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Rowena Ravenclaw considers knowledge and wisdom to be of utmost importance. She prides herself upon her intelligence. More intelligent, she thinks - with no trifling amount of arrogance - than most people of her acquaintance.
Why, then, has she been so incredibly foolish?
A fierce gust of wind whips inky hair into Rowena’s face, unravelling yet another strand of her dark plait. It only serves to increase her anger at herself, at him . She jerkily swipes at her hair, roughly pulling it behind her ear, before growling the next charm more ferociously than is strictly necessary. Rowena is furious - angry beyond anything she’d ever thought possible.
Apparently, she fumes silently, a lot of things she’d once thought impossible have come to pass. First and foremost is the fact that she thought herself above falling for the pretty words and easy charms of men. She believed him. Believed like a dimwitted, ignorant, airhead that he’d been sincere. A roar tears from her throat as she raises her arm to add the next layer of the protective charms she has created - just for him. Because of him.
Never in her life has her precious control slipped so easily from her, like water through cupped hands. Blind anger is never wise, and she feels yet another pang of idiocy in the very heart of her as she slashes her wand viciously through the air, adding another layer of protection so that the man who robbed her of her wits can find no easy return.
When Helga had questioned if it was truly necessary to add new charms that would prevent anyone from apparating into the grounds of Hogwarts, into the confines of the castle itself, Rowena cast a withering glance that had her friend wilting back without further protest. Rowena, in some distant part of her mind, supposes she ought to feel guilty; she has so easily thrown too much of her considerable ire upon the kind-hearted woman. Yet, she admits as her ragged breath catches in her chest and blood roars in her ears, perhaps Helga should consider herself lucky; Rowena could have very easily hexed the woman in her anger, had the other witch not wisely walked away.
Driven by instinct alone, her wand arm weaves intricate patterns of spellcraft that kisses her surroundings with an eerie glow. Rowena imagines a protective globe, high above the grounds like an upturned glass bowl. One strong enough to withstand the oncoming storm, magical and natural.
How could she have been so wrong all these years?
It was laughable.
It truly was; this feeling in the pit of her stomach, driven entirely by intuition and intellect. Yet Rowena knew, without a doubt, that if she did not heed the call, she would be making a colossal mistake.
For could a dream be just a dream, if it would not let the sleeper rest?
At first, she thought it had been her mind playing tricks on her; a strange way to distract her from her sorrow after her husband died in a hunting accident. Yet the dream kept recurring; an unrelenting urge to follow four hairy hogs, entirely of her own imagining, to the North Highlands.
“Do you think I’m quite mad?” Rowena asked, flicking through sheaf after sheaf of parchment, with their reams and reams of funeral arrangements.
“You? Mad? I shouldn’t think that of you for a second, love,“ she tutted lightly. “Nay, I think it would do you well to listen to that heart of yours, instead of your head,” Helga Hufflepuff gently stroked the dark hair of her goddaughter, Helena, who slept fitfully on her lap at last. “But we should not travel alone in these dark times. We could do with a strapping young man indeed to keep devilry at bay.”
Rowena paused in her restless organising, her lips quirking upward briefly. “You mean Gryffindor.”
“Well,” she huffed, but her eyes twinkled in the firelight. “It would harm none, would it? And he is awfully easy on the eye.”
“Yes,” Rowena sighed and sat in the delicately carved chair her husband had always worked at. “But the problem with Gryffindor is he likes to bring company , and I shouldn’t think I’m in the mood for the sort of friends he tends to keep.”
“Oh, hush. We shall go, and breathe the highland air, and we shall all be better for it. You’ll see.”
Rowena had expected a party of knights, drunken and debauched, but the only companion Gryffindor brought was a young man. He was quiet and reserved, but oh, so bold in his intelligence and quips. Salazar Slytherin, he said with a deep bow - a man with hair as dark as night, and a velvety voice to match who hailed from Éire.
If either of the men thought her following her dream - in the most literal of senses - a foolish endeavour, the young wizards concealed it well. They used a horse and carriage to travel like Muggles, as her dreams had foretold.
Further and further they ventured northeast, following ragged little roads, taking shelter in little inns along the way when the horses could no longer sustain their pace. Upon reaching Inverness, they stayed an extra day at a larger inn that provided hearty food and gave everyone, especially her daughter who was growing wearier and wearier of their journey, a much-needed rest.
A knock on her door disturbed her from her solitude, and Helena stirred for but a moment before falling back to her sleep. Upon answering the knock, the handsome face of Slytherin stared back. “May I help you, good Sir?”
“A moment of your time?” he began and then noticed her sleeping daughter. “Though perhaps this is inconvenient…?”
“Oh, please - come. Helena will sleep through the brashest of storms; do not let her rest trouble you.” She stepped aside, drawing her cloak a little tighter around her as a chill from the hallway swept through along with the wizard. “How may I help you, Sir Slytherin?”
“Salazar, please, my Lady Ravenclaw,” he bowed his head, words quiet, and then sat at the small table that sat in the corner of the room. “I feel that I… I must ask. Where is it we go? What drives our journey to the north?”
Rowena paused and walked to the small pane of glass that served as a window. “You know I had a dream, yes? But this was no simple dream. It has occurred nightly for many months, and it never changes, never wavers.” She toyed with a thread on her sleeve for a moment, startling when Slytherin let out a bark of laughter after which both quickly glanced at her sleeping child.
“This, my Lady Ravenclaw, sounds much like that murky art of Divination,” Salazar said, and she could hear the mockery dripping from every word.
“Perhaps,” Rowena sighed, staring out of the uneven, cloudy glass. “Perhaps it is a fool’s endeavour, but - have you ever felt something so deeply, Sir, that you are unable to let it go? Have you ever followed an impulse so strong you feel you would expire if you didn’t heed it?” she placed a fist over her breastbone, clenched tight.
Five days later, the unlikely quintet stood in front of a quaint little pub called The Three Broomsticks that was, for all intents and purposes, located in the middle of nowhere. A single cottage was near the pub, inhabited by the local woodsman. Thankful to have found the Three Broomsticks to be of wizarding origin, Rowena and her merry band of friends along with her daughter, gladly arranged to take the guest rooms above the serving rooms.
She was here , Rowena knew. This was where she was supposed to be.
“What now, a chara ?” Salazar asked as Rowena stood on the bank of a great loch, the highland winds fierce.
“Now, Sir Slytherin,” she began, and paused as a wide smile lit up her face. “Now, we build something that has never been seen before.”
The quaint pub became their home for the next year as they used magic old and new to create a castle - one that would withstand the test of time for centuries to come. Not a home but a formal school, bringing with it new generations of well-educated witches and wizards.
Godric had called it ‘Hogwarts’ in jest, making friendly fun of Rowena’s dream, and it would be located on the rocky cliff above the loch she had found where a stronghold lay in ruins. It appeared long forgotten by the Muggles who’d once occupied and then deserted it. It provided, she considered, a rather convenient ignis fatuus for their warding. There, they began their great task.
Once the castle stood, tall and proud, Rowena and her friends celebrated with great ceremony, holding the first of many feasts in the Great Hall. The Chief Warlocks of England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland, who headed the earliest Wizard’s Council, attended; as well as their families and friends from far and wide. A school such as Hogwarts, giving formal education to magical children of the four kingdoms, was a great feat indeed.
The four founders toasted each other, secret knowing smiles on their faces. Whatever achievements the wider community celebrated, they didn’t know the half of their achievements. During construction, each ensconced a secret chamber no stranger would ever see, and only the best of the students might ever discover.
Rowena smiled with unadulterated joy as she thought of the concealed room she constructed within the castle, with magic far beyond anything else she’d created before. Her Chamber of Erudition would appear to all who figured out how to summon it, in whatever form they might require. She wished she could live long enough to see what might come of it in the decades and centuries to follow.
And right there, among the merrymaking and dancing and beneath the clear sky under the full moon and twinkling stars, Rowena Ravenclaw finally succumbed to Salazar Slytherin’s charming silver tongue.
It was to be the beginning of a passionate affair that lasted for years.
Years in which the four friends revolutionised the Wizarding world, giving even the most destitute magical children hope for a brighter future.
Years in which Rowena watched joyfully as her own child, Helena, grew up within the castle walls. “I must not be biased, I know, but Helena really is flourishing,” she sighed as she leaned against Salazar’s shoulder one dark evening, mead in hand.
“She is; I note she is particularly gifted with her charms and brewing, and is one of the more tolerable students in the school, for a lass of her parentage.”
Rowena bristled but said nothing. It was no secret that Salazar would tolerate all magical children in the castle, though he preferred only those pure of blood, without Muggle heritage. Naturally, she, Helga, and Godric refused his every attempt to restrict the school admissions to his favoured ‘purebloods’ alone.
For fifteen years, the four exceptionally gifted young friends passed on their wisdom to children from all four corners of the kingdoms. Each educated their own charges within their respective houses: Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff, Slytherin, and Gryffindor. On the rare occasion of finding a student particularly interested in a subject not of their mastery, they would politely ask if one of their friends could take him or her on in some of the lessons.
Salazar would only accept if the student was pure of blood. Many an evening was spent arguing that any witch or wizard, regardless of their parentage, ought to be given the same advantages though he never wavered in his beliefs.
“Salazar,” Rowena ventured on a warm summer’s night shortly before their students would return from their holidays. “We’ve been teaching the young ones for many years now. Surely, you would agree that magical children, no matter who their parents are, are capable of great things. Will you not let us co-educate them all, as we discussed yesterday when breaking our fast together?”
Salazar didn’t break his stride, though she could feel the muscles in his arm tensing under her hand. “Your stance is admirable, of course, mo chroí. Though you must understand that I cannot accept anyone less than pure into my teachings. It goes against my very soul.”
She stopped walking, effectively halting Salazar also, and faced him, laying her free hand on his chest. “Listen to your heart, Salazar. If only you would follow your heart.”
He looked down at her, his silver eyes searching her own green ones. “You sound like Helga. This foolishness doesn’t become you.”
It was then her heart began to crack just a little. She had found herself more than in love with the man standing before her; she needed him like she needed the air to breathe. Their love for each other would be legendary, if only it was known beyond the castle walls. Truth be told, if it were known beyond the walls of their rooms. They had kept their affair quiet in order to not undermine Helena’s reputation and, frankly, because it wasn’t anyone’s business.
For all these years, they had given in to their mutual desire for each other. It had not, of course, escaped her that, despite his declarations of love, he never once offered marriage and the few times she’d brought it up he had expertly evaded the subject.
Then again, it had never been a pressing matter to Rowena. She was content to be with him just the way they were. After all, a wedding ceremony aside, their lives wouldn’t change all that much. Maybe she’d be sleeping in his room instead of her own - though many married couples continued to keep separate sleeping quarters. She had been married before, after all. Until her beloved Alasdair had not returned from a hunt, only to be found fatally wounded a day later.
Rowena didn’t need wedding vows to be happy with Salazar. She did need him to see sense, however.
“Is it really so foolish to hope for equal schooling? Every one of these children deserves to be taught our knowledge. Imagine the power our combined knowledge would equip them with. Imagine the great deeds each and every one of them would be capable of.”
She blinked owlishly up at him and gently moved her hand across his chest up to his cheek. “Imagine just how proud you would be to see all our charges accomplish anything they set their minds to after they leave this place.”
Salazar turned his head into her caress and kissed the inside of her palm as he brought his own hand to cover hers and hold it in place. For a moment all conversation was forgotten as he drew her close and covered her mouth with his, kissing her in that possessive way no other man - not even her late husband - ever had.
When they broke apart, breathless, his kisses whispered across her skin to her ear and he murmured words of love and adoration - endearments spoken in his native Gaelic that were sure to go straight to her heart. “Let’s not fight over this again, a chuisle mo chroí . You know as well as I do that I will not be swayed. Instead, let us celebrate another formidable year to come.”
Rowena resolved to let the matter rest, for now, and let Salazar’s tongue seduce her with words and action in their secluded spot on the vast grounds.
That magical night had been a mere three weeks ago. Three weeks in which Godric became more stubborn and reckless bringing forth arguments that held no sway with his best friend. He let his emotions, which he wore on his sleeves at the best of times, come the better of him and in the heat of the moment, he pulled his wand and sent a hex at Salazar right there, in the Great Hall mere minutes after the students had retired for the night.
Salazar had been shocked that his friend dared to attack him but not enough to not retaliate. Helga and Rowena had swiftly retreated to the opposite side of the hall, at first bemused at their peacockish behaviour. They even remarked how juvenile their conduct was, such as often observed among their older students - usually in relation to a young witch.
It soon became obvious though that more than a simple disagreement was afoot. Maybe, Rowena allowed, it had begun that way. In the end, however, the culmination of fifteen years of differing viewpoints and simmering rivalry got the better of both wizards as they duelled in earnest. All the women could do was protect themselves and their surroundings with the strongest shield charms they knew.
After what felt like hours but in truth couldn’t have been more than twenty minutes, Godric hit Salazar in a way that made him drop his wand. Salazar raised his hands in surrender, a sarcastic jeer on his face.
“Have it your way, Godric,” he spat at his oldest friend. “See if I care!”
Godric, having lowered his wand as soon as Salazar spoke, stared at the other man, his mouth working without a sound. Salazar mockingly bowed to Godric, retrieved his wand with a silent summoning spell and disapparated on the spot.
Rowena, suddenly gripped by desperate fear, disapparated only seconds later, materialising a scant few feet from Salazar in his quarters.
“Leave,” he growled at her before she could even draw breath to speak.
“Salazar, see reason. Godric-” she began but he cut her off with a roar.
“Silence!”
For a moment she shrank away from his tall form, his anger palpable in the air around him. After a few frantic beats of her heart and a deep breath, she steeled herself and approached him like the dangerous animal he was.
“Salazar.” She reached him where he stood by his bed, throwing items into an open trunk. “Sal. My love.” Rowena reached out to touch his back and glide her hand across his shoulder to his arm, hoping to make him face her. He shrugged her hand off with a forceful movement but remained silent which she took as an encouraging sign.
“Sal, won’t you turn to me?” she tried again. “We can talk about this.”
He did turn to her and it took all her power to not step back at the fire in his eyes. In all truth, the intensity with which he glared at her scared her to her core, but backing away at that moment would surely mean she would lose him. She knew it in the depth of her soul that she had to stand her ground.
For a long moment they stared at each other before, at last, he moved and together they stumbled until her back hit the bare walls and his mouth claimed hers and he kissed her like a man possessed. It wasn’t a kiss of passion, it was a kiss that spoke of punishment and regret and it broke something deep inside her as she desperately clutched her hands in his robes.
When he wrenched himself away, his voice was gravelly and low but clear as he turned away again. “Farewell.”
The click of his trunk closing echoed loudly in her ears as she stood still as a statue and watched him disapparate without another look back.
A crack of thunder and a flash of lightning brings Rowena back to the present. She’s sagged down to the ground during her reminiscing, sitting awkwardly and uncomfortably on a large rock.
As the first drops of what is sure to be a deluge begin to fall, she raises her wand one last time, together with a token pin he gave her long ago, bearing an intricate letter S formed of filigree with a snake winding its way around the outside.
Silent tears course over Rowena’s cheeks as she stands, her face tilting to the heavens. She thought she’d known what heartbreak was when she’d lost her husband so young many years ago.
She was wrong.
With a new spurt of anger, she grips her wand tightly in her hand and throws his pin high up in the air. Rowena mutters the final charm that would hopefully protect what was left of her shattered heart; nay, soul. Whilst the charm to prohibit apparition will be passed down from one Headmaster to the next, this particular charm will die with her: a sounding alarm should Salazar ever dare to cross the boundary of Hogwarts again. She knows she will need that warning to steel herself before facing him again.
She hopes she’ll never hear it.