"No, we have to go back now," Merryone decided, and held up the Time-Turner before her eyes. "One spin."

"Erm," Darry said, looking at the thing. "Which way do we have to spin it to go to the future? I'd rather not end up another millennium in the past."

"Then shut up and let me examine it," Merryone snapped, irritated and something else as well. She turned the hourglass around in her hands, careful not to spin it. There were not many markings on the metal. Frowning, Merryone read the few ones that were present. None of these said anything about the directions of spin. And she was sure that Bron did not remember which way he had spun it. She couldn't exactly blame him, considering the situation in which he had spun it, although she wanted to.

"Merry," Darry suddenly said in a hushed voice.

"What?" the elf said, "and don't call me that."

"Err…" Darry hesitated. Merryone's posture said more clearly than anything else that she did not like to be disturbed. Darry had a pretty good idea just how much more she wouldn't like to hear what he had to tell her.

"Well?" she demanded, staring at him over her long pointy nose.

"It's just that… you said it yourself… didn't you… that-you-cannot-use-a-time-turner-to-go-into-future." There. He'd said it.

She breathed a sigh of relief. For a moment, she'd been really worried. He remained really worried, and therefore she didn't snap at him, but explained patiently,

"Not into the future as such, no. But we can still return to our time, because for us it's the present, even if at the present it's the future."

Darry and Bron displayed matching expressions of confusion, which meant she had to explain more.

"Think of it as a safety catch. It was added to the Time-Turners a while ago, to avoid situations such as this. It means that whenever you travel into the past, you can always return to your presence. But you cannot use a Time-Turner to travel into the future from your own time."

"That's good," Bron grinned, "Good thing they thought about this. Imagine the kind of trouble we'd be in if there was no safety catch. Stuck here, a thousand years in the past, with no possibility of getting back home. I mean, it would be nice for a while, especially for you, Merryone, since you love history and all, but after a while it would get old. Wouldn't want to stay here in the past for too long. I guess it would be great to meet the Founders, though. They were the greatest witches and wizards of their time and you could learn a lot from them, I'm sure. As for me, I've always been curious of what sort of fellows they really were. I mean, it says all those nice things about them in the books, but they wrote it, didn't they? And if I were to write a book about me, I might exclude a few things, you know, the less exciting ones?"

Bron winked and nudged Darry, who didn't react, since there was something bothering him about Merryone's explanation. Bron wasn't much discouraged by it, still hopeful to talk his friends into staying here for a little while, if only to delay the Haa Day. The way he saw it, meeting the Founders would be great, but a small pleasure compared to putting off the damn Haa Day. Maybe not for a thousand years, but at least until he grew bored of the past.

"And I don't think it would change much of the future, talking to the Founders. I'm sure they're prepared for this kind of thing. Hah, don't you think it would be nice to go back and tell Butterfly that we met the real Weasley? Although if he's anything like Butterfly, I'd much rather not meet him at all. But I'd like to see Potter, and Malfoy, and Duckwoman. She was a Seer, too, so she probably already knows we're coming to see her."

"We're not going to stay here to meet the Founders," Merryone said firmly. "We're right out of here as soon as I find the safety catch."

"Aww," Bron wailed, "must you always ruin all the fun?"

"Merryone," Darry quickly spoke, to avoid the brawl that was coming, "you said that the safety catch was added to the Time-Turners a while ago."

"Yes? What about it?"

"Nothing. Nothing important, I'm sure. It's just that… this Time-Turner… it might be… an antique…"

Merryone stared at Darry who stared back. It took some more time for this realization to set in. But they had that – time. Lots and lots of it.

"You win, Bron," Merryone suddenly spoke, in a voice that sounded normal. "We'll stay here after all."

"Blibbering Humdinger!" Bron exclaimed in delight. "That's Wrackspurt! How long can we stay? A day or two, maybe even a week?"

"I think we'll stay a little more than that," Merryone continued at the same level tone. Darry moved away from her, as much as the Invisibility Cloak allowed.

"Really?" Bron asked, excited. "How long?"

"Oh… I'd say… about… a thousand years!"

Her shrill scream of despair reverberated through the castle.

o.o.o

"It seems we need the Founders' help after all," Bron said, throwing a worried look at Merryone, afraid she might start screaming again. She replied with a glare. She knew she had slipped up. She knew she had broken an important rule of time travel, but the rules hadn't mattered much, even to her, in the face of the discovery that they were thousand years in the past with no way of getting back home.

But she had made a mistake, because right now they could still find a way of getting back. The Founders of Pigwarts, the five witches and wizards with enormous power – if there was the smallest of possibilities getting back to the future, the Founders could certainly make it happen. But they had to be careful, very-very careful. Or else there might be no future left to return into.

"That's the plan," Darry summarized. "We'll find a Founder and ask their help."

"But not Weasley," Bron said, shuddering. "If the likes of Butterfly claim to be his descendants, I want to stay away from the real Weasley as far as possible."

"I think we should find Malfoy," Merryone suggested. "The less people know about us, the better. And he was the main author of the original Pigwarts, A History."

"Yes," Bron said, sarcastically, "a historian. Definitely the best person to help us."

"Original?" Darry quickly asked to distract her from Bron's comment.

"The book went missing a few centuries ago," she explained, "it has been rewritten from memory, but the real history of Pigwarts, it is said, was written by several people. All the five Founders, and all the other teachers who worked here at the time it was founded."

"We don't care who wrote the book," Bron said. "We're about to meet the Founders ourselves."

"How about we just ask the first one we find," Darry suggested. "Leave it to chance. How about that, Merryone, Bron?"

She shrugged her acquiescence while he muttered his,

"Just as long as it's not Weasley."

"Err… how exactly are we going to find them?" he then asked, "Does your beloved book tell us that?"

"That's the easy part," she replied, "we'll just have to find their office."

"That could take some time."

"Good thing we've got a thousand years then, isn't it?"

o.o.o

Jim grinned. Things were looking up for him. He'd lost the really sticky goo to Tim, and had to make do with the itchy one. But this mattered little, because he was just about to win their little goo competition. He was following the Scheming Sisters down yet another deserted hallway. They were clearly up to something, but so was he, and soon they'd be up to their necks in itchy blue and green dotted goo. He repressed a devilish giggle.

The sisters had stopped, a little ahead of him. They were in a soft conversation with each other, and also on the perfect spot for Jim's surprise – on such a perfect spot as if they had done it on purpose. Jim ignored his sudden feeling of suspicion, he could almost taste his victory. He carefully levitated the bucket up to the ceiling and then very slowly moved it towards the two girls. He was shaking with excitement, grinning like a lunatic, and holding his breath.

Ahead of them, Monika whispered to Mia,

"I see him. He's shaking in fright and grinning like an idiot. Seems to be drooling, too."

"Jimmy of the JimTimTeam," Mia said, shaking her head, "I feel almost sorry for him. Almost."

"His fault he sided with Ambrose. He should have sided with us instead."

"But we wouldn't have let him."

"Still," Monika shrugged. "He should have tried, at least. Where's the bucket?"

"Almost right above us."

"He's not going to chicken out at the last moment, is he?"

"And ruin our prevenge? He wouldn't dare!"

"He better not!"

The girls waited. Minutes ticked by, but no promised bucketful of goo attempted to rain of them. Monika chanced a look towards the place Jim had previously occupied.

"The coward!" she hissed in anger.

Mia sighed, "There's still the other one. Not to mention Ambrose."

Monika's eyes lit with glee, "He won't chicken out!"

"Let us find him then, before he uses his goo on someone else," Mia suggested, and they hurried back the way they had come.

o.o.o

After the girls had disappeared out of sight and hearing, Jim carefully inched his way back into the corridor. He stared up at his bucket of goo. He was puzzled. He had tried to tip the damn thing a dozen times, but it hadn't moved an inch, as if someone had been holding it in place. Had it been the work of the Sisters, had they done it? Was that the thing they were scheming about? Is that why they had let him follow them here and stood on a perfect spot for him to douse them with itchy goo? Was their running away part of their plan? Were they now luring behind a corner, about to drop the goo on his head instead?

Jim held his breath and waited for it, but when the bucketful of goo failed to rain down upon him, and no victorious laughter came from round the corner, he carefully levitated the bucket back down. He stared at it, suspicious, then stared around him, suspicious, and then slowly walked away, still suspicious. The Sisters were clearly up to something. Perhaps it would be better to find another victim. But who would be good enough for him to still win the competition?

o.o.o

Darry, Bron, and Merryone let out the breath they were each holding and inhaled deeply. Even Bron did this, even though he could do without oxygen for a few hours. But this was also a social gesture, not just staying alive.

After another discussion, they had decided to delay their plans till nightfall and remain in this deserted hallway. The deserted hallway, however, hadn't remained deserted.

"Did you see their clothing?" Bron broke the silence. "It was like… totally nargles."

"I shouldn't have done this, I shouldn't have done this," Merryone silently wailed.

"Why did you do it?" Darry asked as soothingly as he could. He, too, was shocked by what had just happened.

"And the goo, did you see that goo?" Bron went on, excited. "That must be the original goo-spilling. Do you realize, we saw the original goo-spilling! Nothing like the way we do it now, but this was a thousand years ago, of course. Can't expect them to spill goo like we do."

"I thought that if the bucket of goo fell, we'd all get hit," Merryone explained. "And be discovered."

"But then it's a good thing you stopped that, isn't it?" Darry wondered.

"I changed history!" Merryone squeaked. "That bucket of goo should have dropped on those girls, but now I've stopped it. Dumbledore knows what I might have changed!"

"The original goo-spilling, think of that!"

"Don't worry, Merryone. It was just a bucket of goo. I mean, what could a bucket of goo possibly change?"

As Darry said it, he had no way of knowing that on top of Perry Purple, a bucket of goo could do quite a lot. Even if he'd been a historian and read all the books about Pigwarts, he couldn't have known this. Because it hadn't happened. Until now.