A Lack of Color
One-Shot
"Friendships that have stood the test of time and chance are surely best, Brows may wrinkle, hair grow gray, Friendship never knows decay."
Everything in the world seemed so terribly gray. The sky was an endless blanket of that boring shade, completely drab because not only were there no breaks, but it hadn't even had the manners to rain and at least make things a bit more interesting. Just an endless expanse of gray. Hardly any color was on the grounds below either, despite the normal verdant brilliance of the forest to the East or the lake to the West.
An airy sigh escaped the tower's soul occupant. She was a woman of average height with eyes like glowing amber and hair a medium brown sheen tied with the ribbons that signified she was yet-unmarried. Her face was a pleasant oval shape, nose straight and mouth small. Truly, she was considered a beauty in her culture, yet unmarried to an embarrassing age.
Helga Hufflepuff sighed once more. It was hardly the mood for Aphrodite's chosen day, this dreadful gray. She snorted. Rhyming! Rhyming on her most hated of days in the entire year. It was atrocious really, the way young romantics fawned over the day that, normally colorful, had finally taken on the gray of her yearly mood. It wasn't so much that she liked to spite those who found joy in the day of love, as it wasn't in her nature to willfully move against a person. But she did like that, just once, the day of love shone with the lackluster appeal for the loveless.
It didn't make matters any better though. No, now the young couples - some engaged or courted, others already wed, depending on age - wandering about the castle were unavoidable, unable to have their little picnics outdoors due to the chill. So Helga had climbed the East Tower for peace, glad that classes were out for the day. If she had to hear one more term of endearment while she was trying to teach her classes about mimbulus mimbletonia or the banishing charm there would be detentions!
Ire spent, Helga leaned over the edge of the tower on one of the lower ledges. The ground was really looking pleasant for such a dismal day. Every color was muted just-so, which meant that the next day, when all was over and the sun shining, everyone would appreciate the warmth and color all the more.
"You shouldn't lean so," A low voice came from behind caused Helga to jump slightly and turn around. It was Salazar Slytherin, a dark man with dark hair, darker magic, and brilliant green eyes who usually treated her with such apathy as to make her think he was, perhaps, as heartless as they said. Now, however, he had only a melancholy air about him. "It would be a nasty fall from up here, and you have yet much to live for."
"Have I?" Even Helga herself was surprised by the words that came from her mouth, but she stuck to them. Why should Slytherin, Lord of the Snakes, care so for the lowly badger-woman? After all, while she spent her time digging in the dirt and teaching students simple household spells, he was teaching them to fight and brew Potions (which happened to use the products of her digging). Why should he care? "Have I really got so much going for me that you of all people actually care?" Alright, so Helga was in a bad mood, but she blamed the Gods, romance, and the man who had last courted her for getting himself poisoned at dinner. It wasn't her fault!
"Most people do," Slytherin affirmed. He moved forward at his usual pace, seeming to glide across the stone floor with an unnatural grace, to stand beside her. His eyes flew over the gray grounds, a small smirk flicking into place, almost mistakable as a smile. But Slytherin didn't smile, it wasn't his way. After all, the pureblood lord would never smile before the worthless muggle born peasant. Never in a million summers.
Helga huffed like the indignant Hufflepuff she was. "I'm not most people," as if to just prove him wrong, Helga picked up her skirts, climbed onto the low stone wall, and hopped off with not even a how-do-you-do. Of course, falling almost one hundred feet is rather bad for a person, so she didn't. Instead the female founder hovered at the level of the next floor down, looking dangerously at the man above her. "If I had fallen, I'd not have died, I assure you of that." She returned to her previous place on the battlements and glared. "Just because you hate what my parents were, it doesn't mean that I am any less magical than you, Lord Slytherin, and you had best remember that."
Sweeping away from the tower, Helga tromped down the steps to the main castle and her room. It was just near the kitchens, accessible only to faculty or else those who really needed to see her (much like the gargoyle who guarded Godric's office would only open to faculty or a student who said the name of his favorite sweet for the week, but he always had been a bit daft). The decor was simple, blackout drapes before the window with a thinner yellow overlay for during the day, a yellow and black checked bedspread and ebony furniture made up her bedroom while the sitting room was decorated in various colors, even purple.
However, it was in the former that something was found off. A small envelope, dark gray with pale gray - like the day's sky - writing lay on her pillow. She opened it and read the letter, eyes widening. A love letter, a love letter for her! And, what was more, there was a meeting time on it. A time past half an hour since.
What was worse was that there was a place on it. The East Tower, where she had been half an hour past. Where Slytherin had appeared a half hour ago.
To be honest, Helga couldn't remember what she did for the next ten minutes, but she assumed she ran through the school to the dungeons as that was where she found herself at the children-curfew bell (for they couldn't expect to give every age the same hour for curfew). She knocked thrice on the warm mahogany door of Slytherin's rooms. A disgruntled "Mm" was the reply as the door swung open.
"Salazar..." she murmured, poking her head in. The man in question was standing by his coat hook, no doubt having arrived just minutes before as he seemed frozen in the motion of hanging the light gray cloak he had been adorned with on the tower while a small stein of beer was on his table, just barely touched, and the room itself was only just beginning to warm from the crackling flames in the grate. All the room was adorned in that same light gray as the sky had been, the ink on that envelope and the very fabric of Slytherin's cloak.
"Yes, Ms. Hufflepuff?" His voice was as cold as Helga imagined her own to have been when she had let her anger out on him. He was a Lord and she but a woman who, had a local wizard not discovered her talents at a young age, would likely by now be wed to an ugly peasant with a dozen children, probably most of them dead, or else be a tavern wench.
"I came to apologize for my short temper earlier," there, that was ambiguous enough to encompass her sharp tongue. "You see, I was very busy today, and hadn't had any time to just unwind. I had decided to come to the East Tower to cool down after dinner and be alone, as Rowena would likely have come to get me in my room, and I hadn't really thought of the possibility of anyone else coming up to the tower while I was there. So, again, I offer my apologies."
"Is that all, or am I to be kept from my bed any longer?" The tone was clipped as Slytherin moved to tend his fire, waves of heat crashing through the room. When he turned to look at the fair woman, she merely shook her head in the negative and left.
It was done. She apologized, let him know she had only just received his letter, and he obviously had left the envelope to the wrong person now. Which student would he be courting? Most likely the young Lady Coreanna who was in her house, just in the blossoming of womanhood. Yes, a fine match, surely.
Just as Helga stepped from the warm room and back into the cold dungeon halls, a hand caught her wrist. Helga turned and found Slytherin was there. But why? It was not her the message had been meant for, why should he stop her at all?
"Forgive me, Lady, for giving the impression that I did not like you," the hand he had caught was brought t the aristocratic man's face, given a small kiss, and finally released. "Good day, Lady Hufflepuff." The door closed slowly, and Helga allowed a slow smile to creep over her face. Perhaps gray wasn't so bad. In fact, now she thought on it, it was hardly gray at all... silver was more the word. Yes, silver like the Slytherin crest. She rather liked that. A silver sky for the day of love.
Author's Note: The crack-fic died. Sorry. I hope you liked this little Huflepuff/Slytherin budding romance thing. Those are my two favorite houses you see, and Konoha's Kage mentioned she liked the pairing, so that was my decision. I am Slytherin because that is where I am sorted and Hufflepuff because I cosplay Tonks, who just so happens to be a 'Puff. Woot.
Happy Valentine's Day! Course, I don't like it, but oh well.