Chapter 8

Luna wrung the water out of her long hair, creating a tiny waterfall of saltwater from her head. "Oi! What do you think you're doing to my floor?!" She heard Filch growl from across the entrance hall.
"Sorry." Luna murmured, looking warily at Filch's demon-like cat, Mrs Norris, who was purring scornfully at them with her eyes glinting in the hope that she would be allowed to attack the pair. Filch shook his head with animosity and shuffled away, muttering various profanities under his breath, triggering a bunch of first years to gasp in horror. Luna giggled, "I really don't understand why he works in a school since he hates teenagers so much."

"I think he's so moody because he's such a filthy squib." Draco laughed maliciously.

"I thought you might have gotten over that frame of mind, Draco." Luna said unexpectedly, "I'd better be going actually." And she turned around and began to walk away. Draco opened his mouth to say something in his defence, but he knew she was right. Although he didn't have anything against mudbloods, no, muggleborns, he still saw muggles and squibs as utterly intolerable.

As Luna walked through the elegantly antiquated corridors she realised what it must have looked like. Like she was annoyed with him, she thought of turning back but she had too much homework to do. She knew how Draco had been brought up and it was very hard to change your mind about such things; her mind wandered to cold nights by the fireplace in her own home as a child, the flames dancing gracefully as they caressed the gradually rusting grate which imprisoned them, when her mum and dad had told her stories of magical creatures which, at that moment, were creeping or prancing or slithering through the roaring wind under the roof of black, pocked with glimmering stars. She had believed all of that hadn't she? And she still did, even though she knew most people thought she was an idiot for it. Her heart wrenched as she thought of the way Draco's expression could drop into a puzzled frown, as if a rough breeze had gathered up any mirth that had previously resided there. Luna was pulled from her own thoughts by the voices of Harry and Hermione, who were talking in hushed voices. "It was Malfoy, I know it was." She heard Harry whisper.

"No you don't, Harry. We know he's on our side, otherwise he wouldn't have taken us to his house to put two death eaters in Azkaban, he wouldn't try and help us by contributing to the D.A, he wouldn't have used the cruciatus curse on Greyback. Is that enough evidence for you?" Hermione replied.

"Surely you've seen the way he looks at Luna, it's the same way you look at Ron; it was only for her that he did that to Greyback." Harry muttered.

"You don't know that! And I do not look at Ron like that, I resent that stupid-"

They both suddenly seemed to spot Luna looking inquisitively at them and shut their mouths abruptly. "Er, hi Luna." Harry said.

"Hello." She replied, still thinking about what Harry had said about Draco. Did he really look at her like that? She felt two spots of red appear on her cheeks and a small smile finding its way onto her face. She suddenly didn't feel like talking to anyone, she wanted to be lost in her own beatific thoughts. "I've got to go, sorry, bye." She said quickly, and scurried away from the confused-looking Harry and Hermione.

Draco sighed wistfully, why did he have to open his stupid pureblood mouth? He imagined Luna muttering things under her breath about how much she hated him as she walked away. His only true friend was now annoyed with him. He ran his hand through his wet hair and frowned.

"Are you just going to stand there Mr Malfoy?" He heard a voice call.

"Professor Snape!" He replied. "Um, no. I'm not."

Snape lowered his voice. "Good. I saw you frolicking about the grounds with Miss Lovegood, do you not realise that you have been set an extremelyarduous task and that these types of distractions are not good for you."

"I wouldn't exactly call being attacked by The Giant Squid, frolicking." Draco muttered.

"Hm." Snape breathed sceptically. "Anyway, I have a letter here from your mother." Snape plucked a letter from his robes and handed it to Draco, who recognized the calligraphic plum coloured script as familiarly as his own. He opened the letter with his index finger and pulled out the letter cautiously. It read:

The Dark Lord will be here during the Christmas period, please be careful with your activities from now on.

Lots of Love, Your mother.

He was filled with heavy dread, what if the Dark Lord invaded his mind and saw the scene that had occurred on that night at Malfoy Manor. An idea sprung unexpectedly to the front of his mind. "Professor Snape, do you think perhaps I could have occulemency lessons from you?"
"I hear you have had rather thorough lessons from your Aunt already." Snape replied. It was true, but Draco hadn't needed to use these skills in the past three and a half months and was lacking practise.

"I just need a little practise, you know." He said honestly. Snape nodded.

"I'm not sure where these sudden desires have come from, but I suppose will fulfil your request anyway, but only because I know you are the most talented student in Slytherin house; consider yourself lucky that I have giving you the privilege of extra lessons. Tonight and tomorrow night in my office at six pm. If you would like a substantial amount of practise in before the holidays we can't have you wasting time."
"Thank you, Professor."

Perhaps his Christmas present wouldn't consist of death this time around.

On Monday when Luna went down to breakfast she noted the new appearance of iridescent festive garlands adorning the twisting bannisters throughout the school and herculean Christmas trees littering the Great Hall. She was resenting the thought of Defence Against the Dark Arts with Professor Snape who regarded anyone associated with Harry with complete enmity. It wasn't as bad for her because she was a Ravenclaw but she had noticed that Snape was in a particularly bad mood this morning when he took points of students of his own house (!) for getting into his way.

Draco walked with Pansy, who seemed to be an irremovable growth on his arm, towards the Great Hall. There were unfortunate embellishments of mistletoe on the high ceilings which Pansy took a sickening delight in. He was already in a bad mood, the occulemency sessions had gone extremely well and Draco didn't need that much practise after all, but he had realised how depressing his holiday was going to be with the Dark Lord as a guest. Eventually it got too much so he prised the irritating girl from his arm in disgust. He held back a bit from the Slytherin gang, since he had abandoned them for Harry on the trip to Hogsmeade, all of them apart from Pansy were refusing to speak to him and when they did they were usually insults and spiteful comments. He heard a relieving voice whisper in his ear, "Did you know that mistletoe is the preferred residence of nargles?" When he turned around he was practically beaming with the knowledge that Luna wasn't annoyed with him. "No I didn't. It gives me better reason to avoid mistletoe and therefore Pansy." He grinned.

"Do you not like Pansy? I thought she was your girlfriend." Luna said.

"I'd rather kiss the giant squid than her." Draco groaned, and Luna found her spirits brightening considerably at this. "Anyway, I'd better get going."
"See you later." Luna smiled.

"Hopefully, if she doesn't suffocate me with her mouth." Draco muttered as he felt Pansy's hand slide back into his and drag him away.

Luna's first lesson was potions, and she was so distracted by thoughts of Draco and also dread for DADA that she managed to spill a pale rose coloured potion onto arm that caused mild irritation. "Oh dear! Perhaps you should go to the toilets to scrub that off." Slughorn had chuckled jovially, quite obviously trying to hide the worry that was present in his eyes. Luna suspected the worry was more for fear of getting told off for not doing his job, rather than for her own safety. When she got to the toilets, however, she completely forgot of her fervently itchy arm because she saw Hermione curled up on the floor, tears falling rapidly from her eyes. Luna was beginning to wonder if the bathrooms of Hogwarts held some kind of charm that made you cry once you got in there. First Draco (at the thought of him her heart stopped momentarily), and now Hermione. "What's wrong?" She asked, sliding a comforting arm around Hermione' shoulders. All she got was a sniff in return, and the faint mutter of a name beginning with R. "Come on." Luna said, helping Hermione up from the floor and guiding her outside, where they saw Harry looking quite frantic.

"Oh, hello, Harry." Said Luna. "Did you know one of your eyebrows is bright yellow?"

"Oh, yeah. Er, Hermione, you left your stuff." Harry handed a cluttered pile of books to her.

"Oh yes." Said Hermione in a choked voice, taking her books and turning away to hide the fact that she was wiping her eyes on her pencil case. "Thank you Harry, well I'd better get going…" And she stalked off, looking rather dejected.

"She's a bit upset. I thought at first it was Moaning Myrtle in there, but it turned out to be Hermione. I think she said something about Ron."

"Yeah, they've had a row." Harry murmured, hating being caught up in the middle if his two best friends' rage-fuelled contention.
"He says very funny things sometimes doesn't he? But he can be a bit unkind, I noticed that last year." And this year, Luna thought, he didn't exactly accept Draco with open arms. It could hardly be expected after five years of discernible resentment though, she pondered as an afterthought.

"I s'pose." Said Harry, not really wanting to say anything against his friend. "How are you getting on this year?"
"It's been wonderful, I might say it's as good as last year! I'm glad we've started up the DA again, otherwise I only really see Ginny. And of course there's been the addition of Draco."

"Oh, yeah, Malfoy. I'm a little suspicious of him after the Katie Bell incident." Harry admitted. Luna considered telling him the truth, but didn't think it was her story to tell, and it would probably make Harry even more wary of Draco. "Look, Luna, how would you like to come to Slughorn's party with me tonight?"
Luna turned her protuberant sapphire eyes on him in surprise. "Slughorn's party? With you? I didn't realise that was tonight actually."
"Yeah," said Harry. "We're supposed to bring guests, so I thought you might like…I mean…er…just as friends, you know. But if you don't want to…"
"Oh, no, I'd love to go with you as friends! Nobody's ever asked me to a party before, as a friend! Is that why you dyed your eyebrow, for the party? Should I do mine too?" Luna thought it was a brilliant idea, wondering what colour would be most interesting.
"No," said Harry firmly, "that was mistake. I'll get Hermione to put it right for me. So, I'll meet you in the entrance hall at eight o'clock then?"

"AHA!" Screamed an eager voice from overhead. Luna looked up in shock and saw a familiar figure, his mischief filled eyes glinting with glee. Peeves. "Potty asked Loony to go to the party! Potty lurves Loony! Potty luuuurves Looooooony!" He sang. Both of the pair's eyes widened in horror, Harry's thoughts straying immediately to Ginny and what she would think if she heard and Luna thinking of what Draco's reaction would be.

"Nice to keep these things private." Harry commented.

That night, Luna was in the Entrance Hall at eight sharp, wearing a silver sparkly dress, adorned with serpentine silver tinsel which twisted around her figure like a glamorous snake. When they got to Slughorn's office where the party was being held, Harry was immediately greeted eagerly by Professor Slughorn. "Harry m'boy!" The round bellied man boomed as they squeezed through the door. "So many people I'd like you to meet!" Luna found herself being dragged along by Harry who was in turn being dragged along by Slughorn who was holding him with a vice-like grip. After participating in an over-enthusiastic conversation with Eldred Worple, Harry seemed as eager to escape from the clutches of Slughorn as she was, so they hurried over to Hermione who had just disappeared between two members of the Weird Sisters. Luna was approached suddenly by Professor Trelawney who seemed more than a little tipsy, whilst Harry comforted a stressed-looking Hermione. Luna held back a giggle at the sight and talk of the bulging eyed teacher in her drunken state. After hearing Trelawney drawl on about her resentment for Firenze, her fellow divination teacher, they were joined once again by Harry, and almost immediately after, Slughorn, who had a very angry looking Snape hooked under his arm. Luna zoned out for a little while, when to her horror she heard Harry comment on his desire to be an Auror. "I don't think you should be an Auror, Harry. The Aurors are part of the Rotfang conspiracy, I thought everyone knew that. They're working within to bring down the Ministry of Magic using a combination of Dark magic and gum disease." Harry inhaled half his mead up his nose as he started to laugh and Luna was shocked. "Did you not know that, Harry?"

"No, thanks for telling me, Luna, but I'd still like to be an auror." Harry said, visibly trying to keep a placid expression.
"Hm, perhaps some aurors are ok. I met a very nice one name Tonks once when I was at Ginny's house." Luna said, recalling the bright haired young woman to mind, she had been very kind and funny even if a little clumsy.

As Draco was pulled into the hot bustling room of partygoers by Argus Filch, his heart sank. When he had heard about Luna coming to the party with Harry he had been painfully disconsolate enough, but the fact that he was going to be embarrassed in front of her for being out of his dorm afterhours just put the morbid cherry on top of his cake of misery.

"Professor Slughorn, I discovered this boy lurking in an upstairs corridor. He claims to have been invited to your party, but I don't believe a word of it." Wheezed Filch. Draco noticed Luna give him a questioning look from the corner of his eye, and his heart sank slowly deeper. He also noticed how close she was standing to Harry and a spark of anger ignited within him. "Alright, I wasn't invited! I was trying to gatecrash, happy?" he said angrily, pulling free of the greasy caretaker's grip. Filch began to reply with a sadistic comment but Slughorn interrupted. "That's alright, Argus, it is Christmas after all! You may stay, Draco."

Draco thanked Slughorn for his generosity but couldn't ignore Snape's look of seething anger right beside him. "I'd like a word with you, Draco." Muttered Snape, and the two stalked out of the room.

"I'll be back in a bit, Luna – er – bathroom." Harry said, already leaving the room. Luna was quite thankful for this; she wanted to know what was going on with Draco. When she had seen him being pulled into the room, she had become quite breathless with excitement at seeing him, but upon seeing the look of fury on Snape's face she had become rather worried. As soon as Harry was out of sight, she scurried towards the door and saw Snape and Draco in the classroom opposite, but to the right a little. She stood by the door, not particularly wanting to disturb them. When the door was finally flung open and Snape strode out, a furious look decorating his face, Luna snuck out to join Draco who was rapidly walking down the corridor. "Hey!" She called, and Draco immediately swung around, a look of complete irritation painted over his sharp features. She caught up with him and said, "What happened?"
"Snape's furious that I got caught wandering around the castle. He thought I was working towards that bloody assignment I've been set, when really I was just walking off my annoyance."
"What are you annoyed about?" Luna enquired.

"First things first, I've got Voldemort coming for Christmas dinner so that's going to be fucking cheerful isn't it?" Draco's face was getting redder and redder with anger. "Not to mention you're now going out with bloody Potter."

"Excuse me?" Luna said, feeling shocked that Draco thought she would be 'going out' with Harry.

"Old hatred never really dies, Luna. Harry's always taken everything away from me, popularity, fame, and now you." Draco sent a burning purple spell at the wall and it left an ugly mark.
"Harry is not any more than a good friend to me, Draco!" Luna interjected, taking his arm, getting concerned by his anger.
"What?" Draco spat.

"He just asked me as friends; anyone who really knows him would know he would much prefer to take Ginny to Slughorn's party!"

"Ginny?" Draco said, his voice faltering.
"Yes. I can't believe you would even think that there was anything going on between me and Harry." Luna said softly, she hated the thought of what Draco must have been feeling since the morning when he had heard the news, as the rest of the school had. Gossip travels around Hogwarts like a hurricane, Luna thought bitterly, bitterness was not an emotion that she was used to feeling. If what Harry had been whispering to Hermione was correct, she thought of how awful Draco must have felt, after her own experience of seeing him with Pansy.
"Good." Draco whispered.

"Come with me." Luna said, taking his arm softly and leading him towards the Room of Hidden Things.
"Why are we here?" Draco queried, raising his eyebrows.

"I don't know, I just really like this room. You never know what you'll find." Luna grinned, tossing her flaxen locks behind her shoulder, her eyes darting curiously around the room. She raised her wand and whispered a spell, and an item which looked a little like a rope made of flamingo feathers flew towards them. "Is that a feather boa?" Draco said, looking a little horrified. Luna giggled and casually tossed it across his shoulders. "What-" He felt himself being lifted into the air, an insistent pull tugging at his shoulders, and he realised that it was the ridiculous roseate guise that was causing the unexpected levitation. He found himself laughing, "Who makes these things?"

"Probably Ravenclaws, in the common room there are always people inventing and creating new things. It's wonderful." Luna said whimsically, a look in her eyes like a mist of blissful remembrance. Draco removed the feather boa from his shoulders and he instantly fell towards the ground. He anticipated the cracking pain of the hard floor, when he found himself landing on what felt like a pocket of wind. He looked down and saw that he was sat beside Luna on an antique flying carpet, which had curlicuing, orange patterns like flames all over it. Draco found that when he sat on the flames it was warm and when he was on the royal blue weavings surrounding them, which he supposed represented the sky, it was cold.

"This is a wonderful room." He whispered into Luna's blonde curls. She nodded and leaned into his chest. He looked around him and saw a lamp spurting multi-coloured coloured fireworks, Draco noticed they were the various house crests, and finally in the sequence was a colossal Hogwarts crest which exploded into the dusty air. He turned around and saw Luna wearing what looked like a very plain Venetian mask, suddenly he found himself looking at a reflection of his own face. "Er, Luna?"
"I think this is a mask that turns into the face of whoever you're thinking of." Luna smiled. Draco shook his head in befuddled amusement; it was extremely aberrant looking into your own eyes, and perhaps even stranger to watch it being peeled away to reveal another face. Luna grinned at what was sure to be his wide-eyed and mystified expression. Suddenly something expensive-looking caught his attention; perhaps it was because of his Malfoy ancestry. "Look!" He said ardently. "Wingardium Leviosa." A glimmering silver tiara with specks of sapphire amid its surface slowly levitated into the air and made its way towards them with a calm drag of Draco's wand. "Is that Ravenclaw's diadem?" Luna breathed, remembering the stories that she had been told by the older students when she was a tiny first year. Draco shrugged and placed the diadem atop her head, and completely unexpectedly to her, he bent down and pressed his lips softly to hers. Luna felt like she was falling a flying all at the same time; it was wonderful. She reached up to curl her arms around his neck and kiss him back, feeling as if all the nerves in her body were on fire. Draco himself was hardly breathing; he could feel her long hair tickling his face deliciously. He tightened his arms around her small figure. For the first time he forgot all about Voldemort and Dumbledore and all his problems, his mind was consumed by Luna Lovegood. Eventually he pulled away and smiled down at her, and Luna grinned animatedly back, her cheeks flushed a pale cardinal. He felt her cobalt blue eyes, boring into his light grey ones; a storm across the ocean. "Goodnight." He whispered into her blonde hair, glad to know her breathing was as heavy as his own. They descended from the carpet and when as they both left the room to go their respective dorms, they had something new in clutched in their hands, thinking of how much the other person would love the exotic gift.