Prologue

The fire roared warmly in its hearth as Ron Weasley set his trunk of childhood memories on the floor. He smiled up at Hermione and opened it, searching for the book he remembered his father reading to him when he was small.

“It’s in here somewhere, Hermione,� he said as he dug deeper into the wooden box, “I know it. I would never have let my dad throw it away or sell it.�

Hermione smiled at the red-haired man’s enthusiasm. Ever since she had told him about the baby, several months ago, he had been searching the Burrow for toys and items that he could remember having as a child. He was currently trying to find a book of fairytales that he had loved to add to the collection of storybooks Hermione had created in their nursery.

“You’ll love it, Hermione,� he said, pulling out teddies and tiny Quidditch robes. “Of course, a lot of my things went to Ginny when she was born but I wouldn’t give her this. I liked it too much.�

His head was now deep into the chest as he searched. Hermione was surprised that he hadn’t fallen in, he was leaning over so much. She was beginning to wonder if the chest had been magically modified to fit so many things inside when a muffled voice called from inside.

“Found it!�

Ron emerged with a large, leather bound book in his hands.

“This is it Hermione, this is what I was trying to find.�

He walked over and sat beside her on the sofa, placing a hand on her stomach and feeling the baby move. He handed her the book which she opened and looked through. There were several stories that she knew from her own childhood books as well as some that she hadn’t heard of. Each story was hand written and illustrated with magical moving paintings, little elves making shoes, a little girl running away from a wolf. According to Ron, the book had been made by his Grandfather when he was born. The first page was emblazoned with the words ‘Fata viam invenient.’

“The fates will find a way?�

“My Grandfather believed that everything happens for a reason. Whenever I found something I couldn’t do, he would always say that and tell me to give it time. I guess he was right, huh.� He smiled at her. “He wrote that message on the first page just before he died. I guess he wanted me to remember it after he was gone. I actually took it out and looked at it before the battle, when everything seemed to be going wrong. He was a great guy, my granddad.�

“It’s perfect, Ron,� she smiled and kissed him on the cheek.

“I can’t wait until it’s born,� he replied before talking directly to her belly. “I’ll read to you everyday.�

“Can you read them to me now please, Ron?� Hermione asked, “I’d like to hear them and you never know, the baby might be able to hear them too.�

Ron smiled and opened the book.

“Ok,� he cleared his throat. “Wizarding Tales for Bedtime.�

The Elves and the Shoemaker



Once, a very long time ago, there was an old shoemaker by the name of Holbrook, who had very little money. Everyday, he would sell his shoes from his small shop in Diagon Alley, but everyday he seemed to get poorer and poorer. Until one day, he had no money left to buy leather to make his shoes. He bought his last leather and put it in a drawer in his workroom hoping that he would get enough money to add to it soon. He spent days trying to sell his remaining shoes, but then came the day when he had only enough leather to make one final pair.



That night, he cut the leather to size and left it on his workbench, ready to make his last pair of shoes in the morning. As he said goodbye to his last customer, who didn’t buy a single pair, and closed up his shop, he found himself asking the empty room for some help. With a sigh, he went upstairs to join his wife.



The next morning, when the shoemaker returned to his workbench, he found something incredible. On the bench where the leather had been, sat the most beautiful pair of shoes he’d ever seen, shining red in the sunlight. He ran forward to look at them thinking that he couldn’t have made anything so beautiful himself!



That morning, a rich wizard walked past the shop. He saw the pair of shoes through the window and liked them so much that he was willing to pay twice the amount of Galleons the shoemaker was asking for them. He promised to tell his friends about the shop if he could give him another pair of shoes to match his green dress robes the next day.



The shoemaker agreed and went out to buy more leather for the green pair of shoes. He sketched how he wanted the shoes to look and cut the leather ready to be put together in the morning. He went to bed hopeful that the shoes he made would be good enough for the wizard.



The next morning he found that the shoes had been made for him, with black ribbon laces and silver buckles which he was certain he hadn’t bought. When the wizard returned he was so happy with his shoes that he gave the shoemaker all of the money in his purse and promised to return the next day with his friends.



Now the shoemaker had enough money to buy leather for four more pairs of shoes. He cut them out and left them on his workbench and in the morning, to his amazement, the leather had been stitched into more beautiful pairs of shoes. He sold the shoes and had enough money for eight more pairs of shoes.



For some time, the shoemaker carried on in this way, buying the leather and selling the magical shoes for more and more money. Very soon, the shoemaker and his shop became famous and rich witches and wizards came from all over the country to buy his shoes.



One day, as the shoemaker said goodbye to the crowd of customers at closing time, he said to his wife, “We should find out who is doing us this favour and thank them. Think how poor we once were and how well we’re doing now. Let’s stay tonight and see who’s making these shoes.�



So instead of going to bed that night, the shoemaker and his wife hid behind the door of the workroom and waited.



At midnight, as the old wooden clock on the wall chimed, two small elves with large eyes and bat-like ears clambered onto the table. They were dressed in tattered rags which looked as if they were made from old pillowcases. They ran from one side of the bench to the other, picking up the leather and seeing what work they had to do. Then they picked up the shoemaker’s tools and began to put the shoes together. As they worked, they sang:



“Stitch and sew and make the shoes,

Fit for magic folk to choose,

Thread the needle, make a stitch,

Make the Mr. Cobbler rich!�



Long before the sun rose, the elves finished their work and ran away.



The shoemaker and his wife got up late the next morning and talked about what they had seen the night before.



“Think how cold those little creatures looked,� the wife said over breakfast, “Their clothes were rags and their feet were bare! It made me shiver just to look at them. Don’t you think we should repay them for everything they’ve done for us?�



The shoemaker agreed and he and his wife set to work immediately. They created the most beautiful sets of dress robes you can imagine and pairs of socks and shoes to match. Then they shrank them to fit the tiny elves and left them on the workbench for the elves to find.



At midnight, the elves clambered back onto the workbench ready to work. At first, they looked puzzled to find clothes on the bench instead of leather, but suddenly they realized that the clothes were a present to them. With cries of happiness, they pulled on the little outfits and began to dance. As they danced, they sang:



“Clothes and socks and shoes for me,

The shoemaker has set us free,

He has no need for more house elves,

Now leave him to stock his shelves.�



When they finished dancing, they ran out of the door and across the road, never to return to the shop again. The shoemaker was sad to see them go but thankful for all that they had done. And they seemed to have left some of their magic behind for he and his wife were lucky for the rest of their lives.



ex post facto



And from that day, House-Elves have often visited wizards in need. Some families have kept them, refusing to set them free as the little elves seem to enjoy their work so much. Wizards ask the elves to help and they do so without question, and nothing but clothes will prove to them that a wizard can survive without their help.

Sleeping Beauty

Once, a rich old wizard and his wife had an enormous party to celebrate the birth of their baby daughter, Adela. After a huge feast, the wizard stood up to make a speech. He talked about how happy he was to finally be a father, for he and his wife had been waiting for many years to have a child, and made his guests laugh by telling the story of how he learnt to look after his daughter by himself when his wife was called away. Then it was time for the guests to give their presents to the tiny baby.

The last to come forward with their gifts were Helga Hufflepuff, Rowena Ravenclaw and Godric Gryffindor, three of the founders of Hogwarts School.

First, kind Hufflepuff announced, “My gift to the baby is beauty and happiness, may she enjoy her life to the full.� She waved her wand over the baby girl and smiled as she giggled under the spell.

The guests cheered and clapped, and Rowena Ravenclaw stepped forward. “My gift is knowledge and wisdom. May she be one of the brightest witches of all time!�

The old wizard smiled so much that tears came to his eyes. Then, as Gryffindor was about to give his gift, a loud Crack! shook the room. Salazar Slytherin appeared, his bottle-green robes flying around his legs in an invisible wind.

“Where’s my invitation?� he asked, outraged at not being invited to such an event, his looming figure advancing towards the child.

“Someone must’ve – er – forgotten to deliver it,� the wizard mumbled, an anxious look on his face. He had decided not to invite Slytherin as the four founders had been fighting a lot recently; Salazar had even been forced to leave the school. He didn’t want to cause an argument at his daughter’s party and so, left him off of the Guest list.

“Never mind,� Slytherin said, a chilling smirk growing on his face. “Is it time for presents already? My present for your daughter is that on her fifteenth birthday she will prick her finger on a spindle and die!� And with that, he Disapparated, leaving the party distraught over the dreadful curse. The old woman began to cry uncontrollably.

Gryffindor stepped forward. “I haven’t given my gift yet,� he said softly. “I can’t undo Salazar’s curse, but I can change it. My gift to your daughter is that instead of dying on her fifteenth birthday, she will fall into a deep sleep for a hundred years.�

Years passed and all went well. The baby girl grew up into a young witch, pretty, happy and clever. The old wizard and witch no longer thought about the curse, after having all of the spindles in their village destroyed. On her eleventh birthday, Adela received a letter inviting her to study at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, where she would be protected by the kind founders who had blessed her when she was born.

But on the very day of her fifteenth birthday, she found herself lost on one of Hogwarts’ many moving staircases. At the top of the staircase she found a door that she had never seen before, with a further stairway on the other side. At the top was a tiny room, with a single window telling her that she was somewhere on the east side of the castle. The room was bare except for an old wooden telescope, a chair and a spinning wheel.

Now Adela had been warned of the terrible curse that had been put upon her and turned to leave the room, but found a giant serpent blocking the doorway. She stumbled backwards and pricked her finger on the spindle, falling down to the floor.

Later that day, Gryffindor found the girl asleep in the room and carried her back down to the Great Hall where the other professors were waiting, not daring to hope for the best. When Godric entered, Adela in his arms, Hufflepuff began to cry.

“We’ll build her a tower in the grounds,� she said through her tears, for the young girl's parents had died shortly after she had gone to Hogwarts, “where she can stay until she wakes up.�

And so it was that a great stone tower was built in the middle of the Hogwarts grounds, where she could lay undisturbed for a hundred years.

Time slowly passed and the forest grew around the tower. Soon, the founders left Hogwarts and the tower slipped into legend. Students came and went through the castle, never coming near the forest or the secret slumbering chamber within. Until a hundred years later, a handsome young wizard explored the forest, driven by the story of a beautiful witch in an enchanted sleep.

At first, he could see no way to the centre. Thick vines had grown around the path and he had to use his wand to hack a way through. He could hardly believe his eyes when he found the silent tower, abandoned yet perfect as if frozen in time. Little clabberts and bowtruckles scuttled across the clearing, tending to small flowerbeds like proud little gardeners, and running for cover as the wizard came near. He could feel the magic tingling in the air as he walked towards the tower in the middle of the space.

He came to the half-open door and stepped inside, taking in his surroundings as he went. Walking slowly up the spiral-staircase, he looked at the portraits that dressed the walls, each with a slumbering subject who woke as he walked past. Then he found himself in a golden room, standing beside the sleeping girl.

“Sleeping Beauty,� he murmured to himself as he crouched beside her. He couldn’t resist. He bent down and kissed her lightly on the lips.

At once, Adela opened her eyes. Finding the wizard still bent over her, she smiled her first smile in one hundred years and thanked him for waking her at last.

In that moment, the wizard knew that he would never be happier than he was with her and made his choice.

“Will you marry me?� he asked quietly, his eyes never leaving hers.

“Yes!� she cried and kissed him happily.

When the headmaster of Hogwarts heard their tale, he ordered an enormous feast to celebrate, and the witch and wizard were married and lived happily ever after.