Draco boarded the train and immediately looked for the first empty compartment. He was in no mood to deal with stupid questions and trivial talk about holidays. And most of all he could not be dealing with Pansy pawing at him for the whole journey. He had received enough owls from her over the holiday to build a satisfyingly sized bonfire which Draco had set fire to the evening before he had left.

He had plans to be making. The vanishing cabinet was working well, phase apple had gone according to plan and now it was just simply testing its capability with living things. And of course there was that slight issue of a certain headmaster still walking the-

Draco stopped mid thought to glare at the Ravenclaws glancing through the compartment window. They scampered away, a couple of them giggling. Draco rolled his eyes, taking a certain amount of pleasure in imagining their blissful faces as they learned that he was not to be trifled with.

He was just at the point of imagining how Potter would seethe at the news when the same gaggle of voices clattered through his daydreams.

He glanced up, barely taking in the shapes of the same group of Ravenclaws that had passed earlier. It was only when he heard a familiar airy voice as she defended herself that Draco paid attention.

He listened and found himself getting annoyed at the pettiness of their complaints and Luna's lack of response.

She was too blunt and too strange. They called her Loony or warped, insulted her father, her mother.. the list went on and yet she did not retaliate.

As the voices grew louder, Draco stood up and headed towards the door to tell the bullies that if they did not stop disturbing his peace, he had several experimental spells he would be all to happy to experiment on them.

But he didn't get the chance. For no sooner had he reached the door, it burst open, hitting him square in the face. When his vision had stopped spinning he managed to make out the shape of five shocked and scared faces, some staring at him, the others staring at his feet.

Draco didn't need to look down to know what had come crashing through his door. As he wiped the blood which was dribbling down his lip away, he sneered at the girls, making swift eye contact with each of them.

The one he had heard the most as she had taunted Luna squeaked an apology and scurried away, followed by the four others.

Slamming the door shut behind them, Draco turned his attention to the girl sat at his feet.

Luna smiled as she saw him staring at her own, now shoeless feet.

'They've taken them. Just getting an early start on the fun.'

Luna sounded as though she completely believed what she was saying but a slight dullness in her eyes told Draco that maybe the bullying bothered her a bit more than she was letting on.

Draco sighed and sat down, holding a tissue to the fountain of blood gushing out of his nose. Luna watched him and realised that it had been worth testing out that spell on Harry since she'd now be able to use it again.

'I can fix it if you like?'

Draco looked sceptical but something told him he could trust her so he removed the tissue and nodded. It was causing him a considerable amount of discomfort.

Luna stood up but as the train chugged along she found the movement was making it difficult to hold her wand in the right position, especially as Draco's head seem to go in the opposite direction to where she was pointing every time the train moved.

Her face looked quizzical as she gently placed one hand against Draco's cheek to hold it steady.

'Episkey!'

There was a crunch similar to when she had fixed Harry's nose but very little reaction from Draco. He had tensed and Luna saw him grit his teeth but he had made no sound. His eyes were expressionless as he mumbled his thanks and Luna had a feeling that he wasn't really seeing her anymore.

She sat herself down on the seat opposite him and pulled her knees up underneath her chin, peering at the Slytherin over the top of them. She just couldn't figure him out. He had changed so dramatically and Luna knew that she would probably not discover the reason for that change until it was too late.

They sat in silence but as the sound of the sweet trolley coming clattering along started to draw near, Luna stood up and began to creep away, hoping that Draco wouldn't notice or be disturbed. She had just placed her hand on the handle when with a click and swish the lock turned and the blind came down.

'You don't have to go.'

Draco's wand was still pointing in the direction of the door as Luna turned to look at him, awestruck. So awestruck in fact that she didn't hear the sound of the trolley lady knocking on the door.

As the friendly familiar call of 'Any candy from the trolley?' sounded through the door, Draco sighed and got to his feet with Luna only just moving out of the way in time for him to open it slightly and politely decline the old lady's offer.

He shut and relocked the door, this time by hand.

'I won't hold you prisoner if you would hate my company that much. But you don't have to leave.'

In answer to his question, Luna turned and skipped back to her seat. Draco followed suit, returning to his pass time of staring out of the window mysteriously.

'There's a saying that muggles have. It goes 'Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies.' I think we should stick to that this year.'

Draco regarded her questioningly. 'And why's that, Lovegood?'

'Because we all have secrets which, if the right person asked us, we would probably tell.'

Her eyes bore into his and Draco knew she was referring to his outburst at the astronomy tower before christmas.

'So, no questions?' she held out her hand and Draco shook it tentatively. It was as though they were settling a business deal and Draco had had too much of 'business' in the past two weeks.

The pressure was mounting as one term had already gone by. His mother had been jumpy and overly attentive all holiday which had only made Draco more worried. He could feel Luna's eyes on him as he thought but he wasn't concerned.

'We're nearly at Hogwarts, I hope there's pudding.'

With that one sentence, Draco understood what had possessed him to allow Luna to sit with him. Her weightless concerns and observations calmed him. He could almost forget the seriousness of his own situation when he was around her trivial worries.

He glanced up to see her staring straight at him and realised he hadn't been completely accurate with his assumptions.

Her worries were not all trivial because from the way she was gazing at him, Draco knew instinctively that he was one of them.

Wooo! Long chapter! Really I would have split this into two and got them up quicker but there was really no good place to split it so I just kept writing! I also found another fanfic I wrote a while ago so I finished it and uploaded it. It's called 'Today's answer, tomorrow's question'. Please feel free to read and review it if you have time! x