Chapter 17 – Christmas

"Listen to that," Rowena said as she sat on the front steps of the castle.

"What are we listening for?" Salazar asked as he sat down beside her.

"Quiet," Rowena replied. "Peace and quiet. The last time it was this quiet was before we opened."

"We do still have a few students here," Godric pointed out as he joined them. "Young Cutts is still here because his younger brother's have all got some contagious illness that the local healer can't identify. There's also a few others whose parents are abroad."

"But still," Rowena said. "It's so quiet."

"Well it would be if you didn't keep making a noise by saying so," Helga commented.

"We actually made it through the first term," Godric said. "With no deaths or serious injuries at all."

"Why do you sound so surprised?" Helga asked. "Were you expecting death and destruction every day?"

"Well perhaps not every day," Godric replied. "But certainly I was expecting more trouble than we've had. Let's hope that things continue like this for many decades to come."

"It will," Rowena said. "We've made it this far!"

Together the four founders sat and watched the sunset before heading back inside for supper.

"But why can't I have my present now?" Rowena asked in a whiny voice. It made no difference and Salazar continued to withhold her Christmas present from her.

"It's a surprise," Salazar told her for the fourth time. "You'll have to wait until later. And stop following me around pestering me or you won't get it at all."

"You've had your present," Rowena pointed out sulkily. "You've been going on about how wonderful this present is for days, and now it's finally Christmas Day you're still holding it back."

"That's right," Salazar replied with a smirk. "Now go help Helga in the kitchens or something."

"Helga kicked me out earlier. She won't let me back until she's finished preparing dinner. She says I get in the way and cause her twice as much work."

"Then why not go and help Augustus in the stables? Or go and read in the library?"

"I don't want to. I just want to know what my present is."

"Why don't you just give her whatever it is?" Godric asked from the other side of the teachers' common room. "Really, she's whining more than any of the first years did that day I told them we were going swimming in the lake."

"See, even Godric agrees with me." Rowena turned on her most charming smile and batted her eyelids rapidly.

"For crying out loud, would you just tell her before she sends herself blind," Godric called.

"No," Salazar insisted before pulling out his wand.

By the time Rowena had recovered from the full body bind Salazar had disappeared from the room.

"I can't believe he did that!" she exclaimed to Godric who seemed to find the whole thing extremely amusing. "Do you know what he's up to?"

"Thankfully I can honestly answer 'no' to that question," Godric replied with a smile. "He's been acting secretive all week."

"Are you sure about that?" Rowena asked as she brandished her own wand in Godric's general direction.

"Very sure," Godric said as he turned back to his correspondence.

Rowena wasn't sure that she believed him but it seemed to her that the easiest thing to do would be to simply try and track down Salazar wherever he'd disappeared to.

Several hours later and Rowena had still not found where Salazar had gone. She was starting to think that he was in the secret chamber but since he'd put Godric's pet basilisk in there she'd not even tried to figure out which bricks opened the passageway. Now she only went into the chamber with Salazar and was too nervous and jumpy to enjoy the place as she once had.

Since she couldn't find Salazar and didn't want to try to get into the Chamber, Rowena was now perched on one of the tables in the kitchen whilst Helga struggled to work around her.

"Maybe he forgot to buy me something and he's gone somewhere to find me something really special," Rowena suggested as she popped a grape into her mouth.

"He can't have forgotten Christmas," Helga patiently pointed out. "It's not like it's your birthday or some other odd date. It's Christmas!"

"He remembered my birthday," Rowena commented. "Maybe he's been kidnapped or got lost or…"

"This is Salazar we're talking about," Helga interrupted. "Not Godric."

"Well he must be somewhere!"

"He'll turn up when he wants to."

"You're not still whining about me, are you?" Salazar asked as he put his head round the door.

"Of course she is," Helga replied. "Now take her away with you so I can work in peace. She's been pestering me here for the last three hours."

Salazar rolled his eyes as he waved Rowena out of the door.

"So can I have my present now?" Rowena asked as he led her down the corridor.

"In a few minutes."

"After all this build up, it'd better be good," Rowena warned.

"Oh, I think you'll like it," Salazar said as he led her down to the dungeons.

"My present isn't anywhere near Godric's snake is it?" Rowena asked.

"No, it's in here," Salazar said as he opened the door to his own chambers.

A few minutes later Rowena was tearing into the wrapping paper around the small box.

"It's jewellery isn't it?" she asked as she shook the box slightly.

"Sort of," Salazar replied. "Considering the fuss you've made all morning, how about you open it instead of shaking it to pieces?"

"Good idea," Rowena said as she pulled the lid off the box and looked inside. "What is it?" she asked.

Inside the box was the most unusual necklace she'd ever seen. On the end of a fine and delicate silver chain hung a miniature silver hourglass suspended loosely within a ring.

"Don't turn the hourglass yet," Salazar said as Rowena moved to poke at it with her index finger.

"Why not?" asked Rowena as she looked closer at her present.

"It's a time-turner," Salazar said with a grin. "Or at least that's what I'm calling it."

"I've never seen anything quite like it," Rowena said. "Where did you find it?"

"Well that has to do with the other half of your present," Salazar said with a smug grin. "You see I finally managed to figure out how to work that room on the seventh floor, the one that comes and goes."

"You mean you got this in there?" Rowena asked. "I don't remember seeing it when we were there before."

"That's because it wasn't there before. The room provides whatever it is a person needs…with a few exceptions. It don't seem to be able to manage food or drink for example."

"You mean you got my present from the room?" Rowena asked with a raise of one eyebrow. "Cheapskate."

"Well if you don't want it, I can just take it back," Salazar teased. "But you might want to wait until I explain what it does."

"Does?"

"Actually I think it would be best to have you find out for yourself. Here, let me put it on you." Salazar moved behind her and took the necklace from her hands to tie it behind her neck. "Now turn the hourglass two…no make it three times."

Rowena did as he asked and waited.

"What now?" she asked. She turned around only to see that Salazar had gone.

"Salazar?" she called out. "Where are you? Sal? Come on, this isn't funny!"

Unfortunately Salazar didn't come at her call and no amount of searching his rooms could reveal his presence.

Eventually she decided to check out the mysterious room on the seventh floor. If it would open up for her, that is. However it was the only clue she had so she headed upstairs, keeping her eyes open for Salazar as she navigated the halls.

She arrived at the corridor where the vanishing room was located and was immediately surprised to see a door, slightly ajar, already there.

"Salazar?" she called out as she pushed open the door.

"Through here," Salazar called back.

Rowena closed the door behind her and walked down the hallway that was so different from the room that she'd seen the last time they'd gained access to the room. The hall was decorated for the holidays and opened out into a large living room with a roaring fireplace. This room was also decorated and Salazar was waiting for her in the centre.

"So how do you like your present?" he asked with a wide smile.

"How did you disappear from your room?" Rowena asked. "I thought we couldn't apparate in the castle?"

"I didn't apparate," Salazar replied. "In fact, I'm probably still there."

"Huh?"

"You haven't figured it out?" Salazar asked. He sounded a little disappointed in her but quickly recovered. "Never mind, it took me a while to figure it out too."

"Figure what out?"

"That little necklace you're now wearing can turn back time."

"What? Really? How do you know?"

"Because I did some extensive testing with it before deciding to give it to you," Salazar replied as he slapped her hands away from the hourglass in case she turned it again. "It goes back one hour for each turn. So now you're not only here with me, but you're also somewhere else in the school right now…bothering Helga, I believe."

"What if I'd run into myself?" Rowena asked. "That would've been really strange."

"You were in the kitchen with Helga so there was no chance of that providing you came straight up here like I'd planned. I just have to make sure that in three hours time I go and rescue Helga by removing you from the kitchen and giving you your present."

"Are you sure about this?" Rowena asked as she studied the hourglass.

"Absolutely," Salazar replied. "Plus, it'll get Godric off our backs. With this little beauty you can be a good little girl keeping watch over the Ravenclaw students upstairs in your own rooms, and keeping me company downstairs in my rooms at the same time."

"And this just appeared in the room here?" Rowena asked. "And why is the room so different today?"

"Well that's because this room is whatever you want it to be. I was here a few weeks ago, pacing outside it trying to figure out how to open it up again and then suddenly the door appeared. But the room was different. Once I figured out how to open the room up I started to experiment to see what else it could change into. Then one day I was in here and was wondering about how to solve our other little problem and suddenly there was the time-turner on a table."

"Are you sure you don't want to keep it?" Rowena asked.

"I can always try to get the room to provide another one." Salazar grinned. "And what do you think of the rest of your present." He gestured around the room.

"It's a lovely room," Rowena said as she settled down in front of the fire. "It's like a little cottage. It's hard to believe we're still in the middle of the school."

"A cottage is exactly what it is," Salazar said as he sat down beside her. "You've seen the hallway, this is the living room. There's a kitchen through there, though you have to provide the food yourself, the bedroom and the privy are both back there." He pointed out the various rooms as he spoke then turned his wand towards the fireplace causing the flames to shoot even higher.

"It's perfect," Rowena said as she curled up beside him like a contented kitten.

"Not quite," Salazar replied sadly.

"If you're going to make some joke about my cooking…" Rowena warned as she jabbed him in the ribs.

"I mean it's not real," Salazar said as he grabbed her hand to stop any further assaults on his person.

"Seems pretty real to me," Rowena replied. "I can feel the heat from the flames."

"But it's just a magical room in a castle and not an actual cottage where we could live out our lives together."

"I never pictured you as the cottage type."

"Why not?" Salazar asked. "I'd be world famous by inventing new potions and improving the ones we have, you'd be raising our dozen children."

Rowena snorted.

"What?" he asked.

"You want a dozen babies then you better start working on a potion that enables men to carry them and give birth."

"All right, maybe half a dozen then."

"Some compromise," Rowena muttered. "What's wrong with me being a famous inventor?"

"Nothing at all," Salazar admitted with a laugh. "You can be whatever you want to be. And woe betide anyone who stands in your way."

"Too right!"

"I'm sorry," Salazar said as he hugged her close.

"What for?"

"For not marrying you five years ago when I should have done."

"You'd have been cut off. I understand the choice you had to make. I never blamed you for it."

"I know you don't; that doesn't stop me blaming myself though."

"I'd not ask you to choose between me and your mother."

"Which is one of the many reasons I love you so much."

"Maybe your father will change his mind one day?" Rowena suggested, though she didn't sound very hopeful.

"Whether he changes his mind or not, one day we'll be married and we'll have our cottage, I promise."

"Don't make promises you can't keep," Rowena warned.

"I never do," Salazar assured her. "No matter what, one day this will be real."

"Whatever it takes," Rowena agreed.

"But for now, this'll have to do."

"And it does very nicely," Rowena replied. "It's a wonderful present, thank you."

Salazar smiled down at her mischievously. "Well we have a few hours to kill before I have to leave and give you your present. What do you suggest we do to pass the time?"

"Oh I have a few ideas," Rowena replied with a wicked grin of her own.

Author Note: This is the final part of this story so I hope you enjoyed it. I thought that the end of the first term of Hogwarts was as suitable a place as any to wind things up.

I have now posted the first part of the sequel to this story since a few people indicated they wanted to see one. It is actually entirely written now (yes I have no life at all) so there is no danger of the sequel being an unfinished story or anything like that. The sequel does have some humour in it but is rather more romance/drama than romance/humour. It is called Whatever it Takes and I hope if you enjoyed this story you will consider checking out the sequel as well.