Adenium Obesum

Percy Weasley made his way carefully down a long, winding path through the flower garden that was surrounded on all side by tall hedges, feeling as if he was lost even though he could clearly see the dark, cylindrical house still ahead of him. Inside was Luna Lovegood, the eccentric witch he had been tasked to come and check up on.

The garden was beautiful, that much was certain, the path he walked along was lined with blooming flowers in colours and shapes that almost seemed too perfect to be real. The smells around him were inviting and he even saw a few buzzing bees zipping through the blooms. It was strange to be in a place so beautiful to his senses and know there was much to be wary of. Had Percy not been warned by a number of people to not touch anything he may have even given into his curiosity and plucked one of the exotic flowers to keep for himself.

Which would be a terrible mistake since he had been told by Ginny that, in a move she had described as one of those Luna things, the entire garden was made of the deadliest varieties of flowering plants that could be found from magical and Muggle sources alike.

Even still, with every few steps, he would feel an unexplainable urge to pause and press his face close to one of the clusters of bright coloured plants, smells of spices and exotic perfumes rising up to greet him until a rational part of his mind would yell out DANGER! and he would pull away at last. Straightening back up again after what he figured was the seventh time he had stopped to smell the strange flowers along the path, Percy steeled his gaze back to the house and began to walk with determined steps towards it again.

Time felt funny here, and looking at how low the sun had dipped brought him more questions than answers since he remembered quite clearly leaving right after breakfast at his sister's urging. The magic around the garden reminded him of the spells around Hogwarts and other protected places except instead of keeping Muggles out, it seemed to be designed to keep everyone out. At the center was his real destination and Percy knew he had to stay focused on reaching the Lovegood home before the sun lowered beyond the horizon and he would be lost amongst the likely dangerous plants in the dark.

Since the final battle last May, Luna had sequestered herself inside of her late father's home. Something Percy could mostly understand knowing that she lost her father during the battle at Hogwarts and many of their past classmates had found they needed time away to recuperate from the trails of the war. Until more time went by with Luna tucked away from any prying eyes and it became clear that she wasn't moving on like most everyone else had.

According to Ginny, she was now dedicating all her time to cultivating poisonous plants and testing potions and charms that would help them grow in the peaty soil on her family's plot. When Percy had asked Hermione, who was the only person still in real contact with Luna through letters and book exchanges, he had been shown a photo snapped by a reporter for the Daily Prophet. In it, Luna was standing near the edge of her property line, looking as odd as ever with many of her flowers decorating her hair as if to send out a warning for no one to come near with uncharacteristic glare darkening her normally delicate features.

As the Muggles Percy had studied with for a few months while working on his mastery program said, it was textbook. Clearly, Luna was reacting to the emotional pain of the war by literally building a shield around herself of beautiful and deadly flora. Her trick certainly had worked since even her old friends were too nervous to come visit her, sending Percy to fish her out instead. He only hoped he could do something to help her come out of it.

At least he was armed with the knowledge he had gained as a fledgling Mind Wizard at St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries. It was a change of profession for him that seemed necessary when he recognized that more and more battle-scarred witches and wizards had found little help in a society that was trying to put itself back together. Even Percy himself had sought help from the Mediwitches to be turned away due to a lack of staffing which sent him out warily to find resources in Muggle London to help him stop the nightmares after Dreamless Sleep potions no longer worked. He thought his studies into mind magic and Muggle psychology may have been the right push to make him quit his ambitions with the Ministry at last and actually do something of purpose with his life but he knew there was much more to learn.

A year later and he was mostly calm and collected again as he had been before the war. He worked a steady job as an apprentice with the hospital and read recommended books through the night. Percy felt driven again too, a spark of his old self returning as he worked hard to establish a better reputation for himself outside of his shame-filled past within the Ministry.

Percy stepped quickly to the side as an orange coloured vine unraveled itself in his path, the barbs on the end of it promising pain should he get too close.

"Oh dear Merlin," he muttered as he carefully stepped around the vine, grateful to see the front door was only a few paces more ahead. Although Percy questioned the thought, he felt the garden around him almost retreating, blooms shrinking back into less ominous poses as if the magic trying to prevent him from reaching the house had given up.

Surprisingly, the door was open but there was no sight of the blonde witch on the stoop in front of him or on the paint-chipped veranda of the second level.

Dodging past blood red irises and twitching violet blooms, Percy reached her home at last and called out her name as he stepped quickly to the open door that led into right into the kitchen. He looked around, noticing the space was still in use but that the shutters had all been nailed shut with more plants lining the outside of the room. It was another shield, he thought.

"Luna? It's me, er- Percy. I know we…ah," he cautiously moved around a potted plant that rattled ominously before continuing. "Well, we don't know each other very well. Yet. I..er- Ginny asked me to pop by if that's alright. She.. well, she thought you might enjoy having some company and I brought you a bit of my Mum's treacle tart. Gin said you liked that last time you were over."

"Funny."

At the sound of her voice, Percy turned to see Luna perched on a dark wood table in the corner of the kitchen. She didn't look anything like he had expected or imagined. Instead of her more signature pastel robes, she was dressed in a tattered green dress that seemed much too big for her, making her look like a little girl playing dress up. Even from where he stood, he could see pink scratch marks of varying lengths down her exposed arms along with a few scabs of deeper gashes and he wondered if it had been the plants that caused them. Or maybe her own hands.

Percy took a deep breath in and stepped further into the room. "What's funny?" he asked in what he hoped was a calm, confident voice.

Despite his best efforts to not judge her, Percy couldn't help how his fingers flexed around the wand in his pocket. There was a dangerous glint in her light eyes at his question, something dark that he hadn't seen in another person's face since the war.

"It's funny that they sent you to find me." She spoke slowly as one might to a child, explaining her reasoning to him. "Of all the Weasleys…they sent the good brother. The bad brother. The boring brother. The one they forgot. The one they remembered. But only just in time to send you on their errands. It makes them feel better to not take out their own garbage and why should they? They have you to do it for them." Her head tilted to the side as she continued in a haunting tone. "Percy Weasley…the know-it-all brother. How funny they sent you of all people."

Percy let out a bark of a laugh, trying to suppress the urge to run right back out the door and leave the eccentric witch behind to rot in her self-made prison of creepy flora. "I thought you liked know-it-alls." He hoped that by referring to Hermione, the one person Luna still managed to keep in touch with through letters, the tension in the air would dissipate.

He was wrong.

"I don't like know-it-alls, actually. And she isn't like you one bit. Hermione seeks knowledge and understanding for things she doesn't know. You assume you know about things you do not. You're doing it now with your eyes judging how I've chosen to arrange my home."

He bristled, wondering how everything had gotten so far off track in a matter of minutes. "Now, now, I don't think that label is entirely fair. Luna, I am sorry if I've offended you-"

"You're not." She interrupted him, jumping down from the table, the volume of her dress bouncing around her as she came closer to him. "People are rarely sorry they have offended, only sorry if they have to face the consequences of that offense."

Luna stopped walking only when she was a few inches away from bumping right into him. He looked down, mesmerized by the way her silvery-blue eyes caught the beams of light poking through the shutters. Percy chose his next words carefully, remembering his training.

"You're right, Luna. I did come here today with an assumption based on what I have been told instead of letting you share your story with me." When he saw her relax a bit, he pressed on in a calm voice. "Hermione told me you hadn't responded to her letter earlier this week and well, Ginny said that she misses you. They worry."

"Then why aren't they here asking questions instead of you?"

It was an honest question, one asked without a riddle around it and Percy felt relieved that perhaps they would be able to make some leeway after all. "Would you prefer it if they were?" He glanced over as the slow movement from a set of pots holding glistening, red plants he remembered from Hogwarts. Dragon Flytraps, his mind supplied and he repressed a shudder at the memory of having to carefully feed them beetles in his third year. "To be perfectly honest, Luna, this place- "

"My home," she interjected.

He nodded. "Yes, of course. Your home...well, er- it doesn't seem all that inviting. You don't appear to want anyone to come by and even your garden seemed determined to keep me from reaching your door. Your flowers...are they really all deadly?"

Luna's answer made the tingling in his spine return. "Life is deadly, Percy Weasley. Do you not recall that from watching you own brother fall in the battle? After all the point of living is to someday die. Perhaps, I prefer the company of things that are not ashamed of their poison and are truthful of their danger."

Interesting. Percy paused, searching her bright eyes for any sign that he had gone too far. She tilted her head again to the side and made a motion for him to continue. "I've been studying as a Mind Wizard with St. Mungo's and working with people who have had a harder time adjusting to life after the war. I - well, I certainly mean this respectfully, I really do, but I wonder if you are doing okay."

"You assume I am suffering?" She volleyed another question his way.

Percy couldn't stop his eyebrows from raising high at what she was asking. "Now, Luna, certainly you can admit that something is wrong here. You have a maze of poisonous flowers blocking your home on all sides. Your windows are barricaded by them and I even see more hanging from the banister outside this room. For Merlin's sake, please just tell me, what are you protecting yourself from?"

The silence that met him from his last question was louder than screaming until at last, she spoke again.

"So it is as I thought. The know-it-all brother has come to do the fixing of what doesn't need repair." Luna smirked, her tone softening in the smallest of ways but as she continued, Percy realized her softness was a trap. Much like her flowers.

"I wonder...what would a wizard of logic understand of the emotional mind?"

At this, he sighed. Percy wanted this conversation to be done and over with, already planning on returning home and insisting that if the two that sent him here wanted to see the odd witch then they would have to come themselves. "I understand enough to see this can't be a good thing for you, Luna. Nothing good could come from being surrounded by all of this."

She moved even closer, thrusting her face up towards his and her silvery-blue eyes turned at once into cold, hard steel set out to cut him down. "Surrounded by what? Life? Death? Danger? Purpose?"

Luna made a growling sound, turning her head sharply away to stare at the shutters hidden by flowers but never made a move to step out of his personal space even though he was silently begging her to. "Do you think the others are so well adjusted that you must seek out someone who doesn't hide or pretend that being ripped from her father's arms and held hostage by killers didn't leave a scar not easily seen?" She looked back at him then, eyes staring nearly through him. "Does it soothe your own guilt to watch your sister hide behind her ambitions or for you to hide behind your own? I'm sure if you looked around with eyes not clouded you would see enough pain you can soothe with half-hearted words without coming here. Or is it more intellectually stimulating for you to witness a more truthful unraveling?" Luna paused for a moment, her breathing uneven.

Her next question came several heartbeats later, in an airy tone Percy almost recognized. "Perhaps the know-it-all brother would like to see more of my assumed suffering?"

Without waiting for his answers, Luna spun on her heel, the voluminous, green dress brushing against him in her sudden movement. Percy followed behind her without invitation, mostly to not be left alone amongst the plants he hadn't confirmed the danger of yet. He felt confusion at her questions and replayed them in his mind as they walked up a stairwell and into another room.

In the center of this room was a large shrub-like plant with flat, green leaves and five- petaled, pink flowers with centers that trumped out in a paler colour decorating every branch. The blooms glistened as if it had just rained inside the boarded up room and a ball of magical light shone on the branches. Percy turned back to find Luna leaning against the doorframe, her bony hands holding up folds of her dress as she watched him carefully.

"What is this?"

Her smirk returned. "You don't already know?" The question was clearly rhetorical and Percy made no move to answer it. With a light sigh, she continued, "Adenium obesum. The Muggles call it a desert rose. Professor Snape called it the dart flower... if you remember. It's beautiful and the sap can take down large animals if injected into their blood." Her eyes glazed over, a dreamy look Percy remembered more clearly of the Luna he had known before today taking over her face. Luna's fingers began tracing a pattern into the fabric draped on her slight frame. "My mum taught me how quickly its poison will work to stop a heart from beating."

Oh. Percy looked warily back at the plant, racking his brain for the right thing to say at her revelation. She beat him to it though, stepping forward to catch his eye again. "Would you like to see the rest?"

Percy smiled at the slight eagerness he could see in her expression. "Would you like to show me?"

"Yes, I think I would. And you certainly could use some paradigm shifting."

Together they went on the oddest tour Percy had ever been on in his life. As they wove through the house, Luna seemed more and more like her past self, her voice taking on a softer tone without the undercurrent of coldness he had heard before as she happily chatted about the various plants growing in makeshift greenhouses in nearly every room of her home. She showed him an old bedroom now filled with thorn-covered roses whose petals could cause extreme hallucinations, pots filled with tubular carnivorous plants that she insisted she was growing to give to Neville Longbottom as a gift someday and a small potions lab where she experimented on improving fertilizers. He found himself feeling lost for the second time. Only now it was being lost in her, the way her eyes sparkled as she talked about the vines growing off the stairwell and how she gathered up her absurdly large dress to stoop down and pet moss covered rocks.

She seemed happy, he realized with a start. Perhaps a bit mad in her joy around the toxic plants but she was at ease in this space. It arose a new set of questions in him.

"I thought you tracked down little fairies and creatures no one else can see. What made you change..er- hobbies, if you will?"

Her reply was thankfully gentle as they journeyed back to the room with the pink trumpet blooms and she settled on the floor with her frayed, green dress pooling around her. "Do you know what Hermione and I write letters about?" He shook his head no, imploring her to continue as he sat down close to her. "Mostly, we write about this one here. My Adenium obesum. Although I suspect she thinks I only have books about it. Knowing her she probably researched enough to know this particular type won't grow usually around magic. Strange plant this one… if used just right it can bring back something that gets lost sometimes in our heads."

Percy watched as Luna turned her face back to admire the pink flowers, her eyes darting from bud to bud. He felt confused by her and yet somehow also a clarity, an assurance of self, he had been seeking for himself for years. More questions wanted to tumble out of his mouth to figure out why it was deadly plants she favoured but he fell silent, changing his position to stare at the green and pink covered shrub too.

He knew nothing more really than he had when he arrived except that somehow Luna was alright. There was a secret still in her newest obsession but he admired her for at least having a reason to keep moving through the day. So many he had met through St. Mungo's didn't have even that.

"Do you still think you have the answers?" Luna asked him as darkness fully took over the room and she moved her wand slowly to light candles placed in every corner, setting a soft glow across the enormous potted shrub in front of them.

"I still believe I have some of them, yes," Percy answered honestly, hoping to not bring back out the side of her he had seen before.

"Hmm. And do you still want to fix me?"

He thought that question over, this time not for the sake of avoiding offense but because he was starting to understand that there was more going on with Luna than he had realized when he first entered her garden. She was complex to put it simply. A young woman who had been hurt more times than she ever deserved, who had taken that pain and found an outlet for it. She was clever, powerful, compelling and was more sure of who she was that he suspected more people were. Luna was right, she didn't hide her herself away, she was flourishing here somehow like her plants. It was the rest of the world that defined that as a weakness. Maybe the Mind Wizards have it all wrong in their approach to these children of the war.

"Perhaps?" Percy heard the uncertain lift in his voice, watching her face in the candlelight carefully. "I want to help you but for new reasons now, I think."

He heard a rustling of fabric and turned his head to see her staring back at him again. "The honest brother. This one I prefer." She pulled a folded piece of parchment paper from a hidden pocket in her dress. "If you come again...chant this phrase three times while holding your wand above your head. The garden will part easily for you. It's the same for when you leave."

Percy opened the paper with a soft nod of thanks to the witch beside him and chuckled quietly at what he saw written there knowing already that he would come again to visit Luna Lovegood very soon.

Poison is in everything, and nothing is without poison. Such is Life. Such is Beauty. Such is Truth. I seek to learn from it.

This is my favorite story I've ever written. Thank you for reading.