What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow

Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,

You cannot say, or guess, for you know only

A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,

And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,

And the dry stone no sound of water.

~T. S. Elliot

She who speaks of moon rabbits and Other beings, the strange beings, (from behind the cracks in the wall and beyond the corners we never turn) and can never quite understand how everyone else sees the world (they don't) sits under an apple tree, holding an apple leaf, and wonders.

She's covered in soot from head to toe. Her clothing is ruffled, burnt, and torn. Her hair's a mess and her shoes are mysteriously missing. Tears have streamed down her face, blood dripped sluggishly from scratches, and her skin turned black and blue under its earthly blanket.

"What is this thing called grief?" She speaks to herself out loud, knowing (understanding, unlike so many others) that They are always listening.

"I don't know," Grief tells her, draping theirself across Luna's back and resting their head on her shoulder. They are a warm presence against her back, but only so because she believes in the power of melancholy.

(Dear Keats, who claims grief lives in the house of pleasure. You were right)

"Isn't that rather strange?" Luna muses, turning her gaze skyward. Wrackspurts buzz around her ears and her earrings keep her safe from fuzzy thoughts and a knife to her wrist. (In another world, in another life, in another timeline with so little changed and so much changed and-) "You'd think that you'd know what you are."

Grief hummed, reaching out with fingers of bone (decorated with flowers, so pretty) to grasp the leaf within her hold. It decayed under their touch, like it was Death draped across her back and not Grief as she believed it so. Perhaps it was Death at her back, and not Grief, and she was merely mistaking what she saw. But no-she saw Grief, and thus it was Grief, for was there really any other way to know?

"Mother is dead." Luna's voice was soft as she spoke, whispers joining the unseen wind. (Would someone hear her? Miles and miles away, would they hear the echo of her words?)

"I know," Grief said, the leaf crumbling to dust. It coated her hands and smeared across her skin-but more paint on the canvas of her body.

(She was a painting not yet painted, a masterpiece laying under layers of cloth and dust. Where oh where did the painter go? She had lost him so long ago)

"What do I do?" Her eyes felt wet as she laced her fingers with those of Grief's. They were a quiet companion in her melancholy, a stranger on a train ride to oblivion. Would they stay with her for as long as she clung? If she never let go would the memory of her mother never leave? Luna didn't know, just as she didn't know a great number of things for she was young yet, (so terribly old) and still needed to be told things by adults who knew better. (They didn't)

(Like Heliopaths in Sweden singing of madness and order. Like Nargles in Hogwarts causing chaos with every word. Would she meet that being called Chaos one day? The one who had so loved the thing called Death?)

"I don't know," Grief said, gripping her hand just a little bit tighter. Insects crawled along their skin, butterflies eating their flesh with brilliant color.

"Will it ever get easier?" Luna questioned.

"I've been told time heals all wounds, my dear. Though I know not if it is true," Grief answered.

"Because time doesn't flow for you. Not since you stopped being human."

(Madness crept up to him, a noose around his neck. Victory had been within reach and yet-)

The wind picked up and blew across the hill, shaking the leaves and shattering the quiet silence in the air. It crescendoed like magic was known to do, loud and boisterous and almost… lonely. The purveyor of imagination, the beloved of the Court of Madness-governors of creativity-was it so lonely to travel the land alone? Perhaps Luna should be its friend.

"Luna?" A voice, so familiar, it called to her and the wind carried his voice to her ears. "Luna?"

The speaker of moon rabbits stood and brushed off her skirt, torn and dirty as it was. "I'm here, Daddy!"

The moment was gone, her tears were dried up, and Grief remained draped across her back. Her father found her and brought her home, treated her wounds and calmed her down. (But Luna was already calm, she had always been calm, so why did he believe otherwise?) Mother was dead and Luna was there when she left, following Death's gentle hand to somewhere beyond her body. But Luna was okay, despite her scratches and her bruises, because she had Grief on her back and the wind for a friend.

Her mother was dead, but Luna would be alright.

There is shadow under this red rock,

(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),

And I will show you something different from either

Your shadow at morning striding behind you

Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;

I will show you fear in a handful of dust.

~T.S. Elliot

AN: This, if you couldn't tell, takes place directly after the accident that kills Luna's mother. This chapter was inspired by the fact that everyone keeps comparing Tsuna from my story "There are Stars in Your Eyes" to Luna. So, in the spirit of irony, I have made Luna like Tsuna. Kinda. Also, the quotes are both from the poem "The Wasteland". It was also one of the things inspiring this chapter. Prompts anyone?