Luna couldn’t keep herself from stuttering, “Pr-Professor! I didn’t mean-I didn’t know…” She was shaking. Was he angry? Did he know she’d heard everything?
“Luna,” Dumbledore said softly. Luna marveled at how this man seemed to know every child by name at Hogwarts. It wasn’t like Luna was anyone special… “How can I say that I’m not at all surprised to see you here?” She looked at him in confusion. His watery blue eyes glimmered in the light provided by both of their wands.
“What do you mean, Headmaster?” she replied quizzically.
Dumbledore smiled through his frizzy gray beard. “What an intriguing young lady you are—that is all I intended.”
Luna paused before daring to ask, “What is going to happen to our school?”
The old wizard sighed, suddenly appearing fragile for the first time Luna had ever seen. He’d always seemed so strong, so invincible. Now he was just a weak man, thin in his flowing robes. “I don’t know, Miss. Lovegood.”
“Are you really going to leave us?” Luna suddenly had a fire in her. She couldn’t think of any other way to explain why she had the guts to question the Headmaster’s motives.
“Yes, my dear. It is the only way.”
Luna looked down at her dusty shoes, ashamed she had even asked. But when she looked up, Dumbledore was gone. Startled, she turned around and around, but he was really gone. It was like he’d never even been there…
Surprised, Luna found herself wiping a tear from her eye. What would become of them all now? The next day her question was answered.
The announcement was made at morning meal the next day. Umbridge was sitting in Dumbledore’s chair and before anyone could raise a fork to their mouths, she cleared her throat and “hem, hemmed” in that cutesy little way she did that sounded like grating teeth to Luna’s ears. Then she began to read off of a page of parchment, “By order of The Ministry of Magic, Dolores Jane Umbridge (High Inquisitor) has replaced Albus Dumbledore as Head of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.”
The room was abuzz with cries of outrage, confusion, and mayhem. Dolores tried to quiet them, fairly unsuccessfully. Filch the caretaker appeared next to her, took the paper and huffed and puffed his way out of the Great Hall, no doubt to go and nail the proclamation to the wall already filled with hundreds of other rules.
Luna went and sat down at the Gryffindor table to hear everyone talking about Dumbledore had taken down two Aurors, Umbridge, the Minister of Magic, and his Junior Assistant to escape. Marietta certainly wouldn’t have told anyone about her shameful night, and Harry was one to keep things to himself. She smiled to herself. Luna hadn’t gone straight back to Ravenclaw Tower the night before. First she’d run straight to her favorite corridor to speak with her favorite ghost. Apparently Helena was one for spreading gossip. Oh well. The truth wasn’t going to hurt anyone…anyone who was innocent, anyways.
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Luna Lovegood
Fanfiction[BOOK ONE] Loony Lovegood--the girl everyone made fun of. The girl with more to her than what meets the eye. She's different, you know (although I presume you already figured that out for yourself). She's special, and she has a story, too. Foll...
