Elixir for Christmas - My Advent's Calendar story 2015
by Healer Pomfrey

All recognizable characters belong to J. K. Rowling, and I am not earning anything by writing this story.
I am not a native speaker of English. Please excuse my mistakes.

An Advent's Calendar story with small, daily updates! COMPLETELY AU! Partly OOC.

It is my story, and I intend to write it the way I want it.
If you don't like it, go and find something else to read or write your own story to your liking!

1 December (1986)

Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry was not only old, but also magically powerful and extremely knowledgeable due to her more than one thousand years of experience.

Most of the time, she merely observed what was happening within her walls, however, from time to time she saw fit to interfere as much as expelling an unfit headmaster out of her walls or giving advice to those who needed it.

Her first priority was, however, to assist her founders and their descendants. 'They're my children,' she always thought to herself, feeling proud that many of her children had achieved marvellous things during their lives. She knew exactly who were the heirs of her founders and what they were doing, even at a time when they were residing somewhere outside her walls.

On this first of December, 1986, she felt that she had to interfere for the first time in several hundred years. She had three children, each of them living with some kind of problem, knowingly or unconsciously, which she could remedy by making the three interact with each other. 'They are destined to work together, and they will save the magical world of the next generation,' she thought, feeling very proud of her children.

メリークリスマス

Six-year-old Harry Potter was an unhappy child. He stayed in the house of his relatives, in the cupboard under the stairs. He had a cousin who was of the same age as himself, however, there was no friendship between the two six-year-olds. On the contrary, Dudley called him a freak and despised him - just because his parents did. Harry had no friends, not because he did not like the other children, but because everyone was afraid of Dudley, who was a bully.

On this first of December, 1986, Harry was lying on the shabby mattress in his cupboard reading an old gardening book, which he had found in the garbage a few days ago. He was thrilled at his new treasure and happily devoured every single word. Although he had never possessed a book of his own, he could read better than most of his classmates, at least the teacher had told his relatives as much. Unfortunately, this revelation had made his uncle very upset, and Harry had learned the hard way that it would not do good to be better at school than his cousin in any subject.

Now however, his ability helped him to understand what the gardening book was about, and Harry found it extremely interesting. He loved to get to know as much as possible about the plants, which he could see in the pictures. 'I must be the happiest boy in the world,' he thought, as he continued to read, for once not waiting for the weekend to be over as quickly as possible.

メリークリスマス

Severus Snape was sitting behind a mountain of parchments on his desk, which he had to grade.

'What a dunderhead,' he thought in annoyance, as he let his red quill play wildly over the parchment. 'What in the world was I thinking when I agreed to teach such idiots?' he questioned himself, as he cast the parchment onto the low pile with the finished ones and rose from his chair in determination.

'I'm much more efficient in the lab,' he thought, as he headed to his most treasured room and pulled out his silver cauldron, which he solely used for his research.

Just like dozens of potions masters before him, Severus was trying to find a cure for lycanthropy. 'Ridiculous,' he thought, as he gathered the ingredients, while his cauldron was heating up. 'Why do I even try?' he asked himself, only to provide the response for himself, 'In order to not go nuts in the company of dunderheads of students and meddling colleagues.'

On this first of December, 1986, nothing seemed to go well for the potions master. Just when he was half through the brewing of the potion, for which he could not use any charm like the stasis charm, he was called to the hospital wing, where two of his sixth-year dunderheads had injured each other. His second attempt failed because the headmaster shouted for him through the fireplace, sounding much too energetic for his liking, and when he was beginning to brew the potion for the third time, his thoughts went back to the sole true love of his life, Lily Evans, causing him to absentmindedly stir into the wrong direction.

'Ah, today just nothing works,' he thought in annoyance, as he decided to leave his the solace of his quarters and head for a long walk through the Forbidden forest that looked very much inviting in the deep snow.

メリークリスマス

Nicholas Flamel was sitting in the living room of Flamel Manor together with his wife Perenelle. They were enjoying tea and scones, which their house-elves had provided, and stared into the snow that was piling up in the garden right before their window.

"Soon, it will be Christmas again," Perenelle spoke up, sighing.

"I know," Nicholas replied in a soothing voice, understanding without further words what his wife's remark implemented.

Every year before Christmas, Perenelle became extremely sentimental, thinking about her children and grand children, who had all passed away hundreds of years ago, leaving them completely without a heir.

In fact, Nicholas, who was a world famous alchemist, was the inventor of the Philosopher's stone and along with it of the Elixir of Life. Once a month, he and Perenelle had been drinking the elixir, however, they had not shared it with their children - something that they both regretted more and more as the time passed.

'Perhaps we could adopt a child,' Nicholas thought, however, dared not voice his idea to his wife. 'I'd prefer our line to not die out,' he thought, knowing that they were probably too old to have more children of their own.

He pulled two small phials out of his robe pocket, filled with a light red liquid, handing one to his wife.

On this first of December, 1986, however, Perenelle let out a long sigh. "Nicholas, do we really still want to take it?" she doubted for the first time ever, unobtrusively wiping a tear from her cheek.

Nicholas remained pensive for a moment, before he replied, "Yes my dear, we still need to take it. I don't know why. I think it's some kind of foreboding, but yes, let's take it." With that he uncorked his phial and gulped down the cool liquid like he did every other Saturday.

メリークリスマス

Hogwarts sighed upon pondering the situation of her three children. 'I need help,' she thought, knowing that she was unable to take action beyond her boundaries.

"Lisa," she called a house-elf. Lisa had been the Potters' elf but had come to work at Hogwarts, when Dumbledore placed little Harry with his atrocious Muggle relatives.

Lisa appeared in the chamber of the founders' quarters, where Hogwarts was able to speak aloud to everyone assembled in the room. The founders had named it 'The Parlour.' The small elf looked around, surprise clearly written in her face.

"Hello Lisa, I'm Hogwarts," the castle said to the small elf. "Don't be afraid. I've called you here, because I have an important job for you."

"Lisa is here, Mistress Hogwarts," Lisa replied in a small voice.

"Very well Lisa, I wish to bond you to myself, so that you will only listen to myself and not to the headmaster, because I wish you to be here for little Harry Potter. Does this meet your interests?"

"Of course Mistress Hogwarts, I'd love to work for you and little Master Harry," Lisa replied with a huge smile on her face that only intensified once Hogwarts had performed the bonding.

"Very well Lisa, please come to see me for further instructions at seven o'clock tomorrow morning," Hogwarts instructed the elf, who eagerly nodded her head in agreement.

tbc tomorrow...