Authors Note: I DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT own any of the Harry Potter characters, names, places, things, etc. All of this belongs to the ever legendary J.K Rowling. Please Review, Favorite and Follow!

I really don't got much to say this chapter, but thanks to all of those who have stuck to this story! I really appreciate it!

OH! Got something! If anyone has any prank ideas they would be willing to let me use in later chapters and stories I would really appreciate it! Of course I will give credit to who gave me the idea. I'm trying to come up with some good ones! Thanks in advance! '

It was now December and that meant one thing. Christmas was coming. To most of the school it was a heaven sent, meaning time to visit family and friends from your old school, no homework, and presents. To me it meant staying with either the Dursleys or staying here at the school, no homework and no presents. Yes I know, my life's depressing, but hey, it's mine.

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So now it was mid-December, the weather turning an icy cold which meant every morning you had to run from your warm blanket cocoon and sprint for the bathrooms to shower otherwise your feet would freeze to the carpeted floor. No one was found wandering the corridors without a coat or a winter robe on and nearly everyone had a trail of mist puffing from their mouths as they talked. The top layer of the lake was frozen solid, the murky water underneath stagnant from the frigid temperature below. The bitter winds that had come down from the mountains battled against the owls making their way to Hogwarts to deliver letters, battering their wings and rustling their feathers, but Hagrid nursed them all back to health before they flew off again.

The twins had gotten detention a week back for bewitching snowballs to hit the back of Professor Quirrell's turban, making them follow him around wherever he went. When asked I refused repeatedly to the teachers that I had no part in it, which caused the twins to 'ignore' me for a week. But for them 'ignore' just means I can't participate in any of their pranks. Something their younger brother, Ron, thinks is unfair because 'ignore' for him is basically the silent treatment.

The classrooms themselves were freezing, but the worst had to have been the dungeons. Most of the teachers had been nicer and conjured little fires in their rooms, but Snape sure didn't. Add to that the fact that the wind came in through the corridors and drifted down to the already cold dungeon classrooms. Most of us kept as close to their cauldrons during those miserable hours. Malfoy had made a snide comment in Potions class one day, sending me a pointed look as he looked straight at Harry "I do feel sorry, for all those people who have to stay at Hogwarts for Christmas because they're not wanted at home."

I send him a sharp glare and turned back to mixing my potion with Hermione. I hadn't caught Harry's response.

After the Potions lesson Hermione and I huddled against each other as we made our way out of the dungeons, but the next corridor was blocked by a large fir tree. I glanced at the large feet sticking out from the bottom "Hi, Hagrid, want any help?"

"Nah, I'm alright, thanks Hope." Hagrid huffed.

"Would you mind moving out of the way?" Malfoy drawled from behind us. "Are you trying to earn some extra money, Potter? Hoping to be the gamekeeper yourself when you leave Hogwarts, I suppose—that hut of Hagrid's must seem like a palace compared to your house back with your filthy muggle relatives."

I spun on my heel and was about to dive at Malfoy when someone beat me to it. A black haired, green eyed someone. I heard a gasp from behind when Daphne rounded the corner "Harry!"

Harry pulled back from his punch with a satisfactory smirk. Malfoy's once slicked back hair was now ruffled with odd ends sticking in odd places and his lip had busted open, bleeding all over his pristine robes. Malfoy blinked up at him in surprise, hand wiping at his lip and pulling it back to see it for himself.

"POTTER!" Snape had just came up the stairs.

"He was provoked, Professor Snape," Hagrid said at once, sticking his hairy face out from behind the tree "Malfoy was insulting his an' Hope's family."

"Be that as it may, fighting is against Hogwarts rules, Hagrid." Snape said silkily. "Five points from Slytherin, Potter, and be grateful it isn't more. Now move along, all of you."

Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle all pushed past us, bumping purposefully into the tree and scattering needles.

"I'll get him, one of these days, I'll get him." Harry said menacingly.

"I hate them both." Theodore stated "Malfoy and Snape."

"Come on, cheer up, it's nearly Christmas." Hagrid said in an effort to lift the heavy mood "Tell ya what, come with me an' see the Great Hall, looks a treat."

So all five of us followed Hagrid and his tree to the Great Hall, where Professor McGonagall and Flitwick were busy with the Christmas decorations.

Hagrid was called over to put the tree elsewhere as we gazed upon the hall. It really did look astonishing. Garlands of holly and mistletoe hung around the walls and at least twelve towering Christmas trees stood around the room, some sparkling with tiny ice crystals or hundreds of small candles.

"How many days do yer got left for yer holidays?" Hagrid asked.

"Just one." Hermione replied "Which reminds me, Hope, Harry, Daphne, Theodore, we should be in the library."

"Oh yeah… right." I groaned, tearing my eyes away from the golden bubbles coming out of Flitwick's wand.

"The library?" Hagrid asked surprised "Just before the holidays? Bit keen aren't yeh?"

"Oh, we aren't working." Harry said brightly "Ever since you mentioned Nicolas Flamel we've been trying to find out who he is."

"You what?" Hagrid asked shocked "Listen here—I've told yeh—drop it. It's nothin' to you what that dog's guardin'.

"We just want to know who he is, that's all." I said innocently.

"Unless you'd like to tell us and save us the trouble? We've must've been through hundreds of books already and we can't find him anywhere." Theodore started hopefully.

"Just a hint." I whined "I know I've read his name somewhere."

"I'm sayin' nothin'." Hagrid said flatly.

"Just have to find out for ourselves then." Daphne sighed dramatically and we all left Hagrid to go off to the library.

We really had been looking for Flamel's name ever since Hagrid had let it slip. How else were we going to find out what Snape was trying to steal? Only problem was, it was very hard to find a place to start, not knowing what he did to get himself into a book. Daphne and Hermione had scavenged all the more vastly known books like Great Wizards of the Twentieth Century, Notable Magical Names of Our Times, Important Modern Magical Discoveries, and in A Study of Recent Developments in Wizardry. We just couldn't find him. Even the library itself must have grown in size since the last time I've seen it, it just appeared as if it had more books than before. There were tens of thousands of books, thousands of shelves and hundreds of narrow rows. We were doomed.

Hermione pulled out a list of things and subjects she had decided to search and marched off with Daphne in tow while Harry, Theodore and I were left to start pulling books out of their shelves at random. I passed the Restricted Section and wondered for the millionth time if Flamel wasn't somewhere in there. Sadly you needed a signed form to get any of the restricted books and I knew I probably couldn't get one. Most of the books were dangerous and either were full of Dark Magic or something else unsafe.

"What are you looking for, girl?"

I glanced up at Madam Pince, the librarian "I—I'm looking for… my friend. Oh look, there he is."

I dashed away from the librarian before she could call me back as I made my way towards Harry, dodging a Ravenclaw to absorbed in her book to move. You may be wondering why we never asked the librarian about Nicolas Flamel, it would be the smart thing to do, and we would, but we didn't want Snape to find out we were looking in to it. Considering the fact we had been in the library for only two weeks, sneaking in library time during odd moments, we weren't surprised we hadn't found anything yet.

I snatched out a book and started to flip through the pages, skimming its content and humming to myself. Theodore walked over to me and grabbed a book "This is stupid."

I huffed a laugh and righted the book in his hand as he had begun reading it upside down. He pretended he didn't notice.

I walked over to the desk Harry sat at and sat down beside him. I heard a frustrated groan and Hermione came around the corner "I can't find Famous Witches and Wizards of Our Era anywhere! Madam Pince said it was in."

I held up the book in my hands so she could see the cover "This it?"

Hermione blinked at me "How did you find that?"

"I picked at random."

Hermione snatched it from my hands and walked away yelling "Daphne I found it!"

"Where was it?"

"Hope had it!"

"She took my book." I pouted.

Harry watched me from behind his own book "Poor you."

"Poor me." I agreed.

Harry went back to slowly skimming his book. I cleared my throat. He looked up at me "What?"

"I just wanted to say thanks… you know… for earlier."

Harry frowned before realization appeared on his face "You don't have to say thanks, you didn't make me. It was of my consent and of the whole school's consent, but mostly mine."

I laughed softly at the memory.

Daphne came up to us from behind and shook her blonde hair "We looked at the few books we both thought to look up. He's not there."

"But Nott is here." Came Theodore's voice.

We all groaned and Harry swatted at his friend's head.

Hermione walked over and looked at me "You will at least keep looking while we are away, won't you?"

I rolled my eyes. We had been over this before. "Yes I will and I'll send you all an owl as soon as I find it."

"You sure you'll be ok here alone?" Daphne asked me in concern.

Daphne, Hermione, Harry and Theodore were all going home for Christmas while I stayed here at Hogwarts.

I nod "Ill. Be. Fine. Honest."

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Once the holidays had started, I forgot all about Nicolas Flamel. Since I was without Hermione for the holidays and therefore 'alone' as the twins called it, I spent most of my time with them. And Ron, but only because Dean and Seamus had left him all alone too. The reason the Weasleys weren't going home for the holidays was because their mum, dad and younger sister Ginny were going to visit their older brother Charlie in Romania on a dragon preserve he worked at.

I had started to become good friend with Ron. Whenever I wasn't thinking up good prank ideas with the twins or all three of us were having a snowball fight, I was with Ron roasting anything we could find like bread, English muffins, and marshmallows over the common room fire on a toasting fork. Ron had also started teaching me how to play wizard chess. It was exactly like Muggle chess except that the figures were alive. Ron's chessmen were old and battered, like everything he owned, having once belonged to his grandfather. But that wasn't a disadvantage at all, he knew them very well. As odd as that sounds.

Ron had smuggled Seamus' set of chessmen for me to play with and let me tell you, they didn't trust me one bit. I wasn't a very good player yet and they kept shouting different bits of advice at me. "Don't send me there, can't you see his knight? Send him, we can afford to lose him."

It got very confusing.

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Christmas Eve had arrived faster than I thought. I went to bed that night ready for the food and the fun, not expecting any presents. However when I woke up, I was faced with a small pile of packages at the foot of my bed. I blinked in surprise and looked around the empty dormitory before I slinked down to the floor. I picked up the top parcel which said it was from Hagird and tore it open. Inside was a roughly cut wooden flute, something Hagrid had obviously whittled himself. I blew it and it sounded very much like an owl.

I picked up a very small parcel and read the note attached:

We received your message and enclosed your Christmas present. From Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia.

And taped to the note was a fifty-pence piece.

"That's friendly."

I then grabbed a lumpy brown parcel and felt as it squished beneath my fingers. I opened it and found a thick, hand-knitted sweater in emerald green and a large box of homemade fudge. I frowned when I found no note and hesitantly took a bite of the fudge, which was very tasty. I shrugged and tugged the sweater over my tank top.

The next present was also candy, a large box of Chocolate Frogs from Hermione. I popped out a chocolate frog and laid the Miranda Goshawk card down on the floor, I already had her, chomping on the rich chocolate slowly.

Daphne had sent me candy to, a box full of sugar quills. I think she's addicted to them, you never see her without one.

I grabbed the last parcel and opened it carefully, being the last present I had gotten. I let the paper drop to the ground and I picked up the note:

Merry Christmas from us all. I was going to get you something else, but Pads said you would like this more because no one can resist Sirius Black. You can punch him next time you see him.

Love James, Lily, Harry, Sirius and Remus

Each name was signed by its owner, something that surprised me. I looked down at the present Sirius had gotten just for me and laughed out loud. I gazed upon the black miniature stuffed dog with dark brown eyes. It looked exactly like the Grim who so happened to look exactly like Sirius. Or should that be the other way around? Sirius looked exactly like the Grim?

I picked up the dog and marveled at its soft fur. I laughed "Padfoot."

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I walked down the stairs and entered the common room, smiling as the twins and Ron looked up at me.

"Sleeping Beauty awakes!" George cried. "It's a miracle."

Ron's eyes landed on my sweater, his cheeks flushing red "You got a Weasley sweater too?"

I gazed down at my shirt "Is that who it's from? There wasn't a note."

Fred and George both nodded "Yeah, we told mum how you told us you weren't expecting much for Christmas."

"So she must have made you a sweater."

"Ah, that was sweet of her." I said softly.

"She obviously makes more of an effort if you're not family." Fred frowned.

It was then that I noticed that Ron was wearing a maroon colored sweater with a large R on the front. The twins both wearing a blue one, one with a large F while the other had a large G printed on the front. I cocked my head "Hey George, aren't you wearing Fred's?"

Both twins looked down at their sweaters.

"I suppose you think we forgot our names, huh?" George tutted. "But we're not stupid—we know we are called Gred and Forge."

I blinked at his sudden serious face and started to laugh.

"What's all this noise?"

Percy Weasley made his way over to us. Clearly he had been in the middle of unwrapping his presents as he too carried a lumpy sweater over his arm.

Fred seized it at once and cooed "Oh look, P for prefect! Get it on Percy, come on, we're all wearing ours, even Hope got one."

"I – don't – want." Said Percy thickly as the twins proceeded to force the sweater over his head and knocking his glasses to the floor.

"And you're not sitting with the prefects today either." George said rather firmly "Christmas is a time for family."

The twins then marched Percy over to a couch to sit down, Percy's arms pinned down to his side by his sweater.

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Never in all of my life had I had such a Christmas dinner. A hundred fat roast turkeys, mountains of roast and boiled potatoes, turrets of buttered peas, silver boats of gravy and cranberry sauce covered the tables. I could only wonder how this many students could consume this much, it was nearly a feast and nearly three-thirds of the students were gone. There were these things called wizard crackers that were stacked every few feet and these were nothing like regular, muggle ones the Dursleys usually bought. I had pulled one with George and it banged like a cannon and engulfed us all in a cloud of blue smoke, leaving behind a rear admiral's hat and several live, white mice. George forced the hat onto my head.

Flaming Christmas pudding followed the turkey, Percy nearly breaking his teeth on a silver Sickle embedded in his slice. It was funny to watch the professors up at the Head table, Hagrid's face getting redder and redder as he drank his wine and he actually kissed McGonagall on the cheek, making her giggle and blush.

By the time the feast had winded down I was loaded down by a stack of things from the wizard crackers. Including a pack of non-explodable, luminous balloons, a Grow-Your-Own-Warts kit, and my own wizard chess set. Closely after that the Weasleys and I had a furious snowball fight on the grounds. Fred, Percy and Ron had sided against me and George, but I was glad to announce that they left just as cold, wet and as breathless as me and George did. We all returned to the fire in the Gryffindor common room and Ron made me try out my new chess set.

I suspect I wouldn't have lost so badly if Percy hadn't tried to help me so much.

After a meal of turkey sandwiches, crumpets, trifle, and Christmas cake, everyone felt to full and sleepy to do much of anything. Ron and I lazily watched as Percy chased Fred and George around the tower because they'd stolen his prefect badge.

That day had been the best Christmas ever, and after biding goodnight to the Weasley boys, I headed to bed. I was asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.