A Harry Potter/Throne of Glass/A Court of Thorns and Roses crossover

.12.

The last few days before the school let out for the winter break were more peaceful than the past few months of classes had been. Everyone seemed to be happily discussing their plans for the holiday, what they hoped their presents would be, what they were planning to get their friends and families. Even the professors seemed to be more relaxed. And what with all the snow frosting the grounds and all the decorations on the inside, the castle actually looked somewhat pretty for once, which was a pleasant change.

The day the holiday began; there was almost a stampede for students to get to the train station on time, to the extent that there was a serious threat that one of the younger students could get trampled on one of the staircases. "Always the same, always the same," they heard Headmistress McGonagall muttering under the breath, "These staircases really ought to be fixed – wider with shallower steps. They're a death trap at the moment – all tall and narrow. You would really think that the founders would have thought of it when they designed and built the castle, all of those many centuries ago."

Yet, the moment that the train took off from the station, everyone from Erilea and Prythian who had remained behind, breathed a sigh of relief. It was a breath of fresh air to be away from all of the judgemental stares and criticism, for all of the prejudice had not entirely faded yet. Things were a lot better now than they were in the beginning, but a small hard core group of students were still unable to let go of their self absorption and their own inflated sense of their own self importance, and were still quite vocal about their hatred.

The most vocal of this small group of students was, of course, Malfoy, who continued to refuse to believe or let alone accept, that the centuries old exchange students from Erilea and Prythian were far more powerful than he and his demented father – who had been imprisoned after the war – and that times were constantly changing. Unwilling to move with the times, Malfoy and his gang of followers were constantly trying to turn his fellow students and the staff against them.

It was also a relief to get some damn peace and quiet for once, as the constant chatter and gossip of over a thousand selfish teenagers who thought that their own petty problems were the be all and end all constantly grated on the nerves. When you live for millennia, a human who lives well into old age, who lives to be eighty, is really only still a child compared to the lifespan of the High Fae, their centuries of experiences, of life. This was why so many of them disliked Headmistress McGonagall, because, although she was an intelligent, educated woman in her sixties, she was, in reality, still a child compared to so many of those who were from Erilea and Prythian, most of them alone being over five hundred years old, and she sure acted childish when it came to dealing with them.

There were also a few advantages to having the castle more or less to themselves. Having their common rooms to themselves, being able to wander around wearing whatever they wanted, being able to hang out with their friends in other houses for as long as they wanted... Well, at least until all of the annoyingly stupid painted portraits started making a fuss. Then they would converge in the Room of Requirement as a group or couples would start seeking out little hidden corners in order to spend a little quality alone time together. It was amazing the amount of fun you could have, sneaking around a one thousand year old castle, trying to avoid the two and a half dozen other people who were also sneaking round the castle, who were trying just as hard to avoid you as you were trying to avoid them.

Also the gossip! The castle's most utilised bathrooms, and the Room of Requirement were constantly filled with the hushed voices of ancient voices of two dozen immortal gossipers. It was incredible, the amount of time and effort an immortal could put into their gossip. It wasn't that they were any different from Hogwarts' regular students, the two groups just didn't understand each other, deep down they were just too different. Immortality was a long time to be bored, after all.