A/N: Okay, this is the third chapter. I thought this might be where we get some answers, but I cut it off a little shorter than that. So, here it is! Please, PLEASE READ AND REVIEW!!

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. Duh.


Fred shook Luna's shoulders. "Luna. Luna!"

Dazed, still wide-eyed and mad, Luna looked over at him.

Fred shook his head. "Luna," he said softly, "it's over. It's done. Don't throw everything away trying to fix something that cannot be changed."

Luna stared at him. The madness drained from her face slowly. Tears welled up in her eyes and flooded over.

Tom put a hand on her shoulder. "Luna," he said softly. Luna shook her head and buried her face in Fred's shoulder.

George raised his own wand and pointed it at Greyback. "The man you attacked was our brother," he told the man, not bothering to quiet his voice. "Now, we stopped Luna… but if I were you, I'd run before we decide that was a mistake."

Greyback was shuddering all over from Luna's curse. George couldn't help feeling a strange, twisted admiration for Luna's spellwork; not many Light witches could cast an Unforgivable Curse.

The werewolf stood, staggering as his feet took his weight. His good hand grabbed his wand from where it lay in the grass. George didn't lower his wand until the werewolf had turned and run.

Luna wiped her face on her sleeve. Her tears had by no means stopped, but they had at least slowed to where she could see through them. She shook off Fred's restraining hands and turned to George. She extended her hand wordlessly for her wand.

George held back for a moment, but only that. The look in Luna's eyes was just as hard as when she had yelled her last incantation, and she would not be defied. He handed over the wand quickly.

Luna walked past the twins toward the castle, Tom at her shoulder. "Hey!" Fred yelled. "Where are you going?"

Luna stopped for a moment and looked back over her shoulder. At that moment, she looked remarkably like a heroine from old, and so completely untouchable that Fred wouldn't have tried to stop her for another thousand Galleons.

"I have to get to Albus' office," she said. Even the deadened quality to her voice brought on by her intense crying did not lessen the steel in her eyes. Fred and George did not protest as she headed on.


When they reached the gargoyle leading to the headmaster's office, Luna stopped. For the first time since entering the castle, her face showed uncertainty.

"Umm…" she said. "I… don't know the password."

"That's not a problem." Tom waved away this news impatiently. "The password is sugar quill."

"Sugar quill?" Luna repeated incredulously. At her words, the gargoyle leapt aside, revealing the moving staircase beyond.

"And what do you say?" Tom asked in a patronizing tone.

"I say the man was crazier than I am," Luna told him, and stepped onto the staircase. Tom followed.

The headmaster's office was filled with oddities that brought a broad grin to Luna's face: the tiny silver instruments on their spindly silver tables; the stone Pensieve in the cupboard; the portraits of former headmasters and headmistresses hanging all over the walls. When they saw Fawkes, Luna gasped softly in wonder. Even Tom seemed impressed.

Luna walked up to the phoenix, but Tom interrupted her. "Time enough for that later," he said. "We need to get the fang."

"Don't you need the diary?" Luna asked, turning to face Tom. There was a small smile on her face.

Tom seemed taken aback, but only for a moment. "The diary…" he said softly. "How do you know about that?"

"Ginny's in my year," Luna told him. "We have a lot of classes together. I saw her with that diary, and I saw it absorb a whole bottle of ink when Harry had it. It's remarkably easy to learn things when seven of the most powerful wizards in the world are your allies."

Tom blinked. "Who told you?" he asked.

"Ginny's brother, Bill." Sadness flitted across Luna's face for a moment before she went on. "Then Albus. So, don't you need the diary?"

Tom shook his head, half in amazement, half in reply. "No, I don't. Not anymore." At Luna's questioning look, he sighed. "What you're wearing is another Horcrux." Luna looked down at it, horrified. Tom stilled her hand as it moved to pull off the locket. "It's alright! When the diary was destroyed, I moved to this Horcrux. I pushed the other piece of soul out, so it's just me in there. I can manifest, well… because of who I am."

"So why do you need the fang?" Luna asked, now beginning to search the shelves for it. "Why do you need that particular fang?"

"It's from my familiar," he said.

"Then your familiar's dead," Luna said, finally locating and taking down the basilisk fang. "What will you do now?"

"There are generations of basilisks down there. I can claim any of them, bond with any of them. But you can't speak Parseltongue to get into the Chamber, so I need that fang. Besides, it knows my—Voldemort's—Horcruxes, so it will be easier to use for this."

Luna nodded thoughtfully. "But it's going to take a while. I'm not ready to use this thing yet."

Tom sighed and raked a hand through his hair. "I know, I—" He stopped, apparently listening. "Get out! We've got to get out of here!"

"Why? What's going on?" Luna listened, but her own ears picked up nothing.

Tom pushed her over to Fawkes. "Just grab the bloody bird! People are coming! We need to be gone now!"

Luna's eyes widened. She grabbed Fawkes' tail, making sure to keep a hold of the basilisk fang with her other hand. Tom gripped her shoulders tightly so they wouldn't be separated.

"Fawkes," he said, "Albus is dead. Go to your new Master."

The bird raised its head, stretched its wings, and burst into a ball of flame that raced down Luna's body, consuming the girl and her companion with no more heat than a Floo fire.


Harry pursued the two Death Eaters through the gates and out onto the road. Blinded by rage, he barely noticed the pops and cracks of the other Death Eaters Disapparating. He reached out and grabbed Snape's robe. His wand was in his hand; he was going to hurt Snape, to kill him—

"Peverell!" Malfoy yelled. Harry froze. "Peverell, don't!" the Slytherin shouted.

Harry's arms were locked in place. He didn't understand what Malfoy had said, but it—meant something… Something important…

Then Snape yanked his arm away, and Harry's paralysis lifted as the man grabbed Malfoy and Disapparated.

A frustrated scream tore through Harry's throat and ripped through the air. "NO!" he shouted. "No! Get back here, you cowards!"

"They can't hear you, Harry," Fred said from behind him.

Harry whirled to face the twins. Fred and George stood just a few feet behind him. There was no laughter in their faces; their eyes were haunted.

George held out his hand. "Come on, Harry," he said. "Plenty of time for revenge later."

Harry stared at the extended hand, unsure of what he was supposed to do with it. The silence weighed heavily on his ears. In the Forbidden Forest, a crow called and a wolf howled; he heard Fang barking in reply. The sounds seemed lighter than the silence, somehow. Still he didn't move.

George lowered his hand. Fred wrapped an arm around Harry's shoulders, and the three of them started up towards the castle.


Some of the haze around Harry's mind lifted when he saw all the Weasleys in the hospital wing. Certainly he was suddenly lucid enough to ask, "What happened?"

Ron looked back at Harry and moved away from the bed. Harry gasped.

Bill lay on the bed, blood-soaked and covered in gashed. His face was a mess; his hands looked like raw hamburger. He opened one bruised eye when Harry opened and attempted a smile. "I look a right mess, huh?"

Fred and George left Harry's side and went over to their oldest brother. Still, there was no laughter in either face. Mr. Weasley stood off to one side, stony-faced; Ron looked shaken where he stood with Hermione. Mrs. Weasley had started dabbing ointment on Bill's wounds. Ginny was standing against the wall, looking like she had when Harry had woken her up in the Chamber of Secrets.

"Greyback attacked him," she told Harry. "When it wasn't even the full moon. How sick is that?"

Harry didn't answer. In the absence of any new shocking revelations, the haze around his mind was coming back.

"Sick…" Ron moaned. "So wrong… What's gonna happen to Bill now?"

Mrs. Weasley seemed to take this question worse than she had the attack; she collapsed, crying, over her son, who appeared to have passed out.

Mr. Weasley looked over at Lupin, still smooth-faced.

Lupin, however, seemed almost as clueless as they were. "I don't know what will happen, Arthur. I doubt Bill will be a full werewolf, but there will probably be some contamination. He'll probably have some wolfish characteristics from now on."

Ron flinched and covered his face with his hands. "No…" Harry could hear him say. "Not Bill… This can't be happening…"

"I wish it weren't," Lupin said softly.

"Of course, it doesn't matter w-what he l-looks like," Mrs. Weasley was sobbing, "b-but he was always such a beautiful b-boy… And he was g-going to be married…" Mr. Weasley twitched.

Fleur took offense at Mrs. Weasley's words. Harry didn't hear most of their argument, but he noticed Fleur take the ointment from Mrs. Weasley and start treating Bill herself, and he noticed the two women suddenly start crying into each other's arms.

Hermione was the first to take real notice of Harry. "Harry, what happened?" she asked.

Harry stared at her, wide-eyed. What happened…? Dumbledore's limp body flashed in front of his eyes… Draco, lowering his wand… Luna, attacking Greyback… Snape, hatred and revulsion twisting his face…

Hatred of his own coursed through his veins, finally penetrating and lifting the haze that filled his mind. "Dumbledore's dead," he said softly, then louder. "Dumbledore's dead. Snape killed him."

Harry hadn't reckoned on just how much it would affect everyone present for him to say that. Ron lifted his head from his hands and yelled "WHAT?" Ginny's head snapped up, murder in her eyes, and she stepped away from the wall. Hermione took a step backward, hands flying to her mouth in shock. Bill tried to sit up and both Fleur and Mrs. Weasley moved to restrain him, although Fleur shrieked so loudly everyone clapped their hands over their ears.

"Why? What exactly happened?" Lupin asked, looking dazed.

The next half hour or so was a blur of meaningless explanation as Harry recounted the events from the tower top. He hesitated at mentioning Luna's part, but Fred and George took that matter out of his hands.

"Off the record, Luna went temporarily insane—" Fred said.

"Meaning even crazier than usual—" George interrupted.

"And ran out—"

"And used a couple wicked nasty curses on Greyback—"

"When she found out Bill had been attacked," they finished together.

Ron stared at them. "Are we talking about the same Luna?" he asked blankly.

"Luna Lovegood, blond hair, wide eyes, likes talking about Crumple-Horned Snorkacks and apparently very at home when riding a thestral," Harry supplied. "Anyway, after that, Snape and Malfoy got away. That's really all I know." Except the bit about the name Malfoy had shouted back at him, the name that he had already forgotten; and about the paralysis that had followed—and there was no way he was going to share that.

"Maybe you should go tell McGonagall about this," Mr. Weasley suggested. "Ron, Fred, George, you stay here. The rest of you should tell the Order what happened."

"Ginny stays, too," Bill broke in. His eyes were barely open, but he was awake again, if only for a moment before his eyes closed once more.

Mr. Weasley looked at Bill questioningly, but agreed, "And Ginny, too."

Ginny looked stunned. "Seriously?" she asked. "Oh, don't answer that—I'm staying here."

Mrs. Weasley looked even more surprised than her daughter, but she left the hospital wing with Fleur and the others.


A/N: Okay, that's not as good a cliffhanger stopping point as I normally would have liked, but I have some things to say!

First, I AM BACK IN SCHOOL. This means that I won't have a whole lot of time hanging heavy on my hands to play with the computer and churn out three chapters of fanfiction a week. What with me being on a major HP kick right now, I'll probably be working on these for a while yet, but I will work HARDER on the ones that get REVIEWED MORE. HINT! I updated this week, even though last chapter I didn't get ANY reviews, but I WILL NOT do that again. I will START working on the next chapter when I get a review for this chapter, and, like I said, how hard I work on it, and thus how quickly I update, will be directly proportional to the number of reviews that I get. Did that sound angry? Well, I am upset. I spend my own time on these stories—voluntarily—and it is nice when SOMEONE notices that and reviews. Okay? Thank you.

Second, (I kind of covered this in the first), if you want me to update sooner, then hit the little purply button and send in a review! Seriously, it doesn't take long, and it means that I won't take as long. See how it keeps everyone happy?

So now, please, PLEASE review, and I'll be back soon! Thank you!