Little one-shot, written in response to the 13th February Prompt of the Day on the Hogwarts Online forum: "Stormy weather".
All was still.
There wasn't a breath of wind, not a whisper of life to relieve the aching tension. There wasn't a ray of light to pierce the thick, angry-looking gray clouds that hung so low, leaving the wide castle grounds with a feeling of hollowness and oppression, trapping the world by hiding higher skies from view. There wasn't a smile on the girl's pale face – just an oddly serene look, clear blue eyes not quite taking in that upside-down world that cracked with fear and anxious expectations. Just something akin to wisdom – or was it madness?
It was madness, decided the fidgeting redhead. It was wisdom – what was wisdom? The world was mad. Luna Lovegood was... something else.
Maybe Luna would keep her sane.
"The storm is near," she spoke, loathing her cracked, weak voice. "We should go inside, Luna."
Seconds ticked by. Perhaps she hadn't heard. Exasperated, Ginny nearly went to shaking her. She nearly did – and recoiled her hand. She draped her arms around her torso, holding tight, pondering heading back inside, right now. She didn't. No solid walls, no haven could keep her from crumbling in the end. No embrace would hold her together. Her world was empty.
"It is a storm, Ginny." Luna's clear, sweet voice echoed in the air, painfully eerie. "The storm is there when you can't see where each piece of cloud ends. The storm is there when the sky is huddling together or closing around himself, and when you can't find lightness anywhere to escape the tension. When black and white aren't defined anymore." She paused. "We've come to breaking point. The Nargles are scared."
She was more scared than the Nargles. Or perhaps she wasn't – Ginny felt numb, her world darkened and blurred together like this heavy sky, and falling apart at the edges. Someone had taken off the lights, and left nothing but harsh fears and expectations. She yearned for the lightning to strike.
"Breaking point," she murmured, tasting the words on her tongue. "Brea– " but her voice broke. Ginny swallowed back a sob, and looked away – but there was nothing neutral to focus on. Everything looked dark and messed up, everything spoke to her of loss, absence and hideous anguish creeping in the shadows. She couldn't make sense of her world.
"We will fight, you know." Luna had spoken softly, confidently – no, this was no confidence. It was the voice of someone who knew – someone who saw, beyond storms and wars, the next flash of hope, the first ray of light to touch a new era. "You will fight. You are strong, you just don't feel it right now."
There was a pause. She didn't want to answer. She didn't want to listen – she wanted to escape, to fly away. Action – yes, that was what she craved. A goal, a foe – blunt fact, a concrete presence she could crash into with all the unused passion in her heart. She would have welcomed pain and death with relief at that very moment – if only she could fight.
She couldn't handle waiting and helplessness.
"You deserve him," Luna said again serenely. "I wish I didn't have to remind you."
Those words made Ginny cover her face in her hands, made her want to cower and cry. No, she didn't deserve Harry. She wasn't fighting. She wasn't out there. She was locked here, safe, and the mere notion revolted her.
But she was still standing.
A cool drop fell on her forehead, and her head shot up towards the sky. A second drop splashed her cheek. Tears from the sky, she thought. The tears she had no right to cry. The idea was stupidly romantic – she didn't want to be some freaky princess locked in her tower. The sky wasn't her friend and the world had no happy ending. She was lucky if it would end at all.
"Come," Luna said. The redhead turned and saw her friend's outstretched hand – and those blue eyes, oceans of peace no war could stain. "Inside, Ginny. That's where we are needed. Inside, with all of them. People who need us."
Ginny's heart hammered in response, and she grabbed Luna's white hand as if it were salvation embodied. She was no hero, she thought, turning back towards the castle. She was no warrior, she had no escape, and quite honestly, as obscene as it might seem to think this when she hadn't lost anyone yet, she was hurting like hell. But God, she would fight anyway.
She, too, was needed, and she had a duty: to go on.
(for them all, for herself, and for him)