"Miss. Miss," Winky squeaked, tugging on the top blanket. "Come and see. It has snowed, Miss. It has snowed."
Sybill yawned and blinked repeatedly, fumbling for her glasses, until the eager elf put them into her hand. Shivering slightly, she made her way over to the window and looked down on the grounds that were, indeed, covered in a surprisingly thick blanket of new snow.
Sybill smiled, remembering how such mornings at Hogwarts were usually full of shouts and screams from eager students pelting each other with snowballs from dawn until dusk if they could get away with it.
When she had just started teaching, she had often joined them. But then Minerva had mentioned that putting herself on the students' level like that might be one of the reasons she was having a hard time maintaining discipline in her classroom. She couldn't expect the students to see her as a figure of authority if she was cavorting with them like that.
So she had stayed back, though it had felt terribly lonely and dull at first. But Minerva, after she had returned to the castle, had been a true friend and spent most of her first winter back keeping Sybill company and taking her mind off silly things like snowballs.
Sybill wasn't entirely sure when their friendship had changed. The change had been so gradual, but she was pretty sure that a major turning point had been that one week when she'd moved down to Minerva's room.
Sybill laughed to herself as she walked over to the lovely breakfast table that Winky had prepared for her. She had been livid that day. Minerva had been teaching a Vanishing Spell to a group of Gryffindors who had gone straight up for their Divination lesson afterwards. And one of the boys, a terribly dull mind, had apparently been less than captivated by the day's lesson and had decided that his time was better spent practising for Transfiguration.
Suddenly, with a loud pop, her entire fireplace, flaming logs, perfumed smoke, boiling teakettle and all, had winked out of existence. The students had of course found this terribly amusing, but once the Headmaster had been summoned, it had turned out that the fireplace was gone for good and the boy had been terribly embarrassed. As he should be.
Sybill had tried lighting candles on every surface in the room, but it had not done much good, since it had been a particularly harsh winter that year and the wind seemed determined to find its way in through every impossibly tiny crack and hole. Though she had been rather miffed with Minerva who was, in a way, responsible for what had happened, she had also been exceedingly grateful when Minerva had offered that she could come stay with her until the fireplace had been found or a new one had been fitted.
She had already moved lessons to an empty classroom right next to where Minerva taught Transfiguration, so it made perfect sense. They had carried her things down together and that night they had lain awake for hours, just talking.
Sybill had tried sleeping in a soft armchair with her feet up on a stool, but it had been terribly uncomfortable. After she'd been turning and huffing for a while, Minerva had laughed and said that she had better come join her in the bed, or none of them would get much sleep. Which they didn't anyway. Lying there in the darkness, Minerva had opened up in a way she never had before. Told Sybill about her childhood and the years before she came to Hogwarts.
Sybill had returned her confidence by telling her about her own family and especially the expectations everyone seemed to have of all the female descendants of Cassandra Trelawney. Sybill had been the first to show any signs of Second Sight in half a century, so of course everyone had hailed her as the next great Seer.
At some point during the night, they had both drifted off, only to wake up, sleepy and confused but very very comfortable, as a house-elf knocked on the door, informing them that classes would be starting in twenty minutes.
It had taken several moments to register than they had somehow ended up in each other's arms. With a gasp they had pulled away and Sybill had practically jumped from the bed and picked up her clothes as she ran, blushing, from the room.
She had been rather distracted that day, but had made it through her classes. She took her lunch in the kitchens, but at dinner she figured there'd be too many questions if she did not come to the Great Hall. The whole school knew, after all, that her own rooms were uninhabitable.
Her seat was, thankfully, at almost the other end of the table from where Minerva sat and she avoided making eye contact. But then came the real dilemma. Should she return to Minerva's rooms? Where else could she go?
Figuring they might as well move past this silly thing, she knocked softly on the door before entering.
"Ah, Sybill," Minerva had greeted her. "Come in. It's far too cold to stand in the corridor. I've just made tea, do you want a cup?"
Almost laughing with relief, Sybill had nodded and joined her. The morning's incident had not been mentioned, though there was a brief moment of awkwardness when Sybill, shivering in her thin nightgown, had stood in the middle of the room, not sure where she was supposed to sleep.
But Minerva had just smiled and pulled the covers aside, making room for her in the bed.
The next morning, having managed to fall asleep before midnight, they woke up early and this time neither of them made any move to break the warm and comfortable embrace they once again found themselves in.
When Dumbledore, a week later, had told Sybill that her fireplace was back, she had moved classes back up to the tower, but continued returning to Minerva's room at the end of the day. They never really talked about it. They both just knew that being together made much more sense than sleeping apart.
"Miss…" Winky's voice tore her abruptly from her memories. "Miss should come see this. It is very strange, Miss."
Pulling her shawls around her, Sybill got up from her chair and joined the elf at the window. "What is it, Winky?" she asked, squinting a little in the bright sunlight reflected off the snow.
"Professor Hagrid's cabin, Miss. Look." Winky pointed and Sybill finally saw it.
Everywhere she looked, the ground was sparkling white. Except for a wide circle around the small cabin, where the grass was not only visible, but green as if in midsummer.