Moonchild

Chapter 17

Seleneo

A few weeks passed uneventfully, and it was now nearing the Christmas holidays. The sign-up list had already been put up on the notice board in Ravenclaw Tower as to who would be staying at Hogwarts and who would be going home.

"You're not going home?" Luna inquired when she saw Seleneo's name on the list for those who were staying in the castle.

"What would be the point?" he replied fairly downcast. "I'd spend X number of days travelling, and then I'd have to turn right back around and do it again. I wouldn't even have that much time off."

"Christmas holidays are two weeks," Luna reminded him.

"Here they are," he said. "The semester at SWI doesn't end until the twenty-third. So, I'd still have to finish out the semester in person, and then I'd have to be back here at the start of January. It wouldn't be worth it."

"I guess you have a point…" Luna cast a look around the common room, as if searching for some alternative laying around on the sofa or something. "Hey!" she exclaimed suddenly, causing Seleneo to jump. "Why don't I write Dad and see if he's ok with you staying with us?"

"You think he'll be ok with that?"

"Hard to say," she admitted. "Our house isn't very big, but I'm sure we could figure something out."

"Ok, yeah, that sounds great," Seleneo said. He wasn't entirely sure how he felt about that; on the one hand, that'd be two weeks he'd have Luna all to himself. On the other, that was two weeks he'd have her dad to himself, too. I may just stay at the castle anyhow, Seleneo thought as they headed down for breakfast.


As he was leaving the Great Hall, Seleneo was stopped by Harry, Ron, and Hermione. Seleneo immediately felt a pang of guilt when it occurred to him that he hadn't spoken to any of them since the fourteenth of November. Based on what happened next, that didn't seem to matter much.

"Got a second?" Harry called after Seleneo as he was leaving the Great Hall. He stopped and turned to see who had beckoned, and consented to hear what Harry had to say. "Yes," he replied.

"Good," said Harry. "We were talking about it, the three of us, and we thought if you wanted you could come spend the holiday with us." Seleneo gave him a puzzled look. "I inherited a pretty big house from my godfather," Harry explained, "so I'm having the Weasleys and the Grangers over for the holidays, and I'd heard that you were staying here and so I thought if you wanted you could come stay with us."

"Interesting," Seleneo mused. "I'll have to give this some thought. If you haven't got an owl from me by the end of the week you'll know I've declined, assuming I haven't caught you in person by then."

"Alright, sounds good," said Harry, and he and his flanks headed off towards the dungeons.

God forbid anything be simple, Seleneo thought to himself on his way up to Flitwick's classroom.


"So…I have a problem," Seleneo began once he had reunited with Luna at dinner. "You invited me to spend the holiday at your place, but then right afterwards so did Harry Potter, so now I dunno what to do. On the one hand, I do want to go with you because, well, duh. But then on the other, it would be nice to have other friends at Hogwarts who are just friends and nothing more than that."

"Well, that would be disappointing for you not to come," Luna said, "but it would do you good to have someone to hang around with other than me." She paused for a moment. "Tell you what, you go on and go with them."

"Are you sure?" Seleneo asked. "I mean, I don't have to."

"Go," Luna insisted. "I'll be fine, I promise."

"Well, you're certainly taking this better than I had expected," Seleneo admitted. A little too well, he admitted in his head.

"I just don't see the point in getting all worked up about it," she said. "I mean, it's like you said, it'd be good for you to have other friends besides me, and it's not like I'll never see you again."

"Yeah," Seleneo mused. "That's true. Well, you about ready to head back up to the common room?"

"No," she said, "but I need to. I've got a lot of work to get done."

"I know," he said with a smile, his eyes holding something almost akin to sadness (he hoped she didn't notice). "If you'll recall, I've been helping you with quite a bit of it."

"I know," she said, and gave him that look that made his heart pang with guilt that she was his and not someone's that might actually deserve her company. He took her hand in his, and together they headed back toward the west tower up to the Ravenclaw common room.

Yep, he thought. Nothing can ever be simple, can it?