She and Harry make their way up the stairs, and just before Harry can reach out to touch the wall, he pulls something out from under his clothes. Soft, silvery, seeming to transcend the boundaries of the world – the Invisibility Cloak. And as he tosses one end of it over her head, she pulls it snugly against herself, and a new possibility suddenly floats into her mind.
What if . . . ?
But there's no time for that now, if all goes well she will have plenty of time to ponder it later, because now Harry has pressed his hand to the wall and it's receding, and automatically Luna holds her breath, her heart and blood now racing in that familiar way they always did during night escapades before December, before the cellar, and she looks around, searching for someone, Filch, a prefect, a Carrow . . .
But there's no one, and Harry's arms are around her now, pulling her aside into the shadows, where no one will run into them, where they will disturb no one, and he pulls out a piece of paper from a pouch, and whispers to it, and she watches as a map blooms on the page.
She doesn't have much time to look at it, because Harry soon finds what he's looking for. "We're up on the fifth floor," he murmurs in her ear. "Come on."
She holds onto his arm so that they can keep close together. By listening to his breathing and feeling the rhythm of his steps, she's able to synchronize her own pace with his, so that they don't bump into each other with every step. She wonders how often Ron and Hermione have been under this Cloak with him, how very in step the three of them must be after so many years.
And they continue silently on through the darkness.
The darkness.
They're so quiet that she can hear Harry's heart – it's pounding almost as hard as hers is. She wonders what he's really been doing over the last few months – if his reaction has anything to do with the darkness the way hers is, or if he's simply totally focused on the task at hand. She tries to slow her breathing, but she can still feel her heart slamming against her ribs, trying to jump into her throat. With more effort than ever before, she pushes it back down. She cannot let her fear get them caught.
"This way," she chokes out, tugging on his arm, as she notices the staircase that leads to her common room. Here, on familiar ground, her blood cools down a bit, the flow not so panicky-fast the way it was before. It's still an effort, though, and she tries not to squeeze Harry's arm too hard. But he probably doesn't even notice, so absorbed in his own thoughts, his own struggle.
It's a bit lighter when they reach the common room, not as dark as before, and she feels her hand unclench just a bit in relief. Her other seems to float in nothingness as she knocks on the door, and she prepares to let herself go, prepares to drift into the consciousness she always finds when there's a question to be answered.
"Which came first, the phoenix or the flame?"
She breathes out once, deeply, but before she loses herself, she asks Harry what he thinks.
The confusion on his face tells her that she shouldn't expect an answer from him, and she answers his question – "Isn't there just a password?" – with little attention. She lets go of all focus, all worry, all fear, and lets her mind relax into the consciousness of the universe..
The phoenix or the flame . . . In her mind – or maybe it's not her mind at all – she can see it, can see the beautiful red-and-gold bird rising from the fire, growing, living its life, every stage of beauty, and then sinking gracefully into flames, before the flames burn to embers and the bird rises again . . . it resolves itself into a circle into her mind, a circle of red and gold – but a circle has no beginning . . .
"Well reasoned," says the door, and she can feel Harry's sigh of relief, but in her mind it's not reason at all. It is the truth, and the truth is not reason, because it simply is. Reason has very little part in life, in the way things are, and that is the problem that most Ravenclaws have.
As Harry admires the statue, Luna looks around the common room. It's just as beautiful as it was her last day before Hogwarts. She especially loves the high arched windows – living in a warm, cozy common room like the Gryffindors do would have no appeal to her. Here, she feels close to the world – and at a time like now, that is greatly appreciated.
Harry's side of the Cloak drops suddenly, trailing on the floor, and Harry is gone. He's stepped up onto the plinth beside the statue, and, tracing the words with his fingers, he whispers, "Wit beyond measure is man's greatest treasure."
And then – only then – Luna notices something she didn't see before, something that makes her heart beat ten times faster than before, something that makes her raise her wand in both fear and defiance: A dark figure steps out from the shadows – the figure of Alecto Carrow – and her grating, colloquial voice speaks.
"Which makes you pretty skint, witless."
And Luna points her wand, but she knows she's too late as the finger descends onto the dark tattoo on the arm, and the air suddenly feels charged with heat.