Chapter Eighteen
oooP1ooo
(Harry)
Morning light filtered through branches and evergreen needles. Snow covered the ground. It muffled any sound that may have reached him during the summer. The ancient forest was so very quiet. Even Mother's magic felt sluggish underfoot. Everything slept in winter, even her.
Salazar stared down at the opening to the escape route, ignoring how slowly the wild magic moved through him. The opening was more obvious now. The tree reaching out from inside the hole was one of the deciduous trees in the forest. Without leaves to shelter it, snow floated down into the hole. Light reflected off the snowflakes in such a manner that it gave the hole a halo effect.
The snow crunched underfoot as he traced the entire opening with a hand. He had to walk several paces from one end to reach the other in every direction. His wand rotated across his other palm as he walked the large gaping hole, always pointing North. Once he traced the edge and determined the cardinal directions, he pulled out four small disks of wood. The disks were absolutely covered in runes and identical to each other.
He pressed a disk onto the inside ceiling of the opening as close to North, East, South, and West as he could estimate. A burst of magic into each disk partly stuck them in place and partly began the awakening process. Then he climbed back into the escape route.
The four disks glowed from their places on the ceiling. Magic slowly pulsed across the tiny runes etched across the wood.
Salazar pulled out the cube, now completely covered in swirl designs of runes. There were so many layers it looked like a snapshot of a vortex instead of a wooden cube. The boy pressed his fingers on opposite sides of the cube so that he held the cube between his fingertips. He pressed magic into the runic design. His magic activated the runes and began to spin the cube. The runes across the cube lit with vibrant blue and green light. Afterimages of the light seared across his sight, creating swirls of green and blue in his vision.
A humming filled the hidden hall as the cube spun. At the sound, Salazar slowly moved his hands away from the spinning, now floating, cube. He kept his hands a few inches from it, magic glowing against his fingertips as he continued to feed the runic design power. Another moment passed, then the humming rose an octave and the runic swirls visibly waved and twisted right off the cube.
Ribbons of the carefully etched runic scheme floated with dazzling brilliance out into the walls. Some even traveled straight through Salazar, intent on its intended home and unconcerned with anything else. Once the marks reached the stone, the swirling runes etched themselves into the walls. The swirls seemed to merge with the stone even as they continued to dance and unravel from the cube.
The hum reached another octave as the ends of the swirling design separated from the cube. The disks on the ceiling flared and called out with their own humming. The tails of the swirled design responded by whipping up into the disks. Each disk caught seven tails.
Light flashed from every inch possessing a runic mark, blinding Salazar for a moment. When it died away, the runic scheme faded from view. The stone returned to its normal gray appearance. Only the disks remained. Their surfaces were still covered in runes but they were stained a deep gray and blended well with the stone. They were a blatant weakness to the otherwise eloquent ward design.
If Salazar had had more time he would have been able to create something better but one had to consider all the various duties and desires and weigh them against perfection. He simply didn't have the time to spare nor was this little opening worth the time it would need. Maybe he'd come to regret his decision down the road. There was no point in worrying over it now.
Salazar dusted his hands. Fine wood dust fell, the remains of the wooden cube. His hair was soaked through. Sweat slid down the sides of his face in thick drops of liquid. His tunic had seen better days between the large swaths of sweat and the layer of fine wood dust.
An ache pulsed from his chest, his core was stretched just past comfortable. Between the most recent purification, the lasting edge of strain from Samhain, and this, he would have to take it easy the next few days. The parselmouth needed to avoid setting up any other wards at the very least.
He climbed back up the tree to make sure what he had set up worked well enough. At the entrance of the opening, a transparent blue barrier materialized. Salazar pressed his hand against it. The barrier rippled. A thin layer of magic swept out and returned with a general affirmative warmth against his hand. No intelligent being was near.
The barrier dissolved after that check and he climbed out of the opening. His illusion worked as well as expected. There were some things he couldn't change or hide with the time he had. The tree was still shorter than the rest of the trees surrounding it. Now it appeared to have a rooted base above ground, though. And if one looked too closely the snowflakes that fell didn't cause the illusioned snow pile to grow. Luckily it would only be obvious if someone saw a large amount of snowfall at once and witnessed the lack of change to the height of the illusioned pile—or actually stared at the illusion long enough to see the slight jump as the illusion shifted the snow height to match the surrounding piles.
He returned to the opening and proceeded to walk across it. There was no sudden drop nor any shift of the ground. The illusion successfully continued the sound of crunched snow underfoot. A glance down revealed "his" footprints. Salazar stared at the illusioned footprints for the next ten minutes (admittedly considering what he should focus on next instead of paying the illusion much mind as he waited for the equivalent of paint drying).
At the ten-minute mark, the illusion reset itself. The footprints vanished but the real ones he had created remained—including the circle of footprints he had made when setting the discs on the ceiling.
Another weakness he couldn't do much about right now.
Salazar sighed, kicked up some snow to destroy the majority of his footprints, glanced up at the dark sky, and forced himself to return to the entry. It was going to snow more soon. There was little reason to think someone or something would find his footprints before they vanished. He hissed out his chosen password and headed back inside. There wasn't much else he could do. It would have to be enough for now.
oooP2ooo
(Neville)
Godric flopped down onto his Hogwarts-colored pouf with a huff. Sweat slicked his hair back. He should be taking a cleansing bath, Salazar was probably waiting for him in fact, but he felt too antsy to laze about a pool.—He had the feeling his memory issues were not the only reason he had been on a hair-trigger when he first awoke.
His core thrummed against his chest. Even the tiny amount of contamination removed by the latest purification left him light and jittery with energy. Burning through it all was counter to the healer's orders to rest his core. Sword training only strained his physical form but it was something he could do. Feeling exhausted and energized all at once was frustrating. That he could do nothing about it, only made it worse.
He couldn't help but wonder how it would feel to be entirely free of the gunk trapping most of his core away. Godric imagined not being able to sleep for a week straight. It would be both glorious and agonizing.
The blond glared at the flickering candle before him as he forced himself to take a deep, slow breath. Magic pulsed through the protective runic circle, glowing around the edge of the tower room as he tried to focus on meditation. If he wanted to make certain Sally lived, he needed to be in top shape. That meant more than just cleaning his magic. Missing ten years of memory was not being at his best either.
Of course, he still didn't know how to find those memories. Some people never regained what they forgot.—His gut churned with anxiety at the thought of never regaining the memories he misplaced.
Bizarrely, that reaction was comforting. Godric had never felt so much anxiety and worry until he woke up here. Those emotions were from whatever the hell had happened to him in the last ten years. It meant his missing memories couldn't be so far out of reach. They were affecting him in ways he didn't really get but he, grudgingly, would take the sign in a positive light.
Godric closed his eyes and breathed slowly. If he didn't get his memories back or didn't get all his memories back, he at least had his muscle memories and his past life's knowledge. He wasn't starting from scratch on fighting and defending, just on modern knowledge and his life now. Godric could keep Sally alive.
A useless wand didn't mean he couldn't fight. Most of his magic was too destructive in tight quarters without a focus but he would figure it out, had done so before.—And sword training was going somewhere. He was losing the excess weight as he worked his ass off. If he could find his original sword, as unlikely as that probably was, he would be golden. That sword was worth more than ten usable wands. After so long, it was more attuned to his core than any wand could possibly be for the next fifty years. (Or could have been...he had no idea if it would still be attuned to his core.)
"What are you doing?"
His mind stilled at the whispered demand of an old lady floated to his consciousness. It was gone as soon as it came.
Hazel eyes blinked open in confusion. He stared at the dancing flame.
That had to have been a memory, a snippet of memory. How had he pulled it to the surface? He hadn't even really focused on meditating over memories.
He had been thinking about his swordwork. He had a long way to go before he was where he wanted to be at eleven but he was getting somewhere with it, unlike his magic. It was one of the few things he had accomplished over all these obstacles, many of which veered toward issues he had little experience in. Emotional and mental upheaval without the accompanying memory to explain it was just exhausting. Give him monsters any day.
"–fighting the monsters Gran!"
Godric blinked a few times. That tiny little child's voice was him. It was a simple, bizarre fact that he just knew.
A thought about monsters had helped pull it toward the surface. Godric took a steady breath of sage sweet air, mentally pushing away any rush of excitement (and fear), and closed his eyes. The candlelight glowed through his lids as he focused on both his sword work and the monsters he had taken down over the years while keeping in mind the missing memories.
There was that rabid buggane(1) that cursed an entire village because one of the men had stolen its hunt. That had taken some work. Sally had spent a week unraveling the curse over the village while Godric figured out how to kill the thing before it could curse either of them.
The hag Salazar had teased him about was another kill. She had been hunting children on the outskirts of York. Sally and he had happened to be in the area—cute little apprentices that got mixed up in things bigger than themselves at the time.
Just thinking of some of the creatures he had fought and killed had his hand itching to pull a blade he no longer had. That desire pulled the worst of the creatures to the forefront of his memory. The daimōns they had found in the East were disturbing and dangerous creatures that liked the taste of magical humans, particularly the young ones.—Thank the Mother that the groves helped keep those creatures and their dimensional gates from the Isles. (If only the groves gave similar protection to the various horrors from other parts of the world. The fewer ghouls running around, for instance, the better.)
Godric made a face as he considered the creatures they had helped hunt after running into a party of the Triad. That had been one long campaign Salazar and he shouldn't have gotten involved in. They had met people from all over the known world, but they had nearly died multiple times.
He swung the stick. It swooped through the air and the evil creature screamed as the stick—sword—sliced through it. Excitement pulsed through him as he danced about the back garden with the stick he had found. The dream—nightmare—had the ugly, horrid monster screaming at him with red water (Blood. He knew it was blood even though he had never seen it before, had never been told of it.) dripping from its lips. It had feasted on some one thing.
There had been a battle in his nightmare. These monsters had been in it and it was terrifying...so many people laying in red water on the ground. But he had fought back, just like he was now. The monsters couldn't get him. He would stop them and had stopped them in the dream. He had to because his brother dropped to his knee and–
He paused in his imagined battle: He didn't have a brother.
"What are you doing?"
Godric flinched and twisted about to face his Gran, clenching his sword—stick—behind his back. She had her lips pressed, displeased.
"Well?"
"I'm uh…" Godric darted wide hazel eyes over to grandpa who had just left his greenhouse and was headed over to them. Grandpa was too far away to help. He turned back to Gran and said, "Imma fighting the monsters Gran!"
Her lips puckered as if she didn't know if she should be pleased or not. "Monsters?"
Grandpa joined them and looked amused as he caught the last remark. "That's a mightily long wand, Neville. I can't say I've seen a wand that long–"
"It's a sword!" Godric corrected sharply, insulted at the idea that he'd bring a wand to a life-and-death situation. Wands were for children! They were beginners' tools and used to restrict magic in duels, they weren't for killing and defending.
Neville frowned at his own thoughts.—That couldn't be right. Everyone used wands. You had to use a wand to use your magic.
Gran yanked the stick out of his hands before snapping it across his rump twice. He yelped but she shouted over his cry. "You are a wizard! Proper wizards don't use–" Her lips curled in disgust even as tears welled down his cheeks from the sudden pain across his backside. "–muggle weapons!" She took the stick in two hands and snapped it in two before pointing back to the house. "Inside, now! You're grounded from playing in the garden for a week!"
Godric sucked in a breath and blinked open his eyes. His stomach rolled. He had the strong impression he never played outside like that again. When he needed to do something, needed to move, he snuck into Grandpa's greenhouse. It wasn't a lot of physical activity but it was something to do with his hands that didn't outrage Gran as much as playing hero had—a hero with a sword but he...he hadn't distinguished that fact.
He swallowed spit as the last stray fact floated to his consciousness.—He had gotten used to the lack of physical activity. His relatives had forced him to stay still more often than not.
The reincarnate scrubbed his hands over his face. He didn't want to consider what this implied about his childhood. It wasn't an auspicious start.
oooP3ooo
(Harry)
"ss:_Open_:ss," hissed Salazar.
The blank stone wall he had been glaring at for the better part of the week, off and on since the failed conversation with the Weasley twins, slid open without a sound. Stagnant air rushed across his face. Salazar doubted this had been opened since the other founders had died, possibly longer.
His glare dropped into a frown when a spiral stone staircase was revealed. That was new. This should have opened into a short hallway. Salazar stared at it for a long moment more before he flicked a hand up, silently summoning an orb of light that floated just above his palm, and climbed. The stairs opened into a small foyer. There was no dust or spiderwebs. Mipsy had cleaned it out and had likely not stopped at the foyer.
Salazar took a slow step up into the room. Directly across from the stairs from the ritual rooms were more stairs leading up—stairs that had once been a closet. He turned to the room as he decided against investigating the next floor up. Light reflected eerily across the empty room, casting his shadow long.
This had been the entrance to his rooms, his home within a home. Across from him was the official entry. Light fell through the large opening, the double doors long gone, and faded into the deep hall. Where exactly it led, he no longer knew. It had once opened into the Slytherin common room but he knew there was no longer a door in the common room, hidden or otherwise. Godric and the others had moved his rooms, hiding them from enterprising thieves that thought there would be some prize hidden away.
He was struck with the sharp relief of the past. This was not his foyer. The clutter of his things were gone.
It was just an empty room.
The foyer opened on either side; each of its four walls had a pathway between the official entry, the stairs, and the two archways that opened into distinct sitting rooms. The one to his right—technically the lady's sitting room, if he had ever married—was as empty but clean as the foyer. He could just make out the two hallways leading off into the dark recesses on the right side of his suite. The one to his left held a worn, unremarkable, and foreign trunk but was otherwise similarly empty.
Empty of things: Full of memories.
Salazar slowly walked over, gaze flicked across the old stone walls, across the empty fireplace. He had met pupils here in a private setting for so many different meetings. It had been his unofficial office, a place that allowed the children to relax a little before they had uncomfortable, private, conversations as they attempted to learn and understand how to be working members of society, to ask over a particularly confusing theoretical concept, or even to find help in accepting that their families hate and disgust over their magical existence wasn't their fault.
The founder stilled before the trunk. It was missing a lid and was old but well-loved instead of trashed. It was filled to the brim with his things. He doubted the trunk could actually be moved without losing a side. It would work for his purposes for the moment, though.
Salazar assumed Mipsy had been popping in here to collect all his various items over the last week. It made sense that she had moved it all here soon after his agreement instead of chancing a Gryffindor spying on her by returning to Godric's dorm each time he requested something.—He needed to get a satchel.
He looked over the room once more, now with a slight frown. There was nothing left. It was an odd relief that nothing had survived to remind him so sharply of the days past and gone. There were enough memories pulled forward without particular objects forcing more.
His eyes fell onto the hall that led off into his study and bedroom. Salazar found himself down the hall before he realized he had moved. Like the other doorways, his study and bedroom were missing the wooden doors. The rooms were also just as empty of things.
There was nothing left, but he had never had much in the first place.
The sound of steps startled him. Salazar snapped about and met hazel eyes. Godric had wet hair. They had probably just missed each other at the cleansing pool. And something must be bothering Gryffindor for him to skip drying off.—It wasn't exactly difficult for him even if the runic array was malfunctioning or something. Just an internal circulation of his elementally heated magic would do it.
"You weren't being subtle about this," Godric said quietly before he peeked into Salazar's old bedroom, "We didn't remove your things for years...Eventually, I took your weapons and armor. Rowena took all the surviving runic designs you had drawn up, copying them to scrolls if you had drawn them on a tablet or burned them into some wooden block...Helga claimed some of your furniture, I think." Godric gave an uncomfortable shrug and messed with his still-damp hair.
Salazar nodded slowly in understanding, appreciating the explanation no matter how bittersweet it felt. It made sense. There was no point in leaving his things where they had been. He had died and they had neither the precognition to expect him to be reborn nor the capability to keep those things from deteriorating over a thousand years.
"What of your rooms?"
Godric flinched and bowed his head. After a moment he looked up with a grimace. "I doubt they've anything."
Salazar tilted his head in inquiry.
His brother sighed and tugged his hand through his wet dirty blond locks. "I married, as you know...I had a son and a daughter.–" Wistfulness flooded his voice as he spoke. "–I hope my children were of a mind to take the things left behind. To use it as they needed to."
"How old were you, when you died?"
Godric blinked slowly, blinked away memories of long lost times it seemed as his sight refocused on Salazar. "75...6, perhaps. Died around about my nameday."
"So not old and wrinkled…but you saw your children grown at least." Salazar offered. Hoped.
The blond relaxed and offered a smile at that. "Aye...yes, I did at least. Though I've no clue who the lucky bastard allowed to marry my little girl was." He frowned. "Salton(2) better have made the bastard pay for the honor."
Salazar started. "Salton?"
"Named for you, obviously. Why'd I name my son after a bunch of trees otherwise," Godric said dryly before he turned away and swept back to the foyer.
"And your daughter's?" Salazar asked as he followed, "Your wife was Acadia, yes?"
Godric flicked his gaze back at him before he turned to the trunk. "What's this then?"
Salazar sighed as he pushed his glasses up his nose. "Nothing. Just thought I'd move my things here."
Godric raised a brow and the two stared at each other. His brother didn't believe his nonchalance. Gryffindor knew him too well.
Salazar looked away, with a frown. (Though it felt like a pout, it was absolutely a frown.) "My roommates must know of my bag enough to wonder at a sudden trunk appearing. So my things need to be held somewhere else." Left unsaid was the number of things he didn't need any child finding when they attempted to snoop.
"Bryony," Godric answered quietly, "I named my daughter Bryony."
Salazar snapped his head back towards him. "After...my sister?"
"Yes," Godric said with an uncomfortable shrug, "Felt right, you know? I knew if you had lived to have a daughter that was what you'd have named her...At least back then. Lily would be a fair name to use now."
"You became terribly sentimental after I died," Salazar finally said, not entirely certain how to respond to Godric. Finally, after staring at Godric for a long moment as he attempted to think of a better response, Salazar stated simply, "Thank you."
Godric waved the statement away as he walked over to the topless trunk to look in. "My wife was called Acadia...she killed me." Godric looked back at Salazar. "Some type of poison, I think."
Salazar frowned. "That...doesn't make any sense. We're resistant to most of those, I made sure of that."
His brother shrugged as he pulled out one of the Harry Potter adventure books. "I know but that's what I recall about it. She even sat by me during my last moments and bragged. Bitch." Godric flipped through the novel before lifting it at him and said, "You mind if I borrow this one?"
The title Harry Potter and Memories Stolen almost seemed to glow a deep emerald green that matched the illustrated child's eyes. Salazar rolled his own green eyes and nodded. Godric flipped to the front of the book right there and then. He rolled his eyes again and turned back to the empty room.
If he were going to leave his things here, he would need to move the entry, maybe even add an entry or two. And if he was going to be trekking down here all the time for clothing, and whatnot, he might as well set up his lab down here again—Rowena would appreciate that. A spot for Godric and him to laze about discussing sensitive topics would be good also. Hogwarts could use a place she could come and go without people catching sight of her too. A room to start scripting out the new wards were also needed.
Having all that down here meant he needed to make some changes. The layout wasn't terribly useful as it was. Salazar pulled out a notebook and pen, flipped to an empty page, and began sketching out possibilities.
"Memories," Godric said, interrupting Salazar's thoughts sometime later, "Can be triggered by a whole array of things, can't they?"
Salazar tilted his head in thought,—A meditation room would be good too, though Godric must have found something suitable enough.—before he answered, "I believe any number of possible stimuli exist. Objects, places, and even sounds, and smells can trigger a memory or a whisper of one.–" He focused on Godric properly and saw the frustrated expression. "–They aren't coming to you easily, are they?"
Godric made a face.
He hummed thoughtfully as he turned back to his sketch before offering, "The greenhouses and gardening might help pull some forward? I got the impression you did quite a lot of that before school."
"That's not going to work."
Green eyes snapped up to stare at his brother. Godric was studiously staring at the book in his hands. "Why not?"
Gryffindor flicked his gaze up toward him and back to the book before he admitted quietly. "I feel like I'm almost reliving the memories...I'm not aware of what's happening around me.–" He closed the book and grimaced towards Salazar without looking at him properly. "–I fear what my elemental magic may do if I run into a particularly...difficult one."
"You aren't going to hurt a child," Salazar said as he watched his brother. A look of disagreement flashed across his round face before vanishing. "You aren't, Godric. You've never harmed a child before. You aren't going to end up doing it now. Accidentally or otherwise."
Godric huffed and turned away. "I know that, Sal."
Salazar had a strong impression that Godric didn't quite believe that. Elemental magic was dangerous and difficult to control at the best of times and his brother was struggling with it at the moment but Salazar was confident Godric would hold it together. Gryffindor just needed to believe that too.
With a huff, knowing he wasn't going to get through Godric's thick skull, Slytherin claimed a seat on the ground with his back against a wall. There he focused on plans for his old suite. His brother silently settled on the floor beside him, novel in hand.
oooP4ooo
(Neville)
Memory tied to objects might be the key he had been looking for. It was undoubtedly imperfect but it was a place to start. Hopefully, once he found a stimulus that freed some of the memories, the rest would be more easily accessed.
Godric flipped through the novel as he climbed the stairs to his dorm room. It was a ridiculous story about Sally losing his memory of being a wizard and yet somehow using magic to regain it all from a terrible dark lord that didn't like using a name. Still, there might be something in it he could adapt to his situation.
He nudged the door open with a foot and wandered in as he scanned another page for some ideas. The character of Sally had used an album of pictures to regain memories. It felt a little too on point but it was a place to start.
The blond looked up from the book as he considered the novel's idea more seriously than he had expected—he had that portrait of his parents—and stopped. Seamus and Dean sat with a chess board between them on the floor in the middle of the room staring up at him.
"Err...Hi?" Godric offered.
The two shared a look before they each offered their own "Hi" back.
An awkward silence spread after that. Godric shifted from one foot to another as he considered asking what the twins had done to them but, as the two turned back to their game, he decided against it. Instead, he dropped down before his trunk and dug around for possible sentimental items.
The silence reigned for another long moment before Dean stated, "Pawn to F4."
Godric moved a sock out of the way and sighed when Seamus didn't respond. He turned back to them and found Seamus frowning at him.
"Look," the founder said, "I'm sorry for whatever George and Fred did–"
"What about having Potter sleepover without asking?" Seamus blurted out as if he had been wanting to demand that since Godric came in.
Dean glanced back and forth between the two. "I think the Weasleys pranking us so we couldn't stay in our dorm outside of sleeping without weird fart sounds following us was more annoying."
"I, uh, I have to agree with Dean on this one." Godric offered. At the scowl from Seamus, he quickly added, "Not that I shouldn't have talked to you both about sneaking S-a Slytherin in.—He wasn't going to be here multiple nights!"
Seamus made a face. "Potter's an alright chap. A tad...odd and annoyingly brilliant but it's The-Boy-Who-Lived so he's sort of expected, you know? I just think, since we all sleep in here, we also should have a say if we are going ta have anyone spend the night!"
"I think we should agree to leave the pranks outside the dorm, especially if it's asking an older year to do the pranking for you!" Dean complained back, "I don't care about someone spending the night. There are only three of us in this entire dorm room but pranking people should not happen where they sleep."
"Agreed!" Godric said, quickly jumping in as Seamus looked ready to argue. "No pranks in the dorm room. No asking older years—or younger years—to prank for you in the dorm room. No having anyone spend the night without asking permission of the others in the dorm room."
Dean beamed. "Agreed!"
Seamus made a face but at Dean's prompting said, "Alright, alright. That's for going forward. For having Potter over without asking, I want to see Potter's latest history homework—the one about the Goblin Rebellion of 1612."
Godric stared at Seamus for a moment, quite certain he had never seen Salazar do any history homework before. Even if Salazar had done it, and that would require Sally actually going to history class, Godric didn't see how he could get it from his brother. (Not that he should support cheating either.) "Wasn't that due today?"
The boy turned red. "Bullocks." Seamus sprang up and bolted out the door.
Dean spoke up, confused, "I thought it was due next week?"
"..I thought he asked for it as we were leaving."
"Did he?" Dean rose in horror.
The Gryffindor founder stared back, equally confused. "...I don't actually know, I was sleeping. I just turned it in."
The other boy looked even more worried. "I was sleeping too...Hermione would know!"
Godric watched the boy rush off before he pulled a parchment sticking out of one of his books. It was the letter from Gran. He frowned down at it thoughtfully. It was personal, wasn't it? The portrait of his parents might be better...but if he was raised by his Gran, would the picture of his parents be personal?
The Gryffindor founder huffed at himself and looked into the trunk full of things once more but saw what he had already known. There really wasn't much in there he thought could be personal. The letter was probably as good a place to start as the portrait.
oooP5ooo
(Harry)
Salazar passed rows and rows of books as he debated, again, about what to do on the soul magic issue. There was nothing he could think of; it was such a rare and dangerous art that few had ever delved into it a thousand years ago, but that didn't stop him from trying to think of a solution.—He doubted there was any information in Hogwarts's library. (Or, perhaps, he hoped there was none because it was not an art that should be documented and left about for any enterprising child to find.)
His gaze flicked over to the restrictive section as he headed up to his study area. If there was any information here, it would be there.
He didn't know what he'd do if Soul magic was out in the world for anyone to learn, just as the mind arts seemed to be. It was less horrifying thinking some fool master had taught Voldemort the art instead of the man finding a book about the subject. Few rare and dangerous fields of magic should be open to everyone to learn.
Though, on the other hand, at least the knowledge hadn't been wholly destroyed and lost to the ages. The less magic and tradition he had to try to reintroduce to the world, the better.
The parselmouth found his study area empty.
He frowned down at his scattered things. A bin of wood shavings was to one side. Stacks of books he was hoarding sat on the floor and across the other end of the table. Various partly created conceptual arrays were stacked in a few sections.
Rowena had made it clear he needed to move it all. Now that he was using his old suite, he had no excuse to leave all this in the library.
If he moved, his various Hufflepuff cousins wouldn't be able to find him. They hadn't come for him recently but that was probably because of his promise to join their study group over the weekend. That didn't mean one wouldn't search him out before then. They liked surprising him.
There were also his budding relations with Draco. He wanted to encourage that interaction. Disappearing entirely was counter to the effort.
Salazar made a face as he tried to plan a balance between this new childhood and the future he'd have to live with and deal with the endless list of fixes before things went sour. The founder gave up on trying to plan such things and started to go through the pile of objects he had accumulated over the two months.
He could use a satchel right now.—Salazar had the, perhaps inappropriate, desire to say that to Godric. Again. He should probably go look through the lost and found Mipsy had directed him towards instead. (Hmm. Such choices...Annoying Godric sounded more entertaining.)
"Potter?"
Salazar slowly turned his head towards the voice, more than a little startled to hear it. Gregory stood before him. Salazar blinked a couple more times. The boy was still present. At last, he asked, "Yes?"
The boy shifted about, uncertain. "Um...I...Omorose is pregnant, isn't she? I saw her earlier—well, she jumped into my lap for pets...uh…"
Salazar turned properly towards the larger boy. "Did she? I haven't seen her in a week...Glad she's back in the school." Gregory gave him an odd look and Salazar explained quickly, "Saw her on the grounds last before the lake blew up...And, yes. I mean, yes she is pregnant. It'll be her third litter."
Gregory's eyes lit up. "Could I be there for the birth?"
Eyebrows shot up in surprise. Salazar hadn't expected a child to be interested in that. "Uh..." Weren't animal births as messy as human births? Should an eleven-year-old be present? He had been present for plenty of births, being Master Hardwin's apprentice. Gregory was older than he had been when he had first helped.
Before Salazar could respond, the rotund boy spoke up, "I mean, I know we haven't been talking but Draco told me how the headmaster was being mean, trying to force you to do things you don't want and that had me thinking about it all."
Gregory continued to rush out an explanation, "We stopped hanging out because Draco said we should and he said that because his dad said to follow Professor Snape's directions. And then the older students said that we don't want you in Slytherin because you killed the Heir of Slytherin so you shouldn't be in the school house! So we should make you want to ask to leave by ignoring you...and I'm sorry. I really am. I was just following what everyone said we should do even though you're the first person I met that likes kneazles as much as me! My auntie bred them and said she'd give me one for my birthday but then she died and Father sold all her cats without telling me! I was supposed to get one and would have taken care of all of them but he didn't ask!"
The large boy was panting at the end. As they stared at each other, he turned pink in embarrassment. Salazar didn't let the child back off now. No way was he going to make the boy embarrassed for liking animals or opening up to him.
"You are welcome to it, though Omorose has an entire castle to find her little corner to have the kittens in. It's entirely possible she'll just appear one day with a line of kittens trailing after her." Salazar explained before he rose and waved at Gregory, who had relaxed at his words, to follow, "but we could research what to prepare for her. If we set up a cozy spot, maybe she'll accept it. We've time. I think the litter isn't due until December."
Gregory rushed after him until they were walking side by side. "Auntie told me that kneazles like to hide when having the babies but you're her human so she might accept something if it's easily defended and away from most people."
"Hmm," Salazar turned thoughtful as they headed back down to the first floor of the library to hunt through the magizoologist books. "That removes our dorm room as an option. I think Neville might like to be able to join us too, anyway...so…" He looked over at Gregory with a faint smile and kept it firmly in place even at spying a faint grimace from Gregory. "Maybe we need to search the school for likely spots?"
The boy gave a serious nod at that, clearly believing his reaction to Godric's name had gone unnoticed. "There are so many people and animals around here, it'll take forever to find a good place. Especially with the other half kneazles about."
"What?"
"Male kneazles sometimes kill kittens that aren't theirs," Gregory explained grimly, "like lions and griffins. Some of the half kneazles do the same."
Salazar frowned. "Now that is good to know." He then offered a faint smile at the grim boy and added, "but we'll figure it out."
Gregory grinned, still a little grim and determined as an eleven-year-old could be. "Yes, we will."
oooP6ooo
Salazar stifled a yawn as he watched a door materialize across from the tapestry of ballet dancing trolls. Who would have expected an eleven-year-old could fixate so thoroughly on cats? Gregory had kept Salazar up late reading over all the books they had checked out from the library. It had taken dessert and getting in bed himself to get the boy to finally stop with the planning.
It wouldn't have been so bad if Salazar hadn't actually fallen asleep. But he had, so here he was at three in the morning attempting to find a satchel. This should have been done hours ago so he could have a full night's sleep.
The founder continued to grumble to himself as he yanked the door open and stomped into the Lost and Found of Hogwarts. He blinked a few times as the last grasp of sleep was yanked from him. This was not what he had imagined when Mipsy had said there was a lost and found. The bucket of forgotten things at his muggle school had come to mind. A little pile of half-pairs of gloves and socks and shoes alongside a few binders and the odd toy was what he had expected—just a little magical.
This was not that, not at all.
Inside was a maze of lost objects stacked high within a cathedral-roofed football field-sized room. Thousands of books, hundreds of broken and worn furniture, and junk of all types filled the space. It reminded him of the Diagon Alley's Muggle Extraordinaries store, just filled with magical objects instead of technology and muggle paraphernalia. There was definitely plenty of furniture he could repair for his suite but he didn't spy any bags off hand.
He could use some open space to place things of interest: The right side of the room suddenly had a large open space where no space had been before. Salazar eyeballed it for a long moment, very thoroughly regretting not asking Rowena about this room, and then chose a random alley to shuffle through. Unlike Muggle Extraordinaries, there was no easy way to move the things he was interested in or even see many of the objects properly.
It was all haphazardly stacked on each other. Salazar found himself carefully climbing into piles to get a better idea of what was in them and the condition of some objects. The first time he found something worthwhile, a leather wingback chair with a missing leg he could easily take from another chair, he spent a good hour shifting the pile and levitating the chair out. It was hard, delicate work.—Work he should probably not be doing at three in the morning but interesting things made for interesting distractions.
Salazar knew he should just hunt down a pile of leather bags and be down with all this, at least for now, but there were so many potentially useful items to be claimed and he doubted he'd be able to find them again if he came back later. Free books had to be investigated, split potions needed looked over and shielded so nothing horrible happened, jewelry had to be tested for magical conductivity and either tossed or carried back to his open area, and furniture that could work needed to be pulled out and moved and debated upon.
Time flew by and not a bag was found.
Only when Mipsy pop-clicked into the room beside him did he stop his meandering investigations.
"Master Sally breakfast be ready."
"Uhh…" Salazar pulled sweat-covered hair off his forehead, thoroughly regretting doing this in his pajamas, as he stared from her to the pile of chairs he was in the middle of. "How long until it's over with?"
She gave him a long, stern look over but answered curtly, "In two hours, Master. You be having potions then."
He nodded. "Right. Okay...Any idea where I'd find a pile of satchels?"
Mipsy gave Salazar another look. "You be asking the room for them? Or you be wanting to see everything–" She waved her arms out at all the junk. "–more?"
Salazar stared for a second and couldn't stop his gaze from moving toward the open space that had appeared after he had decided he had needed it. "Oh."
The House elf rolled her eyes at him and announced, "I be dragging you to breakfast if you be still here in an hour." Then she pop-clicked from the room.
He very firmly did not pout before forcing himself to focus on bags and only bags being in the room—bags he could take out of the room. Godric and he had already learned the hard way that the room created most requested items and those items could not be taken out of the room. He needed a real bag, not an imagined one.
The pile of chairs surrounding him vanished. All the towers of things faded away. Only large piles of bags remained. The options shrank as Salazar focused more carefully on the type of bag he was looking for. It took only a few minutes to find a leather satchel of a similar enough design to work.
It wasn't magical in any way and worn in places but it was the right color and had the right, visible, number of pockets to pass inspection. An afternoon of embroidering some runic arrays on it would strengthen the worn sections, keep anyone from snooping, and possibly lighten the load.
Salazar rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he wandered through various hidden passages, dodging all the children headed to the Great Hall, and considered his options. Nothing too extravagant since the bag had likely been sewn together without magic in mind but if his plans for the suite worked out, he wouldn't have to carry everything around anymore.
oooP7ooo
(Hogwarts)
Students rushed through her halls, sat in class learning to be decent little magic users, snuck in closets to do naughty things that adults did but didn't like children doing.—They were always doing that. It was boring.—She saw no reason why she should pay particular attention to it all.
The rat community was more interesting because it became a community within her walls. They developed and became more than their species was supposed to ever become.
Her library could be interesting because of all the odd knowledge within it. Mama Wena loved the library. But Sissy Lena had avoided it for years and years so Hogwarts had too.—Sisters stuck together and she took her sister-duties very seriously.
All the ghosts were fun and had interesting stories. Halloween was the bestest day because of all the guests that came to celebrate. All the new faces brought new stories. All those new stories made it so it was never boring.
Having her Papas back made things change. The library was no longer taboo. Classes and students and even the teachers and heads master were interesting because Papa Sally and Papa Rie were there. Some of the people needed to learn how to treat her Papas better but she didn't do anything—for now—because her Papas were super powerful and fantastic...even though Papa Sally had left and died and someone had actually killed him.
Then Papa Sally had almost died, again. And on her favoritest day. It should have been even more of a favorite day because her mamas and grandpa had visited. The bad wizard and troll ruined that by almost killing her Papa Sally.
Now she knew that her Papa Rie had been killed too.
He had been killed while in his rooms, within her walls, and by someone she had always sort of liked. That could not happen again.
"~Hogsie, Hogsie, Hogwarts! Hogsie hog!~" sang her bestest friend, when he wasn't causing trouble for her papas at least. He knew better but it was against his nature to be anything but a prankster. "Hogsie, let's tie water balloons on the chandelier in the main hall!"
She huffed and shook her head. She was in the middle of a very important decision.
Her bestest mate flipped about mid-air so his hatted head was floating upside down before her face. "Turn that pout upside down! Let's prank the snakeys, make them all reddish-brown!"
"No," she countered shortly and turned away from the poltergeist.
He flipped upright, moving into her view once more, and settled his feet on the stone floor. "Then tag! Tag always brings a smile to your face." Peeves beamed with his too-big mouth wide open, showing off his shiny, sharp teeth.
"No!" she snapped in frustration. It became teary frustration as she blubbered out, "I got to figure out how to protect my papas!"
"Well." Peeves frowned at her and she frowned teary-eyed back. The poltergeist turned thoughtful. "That can be tricky. They're pretty dumb."
Hogwarts blinked away her tears, startled at that claim. No one had ever called her papas dumb before. She wrinkled his nose at the idea that someone would dare say that. Best mate or not, he was wrong. Her papas were brilliant because her papas helped make her. Not any dumb person could have done that.
She was one of a kind, more so than all the students wandering in her halls. Sissy Lena had told her so.
"I know!" Peeves proclaimed as he leaned toward her, his sharp grin wide. "Let's prank the headmaster until he runs away!"
The little, glowing girl blinked owlishly at her bestest friend in the world. "I guess...until I can think of something more…" She sprang up with her own grin. "Yes! Let's."
oooPooo
1. From a fun little blog about magical creatures - website themonsterblogofmonsters . tumblr post / 163111360308 / buggane-a-kind-of-ogre-found-on-the-isle-of-man - Buggane: A kind of Ogre, these creatures are the origins of a number of the more unsavory tales regarding the largely peaceful species. Largely disavowed by their more pacifistic kin, Manx Bugganes are generally considered a separate subspecies of Ogre and are not held under the same rules and regulations as the usual Ogre is. Recognizable by their thick bushy hair (most Ogres are largely hairless, though their skin color varies considerably) and large tusks, Bugganes are vengeful if they feel they have been wronged and can be surprisingly destructive.
Bugganes are found very rarely in the rest of the British Isles, where they are sometimes contracted to act as guards, as they are more intelligent than Trolls (who are also known to offer basic security services) and are of roughly the same size and strength, though they are not quite as spell resistant. However, they are often considered more trouble than they are worth, as the creatures are known to cast odd and lasting curses if they feel they have been wronged in some fashion, and these spells can persist until a skilled Cursebreaker or a willing Ogre can be called in to undo it. As most Ogres prefer to keep to themselves and would rather have nothing to do with their Buggane kin, the former is usually the common outcome.
2. Salton means "place in the willows". May have originated from the Yorkshire area. This is probably a bit of a stretch for a name from the 11th century but I liked the connection to plants, and Yorkshire where I have Salazar originating from. It is technically a surname that became a first name, as far as anyone can tell, which is a major reason for it not being the most accurate name for Godric to use. I like it, life goes on.