Luna Lovegood was not someone easily frightened or swayed away from things other people thought were odd. Often, these same people thought she was odd, and Luna hardly thought she was anywhere near as fascinating as all the things yet to be discovered in their world. Their hesitance about what was not normal came from fear, but that is where her Ravenclaw heart drew courage from—at the endless possibilities that came from digging deeper, from seeing beyond the surface of one thing to discover a plethora of truth.

For that reason, Luna had to nudge Cho on the shoulder a half-hour past midnight.

"Blaise, I'm not reading you another bedtime story. Go to sleep," mumbled Cho, swatting Luna's hand off her shoulder.

"It's Luna," she said, nudging gently again. "Although, I do have an interesting story about a niffler that used to belong to Newt Scamander. The little thing was responsible for the biggest jewelry theft in—"

Cho opened her eyes, a glare already present as she rolled over to look at her house-mate. "Why?"

"Well, you see, nifflers are quite notorious for being attracted to—"

"No, Luna," Cho mumbled again, sleep still threatening to weigh down on her eyelids. "Why are you waking me up? Did someone steal your pillow again?"

Luna shook her head, slowly sitting up on her knees, looking around to make sure the other Ravenclaws were soundly asleep. They were sharing a four-poster, she and Cho, courtesy of the latter's little sister for the sleepover they kindly invited Luna to join.

"Ginny keeps waking me up."

Cho groaned, pulling herself up on her elbows to scout the dormitory. When she did not see the redhead Gryffindor, she sighed, "Explain, please."

"She's in my head."

With something that sounded like an exasperated curse word, Cho dropped herself back on the four-poster. "All right. What's Weasley saying?"

"That I'm being silly."

"I can agree with her there," mumbled Cho before saying more clearly, "Is this about Thomas?"

Luna nodded, moving the stray blonde hair falling out of her ponytail from her face. "I think Ginny might be right. I've been silly to hide from Dean because I'm scared."

"Why are you scared, Lu?" asked Cho, no more trace of annoyance across her tired eyes. "You love him."

"Isn't that the most terrifying thing?"

Cho was not a stranger to tears. In fact, she knew they were going to surface, her own little waterfalls, always ready to leave trails down her cheeks as evidence that heartache still lived within her. Grief, she knew so well already, was a monster of a different magnitude, but so was love.

Love opened possibilities for extraordinary things, but was also the gateway for the things that could ultimately destroy all that was built.

Four years after Cedric Diggory's passing, Cho didn't know if loving him was worth everything that came because of it.

She could not be frustrated at Luna's hesitance, then. Not when giving away one's heart was a chance game most people were terrified to play.

"It is," Cho murmured, "but Thomas loves you, too, Luna. If you're going to be terrified, be terrified together. You don't have to have everything figured out. Believe me, none of the rest of us do, but at least you, alike Weasley and Harry, or Neville and Hannah, are a step ahead. You already have what the rest of us have to find."

Luna put her hand on Cho's shoulder again, squeezing. Cho moved her own hand over hers, smiling one of those watery-eyed smiles Luna sadly thought were too common on her friend. "You deserve it, too. You know that, right? You just have to let yourself."

"It's not smart in Hogwarts to tell someone to heed whatever a Weasley says," said Cho instead, not able to find an answer to what she does or doesn't deserve at this juncture of her life, "but I think you should this time. Go back to your chamber and talk to Thomas. Figure things out together."

After pressing a kiss onto Cho's tear-stained cheek and murmuring a goodbye, Luna quietly pulled herself from the four-poster and headed for the dormitory door.

Alike most days of her life, Luna wished she had her mother with her. If Pandora Lovegood was extraordinary at magic, she was more so when it came to loving everything this world had to offer. She had taught Luna the purity of the emotion and its strength. Luna knew, then, her mother would have taken her hand, looked her in the eye, and told her to love boldly.

But like the same thing that tormented Cho, Luna finished growing up to watch her father grieve her mother in a way that made him lose pieces of himself. He was absolutely brilliant, but even Luna knew his head was never right after losing his wife.

The thought kept plaguing Luna after the Ministry of Magic announced their marriage law. In turn, the fear those memories brought became much louder than her heartbeat, one that echoed out Dean Thomas' name since sharing fragile moments at Shell Cottage at the height of the war.

Get in there, Ginny's voice rung in Luna's eardrums when she came to a stop in front of her chamber. Get in there, wake the idiot up, and tell him you love him!

"In that order?" said Luna.

Now! Or so help me Merlin, Lovegood, I will yank you two by the ears and marry you myself in front of the entire Great Hall! Don't test me.

If there was one absolute certainty in this world, it was never to cross Ginny Weasley. As such, Luna reached for the doorknob and let herself into the chamber.

"Bloody hell. Where did I leave—Luna!" At the exact moment Luna had been about to enter her bedroom, Dean rushed out of it. When he came face to face with her, he stumbled back, terror flashing bright across his dark eyes. He put one hand over his bare chest, covering his heart.

Luna let her eyes drift over the expanse of soft, dark skin, marveling at the scatter of freckles mixed with silver scars, and even the streaks of green ink around his collar bone.

"Um, why are you—why are you here? I thought you were sleeping at Ravenclaw Tower tonight?" he spoke again, making Luna meet his dark gaze, offering him a tentative smile at grimace creeping on the lines of his beautiful face.

She reached for his hand. For a moment she thought he would not extend his like he had done so many times in the past couple of months, but Dean, Luna was coming to find out, would never hesitate to reach out to her when she needed him to. His fingers were covered in dry, blotched green ink, too.

"Ginny woke me up," she murmured, surveying his long fingers before steering him toward their couch. He followed blindly, Luna could see; his eyes still in hers. "She told me I had to come home."

Dean's hand pressed more firmly against hers.

Home.

Where he was, where he waited for her—that's what Luna considered home. She knew that even before she started avoiding Dean. She had discovered early on there was no place she felt more herself, more at peace, more loved than when Dean had an arm around her shoulders, looking down at her with a love her mother used to read her bedtime stories about.

Gryffindors like him got the inherent label of brave, but other Houses were, too. Luna was, too. Maybe it did not show in the same ways that it manifested for them, but it did not make it any less potent. As a Ravenclaw, her courage came from her knowledge—and what Luna knew absolutely, without question, right at that moment, was that she loved Dean Thomas in a way she never thought would happen to her.

Naturally, she rose up from her place next to him on the couch and knelt down before him.

"I've seen firsthand what love does to people," she whispered, her hand still firmly in his. "It's wonderful, like you and me with our toes in the sand, painting the sunset in Brighton this past summer, do you remember? But I've also seen the grief it leaves behind when it's gone, like my father never being the same after my mother died. And it scared me to think I could lose you, too."

Dean instantly sank to his knees, too, reaching for her free hand and bringing both up to his chest. He squeezed like she was a lifeline and there was a tsunami approaching. "I can't defeat Death or know what lies ahead of the unknown, but all I can promise you is this. My heart. Yours, Luna. For as long as you want it, even long after that, too. I promise you will always have me."

"Will you marry me, Dean?"

He let out a loud laugh, dark eyes brimming with tears, nodding fervently. "Yes, Lu. I'll marry you."

"Dean, I think I'll head back before—"

Something shattered.

Maybe it was the golden bubble of magic weaving around Dean and Luna, wrapping them up together as their love, pure and whole, manifested.

Maybe it was the happiness that had grown the most handsome, sweetest smile on Dean's lips.

Maybe it was the frustration with which Lavender Brown exited Dean and Luna's bedroom, a towel wrapped around her naked body, long, blonde hair dripping down her back, the ends the same green that had tainted Dean's skin.

Maybe it was Luna's young, foolish heart.

"Luna," gasped Lavender, eyes wide when she clocked in on her. "It's not what it looks like, I swear it!"

Her words were wasted. Luna could not hear. The world had lost all its sound. It had lost all of its color, too.

Luna fell back from her knees, an onslaught of thoughts invading her head, screaming out so loud Ginny's encouraging words had been replaced with Leave, Luna! Leave! before they got lost in all the noise.

Dean was trying to reach for her again, the same terror that she had seen when she entered their chamber was flashing across his face once more. His mouth was moving, eyes red and pleading, but Luna turned her body, crawling a few inches before she got enough momentum to pick herself up and run.

The days following the Ministry of Magic's public release of their Restoration and Magical Retention Act were nothing short of chaotic. Constant owls were being sent from outraged parents and betrothed partners outside of Hogwarts, most of which were Howlers directed at the staff; as such, Headmistress McGonagall had to send out firm reminders of the castle's mailing hours to all households in order to regain control within the school. Of course, normalcy in a time of marriage laws was hardly achievable for even the Headmistress. Once the younger students caught wind of it, all the Sixth and Seventh Years were put on display.

McGonagall and the rest of the Hogwarts staff had to stop the younger students from shouting—begging—at Harry Potter and Ginny Weasley for an invitation to their upcoming wedding every chance they got. Or, more than a couple of times now, McGonagall had to save Hermione from being cornered by younger girls, tears in their eyes at the tragedy her romance with Ron had become, and bombarded her with offers of making Draco's life miserable and (or) throwing Pansy to the giant squid so she was never heard of again.

Because it had become almost impossible to walk around the corridors without being flagged down, Sixth and Seventh Years under this marriage law were keeping to their chambers as often as they could. None more so than the Golden Trio, but at the first signal of an easy retreat out of the castle, Harry, Ron, and Hermione hurried to the gardens near the Herbology greenhouses after their Potions lesson.

Harry stretched out under one of the trees like the sun was pouring down warmth and there were no red, dying leaves cushioned beneath him. "Look at his face," he said, nudging Hermione with the tip of his shoe. "Mr. Sunshine, that one."

Hermione looked up from her Herbology notes, frowning at the wet mark he left on her knee. While she hardly cast a glance over at Ron, she was aware that he was grinning, just as stretched out across the damp patch of grass like he was bathing in sunlight.

"Bet he and Parkinson have...you know."

"We are meant to be revising," reminded Hermione sternly. "We have an exam in a few minutes. We don't need to know what Ron does inside his chambers."

"Or inside Parkison," offered Harry with a wiggle of his brows.

She let out a gasp, extending her leg to kick Harry in the kneecap as he had done to her. "Stop it, Harry. You don't want to talk about your sex life, then it is only fair not to discuss Ronald's—"

"We are never discussing Harry's sex life," hissed Ron, opening one eye to glare at his friends.

"You do know we are meant to reproduce because of this marriage law, right?" said Harry despite Hermione giving him another kick. "I'm going to give you nephews or nieces, mate."

"Ignore him, Ronald," Hermione said instantly, looking at the redhead with a patient smile. "Go back to your happy place."

Doing just as he was told, Ron closed his one glaring eye and took in a deep breath, holding it for a few seconds before exhaling.

Hermione and Harry watched as he repeated his breathing technique. Although they thought it best never to voice it out loud, both were relieved that Ron had managed to find his way to the counseling sessions Hogwarts provided every Saturday and Sunday mornings for the students that needed them. Granted, Hermione knew all three of them needed to attend, but Ron had been the one closest to a breakdown with no return. His grief created enemies everywhere he went, especially when he looked in the mirror. She had once loved those blue eyes and scatter of freckles more than anything, she couldn't stand the idea that Ron thought them features of a monster, of someone not worth loving.

Of someone not worth living.

Both Hermione and Harry had also thought it best never to voice out loud that one morning they caught Ron and Pansy entering those sessions together, hands clasped tight.

"You okay?" whispered Harry, nudging her a lot more gently with his shoe. He had asked the same question when they had seen Ron and Pansy that morning, his green eyes glimmering with a worry Hermione had not seen since Lavender hung herself around Ron's neck, her mouth attached to his.

"Yes," said Hermione, blinking away from Ron. She had answered the same then, but somehow something about it felt more concrete in her chest. It didn't feel like a half-life anymore. It was more like a dull ache, like thinking back to a memory that happened long ago.

Harry nodded, but then reached out, grabbing Hermione's ankle to squeeze once. "He did love you, you know?"

"I know," Hermione muttered. "It just wasn't enough."

"Love should have prevailed."

"But war still has its consequences and we were that," Hermione told him, a smile tugging the right corner of her mouth. "Besides, he's learning to be happy again. If Parkinson is helping him see something I couldn't, then how can I be jealous of that?"

Harry hesitated for a moment but, in the same whisper, asked, "Do you think the sorting hat was right, then? Placing Ron with Parkinson. And you with—"

"Do you think I belong with Malfoy?"

"Do you think you belong with Malfoy?" returned Harry. He was smart enough not to answer that and face his best friend's wrath in case he was wrong.

Besides, if it had been up to Harry, Hermione would have been excluded from this law completely. Ginny said he was an overprotective fool, but Hermione was his sister. Harry did not think there was a bloke alive who deserved to have Hermione's heart. Naturally, he would never tell her that; she would either roll her eyes, smack him upside the head, or launch herself at him to trap him in an embrace (either option would definitely hurt).

"He's trying. I see it every time we are together," said Hermione, looking back to her notes. Harry did not miss the pink flushing under her pale cheeks. "But...it's only common sense to expect the worst, right? I mean, this is Draco Malfoy we're talking about. I'd be foolish not to protect myself."

"I think you're afraid."

Hermione looked up at him again, brown eyes narrowed. "Afraid? Of what?"

"Of believing Draco Malfoy is not the arrogant, pathetic, cruel bouncing ferret he was before. You're afraid to get attached to the Slytherin, aren't you?"

As the words left his mouth, Harry did not think himself stupid to say them—even if he was not entirely sure he wholly believed it, either. Of course he was skeptical of Draco; Harry and Hermione both had years worth of bad memories with the Slytherin to think back on that allowed them to be so. Still, while Hermione was determined to limit how much of Draco she integrated into her personal life, Harry had seen when they were together. There were no sneers on Draco's face; no frowns, no smirks, no evidence that he hated Hermione for the things she was unable to control. Before, he would have rather died than to be even five feet across from her, but these days, Harry did not see Draco and Hermione with more than five inches of distance between them.

Harry did not trust Draco Malfoy with Hermione's heart, but he wanted to believe—he needed to believe—that the war had changed him enough to one day warrant it.

"What are you saying, Harry?"

"That maybe it isn't ideal, or what any of us expected, really, but you deserve to be happy, too. It's all any of us want for you."

Hermione pressed her mouth into a tight line, forcing the words her tongue created not to come tumbling out for fear that Harry would know the truth.

And the truth was this: her heart no longer felt like the remains of shattered glass, rather a mosaic of stained crystal, put together in its mismatched, colorful state for Draco Malfoy to marvel at.

She was afraid that she already was open to the possibility of not being afraid of him.

"Release," Ron murmured from the background.

Hermione and Harry turned to their friend, his blue eyes opening again. His same grin was still on his face, causing them to return it, too.

"It's gotta be sex, 'Mione," said Harry with a laugh. "Or the Imperius Curse."

Ron gave him the finger just as their lonely, sacred solace was interrupted by a wave of students leave greenhouse four. From the throng, he spotted Ginny, all shiny, red hair pulled up into a messy bun and Luna, all long, blonde hair that was currently rivaling Hermione's worst bad hair day.

When he also spotted Ginny making her way toward them, Harry sprung up from under the tree. She barely came to a stop when he wrapped arms around her middle, hoisting her up.

Hermione lingered at the sight, but blinked away when Ginny's lips came down on Harry's. "Luna," she said, clocking in on the sullen Ravenclaw. A frown started to settle between her brows; if there was one adjective to describe Luna, it was definitely not sullen. "Are you okay?"

"Don't bother," said Ginny for her best friend soon as she was back on her own two feet. She shot Luna a sad glance before turning to the others again. "Neville said she's not talking about it."

"Neville?"

Ginny nodded at Harry's question, his green eyes already drenched in concern. "He said she went to his and Hannah's chamber last night. Wouldn't say a word about it."

Harry starting pulling his arms from Ginny, but she reached out to grab his wrist, keeping him in place. He raised a confused brow.