~Chapter 37~ What really happened in the past – 27 September 1996

Notes: We finally learn why, even though the founders are alive, they didn't continue running the school, and a few other surprises. This is the last chapter before the epilogue, which I also hope to finish today. Enjoy!

~Harry~

The next morning they found themselves in the Malfoy dining hall, watching with a mixture of suppressed laughter and horror as Godric Gryffindor, dressed in expensive dress robes, sat next to Rowena Ravenclaw drinking tea with his pinkie in the air, and whenever someone tried to talk to him, he would answer them in such a high version of Olde-English that they could barely comprehend what he was talking about.

Godric clearly hated every second of it, but a glance from Rowena had him sitting up straight and smiling again. At first, Harry was quite worried that Rowena had cast some kind of spell on Godric, but Voldemort soon took pity on him and informed him that Godric had a crush on Rowena, so he was trying to impress her despite hating every moment of it.

Harry felt a poke in his side and turned to see that Salazar had claimed the seat next to him, "If there's anyone that could get Godric to behave, then it would be Rowena. She was a part of the reason why Godric haunted the castle as Peeves."

Harry fully turned to the Slytherin Founder, "I still don't get it. Why did all of you leave the castle then in the first place? You apparently knew that you wouldn't die, so why didn't you just carry on teaching?"

Salazar looked thoughtful as he nodded, "We could have, but how do you think other witches and wizards reacted when they grew old and died while we stayed the same? And it wasn't as if we didn't try. We ran the school for close to 500 years before rumors reached us that a small group believed that we were practicing Black Magic and sacrificing the students' life energies to stay young."

Harry could only gape at him, with Voldemort now paying close attention to their discussion from Harry's other side, and Salazar nodded, "They couldn't prove anything, but the fear that the rumors caused almost closed the school as parents stopped their children from coming to school. It was around that time that Godric and I traveled about to try and soothe the people's fears that the school was attacked. Rowena and Helga managed to drive the attackers away, but the barrier they threw up to protect the school, sapped their magic."

Harry looked up as he heard footsteps and he saw Rowena and Godric pull up chairs in front of them. Rowena then took over from Salazar's tale, "Helga and I split up to each shield half of the school, she was a nature Sprite so she took the side of the forest while I chose to draw strength from the lake, seeing as it was the only source of water nearby. We held off the attack, but I was wounded and my body forced me into a deep slumber. With the last of my consciousness, I managed to send a short message to Godric, saying that I would be entering a healing sleep, but I wasn't able to say where, as the squid, who is actually a baby Kraken named Poseidon, that I received from my older sister the day before I left, brought my body to a cave and guarded it until I woke up about a month ago."

Harry saw Godric lightly squeeze her hand, "It took her the entire month to regain enough of her strength to swim to the surface and I only sensed her magic early yesterday morning. I of course found her message once Salazar and I returned from our trip, and I searched everywhere, but the Kraken was smart, he hid her in a cave with magic-suppressing rocks that would ensure that she didn't overuse her magic any more than it already was, unfortunately, it also slowed down her healing and made her lose track of time."

Harry frowned, "What happened then?"

Salazar spoke up once more, "When Godric and I got back and saw that there had been an attack, he told me about Rowena's message and we searched for both Rowena and Helga, but couldn't find a trace of either of them. We decided to start applying charms to make it seem as if we were growing older, but that didn't help much because the damage had already been done. Godric decided to take on the form of a ghost after that as he mostly locked his magic away until he needed it again and I decided to help Death out a bit after he'd given me the suggestion. The ghostly form allowed Godric to stay at Hogwarts and to search for Rowena."

Voldemort glanced between the founders, "That still doesn't explain where Helga Hufflepuff is. Do you think that she is truly gone?"

Rowena shook her head, "She could be stuck in a slumber similar to mine. As a nature Sprite, she draws power from the earth, but that could be anywhere…"

A hiss drew everyone's attention to the side where Nagini had appeared during their conversation and she seemed to bristle in anger and Harry shared a worried glance with Voldemort. Because of everything that had happened lately, they hadn't given a lot of attention to Nagini and that was bound to make her very irritable.

Harry decided to quickly intervene in the hopes of at least appeasing her a little. Nagini liked sparkly things so he decided to conjure a sparkly rainbow bunny, but just as he was about the let the bunny go, Nagini's hissed words reached him, ":: I sslither around all over trying to find you and thiss iss what I get?! You didn't even tell me where the two of you were going and there iss a angry lady in a tree and…::"

At this point, Harry looked at Voldemort with wide eyes. Could Nagini have found Helga Hufflepuff? But the snake was currently too upset to listen to Voldemort as he tried to calm her down so Harry stepped forward with the glittery bunny and it was almost comical to see how quickly her attention snapped to the bunny as her mouth froze halfway through a hiss.

Harry decided to take a chance, ":: Nagini, you can have this bunny and I will even make you another one if you can tell uss where you ssaw the angry lady. ::"

Nagini closed her mouth with a click and narrowed her eyes, ":: I could tell you, but I need ten bunniess and three nights of cuddles, ooh and a bigger warming stone!::"

Harry glanced at Voldemort, who shrugged with a grin despite the situation, "Don't look at me, you're the one that started it all with the bunnies and the other spoils." His words had Godric and Rowena looking at Salazar in confusion and mouthing 'bunnies?' to which the Slytherin founder simply smiled in amusement.

Harry turned back to Nagini, ":: Alright, 10 bunniess, 3 nights of cuddless, and a bigger warming sstone. Now, can you tell uss where you heard the angry lady?::"

Nagini nodded and sailed towards the numerous paintings that adorned the walls, the one she indicated with her tail, was of Hogwarts and Harry stepped closer as she hissed, ":: The Lady sseems to be sstuck in the angry tree. I was looking for Master Sslytherin when I couldn't find you, but he wass gone ass well, so I wass searching for him on the grounds.::"

Harry turned to the rest of the group with wide eyes as he released the bunny, which Nagini immediately followed, "We need to get to Hogwarts, Nagini may have found Helga." He then looked around the dining hall and saw that only the Malfoys were awake. He walked over to them, "Good morning, it seems that something came up and we need to leave for Hogwarts. I don't know how long it will take but can you inform everyone as they wake up?"

Lucius gave him a nod, but Harry could see that he was curious, "Nagini may have found Helga."

The Malfoy patriarch's eyes grew wide and he gave a slight bow with his head, "I will inform your guests."

Harry then turned to find the founders, as well as Severus, and Sirius, heading towards the floo. Voldemort was waiting for him about halfway there and he laughed as he saw Harry's face as he glared at the floo, "Why don't we rather apparate?" Nagini was draped over his shoulders and the bulge in her stomach told him that the bunny hadn't lasted very long.

Voldemort saw his gaze and smiled, "You know, you still haven't told me where you found all these types of bunnies. They can't all be from the same world."

Harry grinned, "They are. Death angered Fate once and in an effort to appease her, he found out about her interest in cutesy things and decorated an entire wing of the Death realms with them. Unfortunately, by the time he was done, her interests had already shifted to something else but she said she would forgive him only if he kept the cutesy wing. Neither of them suspected that the bunny numbers would get so completely out of control, so I received permission to do with them as I pleased after neutering most of them to ensure that an outbreak didn't occur."

Harry gave a step back as Nagini raised her head and he almost had flashbacks of Dumbledore as he saw the twinkle in her eyes, "::Bunniess!::"

Voldemort quickly used a spell to gently send her to sleep as he looked at Harry, "Hopefully she believes that she dreamt the entire thing."

They made their way to the apparition room and apparated to Hogwarts. Voldemort quickly cast a disillusion spell around them to hide them as they made their way to the Whomping Willow, which seemed to be weeping instead of throwing about its branches.

No one dared to move, but Harry immediately stepped forward despite the protests that echoed out behind him, "Don't worry, I've done this many times."

The tree started swinging its branches and the onlookers were surprised to find that it was doing so slowly, instead of trying to bat him away. He made his way to the trunk, but his hand hovered over the knot that usually made the tree freeze.

He slowly allowed his hand to fall and stepped back, looking up at the still-active Whomping Willow, but it was as if it was looking back at him and keeping its branches still, "We came here to help Lady Helga. Is there something that we can do?"

The tree twisted slightly and Harry was surprised to see that a new doorway had been revealed, but some type of magic seemed to be interfering with the door's own, causing it to glitch and not work as it should. It took him a moment to realize that the magic that created the shortcut from the Whomping Willow to the Shrieking Shack, had interfered with the magic from the haven that Helga had probably created to recover.

He stepped closer to the tangled magic and tried to untangle it, but it didn't seem to be enough until Voldemort and Salazar stepped forward as well.

After, what felt like, quite a while, they finally managed to separate the paths and the new doorway opened with a bang, revealing a short, young, dainty-looking woman who seemed to be floating instead of walking. She had a regal air about her, but the impression only lasted for a couple of seconds as she spotted the other founders. But she seemed to be looking for someone else as well.

Sirius and Severus, who had come to stand with them, wisely stepped back as they noticed how she zeroed in on Salazar and the Slytherin founder didn't have a lot of time to brace himself as she rushed forward in a blink of an eye and crashed into him.

Rowena laughed as she spotted the looks on their faces, "As you can see, Helga is the youngest. Salazar adopted her as his younger sister after saving her from a few wizards that were trying to catch her. She put up a magnificent fight apparently, but they seemed to have something that could knock creatures out. Salazar didn't take kindly to that of course."

Rowena's words had Helga turning and noticing the two men standing behind Salazar, she looked at her brother, "From the bonds I see between you, does that mean…?"

Salazar smirked and nodded and for a moment Helga froze before a wide smile spread across her face and Harry laughed as he noticed how Severus was trying to duck behind Sirius as Helga made her way toward them. She glanced up at Severus as she leaned around Sirius, "You're my brother's mates?"

Both men nodded and her grin grew even wider before she first hugged Sirius and then caught a hiding Severus by the hand and dragged him out before turning to Salazar, "We need to celebrate! This means I now have two more brothers!" She then turned to Harry and Voldemort, before glancing at Salazar and Godric in confusion, "How did your children end up as mates? And why is one of them a Horcrux of the other? I thought we banned that magic?"

Both Salazar and Godric looked at each other in horror before they hurried to explain the situation to Helga and Harry and Voldemort introduced themselves. She didn't look very happy at first, but she understood that someone had meddled in their lives. She took a second look at Harry and smiled, "Finally I have someone around my age to hang out with, someone who wouldn't age!"

Her words hit Harry hard for some reason and he was reminded of his own thoughts once he learned that he would never age. Overall he found that Helga was nothing like the books tried to describe her, although she did retain the core principles for which her house stood.

Harry felt a wave of magic and he looked towards Hogwarts to find that the castle was warning them about the students that were waking up.

They apparated back to Malfoy Manor where everyone was still sitting around the dinner table and Helga quickly made friends with Hermione and Luna after their initial surprise of finding all four founders alive.

Harry found himself glancing around the table, wondering how he got so lucky, and he felt Voldemort squeeze his hand. He spotted Godric reaching for another chicken wing and called out to him. The man's gaze focused on his and Harry leaned in a little, "Why did the Sword of Gryffindor not hurt me?"

Godric seemed to be confused for a moment before his expression lit up in understanding, "That's because you are the royal heir to our race. The new King if you will. You now hold the power to give the spirit of the Golden Dragon to whomever you wish, and they will live just as long as you would. The sword recognized that and you can summon it at any time you now wish."

The man then went back to eating as if he hadn't just shattered and rebuilt Harry's life in a matter of seconds. He looked toward the friends and family around the table and for the first time, he realized that he didn't have to lose them. Of course, he wouldn't force it upon them, and they would have to move around a lot to avoid a repeat of what happened to the founders, but they would be together and that was all he longed for.