The morning had come much earlier for one inhabitant of Hogwarts castle. His shift started long before the Students and Professors even thought about crawling out of their cozy beds to prepare for the day ahead of them, and as such, he need to have his duties out of the way when they did start to rise. The sun had yet to show its colors over the distant mountains, so the early riser had to light a lantern in order to see what was below him. Should he misplace his large feet, the resulting sounds of hoof on stone would be sure to wake any sleeping portraits, ghosts, witches and wizards that resided in the great school. The being turned slowly in his small room, gathering up his work supplies and marking off the route he would take today in his patrols of the halls. With one last look around the room the great mass backed out of the room and into the silent hall. He held the lantern high so that he could see not only the keys that hung from his belt, but the door to the quarters that he had just vacated. It took him all of twelve seconds to find the key he needed, and he placed it in the keyhole on the door and locked it. The golden name plate next to the door caught the light from the lantern and flashed the figure’s name back at him in bold letters.


MULGRON BLOODTHORN. MINOTAUR GUARDIAN OF THE CASTLE, GROUNDS, AND VILLAGE.


A few fingerprints from students who had rubbed the plate the day before, suddenly became an eyesore in the mind of Mulgron, and he took to trying to clear them off with the top of one of his furry hands, minding his three, hoof like fingers so as not to scratch it. The attempt only made the problem worse. It appeared that the fingerprints had been charmed to become more visible the harder you tried to clean them off. With a great grunt of frustration, Mulgron Bloodthorn snatched up his spear from beside the door, clutching it closer to him, and held the lantern farther out as if it might bite him. His first few steps were loud on the stone floors of the school and only after a number of tries at making them quieter by walking slower, did he find that he needed to put on those hoof mufflers that the Headmaster had made for him. Leaning his spear against a nearby wall and setting the lantern down on the floor, Mulgron slowly pulled a small bag off his back. He took a moment to rummage through it, picking out small objects and placing them back only after having looked under them. It was about five minutes later that he found what he had been looking for and he pulled them out with great haste.


They looked like hoof shaped socks. Two perfectly fitted wool socks that were pitch black in color and had no other real purpose to them aside from making the wearer more stealthy in their endeavors. ‘Well at least they aren’t pink’ he thought to himself as he slipped them onto his large hooves. After admiring how they seemed to blend into his fur color and texture, Mulgron got to his feet and took one careful step to see what they sounded like. He had expected a soft clap, or at least a thump. But to his surprise, the socks muffled all sound that could possibly be made by the Minotaur. His mouth now hanging open in awe, the great beast took a few looks about the way before jumping straight up with all his strength, and landing hard on the ground with a soft, cloth on stone sound. ‘This is fun!’. The Minotaur again lept into the air and landed with a soft ‘puff’. He did this four more times, adding a new move to each leap. Sometimes he would twirl, other times he would try to land in a combat stance, with each movement his smile grew wider until it finally consumed his face. If anyone had been out for walk, they would have died of laughter at the sight of such a beast preforming what looked like a graceful ballet for children of ages much younger than school attendance. But the game soon grew tiresome and Mulgron gave up in his attempts to amuse himself. His shift had started at least twenty minutes ago; he was running late.

The Minotaur gathered up his spear and lantern, the latter was now becoming useless as the sun’s rays were slowly filtering through the windows down the hall from him. But it would be needed for awhile yet as his first stop would be the dungeons, and there were no windows down there.


By the time his sweep of the castle had ended, his second shift, the guarding of the Great Hall during breakfast, was about to start. With a quick stop to his room to drop off his lantern and backpack, Mulgron readied himself for the main brunt of his work here at Hogwarts. Normally he would stand outside the Great Hall doors so that students would see him as they entered, but today the Headmaster had managed to convince two Aurors to guard the outside, while Mulgron took care of the inside. As the Minotaur approached the doors, the two Aurors shuddered under his gaze, neither making eye contact with their comrade in arms as he passed them. The Hall was empty, as was to be expected at the moment, so Mulgron plastered himself on the right of the door, so that he was in poking range of the elder Slytherins and Ravenclaws, should they get on his nerves. There were new staff this year at the school, not that Mulgron had been guarding it long enough to really notice. This was his second year here and he really hadn’t spoken to any of the staff, aside from the Headmaster, outside of his post. He hoped that would all change this year.

A fury of sound assaulted the sensitive ears of the guardian. A rumble so tremendous that it threatened to outdo the thunder that he storm above was casting out. It was the sound of hundreds of feet as they made their way from every corner of the castle in existence. Mulgron stood up straighter as the Great Hall doors were blown open further by the hands of many a student, bent on entering the hall for the purpose of filling their bellies. If they noticed the Minotaur was inside the hall instead of outside, they made no visible motion, and continued on their predestined course to snatch a seat before the tables filled up. Groaning loudly, Mulgron leaned his head back on the wall and waited for the professors to arrive so that the noise level would die down to only the soft sounds of smacking as food was consumed.

This post has been edited by Mulgron Bloodthorn on July 30, 2009 07:57 am