WEEKLY CHALLENGE. The Founders- Week 1. RESULTS

Name: Caroline/iwannabeanauror
House: Gryffindor
Title: Helena
Ratings/Warnings:6-7 years, because I'm paranoid. It's probably 3-5 years. As for the warnings, uh, only a tiny bit of implied SS
Word Count: 321
Favourite Founder: Rowena Ravenclaw (I loved this challange! :))
A/N: I wrote this because I've always wondered who Helena Ravenclaw's father was.

Rowena Ravenclaw ran through the halls of Hogwarts on a busy Tuesday afternoon. Navigating through the crowd of students, she was trying to think of how she should tell Salazar. She just know that she had to find him. The sooner the better; she wanted to get this over with. She was so caught up in her thoughts, though not in her usual daydreaming way, that she did not notice that he was right in front of her; until, that is, she literally ran into him. She stood up, blushing an abnormally bright red. "Oh, sorry," she gushed, "I actually need to talk to you. Do you have a minute? It's really important."

Salazar nodded; he wasn't particularly loquacious and his answers were always quite terse. They walked together in silence to Rowena's office. It was not an awkward silence; in fact they were quite used to being quiet around each other. Many did not understand their relationship. Rowena felt that their understanding was unnecessary. Helga insisted that this was true love; she felt the same way about Godric.

Entering the office, they sat down and Rowena started gushing again.

"I'm not sure how to say this," she started, chewing on the inside of her cheek, her blue eyes turned straight down at her small feet, "but, well," she took another deep breath, "we're going to be parents."

Salazar smiled. "You were really nervous about telling me?" he asked softly. Though not normally emotional, his grey eyes filled with tears. Whether from happiness or shock, Rowena did not know.

Rowena nodded. "Maybe a little."

They then met each others eyes and smiled. Rowena resumed the conversation.

"If it's a girl," she said, "I'd like to name her Helena."

Salazar nodded. "That is a great idea."

Rowena smiled. She pulled him into a hug, which was uncharacteristic of her normally. But not today. This Tuesday was a day she would never forget.

I Welcoooome all of you to Hogwarts!

Closing date: Sunday 6TH November 10pm GMT

Quote:

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"You all know, of course, that Hogwarts was founded over a thousand years ago - the precise date is uncertain - by the four greatest witches and wizards of the age. They built this castle together, far from prying Muggle eyes, for it was an age when magic was feared by common people, and witches and wizards suffered much persecution."
-- Professor Binns (CS)

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Hello, there! Welcome to The Three Broomsticks Founders Challenge, WEEK 4!(The FINAL week!)

As a twist on our regular weekly challenges, this barmaid has decided that it would be fun to have four weekly challenges spread over October all based around the Founders of Hogwarts.

The prompts for these challenge are pretty simple really, each week you will be given the name of a founder and based around that you must create a drabble of between 300-500 words.

Your prompt this week is:
Salazar Slytherin

Rules:
300-500 words
MUST be set in the Founder Era.

Form for your drabbles:

PHP Code:

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[B]Name:[/B]
[B]House:[/B]
[B]Title:[/B]
[B]Ratings/Warnings:[/B]
[B]Word Count:[/B]
[B]Favourite Founder:[/B]
[B]A/N:[/B] 


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There will be SEVEN points for participation if you complete all four drabbles.
15, 10 and 5 points will be awarded each week for first, second and third place respectively.

Please direct any questions to the Question Corner thread =)

HAVE FUN DRABBLERS!

~Madam Russia and Madam Carole xxxxx

Name: iLuna17/Ellie (last time I checked. . . you could call me Elyse, but then I would have to kill you)
House: Slytherin! (Please don't hurt me. . .)
Title: Alone With His Demons
Ratings/Warnings: 3-5th years for death/the word lovers
Word Count: 500 on the dot
Favourite Founder: Still Slippy Slithery Slytherin
A/N: Most of it is fluffy, but my little short story collection has a slight up in the air ending :)



Salazar Slytherin woke up in a cold sweat. In his dreams he had caused Helga’s death for the thousandth time. That’s why I should stop interacting with organic life forms. All I’ll do is hurt them in the end. . . His mind immediately drifted to his father, and the pain he had caused Salazar. He looked down at his bare chest. The scars would always be there, the magical whip marks crossing each other in every which way.

Realizing sleep was not an option Salazar dressed and left his chambers, deciding to wander the grounds. Today Hogwarts would open. His father had taught him that Muggles were ugly, slimy, and stupid. Being taught these ideals the hard way, Salazar had insisted they only let in those of pure blood. Helga had immediately slapped Salazar across the face.

Helga, sweet Helga. A witch of only seventeen, she was quite beautiful. An innocent kind of beauty with her perfect golden ringlets and bright blue eyes. Salazar, at the age of twenty-four, loved her more than even he could comprehend.

Only a week before Salazar decided he would only teach those who were pure, as his father had preached, whereas Helga, being the youngest and most agreeable, was left with everyone else’s discards.

But Helga took it into her stride, and no one would even begin to call her house “soft”, or they would receive a strong hex in return. Salazar chuckled to himself, not realizing that Helga had snuck up behind him, giving him a soft peck on the cheek.

“Hello, love. Nervous about today?”

“Not at all. Just my thoughts keeping me from slumber.” He kissed her lightly on her perfect lips. He smiled, but she was not fooled.

“Salazar Slytherin. It. Was. Not. Your. Fault.” Helga scolded before smiling. “Do not feel guilt. It is not the Slytherin way.” She giggled, as this is what Salazar’s father had always preached.

“No.” He kissed her nose. “I will not tell the truth unless I can achieve something from it, I will not feel love unless I can gain something of it, and I must not show mercy. This is the Slytherin way.” He said, imitating his father, before picking Helga up and swinging her around while she playfully kicked and laughed. The two lovers continued their game until a half-asleep Godric stumbled out of his chambers.

“What in the name of Merlin is going on?” He looked at Slytherin, who had put Helga down and faced Godric with his normal emotionless face. His smiles were rare in front of most, and only Helga could make him truly grin.

“Godric.” Salazar acknowledged, but Gryffindor just winked before leaving. “Now, where were we?” Helga smiled before yawning loudly. She gave him another light peck on the cheek.

“Go sleep, my love. The students will be here in a few hours.” Then she was gone, and Salazar had no idea she would be dead within the hour, leaving him alone with his demons.

Name: Joy
House: Ravenclaw
Title: Reunited
Ratings/Warnings: 3rd-5th years (probably too extreme for a little ruthlessness, but it's still there)
Word Count: 466
Favourite Founder: Still Ravenclaw, but Slytherin comes a close second! :]
A/N: One more founder, one more object. Determination is pretty fun to write!
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Smoke rose in wispy strings from every wooden log left of the shack. Small flames still licked the edge of the grass, trying to catch a dry patch to feed on. Where a small house once stood, a pile of rubble remained. Where a shelf once belonged, a single man stood.

The man dug quietly through the ashes, brushing away the charred remains to find his prize. With a flick of his wand, the debris would scatter, and he would continue his search. A glitter in the morning sun caught his attention.

“Ah,” he said, picking up the undamaged article. “There you are.”

He turned the locket over in his hands a few times. This was it – his locket – indestructible to almost all known magic. How could those Muggles believe that they could hide his prize?

For ten years the memory of losing his family heirloom haunted him. A Muggle boy, no older than he was at the time, had taken it right out of his hand as he made his way through a busy Muggle market to meet a teacher. The fool! Salazar Slytherin may have been young, unable to perform magic and chase him, but he would never forget that face.

It took another decade to track down the thief. He was in a desolate corner of a war-ravaged village, pillaging for the remaining treasures of the deceased.

“I sold it, I sold it!” the man cried as Salazar dug through the memories of a thief. “It’s not here!”

The memories proved truthful to his statement, and Salazar had another lead as to where his treasure was. Still, no thief of this magnitude would go away unpunished. He was dead before he could squeak out where he last saw the locket.

No matter, Salazar had a pretty good way with minds, and Muggles were particularly easy to crack. Just a few more years of tracking brought him to the house, standing alone by a thick forest.

Salazar had not bothered with these Muggles, for they were as filthy for having the locket as the thief was for stealing it. A ring of fire surrounded the house, and Salazar had left it to burn well into the morning before he returned.

As his fingers traced the S engraved on the front, he again considered the long journey that had just come to an end. The guilty parties had paid the price. He was free of the burden that the missing heirloom had brought upon him. It was time to return to his school, to his students.

As he walked away from the rubble, he vowed that no spawn of such filth would ever enter the doors of his school. Ideas were brewing in his head, and they would last until long after he was gone.

Name: AidaLuthien
House: Hufflepuff
Title: For His Daughter
Ratings/Warnings: 1st-2nd
Word Count: 397
Favourite Founder: Right now, strangely, Hufflepuff
A/N: I wondered how it ended up in the hands of the Gaunts, if the male line of the Slytherins just died out, and then came up with this.

A young couple sat hand in hand, by the edge of a lake. She had brilliant green eyes, dark flowing hair, and wide lips that were usually creased in a smile. He had similarly dark hair, but compared to her, his skin was almost deathly pale.

“I have something for you,” he said, reaching in his robes.

She raised an eyebrow, quizzically. “What is it, Salazar?”

He smiled and kissed her. “Close your eyes, Selena.” She closed her eyes, then opened them again a tiny bit to peek. “All the way closed, Selena,” he chided. She smiled, and kept her eyes shut.

Salazar pulled out a locket. He carefully draped it around his wife’s neck and then closed the clasp. “There. Now you can open your eyes.”

Selena’s eyes snapped open and her hands immediately went to the locket at her throat. “Oh, Salazar... it’s beautiful.” The oval shaped locket had a stylized S made of green stones on it, that almost looked like a snake. Selena looked at her husband, smile growing broader. “Is the S for Selena, Salazar or Slytherin?”

Salazar put his arms around his wife and pulled her a little closer. “Why not all three?” He kissed her hair.

“If it is for Slytherin, then I will give it to our daughter,” Selena declared.

Salazar laughed. “Why to a daughter and not to a son?”

“So that she remembers who she is, even when she marries and takes another man’s name,” she whispered. “Is it a locket or a pendant?”

“A locket. The kind that only we could open.”

Selena grinned. “Open,” she hissed to it in Parseltongue, and the locket obeyed.

* * * * *

Salazar Slytherin opened his eyes. The other side of his bed was cold. Like it had been for decades now. His beautiful Selena was gone. Killed by a Muggle who did not understand that Parseltongue was not the devil’s speech.

His daughter, Sabela, was to be married next week - he supposed he should give her the locket. It was what Selena would have wanted. Besides, his daughter’s Parseltongue was much better than his son’s. Severino could speak to a living snake directly, but he found it difficult to communicate with portraits, statues or imagine the snake on the locket as a real snake. Sabela would find the locket easier to use.

Involuntarily, his hand went to it. “Open,” he whispered.

Name: inspirations
House: Hufflepuff
Title: A Warning
Ratings/Warnings: 3rd-5th years; violence.
Word Count: 360
Favourite Founder: I can't say I have one, tbh.

The blood runs in rivulets down your arms. The snake twists around your neck. You are suffocating. You are drowning. You are helpless. You can’t speak. You are immobilised.

Rowena woke with a start, cold all over. She took a sharp breath of air and eased herself onto her elbows. At the end of her bed sat Salazar Slytherin, swaddled in emerald robes. He stroked his chin out of habit, but otherwise perched on the edge of his chair, completely still, leaning towards the bed at a very slight angle.

Instead of speaking, Rowena said nothing. She kept her eyes fixed on Salazar, waiting for his cue. The back of her neck crawled; he unnerved her, a feeling that overwhelmed her more and more frequently in his presence. His cold eyes watched her unflinchingly, as if evaluating her, as if waiting for her reaction.

Finally, she broke. ‘What is it?’ she asked calmly, sitting up properly. Her elbows ached, and she crossed her arms across her chest. She remembered her dream suddenly, remembered how powerful Salazar was. It occurred to her how vulnerable she was, sitting in bed -- wand-less. It occurred to her that she should probably start guarding her dreams from Salazar. He was powerful, but she could match him if she tried.

‘Nothing in particular. Nothing.’ His voice was unreadable. She’d never understood him.

‘Then why, dear Salazar, are you sitting in my chamber? It’s rude to interrupt a lady’s sleep.’

‘But I didn’t interrupt, dear Rowena. You simply awoke.’

‘Answer my question.’

Almost lazily, Salazar stood up and stretched. His hands almost touched the ceiling; Rowena’s wouldn’t have. She could feel his power rippling around him, like a magnetic field.

This encounter was a reminder: a warning. Rowena got out of bed and picked up her wand. Salazar laughed softly.

‘What are you scheming about?’ Any semblance of politeness was gone; Rowena jabbed the wand into his chest, leaving a tiny scorch mark. Salazar didn’t react, just simply smirked.

‘Nothing in particular. Nothing.’

With that, Salazar turned abruptly and left the room. Rowena’s skin crawled. Something bad was happening, and he wanted her to know that.

Name: secret_hermoine
House: Hufflepuff
Title: A Slytherin's World
Ratings/Warnings: 1st-2nd years/none
Word Count: 412
Favourite Founder: Rowena Ravenclaw
A/N:

I've always been different from the other Founders. Older, more serious, more choosey, more stringent. Overall I'm the least favorite Hogwarts teacher. Even some of my own students dislike me. But those that are really of my kind live a life unknown to others. We learn things that other despise, and find uses for things thought to be harmful. We have our reputations, but we are willing to go to more lengths to reach our goals. And generally they are good.

“Salazar!”

I turn around from the research I'm doing at my desk.

“What are you doing here, Godric? I thought you were out for the day.”

“I am, after the Quidditch game. Which you are about to miss if you don't come with me now.”

“It's Ravenclaw vs. Hufflepuff, I don't have any stakes in the match.”

“You are a teacher at this school. You should come make your presence known. It's not like you make yourself particularly accessible to even your own students.”

“They need to learn to be self-reliant. We can't nurse them along every step of the way.”

“They are also learning the ways of the world and cannot be expected to do everything on their own yet. Besides, coming to a Quidditch game won't send them back to the cradle. It'll be good to get your mind off things.”

I don't really want to get Godric irked at me just now. He's my best friend, but we have our disagreements, and now is not the best time for one. I'll need all of the Founders behind me if I want to pull this one off.

Since Hogwarts was founded, a form of central government has been put in place in Wizarding Britain. In theory I agree with it, but I know how govenment and education clash sometimes. We need to keep ourselves out of the direct control of the new Ministry, but there's no way that they're going to go for it without good reason. And it might need more than just an honest look into the future. We need something on them.

It'll be hard to get Godric and Rowena on board, but Helga will be practicality impossible. And that's another something that I need to work out the kinks on.

Good intentions with a bit of disregard for morality and what is considered “wrong.” But in a Slytherin's world, we are right. And eventually we will conquer.

-inconspicuously flutters in two days after the challenge has closed-
(Feel free to disregard me, I'd understand!)

Name: Phia Phoenix
House: Ravenclaw
Title: Swan Song
Ratings/Warnings: Um, I'm a bit rusty here - 3rd-4th, I guess, for the very-slightly-implied bestiality and rape? (It's not as bad as it sounds, I swear!! Greek mythology!!)
Word Count: 484
Favourite Founder: Rowena by a mile. But I'm not biased.

~~~

The night was settling its dusky wings over the Forbidden Forest – all was still and quiet, as if holding its breath. Here, only shadows without owners ever seemed to move, sliding and slipping over silent territories which kept their clandestine secrets. Yet twisting amongst the roots of the gnarled trees there seemed tonight to be another shape – the glistening body of a serpent wound through the hushed evening, making its sure way towards the crystal sounds of a nearby brook.

The stream was only small – a minor tributary that fed the Black Lake –yet still it cut a swathe in the gloom of the Forest, a ribbon of clear air where the ground knew sun- and starlight. Here, half submerged in the flowing water, there lay a lady with raven-black hair and starry-blue robes. Her eyes were open, and a smile curved her slight lips as the snake slithered down the embankment and through the clear mountain water, twining itself around her arm and pausing at her neck. The feeling of its scales against her skin raised instant goosebumps, though the night was warm. Rowena carefully exhaled and attempted to calm her heartbeat and voice.

‘You know, Leda was visited by a swan. Much more romantic.’

Salazar laughed; Rowena sat bolt upright, her long hair swinging from the stream’s embrace and spraying his face with droplets of water. She had barely felt him leave her and return to the embankment, much less sense him transform. She thought of the signs she had just been reading in the stars, and felt a frisson of fear shiver across her skin, colder than the running water yet still warmer than the snake’s scales had been against her throat.

‘And Leda, I believe, gave birth to the most beautiful female in the entire world.’ He touched with one long finger the bump swelling in Rowena’s stomach; she blushed, and felt the Forest seem to close in around her. This place – this stream – reminded her of the river that had run through the glen in which she grew up – yet Salazar had managed to bring to it a sense of the dread and foreboding she always experienced as she hurried through the ominous shadows of the Forbidden Forest.

‘Now, what was her name, again?’ Rowena started; she had barely heard Salazar’s whispered words, harmless yet as menacing as the wind, and ducked from his half-smiling gaze as she attempted to stutter an apology. But he only laughed, and when Rowena found within herself the courage to once more raise her head and ask him why he had changed so – he was gone, melted once again into the shadows which were coming to define him.

She lay back again into the soothing arms of the stream, and squeezed her eyes shut against what the stars urged her to see. ‘Helen,’ she murmured, caressing her stomach, ‘Her daughter was called Helen.’

~~~

A/N: This is as much Rowena Ravenclaw as it is Salazar Slytherin - forgive me, I'm an ardent shipper and to me the two are inseparable. Also, in Greek mythology Zeus visited the human woman Leda in the form of a swan as she bathed in a stream, fathering Helen, who became Helen of Troy.

First Place: Minnabird (10 points for Hufflepuff)
Second Place: AidaLuthien (5 points for Hufflepuff)
Carole Edit: AidaLuthien is a Hufflepuff, not a Claw. Thanks Aida for the heads up.
Russia Edit: My baaaaad! Sorry Aida! (And thanks Phia who also notified me by PM!)

A note for everyone...

AMERICANISMS. Way too many of these drabbles contained words like 'color' and 'realized'. Both of your barmaids are British, we WILL pick up on these things. Please make a conscious effort to use British English, thanks. =)

~Madam Russia xxxxx

I've had a few PMs about my note on Americanisms up ^^ there, so I would just like to make my point clearer!

You WILL NOT be discounted for using American spelling. It will not negatively affect your drabble result in any way, that was supposed to be merely a friendly remainder that British spelling is preferred if at all possible. :)

Sorry for any confusion!

~Madam Russia xxxxx (Really needs to get her brain in order before posting in TTB! >.>)