Disclaimer: I do not own the original canon nor am I making any profit from writing this piece. All works are accredited to their original authors, performers, and producers while this piece is mine. No copyright infringement is intended. I acknowledge that all views and opinions expressed herein are merely my interpretations of the characters and situations found within the original canon and may not reflect the views and opinions of the original author(s), producer(s), and/or other people.
Warnings: This story may contain material that is not suitable for all audiences and may offend some readers. Please exercise understanding of personal sensitivities before and during reading.
Author's Note(s): This is for Trish (starspangledpumpkin), because she loves Red Moon and deserves to have nice things.
Challenge/Competition Block:
Stacked with: WB; SHoE; SS; AD; AFS; DtW; FPC; BAON; StL; NC; LL; PP; SoC; FF; NCR; RC; Neurodivergent (N); Fear Inside (N); Quiet Time (N); Gryffindor MC (N); Ravenclaw MC (N); Shipmas (N); Long Haul (N); Trope It Up A (Y); Tiny Terror (N); Red Moon Quindrabble (n/a)
Space Address (Prompt): 3C (Mistletoe)
Representation: Red Moon (Luna/Ginny); Hogwarts; Magic; Neurodivergent Life; Ginny Weasley; the Weasleys; PTSD
Bonus Challenge(s): Sweetest Burn; Where Angels Fear; Second Verse (Not a Lamp; Ladylike; Clio's Conclusion; Nontraditional Family; Mouth of Babes; Wabi Sabi; Nightingale; Tomorrow's Shade; Unwanted Advice; Some Beach; Unicorn; Odd Feathers; Casper's House; Tied & Died; Esbat; Infinity; Under the Bridge)
Secondary Bonus Challenge(s): SHoE (Brood); SS (Schooner; Sanctuary); AD (Amphibian)
Word Count: 1488 words
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Power of Belief
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Luna did it first.
Ginny had snuck through the orchard to play with someone whose jokes didn't involve sounds made by their own bodies. Luna was strange, with her way of noticing too much but also missing the obvious, but at least she didn't smell like dirt. Luna had no problem playing any game that Ginny wanted, even if it was something she would play with her brothers.
They had been running through the small band of trees on the other side of the Rookery from the Weasley orchard when Ginny had tripped over a root and fallen. A sharp rock bit into the skin of her knee. Despite being tougher than any of her brothers put together, Ginny still found herself fighting to keep the tears back.
Luna had sat beside her until she felt able to walk to the creek that cut along the outer edge of the property. With a handkerchief she had pulled from a pocket in her romper, Luna had washed the dirt from the small wound. She then put her lips right up against Ginny's knee and murmured a few words that Ginny couldn't hear before planting a gentle kiss to it.
"That will take care of it," Luna said, sounding as certain as rain in springtime.
Ginny had never believed anything as much as she had believed Luna in that moment.
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It was Luna who found her.
Ginny had once again snuck through the orchard to the Rookery. Instead of seeking out her friend, Ginny had curled into a ball at the base of the great oak near the front gate. The roots curled into a small basin that Luna's mother had added runes for cushioning and comforting charms. It was the perfect temperature year-round and as comfortable as the overstuffed armchairs of the Gryffindor common room. Despite the fact that it was the height of summer, the mistletoe clinging to the tree was heavy with berries. Every time the wind shifted the vine, it made a shushing rattle that reminded her of Parseltongue.
Unable to keep pretending to be strong, Ginny let the tears fall.
Luna slipped into the space beside her. She said nothing, not the empty platitudes that Ginny had gotten from the headmaster or weepy gratitude that her mother was prone to spouting. Instead the blonde had just held her as she had wept for the innocence she had lost because she had trusted wrongly. Finally, after Ginny had stopped, Luna gently wiped her face with a handkerchief before pressing a kiss to Ginny's forehead.
"We'll get through this," Luna promised, as if it was really just that simple.
Ginny believed her.
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Ginny started it.
Her mother had sent her back to Hogwarts, despite their openly known status as blood traitors and allies to Harry Potter. Her father never questioned the wisdom of that. Ginny didn't know if they just hadn't thought what that might mean when Death Eaters controlled the school as well as the ministry or if they really believed that Snape wouldn't let anything bad happen.
Either way, it was bad from the beginning. With Snape as headmaster, his thin excuses for assigning detention had spread beyond just the ones that he assigned. The Carrows loved it and took full advantage. Students had two choices during their detentions: practice curses or be the target. Trying to get a detention reassigned to another professor never worked and only let the Carrows pick which one a student was. Being unable to cast a curse or refusing to meant that they got creative with what they substituted in its place.
Luna was often singled out due to the stupid pranks that her dormmates still continued despite everything else happening. Her habit of talking about things that many people either didn't or couldn't understand certainly didn't help. The way her voice didn't seem to always be a little bit flat or disconnected gave the Carrows plenty of reasons to accuse her of a flippant attitude.
Watching Luna shrug off her own pain never failed to make Ginny's blood boil. Luna was weird, and Ginny would never deny that because it was part of what made Luna so Luna-like, but none of that weirdness deserved punishment. Even if Luna didn't care about her pain, Ginny did and not just because of the hours spent cleaning and healing the evidence of it all.
Ginny just wanted to protect her, no matter what the cost was.
Which was how they found themselves hiding in the classroom that Firenze had used when he had been allowed to teach. The fake trees around them had changed colors to match the fall foliage on the trees outside. Very few people bothered to visit the abandoned classroom, especially since the house elves had placed a ward over the door that barred certain people from entering.
Luna looked ethereal in the glow of the full moon, like a fairy or a will-o-wisp come to lure the unwary.
Ginny cupped her face like she really was the treasure that Ginny had come to believe she was. Then with a gentleness she had never even tried to use before, Ginny pressed their lips together. Magic flowed between them like a current. Luna opened beneath Ginny's questing tongue, just as responsive and adaptive as she had always been.
"I'll take care of you," Ginny promised, when they broke apart to pant for breath. "I'll protect you."
Luna's smile was as breathtaking as the kiss had been.
Ginny truly believed that they could be happy, if only in stolen moments like this one.
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Ginny found her.
Luna had disappeared from the grounds of the Burrow as they bustled with activity of the wedding that Ginny's mother had insisted they just had to have. Ginny would have been just as happy to skive off a ceremony entirely and just file the required form with the ministry. Judging by how Luna had retreated to the familiar grounds of her childhood home rather than face another argument with Molly Weasley and Hermione Granger on how yellow wasn't an appropriate color for the bride to wear, Ginny suspected that her soon-to-be wife would agree.
Ginny curled into the space next to Luna, despite it being a tighter fit than it was back when they were twelve. Luckily, she had chosen to wear a Muggle-style pantsuit instead of robes or a dress. It created more ways to sit without having to worry about flashing the gnomes her panties. It was still nice to just be pressed close to Luna with her legs draped over the blonde's lap. They hadn't really had time to just be together since they had arrived at the Burrow for the last bit of wedding preparation.
"I want to marry you," Luna announced apropos to nothing. Ginny kissed her bare shoulder beside the strap of her lemon-yellow sundress. Then she laid her cheek against the spot, just listening. Neither of them was really dressed for the winter cold, but Dione's runework had held up throughout the years. They were both comfortably warm. "I want to marry you and be able to call you my wife and wear your ring. I want all that."
"That's good," Ginny acknowledged with only a bit of dryness in her tone, "because I want that, too."
"I want to marry you," Luna continued, leaning her head against Ginny's, "but that's too much. It's just… too much."
"Alright," Ginny agreed. She understood what Luna was saying. Mum had gone wild with the event, wanting Ginny to have a full traditional ceremony with reception to follow. There was flowers and bows everywhere. It was beautiful. It just wasn't her and Luna's style. That was before taking into consideration how busy everything was at the Burrow right then. It was getting to Ginny even, and she was used to busy crowds. Luna wasn't nearly as adept at either.
"You don't mind?"
"Hey," Ginny said as she laced their fingers together, "as long as I get to keep you by my side until the day we die, through all of life's trials and tribulations, as long as I can share all my joys and triumphs with you, I don't care about anything else. I would escape the wrath of a Weasley matriarch and march through a frozen forest just to cuddle with you in a nook of a tree covered in mistletoe. I would do anything for you, and I will continue doing anything for you, until the day we die."
"I would do all that," Luna countered, her voice soft but strong, "and for this life and the next."
Ginny lifted their hands to press a kiss to Luna's fingers. Her lips brushed against them as she murmured her agreement to those terms. Then she pulled back to make sure that Luna could hear her next words.
"I'll take care of everything."
Luna believed every word.
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An Ending
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