A/N: Sorry for the sheer amount of dialogue in the chapter, as well as the absence of Anthony, Colin and pretty much everyone else. I also just wanted to point out that Remus's 'handwriting' hasn't changed since he was a teenager, back in the days of Keeping To My Morals.
Chapter Seven: Luna Lovegood Once Again
Now that she had been given an opportunity to escape, Victoria was not going to let Cornfoot restrict her again.
"Roger, there's nothing you can do!"
"This is my property, I can have anyone I choose on it and anyone I don't want can leave. If the two of you aren't gone in one minute precisely, then I'll..."
"Your property? What would my daddy say to that? Or his will? Or the solicitor, oh, I'd love to see what he would make of all this! You may be a wizard but the law is against you." Victoria glared at him severely, then turned away from him and folded her arms defiantly.
Cornfoot seemed slightly shocked by his fiancée's sudden outgoingness. He looked almost pleadingly at her.
"Well, before you start wailing to them about your mental and physical scars and how you can't have babies and so on, I want to express my point of view."
Padma almost smiled. This was getting exciting. Luna was slightly worried; whatever was going to happen next? She couldn't stay with him now, and would want to go with them, but where would she stay? But they would worry about that when the time came. For the moment, she, like Padma, witnessed the banter between a couple who had probably not had a real conversation for fifteen years.
"Oh, what is this, some sob story about your pure blood? I don't want to hear it!"
"Don't, then." For the first time, Cornfoot looked directly at Luna and Padma.
"You probably think I'm more of a monster than she is, and I daresay I deserve it. but at the time, there was no alternative..."
Luna considered this. Sure, he could tell the villagers she had died. He could then pretend that the manor house reminded him too much of her and move away to start a new life, smuggling her along with his things. They could then start a new life together in the wizarding world, and everyone would be happy. But she had learned from experience that generally one shouldn't tell people a better idea when they're in the middle of suffering the consequences of their bad idea.
"I knew as soon as it happened that Victoria had been attacked by a werewolf, but I could hardly bear to accept it. I've been brought up to...see them as monsters, which to all extents and purposes they are, and my mind pushed away the idea that my beautiful fiancée was to be one of them. I managed to get her back to the manor without the Muggles knowing, and I left her in the bedroom to be nursed while I went to bed and tried to gather my thoughts."
"The next morning my worst fears were confirmed. Victoria was well and conscious, but there were...changes. Her eyebrows were thicker and longer, and she showed me her palms, which were itchy. I imagined, correctly, that hair would develop on them. She was obviously in a lot of distress, and I realised I would have to explain everything to her. You see, before that, she did not even know I was a wizard! You can imagine the task ahead of me, can't you? It seemed so easy to tell everyone that she was dead. I expect Victoria hasn't told you how terrified she was of going out in public after becoming a werewolf? How embarrassed she was?"
"Sure, I was nervous, but I didn't ask you to lock me in my bedroom for fifteen years! Are you trying to pretend that I asked you to do this? That it would benefit me? You did this for your own benefit, Roger. To preserve your dignity, your family's dignity. You didn't care about how I felt at all!"
Luna found herself considering Cornfoot's story. He would have been very young at the time, just settling into a committed relationship. His fiancée would be a dangerous creature at the full moon and a patient after it, as well as a wife. She would never produce the son and heir his upper-class family obsessed with. It was a lot for her to take in...the task of telling her must have been extremely painful. Luna began to wonder if their story, though interesting, ought to be published. She did not want to lower the newspaper to being like a women's magazine, telling far-fetched tales about other people's real lives. "My Husband Threw Me To Angry Hippogriffs.", etc.
"Do you think I'm happy?" Cornfoot shouted, startling everyone in the room. "Do you think I enjoy hearing you sobbing your heart out every night with pain? Do you think I like hearing the nurse describe your agony to me? 'Oh, Sir, she's got an 'orrible great scar on 'er. Can't do nuffink. She's rollin' about in terrible pain.'"
Victoria stared at her fiancé. If it were possible, she had gone even paler. She was speechless for a moment, then finally, shakily, replied:
"Roger...you think it was physical pain that was making me sob and scream and ruin my furniture? You think I was wailing over some...wound? I'm used to physical pain now, I've been transforming every month for fifteen years! If you ripped out a chunk of my hair I'd probably just say 'Ugh, I've got a bald patch now.'. It was loneliness, Roger. That's what drove me insane."
Time seemed to stand still for a moment. Loneliness. Luna knew what that was like. She'd always had a loving family, but there were times when even they couldn't support her. When her mother died, her father withdrew, not wanting to look after her, or even himself particularly. When she went to Hogwarts, she felt a million miles from anyone who cared about her. If she had a terrible accident, people there would just say 'What a pity' and carry on. It felt like...
"No one in the world cared about me." Victoria said, tears pouring down her face. "Everyone outside the house thinks I'm dead, and everyone inside the house would probably be relieved if I did die. I thought it'd never be over, you know. I thought...this is my life. Victoria did nothing wrong but is being punished like a criminal anyway. You know criminals at least can have friends and stuff...God, I've been so, so alone..." Victoria began sobbing then, and Cornfoot could not look at her.
"I didn't want to hurt you. Not really. I just...got carried away."
"Well, now we are carrying her away." Padma said defiantly. She clearly felt no sympathy for Cornfoot, and now, neither did Luna. Anyone who could so cheerfully enforce those terrible, terrible feelings of loneliness was not a good person.
Cornfoot made no resistance as his fiancée gathered her things. Padma assured her that her two-bedroom flat would be just fine, although perhaps they would have to use St. Mungo's for the full moon. Victoria was still shaky, having finally expressed her mental anguish, and Luna and Padma remained close to her as they left. Cornfoot approached Victoria for the last time before they left, but she glared at him and he withdrew to stand among the startled servants.
The weather outside, though nothing special, delighted Victoria. She awkwardly sat on the grass, then happily ran her fingers through it. But as she looked from the hill onto the village below, a feeling of shock overcame her. Luna wondered if she was experiencing some agoraphobia, having been cooped up for so long. But it wasn't this that disturbed Victoria. She looked at her palms, which had soft, fine hairs growing on them, and then at Luna and Padma.
"I don't know how to really live any more." she said. "I mean, I can't have a job or anything, can I? Considering all the sick leave I'll have to take. I have no friends...I'm as pale as a sheet and look like a freak, and I'm a werewolf. How does one live as a werewolf? Roger told me...that they were all evil and went around in packs hunting children, so it was better I stayed away from it all. But that can't be true, can it? There has to be a decent werewolf or two, or does lycanthropy corrupt the mind? Is my mind going to be corrupted? Has it been? Am I insane?"
Padma looked at Luna as worriedly as Victoria was. She was used to having ideas, but now, it seemed, her mind had gone blank. Luna, however, knew exactly who to contact.
"So you want a werewolf, who is a good and nice person, with a lot of experience of living in the real world? I think I may be able to find someone..."
