Luna Lovegood

She Never Lost Her Roar

            Finally reaching the actual stadium, Luna found a position by a bench but, like the rest of the students, had no intention of sitting on it.  Instead, she chose to place her feet on it, raising her just a few inches above the excited crowd, her hat emerging quite visibly from the rest of the group.  Every so often she would raise her wand to the tooth and set off a ROAR! to show her enthusiasm.  And it did indeed tend to send the crowd into more enthusiastic cheers.

            Then the game began.

            The players were zooming around the arena, wild bludgers flying aimlessly, quaffles strategically placed, and Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy searching the field for the allusive and speedy snitch.

            But as the Slytherin’s took a hold of the quaffle and were racing towards Ron’s goal, Ron’s face grew greener, and the bystander Slytherin’s horrid song grew louder.  Soon they were thundering and poor Ronald didn’t have a chance at concentration or blocking the shot.  Soon the stands were in an uproar, Gryffindors shouting encouragement, Slytherin’s screaming thanks to their “King”.  And then the game was on again and more singing continued:

WEASLEY WAS BORN IN A BIN,

HE ALWAYS LET’S THE QUAFFLE IN,

WEASLEY WILL MAKE SURE WE WIN

Then, out of the corner of her eye, Luna spied Harry zooming towards the ground.  And Malfoy, too distracted with his ludicrous singing and taunting was too late to realize that the game was almost won.  With his hand outstretched, closing the gap between him and the ground at an astounding pace, when his padded hand finally closed around a fluttering golden wing and the game was Gryffindor’s!

            Along with the others, Luna jumped up and down in the stands and her hat “roared” victoriously but her smile faltered as Crabbe, a Slytherin beater and a known Potter-hater, his bat made contact with a bludger and it went zooming towards Harry.

            “Harry!” Luna screamed, but the wild crowd was too loud and she had no hope of being heard over the din.

            WHACK!

            The savage bludger made contact with Harry’s back and he fell to the ground, the wind knocked out of him.  Shocked gasps rang out, but soon Harry was on his feet again.  The crowd continued to cheer.

            But through all the excitement, Luna spied on the ground, an argument brewing between Draco and Harry and the Weasley twins.  Then, out of the blue, Harry’s fist was in Draco’s gut and then George was on top of them both before Madam Hooch could break them up and send them away.

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Back inside the walls of Hogwarts, Luna went to visit Helena before retiring to her bedchamber.  Spotting her transparent figure in the west wing of the 3rd floor, Luna ran towards her.

            “Helena!  There was such an exciting Quidditch game today, and my hat!  Did you see it?  I-” she exclaimed but stopped mid-sentence when Helena turned around.

            Turns out, it wasn’t Helena.  It was none other than Moaning Myrtle, the ghost from the girl’s bathroom.  She used to be a student but was killed by a basilisk, whom Harry later killed during Luna’s first year.

            “OH!” Myrtle shrieked in an insanely high-pitched voice, her timbre so utterly annoying Luna fought to not cover her ears.

            “I, I’m sorry,” Luna stuttered.

            “No!  Don’t be sorry!  No one care about Myrtle!  No one cares that she’s her own person!  No one wants to tell Myrtle news, no!  Just talk to the other ghosts, why would you talk to her?”

            “I’m quite sorry, Myrtle,” Luna stammered.  “I just didn’t realize it was you.  I will talk to you if you’d like.”

            “Oh, does it matter?” she squeaked.  “I did hear about the Quidditch match, though,” Myrtle said, her angry voice softening just a bit.  “Some noisy first year girls came into my bathroom.  I heard, though, that Harry Potter did wonderfully,” her shrill tone getting the faintest bit dreamy.

            “Yes, yes he did,” Luna began shortly.  “Now, I really have to get going-”

            “FINE!” Myrtle screamed and zoomed away.

            Fairly shaken up, Luna began walking away, wondering where Helena could possibly be.  Wandering through the corridors, she finally gave up and began her way towards the Ravenclaw common room.   But around the corner, she heard voices.

            “…if Hooch hadn’t stopped them, I daresay they could have killed me!  My father will hear about this-oh Dumbledore will be sacked for sure!” It was the sneering, sniveling fiend Draco!  And by the looks of it, he wasn’t in a good mood.  Running the quickly by Draco and his goons, Crabbe and Goyle, she heard Draco shout out after her:

            “Hey!  It’s Lovegood!” Followed by the pounding of feet coming after her.

            Why do they have to come after me? She thought, picking up the pace and dashing harder now towards her tower.  What did I ever to do them?

            She reached the common room entrance and quickly knocked on the door.  The picture of a raven appeared and squawked out:

            “What do you get if you added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?”

            Oh!  This was such an elementary answer, yet with her panic and fear, Luna was completely scrambled and couldn’t wrap her brain around an answer!  But she was too slow in her thinking as Draco and his bodyguards rounded the corner and began walking towards her menacingly.

            “Go away,” Luna said, with as much spite as she could muster.

            “Oh look,” Draco sneered.  “The freak’s lost her freak-hat.”

            This insult was extremely stupid and not in the least degrading, but nonetheless, Goyle and Crabbe laughed at it.  Draco smiled.

            “Stop it,” Luna ordered, her voice just a bit less commanding than she could have hoped for.

            “So the freak’s lost her roar,” he said maliciously.

            They were just about to close tighter around her when suddenly a wisp of white gloom shot through Draco and he fell to the ground.

            “Ah!” he exclaimed as he scooted away from the mist.

            Then the mist began to form into a figure, a figure Luna knew so well.  As the Slytherin’s scrambled away, the figure turned and smiled at Luna.

            “Thank you, Helena,” she said with gratitude.

            “Anytime,” the Gray Lady said with a smile and then floated away.

            Turning back to the door, Luna smiled broadly.

            “Draught of the Living Death,” she whispered.  The door swung open and Luna entered the cozy, fire-lit room that was her home.