Means to an End

Luna entered the room with a frown; this fact was a hard one to determine, as the room was totally and utterly black. She stood for a moment, silhouetted against the sterile brightness of the hallway beyond, squinting as her eyes adjusted to the light--or the lack therefore. There was a faintly feral snort, and a voice, little more than a growl, was heard to comment on the situation.

"Close the damned door," he said, and, frowning, she obeyed.

For several moments, the voice died. There was a pregnant silence where a yell had been the moment before. She heard nothing at all of the voice, although she was keenly aware of the chatter that remained just behind the door. While she generally allowed the patients to speak first, she very doubted that he would, and so she herself took the initiative, which, given the circumstances, initiative was not a terribly easy thing to take. "You have to eat eventually, you know," she said, sighing.

"Do I," drawled the voice, sounding quite bored.

She rolled her eyes. "Yes," she spoke to the darkness. "You cannot simply rot away in your room."

"Watch me."

"That can be arranged. Inflammous," she added, as an afterthought, and, with a quick motion of her wand, every light in the room flickered on. The man, who had been lying serenely on the bed, now gave a choked howl and leapt several feet in the air, shielding his eyes. Luna rolled her eyes. "You aren't blinded. Sit up."

He very carefully lowered his arm and eyed her as though she were some sort of rabid hippogriff. His hair was messy, which was rare, and his eyes were vastly distrustful, which was not. Both pale eyebrows were raised in an expression somewhere between anger and disbelief. "I see you've read Atilla the Hun's new book on psychology."

She stared at him for several seconds, as if comparing him, mentally, with the books of statistics she'd been forced to memorize when she was studying St. Durmott's. The school, while prestigious for its advanced healing program, involved quite a bit of memorization, facts she'd never thought she'd practically apply. He returned her stare in kind, looking totally nonplussed by the entire situation. She pursed her lips and exhaled deeply.

"I'm sorry." Luna frowned. "This is not your fault. Are you... feeling any better?"

"Absolutely lovely," he deadpanned, with a sneer that could well have been a snarl if he'd not been trying, desperately, to get some sort of handle on the situation. "I absolutely adore reliving torturous memories. It's one of my favorite pastimes. I see why Potter used to get such a kick out of it..."

She chose (quite wisely, she thought) to change the subject. "Do you have any idea what triggered the resurfacing? It seemed as though his words triggered seemingly unrelated events, which is strange, as in the past your thought patterns have been reasonably measured... was there any one image in particular that stood out to you? Any thoughts that stuck out in your mind? You kept slipping into different events, so it was hard to tell which one, exactly, prompted you to..." she searched for an appropriate term.

"Collapse into a pathetic, whimpering heap?," he sneered.

"That," she corrected firmly, "is not the way I would have chosen to phrase it. It was not pathetic, it was entirely understandable manifestation of your suppressed memories in response to pressure. You were not ready for those questions to be posed, and, in response to the tension, they were forcibly revealed, with obvious negative effects. It was almost predictable. Not at all abnormal..."

"Abnormal for whom? Some crackpot locked up in a padded cell, babbling to himself, condemned to spend the rest of his natural life in this hellhole? Incapable of rational thought? Totally and utterly insane? Yes, yes, I can see how that's normal..." he'd stood and was now facing a wall, hands jammed moodily in his pockets. "...normal. Right. I mean, hell, if you think I'm crazy..."

"I never said that," she frowned.

"Ah," he vented, "Yes, because I know it's quite legal to lock up people you think are perfectly sane. But if you can crusade under the banner of 'illness', then, by all means, toss them in a cell, throw out the key... they won't be needing it, because they aren't well." He snarled viciously at the wall. "They need special attention, special treatment... heaven forbid they get any human contact whatsoever... it isn't as though they have any rights at all..."

"Draco," Luna sighed, shaking her head. "You're ranting. You know that isn't true..."

"How?" he turned upon her, scowling. "Do regular people not have the right to say who they do and do not want to see? Can't they determine for themselves when they are perfectly healthy, thank you very much? I'm being held for hostility, but I bet I'd be a hell of a lot less hostile if I wasn't shut up in this miserable excuse for a dungeon and told that I'm crazy. I'm not crazy. I don't care how quietly and gently you tell me that I am. I don't care how many sympathetic looks I get. I don't care about the comforting looks, or the silent assurances... but if everyone expects me to be well-behaved, well, I'm afraid that simply isn't going to happen."

She could not escape the growing conviction that nobody who had seen him before could possibly have equated behavior with sanity. "We are expecting you to be civil, yes, but you have to understand... calm down..."

"You're treating me like I'm... insane..." he sneered, "but you expect me to act like there's nothing wrong. How long do you think you would last, everyone treating you like you are totally incompetent? Shall I spoon-feed you your oatmeal, Miss Lovegood? Shall I check your temperature? Would you like sugar on that glaring mental deficiency?"

She exhaled, running her hand along her forehead. "Do you want me to take your room of the nurses' roster? If it would help..."

"No, Lovegood." Draco shook his head, and actually laughed. It was a mirthless laugh, very cold, almost desperate. "No. You know what I want? I want you to give your good friend Potter a message. You're all chummy, aren't you? I want you to go and find him. Tell him that I'll give him whatever information he wants, if he gets me out of here... make sure you also add a note about exactly where I think he ought to stick his extraction spell..."

"What?" her eyebrows raised, her lips slightly parted. "You cannot be serious..."

"I am quite serious. And if he doesn't like my answers, I'll just change them until he does." His eyes narrowed. "It's not like I have any pride left whatsoever..."

"He used an extraction spell on you?" she asked icily. "When?"

The man eyed her warily. It was as though his posture had caved in upon itself; he had slunk into the chair, hands still deep in his pockets, and his eyes seemed almost paler than usual. "I was a bit too occupied by reliving traumatic memories to notice exactly when he cast it. But I know how they feel, believe me..."

She flipped open her folder, quickly scanning the notes she'd taken. "You never said that they used extraction spells on you."

He looked momentarily startled at this fact. "Apparently they did," Malfoy said, finally, a bit more defensively than was necessary. "It wasn't a huge leap of logic."

Luna paused and watched him for several seconds as he became almost defiantly interested in the lines in his palm. Then, wordlessly, she scrawled a few lines on a stray piece of paper. "I see."

The pale, pinched man stood again, gesturing restlessly as he walked. "No more questions. I'm tired. I'm sure you have plenty of other people to harass. Go kick a nurse, or something." His words, however, were quiet, and lacked the almost violent undertones they usually wore. "Or something" was not a phrase spoken often by Draco Malfoy.

She glanced down at the annotated list she had made, and, sighing, shook her head. After what had happened, before, she did not want to press him... but an extraction spell... no. She would not believe it. He was not entirely stable, after all... and if he was in denial... it could easily be fabricated... he didn't like Harry... it would have been easy, and not even intentional... not that he wouldn't lie even if he knew full well that he was doing it...

"Perhaps," he drawled, "I was not clear enough. I do not wish for you to remain. Go away."

A frown wound upon her features. "I... alright. But we do need to talk about this, eventually. Just let me know when..."

"I'll have my people call your people. Now get the hell out of my room."

For a few seconds, it seemed as though she might mention something. But she did not. She stood and smiled politely. "Thank you, Draco."

"Malfoy," he corrected.

"Thank you, Malfoy. We will talk about this later." Before he could argue, she'd slipped out of the room and into the hallway, where a few nurses were gathered suspiciously close to the door, looking a bit too casual to actually be so. Rumors moved quickly on the third-and-a-half ward, and it seemed as though this--although admittedly she was not sure what 'this' was--had reached such a status. She eyed her employees warily. There was nothing she could do about them, however. If they wished to gossip and speculate about it, it was certainly their prerogative to do so; it wasn't as though she could answer their questions herself. They scattered after a few seconds of guilty whispering, except for one, the squirrelly young one, who hurried up to her and thrust a creamy envelope in her general direction.

The nurse swallowed, voice shaky. "This is for you... it was marked 'personal', but it was sorted into the general ward mail, I don't know why... I didn't move it, I think it was the mail boy, he's no good if you ask me, but I found it, and here it is, and it looks important, and it was in the wrong place."

"Thank you, Samantha," she said tiredly. "In the future, however, you can just put the letters in their correct places; you don't have to inform me of it. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have some... work... to work on in my office, so if you could make it known that I am not to be disturbed, that would lovely. Unless, of course, there is an emergency, which means that someone is bleeding, dead, or transfigured into an elk. Spilling a cup of coffee is not an accident, nor is a patient talking about his grandmother. Please make sure everyone knows this."

The nurse's eyes widened, and she shook slightly. "Yes, yes, I will."

"Good," she sighed, "very good. Thank you. I'll be doing paperwork now. In the quiet." Luna closed her office door behind her, leaning against it for several seconds before working up the energy to walk to her chair. The pile of paperwork in front of her would find itself shelved that morning, abandoned in the pursuit of quiet contemplation. She laid the envelope squarely on her desk and eyed it suspiciously. She knew quite well who it was from. Answering it would most certainly not be conductive to a restful and enriching morning. For a long while, Luna was tempted to slide it to the bottom of her "in" box, just to see how he liked St. Mungo's bureaucracy. It was a fleeting fantasy.

"Never again," she muttered, as her willpower faltered and she slid her fingernail under the seal.

***

"Mr. Weasley! Message!"

Engrossed in a document sent by the Undersecretary for the Preservation of Shiny Trinkets, Baubles, and Talismans, Ronald Weasley did not bother to glance up. "I'll take it in here, Gabrielle," he said inconsequentially, shuffling through several piles of papers as he spoke. He ran his fingers across the documents on his desk. His paperweight sniffed indignantly and hurried out of the way, just in time to avoid the piece of paper that the lawyer subsequently caught and lowered messily to the desktop. There were red block letters on the front that said "urgent". This served only to make it blend with the rest of the envelopes, most of which were vying for top priority.

As the two portraits behind him began to bicker about a suit leveled several hundred years prior, the redhead slipped the paper out of its envelope. The general protocol was to allow letters from the ministry to age for a week, after which point the problems had either resolved themselves or the people who were having them were frantic and willing to pay outrageous sums to have them fixed. Documents from foreign dignitaries were to be opened immediately, then forwarded to various colleagues and subordinates, simply for the pleasure it gave him to have them returned when the senders requested him personally.

But the letters from aurors he opened out of curiosity, if nothing else. There was something oddly fulfilling about receiving the official letters. They were written on crisp cream parchment, with raised wax seals decorated with the heraldic insignia of the various departments. They were very important-looking, even among the other important-looking things that decorated his desk.

He opened it with an almost smug smile; usually, they were rather amusing. Upon reading it, however, the grin melted off his face and collected in a lukewarm puddle on the perfectly shined floor. He cursed rather vehemently under his breath--he'd developed a rather extensive vocabulary--and tossed the letter back onto the pile. He glowered darkly, as though urging it to explode. "Gabrielle..."

"Yes?" A blonde peered around the corner of his office door.

"We need to cancel Mrs. Fitzbintel's meeting." He sighed and leaned deeply back in his comfortable dragon leather executive's chair, looking very important indeed. "Urgent business."

"She will not like that," the blonde cautioned, then added, tone wistful, "In fact, she will probably roast you alive and feed you to her cats."

"Tell her... one of my brothers... drastically ill... uh... family crisis... had to go..." he rustled around on his desk, having laid down the letter and now thoroughly incapable of finding it again.

Gabrielle heaved a heavy sigh. This was a feat she contrived on a semi-regular basis. She tossed her hair and sniffed haughtily. "And which brother shall I say is knocking at death's door, so totally and utterly ill that you would cancel such an important meeting?"

He waved a dismissive hand, holding a letter up to the light to inspect it. He dropped the envelope quickly when it began to smoke. "Ah... I don't know. Bill, maybe?"

"Bill is in Greece," she said, "With my sister, on their painfully "romanteek ide-away". So if she'd see you here..."

Ron snorted mirthlessly. "For some reason, I really doubt I'll run into our favorite demanding old heiress where I'm going, and, if I do, the world has deeper troubles than my canceling a meeting." He straightened his robes, out of habit, and glanced at his watch. "I really do have to be going, if I'm going to stop by my sister's before I go..."

"Remember, your sister wants to talk to you..." there was a very ugly emphasis on the word 'talk', as though it were a painful experience that she warned against.

He winced. "Great. Lovely. Well, perhaps I won't stop by, then. She's been hanging around that Theodore Parkins fellow quite more than is good for her..." he looked momentarily thoughtful. "Or my good, really."

She smirked at the highly accurate depiction of her sister-in-law. "Personally," she said, smoothly, "I don't think you ought to worry about her. My pity falls almost exclusively upon Parkins."

Ron snorted, although his wry, slightly rueful expression hinted that he may have found her statement equally true. He flicked his wand in the direction of the fireplace. It quickly smoldered into nonexistence. "If I have any callers..."

"I am sorry," she mimicked with a vacantly cheerful expression, "Mister Weasley is out on urgent business and cannot be with you at the moment. I will inform him of your interest when he returns. Thank you."

Ron grinned as he straightened his tie in the mirror over the mantle. He ruffled the smoothness out of his hair and smoothed the wrinkles out of his lapels. There was a final glance over the surface of his desk, in which he abandoned all hope of finding the letter, and reasoned that the document itself was unimportant, anyway. "Have I ever told you just how absolutely wonderful you are?" he asked, laughing. "Seriously. As far as secretaries go..."

"...I'm underpaid, overworked, and a good bit more tolerant than anyone else would be."

"But at least your boss is an all-around swell guy."

Gabrielle rolled her eyes, displaying, momentarily, the certain good-natured self denial that was characteristic of martyrs, mothers, and overworked secreatries. "Just what I was about to say, of course. What should I tell your family? I wouldn't put it past one or more of them to drop by. And I don't think they'll listen if I tell them that Bill is sick, particularly if it's Bill who is asking."

"Tell them," he said vaguely, rustling through his papers a final time, "that I'm having dinner with a friend."

The blonde woman sighed, crossing her arms, which wrinkled the fit of her almost distractingly fitted sweater. "Great. You do realize that they'll assume I have insider information and torture me until I tell them who the date is with, correct?"

Ron seemed only slightly ruffled by the implication. "It's not a date. It's dinner with a client."

The woman eyed him rebelliously. "You've taken on a new client? Why haven't I heard about this?"

"Oh," he declared, "you will. In a few days, I doubt you'll hear of much else. Goodnight." He smirked, tugged on his robe, and, with that, strode purposefully out of his office.

***

Roderick Mccallion threw his Quidditch equipment in a rather undignified heap, kicking his gauntlets once before storming off to the showers. The other players parted so that he could pass, knowing that they would not be able to get theirs until he finished... but that was something they had grown used to. He slammed his fist against a wall as he left the room and jogged up the steps two at a time, pulling off his Quidditch colors as he went. It would have been easier if he could have said that it was just a game, but it was not just a game to Roderick Mccallion. They should have won, and would have won, if not for the absolutely bogus call made by the referee that awarded had awarded Maccabe a penalty. It was absolutely ludicrous... it was moments like this that made him want to quit the entire godforsaken game.

The sheer thought made him ill, he noticed, as he reached the top of the stairs; the lights flickered on automatically as he entered, a touch too bright, and so he yelled at them. The tile was slippery underneath his feet, which he would have to yell at the house-elves for. He began to lazily unbutton his shirt, turning the shower on with his wand, hanging the robes on a hook nearby. He took a moment to smirk at the sole mirror in the room, flexing twice, eyeing his shirtless torso with a highly smug expression.

"Sorry, love," cooed the mirror in flirtatious tones, "I've seen better."

He scowled, retracting his wand a second time and muttering "Occulto!" under his breath. The mirror made a highly indignant squeak at his covering spell, and was heard to curse in muffled, angry tones; he smirked victoriously, twirling his wand like a baton and placing it on a counter. He ran his fingers under the water to determine the temperature and quickly drew them back, lighting reflexes allowing that he was not too badly burned. He hissed angrily, leaning forward to add cold water to the hot; stupid, stupid game, drawing away his concentration from the stupid, stupid shower.

Roderick cursed at nothing in particular, yelling at the lights again for good measure; he would have hit something, but his fist still hurt from the ill-placed punch he'd just aimed at the wall. He stood, waiting for the water to cool. He was about ready to check the water again when, suddenly, the lights flickered out of existence and the windowless room was plunged into utter darkness.

"Pentby!" he roared, voice loud enough to resonate and carry down the stairs, "I told you, it's not amusing to play jokes, I know you cut the lights and if you don't turn them on now I swear that I will kill you until you are very thoroughly dead!" He was rather pleased with his threat, although he had very little time to dwell upon it. Something slid between his ribs, something icy and sharp and painful. His lips parted, but, for the first and last time in his life, he found it impossible to scream.

***

As Luna Lovegood wound her way down the vast hallways of the British Aurial Institute, she was firmly holding two things: one was an envelope, folded in half, and the other was an air of distinct and increasing suspicion. The institute itself was huge, with cavernous, two-story hallways and vast windows that reminded her of the Hogwarts' owlry. It seemed that classes had ended for the day. Few students remained, and those that did seemed stragglers by their very type. It was hard for her to fathom that Harry worked here; if one included for four years of training, he himself was a fairly recent graduate. But, then again, he was hardly unqualified for the job...

Compared to Hogwarts, the floor plan had been crafted with almost childish simplicity. It seemed that the art of disappearing hallways and dubious moving stairs had been lost in the centuries between the two buildings. Luna navigated her way to Harry's office with little trouble, occasionally pausing to marvel at something or another; an apparently sentient ball of reddish light leisurely crossed per path, and, apparently frustrated by the rush, an irritable-looking old man muttered and transfigured himself into a hawk. She had always found transfigurations fascinating, but presently lacked the interest and energy to care. If he wished to summon her to a meeting, she fumed, he ought to at least write her a note, not send her one of the bland default ones, complete with a signature she was quite sure had come from either a charm or a secretary. For the sake of her sanity, she told herself that it had been a charm. That, at least, would have taken a degree of effort...

She roughly opened the door, expecting to be let into a small waiting room, perhaps adorned with trashy old magazines nobody cared for anymore. She was not. Harry's waiting room was spacious, elegant, and utterly expensive-looking; while not arrogantly decorated, the velvet tassels and two roaring fireplaces did not speak volumes on conservative modesty. A smattering of Persian rugs broke up the monotony of a stunning wooden floor. The walls, when not covered with large windows, bore portraits, tapestries, and interesting objects that she had not previously considered as wall-hangings.

This infuriated her beyond easily expressible words. His office at the ministry, at least, was of a reasonable size. She turned almost accusingly towards the end of the room, where a messy desk more than amply accommodated the secretary that was not there.

"Hmph," she declared, which, apparently, was not the right thing to say.

"I see you like it, too," remarked a familiar voice from the opposite corner. The speaker had been shaded by a vast bookcase, although she could have seen him if she'd tried. He was staring intently at the roaring fire, the hue of which offset the now-hidden undertones of his hair. "I'm still trying to figure why he needs two fireplaces."

Despite her best effort, her eyes widened considerably as he stepped into the brighter light. "Ron?"

He smiled dryly, but continued his previous chain of thought. "I was thinking," he mused, "that perhaps he needs a spare, in case the friends that he's roasting marshmallows with don't get along. Or maybe he alternates, depending on the day of the week..."

Luna laughed quietly, shaking her head. "Well, well. I'd no idea that you'd be here..."

"Ah, yes, the invitations were a bit vague, weren't they? He might well have done them in cutout ransom-note letters..." The man was taller than she remembered him, healthier. She'd always thought that he looked as though someone had stubbornly decided to make him a certain height, but had lacked the materials to do so. That impression was no longer an issue. As she chuckled again, he grinned. "So, how long has it been, exactly?"

"Hmm..." she attempted to count, then smirked. "Well, we met at the ministry ball a few years back..."

He laughed, shaking his head. "Ahhh. Right. I remember that. If I remember, we 'met' in the sense that there was much awkwardness and shifty eye movements from across the room, culminating in exactly one muttered 'hello' at the height of the evening. Yes, that was certainly enlightening..."

"I was under the impression that you hated me," she reminded him, although the fact that she brought it up at all was a bit of a wonder. She had worked out about a hundred scenarios in her head, about how it would be and what she would say if he or Hermione met, casually, while buying books, or were in an elevator, or happened to brush elbows while perusing herbs in Diagon alley.

Ron gave her a long glance. When he chuckled, it seemed as though it had been too quick a response, despite the moment's hesitation. "I didn't hate you, really. I may have thought a few mildly menacing thoughts in your direction from time to time, but hate is a bit harsh." She must have looked the slightest bit unconvinced, for he chuckled and shook his head. There were a few seconds in which he appraised the binding and pages of a convenient tome. He set it down on the embellished table from which he had plucked it.

"Now Malfoy," he admitted, quite thoughtfully, "him I hated."

"Ron," she sighed, "I won't vouch for how he used to act... or, in that vein, how he acts now... but give him a chance."

He tore his eyes up from the books on the table and appraised her with a thoughtful sigh. "I am going to ask you this quite clearly, Luna. I don't want a sugar-coated answer or vague niceties. Do you seriously think that he should be released?"

"Does it matter?" she asked, snorting indignantly. "Up to this point, I'd just thought that it was a bargaining tactic. I know nothing about this."

He smiled dryly at that, as though she'd supplied the punch line to a long-running joke.

"Is this somehow amusing?" she asked, an eyebrow raised.

There were several tables scattered throughout the room, one of which was covered in glasses and cut crystal bottles; it was in this general direction that Ronald Weasley gravitated as he spoke. "You know, right after... the fight..." here Ron gesticulated convincingly, "I was pretty bitter about it all. McGonagall almost kicked us off the Quidditch team, Gryffindor lost vast quantities of points, Hermione wouldn't speak to me... and then there was Malfoy smirking, and at the time I didn't think you were much better. But you know how I consoled myself? I said, "Luna will never know Harry the way that Hermione and I did". But, as you've been dragged into a plot you never knew existed, recruited for a job you're reluctant about, and told absolutely nothing about it, and as he's shrouded it all in a distinct air of mystery and importance and noble self-sacrifice... you know, Luna, I really believe that you're beginning to know him exactly like we did."

He poured himself a quantity of alcohol, and drank it with neither a pause nor a toast.

***

Draco had often known how it felt to wake up from a dream, merely to find that it was not real; this emotion was almost entirely the opposite. He was aware that he had forced the memory upon himself. He was viewing it from the third person, after all. But he was sure that he had not noticed things this clearly, even when he had been there himself. It was a routine event. He had not thought about it at the time, and it was inconceivable to him that he was thinking about it now. The two Malfoys walked silently; three, really, but, from so many years and the opposite side of the pensieve, he could not count himself among them.

"I'm tired, father." The little boy's voice was plaintive, imploring, and slightly bored, highly characteristic of a seven-year-old. Being of the certain age wedged in the middle of one's childhood, and therefore finding it quite impossible to remain fixated upon any one task, he almost immediately began to fiddle with the intricate silver clasp of his cloak.

Lucius Malfoy laughed at the admittedly amusing sight of his son, who had unfastened the cape and was now trying rather desperately to close it before he noticed. "Does your governess never bring you outside, boy? The air is exhilarating..." Exhilarating was not a term anyone else would have used to describe the woods outside the Malfoy manor. It was an old forest, populated chiefly by old, gnarled trees. It was certainly not an expression that Draco used, although he had the sense not to mention it.

"She does," he said loftily, "to take walks sometimes, in the garden and the courtyard, and..." his voice suddenly became very small, "... and Quidditch."

"I see," said the elder Malfoy to the younger. "Yes, yes, I have heard from her about that. Specifically, she seems to think that you've no skill at all... perhaps we should arrange for more practices each week? You'll be away at that cursed school soon enough..."

The child wrinkled his nose, making him look quite a bit like his mother's son. "I do not want any more practices. I do not like practices. The broomstick is too big, and Crabbe and Goyle are too big, and they always try to hit me with their bats."

His father laughed again. "Well, at very least you have an initiative to fly quickly. And do call them 'Vincent' and 'Gregory'. They are your friends."

"I do not wish to play with them, father. They are not," the little boy kicked a stray rock for emphasis, "my friends. They are mean, they do not listen to me, they're bigger than I am, and they don't talk correctly."

Lucius Malfoy cast a long glance over at his son. "So you are going to let yourself be bullied by them?"

The boy's blank expression hinted that this was exactly what he intended to do, if only his father would allow it.

"Malfoys," the man continued, "do not allow themselves to be bullied. They find ways to further their needs. You will learn that. We will add two more practices a week."

"But, father..." he whined imploringly.

"It is settled, Draco. Do not attempt to argue with me."

His son dejectedly kicked another rock, although for several minutes he said nothing. When he did, it was a question, not a protest. His grudges were vehement, but his attention span was short. "Where are we going?"

"Into the woods," said Lucius Malfoy, not glancing down at him. "Into the woods, my boy."

***

It was one of those exceedingly long muggle funerals in which everyone had to come up and speak. This, Tribecca mused, either meant that he was a saint or quite horrible, perhaps it was both. Alexander Dervish was both revered and feared among the wizarding community. He had been immortalized as a poet and scholar ("for on the windows, rain may fall / but tears of veelas drown them all"), but was also notorious for his generally reclusive ways. His final years had been spent in self-imposed exile in the muggle world, although nobody could quite reason why. Some thought it was noble and self-sacrificing. Personally, she thought he was insane. The only thing that was perfectly clear to her was that the small town of Milleding could use a bit more excitement; among the citizens, the death of a cranky old man warranted the same degree of captive enthusiasm as a Weird Sisters concert.

"Is this seat taken?" asked a smiling housewife, leading two toddlers and a brooding ten-year-old.

Tribecca eyed the children before contriving a highly apologetic smile. "I'm afraid so."

The mother sighed and led her brood to another pew, where, presumably, the occupants were more conductive to small children. Tribecca absently dabbed the corner of her eye with a handkerchief--how muggles survived funerals without tear-producing handkerchiefs, she'd never know--and sniffed at the touching words of the local butcher, who ended his speech with the phrase, "and let us honor him by buying only the premium meats that Mr. Dervish knew and loved". She did not know much about the poet that the funeral was supposed to be honoring, although she assumed that he probably deserved to have his death be occasion for a special advertising section.

Milleding was a small, close-knit community, where crime was generally negligible; the last homicide within public memory had occurred thirty-seven years ago, and there were still those who thought it was nothing more than an unfortunate accident. The mentality now was quietly mournful, although a certain delegation of housewives gossiped between wholly unconvincing sobs. Muggle law enforcement had officially labeled it as suicide. She, however, found this highly unlikely, unless it had been one of those special cases where the victim had stabbed himself--in the back--before hiding the knife. Aurors had immediately confiscated all magical property from the house, but they'd never found his wand. It wasn't often that people spontaneously grew gaping stab-wounds in their chest. She really did dislike muggles.

By the time that the pimply town paperboy went up to the front to charm them all with his delightfully squeaky voice, she was ready to wring someone's neck. She cast a glance down at her watch. It was a rather irrelevant assignment, if she said so herself; and she had, many times, to the Man Who Did Vastly Irritating Things for No Readily Discernable Reason. She tossed her chocolate-brunette hair and allowed her eyes to idly scan the crowds, fighting the urge to snap and kill them all.

If Potter wanted information, she'd be damned if he wouldn't get it.

***

The conversation had degraded rapidly after Ron's comment. He found himself a chair and began to scribble paperwork. In the indignant thoughtlessness preceding her arrival she had forgotten to bring anything but her envelope. She scanned it several times, although the wording was terse and the subject matter itself rather bland. The letter had said to meet at his office at 5:23. It was now 6:42, and she was beginning to wonder.

Ron began to pace. It was a disorganized, distracted method of movement, however, with the implied goal being to see how many patterns he could trace along the floor before Harry returned. His eyes wandered the decorations. Before one fireplace, he paused, squinting vaguely up at a plaque that hung above it. From Luna's vantage point, it appeared that he'd stapled a stick to the wall, rather like a hunting trophy.

"He hung up his old broomstick? I mean, who does that?"

Luna crossed her arms and sighed. "Someone who has fond memories of it?"

He paused and laughed rather hollowly. He shook his head. "His firebolt? He broke it after the game, when Slytherin won. Harry, I'm afraid, didn't leave the sport on the best of terms."

"No, he didn't," she said quietly, "but just because something didn't end well doesn't negate the value that it once had."

For several seconds he leaned against the wall and frowned thoughtfully. A peculiar change came over his face; the shadows melted away from his features, and he chuckled, not bitterly, but in a mild degree of disbelief. It was as though someone had taken his grim expression and folded it neatly into nonexistence. He looked particularly amused. "How did you do that?"

She blinked. She had thought of many responses to her question, some angry, some grudgingly accepting. That had not been one of them. "What do you mean?"

"I mean," he chuckled again, "that it's not a topic I normally bring up... much less reveal my deepest, innermost thoughts about..."

"I'm still not understanding you," she said incredulously, eyebrows still raised.

Ron laughed at some subtle amusement that she could not understand. "Never mind, never mind. It's just me being strange." He proceeded to put his hands in his pockets and glance around again; in this way he had already managed to see most of the room, despite its size. "I'm beginning to realize why he has so much stuff in his waiting room."

"To keep us placated?" she smiled ruefully.

"So it would seem," he smirked. "He's over an hour late; Harry is never late for meetings, ever, unless he's trying to get a point across."

It took a great amount of self control not to roll her eyes. Luna was not keen to form many Harry Potter fan clubs at present, but neither would she admit to formulating conspiracy theories about him. "I seriously doubt that he's attempting to make a statement. He's probably just... busy..." the weakness of her argument was evident. She'd based it, previously, on what she took to be the generally acknowledged standard of his integrity. Now things were slightly murkier than that. Ambiguity was a most unwelcome addition, and possibilities she's previously dismissed were slowly but surely gaining ground.

Ron smirked. "He does nothing at the institute. Nothing at all. It's like an honorary office, just so they could say that he's here... why do you think they haven't bothered to give him a secretary? The only people who would want to visit him are 'fans', and they don't let them in, so it's really not necessary."

Luna frowned. "So, basically, you think that he's putting us off... why? It doesn't tend to foster warm, fuzzy feelings, or compel us to rally behind his cause. I don't think he'd jeopardize the chance to make a good impression on us if he could..."

"He summoned us here," he remarked, slowly turning an ancient old globe on its axis, "to attend to something important. And yet somehow it was important enough to interrupt our day, but not his? Perhaps I'm just bitter that I'm not the one saving the world, but it does seem a bit skewered, don't you think?" He was certainly far more persuasive than she remembered him, something she suspected came along with being a lawyer. Her mind was traveling those paths herself, although she would rather have died than admitted it; she had her pride, after all. For the moment, she had her pride.

"Anyway, I'm leaving. I have papers to work on, particularly if he's serious about what he wants me to accomplish in court. Any suggestions about how I can put a positive spin on 'arrogant', 'cunning' and 'ruthless'?"

"Hmm... indeed, a challenge. How about something along the lines of... 'creative and self-aware, with keen observational skills and a mind for opportunities?'"

Ron smiled ruefully. "I'm trying to defend the guy, Luna, not sell him."

"You're the lawyer," she laughed, waving a hand. "You figure it out."

"I will," he said dryly. "Never fear. I'll probably be seeing you soon, if Harry has anything to say about it..." he folded his papers into his expensive leather briefcase, snapping it shut. "If he catches up with you, think of something really witty and insulting and tell him that I said it. I have wasted enough time this evening. Goodbye, Luna."

She crossed her arms, raising a delicate eyebrow. "Oh? Is my company that tiring?"

"Goodbye, Luna," he repeated, grinning.

Luna laughed and bade her farewell while he left, although she found herself far less fond of the gesture once he was gone. She could only imagine how he'd managed to maintain his sanity before she had arrived; the room was oppressively large, and one could only pass so many seconds occupied by the trinkets on the walls. Many of them were meaningful. She remembered the day that Harry had broken his firebolt; Slytherin against Gryffindor, bets, as usual, on the latter. Nobody really expected Slytherin to win against Gryffindor. It was not a matter of score or statistics; it was simply the way things were.

She lifted her chin, leveling a final glance around the waiting room. It was only a short walk back to the entry hall, where apparition was allowed, but she navigated dusky hallways with an irritation she could not entirely explain. The transition between the marbled hallways of the institute and the worn brick exterior of her apartment was a quick one, but marked no change in her mood.

Ron had been bitter. She'd known this, of course, otherwise she would not have avoided him, but that did not make it much easier to deal with. Ron was bitter about Harry abandoning him, and it wouldn't have been the first time. They weren't thoughts she cared to burden herself with, but there they were: the same series of pointed, self-depreciating questions that she'd toiled over for the past seven years, and would likely toil over for the next seven. They were cold questions, she'd reasoned once. They were quiet, lonely little questions, persistent, and silent and just a few shades darker than Malfoy's eyes.

She slid her key into the lock, but such expenditure of effort was needless, as the door pushed open without requiring a turn. There was no time for her to panic, for the reasoning behind the omission became quite clear once she distinguished the man from the quantity of cloth he was holding over his left shoulder.

"This is my house, Harry," she pointed out, more than a bit irritated by the entire situation.

"I'm injured," he replied, using much the same tone one would use to speak of the weather. At her raised brow, he jerked his chin towards his shoulder.

She frowned and exhaled deeply. The wound was too small to be truly harmful, although she was more than a small bit troubled by the fact that the possibility had never occurred to her, not once, in the course of her thoughts. "Well, let's see it, then."

Luna winced as he lifted the rags. She suspected that it was the sort of wound that looked far worse than it actually was, but that did not prevent it from appearing painful. "How long have you had this?" she asked, frowning. "And where did you get it?"

He glanced shiftily over to the nearest wall, swallowing. It had to be painful. He'd winced when she'd lifted the cloth, and his other hand was balled into a fist. "About forty minutes ago," he said, ignoring the implications entirely.

"Why didn't you go to St. Mungo's?" she asked, as she stood and made her way into the kitchen. She shook her head as she rummaged through a series of almost identical-looking bottles. "They would have been able to work on you more quickly... you'd probably get preference... and if they'd worked on you, it wouldn't hurt."

"I can't tell you that," said Harry, unapologetically.

"Of course you can't."

He seemed only mildly surprised by her tone. "Will you treat me anyway?"

"Of course I will," she snapped. "Don't be stupid." Upon finding an adequate bottle, she shook it several times and uncorked it. The potion resembled Italian dressing, but smelled strongly of pepper and maple syrup; she conjured a rag and poured a small quantity upon it, exhaling deeply as she did. "Just don't delude yourself into thinking that I'm doing this because you're you. I'm doing this because you're injured. And you're lucky. If I wasn't being objective," she noted, delicately placing the cloth on his wound, "I would be pressing quite a bit harder, believe me."

"So Ron's not too happy with me?" he asked, wincing slightly as she pressed.

"Can you blame him?" she queried in reply, paying more attention to the wound than the patient.

Harry sighed. "No, no, I don't suppose that I can. But it wasn't my fault, either. I'm not..." he winced, "...the sort to impale myself to get out of meetings."

"You should have said something. Or at very least sent something. And don't say that you couldn't," she cut him off, "because we both know that if you'd really, really wanted to be able to reach us, you would have found away, raw shoulder or no. So no, Harry, he's not pleased with you. Neither am I, if it matters, although it very infrequently does."

He exhaled. "Luna, I'm sorry, but I've..."

"No, Harry. You've had more than enough opportunity to speak. You've had the time..." she dabbed, "and the energy..." she removed the cloth to look at the wound, the edges of which were slowly receding, "and enough reason to do so. I've clearly stated where I stand, and you have clearly stated that you don't particularly care about my point of view."

"I don't want to fight again," he cut in, frowning sternly, "but if you don't trust me..."

"Explain to me how, exactly, a statement like that isn't going to end up in fighting? That implication," she said icily, "is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard, and keep in mind I hear a lot of ridiculous things in my line of work. You're honestly expecting me to suspend disbelief and allow my patients to be harmed just because you think it's a good idea? If I ask for explanation, not only will you not give it to me, you'll circumvent my authority to serve your own ends. Then you come here, ask me for help, refuse to tell me how you were injured, and say that I have trust issues. You're not asking me to risk my welfare, you're asking me to risk his. I can't just hand over his soul."

He said nothing, which she interpreted to mean she was free to continue. "You've given me no evidence, or even indicated that you thought my opinion was worthy of your time. I'm making decisions on his behalf, and you've given me no reason to think that what you're saying is true."

"Would I lie to you, Luna?"

This was a question she could not answer, and she did not wish to try. She lifted her chin. "I cannot just blindly follow things that I can't see."

He did not meet her eyes, instead surveying her room with an idle curiosity she quickly deemed to be false. "You used to."

For a millisecond, her conscious swelled rage, but the emotion, while vibrant, was only momentary. The world around pitched and inverted on its axis; a bright light flashed behind her eyes, then dove into apocalyptic darkness. She felt ill, and more than a little dizzy; her nerves, still attempting to make sense of the situation, struggled in vain. Her attempt at coherent thought died before it had even been made.

Her confusion was short-lived, in the sense that she soon lost consciousness.