Who's Afraid of Luna Lovegood?

"That's her!"

Sarah nearly dropped her quill at Lispeth's sudden exclamation. She wasn't the only one to be startled; a pair of Ravenclaws seated at a nearby table had sent irritated glances in the Slytherin's direction.

Thankfully the librarian, Madam Pince, was too busy to take notice, being currently occupied with charging out a number of books to several waiting students at the counter.

"What? Where?" asked Judith excitedly, another first year that Sarah knew mostly through association.

"Right over there," answered Lispeth, nodding past Sarah's shoulder. "That's Loony Lovegood. See?"

Sarah craned her neck, looking to the back of the library.

"Where?"

"Right there, near the window," said Lispeth in a hushed voice, flipping over the pages of her book without so much as a glance.

"Which one?" queried Judith curiously. There were several rain-splattered windows along the far wall, and most of them overlooked an occupied table.

"Oh, for - look, see that one getting up? That table right there, the one still sitting."

Sarah did see, now. A brown-haired girl had just risen from one of the tables and was making her way to Madame Pince's counter, several large tomes in hand, leaving a rather dishevelled, sandy-haired girl behind. At first glance Sarah thought she looked more like some disowned orphan peddling trinkets on Knockturn Alley, than a dangerously insane witch.

"That's her?" asked Sarah dubiously, putting her quill aside. "I thought she'd be more...like..."

"What?"

Sarah thought. "Well, creepy, I guess. I mean from what people say, you know?"

"Oh, I've seen her before," said Judith knowingly. "She hangs out in the greenhouses sometimes on week-ends. So that's Loony Lovegood?"

"None other," confirmed Lispeth darkly. "Best never let her catch you calling her that to her face, though."

Sarah shifted her attention back to the raven-haired girl seated before her. "Why?"

Lispeth leaned close, her dark eyes adopting an earnestness Sarah had rarely seen from the normally aloof girl. "Because she'll hex you into next month, that's why," said the girl warningly. "Oh, not when there's anyone around, mind. But she never forgets a slight, you can be sure of that."

"She's completely cracked, I've heard," echoed Judith, gathering her papers together while keeping her gaze firmly locked on the girl at the far table. "Does some really strange stuff, too. That Wilkinson boy followed her one night after curfew, just to see what she was up to. Anyway, she turned a corner somewhere up on the second floor and poof! She was gone. Not a trace."

"Well, maybe she dissaparated," suggested Sarah doubtfully, glancing back at the odd girl.

"You can't," corrected Judith. "Not here in the castle, anyway. Besides, it's not something they teach until...what year's she in, anyway?"

"Fifth," said Lispeth distantly, putting her notes away in her tote bag.

Sarah turned back to her table-mates. "Well, that doesn't sound too bad..."

"I heard she prefers the company of some of the ghosts at night," said Judith furtively. "She never sleeps, you know."

Sarah looked at her, eyes widening. "Eh? You think she's a ghost?"

Judith rolled her eyes. " 'Course not, you're missing the point," she said. "What I'm saying is that it takes a strange sort to prefer the company of the dead to that of the living, don't you think?"

Sarah chewed her lip. "Erk."

Lisbeth dropped her bag to the floor and leaned forward, glancing to either side to ensure she wasn't overheard.

"Last week, one of the Hufflepuffs in my herbology class went back to the greenhouses after classes to pick up his notebook, and she was there. Talking to the plants, she was."

Sarah blinked. "Well, that's not so strange, is it?" she countered. "My Gran does that all the time with her plants, and she's a Muggle."

"No, not like that," explained Lisbeth dismissively. "She went quite mad and started chanting something really bizarre that made the plants act up something awful. He barely made it out of there alive."

"Wow..." said Sarah with a shudder. She'd heard many strange things about Loony Lovegood, but she was intensely grateful she hadn't experienced any of them firsthand. Yet.

Sarah turned and observed the girl once again. She didn't seem overtly sinister, at least on the surface. In fact, she seemed rather innocuous, contentedly flipping through a large tome as her assignments, or at least what Sarah presumed them to be, were busily scurrying about the table in an apparent game of tag.

She'd been about to voice her doubts when the girl suddenly looked up, her huge pale eyes staring directly at Sarah.

The young Slytherin snapped her head round to Lisbeth with such haste that her chair skidded slightly with a loud squeak against the stone floor. Those eyes -

"Oh Merlin," she whispered nervously, her heart racing, "she saw me looking at her..."

Her two companions quickly flipped up their books and concealed their faces behind the worn covers.

Sarah's apprehension took a sudden leap in intensity. "What's happening? Is she coming? Somebody look!"

"Shhh!" hissed Lisbeth from behind 'Holidays with Hags'. "And whatever you do, don't look back!"

Sarah was very nearly hyperventilating. She couldn't imagine the girl would strike her down in broad daylight with so many witnesses about, but if she was truly insane...

"Come on," she pleaded desperately. "One of you look! Where is she?? What's she doing??"

At least Judith chanced a peek over the top of her book.

"Oh crap!" she said, quickly withdrawing behind her tome so that only the very top of her brown hair was visible. "She's coming!"

Sarah let go a tiny whimper and shifted nervously in her chair, one foot wrapping itself tightly around one of the wooden legs. She could almost feel the girl standing right behind her, wand pointed threateningly at the back of her head.

"Is...is she...??"

"Shhh!"

Sarah bit her lip and held her breath, but the expected hex did not come. The seconds passed with agonizing slowness, until finally she spied Loony Lovegood drift past their table without so much as a glance, books in hand and humming softly. To Sarah's surprise she appeared to be in something of a daze, taking a leisurely and meandering course out the library.

Nonetheless, all three girls let out a collective sigh of relief once the door had closed behind her.

"That was too close," said Judith, flopping back in her chair and rubbing her temples.

"Can't you pick someone else?" pleaded Sarah, the memory of the strange girl's disconcertingly intense gaze replaying itself vividly in her mind. "There's loads of others - "

Lisbeth looked at her in irritation. "Look, do you want in or don't you?" she asked sharply, gathering up her quill and inkwell. "She's the one, that's all there is to it. If you can't handle it - "

The warning wasn't lost on Sarah. She quickly acquiesced, but as she watched the two older girls leave, she found herself suddenly wondering if she hadn't just gotten in over her head.