Before Luna followed the two Weasleys through the door in a madcap rush to escape the Death Eaters, she noticed that their motions seemed to slow as though they were suddenly running through treacle. Before she could contemplate this, however, she was through the door and drifting, her feet leaving the floor as she tried to continue running.
Four of the Death Eaters, led by the one that Draco Malfoy's father had called Bellatrix, were soon to follow; Luna tried to use the apparent change in the laws of physics to her advantage by moving her arms and kicking her feet in a swimming motion, but this plan failed miserably and didn't help her flight at all. The Death Eaters behind her seemed just as unable to move freely as she was - a fact which may give her a few more seconds if she could take advantage of it. She couldn't.
They were floating in a dark room, she noticed as she turned her head about. It was hardly an empty one, though, as many large objects floated with them. Peering closer as her seemingly random movement brought her close to a big orange one, Luna saw that they were planets that - as she rolled over and saw - were rotating and circling around an orb in the centre of the room. It was supposed to be the Sun, she presumed. The whole room must be some sort of model solar system
As Ginny Weasley floated across her line of vision, Luna remembered the situation at hand. Ronald was upside-down, looking rather green and orbiting Uranus; or rather, as she found when the first red beam came from above her, Luna was upside down. This curiosity seemed to be just that, a curiosity, and didn't seem to have any effect on her robes as gravity was less than negligible.
Ginny was the first one to react to the attacks, firing off her Bat-Bogey Hex in the direction of the mass of Death Eaters, who didn't seem able to manoeuvre themselves either. Strangely, the hex seemed to bend as it travelled toward Bellatrix, ending up missing her completely and burrowing into the nearby Jupiter, where it had no effect. Ginny gaped at it, but sent off more in rapid succession. One at least had to hit, right?
As Luna watched, all of the attacks from both sides seemed to bend as they travelled, most of them straying near to the bigger planets. Many of Ginny's hexes ended up in Jupiter, and a good number of the Death Eaters' hit Ron's Uranus (or the nearby Saturn as the boy cast a shielding charm). No-one's attacks were actually hitting anyone. Luna wondered about how strange that that was. Perhaps the room was host to a swarm of Kexles, tiny invisible mischief-causing demons that moved light in unnatural ways. Or maybe the planets themselves were pulling the spells toward them? But that would be silly.
Luna took out her wand and considered firing off some hexes of her own. It didn't seem to be working very well for any of the others, though, so she discarded the idea. What they needed to be doing was getting away from the Death Eaters and back to Harry and Neville and Hermione so that they could all get out of there and Harry could find out what had really happened to 'Sirius Black'. Ginny looked very impatient at her famous Bat Boogy Hex for failing time after time, but she wasn't trying anything new.
The tall, dark woman who had sent the first attacks gave a yell of frustration, clearly made even madder by the restriction to movement and hexing than the rest of them were. "Propello!" she cried, flinging her wand-arm behind her. The wand erupted, sending her careening forward, directly toward where Luna was floating. The girl's eyes widened before she made a useless ducking motion and cast a shielding charm in an attempt to fend off the heavier woman's charge. Out of the corner of her eye, Luna caught a glimpse of the other two being set upon in a similar manner by the other Death Eaters, but she had to quickly turn her attention back to Bellatrix Lestrange.
"Expelliarmus!" Luna yelled, as it was the first thing from the DA that came into her head. Bellatrix had been deflected upward by the first charm (as far as Luna could tell which way 'upward' was) and had just turned herself around again when her wand shot from her outstretched hand to spin off somewhere near Pluto.
"Clever, little girl?" the crazy woman asked as she watched her wand fly away, the words followed by a mad grab at Luna's arm. She clawed at her knuckles, and Luna realised what she was doing and tried to drag her arm back, to get her wand out of the woman's reach. Bellatrix' fingers curled around the smooth wood but Luna fought, yanking her arm backward and trying to prise her grip apart, her knees somehow ending up pressed against the woman's stomach, pushing as she stretched as far as she could. If she was to have any hope of getting out, she had to keep her wand!
"Propello!" Luna cried, echoing the spell that the woman had used to move herself. The spell sent the pair spinning into another Death Eater who turned, ready to attack, but a close-range petrificus totalus of Ginny's stopped him. Unfortunately, the impact loosed Luna's grip, allowing Bellatrix to easily prise the wand away with a shout of triumph.
Luna gasped at the glitter in the woman's eyes before lunging back at her, scrabbling and kicking, but the slight pause gave Bellatrix ample time to point the wand, held more securely this time, at Luna's chest. "Bye, bye, little one!" she cackled before Luna felt a hand grab her wrist and was dragged away by Ginny. She had learned the propello charm by imitation, too.
Turning her head against the slipstream, Luna's eyes searched for Ronald as her rescuer dragged her backward through space. She caught sight of him just in time to see a jet of light hit him in the stomach. "Ron!" Ginny yelled, and let go of Luna to return to her brother's aid.
Luna let herself float slowly to a stop, knowing that it wouldn't do any good to flail about. Something floated past her head, so she craned her neck to see what it was - what else had been included in the Solar System model? It was the wand that she had chucked away from Bellatrix, she saw; she bit her lip.
Ginny gave a yell as Luna floated a little way past Pluto, so the blonde girl brought her head back down to see what was wrong. A Death Eater had hold of Ginny's foot, his extra weight slowing her down even as the Propello charm was blasted at his face. Luna looked back at Bellatrix's wand. As she was, she couldn't do anything to help them; she needed a wand, but that wand
Her Father had told her about research being done into the nature of inherited wands - apparently some of the self of the wizard chosen by the wand was passed on with the wand. What if there was some of the Death Eater Bellatrix's self in that wand? What would happen if there were, and what would happen if she used it?
Luna Lovegood bit her lip, and made the decision.
#
The wand sat on Luna's desk as she stared at it, almost trying to will it away. Swapped wands. A magical bond between her and the Death Eater had been forged when she had picked it out of space in order to fight the wand's previous owner. That was something that could easily be considered a Bad Thing, and definitely something that should have needed thought.
Luna chewed her lip and shifted uncomfortably in her chair. She was in the library by herself, researching the subject. It should be there, somewhere, but so far she had been unable to find anything. She wondered about writing to her father for information, or at least to have some of her back issues of The Quibbler sent so that she could read the article, but eventually decided against it. This could be her own private project.
She thought about how it would affect things, to be linked magically to Bellatrix Lestrange. Already she had noticed that the new wand had more 'kick' than her old one, but whether that was due to the wealth of experience that an older witch would have, the crazy emotional highs that she had displayed during the attack on the Ministry or something else, Luna did not know.
The wondering, and the worry; they must have been the reason for the dreams that Luna had been experiencing since the incident. Dreams in which Luna saw, again and again, the way that the woman's eyes had lit up when she took what was rightfully Luna's.
#
Luna stood with Hermione Granger outside Professor Snape's office, waiting for him to leave - if he left. They must have been there for about an hour, and Hermione kept making little worried noises, starting to ask something and then cutting herself off. It was deathly quiet, and had been since Hermione had packed up the Extensible Ears some time ago.
Or at least, it had been quiet until the sound of scuffling, running feet came to their ears. Both girls raised their wands, but lowered them when they saw Professor Flitwick, and got out of the way when they realised that he was heading for the door that they were guarding. He was in a state of frenzy, muttering something that Luna couldn't make out and almost tripping over his robes before he got to the door, wrenched it open, and disappeared inside.
There was a thud, and Professor Snape strode out of the room. He looked to the right and left, and upon seeing the two girls said, calmly: "Professor Flitwick has collapsed. Stay with him until I return, and do not move," before continuing down the hallway. Hermione gaped, obviously conflicted between following Harry's instructions and disobeying a direct order from a teacher (who was almost definitely on their side, she reasoned) or obeying and making herself more useful than she had been. Luna peered into the room.
"He does look a bit peaky," the younger girl said, and Hermione, despairing, came over to check on him. 'A bit' was an understatement, Hermione thought. The man's face was pale beneath his hat, and there was a small cut where his head had hit the floor.
"Episkey," Hermione said, using the healing spell that Harry had taught them (after confirming that he hadn't got it from the Prince's book, of course). The cut sealed itself instantly, and she turned back to Luna. "Snape's gone," she said hopelessly.
"He'll have gone to get Madame Pomfrey," Luna said faithfully, pushing Flitwick into a more comfortable position. "We can follow him after he gets back."
"But what was Flitwick running to Snape about?" Hermione worried. "It sounded urgent - what if he didn't deliver the message? And what if Snape doesn't come back, or-"
Luna sat back on her heels and let Hermione talk herself out, a frown on her face as she concentrated. If they knew where Snape had been sent - assuming that Professor Flitwick had delivered his message before fainting - then perhaps they could beat him there. When the Professor woke up, they could ask him. And if Professor Snape had gone to the infirmary
She stood up, and asked Hermione: "Do you think he'll be all right now?"
"Why?" the other girl asked from the floor.
"If we split up, we might be able to find Professor Snape again."
Hermione's worried expression smoothed noticeably, and she looked down at the unconscious Professor. "Split up..." she muttered, straightening her shoulders. "I'll stay here," she said. "If Snape returns - which he probably will - I'll follow him alone if you aren't back here. Make sure you come back every so often, too - I'll tell him that you went to get Madame Pomfrey. Yes, that'll solve it," she said, looking considerably more relieved. "You go and look for Snape - use the Protean Charm to tell me if you find him - and I'll stay with Flitwick like he said."
Luna nodded and walked stiffly toward the door. She was used to walking about the castle alone, of course, if not the dungeons, but it still felt odd to be walking away from the person that she had stood next to all evening, even if it had been in silence. Hermione said nothing, however, and Luna soon found herself alone in the corridor where she was considerably more comfortable.
Professor Snape had left toward the stairs, so that was the direction that Luna started with. She walked slowly, listening for any queer sounds along the way, sped up when she caught sight of the Bloody Baron floating along at the end of the corridor, and hurried up the stairs, being careful not to slip. Midway up, she paused. Flitwick was most likely to have come from the main castle if he was coming especially for Professor Snape, but what if the message had been about a more immediate emergency? He would have just run to the nearest teacher, and in the dungeons He must have been in a state if he collapsed on reaching the office, after all.
She retreated back down the stairs, intending to continue down the corridor until a sound made her stop. She listened for a moment, and then peeked around the corner to see a masked, robed figure approaching at a rapid pace. A Death Eater in the dungeons! Luna flattened herself against the wall, drawing her wand as she did so. She fished in her other pocket for the spelled Galleon, but froze again, silently cursing that she did not know a disillusionment charm. The Death Eater passed quickly by the stairway.
When it was past, Luna breathed a sigh of relief. Her reprieve was short-lived, however, when she remembered Hermione - the Death Eater had gone in the direction of Professor Snape's office. However, as she fumbled in her pocket and found: The Galleon was gone. She couldn't inform her with the noiseless charm.
She stuck her head out into the hallway. The Death Eater was outside of the office now, but luckily Hermione had shut the door. Luna smiled when she remembered the Felix potion. Her portion - that Ronald had insisted on her taking - had been dripped onto the hanky that was now tied around her neck. She knew that prolonged skin contact made the potion last longer than if it was ingested, but the others had reacted sceptically and drunk theirs. She hadn't pressed the point.
The Death Eater had paused, regarding the closed door silently. Suddenly it reached up and removed its hood, revealing the angry face of Bellatrix Lestrange, the very same Death Eater that Luna had faced in the Department of Mysteries. "Severus, open up!" she shouted, pounding on the door.
At least there was no need to warn Hermione now, Luna reflected, clutching her wand and keeping as close to the wall as possible. The Death Eater was giving her as much time to prepare as she needed, banging on the door and shaking it so loudly. Alohomora was tried, as well as a sound kick, but still the door remained shut. Eventually, Bellatrix gave up and turned back toward the stairs, muttering: "If he's hiding (the coward) he'll get got by the Vow anyway..."
She was cut off, however, by the sound of Luna tripping backward up the stairs.
The girl struggled to untangle her legs and robes from one another, extending her wand as if merely holding it would stop the Death Eater. Bellatrix stopped walking, not six feet away from Luna, and stared at her as if in deep thought. Luna had the distinct impression that the older woman was looking at her knickers, but the moment passed when she spoke.
"Stop looking at my knickers, please," Luna said, an accusing note to her voice, and stood up. When said to this woman, the 'please' sounded rude.
The Death Eater blinked at her forwardness, and stared her in the face. "You're the girl who took my wand," she stated, chasing away her previously subdued manner with an ugly smirk.
"Swap?" Luna suggested, trying to sound brave. This was a chance, perhaps, to undo the magical bond and set her mind at rest (though as the year had gone by, she had found herself getting used to the effects, particularly those that involved her charmwork, almost against her will).
Bellatrix made a grand show of pretending to consider the offer, sliding the smooth wood against her cheek in contemplation. "No, I don't think that we will," she said slowly, as anyone could have seen that she would. However, Luna was prepared - or at least she thought that she was.
"Expelliarmus!" she yelled, flinging her wand-arm over her head just in case it would help. Bellatrix shouted the name of the same spell before Luna's hit, and both of their wands went flying into the air.
As the wands fell, both made a diving grab for Luna's; both missed. Luna had her hand on top of it first, and a year had passed since her losing the first battle for her wand, a year in which she had grown, matured and... not got any better at scrapping. Bellatrix' long nails dug into Luna's wrist, pulling her hand away as Bellatrix' other hand reached out to take the wand. Luna's free hand was fighting it in an instant, both combatants oblivious to the opening door behind them.
Hermione ran her hands over the door, wondering how it had managed to be stuck when rattled and kicked but easy to open when she got to it. Blaming it on the Felix, she sneakily closed the door behind her, hiding Flitwick, and cast a hex at the pair that made them fly apart.
When Luna found herself being thrown against the wall, it was with a gasp of frustration. Either Bellatrix had the wand, or it had fallen to the floor again. She worked on catching her breathing again as Hermione Expelliarmus-ed both wands out of Bellatrix' reach. The older girl fumbled them. The Death Eater darted forward and grabbed the one that had fallen before Hermione could get it, dragging herself up and running off deeper into the dungeons.
"Are you all right, Luna?" Hermione asked, handing Luna the remaining wand. Luna blinked as she focussed on the open hand, but groaned at what she saw.
They still had swapped wands.