Albus has a stalker and Gellert gets jealous. Or maybe Albus is getting paranoid.
1965
15 March 1965
Dear Gellert
May I be so bold to inquire if recent events in the vicinity of my person have anything to do with you? I appear to have the sensation of being watched as I go about Hogwarts. And I do not mean by the portraits. Look, I trust you have not been in contact with any of your followers apart from your maybe ex-wife. I have also checked in with Peeves and the local ghosts if they have heard or seen anything unusual. Apart from Hagrid trying to raise a normal and safe kitten for once, that is.
I could have sworn I was almost out of lemon sherbets, but I walked into the faculty common room to find my candy jar full. It does not come with a self-replenishing charm, by the way. Next was the pairs of my socks laid out on my bed. Peeves swore it was not his doing. Then someone rearranged my students' test papers on my desk when I went out for a breath of fresh air. Transfiguration theory grading can be quite intense. My fireplace has been going off at odd hours as if someone was trying to Floo in but no one turns up. I have this odd feeling of being stalked but my spells did not uncover anything.
Yours worriedly
Albus
Spring 1965
Dearest Albus
My, my, are you trying to make me jealous. How I wish I could be there to shadow your every move… Jokes aside, I have nothing to do with whatever is happening in Hogwarts. About poor Vinda, she has completed her transformation into a lemon tree last spring. Stupid curse. I hear the locals adore her fruits for their lemon desserts. So we can rule her out for one. As to the rest of my motley crew, I have not heard a peep out of them since 1945. They might be dead or turned over a new leaf – not that I particularly care.
Please tell me you did not partake of those lemon drops or whatever sweets that popped up. You might find yourself poisoned or worse, enchanted with a love charm and married to some simpering witch. And get your fireplace disconnected from the Floo network and locked up. Brick it up if needed. An open fireplace is not ideal in terms of security. Imagine the headlines – Supreme Mugwump assassinated in his own bed.
If I were stalking you, I would not bother with the test scripts or socks. Are you sure you are not getting forgetful in your dotage? I mean - did you forget you refiled those pesky scripts or took out your socks in the first place? Maybe I should try if I can still Dreamwalk into your mind like in the 1930's. I doubt it would work given my powers have been on the frizz since that day in 1945.
Yours hauntingly
Gellert Grindelwald
P.S. Perhaps you might have a word with the Ministry for me to join in Hogwarts to catch this stalker of yours. It is obvious you have no clue about how one should go about catching this slippery snake.
1st April 1965
Dear Gellert
Nice try but do not get your hopes up. I am not going to risk any of my students with you on campus. The headmaster would never allow it. Neither will the Ministry. Unless we put you in that currently empty DADA posting – poor bloke got Confounded by a fifth year and was shipped off to St Mungo. I do not hate you that much yet.
Please do not try to Dreamwalk. That is a high-level magic feat and I doubt you have enough magic to pull that off now. You might get magically concussed. Plus, I would like to keep some of my dreams private. As for those lemon sherbets, I disposed of the lot given that I found a dead rat in the jar. I would not mind cockroach clusters or chocolate frogs, but dead rat is a no-no. I am still faced with the socks. One could blame the house-elves but none of them have been in my room since that first incident. As you have advised, the fireplace has been disconnected but I am not bricking it up. Nights are cold here and I do enjoy toasted marshmallows.
Nearly Headless-Nick volunteered to escort me about the place while keeping an eye out for any oddness. So far nothing spotted out of the ordinary aside from the second-years trying to smuggle a baby threstal into the Ravenclaw common room to test the theory of flight. That did not end well. The common room needed extensive repairs. And Minerva's new hairdo – it is either she is looking forward to the Lake Regatta or someone made a mistake with hair transfiguration. Still the stately model tall ship in her hair suits her.
Your friend
Albus
P.S. Someone dumped a baby mandrake in my sheets. I could have been Petrified if the poor critter were not already dead and dried up from being left so long there.
Spring 1965
Dear Albus
How cutthroat is British academia? Sounds like one of your colleagues has it in for you. We in Durmstrang are very competitive and the competition extends to which professors make tenure or Headmaster. By any chance are you in the line-up for Headmaster? That might explain quite a bit about what is happening. We had a change of three Dark Arts masters in my first year with our headmaster due for retirement. Nasty business. If it is too hot for you, you can always get out. Take another vacation. Go tour the Orient or Africa.
Or did you get on the wrong side of one of your students? Perhaps that Tom Riddle chap you keep kicking a fuss about back in the early 1940's? The same bloke you claimed jinxed the DADA post? Silly blighter probably figured you are not touching that post with a broomstick so more creative action had to be deployed to make you question your sanity.
Once more, sure you do not need me to watch your back?
Gravely concerned
Gellert
30th April 1965
Dear Gellert
No, I am not running for headmaster yet. Dippet has been convinced to stay on for another 5 years. My good friend decided to call in the Ministry after I admitted to being stalked. As it turned out, it was a storm in a teacup. One bright young Auror was assigned to go undercover in the student population as a senior transfer student. He set up some devices to monitor my rooms for any malicious presences. None of them went off even when my socks got rearranged again. So Moody decided to have them watch me instead. Turns out I have been sleepwalking while taking naps in my office between classes and rearranging my own socks back in my room. Must be the new caffeinated cocoa tonic I have been trying out.
Dippet also confessed to setting a watch-spell on me and the other professors in the run-up to the faculty appraisal. I believe he set it too strong on me this round so I actually noticed it and it followed me outside my classes. Minerva and the ladies had a few words and more with our headmaster about his spying. I believe it is perfectly acceptable to sit in on a class for that purpose. I will not speculate as to why my friend emerged from that meeting with claw marks on his face. The only professor not subjected to the watch was old Binns for the simple fact he does not draw a salary for teaching History since he died. I am not going paranoid or losing my marbles. The weird Floo-ing was nothing but bad linkage once Moody called his colleague from the Floo Network Department to have a look. Slughorn was holding conferences with his collaborators in the Americas at odd hours and the poor linkage leaked over to my adjacent fireplace.
Hagrid finally came clean to me about his friend – a Caipora named Alfonso. Seems Alfonso was accidentally left behind by an exchange student from Peru about two years back. He did not wish to return home at that point, so he kept hidden in the Forbidden Forest until the centaurs kicked him out. Hagrid found him and took him in. The rearranged test scripts was his doing after he knocked them over trying to find his old master's records for a way to get back to South America. As were the lemon sherbets – Alfonso scoffed the lot and Hagrid replaced them with some he purchased at a dodgy candy shop. The Caipora has good taste. None of the ghosts noticed Alfonso as they mistook him for another house-elf (wearing a wig). The mandrake was also his handiwork. Caiporas are apparently immune to mandrake cries, and he thought the great wizard might be able to save a dying baby mandrake. Sadly, the herbology expert here is Sprout. I was never one for houseplants.
I find Alfonso rather companionable, and I am considering hiring him on as a teaching assistant, but my pay grade does not allow for that. Moreover, the poor chap is homesick. I will be making a change to my vacation plans this year. Somewhere more adventurous instead of Bristol or Dover. I will travel to Peru and see those Inca ruins you mentioned.
Your friend
Albus
P.S. Will send you a postcard.
Summer 1965
Dear Albus
How dare you go gallivanting about Machu Picchu with a jungle sprite? It's a pity there was no actual stalker out to do you harm on my behalf. This is just like that time about Egypt. I told you all about the wonders of Egypt, and how we should go see them together. You went for a sail along the Nile with a troop of Muggles and one of the Scamanders in the 1920's, without me. And may I remind you of your more recent flight over the Victoria Falls?
A postcard? You want to fob me off with a postcard?
Hating you
Grindelwald
P.S. If I do predecease you, I will definitely make it a point to haunt you at Hogwarts. So there.
Author's Notes:
Albus is off on an exotic summer vacation and rubbing it in Grindelwald's face. Grindelwald haunting Hogwarts - will never happen. I think the resident ghosts would vote him out.