Lovegood's Love

Lovegood's Love

by Technomad

Larry Lovegood sat there, in his parlor, and felt his stomach twist as his mind filled with horror. Leaning forward, he strained to hear what his neighbours were saying.

"--so, we thought we'd best tell you. It wasn't in the Daily Prophet, but you have a right to know. Your daughter Luna was in the big fight against the Death Eaters at the Ministry." Arthur Weasley looked ashen, and Molly clung to her husband's arm; Larry could see that she'd been crying. "Our Ronald and Ginny were in the fight, too."

"Was she---were any of them---hurt?" whispered Larry. The thought of any harm coming to his little girl was like nothing he had ever experienced. He had been to Azkaban before, for the Quibbler, and even being near Dementors had been nothing like this. Of course, that had been before his wife had died...

"Yes, she was," sobbed Molly. "So were Ron and Ginny---Ron was hit with some sort of hex that addled his mind, and then he tangled with something they won't be specific about, and Ginny broke her ankle." She broke down crying. "When I get my hands on those two---"

"We're told that our children will recover, and so will your little girl," Arthur husked. He got up, and Molly got up with him. "We'd best go now. We just thought you should find out from us."

"Thank you," whispered Larry as his neighbors Disapparated back to their home at the Burrow.

*

Once he was alone, Larry could give in to the case of the gibbering shakes he had been holding in, not wanting to lose control of himself in front of them. Even though the Weasleys were the wizarding family closest to his own---he and Luna had eaten for weeks on the food Molly had sent over after his wife had died---he didn't want them to see him cry.

My darling, my angel, my baby, my only child! Memories crowded into his mind---memories of coming in to his wife's room at St. Mungo's, after her accouchement, seeing her there, so tired and pale, and so proud, holding up the little person she had nearly died to bring into the world---memories of looking into his daughter's sweet face for the first time, seeing her big blue eyes, so like her mother's, and losing his heart all over again---memories of helping her learn to walk, listening to her first words---memories of finding his wife dead, with Luna frantically doing her poor, untutored best to revive her mother---memories of Luna, standing by his side as he lit the pyre with his wand, both of them all but blinded with tears---memories of seeing her off to Hogwarts every year, waving and smiling as hard as he could until the Hogwarts Express was out of the station, then going someplace secluded and Apparating home, so that nobody could see him cry---memories of how lonely his house and his life was, without Luna there; without her, there was a little-girl-shaped hole in his life. When she was home, she was a ray of sunshine in his lonely widowered life, with her solemn belief in the things he printed in the Quibbler, her unflinching loyalty to him, and her determination to keep her promise to him that she'd made the morning of her mother's funeral: "Don't cry, Daddy. Mummy's not gone forever; we'll see her again one day, I'm sure. In the meantime, I'll take care of you."

I always knew I'd lose her someday---but not this young, and not like this! screamed through his mind. He had known that one day he would no longer be the most important man in his little girl's life. Molly Weasley had been a godsend, taking time to have the sort of talks with Luna that a girl needed from her mother, or at least from a woman, but it had been Luna-and-Daddy for a long time. He had known that he would lose her---but he had anticipated losing her to a handsome young wizard, someone who would appreciate her gentle spirit and her beauty, someone who would sweep her off her feet and treat her like the most wonderful, precious thing in his life, someone who would eventually be presenting him with beautiful, magical grandbabies. The thought of burying Luna, the way he had buried her mother, was a horror he had never allowed himself to consider.

How did this happen? Why would the Death Eaters want to hurt my baby girl? Why would anybody want to hurt my baby girl? The thoughts raced through Larry's mind almost too fast for him to grasp. At first, he tried to take refuge in anger at Luna for being so incredibly foolish as to throw herself into the path of the Death Eaters. When you get home, Luna, I'm first going to hug you till you're blue in the face---and then I'm going to give you the arse-chewing of a lifetime!

Even as he made it, he knew that was one resolution he'd never be able to keep---he'd hug her, to be sure, but he'd never, ever be able to speak to her harshly. She was such a good girl---a little dreamy, to be sure, but she had done her best to take care of her Daddy, just as she'd promised him she would. The house-elf, Bunky, was a huge help, but Luna was the one who made sure that her Daddy got to meals when he was absorbed in some project or other; Luna was the one who saw to it that he took care of himself when he was so down-in-the-dumps he didn't know how he'd go on. Without Luna, Larry Lovegood knew that he'd have probably been in St. Mungo's, or dead by his own hand. Luna was all he had to live for, now.

As he sat and thought, Larry's anger at Luna began to be displaced, toward the Death Eaters. The Death Eaters fought with my Luna! The Death Eaters tried to kill my little girl! And I wasn't there---I wasn't able to protect my baby! I'll kill them---I'll kill them all! All!

Shaking with rage, Larry stamped down into his basement, past the press on which he printed the Quibbler, and opened a door that had been locked for years. When it was opened, he stalked through, face twisted into a nightmare grin of pure rage, and began rooting through the piles of old things there, heedless of the clouds of dust he threw up. Bunky the house-elf appeared as if out of nowhere, apologizing for the mess---"but Master never allowed Bunky to clean up in here; Master said that this was off-limits to everybody forever!"

"Just get out of my way, Bunky," snarled Larry, as he finally found the big oblong box he had buried here long ago, not long after his wife's death. Sneezing, Bunky fled, as Larry hauled the box out into the open for the first time in seven years, and opened it up.

On the top of the box were an Auror's robes, folded neatly. After his wife's death, he had resigned his position as an Auror, not being willing to risk orphaning his baby girl. He threw them to one side---he had done the right people a lot of good over the years since he'd started the Quibbler, since nobody took it at all seriously but Luna, and as a reporter, he could go anywhere and ask questions without arousing suspicion---and looked down into the box, at the project his wife had been working on before she did the experiment that killed her.

At the bottom of the box rested a sword. Its blade was black and very shiny, a full four feet long, straight and double-edged. On the hilt, jewels glistened, and when he reached in and grasped the hilt, words appeared on the blade: HI BOSS.

Raising the sword, he nodded. It had been enchanted so that, to the wielder, it felt all but weightless, but it would have a "virtual weight" of nearly fifty pounds to whatever unfortunates were on the receiving end. He twirled the sword over his head, smiling grimly. Now to see if those Unbreakable Charms we put on the obsidian we made the blade from are still good after all these years!

"Bunky!" At his yell, the house-elf appeared, eyes widening to see him with the sword in his hand. "Bring me the tissues, and the anvil!"

"At once, Master!" In seconds, a huge anvil had appeared, as well as a box of tissues. Plucking a tissue from the box, Larry threw it up into the air, moving the sword under it. The tissue floated down, light as a feather, and landed on the upturned edge of the sword...and continued toward the floor, neatly bisected.

Larry nodded to himself. On the blade, the words writhed for a second, then changed to SHARP AS EVER. "Phase Two of the tests," he murmured to himself. Turning toward the anvil, he raised the sword to his lips in a fencer's salute---then lunged for the center of the anvil. The blade passed through the solid iron of the anvil with little more trouble than a normal knife would through a cheese. Yanking it free, Larry thrust again and again, skewering the anvil in a different place each time.

"Next test---to see if combining a wand with a sword really will work," Larry said. Down the center of the blade, between the two pieces of obsidian that had been joined to make the blade, were a dragon heartstring, unicorn tail-hair, Veela hair, and phoenix feather, all braided around each other. Pointing the sword at the anvil, Larry made a pass, muttering "Wingardium Leviosa!" Obediently, the anvil rose into the air, hovering at the height of Larry's shoulders.

Swinging suddenly, Larry brought the blade of the sword down in the center of the anvil's top, cleaving it cleanly. Another swing, and yet another, and another---and the pieces of the anvil hung in mid-air, sliced as cleanly as though they were pieces of cheese. As he did so, he visualized doing the same to the Death Eaters who had dared to threaten his baby girl. On the blade, the words writhed again, changing to DELENDI SUNT, BABY.

"Yes---'they must be destroyed,' mustn't they?" muttered Larry. Pointing the sword at the pieces, he shouted "Reducto!" Magical energy leaped from the blade, smashing the largest piece to powder. A few more Reductor Curses later, and the anvil had been reduced to extremely fine powder, floating in the air.

Larry gripped the sword. He had been working on the ultimate magical weapon, a sword that was also a wand, when his wife had died, and hadn't had the heart to go back to the project after her death. He had hoped never to touch this weapon again, but it felt so right, so good in his hands! He knew where the "brain" was---they had arranged it so that the thinking part of the sword was in the hilt, and he could feel the sword's happiness. The words on the blade changed yet again, to MY NAME IS 'DELENDA EST.'

"Too right," muttered Larry. Raising the sword over his head, gripping the hilt with both hands, he roared "At last, at last my arm is complete again!"

The sword---Delenda Est---seemed to agree. New words formed on the blade: THE DEATH EATERS PICKED ON THE WRONG LITTLE GIRL. Then they writhed and changed: WE'LL SHOW THEM THE ERROR OF THEIR WAYS!

Grinning ferociously, Larry nodded his agreement. As he left, he snagged his old Auror's robes---he needed to send an owl to his old commander, asking to be put back on active duty.

The Death Eaters would learn, the hard way, that they had, indeed, picked on the wrong little girl.