Harry Potter and the Dementors of Azkaban

by Blue Skyes101

Harry is sent to Azkaban and everyone believes he is guilty. Harry then realizes a strange truth about dementors. Are they really as evil as they seem to be, or just under a curse? Can Harry save them and prove his innocence?

15. Chapter 15

Disclaimer: Hahahahaha! I do so own…no, no, I really don't. I thought I did for a second, but I don't. Sorry.

Chapter 15 The Return of Juan

Harry glanced around passively, mildly interested in where he was. He was, in fact, right in the middle of the forbidden forest, right outside of Hogwarts. Exactly where he was in said forest, though…quite frankly, Harry hadn't a clue. Hey, it wasn't his fault; the forbidden forest was pretty darn big. So, Harry decided to wander around and try and find something that looked familiar.

It wasn't that bad an idea considering he'd been in the forest a few times before and had certainly caused quite a bit of damage when he'd been there. There had to be something somewhere that he could recognize. That tree Weasley's car had run into and dented when they were being chased by acromantula. The multitudes of trees broken down by Grawp. Something.

As he wandered, Harry mused that he should probably feel out of place in the dark, formidable, haunting forest – it was only the afternoon, but the forest was already pretty dark, with the many trees blocking out the sun. However, Harry felt completely at home there; it reminded him of Azkaban in a way. Harry felt a tad nostalgic when a moment of missing the dementors went through him.

Yeah, he'd only been gone for a few days; but even when you leave family for a trip or something, you at least still get to see other humans. Harry had yet to see a dementor. Harry sighed, kicking his foot against a rock. He was definitely lost. Oh, well, all he had to do was find some dark creature – preferably a vampire; they at least can talk; and he could get them to help him out of the forest using his powerful skills of persuasion.

"Hey! Harry Potter! Out here! Alone! In the forbidden forest! Who wants to eat me?" Harry yelled, waving his arms and waiting for some mythical beast to attack him.

Suddenly, a large, black, robed figure glided quickly past Harry, knocking him off balance and right onto his butt. Harry stared. Why had some dementor he couldn't recognize just pushed onto the ground? The dementor kept gliding at his speed until Harry couldn't see it anymore. What was up with that?

*clip**clop*

*clip**clop*

Harry turned his head towards the sound of hoot beats that was drawing closer. He watched as four fully armed centaurs galloped into the clearing, bows and arrows pointed at him.

"Hello," Harry greeted cheerfully. "How are you today?" It couldn't hurt to be polite – Firenze had always been rather strict about manners. The centaurs ignored the greeting, and Bane, who it seemed was still their leader, rode forward to glare angrily at Harry, sticking the tip of his arrow right in Harry's face.

"What are you doing in our forest, human? I thought we had made it clear the last time we had met years ago that we, the centaurs, no longer allow your kind in our forest. Besides, you are a child no more, so you know we would no longer have a problem killing you. Why are you here? Speak swiftly, for my arrow is surely just as swift."

Harry calmly ignored the arrow invading his personal bubble and stared Bane down. "I'm just going to Hogwarts. No big deal. By the way, how did you know I was here?" Harry barely refrained from telling them exactly what they should do with their forest.

Why did everyone keep underestimating him? He could take these four centaurs down easy, yet they were acting like they were so much more powerful than him.. Yeah, it was a good thing when it came to battle – cocky opponent = dead opponent – but this was getting down right annoying!

Bane's scowl got even deeper still. "We did not know you would be here. Had we, we may have refrained from coming so that we did not have to see your face. Or maybe we would have brought more of us, so that we could bring you to your knees in respect to our kind. But, I digress; we were chasing that thing, that creature of darkness, when we happened upon you by what seems to be fate. I should cleanse the forest of your presence here and now."

Harry bristled immediately. "Dementors are not creatures of darkness! Insult me all you want, but don't you dare insult my family! If anything, they're prisoners of darkness. You centaurs act all sagely and holier than thou, but you're just as biased as the rest of the world. And you think you're so much better than us." Harry let out a bitter laugh. "Ha! You would fit in perfectly with the most self-important, judgmental, hypocritical purebloods out there!"

Bane poked his arrow dangerously closer towards Harry. "I should gut you right here and now for that offence. We know of the spell; one of our seers saw it." Harry gave a snort and then felt the arrow graze his nose, drawing a line of blood. Bane glared at him and continued. "We wouldn't be attacking that impure thing if it had not deliberately come into our camp and interrupted one of our sacred ceremonies."

Harry snorted at that, – exactly what sort of sacred ceremony? – but then a thought hit him. Had the dementor led them to Harry? And if so, had he led them here just so that they would try and kill him? Why would a dementor do that?

"Bane," Harry said warily, "I think we've both been had. The dementor must have led you to me in order try to get you to kill me. It was using you for its own means."

Bane's eyes lit up in anger, and he stomped his hooves forcefully. "IT tried to use us for its own depraved gain?"

"Yep, and if you kill me, the dementor will just have succeeded in using you. However, if you don't kill me but instead let me go free, you'll have thwarted it."

Bane looked at Harry for a long while, studying him, before he turned to the other three centaurs. "After the creature!" He yelled, galloping off into the direction the dementor had gone with the other three centaurs hot on his heel – hoof – whatever! Harry nearly avoided getting his head taken off by the arrow.

"Nice talking to you too!" Harry called out sarcastically. "See you at the next bridge meeting! Can't wait!" It was only after Bane was gone from his sight that Harry remembered that he'd forgotten to ask for directions.

'Oh, well,' he thought sullenly, 'he'd probably have just trampled me or something if I'd asked anyways,'

Harry sighed and started waking aimlessly once more. He hadn't been walking for long when another large, cloaked figure came barreling towards him. Harry didn't move, expecting this one to run past him like the other, and so, was extremely unprepared when the dementor came crashing into him, tackling him to the ground. Harry let out a loud "Ooof!" as the dementor's weight fell on top of him.

"Man, Harry, has being away from us dementors for just a few days already made you that much stupider? First, you yell out you position, despite knowing about all the creepy crawlies in here; and then you just stand there when I'm coming towards you. I know you could have moved before I hit you. How dumb can you get?"

Harry gasped and looked up at the dementor on top of him in complete surprise. "Juan? What're you doing here?"

"I," Juan stated, climbing off Harry and pulling Harry up, "am here to save your ungrateful, idiotic, hero-complexed butt."

"What do you mean?" Harry asked curiously, rolling his eyes at the put downs. What was this, Insult Harry Day?

"You're lost." Juan said bluntly.

Harry blushed. "Am not."

"Are too."

"Am not."

"Are too."

"Am not!"

"Okay, then," Juan said slyly. "What way do you need to go to get to Hogwarts?"

"…"

"I thought so," Juan smiled smugly.

"Shut up, Juan." Harry dusted himself off and followed Juan through the forest.

"Sooooo," Juan grinned. "Centaurs are just as biased as the rest of the world, huh. You sure do have a knack for ticking off people groups."

Harry stopped mid-step. "You were there! Why didn't you – wait, never mind, that's exactly the sort of thing you'd do."

"Hey," Juan defended himself. "You were doing pretty okay on your own."

Harry snorted. "Yeah, say that to my facial disfigurement." He pointed to the already healed scrape on his nose from the arrow. "Okay as in they were about to trample me to death."

"But they didn't, did they?"

Harry deemed this as too idiotic to comment on and asked instead, "Why did that dementor lead the centaurs to me, and who was he? I can't ever hope to know all of you dementors, but I didn't recognize him at all."

Juan sighed unhappily and refused to meet Harry's eyes. "That was Calin. He…doesn't like you. You wouldn't remember him because you never me him; he went out of his way to avoid you, as did several other dementors actually."

"But why did he try to kill me?" Harry questioned. He didn't get random murder attempts as often anymore. "I thought you guys at least tolerated me and wanted me to not die so that I could save you."

Juan gave a short laugh. "You don't give yourself enough credit, Harry. Most of us dementors like you quite a bit. However, there are a few dementors who don't like you, such as Calvin. These dementors…they don't want to be free of the curse. They, they enjoy their powers and kissing people. You breaking the curse would destroy this…lifestyle they enjoy, and so, they don't like you and probably even want you dead. You can't expect every creature to be the same in a species or race."

Harry nodded his head solemnly. This hadn't occurred to him, but it should have. After al, weren't Dobby and Kreacher two examples of this? Still, it was disheartening to hear. "How do I know which of you to trust?"

"Easy," Juan grinned. "All the dementors you can trust, you've met. Our so wise and powerful leader issued an order so that no dementor who wished you harm could meet you. That's why Calvin ran away from you so fast."

"Do dementors run?" Harry asked interestedly.

Juan shrugged. "Not really, but you get the idea." Then, Juan just stopped, causing Harry to run into him and almost topple over again.

"What are you –" Harry broke off as he realized that they were at the edge of the forbidden forest, right near Hagrid's hut. Harry made sure that they were far enough away that even if Hagrid were in the hut, he wouldn't be able to see them. Harry started to move closer – he was planning to go towards Hogwarts gates and slip in through there, even though he could just go up from here; call it nostalgia, if you will – when he realized that Juan hadn't moved.

Harry felt around and found Hogwart's wards keeping Juan out. Harry was glad Juan was there for more reasons than one, as if Harry hadn't noticed that he wasn't moving and had taken a few more steps, he would have broken the wards, alerting Dumbledore to his presence. Not that Dumbledore would be able to respond at the moment. Harry moved closer towards Juan before looking at him questioningly.

"Why were you in the forest in the first place?"

Juan grimaced. "Lord Moldy Shorts has dementors regularly patrolling the forbidden forest for wandering students under order to kiss any we find. Luckily, you're no longer a student, so you have nothing to worry about."

Harry patted Juan's shoulder in understanding before carefully turning towards the Hogwarts wards. They were so old and powerful that Harry knew that while he could get past them, it would take weeks to be able to do it without alerting the headmaster. The wards must have been absorbing all the excess magic students let off over the years for them to be this strong.

Harry very carefully reached with magic into the magic which was Hogwarts and asked to be allowed in without alerting anyone. Harry had a feeling this was what Black had done as well. Hogwarts immediately complied, letting Harry through the wards and leaving him with a warm feeling of comfort and encouragement in the pit of his stomach.

Juan smiled sadly as Harry stepped forward. "See you later, buddy. It was nice seeing you again."

Harry laughed and stepped forward to give Juan a hug. "Same here, mate. Now don't go off sucking some poor innocent kid's soul while I'm gone, you hear? …Or, at least, only if they deserve it."

Juan laughed and was about to respond when a soft, dreamy voice floated out from behind Harry. 'Who's sucking an innocent kid's soul?"

Harry whirled around, thinking for a moment that he'd been caught, before relaxing when he was who it was. "Hello, Luna," Harry smiled warmly, reaching forward to give her a hug, which she happily returned. "What are you doing here?"

"Hello, Harry, I've been patrolling the grounds. For some reason, they want all the teachers to do this. Personally, it seems restricting to the students' freedom to have a curfew at all; but despite my objections at our meetings, we still have to do this."

"Meetings?" Harry asked questioningly.

"Oh," Luna waved her hand dismissively. "I started up weekly staff meetings to discuss important issues that tend to go unnoticed, such as the humongous wrackspurt infestation or the fact that we serve spinach at dinner, which, according to Daddy, drastically stunts a young students' growth."

Luna shook her head sadly. "Headmaster Dumbledore was all for it, but none of the other teachers seem to take it seriously at all. It's sad the way the quality of today's educators has dropped. We need to grow and overcome old fashioned, close minded ways of thinking; but no one else seems to even want to try."

Harry patted her shoulder in sympathy. "It's a tragedy. Have you ever noticed how often closed minds are connected to open mouths. But don't worry, Luna, you'll get to them eventually."

Luna smiled happily at Harry. "Thank you, Harry. You know; you've been upsetting the wizarding world quite a bit, it seems. I'm writing an article for Daddy's paper on Minister Fudge's retirement after you revealed his incompetence to the world. Oh! Daddy wants me to thank you on behalf of goblins across the globe and would like to invite you to drop over anytime for dinner."

For a second, Harry had no idea what she was talking about before he remembered the article about Fudge baking goblins into pies or something like that. "No prob, Luna. Tell your dad that I'm grateful for his thanks and that I would be honored to come over for dinner some time."

Luna smiled dreamily again. "Anyways, the article talks about whether or not unattractiveness has anything to do with idiocy and incompetence in people in political positions. We think that this may be a key linking factor in all cases of corrupt and, or ineffectual leaders."

Harry nearly choked on his own laughter. "Unattractiveness?" He heard Juan burst into uncontrollable laughter behind him. "You may be onto something."

"Yes," Luna said sagely. "It was Daddy's idea, really. We tried interviewing Fudge, but he rather rudely declined, so we tried Umbridge." A small frown creased Luna's face at the memory before melting away into another sunny smile. "She threw things at us. Now we're working on a companion article as well on whether or not repulsiveness and lack of a social life has anything to do with anger management and cruelty issues in single witches over fifty."

Harry laughed again. No one should ever get on Luna's bad side. Her revenge type tended to be worst. Maybe that's because of how hard you had to work to get her angry. Man, she must really dislike Umbridge. (Not hate; Harry didn't think Luna hated anyone, except maybe Voldemort. In which case, Voldemort didn't know what he was getting into, making her his enemy.)

"That's an article that could change the world, that is." Harry laughed out, still hearing Juan laughing behind him.

"That's very sweet, Harry," Luna smiled brightly before looking behind Harry. "Is that a dementor?" She asked. "I can't feel him because the wards keep his effects out."

"Er, yes?" Harry said hesitantly before cracking a smile. Of course Luna was interested in Juan; she was interested in anything odd or unusual. This whole encounter would probably turn into an article in the Quibbler. Harry smiled wider. Juan would love to read that.

"Can you translate?" Luna asked Harry excitedly, obviously already going over questions in her head to ask Juan.

"Sure. I just have to tell you what he says, though; he can understand you fine by himself,

"Great!" She said, her eyes alight at the thought of proving the world's truths wrong once more. "May I ask him some questions now? It is a him, correct?"

Harry looked over at Juan who shrugged and said, "Why not? She can ask whatever she wants."

"Um, his name is Juan, and he is a 'he.' Also, he said you can ask whatever you want. I, however, say you might not be satisfied with all the answers.

Smiling benignly, Luna turned to Juan and bowed, surprising both Juan and Harry. "It's a pleasure and an honor to meet you, Juan. My name is Luna Lovegood."

'Great, now he's going to have a big head for weeks,' Harry thought, a tad dismayed.

Luna continued without noticing Harry or Juan's reactions. "How old are you?"

"Erm, only about 160 or so. Pretty young for a dementor, actually." Juan said, a tad embarrassed at his young age. Harry looked at Juan in mild amazement – 160 and he still acted like he was 12? – but translated anyways.

Luna considered this thoughtfully before launching into the next question. "Have you ever kissed anyone?" Harry stared at Luna in disbelief; even he hadn't dared ask any of the dementors that one.

Juan looked a little taken aback, but he answered anyways via Harry. "Yes, once, I don't like to talk about it."

"Why not?" Luna pressed dreamily, trying to get him to open up. Harry suddenly noticed that she had a habit of doing that, getting people to spill all their baggage on to her so that they would feel better. Harry's eyes narrowed. Wait, was that why she always acted so extremely odd? He had always wondered if she acted that way on purpose.

People would probably be more likely to spill their guts to someone everyone thought was crazy anyways and wouldn't believe even if she told. Or they would tease her to make themselves feel better about whatever was going on. Was that why she took their teasing so happily?

Luna was a Ravenclaw, and Harry had the feeling that she acted so dreamy and out there for that reason – and so that she could go about her business unbothered. If anyone ever saw her doing something potentially weir, they would just think, "Oh, it's just Loony Lovegood being strange again is all," instead of bothering her about it.

This would also, certainly, be a good defense against death eaters and Voldemort, who wouldn't think she was worth asking to join or worth being silenced. Flying under the radar, Luna would be able to do much more good than if she revealed the sanity and talent that almost certainly resided beneath her exterior. Besides, it sounded like it was a lot of fun pretending to be insane.

Maybe Harry should try it; he had been in Azkaban. It's not his fault if they'd been too scared of him to check whether or not he was actually sane. So, no one would think twice about him turning out to be insane. Mentally, Harry smacked himself for not realizing what Luna had been doing sooner. Her father had probably taught her.

After all, running a magazine that was thought to be made by crazy people was a good way to get the truth out – no one would bother shutting you down because who would believe you anyways? Harry had a feeling that a whole lot more people would be reading the Quibbler now that he'd been proven innocent. Maybe he should sponsor it….

Harry was so lost in his thoughts that he almost missed Juan's response. "Well, first of all, it goes against every set of morals I have. Second, well, it was my first kiss – quite a waste if you ask me. And third…it was Barty Crouch Junior."

Harry could barely translate that last part he was so shocked. He hadn't known that, and Harry couldn't help feeling a little guilty that he hadn't recognized Juan – even if he hadn't been able to tell the difference between dementors at the point in his life when he'd met him.

"I understand why you'd be upset about kissing him, but did him being Barry Crouch Junior make it worse? I mean, he was a convicted murderer and death eater. Wouldn't you rather have kissed him than some innocent civilian who hasn't done anything?"

"Well, er…yeah, that's true, but..." Juan blushed, a small pink tinge coloring his pale, white face, and mumbled a bit.

"What was that?" Harry strained to catch the words as Juan repeated himself, embarrassed.

"…He was a guy. They made me kiss a guy. I felt…gay. Never again, never again." Harry burst out laughing, translating between chuckles. Luna giggled a little as well before stepping forward and solemnly placing a comforting hand on Juan's arm through the barrier, shivering a tad at the contact.

"I'm sure that was very traumatizing for your, and I'm sorry you had to go through that."

Juan smiled for a moment before looking at Harry. "I like her. You sure do know how to pick 'em, Harry. I'll leave you two lovebirds to it; see you later, and tell the lady I said bye."

With that, Juan glided back into the forest, leaving Harry blushing and spluttering, saying things like, "What the heck does that mean?" and "Dirty minded dementors."

"What did he say?" Luna asked curiously.

"N-nothing," Harry replied, blushing even brighter. He started to get ready to leave for the castle, desperate for escape all of a sudden, even to Hogwarts. "Look, Luna, I'm sorry; but I really need to esc-get going and do a couple of things in Hogwarts. I'll come by again before I leave Hogwarts. I may even see you while I'm there; this could take a few–!"

The rest of Harry's words were lost as Luna gently reached up and touched her lips to Harry's, pulling him close. Harry felt his arms automatically go around her neck. The kiss lasted a few seconds before a slightly pink but satisfied-looking Luna stepped back, sill keeping here arms loosely around Harry's waist.

"What w-was that f-for?" Harry stammered incoherently. Darn, he was starting to sound like UA.

"In case you don't come back." Luna said seriously, as if it made all the sense in the world.

"Wait, but I'm just going up to Hogwarts. And while I do dread going up to that place in the very depths of my soul, I hardly think it's that dangerous."

Luna shook her head. "Maybe not physically, but it's dangerously emotionally. Besides, Juan was here to see you off. Whatever he was doing n the forbidden forest must have been important, so I assumed he was taking a risk even just coming to the edge of the forest with you. So I kissed you. I didn't' want to regret anything in case of the very slim off chance that you were caught by Dumbledore or couldn't say good bye before you left."

Harry looked at Luna, baffled for a moment, before a warm and sunny smile spread across his face. "Don't worry, Luna, I'll be fine. Juan just wanted to make sure I got out of the forbidden forest alright. You see, I have a hopeless sense of direction."

Luna began giggling. "The Great Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived, can survive Voldemort and Azkaban but can't find his way out of a forest. That's too funny! Imagine what they'd say in the Daily Prophet!" Luna's giggles turned into full blown, hysterical laughter; and Harry couldn't help joining in.

"Hey, it's a big forest," he defended himself humorously.

After a few moments, Luan and Harry's laughter subsided; and Luna looked up at Harry and shrugged. "Oh, well, it was a nice kiss, anyways." Harry's smile grew wider. He leaned down to press his lips softly to hers again before turning to go. Luna kept her arms tight around him, eyes downcast for the first time Harry had ever seen, burying her head in his chest, and murmured softly, "Harry, whatever happens when you go up to Hogwarts, just know that however you feel is okay. Hogwarts was your home, and whatever happened later, you still have lots of wonderful memories there. I don't want you to feel guilty for being happy to be back. I want you to heal, Harry, and in order to heal, you need to confront your past there. You'll never be truly free from the pain of your past until you can forgive those who hurt you. And in order to forgive them, you need to confront them." Harry made move to protest, Luna quietly shushed him. "You may not want to forgive now, and it may take a long time for you to; but you will. It's just not in you to hate someone so completely as to be able to hate them forever. And if you were to keep on hating, Voldemort would win."

Harry sighed. "You-you're right, Luna, but I'm just not ready to forgive them yet. I don't know if I ever will be." Kreacher's words echoed in Harry's ears.

"They refused to go along with the plan, didn't they? They told off Dumbledore in front of his entire little Order, didn't they? And they left! Refusing to come back until Dumbledore has failed in trying to capture you and decides not to try again!"

Maybe…maybe he could forgive them eventually.

Luna smiled in comfort, as if sensing Harry's dilemma. "And that's alright, Harry. You'll figure things out, and you'll know when it's time to set aside the past and forgive them. I know you will."

Harry smiled gratefully and reached down to kiss Luna one more time, this time longer and more patiently. 'Good bye, Luna, I'll see you later."

"Good bye, Harry," Luna responded automatically as Harry pulled away and walked up towards the castle. She stood there for a few minutes, hand pressed to her lips, completely lost in thoughts, before smiling brightly and continuing on her pointless rounds, – it wasn't like she was actually going to do anything to anyone she caught – skipping happily the rest of the way.

Author's Note: Hi, hope you liked that chapter. I think it was the longest one yet. I loved having Juan back in it and just suddenly decided to put Luna in too. I hope she wasn't too out of character. Hmm…I don't have much to say today, so bye! Keep reading! And Review! My Jedi mind powers command you! This is the droid you're looking for!