The Founders

Chapter 33

Christmas at the Christensen household was, unsurprisingly, a huge affair. The entire family, from wherever they might have gone to in the world, relocated back to Oscar's grandmother's house in Denmark for Christmas.

No one in the family knew quite how old the venerable Mrs Christensen was, but she had been organising and hosting Christmas for as long as anyone could remember.

She was a well- dressed, calm woman with dewy skin and perfectly straight, cropped white hair. Her house was an enormous country house in the countryside near Copenhagen, and seemed to be a part of the land itself. Ivy and creepers grew over one face, neatly clipped where they encountered windows, and the edge of a pine forest came right up behind the house.

By the time that the three of them arrived there, around mid-December, everything was covered in a light dusting of white icing sugar snow. They had floo'ed into the village pub, about a ten-minute walk from Oscar's family house, since his grandmother refused to let them track ash into the house. When they crossed out onto the street, bags in tow, the sky was dark and the houses were just silhouettes.

As they approached the house, the black outline of pine trees framed the house, topped with shifting weights of snow that gleamed blue. Warm yellow light spilled from all the windows on the ground floor, illuminating squares of snow on the ground. Through the windows, Kyra caught sight of someone moving towards the kitchen with a large plate, and someone standing up in an upper window.

They received a very warm welcome from the entire family, especially considering how little notice they had been given of Grace and Kyra's arrival, and everyone fawned over Oscar. On arrival, the three of them were dragged in the living room.

It was a wood bound, cosy room with leather armchairs ranged carefully around the fireplace, and floor-to ceiling bookshelves spanning the walls. Mrs Christensen ordered one of the cousins to drag their suitcases upstairs and another one to fetch them warm drinks.

Within about five minutes of arrival, they were settled comfortably in armchairs, each with a mug of sweet mulled wine. The cousins who had been ousted from their seats lounged on the carpet, asking Grace and Kyra questions about school in England with remarkable English.

Some of the older adults and parents sat beside the windows, or were busy carrying plates of biscuits to and fro from the kitchen, at Mrs Christensen's command.

Kyra was delighted to find that one of the cousins their age was the one whose name Oscar had matched with on Tinder. He swooped in quickly from chatting with his uncle to divert the conversation, giving Kyra a dirty look.

The three of them went to bed early that night, leaving the room to a chorus of goodnights; Grace and Kyra shared a room whilst Oscar shared with one of his cousins.

The next few weeks in the lead-up to Christmas was spent helping decorate the house with holly which they first had to cut from the forest behind the house. It took a surprising number of mornings to bring back boughs of holly, stomping snow on the threshold on the way back in, and to fix them above doorways and on bookshelves throughout the house.

Kyra attached mistletoe outside of Oscar's room, just in case his cousin should chance to pass by. Oscar was not amused and guilted her to going on kitchen duty with his grandmother. She was a right little tyrant and kept Kyra on her feet until well after lunchtime, when Oscar's mother took pity on her.

After the holly, there was the job of first making candles, scented with a few drops of pine oil or orange, and then of arranging them on coffee tables or windowsills. Grace loved doing this, since it meant that she didn't have to go outside, where the snow was rapidly becoming deeper. She spent most of her time inside, making friends with the adults of the family and being fed biscuits.

Biscuits was another big job that kept everyone busy; Oscar was in his element and he became almost as bad as his grandmother in ordering people around the kitchen. Together, they were a formidable team that churned out plates of warm vanilla biscuits or soft, spiced ones, topped with nuts, or small round spheres covered in crumbly icing sugar. There were countless more biscuits with unpronounceable names which had to be boxed up nicely and carried around to the neighbours.

Kyra once found herself on neighbour duty which, she thought, was an interesting choice given that she was one of only two people who could not speak Danish. When she was inevitably dragged into the stranger's kitchen, wielding her tin of some kind of coffee biscuit, she had the delightful job of explaining to the elderly lady that she could not, in fact, speak Danish. The lady could not, in fact, speak English either, but Kyra still managed to spend about 45 minutes there.

In the evenings, everyone would come back together for dinner, which was hosted in an enormous dining room. The table spanned from the back to the front of the house and everyone could fit comfortably around it. Kyra had no idea how Mrs Christensen managed to conjure up so much food, whilst simultaneously being busy with everything else.

After dinner, some of the adults retreated into a room just off the dining room, partitioned by a hidden door set into the wall. It was apparently some kind of games room, with a pool table and a fireplace, but realistically it was just a place for the adults to get drunk away from their children. The rest of the group trouped back to the living room and lounged around the fire, playing boardgames, chatting and eating biscuits.

On Christmas Eve, a few strong cousins were recruited to find a tree in the forest, cut it down and drag it back into the house. Pine needles were scattered all over the carpet by the time they had pulled the pine tree upright. It was quite a small, bushy one, set on a table above the Nativity scene, and it smelled very fresh and damp.

After it had been secured, Mrs Christensen brought out a box of thin candles set in silver clamps, which were fixed onto the tree, along with dried orange slices. That evening, the entire troupe went to Mass, taking up a huge portion of the Church.

When they arrived back, the candles were lit with a taper and everyone found a spot for themselves in the room. There were presents, a huge dinner and a very late night of strange Danish drinking games.

The rest of the holidays passed in a similarly busy, cosy fashion and Kyra was sorry to say goodbye to the family in early January, when they were to floo back to school. It had felt like a break from reality, where she could properly relax. Part of her was relieved, though, that she would no longer have to wait to do what she needed to do. She could start feeling useful, rather than helpless.

This is what she thought while they were being escorted back to the pub. She was handed her suitcase back, which she pulled into the fireplace with her, and then felt herself be spun back through the flames to Hogwarts.