Chapter 4
Confession
The next morning, Luna went straight down to the clearing in the woods to see the unicorns. She had had a strange dream that night. Everything she had touched had disappeared, leaving her cold and alone in a strange wilderness. The dream had clung to her, leaving her shivering and unsettled when she woke up.
She needed the unicorns to make everything right again. They'd been her companions all summer long. They would never leave her.
Except they had.
She waited for an hour. Still, the clearing remained vacant, silent except for the rustle of the wind through the leaves. No unicorns in sight. Not a sign of them.
Finally, she gave up and walked back to her house. Her footfalls felt heavy as she made the trudge up the road. Were they gone forever? Had she done something to scare them away?
She entered through the kitchen door and stalked past her mother. Her mother rarely asked her about her visits. Perhaps she wasn't interested, or perhaps she knew that Luna and the unicorns shared something that no adult could really understand. Some things can't be explained at all, they can only be felt.
Then again, maybe parents had a similar link with their kids, because Luna's mother appeared in her bedroom door a few minutes later. Luna was huddled face-down on her bed. She didn't particularly want to talk.
"They didn't show up," Luna's mother said.
Luna nodded sadly, head still buried in pillow.
"Oh, honey, maybe they were just off grazing today or something. They'll be back."
"They won't," Luna said, and as soon as she said it, she knew it was true. The unicorns were gone. They weren't coming back. Ever.
"How do you know?" her mother asked. "Things disappear all the time just to show up when you least expect it."
"I saw them leave," Luna said. "They ran away during the birthday party." She wondered whether to add what she'd been doing when they ran away. Somehow, she felt that this was her fault, that she had betrayed their trust. They'd left because she had told Ginny about them.
"Maybe they were just frightened off by the Quidditch game. Those Weasley boys sure make a lot of noise." Luna's mother smiled slightly.
"I don't think so."
Her mother sat on the edge of the bed for a bit, not saying anything. Then, almost abruptly, she got up to leave. "I'll be in my workshop if you need me," she said, and closed the door behind her.
Luna turned over on her bed. Should she have told her mother that she had betrayed the unicorn's trust? It didn't feel right, leaving that unsaid. She couldn't keep the secret of a broken secret.
Finally, she got up and headed downstairs, unsure of how - or what - she would tell her mother.
She worked her way down the stairs, doing her best to avoid the mountains of clutter littering the hallway. Her family collected junk; nothing was too strange for the Lovegoods. Unfortunately, that meant she had to step lightly to avoid tipping over the nearest pile, lest she'd have even more explaining to do.
Pulling open the basement door, she entered her mother's workshop. Her mother was hunched over her workbench, deep in the middle of some spell. A pale green glow shone from a small wire circle on the table. Once in a while, it flickered wildly, sending bright arcs off into the corners of the room.
Luna waited until the spell was over and the ring had died down a bit before speaking. Her mother had warned her often about the dangers of interrupting a spell. The consequences could be fatal or worse.
"Mum?" Luna began, tentatively. "I have something to tell you."
"What is it?" Her mother laid her wand down on the workbench and turned to face her.
Luna hesitated for a moment, wondering how to phrase it. "I…I told Ginny about the unicorns. They didn't want me too. That's why they ran away."
Her mother looked at her with a mixture of surprise and … amusement? But it wasn't funny! The unicorns were gone, and it was her fault!
"Oh, Luna," her mother began. "You didn't scare them away. Unicorns have their own way of things, and they'll come and go for reasons that we humans have no hope of understanding. Maybe they'll come back, maybe they won't, but it certainly wasn't your fault."
"But…" Luna said, frowning. She didn't quite believe her mother. It made sense, at least, but Luna didn't think it was true.
"Come here," her mother invited. Luna walked over to the workbench, and her mother laid a hand on her shoulder and looked directly into her eyes. "Not everything has to do with you. Not everything has a cause behind it. Sometimes things happen for no reason at all, and you just have to accept them and move on."
"I don't understand," Luna said plainly.
"Most of us don't," her mother replied. "But for some things, you don't have to. Logic can only explain so much. At some point you just have to give in and believe."
Luna still didn't get it. Her confusion must have shown in her face, because her mother just laughed and said, "It's not a lesson you have to learn now. Just promise me one thing?"
"What?" asked Luna, genuinely curious.
"Remember. Remember what I'm telling you now, remember the unicorns, remember how it feels like now that they're gone. Because we're nothing without our experiences." And then, speaking to no one in particular, she murmured, "no matter how painful they might be."
She snapped back to attention and looked back at Luna, smiling. "Promise me?"
"I promise," Luna said, and she meant it, even though she had no idea what she was promising.
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AN:Thanks to my only reviewer for chapter 3, Elyse.
