The Aurors arrived almost immediately afterwards, too late as usual according to Sirius' muttering. His Invisibility Cloak and wand were collected and returned to him as they were transported to the Ministry along with the bodies of the dead, a newly orphaned Luna going eerily quiet as she held on to his undamaged hand and stared vacantly at something that only she could see.
Once at the Ministry, a healer had given her a Dreamless Sleep potion and she'd drank it without a word, falling asleep on the provided bed soon after.
That same healer was now slathering his arm with burn salve while he spoke to an exasperated looking Amelia Bones.
"Mr. Potter, you seem to have a knack for getting in trouble." The formidable DMLE director was saying, looking more than a bit displeased.
"They tried to kill me first." Harry said pre-emptively, shrugging as he did so. He was finding it entirely impossible to feel anything but satisfaction at the deaths he'd caused this day. Because of those Death Eaters, his friend was now an orphan.
"You seem strangely unbothered by your rising body count." Bones commented, wanting to know if she was going to have another murderer on her hands in the future.
"I was never one for emotional blubbering and I'm not going to waste my sympathy on people that don't deserve it." He explained. That he also suspected that there was something about the Dark that literally made him unable to feel regretful about sending more lives to the Void he left unsaid. He'd wondered about that ever since the Pettigrew incident and his subsequent lack of regret. He was now even more certain that his rituals had knocked loose whichever psychological screw made the majority of people abhor killing. To him it was just speeding up the inevitable and defending his own life in the process. A somewhat worrying revelation perhaps, but he wasn't killing randomly so it was fine.
Amelia pursed her lips, more in thought than in disapproval. That he had acted in self-defense tonight was beyond doubt. The Death Eater masks and robes certainly proved that. Her only problem was the amount of bodies turning up around the young Potter and the magic used to make them.
The healer was by this point done with the burn salve and had taken to waving his wand over Harry's right arm.
"I am sorry, Mr. Potter, but I'm afraid that I can't keep your arm from scarring." The old man said regretfully. "It was a cursed fire and wounds like that never heal properly. I am surprised that I was able to heal it as much as I did given how much it is resisting my spells and the salve."
"It's fine." Harry said indifferently. The skin on his right arm was full of scar tissue up to the elbow now, but it was alright. He hadn't lost any feeling or dexterity in the limb and it didn't even look as bad as he had expected it to given how painful it had been at the time. He was honestly more worried about Luna than he was about a few scars.
The healer was wrong though. It had been his runes that were resisting the healing spells rather than the wounds themselves. They'd also been working to heal him ever since he'd been injured, though he didn't think the scars would be disappearing anytime soon.
"Are you ready to give me your statement now?" Amelia asked once the healer had left the room.
"Sure." Harry shrugged, knowing that there was no avoiding it. He and Sirius had been separated as soon as they were brought to the Ministry and had no chance to come up with a story that let him keep all his secrets. He would have to be truthful. Getting caught lying was worse than telling the truth.
The story was short and took no more than a few minutes to tell, even with Madam Bones asking for clarification every so often. Things only hit a snag once he was approaching the end of his tale.
"....I knew that they wouldn't let Luna's father go even if I gave myself up, but I had to try. My arm didn't actually get burned by one of the Death Eaters spells, but from my own. I was preparing to cast it from the moment I stepped out from under my Invisibility Cloak and released it when their leader started casting the Killing Curse. My spell wasn't ready yet and it backfired."
Bones looked at him shrewdly for a moment before speaking. "Your wand was found on one of the Death Eater's bodies and I've never heard of a spell backfiring like this."
"I didn't use my wand." Harry was hoping that telling her that one important secret would keep her from digging too deeply.
"You expect me to believe that you cast a spell that killed three people without a wand?" She asked skeptically.
Harry simply pointed a finger at a quill that the healer had left behind and sent it looping through the air.
"I've known about my magic since I was six." He explained to the stunned DMLE director. "I had no idea about wands at that point, but I desperately wanted to do magic, so I practiced. I devoted every spare moment to figuring out how to do it on purpose rather than by accident. It took me years before I succeeded, but it's still slower than using a wand."
"The healer said that your arm was burned by cursed fire." Bones said after taking a minute to absorb this revelation. Wandless magic was considered all but impossible in this age. It had been rare in any age.
"He's wrong." Harry stated simply. "A wand acts as both a shortcut and a safety for magic. Casting without one is far more difficult because you need to figure out all the in-between steps that a wand lets you skip. Perhaps even more importantly, casting without a wand means that there is no buffer between the caster and the spell. The Death Eater that I threw my fireball at had made it clear that he was intending to rape and probably murder Luna after her father and I were dead. There was a lot of anger in my spell and that's why it resisted healing." No way was he telling her about the Void and the Dark. Or about his runes for that matter. The Ministry deemed any magic that involved bloodletting illegal.
"I see." Bones said neutrally, looking thoughtful. That was both fascinating and very, very impressive, but she had to put that aside and look at it from a legal point of view. She'd received preliminary reports that the fire had been very difficult to put out and had nearly gone out of control. It had been almost like Fiendfyre. "Why did you choose such a destructive spell?"
"There were too many Death Eaters to fight, so I needed to scare them into running away. A ball of fire slamming into one of their own seemed like my best bet."
"You're probably right." Bones admitted. The Death Eaters had always been quick to turn tail and run if things didn't go their way. "Very ruthless though."
"I'm an Occlumancer." Harry said with a shrug. "I'd pushed away my emotions and made a decision based on pure logic."
Amelia nodded in understanding, not even surprised that he knew Occlumency already. She was no stranger to using the discipline to push aside emotion at need.
"I would appreciate it if you didn't tell anyone that I can do magic without a wand." Harry requested.
"Why?" She asked, honestly curious.
"Because I don't need any more attention being focused on me." True enough, but it was mostly because he wanted to keep the element of surprise that secrecy afforded him for as long as possible. It had undoubtedly saved his life tonight.
That there were four Death Eaters out there that knew about it now was not a comfortable thought. If he was lucky, they would be unable to fathom the idea of him using such powerful magic without a wand and assume that he'd had another one hidden in his sleeve, but he couldn't count on it.
"I suppose it wouldn't matter if I left that out." Amelia conceded. She wouldn't outright lie about it, but she wouldn't explicitly mention that wandless magic had been used. It should be enough. It wouldn't make any difference and it would spare the young man some unwanted attention, which she was willing to give him since the victims of his spell were all Death Eaters.
It was something of an open secret that Amelia Bones hated the fact that so many Death Eaters had dodged prison after Voldemort's fall. Seeing four of the skull masked bastards that had nearly wiped out her family killed wasn't something that she was willing to be especially difficult about, so granting Harry's minor request was no hardship to her. Her irritation with the Pettigrew situation had stemmed almost entirely from the fact that Potter and Black had hid it for months on end.
"Thank you." Harry said sincerely, turning to check on Luna, who was peacefully sleeping in the bed next to him.
"Does she have any family to take care of her?" Amelia asked softly, looking at the sleeping girl. Another thing that had made a good impression on her was Harry's refusal to leave his friend alone.
"No." Harry answered. Luna had told him that she'd never known either of her grandparents. Xeno's parents had died early in his life and Pandora Lovegood hadn't even been from Britain. "I'll take her in."
"Mr Potter, you're a minor yourself. You can't take anyone in." Amelia told him with a sort of dry incredulity.
"Sirius will take her in." Harry amended with the air of someone repeating their previous statement.
"And you've already discussed this with Lord Black?" She asked with an archly raised eyebrow, wondering just what kind of relationship Sirius Black and Harry Potter had. She hadn't failed to notice that the fourteen-year-old had apparently been off on his own with no supervision when the Death Eater attack happened. That coincided with a few other odd moments where Black seemed to just let him do as he pleased.
"No, but he'll agree." Considering that it was his manor that Sirius was living in, he hardly had a choice. Not that Sirius was likely to object in the first place.
"I'll bet he will." Amelia muttered and left the room. She still had to get Black's side of the story, though she didn't expect it to differ much.
XXXXX
In the office of the Minister of Magic, Cornelius Fudge slumped into his padded chair with a heavy sigh.
What a mess. Death Eater activity after nearly thirteen years of silence, targeted at the Boy-Who-Lived no less. The owner of the Quibbler murdered, his child orphaned, property destroyed, otherwise upstanding members of society killed while wearing dark wizard regalia and attacking a national hero. People were going to want answers.
He'd just spent the past several hours putting out the political fires this resurgence in Death Eater activity had caused. There had been enraged and aggrieved family members screaming demands at him to have Potter arrested for murder once the names of the dead were known.
As if he could do that! Wizards in Death Eater robes had assaulted the Boy-Who-Lived and he was supposed to arrest him? Preposterous. The public would eat him alive, no matter how much they insisted that it had been just a prank and that Harry had overreacted. He would have needed to start a defamation campaign before he could arrest Harry Potter and that was simply more trouble than it was worth, not to mention politically dangerous. The dead hadn't even been part of any of the Noble Houses. Purebloods yes, but not nobles.
No, best to just let this whole thing blow over as quietly as possible. He'd lean on the Daily Prophet too and make sure they marginalized the incident as much as possible. That should be the last important thing he had to do tonight, then it was off to bed and a well deserved rest.
So focused was Fudge on making sure that he didn't look bad in the eyes of the public over this debacle, that he forgot that the Quidditch World Cup had been an international event. Not unexpected really, as Barty Crouch had always handled that angle before and done it well despite his humorless, uncharismatic personality.
XXXXX
"Known followers of a British Dark Lord attack an American campsite, destroying property and causing at least two deaths when the space expansion charms collapsed and you call it a misunderstanding?" The American Ambassador asked, his low tone perfectly conveying his anger at the notion.
"Well of course, Mr. Boyer." Dolores Umbridge said with her usual teeth-grindingly fake sweetness. "What else could it be? Surely you aren't insinuating that upstanding British wizards would deliberately attack your...people."
John Boyer, current American Ambassador to the wizards and witches of Britain, Scotland and Ireland, clenched his jaw in fury at the sheer nerve of this pink toad. Not only was she blatantly ignoring the evidence in order to whitewash what had happened, she was also obviously the worst sort of blood purist of the type that Britain seemed to produce so easily. The bigotry practically oozed out of her. People like her had been the reason that the original British magical colonists had joined with their non-magical counterparts and booted Britain and the Goblin Nation off the continent.
A number of Britain's less powerful Noble Houses had made the move to America in the hope that their wealth and power would be able to grow away from the influence of the ancient families in Britain. The goblins had of course come along because of the treaty that gave them control over the magical banking system.
Neither had considered the fact that the many wizards and witches that had chosen an uncertain future on a new continent rather than put up any further with either of them wouldn't be happy to have them along. The Great Pureblood and Goblin Slaughter of 1773 was still celebrated as a holiday on the 16th of May, despite the complaints coming from Britain and the Goblins about celebrating what they considered the mass murder of their people.
"I'm not insinuating anything." Boyer snapped. "I'm telling you that your upstanding British wizards were nothing more than terrorists and I expect the rest of them to be found and thrown in prison."
"Who are you to make demands of the Ministry of Magic?" Umbridge snapped back, bristling with indignation at the nerve of the jumped up mudblood foreigner that thought he could simply order British wizards of fine breeding to be imprisoned for having a little fun.
The argument quickly devolved after that until the American Ambassador stomped away in a rage. As a consequence of this cock up, relations between the Magical Realms of Britain and North America quickly deteriorated to a state not seen in over a hundred years.
It was almost impressive how Umbridge had managed to undo the work of Barty Crouch and three of his predecessors over the course of a single conversation.
XXXXX
A day later.
"You seem a little distracted."
The voice of his girlfriend brought Harry out of his thoughts. He looked towards where she was lying on his chest with a slight frown.
"What makes you say that?"
"Well...." Tonks began. "One, you weren't performing up to your usual standard earlier. Two, you've been staring at nothing for the past five minutes. Three, you've been absently fondling my bum for those same five minutes but you're as soft as sponge despite having gone only one round."
"Okay, so I am a little distracted." Harry admitted. Even his formidable, rune enhanced libido could apparently be overcome by heavy thoughts.
"Worried about your friend?" The Metamorphmagus guessed.
"Yeah, I'm worried about Luna." He sighed.
They had been able to leave the Ministry soon after Sirius was done talking to Amelia Bones. The Ministry's version of social services hadn't put up much of a fuss over assigning Sirius custody of Luna. Harry had in fact gotten the feeling that they were simply glad to have the problem solved expediently.
In the morning, the Dreamless Sleep potion had worn off and Luna had woken up. Harry had tried to talk to her, but the blonde girl had not been very responsive. In fact, she hadn't said a word the whole day, merely looked spaced out and not quite there the whole time. His strange magical sixth sense was telling him that Luna was not in a good place right now, not that one needed a magical sixth sense to figure that out.
Harry did not have the first clue about what to do with a traumatized thirteen-year-old girl. There were no magical psychiatric services, at least not in Britain. Trying to take her to a non-magical therapist was likely to result in either the therapist thinking that she was completely off her rocker or a round of obliviations if the Ministry caught wind of it.
He was seriously considering having Sirius withdraw both of them from Hogwarts, but wasn't sure just yet if that was a good idea since there was no telling whether that would help or hurt the situation.
"Got a few other things on my mind too." He added.
Such as those muggles he'd seen. He didn't imagine that Death Eaters showing up again and causing trouble had made a good impression if they were there to keep an eye on the magical side of things as he'd surmised. Maybe it was time to start thinking of a contingency plan in case he ever had to leave the country in a hurry? It might just be paranoia on his part, but he wasn't feeling altogether secure with Death Eaters suddenly causing trouble, Voldemort lurking out there somewhere, the government essentially being controlled by an oligarchy of rich nobles, a good chunk of which had quite a bit in common with Hitler, Dumbledore playing his own games, his wealth being controlled by a race that hated humans and now learning that the mundane government was up to something too. In fact, putting all of that together made him think that he was actually a little slow on the uptake and should have made contigency plans before now.
He had not enjoyed feeling helpless, or the harsh truth that he'd only survived through a combination of factors that largely boiled down to luck. Now he would have a permanent reminder of his failure on his arm. He had failed to save Luna's father and had nearly died himself to a clumsy assassination attempt made by a group of idiots. Dangerous idiots, but still idiots. Whether someone else had been pulling their strings or not didn't really matter in the immediate sense, what mattered was that he'd very nearly died because he hadn't been prepared to fight. Could he have saved Xeno if he'd been more of a fighter? He'd never know, but he was intending to be a much harder target the next time someone thought they could take a shot at killing him.
"What other things?" Tonks asked.
And then there was Dora, his shapeshifting girlfriend of a month and a half. His first impression of her had been quite correct. She was loads of fun. This summer had so much happening in it that it seemed to last four times longer than normal, but her presence had made it a lot more enjoyable despite the many annoying parts. Now it was coming to a close and Harry found himself once more thinking of Hogwarts as a nuisance. At this point he was only going back for the expansive library and the personal tutoring in Ancient Runes and Arithmancy, but being separated from her for months on end would still suck.
He knew that she'd been reticent about a relationship due to his age, which was hardly something he could begrudge her. He was glad that he'd succeeded in breaking through that problem. Harry wouldn't say that he was in love with her, but he did like her a great deal and had no desire to have their relationship end.
"You." He said with a smile.
"Me? What about me?" She asked curiously.
"Just wondering how I'm going to survive in Hogwarts without you now that my previous batch of mistresses have graduated." He said mournfully.
"You poor baby." She mocked.
"I guess I'll have to sneak out and pay you a visit whenever I can." He mused. How hard could it be? Just find a nice secluded spot, turn into a raven and fly out of the range of the wards.
"And how do you plan to accomplish that?" She asked skeptically, knowing that Hogwarts was locked down during the night.
"It's a secret." Harry teased. "And speaking of secrets, I've got one that I'd like to share with you....if you can keep it to yourself."
"I'm an Auror, of course I can keep a secret." Tonks asserted.
"Watch this then." He said and raised one of his hands in a cupping motion, his newly scarred right hand as it happened since Tonks was laying on the other one.
"Okaaay, what am I watching?" She asked, bemused by his look of concentration.
"Wait for it." He advised.
"Wait for- whoa!" She exclaimed as a small ball of flame burst into life above his palm. "How are you doing that?"
"Magic." Harry replied, much amused. It seemed silly to keep this from her when he'd told Amelia Bones about it.
"But you're doing it without a wand!" Tonks protested, still staring at the mini fireball.
"Well it wouldn't have been a secret if I did it with my wand, now would it?" Harry reasoned and dismissed the bit of fire he'd conjured.
Tonks opened and closed her mouth a few times, unable to find anything to say. Then she just huffed, gave his chest a slap and called him a prat.
"This is actually why I've got this manly scar all the way up to my elbow now." He said with s sigh, turning his hand over. "I didn't have time to stabilize the spell and some of its power backfired on me."
Tonks reached up to lace her fingers with the scarred limb. The burns weren't horribly disfiguring, but definitely noticeable.
"Is wandless magic that dangerous?" She asked, concerned.
"Depends on what you're doing with it." He answered. "Casting a volatile explosive spell in a desperate situation is definitely more dangerous than it would have been with a wand."
Tonks was a bit worried for his safety, but decided not to pester him about it. He seemed to know what he was doing with this and it had probably saved his life anyway. A bit of scarring was a small price to pay in light of that.
"Can you teach me how to do it?" She asked instead.
"I don't know, maybe?" He replied uncertainly. "I've never tried teaching it to anyone. Sirius lost interest after I told him that it took me years to get even the smallest result."
"Good thing that I'm made of sterner stuff than my lazy cousin then." Tonks declared and hoisted herself into a straddling position. "Now, I recall hearing you say that you had more secrets to share."
"I'm not telling you all of my secrets at once." Harry huffed, amused.
"Pretty pleaseeeee!" She wheedled. If his first one was a profficiency for wandless magic, then the others must be really something else.
"No." He refused point blank. His unregistered Animagus transformation, the runes and his connection to the Void and the Sun were all quite a bit illegal and she was an Auror. He might like her, but he wasn't crazy enough to tell her stuff that could see him getting in trouble with the law until he was sure that she wouldn't blab. Dramatic dilemmas between duty and feelings should stay locked in the chest of cliché plot devices where they belonged.
"Tell me or I'll torture it out of you." Tonks threatened.
Harry gave her his most sarcastic look, silently declaring his skepticism over her statement.
"Don't believe me, huh?" She asked rhetorically before thrusting out her chest. "Fine then, prepare to get smothered in boobs!"
"Wha?" Was Harry's most intelligent reply as he watched his girlfriend's normally B-cup chest balloon into E-cup range and show no signs of stopping. Then he could say nothing at all as the mass of titflesh covered his face.
"You secrets or your life!" Tonks declared with an evil cackle, hugging his head to prevent him from escaping the mammary prison.
Harry was of course unable to reply. In fact, he hadn't even heard what she'd said. It didn't matter though. Even this inventive new form of torture wasn't enough to pry out his secrets. The activity did wake up his libido though.
XXXXX
The next night.
Harry awoke when he felt someone crawl into bed with him. Tonks wasn't spending the night today and this person was too small in any case.
Not to mention that only one magical presence had this distinct flavor to it.
"Luna?"
"Yes, Harry?" The blonde girl asked dreamily.
"Why are you in my bed?"
"I felt lonely and you said that you would do anything you could for me." Luna answered.
He had indeed said that, though he hadn't been expecting her to come cuddle him. Maybe he should have. Well whatever, at least she wasn't staring at the walls as if she could see through them.
"Um, why are you naked though?"
"The same reason as you."
That was a fair point, Harry conceded. Sleeping was indeed best done naked. Or it would have been a fair point if she was in her own bed. Luna probably didn't have the best of grasps on the implications of being naked in bed with another person though, so he couldn't be too surprised.
He felt his manhood stirring at the proximity of a naked female, the disobedient organ blatantly ignoring the fact that he had no intention of sticking it in this particular naked female.
Harry grimaced. Lose-lose situation. He could either be uncomfortably aroused or he could ask Luna to leave.
He sighed. Uncomfortably aroused it was.
"Teeny?" He called.
"Yes, Harry Potter sir?" The house elf whispered loudly as soon as she popped in.
"Could you get me some pajama bottoms?"
Teeny nodded convulsively and popped away, reappearing a moment later with a pair of dark blue silk pants.
"Thank you, Teeny, you're the best." Harry sighed as he pulled on the sleepwear. He'd not used it much since he'd discovered the joys of sleeping in the nude.
The house elf squeaked in pleasure at the compliment and popped away again, leaving Harry shaking his head at the strangeness of the little creatures.
"You don't have to wear pajamas on my account, I don't mind if your penis pokes me in the bum." Luna said once he'd settled back down.
"Somehow, I'm not surprised." Harry said wryly and pulled his friend into a spooning position. He didn't even bother asking if she would like some PJ's herself. He knew her well enough to know that she'd turn him down, utterly oblivious to the fact that it would be for his benefit more than hers.
Luna wiggled around until she found a comfortable position. Harry bit his lip as her tiny butt and still somewhat bony hips rubbed against his erection. Maybe silk pajamas hadn't been such a grand idea. If it was anyone but her, he'd think she was doing this on purpose.
At long last, she settled down. With his silk wrapped tool nestled between the crack of her arse and his scarred arm clutched in between her budding breasts.
Harry took a deep breath to calm down and remind himself that he had a girlfriend already, that Luna wasn't messing with him deliberately(probably), was grieving for her father(definitely) and was only thirteen despite having started puberty already(somewhat hippocritically since he himself was only fourteen, magical super puberty aside).
They spent the next few minutes in silence, with Luna slowly running her fingers over arm that he was holding her with and Harry trying to force his libido into submission with meditation. It was an uphill battle.
"I miss daddy." Luna said out of the blue, her previously vacant, spaced out tone replaced with deep sadness. She didn't burst into tears as he'd half expected, but the sense of emotional pain wasn't any weaker for it.
Having no idea what else to do, Harry hugged her tighter. "You'll always have me."
"You promise?" She asked hopefully.
Harry rather cynically thought that he couldn't promise not to be murdered, since it wasn't really up to him. He could have quite easily joined Luna's father if the Death Eaters weren't cowardly enough to scatter at the first sign of resistance. He could also have been mourning Sirius if the masked twats weren't so incompetent. Hell, the lot of them could be dead.
But he couldn't say that to Luna right now. "I promise." It cost him nothing to make the promise. It wasn't as if anyone would be able to do anything about it if he couldn't keep it after all. Damn I'm gloomy.
She didn't say anything back, but Harry got the sense that she felt a little better. That was something at least.
XXXXX
Two days later.
Luna crept towards Harry's room, completely naked yet again. She figured that he and Tonks had stopped having sex and gone to sleep by now. Her father's death still felt like an aching hole in her chest and she hadn't been able to sleep. Cuddling up to Harry the other night had helped, but it would have been rude to show up before they were done.
Silently, she opened the door and peeked inside. No movement or moaning. The only sound was a quiet snore. Good.
With the same silence, she crept towards the bed and checked for a spot to cuddle. Harry was on his back, with Tonks pressed into his left side. That was perfect, she could take the right without getting in the way.
As carefully as possible, she slipped beneath the light slik sheets and cuddled into Harry's left side. She froze when he grumbled something in his sleep, but smiled when his arm went around her waist. As a final touch, she mimicked Tonks' leg positioning and swung her own leg over Harry's, accidentally sliding it over the Auror's in the process. Tonks had much smoother legs than Harry.
XXXXX
Harry awoke at sunrise feeling a bit...off. And what was all this blonde hair in his face? Dora wasn't blonde often, especially not in the morning.
A closer examination revealed that the strangeness was due to there being two bodies on him today instead of just one. Which would of course mean that the blonde hair probably didn't belong to his girlfriend.
Harry sighed quietly. He wasn't even surprised that Luna wouldn't be deterred by something as trivial as another woman already being in bed with him. This could be akward.
Ah well, might as well get it over with. His bladder wouldn't let him delay for long anyway.
He gave his girlfriend a shake, getting only some disgruntled noises in return. He continued shaking her until she woke up.
"Ngghhh." Tonks said eloquently, leaving a line of slobber on his chest.
"Dora, wake up." Harry told her quietly.
"G'back t' sleephhh." She slurred.
"Dora." Harry said more insistently.
"N'sex. Wank it." She insisted sleepily.
Harry rolled his eyes in amused exasperation. Tonks was definitely not a morning person.
"Doooraaaaa~." He sing-songed, persistently running his fingers over her back.
Tonks let out an aggravated groan and raised her head with what appeared to be a titanic effort, squinting at him with bleary eyes. Then she caught sight of the other female and started blinking in utter bafflement.
"Whazzat?" She asked, apparently unable to process this early in the morning.
"That would be Luna Lovegood. You met her yesterday." Harry explained, vastly amused by her confusion.
Tonks continued to stare and blink at the other female for a good ten seconds, something critical not computing.
"Why'sere?" She finally asked.
"Let's ask her, shall we?" Harry said and started shakin Luna awake.
It didn't take nearly the amount of effort to wake her as it took with Tonks. Luna looked up, clearly also a bit bleary but not nearly as addled as Tonks.
"Good morning, Harry, Nymphadora." She greeted.
"Morning." Harry returned with a resigned fondness. Luna would be Luna.
Tonks was still too sleep addled to even take umbrage at the use of her first name, but she did start getting her wits together.
Harry and Luna waited patiently while the Metamorphmagus rubbed the heel of her palm into her eyes to clear out the gunk. Once she was done, and her vision consisted of something more than blurry shapes, she looked between the two teenagers and asked the all important question.
"What's going on?"
"I couldn't sleep." Luna explained.
"So you decided to come sleep with us?" Tonks asked for the sake of clarification.
Luna nodded.
"Naked?"
"Mhm."
"Right." Tonks concluded. "You got anything to add here, Harry?"
"I really need to use the loo." Harry admitted.
Both females wordlessly slid off him so that he could amble towards the adjoined bathroom, not even bothering to cover up. It all seemed quite redundant at this point.
A silence descended that was akward for Tonks alone. As for Luna.....
"Are you going to have morning sex?" She asked, taking an interested glance at the sex swing hanging nearby.
"Not now we aren't." The Auror said a bit sourly. Despite her zombie-like wake ups, she actually enjoyed morning sex. It was a great way of starting the day and she could always go back to sleep right after if she felt like it, which she often did since Harry usually kept her up pretty late with his crazy stamina.
"Oh." Luna said, sounding very disappointed. "I was hoping I could watch." Her parents had let her watch back when they had both still been alive.
Tonks gaped at the little blonde voyeur, completely stunned by the admission. How was she even supposed to respond to that?
Eventually she managed to close her mouth and decided to tackle a different issue. "Luna, you can't just crawl into bed with people."
"Why?" Luna asked, cocking her head and giving the Auror an unblinking stare. She didn't understand what the problem was. Harry was a friend, she hadn't interrupted their sex and didn't get in the way.
"You just....can't." Tonks sputtered, unsure of how to really argue her point. "It just isn't done."
"But why not?"
Tonks once more scrambled for a response and decided to go on the offensive instead. A good offense is the best defense and all that.
"Do you always crawl into someone else's bed when you can't sleep?"
"I did when mum died, but I don't have daddy anymore either." Luna said sadly.
Nothing to start the day like a nice big pile of guilt and shame. Tonks thought to herself with a wince.
"Could you at least put on some clothes if you're going to do it?" She asked in a resigned tone, knowing full well that she'd just tacitly ceded victory to the strange little blonde.
"Why would I wear clothes for sleeping?" Luna asked, looking genuinely confused at the notion of sleeping with clothes on.
"Because it's not right to sleep naked next to someone you aren't in a relationship with?" Tonks suggested uncertainly, now wary of the young girl's strange logic twists.
"What's wrong about it?"
Tonks opened her mouth to reply, but came up empty. She couldn't for the life of her name a single reason why sleeping naked next to someone was wrong, aside from the sexual connotations that were notably absent here. It was even worse because Luna just looked honestly curious. Based on this and what she'd learned from Harry, she was getting the distinct feeling that the Lovegoods hadn't had much in the way of taboos and had certainly not taught any to their daughter. Trying to instill them into Luna now would be an exercise in futility and not really something that Tonks was willing to attempt.
"It would just be more comfortable for Harry and me if you wore something." She finally said instead of answering the question.
"But Harry didn't seem to mind a couple of days ago." Luna reasoned.
Tonks' hair turned a slightly darker shade of red. Harry hadn't mentioned that Luna had done this before.
"Just wear some clothes ." She sighed.
"Okay." Luna nodded in agreement. She figured that sleeping in a pair of panties wouldn't be too bad for the times when Tonks was staying over. "What about watching you have sex?"
Tonks groaned, a flush working itself up her neck at the uncomfortable directness of blonde's questions. "No, Luna, you can't watch us have sex."
"Why not?"
"Why would you even want to watch us have sex?" The Auror asked, rubbing her forehead and wondering if her current headache was a result of too little sleep, dehydration or the conversation.
"I've always wanted to watch Harry have sex." Luna admitted, not just shamelessly, but also completely oblivious to the fact that there was anything to be ashamed of.
"Why?" Tonks pressed on fatalistically, figuring that she might as well go all the way down the rabbit hole.
"I only got to watch my parents do it before." Luna explained. "I'd like to see how different it is with other people."
Interesting parenting strategy. Tonks thought to herself sarcastically. "The answer is still no."
"Okay." Luna conceded dejectedly. She'd really been looking forward to it too.
Tonks found herself feeling absurdly guilty for not letting the younger girl indulge her vouyeristic pursuits. The whole conversation was too weird for this hour in the morning.
Fortunately, she was saved from any further awkwardness when Harry came out of the bathroom, wrapped in a bathrobe and his hair still wet from a shower. He took one look at the dejected looking Luna and the conflicted looking Tonks and frowned in consternation. Had they been arguing? He'd deliberately removed himself from the situation because he figured it would be easier for the two of them to talk without him there. And also because he had no idea how to tell his girlfriend that he didn't have the heart to tell Luna to stay away at night.
"What did I miss?"
XXXXX
The last few days of the summer holidays passed without incident and the time to return to Hogwarts came about all too soon. Luna still had times when she blanked out, but she seemed to be happy about going back. Harry wasn't. Going back to the castle just didn't hold the appeal it used to. It was too restrictive.
But he was going anyway. For Luna's sake and for what little use he still had for the Hogwarts curriculum. He was still intending to find a way to ditch the school early though.
There was just one thing that needed to be done before going back.
"You want me to do what?" Penny asked, bemused.
"I want you to research how muggleborns are seen in the other magical communities." Harry repeated patiently.
"Why the sudden interest?" The former Ravenclaw asked curiously.
"Just something I was thinking about a while ago." Mostly a worry about the number of bitter wizards and witches the mundane governments could potentially recruit. It might be just paranoia, but he didn't think that could end well if he was right.
"Alright, I can do that." Penny said thoughtfully. "Where am I supposed to start though?"
"Not a clue." Harry shrugged. "Maybe there are magical Ambassadors from other countries somewhere in Britain? It's not especially time sensitive, so feel free to take your time. I'd also like you to thoroughly research the procedure for transfering money from Gringotts to another bank."
"I get the feeling that this is a bit more important than you're making it out to be." She said with a frown.
"It might be." Harry admitted. "Or it might be nothing. Right now it's just a hunch and a bad feeling, that's why I need you to do this for me."
Penny agreed to do it and didn't press any further, for which Harry was thankful. He didn't want to share his suspicions until he had something more solid. Even Penny's research wouldn't really confirm anything. To do that he'd need to actively spy on the mundane government, which wasn't something that he was really intending to do. Frankly, he wasn't so attached Wizarding Britain in its current form that he would bother taking risks to protect it.
He would however like to have a heads up if things were going to go sideways.