Chapter 9

A/N: Omfg! I had NO idea I hadn't put the finished chapter to this online… hides I'm sorry everyone, I truly am. Please forgive me and still review:) Anyway, here it is AT LONG, LONG LAST!

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or anything about it; only the plot and the words.

It was black. All of it was black. His mind, his body, his heart. Where the hell was he? He didn't remember ice, snow, and ground being so warm against his body. Was it Luna? he thought. Was it her pressing him, and making him feel warm on the outside?

No, it wasn't. It was a sheet. A sheet... a bed?

Neville shot up, quick as lightning. His eyes were blurry and he squinted hard to find out where the devil he was. Realization hit him only mere moments later.

Hogwarts...

He was at Hogwarts? How could it be? He was outside, he was cold, he was naked, and... and—

Luna!

He whipped around in the bed, noticing a white curtain. He was clearly in the Hospital Wing. He looked down. He was wearing a white shirt and pajama bottoms.

How did he get here? Where was Luna? Questions burned at his brain.

The curtain was pulled back, and Neville instantly reached for his wand, which wasn't there. Madame Pomfrey looked down at him, tisking and seeming as if nothing had happened, like he hadn't been missing for weeks from the school premises.

"Awake, are you?" she said, looking disapproving. "At least you have clothes on this time. Not like when they brought you in here... disgraceful."

"Where's Luna?" Neville said rudely, throwing off the covers of the bed, and trying to stand. Madame Pomfrey shoved him back down roughly.

"The naked girl you were with?" Madame Pomfrey glared. "Ms. Lovegood is perfectly fine. No need to worry, just relax—"

Neville felt his face redden. No need to worry? Relax? All he'd done for weeks was worry! Worry and wait for Dumbledore to come and find them. What did they do? Leave him there! Leave him and Luna there in Riddle's house, defenseless and helpless— Well, God help him, he wasn't about to relax!

Neville shoved Madame Pomfrey's hand away roughly. He got out of the bed, stumbled a bit as he walked, and looked around the Hospital Wing. Luna wasn't in any of the beds.

"I'm seeing Dumbledore," Neville growled. Without shoes, or proper clothing, he rushed out of the Hospital Wing.

"Mr. Longbottom!" Madame Pomfrey said loudly, rushing to the door. "Come back here this instant! I haven't released you yet!"

Neville ignored her, his feet hitting the cold, bare stone of the castle's floor. He traced his hand along the rock walls as he stumbled, trying to remember where Dumdledore's office was. His vision was blurred, and his mind was foggy. All he could remember off the top of his head was Luna, and her soft fingertips. Luna and her gorgeous eyes, and mouth—

Smash. Neville ran into a wall.

He shook himself, idly walking, not knowing where he was going, simply letting his feet do the work for him. He stopped at another wall and squinted. He put his hand flat against the brick wall. Why did he suddenly remember something absurd about Lemon Drops?

No, not lemon drops.

"Lime Savers," Neville said to the brick wall.

The wall opened, much to his bewilderment, and he stormed through. His feet pounded on the stairs as he stomped up, banging and making as much noise as he could. Neville prepared to pound his fist against the solid door up at the top, but when he went to bang, his fist was sent flying as the door opened by itself. He threw himself through the doorway, still completely fuming.

Albus Dumbledore sat at his desk, his palms together as if he were meditating. He looked up peacefully at Neville, as if the boy had been called to his office to discuss the weather. Neville, on the other hand, was literally emitting heat from the force of his anger.

"What in Merlin's name happened?" Neville thundered. The picture frames on the office wall all cringed and plugged their ears. "What right did you have to take me—"

"Please, do sit down, Mr. Longbottom," Dumbledore said cheerfully, gesturing to a chair. "Fancy some tea? I have some lovely Earl Gray here—"

"What I fancy," Neville hissed, walking closer to the desk and practically spitting at the old man. "Is to know what in God's name you thought you were doing!"

Dumdledore took his time looking charmingly confused. Neville's fist clenched and he knew he was seething—as a picture on the wall so pointedly noted aloud to the room. Dumdledore pointed at the chair, and Neville positively threw himself into it.

Dumdledore cleared his throat. "Now," he said. "Perhaps we can discuss the matter for which I believe you came storming like a barbarian into my office." Dumdledore sipped his tea.

"Oh, let's," Neville said sarcastically. Under usual terms, Neville had never been so frustrated and rude to the headmaster. On contrary, he'd always been sickly polite. Now, however, he could almost feel the anger boiling inside of him.

"I believe you know Tom Riddle?" Dumdledore questioned.

"Rings a bell," Neville growled.

"Yes, I quite thought it would," Dumdledore said, nodding and looking thoughtful. "We had finally found you last night—after much hard work—at a point curiously far away from the Riddle house, and we brought you back. Therefore, I do not see the object of your anger."

"No right," Neville said, his sentences breaking up in anger. "Lestrange was there. You know, the woman who killed my family? I need to get her... you don't understand! Take me back, right now, and I can still get her."

"That would, of course, be breaking the law," Dumbledore said absently, flicking biscuit crumbs from his sleeve. "And not your right to do at all."

Neville banged his fist on the desk, sending several lemon bars flying up. "Not my right!" he thundered again. "You left us there, alone and scared to death! We waited, Luna and I, and you didn't come, damn it. Bellatrix Lestrange killed my parents, and you tell me it's not my bloody right! To hell it isn't!"

"Swearing is not becoming to you," Dumbledore noted. "I shall tell you, as I'm sure you know, that Voldemort killed Harry Potter's parents."

Neville fell silent briefly, failing to see how this was relevant in this instance.

"You were not foreseen in the prophecy," Dumbledore said, suddenly becoming serious, his face growing darker. His voice dropped so that Neville had to lean forward to hear his wispy words. "He is not yours to fight. She is not yours to kill. Evil is not yours to defeat."

"Then why was I there?" Neville asked, feeling himself slip back to a more sensible, controllable manner. "How did Luna and I get there?"

"You were born very close in time to Harry," Dumbledore said. "Evil does not hear, evil does not feel, and first and foremost, evil does not see.

"You stumbled upon something in this castle that was done with the darkest of magic. Even I do not totally understand it. You must understand, Neville. I could not just simply take you and Ms. Lovegood out of the Riddle house without alerting Voldemort."

Dumbledore scratched his nose. "I trust you and hold you in a very high esteem," he went on. "You coped better than expected. But Neville, there is a time, a place, and a reason, to fight evil. This was not your time – this was not your fight."

Dumbledore was silent for many minutes before he stood up and looked out the window. His pale blue eyes looked out into the distance. Neville stared at his back, letting the old man's words sink into him.

Neville, too, stood up in the quiet stillness of the moment.

"She's in the dining hall," Dumbledore said softly, without turning around. "I fancy that she's eating dinner now. I would thus also fancy that you should, too."

Neville muttered a reply under his breath. Luna's face entered his mind, and a great and sudden urge to see her and hold her swept over him like a cool breeze.

He turned to leave, his still-bare feet padding softly and silently on the floor.

"I saw you coming, but you were close," Dumbledore said, turning around, his blue eyes sparkling. "The password is orange wafers."

Neville couldn't help the small smile that slipped onto his face.

As he walked down the hallways, his hand again tracing the stones as he went, he tried to reflect Dumdledore's words. Evil is not yours to defeat. He tried to understand it, he tried hard to fathom the meaning of it, but he couldn't. He couldn't think about it. He couldn't see the meaning to it or any other hard—or for that matter, easy—question. All he could see was Luna.

The loud voices from the Great Hall could be heard, as always, from the stairways. Neville skipped the trick step by memory. It seemed he'd changed in these last few weeks. He was different now. He somehow felt more like a man.

The noise grew louder and louder each step he took. Every inch he moved closer to the Great Hall, the nobody Neville Longbottom remembered all the things that had ever happened to him at this school. Each second that ticked by as he walked, he heard the voices of all the people who hated him, all the people who had ignored him. Those same voices were laughing and talking in the next room over.

The nobody Neville Longbottom stepped into the Great Hall. He was met with complete and utter silence. Faces from each table looked over at him. Those faces that had taunted him not so long ago, now bore into him with shock, awe, and an odd respect that he'd never known from other people.

A bench screeched in the background. Footsteps were coming, and suddenly a blond head was running towards his blurry vision, crying out and screaming his name.

In moments, Neville scooped Luna up in his arms, dragging her to him and twirling her around, right there, right in front of the whole school. And right in front of the whole school, Neville kissed her. He kissed her like he'd never kissed her before, with all the passion, with all the meaning, with all the love he had ever known.

A generalized gasp spread through the Great Hall. Silence again. Then—

Harry Potter stood up from the table and started to clap loudly. Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger, the whole Gryffindor table was standing now, clapping loudly. The Ravenclaws were up in a flash of a second, mimicking their fellow students. Hufflepuff was up and clapping. Several Slytherins stood up and clapped. The teachers were clapping, until the whole Great Hall echoed with the sound of cheers and shouts.

Luna leaned closer to Neville. For several minutes this cheering went on, until it began to die down. Neville walked, dragging Luna with him over to the Gryffindor table. Their fellow classmates seemed to engulf them when they approached. A first year scooted down the bench, and Neville and Luna both sat down at the table.

The first year boy spilled a glass of juice banging into the table while sitting down. He blushed. Neville, looking ridiculous in his white undershirt, pajama bottoms, and lack of shoes, smiled kindly at the first year. His hand snaked around Luna's waist more and more, their legs touching, and her hand on his knee under the table. She grinned dreamily at them, not even bothering to talk.

Dean Thomas took time during all this to look aghast. Harry Potter grinned, Hermione Granger smiled fondly, and Seamus Finnegan sputtered.

Seamus eyed Luna several times. Neville almost laughed at the face his classmate wore. At last, Seamus seemed like he would burst, and could hold it in no longer.

"My God, Neville," Seamus gasped, quite beside himself. "Where in Merlin's name were you all this time!"

Neville looked up at the ceiling of the Great Hall. Bright stars swirled around white clouds on a moonlit night. Neville closed his eyes briefly. Luna's soft fingers moved across his knee gently. Her breath blew in his ear when she sighed in a dreamy and loving way.

Neville Longbottom opened his eyes, clear brown eyes, and saw the world for the first time as it was. He looked at Seamus, his mouth curving into a slight smile.

"We were gone," he said.

FINIS