4

"Master Potions Master, Sir!"

Snape was woken by a very nervous house elf and much too early for his taste.

"What have I told you about coming to my bedroom?" he growled at the small creature.

The elf wrung her hands. "Happy is much aggrieved!" she reassured the angry man. "Happy knows that Master Potions Master's bedroom is taboo but the headmaster is Happy's master and master says to go and wake Master Potions Master." She hung her ears.

"The headmaster?" It sounded just like Albus to send a house elf before the crack of dawn. "What does he want? What time is it?"

"Lessons will start in a half hour, and he says Master Potions Master is to have breakfast with the other teachers before he goes to lessons."

Snape was up in an instant. He had overslept!

Showering, getting dresses and rushing up to the Great Hall was all done in five minutes.

The Great Hall was empty but for Dumbledore.

"Albus!" growled the potions master. "What is the meaning of this?"

"It is urgent," replied the headmaster as he buttered a slice of toast. Breakfast had not yet been served but for a small but delicious looking assortment in front of five plates. "And you wouldn't have hurried for a teacher's conference."

Snape snorted. "You mean a head of house conference. There are only five plates."

"Albus!"

Before the headmaster could say something, McGonagall stormed into the Great Hall. She, too, had obviously hurried her morning routine.

"One of these days I'm going to turn you into a rat!" The woman was seething. "What is the meaning of this?"

"You are aware that you have to take over my job if you turn me into a rat, aren't you?" chuckled Dumbledore.

McGonagall huffed and snatched the honey jar from the headmaster. "No sweets for you!" she snarled. "Now tell me why I had to rush down here before breakfast is served properly."

"I'd rather wait for the others," Dumbledore pointed out and put some blackberry jam on his toast since McGonagall had commandeered the honey.

Sprout came next. The friendly head of Hufflepuff was carrying a plate of sausages and ham and eggs. "Just as I thought. You ordered only the sweet stuff again," she reprimanded the headmaster as she sat beside Snape. The witch held her plate out to the potions master and the deputy headmistress. "Here, have some proper breakfast."

Snape actually enjoyed sweet foods for breakfast but filled his plate with ham and eggs just to make a point against the headmaster. "Thank you, Pomona. At least you are watching out for our well-being." McGonagall went for the sausages.

"You are welcome," Sprout placed the plate just out of Dumbledore's reach. "I thought it would be nice to be well feed if I couldn't have a proper morning shower."

Flitwick was the last to arrive since his quarters were the farthest from the Great Hall and his legs were the shortest.

"Well?" he glared at the headmaster. "Shoot!"

Dumbledore finished his toast before he spoke. "I asked you here to speak about the advent calendar," he began.

The four heads of house growled. An advent calendar was certainly not important enough to wake them at this ungodly hour!

"You all spent part of your first year lessons yesterday with showing the children how to make little trinkets for the calendar," Dumbledore continued. "And I have to applaud you for that. However, if the children have only one thing to put into the calendar every day, the calendar will get boring and will not distract them from the situation at hand. We must not forget that the majority of our students will be devastated when they learn that they cannot see their families this season. I therefore ask you to help me keep the children occupied."

"What do you have in mind?" Sprout took it upon herself to ask for they all knew Dumbledore enough to know that he would not have called them here if he hadn't a plan.

"Weekend workshops." The headmaster's eyes twinkled like mad. He raised a hand to stop Snape before the potions master could say anything. "I'm not asking you to teach on the weekend. There are enough people here who could teach the children a thing or two. I'm asking you to help me organise the event."

"I'll make the lists of participants and a time table," McGonagall was quick to secure the part of the job she was good at. As deputy headmistress she made time tables all the time. "You come up with the courses."

"If we don't want to enlist the teachers to teach," Flitwick pointed out, "we'll have to ask the older students."

"And the house elves," Snape added. He was going to make that little elf pay for waking him. Even if the elf had done it at Dumbledore's orders. Some things were unforgivable.

"Excellent," cried Dumbledore. "Severus, you deal with the house elves, Filius, you ask the students and Pomona, why don't you ask our colleagues if any of them wants to volunteer to hold a workshop? If we do this right, we can start with the workshops tomorrow morning!"

"And what will you be doing?" Snape asked through clenched teeth.

"Why would I do anything more? I organised you to organise everything and I made the calendar. My job is done. I cannot do everything!" Dumbledore looked at the potions master over the rims of his half-moon spectacles. "Ah, good morning, children!"

The headmaster was saved from Snape's ire by a group of Ravenclaw NEWT students who came to breakfast early. Flitwick immediately rushed to the Ravenclaw house table to enlist their help with the workshops. By the time Dumbledore announced that it was time to open the advent calendar, the small head of Ravenclaw had found student teachers for almost two dozens of workshops, some to be held on Saturday, some on Sunday.

Snape's present of the day was a signed photograph of Harry Potter! The cheek of the brat! Arrogant just like his father!

This morning, many of the students discovered small vials of perfume and small jars of hand cream in their advent calendar bags. It went over much better than the socks.

Potter unwrapped a bottle of ink which splashed his face black when he opened it. The Weasley twins roared with laughter. Snape wanted to join in but of course that was out of the question. No point in ruining his reputation just because Potter had got his due!

At the Slytherin table, Draco Malfoy discovered the other twin's gift of exploding ink. The blond shouted hue and cry which caused his house mates to laugh even harder.

Flitwick had got a black parcel with white skulls on it. In it, he found a rather plain tea cup. When he tried it out – nobody thought that the Dark Lord would give a plain cup, there had to be some additional properties – he squealed with delight. The simple breakfast tea he had poured tasted now as if a dash of the charms master's favourite apricot schnapps had been added.

When McGonagall tried it, she swore there was some Scottish whisky in the tea.

Snape tried it, too, and tasted the fire whisky he preferred to lace his tea with.

Snape spent his lunch break at the kitchens. The house elves eagerly provided him with sandwiches of cold roast chicken and tomatoes. While he ate, Snape ordered them – he first tried to make them volunteer but he was informed they could not do that unless he ordered them to volunteer – to hold workshops in cookie baking, knitting and fudge making.

One of the elves pointed out how much work that was going to be and on a weekend, too.

The elves got excited and Snape not only had to eat two more sandwiches but also take a platter of the small delicacies with him for his afternoon tea.

"Tom got your hair growing potion," Dumbledore informed Snape at dinner. "He now has a head of blond locks."

Snape nodded and pushed his food around on his plate. He was not hungry at all after the feast he had had only two hours earlier.

"He wants to order a big bottle, and he wants to know whether you can influence the hair colour. If so, he wants to be a redhead."

"I'll go talk to him later," Snape sighed.

This sounded like even more work. Great.