Before anyone knew it, Christmas had arrived at Hogwarts again and there were only a few days left until Christmas break. There was a festive cheer all throughout the castle that even Ms. Ebenezer Scrooge herself couldn't destroy. I didn't know if it was the giant Christmas tree in the great hall or the suits of armor that had been enchanted to sing Christmas carols whenever you walked past them, but everyone seemed to have a smile on their face.
Being the real-life snow queen that I was, I had taken it upon myself to decorate the room of requirement for the last DA meeting before we all left to go home for the holidays. I also had to bring in some expert help, someone who was practically made for Christmas...
"Oh, look! Candy canes!"
Authors note: As requested, Olaf at the DA meeting! I hope everyone likes it!
"Olaf, you can't have a candy cane as a nose," I told him as I coated the Christmas tree with a light dusting of snow.
"But it looks so pretty!" Olaf said as he danced around with a candy cane in place of his usual carrot nose.
"I know that it looks pretty, but you'll make yourself sick absorbing all that sugar. It will crystalize in your snow and will take forever to clean out," I said to him, holding my hand out for him to place the candy cane in.
"Okay then," Olaf said in a sad voice, placing the candy cane in my hand.
"Since you can't have a candy cane nose, did you want to put the star on the top of the tree?" I asked, trying to cheer the little snowman up.
"Yes please! That sounds like fun!" Olaf cheered as he clapped his hands.
"Hold on, Olaf!"
Creating an icy mist, I lifted Olaf up into the air at the same time as creating an ice start for him to place on the top of the tree. Olaf giggled the entire time he was in the air, holding his arms out like he was superman. When he got to the top, I created a little ice platform for him to stand on.
"And now it's perfect!" Olaf said with a smile as he placed the star carefully at the top of the tree.
"It definitely is," I said as I took a step back to look at our work. "And I think we did a pretty good job with the decorations, if I do say so myself."
"I think we did an amazing job!" Olaf agreed as I looked around the room.
Instead of the usual cool and dark look the room normally had, it was now glowing and warm thanks to the crackling fire that was merrily burning away in the fireplace and the candlelight's throughout the whole room. I had hung a large wreath over the fireplace and had weaved branches around the mantel.
The tree itself was at least eight feet tall and was decorated with hundreds of enchanted fairy lights along with the usually Christmas tree decorations and the light dusting of snow I had covered it with. Throughout the rest of the room, I has placed large light up Christmas 'presents' and had conjured large comfy red armchairs which I placed green Christmas blankets over. The final touch was the mistletoe that I had placed over the fireplace.
"Now all we need is Christmas Carols," I said as the room of requirements suddenly made an old record player appear with a stack of records next to it.
"Thank you, magic room!" Olaf called out, making me laugh.
Flicking through the records, I tried to find the perfect Christmas song to play. Then I found it. It probably wouldn't be known by those who weren't muggle born but it was one of my all-time favorites and the lead song off the one Christmas movie that Mum, Dad and I watched every year without fail.
Placing the record on to the record player and started playing White Christmas by Bing Crosby, I finally felt like it was actually Christmas. Humming the song quietly to myself, I sat down one of the large red arm chairs and watched Olaf dance around the room to a song that was in his head. It wasn't long until the door to the room of requirements opened and Cedric walked in followed by Harry, Ron and Hermione.
"Elsa, this looks absolutely amazing!" Hermione gushed as she looked around the room.
"It does, doesn't it," Olaf said, walking over to where Harry, Ron and Hermione were standing and holding out the basket he had in his hands to them. "Candy cane?"
Harry and Ron looked down at Olaf with a look of confusions on their faces. Then I remembered that neither of them had met Olaf before and the only reason that Hermione had was because he was there when she was telling us about the DA meetings.
"Harry, is that a talking snowman?" Ron asked, looking down at Olaf like he had lost his mind.
"It's a talking snowman," Harry confirmed as he looked down at Olaf as well.
"Why don't you introduce yourself to Harry and Ron," Cedric encouraged him.
"Hi! I'm Olaf and I like warm hugs!"
"Elsa, why do I think that you have something to do this with?" Harry asked me with a smile.
"I may have but he's our secret. Umbridge can't find out about him," I told him as Ron took a candy cane from the basket that Olaf was still holding up to him.
"Don't worry, mate. We'll make sure Umbridge won't find out about you," Ron told Olaf.
"Yay! More people to share our secret!" Olaf said happily.
"I, uh, don't think that's how secrets work..." Harry said cautiously, not wanting to upset Olaf. But he didn't need to worry because Olaf has already lost attention and was in the middle of a candy cane eating contest with Ron.
"Olaf, what did I tell you before about the candy canes?" I asked him, scaring myself because of how much I sounded like my Mum when she used to pull me up for making snowmen in the middle of summer were anyone could see.
"Not to use them as a nose," Olaf said with a mouthful of the candy.
"No, that the sugar would make you sick and crystalize in your snow," I reminded him, finally understanding how Mum felt all those years.
"That's right, I forgot," Olaf chuckled as the rest of the group made their way in to the room.
Even though I had made Olaf promise that he would act like a real snowman and not move when around everyone else, he insisted on going around the room and introducing himself to everyone so that they could be part of our little secret. I was worried at first but then Hermione assured me that she would alter the jinx she put on the DA list to include Olaf so that no one could tell Umbridge about him. So enough it was time for the actual meeting to start and since it was the last meeting before Christmas, Cassy and me thought it would be best if we didn't do our part of the training. That meant that Harry was on his own for instructing the class for the evening.
"Okay everyone," Harry called out to quiet down the room. "I thought this evening we should just go over the few things we have done so far, because it's the last meetings before the holidays and there's no point starting anything new right before a three-week break..."
"We're not doing anything new?" Zacharias called out. "If I'd known that, I wouldn't have come..."
"We're all really sorry Harry didn't tell you then," Fred told him, making everyone start to laugh.
"Well then, how about we practice dueling spells again in pairs. But this time the pairs can go one at a time so we can see how much everyone has improved," Harry said as a murmur of agreement went through the room.
"Hey, how about boy vs girls?" George called out.
"Yeah, that sound likes fun!" Fred seconded.
"Okay then, do we have any volunteers?" Harry asked.
What do you say cousin, should we show them how tough they make us in the country?
Oh, you're on Danny Boy
"Harry, Danny and me will go first," I told him as Danny and me walked forwards from the group.
"Great! Everyone step back and give them some room and let's see which cousin comes out on top. Whoever is forced to drop their wand first loses," Harry laughed. "And Elsa, normal magic only."
With a smirk to Danny and a nod to Harry I was more than ready to start our little practice duel. I knew Danny like the back of my hand, so I knew what he was going to before he actually did it. Unfortunately, the same went for Danny as well which meant I had to stop thinking like myself and channel my inner Nat. But I almost broke and lost concentration when I saw Olaf cheering us for both Danny and me. Fighting back the smile that wanted to appear on my face because of Olaf's support, I did everything I could to concentrate on Danny.
"Rictusempra!" Danny cried out as he sent the tickling spell at me but I was already one step ahead.
"Protego," I said simply, creating a shield to block the spell before dropping it and sending a spell straight back at Danny. "Locomotor Mortis!"
Danny ducked and rolled away from the leg locking curse and was back on his feet in a second, making me regret letting him join in on the Avengers training for all those years. But I wasn't going to let him get the upper hand, even as he sent the jelly legs curse at me.
"Locomotor Wibbly!"
Executing a perfect back flip that probably would have won me gold at the Olympics for gymnastics, I dodged the curse and landed back on my feet in a second which made Olaf jump up and down, cheering. For a moment neither Danny or me moved an inch as we studied each other, trying to figure the others next move.
"Flipendo!" Danny cried out at the same time I yelled "Levicorpus!"
While Danny's jinx flipped me over backwards, mine hoisted him up into the air by the ankles. Even though neither of us had dropped our wands, I still had the upper hand thanks to my ability to land on my feet.
Authors note: I know it's Nat but I couldn't find any Stargirl superhero landing gifs.
"Wow! Elsa did a superhero landing," I heard Olaf say excitedly to Cedric.
Smiling at Olaf's support and gripping my wand tighter and jumping to my feet as Danny tried to cast the counter jinx while he was upside down to free himself, I took the advantage to disarm him.
"Expelliarmus!"
The second that the disarming spell hit Danny, his wand flew out of his hand and into the air which Cedric caught for him before it hit the ground. Crossing my arms and smirking at Danny, I let him hand in the air just a little bit longer. I mean, we were cousins after all and there was an ever so small rivalry between us...
"Okay, cousin. You win. Now can you let me down," Danny laughed.
"I guess I can do that," I drawled as I looked down at my nails, pretending to clean them in perfect imitation of Loki before laughing. "Liberacorpus."
With a wave of my wand and the simple counter-jinx, Danny was lowered to the ground.
"Well done, the both of you," Harry said as we walked over to the rest of the group with Danny's arm slung over my shoulders. "Now, how about Ron and Hermione next."
"Don't worry. I'll go easy on you," Ron said gallantly to Hermione, making her roll her eyes.
"Thanks, Ronald," Hermione told him as he walked to the opposite end of the room.
"He won't last two seconds," Cassy muttered to me as the twins took bets on how long their younger brother would last against Hermione.
"I don't know," I said. "I reckon he will last about ten maybe fifteen seconds."
"Stupefy!" Hermione yelled as she sent Ron flying across the room.
"Told you so," Cassy laughed as Ron pushed himself up off the floor, trying to act like he wasn't hurt.
Ron gingerly walked back over to the group, playing off that he was hurting and like Hermione hadn't just sent him flying across the room.
"I let her do that. It's good manners, isn't it?" Ron said as stopped and stood next to the twins.
"Your right, Ron! It is good manners," Olaf said, happily.
"Keep telling yourself that, Ronniekins and it just might come true. After all, it's Christmas and we still haven't had a Christmas miracle yet," Cassy joked.
"You know what, Stark? You can shove it," Ron told her, only resulting in Cassy losing it laughing.
After about another hour and Olaf's constant cheerful support of everyone, Harry decided to call it a night on the meeting so we could all go back to our dorms and start packing for the Christmas holidays. Much to Olaf's disappointment, I had to turn him back into his frozen, miniature from. Because I had to change Olaf in to his other form, I was one of the last to leave the room of requirement with Cedric who was waiting for me so we could leave together. But as we turned to head of the door, I saw that Cho was hanging back and looking up at Harry from beneath her fringe. Knowing what Cho was playing at, I glanced back over at the pair as Cedric and me walked out of the room, hoping that Cho wouldn't end up hurting Harry.
The next day as we all lined up to get onto the Hogwarts express to head home for the Christmas holidays there was no sign of any of the Weasleys, Harry or Hermione and I couldn't help but feel worried. I knew that Harry was going back to the Orders headquarters with the Weasley's for Christmas, so they should have been at the train station with the rest of us. But no matter how many times I looked for my friends, I couldn't find them. Eventually I had to give up my search for my friends otherwise I was going to miss the train back home.
I made my way to the usual compartment that my friends and me sat in to see that Cedric had already put my trunk onto the racks in the compartment for me and was in the middle of putting his up next to mine.
"You know I can do that for myself," I said, smiling at him and sitting down so I could let Freya out of her carrier.
"I know but I like to," Cedric told me, sitting down next to me and kissing my cheek.
"I can't believe I have to spend Christmas with the pair of you in the Avengers tower," Cassy whined as she walked into the compartment with Lee and sitting down.
"Well, you're just gonna have to deal with it," I laughed.
"Deal with what?" Danny asked, walking in holding Maggie's hand. I tried to hide my smile that showed how happy I was that they were back together, finally. Maggie had been trying her hardest to make up for what she did and I was happy that everything had finally gone back to normal so we could enjoy our last year at Hogwarts like we did in our first year. Which was together, as friends, as a family.
"Deal with the love birds over here," Cassy said gesturing towards Cedric and me.
"Man, I wish I was spending Christmas with you guys at the towers just so I could watch Cassy slowly go crazy," Danny laughed.
"You're not spending Christmas together as a family?" Lee asked looking between us.
"Nah, Mum, Dad and me are spending Christmas with Mum's side of the family this year. We take it in turns, one year with the Avengers side of the family and the next with Mum's side of the family in Tennessee," Danny explained.
"And thank god for that! If I had to put up with three Hufflepuff's over Christmas, I'd go insane!" Cassy said over dramatically.
"Dude, what's wrong with Hufflepuff's?" Henry asked walking into the compartment with Hamish, Amanda and Zane.
"Your too nice all the time! It's too much and I can't stand it!" Cassy said, throwing her hands up into the air.
"Okay drama queen," Zane said as he rolled his eyes. "But where are the twins and Able?"
"Able is staying at the castle over Christmas with the rest of the seventh year Ravenclaw's to study for the NEWTs," Henry said, laying on the ground and playing with Freya.
"And I have no idea where the twins are. They were gone along with Ron and Harry when I woke up," Lee said as he tried to act like he wasn't worried. "I guess they left early or something."
Cedric, Cassy and me looked at each other with mirrored looks of concern on our faces. They only reason they would all leave early would have been because of something to do with the Order. I just hoped it wasn't something bad.
The train ride back to platform 9 and 3/4 seemed to pass in the blink of an eye and the next thing I knew, we were sitting in the back of the quinjet with Dad, Tony and Nat and flying back to New York. Poor Freya was back in her carrier, growling and hiss at absolutely everything, scared of being on the quinjet as usual. No matter what I did, I just couldn't calm her down. She didn't mind being on the train or in the car, but she just couldn't stand being in the air for a long period of time.
"I wonder if it will snow this year?" Cassy asked as she looked out the window at the Statue of Liberty.
"Doesn't it always snow in New York?" Cedric asked with a confused look on his face.
"Not in the city. It's kinda hit and miss and when it does snow, it isn't always like what we see at Hogwarts," I explained.
"Well, if it doesn't, I expect the ice queen over here to do something about it because I want a real white Christmas," Cassy said as she looked over at me.
"Cassy, I can't make it snow over the whole city! Do you know how exhausting that would be?" I asked her.
"Yeah, but I'm sure you and reindeer games and your Mum could make it happen if you worked together," Cassy said stubbornly.
"Don't worry, Cassy. I have a feeling you are going to get your white Christmas," Dad said, pointing out the window.
The three of us immediately looked out the window of the quinjet to see that it had just started to snow and I mean really snow, over the whole city. If I didn't know better, I would have thought it was magic.
"Well, Cassy," I said, looking over ather excited face. "I guess you don't have to dream about a white Christmasat all because we already have one."