tarie
in
sunandsmut
Gift fic for FloraHart!
TO: Florahart
FROM: ANONYMOUS
TITLE: Shelter
WORD COUNT: 8352
PAIRING: Luna/Viktor
RATING: NC-17
SUMMARY: Over the course of the war, Viktor has several memorable encounters with Luna Lovegood.
WARNINGS: None, except possible tooth decay at the end
KINKS USED: Awkward but ultimately satisfying sex, conversation, complications and misunderstandings, first times, desperation, partially-clothed sex, plot.
DISCLAIMER: Not my characters. Never will be.
AUTHOR NOTES: Thanks to E for the beta and to I for listening and encouraging. To my recipient: You have provided me with countless hours of enjoyment as a reader. I hope this one is an adequate testament of my admiration.
The first time he noticed her was at a wedding. Although, he might never have given her a second glance her had she not approached him first. He was sitting there, apart from the crowd, wondering what he was doing there. Really, he hardly knew the bride, and the groom even less. He knew the two best friends of the groom’s youngest brother; in fact he had even kissed one of them. The other he had competed against and come to admire his courage.
But those two-those three, actually, seemed uninterested in catching up with old acquaintances or would-be lovers. Their bodies were present, but their minds were elsewhere, and any hopes that Viktor had had of sweeping the clever young English girl with the fire in her eyes off her feet were soon given up as a lost cause. He had never understood the dynamic of those three. It might have been understandable if it had been some sort of a sexual thing, but somehow he doubted it. They were more like a team, he decided, each of them always aware of the other two, speaking without words, having the same goal in mind.
Viktor understood teams, even though on his own team he sometimes felt like a man apart, always above the activity, with a task of his own that was completely separate from the goals of his teammates. Oh, they carried him on their shoulders as the game was won; they patted him on the back and raised their glasses to him. But genuine comradery was something he hadn’t felt since school. And even then, he was kept apart. His Headmaster’s pampered pet, his prize to be displayed. Karkaroff had let him down in the end. A coward, running off and leaving his charges in foreign hands. A pawn, never quite choosing loyalties. And pawns were easily disposable, were they not?
And so Viktor had made his solitary way in the world-a celebrity, and the crown prince of his country’s magical community. And still he was alone, because every one around him only wanted to grab a piece of his glory. No true friends, no real love. His parents, simple and old-fashioned, were unable to understand the life that their son had been thrust into. They loved him, but they did not know him.
But he had belonged, once-for a very brief moment, at that school in the Scottish mountains, when he had been one of four, and then, sadly, one of three. And so, when the invitation arrived to be part of that trio again, to be able to speak of the fear and devastation of losing one of their own, of finding out they had been pawns in someone else’s game, to renew promises of lifelong friendship, he had come at once. He did not regret it as he sat alone, apart, separated from the happy throng by barriers of language, of celebrity, of the horrors that most of the group had witnessed in the years since he had seen them. He did not understand it, but it was relatively easy to spot the groom’s ravaged face and the pain in the eyes of so many, even the young-especially the young, who should have been thinking of nothing more than who they should dance with and whether or not to find a chance to break away and kiss in the shadows.
As he sat alone at his table on the outskirts, watching Hermione as she became more and more dazzled by the redheads that led her in turn to the dance floor-dazzled, but never taking her eyes off her two best friends for long-he thought about these things, and found his musings interrupted by the presence of a small girl. Or at least he took her for a girl, appearing suddenly as if she has just made a silent Apparition. The long, wavy hair was decidedly girlish, and the shimmering robes just a little too showy for anyone but an adolescent. But when she turned to him, watching him speculatively, he discovered that her eyes seemed years older than the rest of her face.
“You’re Viktor Krum,” she said, and the question (or was it even a question?), though one he’d heard hundreds of times, was asked with such sobriety, such sincerity, that he was taken aback. She didn’t seem discouraged by his lack of response. Instead, she sat there staring out at the crowd, finally observing, “You don’t really fit in here, do you?”
Viktor did not know how to reply. It was certainly an accurate statement, but also one he could easily have taken offense at.
She continued, “I don’t fit in anywhere-but they do try to include me-at least now.”
“Vy now?” he asked before he could stop himself.
“Haven’t you noticed?” she said in an airy, almost ethereal voice. “We’re all in the same fight now. They need all the support they can get.”
“A fight?” he asked, even though it had been obvious from the moment he arrived.
“You were there,” she said. “At the beginning. When he came back-you saw what he did.”
“Vat who did?”
“The one who killed your Headmaster, of course,” she replied.
“My Headmaster vas a coward,” Viktor spat. “He died running avay.”
“My Headmaster died at the hand of a friend,” Luna said, shaking her head sadly. “But it was all part of the same plan, wasn’t it?”
He stared at her for a long moment. Who was this odd child/woman, and what did she want from him? They always had an agenda, didn’t they?”
“I must be going,” he said, pushing his chair back, but her hand on his arm stopped him. The movement was so unexpected that he felt a jolt of what seemed like electricity radiating from her light touch.
“Don’t you want to find out why they invited you?”
Viktor scowled. “Ve shared much in our months of competition. I vill alvays remember my Trivisard friends.” Secretly, he believed that the self-absorbed bride wanted a bit of celebrity to spice up her guest list, but he wasn’t going to admit this to the strange person with the unnerving stare who managed to ask astoundingly personal questions without seeming to blink.
“Stay,” she said simply. “Stay and listen with an open mind when they talk to you. You have to take a stand now, before what has ruined things here comes to devastate your country. It’s only a matter of time.”
“I don’t-” he started.
“I’m sure you read the English papers for months after you left here. Years, maybe,” she said, and he couldn’t deny it. “You know what we’re up against, and you can help. More than you could ever imagine.” With that, she left, seeming to float away with the evening breeze.
Viktor shook his head in bewilderment, but couldn’t seem to leave his seat. Sure enough, moments later, the bride and groom came to sit beside him, laughing, and talking, and kissing each other embarrassingly, while the groom’s father spoke to him in an undertone-his manner calm, his face pleasant and forgettable, but his words chilling to the bone. They needed him. They needed his ability to travel freely, virtually unnoticed, his connections, and the power that came with his notoriety. He marveled later at the brilliance of their plan, but lost a little respect for them for choosing a remarkably effective child/woman to soften him up. Perhaps they remembered his attentions to a fourteen-year-old English girl-his courtly, almost completely innocent attentions, of course, but they didn’t necessarily know that. Viktor was no pedophile. He recognized in Hermione Granger an old soul, not unlike himself. And he’d seen it too in the unearthly blonde girl, whose name he somehow had never caught.
He had trouble pushing her from his mind over the next year or so. He played; bringing glory to his national team, keeping his personal life above reproach. Occasionally he would meet with some strange foreigner or another, with notes to pass on or instructions to follow. Information was a precious commodity. He wondered, sometimes, if he was doing the right thing, but kept his eyes open, reading the English papers as well as the Bulgarian ones, and he worried about the people he’d met at the wedding, particularly the ethereal girl who’d seen right through him.
One rainy February day, he found the trio he had watched so carefully at the wedding on his very own doorstep, wretched and tired and desperate for his help. Naturally, he did everything he could, finding them a safe place to stay completely unconnected with himself, giving them money despite their protests. He stopped in on them as much as he dared, given his high profile, and they seemed to be recovering, but they also seemed to be working on something very secret. He offered to help in any way he could, but other than a few intriguing question about Durmstrang, they didn’t seem to need him much.
During this time, he saw her again. He would have recognized her anywhere, even though she was dressed as one of those Muggle backpacking students who prowled about Eastern Europe every summer. He saw her at the edge of a crowd, fixing him with that unblinking stare. Once she caught his eye, she looked pointedly at the building across the street, a nondescript Muggle hotel with a restaurant attached.
It took some time for him to break away. How she had managed to infiltrate a press conference, he didn’t know. The reporters that followed him doggedly on most days were unfortunately more persistent than normal that day. He finally wound up having to go back to his own home and Apparate to the alley next to the hotel. He hoped he hadn’t missed her, or worse yet, misinterpreted her signal. Or, perhaps he had imagined the entire incident.
But there she sat in a corner booth, and he felt an odd wave or relief and excitement as he spotted her long hair from the corner of his eye. “Hello,” he said, feeling exceedingly foolish. You still don’t even know her name.
She met his eyes, and though her expression was friendly he could see that somehow her eyes carried more sadness, more wisdom than before.
“Hello again,” she said. “Thank you for meeting me.”
‘I’m not-Did you vant something, or vas this just…vat is word…co-vinsidance? “
She smiled then, and he wondered if he’d seen her do it before. It completely transformed her face.
“Yes, I decided to take a holiday in Bulgaria while a war is on. And while I’m here, why not look up the only Bulgarian I know, who happens to be a celebrity and rather difficult to find.”
It took him a moment to realize that she was joking. There was certainly not a lot of laughter in her eyes to back it up. “No,” he said, “is not likely.”
The waitress came up to the table then, glancing over the pair with little interest. It should have been a common enough scene, two young people having a tasteless meal in a tourist trap of a restaurant, thinking they were experiencing the local culture.
He wasn’t certain of her plans-did she want him to share a meal with her here, or was this just a starting off point? She seemed to read his mind as she turned to him and said, “I don’t know my way around the menus here yet. Why don’t you order us some drinks and we’ll see.”
The waitress turned to Viktor with a sigh, clearly changing her assumption to a local boy, trying to get somewhere with the naïve English tourist. He ordered quickly, anxious to get her out of the way so that he could work out what the girl across from him wanted.
“Vat is your name?” he finally asked.
“Luna Lovegood,” she replied.
“Is nice-pretty. Like the moon. Is fitting you, I think.” He hadn’t expected that to faze her. She watched him with puzzlement in her eyes, not uttering another word until the waitress set down their glasses of boza irritably. He dismissed her, watching as Luna took a drink, holding the liquid in her mouth for a moment experimentally before swallowing. “Is good?” he asked.
“Yes, she replied. “Different. It is alcoholic?’
“Just little bit,” he replied. “Very mild.”
She continued to sip her drink, and while he grew increasingly anxious, she seemed to grow calmer. As he saw the waitress begin to approach again, he decided to ask, “Ve vill stay to eat, or no? I take you someplace, food is better, if you like.”
“No,” she said, “I want you to come upstairs to my room.”
He felt his jaw drop open. Surely she couldn’t mean…
In a daze, he asked the waitress for their bill once she arrived.
His mind raced as he followed her into the creaky elevator with its fake wooden panels and bits of international graffiti carved into it. It wasn’t as though this was an unusual occurrence. Viktor was used to bald invitations from Quidditch groupies all the time. He just didn’t see her in that light, though-there had to be something more to it. Still, she led the way into her room, where he felt a noticeable current on his skin as he passed through powerful wards. The only attempts to distinguish this from any typical chain hotel room were the gypsy fabrics on the curtain and bedspreads, and the local photographs framed on the walls.
“Is nice,” he lied, looking out the window at the dingy alley below.
“No, it isn’t,” she replied. “But it will do.”
Viktor turned to her, unable to resist asking, “Vat is it you vant from me? “
“Just a minute,” she said, walking to the window and closing the curtains. She reached behind her, and for a breathless moment he thought she might be removing an article of clothing, but she came away with a wand in her hand, which she used to tap at various surfaces around the room. He stood watching her, completely bewildered.
“Sit down,” she said, rummaging through her backpack and pulling out a white rectangle with two small holes in the center, which he recognized as one of those objects the Muggles used to store music. She tapped it once with her wand, and it tuned into a small folded parchment.
“It’s for Harry,” she finally said. “Information he requested from the Order. I understand you’d be able to get it to him.”
Realization dawned, and Viktor felt rather foolish. Sitting down weakly on the bed, he said, “Yes, of course. But how did you know…?”
“I don’t know,” she corrected. “I don’t want to know. It’s rather crucial that no one can connect me to him.”
“Yes,” he said, nodding. I vill be…stealthy…no, discreet is the vord. I will guard this very carefully. Thank you, Luna.”
As he began to rise, stuffing the letter into his pocket, she stopped him. “No, please don’t go. Not yet, anyway. If anyone is watching…Well, it would look suspicious, you see. At least if you stay, it will look like…” She broke off, and a faint blush stained her cheeks.
“Oh, I see,” he said. “Of course.” Not knowing what else to do, he got up to use her bathroom. When he returned, she was lying on the single bed, watching the Muggle television in the dim room. He sat down stiffly on the chair across from her. She was changing the channels of the Muggle contraption that even he could tell was rather ancient with her wand.
“They’ve come up with a sort of wand that does this for them,” she explained. “But this room doesn’t have one.”
“You…like television?” he asked.
“No, not really, she said. “But we do have time to spare, so…”
For a few long moments, she flipped around the channels, finally settling on a football match broadcast in Spanish. He wondered if she’d left it on for his benefit. He’d lost interest what little interest he’d ever had in Muggle sports long ago, finding them far too one-dimensional for his enjoyment. Taking a chance, he rose and sat down on the corner of the bed next to her. “Ve talk instead-is good?”
Luna looked over at him in surprise, lowering the volume of the television. “Yes, of course. What would you like to talk about?”
“You tell me about yourself, about English var-what I don’t read in newspapers? Is worse than I think, perhaps?”
Luna sighed. “Yes, far worse, I imagine. Our numbers are not good. Most people are too afraid to take a stand.”
“And the school, do you still attend?”
She shook her head sadly. “No, I left early. There wasn’t much point, though I tried for nearly a year after Professor Dumbledore died…”
“And now? Vat is it you do?”
“I work for my father, mostly. But I do things for the Order as much as possible.”
“How old are you?” he asked, burning with curiosity.
“Eighteen,” she replied.
“So much sadness in your eyes for one so young,” he said. “War should not be fought by children.”
“I’ve seen terrible things,” she said. “I haven’t been a child for a very long time.”
At that, she stared at the moving figures on the screen for a time. He felt like offering her comfort, but didn’t know how she would respond. There was a stillness about her that he found puzzling.
“This Veasley man-the one who spoke to me? He said that this var-it vill spread until it covers our vorld. People here, they visper, shake their heads about the news from England, but do nothing. They should have learned-sixty years ago-vas similar. This evil, is like monster-tentacles-vat is vord? Slithering, insidious.”
“Yes,” Luna said, her eyes glittering in the reflection of the television.
Impulsively, he reached out to take her hand, and then withdrew it. For some reason, it was important that she did not think he was the kind of man who would try to turn a situation like this to his advantage. She turned to give him a long, speculative look. Then, to his utter amazement, she sat up and kissed him-a kiss that seemed at first to be as light and inconsequential as a butterfly brushing past his lips, but it grew in intensity until he found himself shaken to the core. As she pulled away, she lowered her eyes, murmuring an apology in a voice he had to strain to hear.
Viktor would have none of it, though. He pulled up her chin, willing her to see the need in his eyes. “Is my pleasure,” he said. “You are beautiful girl. I think, perhaps, ve understand each other.”
He bent to kiss her again. The kiss was meant to soothe, to reassure, but he found her so welcoming, so generous with her responses that he very quickly found his body betraying his good intentions.
“Lovely girl,” he murmured against her ear, and within a few startling minutes, found himself the victim of a sensual assault: of soft lips that unerringly found his weakest points, of strong, silky limbs sliding against and wrapping around him and fumbling fingers tearing away her clothes, and his. He tried to slow her down, but she seemed almost desperate for physical connection.
Perhaps it ought to have registered that her movements were inexpert, but he wanted to believe that she was as astounded by the sudden heat between them as he was-that she forgot any skill she might have previously learned. Certainly, she didn’t give him much of a chance to display any finesse, and her enthusiasm left him very little room for conscious thought.
But sensations, those he doubted he’d ever forget: the warmth of her hand on his cock, the way her finger traveled over the expanse of his back, tracing the line of his spine, only to rest halfway into the cleft of his buttocks, the way her breasts felt under his calloused hands, the high pitched whine she made as he took a nipple in his mouth, those absurd, garishly-coloured knickers and how damp she had been under them, the way her mouth formed a perfect ‘O’ when he dragged his thumb across her clit, and the way his whole body shook as he plunged into the wet heat of her body.
Eventually his sanity returned, of course. He caught his breath and looked down at the girl who was clinging to him, her hair a tangled, sweaty mess, her body slick with perspiration, her pale skin nearly blue in the flickering light of the television. When he reached down to brush her hair away from her cheek, he noticed the tears in her eyes. For some reason, he felt an urge to apologize, but instead he pulled her chin up to look at her more closely. “Is good, no? Ve-you are vell with this? Not to regret?”
“No,” she said, touching his face hesitantly. “I’m a little sore, but I don’t mind.”
“Sore?” he asked. Sometimes the English language-and its words with multiple meanings-gave him trouble. “I vas too hard…?” No, that wasn’t right, he knew. “Rough?”
“No, you were fine,” she said, with an odd little laugh. “I wanted rough, I think. If I’d wanted gentle, I might have chosen someone else.”
“Chosen?” There was something about her that made him think that he would have had trouble comprehending her even if there hadn’t been a language barrier between them. To him, it had seemed a purely spontaneous act.
“For my first,” she said simply.
“First?” he breathed, with a dawning horror growing in him. “Not-not your first…lover?”
“Yes,” she said, giving him a soft smile and turning her back to him, inserting one of her feet between his calves.
Viktor groaned. “But…but I never think-you should have told me. I vould have-”
“Made too much of it, probably,” she said with a sigh. “Felt like you owed me something.”
Viktor shook his head vehemently. “Made it better for you-made it…” Gentle, he wanted to say, but she had already managed to diminish that word’s effectiveness. “Easier-to give you pleasure…to make special…unforgettable.”
She turned onto her back and looked up at the darkened ceiling, giving out an odd little laugh. “I’m not likely to forget this, am I? And besides, who makes these rules, anyway? It’s not as though you love me or anything, is it? But you did want me, and that was enough. Perhaps I like that kind of power-knowing that I made the great Viktor Krum tremble.”
He felt a twinge of disgust. This was something that he’d had some experience with, after all.
But-he remembered what he’d noticed in her remarkable eyes when he had kissed her in return-the longing he had seen there.
It was self-preservation. Somehow he was certain of it. His initial impression of her-the loneliness, the sad, otherworldly eyes-returned in full force. He stood up abruptly and went to the bathroom attached to the room.
When he returned with the objects he had sought, he found Luna buried under the covers, her face turned toward the window, her back to him. Whatever doubt he’d had left over was erased. This was self-preservation if he’d ever seen it. He set down his burdens carefully, hesitantly touching her shoulder. “Luna. Please vil you look at me?”
After an agonizingly long delay, she turned again to her back, but once again avoided his eyes, looking up at the ceiling.
“You think you are the first to give me invitation like this? To hotel room, I mean-though you do not know me. But you are first in very long time I accept. I think-thought of you since that vedding. I vondered vy you spoke to me. At first, I think you work for these-this Order; to test me, prepare me. But I think perhaps you had other reasons. Like you see something. Not unlike a mirror. You feel very alone, yes? I see this, the last time we speak. Ve feel like outsiders, like drifting-vith no control of our lives. Disconnected-from people most of all. You are remarkable girl-woman-much to offer, but few can see this. That is vy I follow you here. That is vy I make love to you. You make me tremble because you give me pleasure. I vanted to give pleasure to you.”
Luna turned to him, fixing him with the full force of that penetrating gaze of hers. It seemed to him that she could do what Legilimens only wished they could do. It was as if she could see his soul, with all its flaws and finer points laid bare.
She didn’t give him any sort of answer, just reached out to touch his hand. In response, he leant down to kiss her gently, pulling away to search her eyes, encouraging her to open up to him and not just with her body, though he was hoping for that too. He cupped her cheek, kissing her forehead, her nose, her chin, murmuring under his breath in Bulgarian endearments, waiting for her body to relax under his. When it did-when her arms slid around him again, when he felt those soft lips that had driven him mad earlier begin to nibble along his sharp chin, he felt something very much like the moment that he had felt the snitch in his hand at the World Cup. He leaned over her on one elbow, drawing the sheet down to reveal her body little by little, kissing random bits of luminous skin as it was revealed to him.
“This light,” he said. “Is not right. Is too cold.” He reached for his discarded wand, shutting off the television and conjuring a candle onto the nightstand. Afterwards, he reached for the plastic ice bucket he had brought in, drawing from it a warm wet washcloth. He parted her legs, pressing the cloth against her intimately, doing his best to soothe the ache he had caused, cleaning away the sticky mess. She sucked in a breath as she watched him, closing her hand over his, at first, he thought, to stop him, but then to encourage him to continue. When he began to use his fingers to stimulate, rather than to soothe, she dropped her head back on the pillow, sighing in response. When he lowered his mouth to her, she moaned, slipping her fingers into his hair, wrapping silky thighs around him as if in encouragement.
He drew the experience out for as long as he could, every now and then pausing to raise his head and get another look at her. The best parts were when she met his eyes with her own remarkable ones-watching him with a mixture of passion and wonder, her hand gripping her own breast reflexively, his fingers buried inside her, slick and hot and utterly perfect.
And when she finally clenched around his tongue, tugging on his hair reflexively, crying out his name, it was better than having an entire stadium full of screaming fans. He meant to simply pull her close afterward, letting her drift off to sleep in his arms, but she rose above him, taking him deep inside, riding him like a woman possessed, still twitching from the aftershocks of the pleasure he had given her, and he was lost.
When he woke up the next morning, she had completely disappeared.
------------------------
The next time he saw her was at the Quidditch finals in Prague. Again, he spotted her in a crowd, but this time she had a press badge and was speaking to a diminutive photographer, who was busy taking pictures of the stadium. When she spotted Viktor, she smiled and waved.
He could only manage a quick word with her, as eagle-eyed reporters were everywhere around them. They made arrangements to meet at a nearby bar, and he found himself shaking with nerves as he got dressed. It was ridiculous, he knew, but their last encounter had left him foundering a bit.
She’d arrived before him, and sat at the bar sipping a ridiculously elaborate drink-pink, purple and blue liquor adorned with twirling umbrellas stuck into a slice of pineapple and a flamingo-shaped straw. He would have preferred to sit in a corner booth as he had things to say and didn’t want them overheard, but decided not to ask for too much. She struck him as…elusive, but perhaps that was because she had disappeared so suddenly last time.
He sat down next to her and was about to greet her, but the look on her face effectively silenced him. A moment later, the bartender approached. Viktor chose a drink strong enough to hopefully numb some of the warring emotions he was feeling.
Once the drink was brought, she turned to him. “How are you?” she asked, and than sent him into a tailspin by adding, “I’ve thought about you, from time to time.”
“I’m…I am vell…the team-vell, obviously, ve are having success. I vorry about you, Luna. The news from England…is alvays bad. You vil tell me the truth, is there hope?”
She looked at him for a long time, and he saw that her eyes looked even older than they had seemed the last time. What had happened to her since that night in the cheap hotel room? She said she thought about him; did she miss him? What would she do if he asked her to stay, here, out of immediate danger? Would she consider it, if it meant staying with him?
Her next words stifled any offer of the kind he might have made. “It’s bad-very bad. But there are small victories. We are gaining people on our side faster than the Death Eaters can dispose of them. And there are things going on, unseen by most, that may just …well, it could turn things up on end.”
He reached out to touch the hand she’d rested on the bar. For a long moment, it was completely still under his, but she eventually turned it slightly until it was clasped with his. He felt his heart race, and tried to think of something to say that wouldn’t make him sound like a lovesick boy. “You are part of the press, no?”
“Yes,” she said. “My father has a paper, and I work for him. It gives me a viable excuse for all the traveling I do.”
“Oh,” he said, nodding in understanding. “And the man you vere talking to-he does same sort of work?”
“Colin? Yes, we work together a lot. Partners, I suppose you could say. I don’t know what I’d do without him.”
Viktor gave her another nod, this one perhaps a bit more curt. After a long swig of his drink, he tried to come up with something else to say, but she saved him the trouble.
“Thank you…for what you did, Viktor.”
He turned to her in surprise. Surely, she wasn’t thanking him for…that?
Not for the first time, he wondered if she was reading his mind, because she gave an odd little laugh and said, “That message you delivered. It helped more than you can possibly know. And the other things I know you’ve done. You’ve been a great help…to us.”
“I vould do more,” he said. “I vould fight…”
“No,” she said. “It may come to that, but for now…you ought to keep doing what you’re doing.”
Her drink was nearly finished, and she was making these little slurping noises with her straw.
“You have…another,” he said. “Or perhaps, we eat…somewhere else.”
“There are reporters everywhere,” she said, “even scoping out the Muggle places. You really don’t want to be seen with me.”
When he was about to protest that sentiment, she stopped him. “For several reasons, Viktor. You’ll have to trust me.”
“Is it…this Colin…he vould not understand?”
She laughed merrily at that, but didn’t explain.
He took her hand again, this time with more confidence. “You come, ve find a place to talk. I know this town…ve find good place.”
After slapping some coins on the bar, Viktor took her arm to lead her outside. They ended up finding a park bench, where he cast warming charms around them and she cast a Muffliato spell to keep their conversation private. She was hesitant at first, but he managed to convince her to open up, and the tale she told of the war and her losses was a difficult one to hear. She kept trying to turn the conversation back to him, and he obliged her by telling more about his life and feelings than he had ever told anyone outside of family. Once again, he marveled at the uncanny connection he felt with this young woman he appeared-on the surface, at least-to have so little in common with. They seemed to be stepping carefully around the topic of their last encounter, though as the conversation wore on he found himself remembering it more and more.
When he leaned in to kiss her, the intensity of her response made him suspect that she was remembering as well. Once again, he found himself hit with an emotion so powerful, so consuming, that he felt as if he didn’t have her immediately he might die from want.
“Come vith me,” he said, and it sounded more like a command than a request.
She clung to him, burying her face in the crook of her neck. “Yes,” she said, and followed him meekly as he made his way to the back of one of the park’s public restrooms. Here, she finally seemed to recover her senses. “Where are we going, Viktor?”
“Ve Apparate to my hotel room.”
“Don’t they have wards around the hotel?” she asked.
“To outside,” he clarified.
“Which will be full of reporters. Honestly, Viktor, It is not good for us to be seen together.”
He wanted to growl with frustration. “Then your room.”
“I’m sharing with Colin,” she admitted.
“And you don’t want him to know,” he said, shaking his head in irritation.
“Oh, no,” she said, and she seemed pleased and amused at his thinly veiled jealousy. “It’s just…he has a date-with the Keeper for the Czech team, actually. I suspect I can’t go back there for some time.”
Viktor knew the man in question, and raised his eyebrows, shaking his head at this new information. Soon enough though, the immediate problem was back at the front of his mind, and he said, “Ve get another room, then.”
“During the Quidditch finals? Not very likely, I’d say. Even the Muggle places are full up.”
Viktor sighed, but Luna suddenly seemed to be giving him a speculative look. She approached him again, sliding her arms around his neck. “I don’t care, Viktor,” she said, and his heart sank at the words. “I just want you to make me feel again how you did that day. I’ve never been able to forget it.”
His heart, which had begun taking up residence in its proper place again, seemed about ready to burst from his chest. “I vant you, Luna. I don’t care what the reporters make of it. I vant you to stay for a vile, to give us a chance to be more.”
“I must leave tomorrow, she said. “And it’s not that I mind people knowing we were together, but I don’t want you associated with Order members any more than you have to be. It would be a waste of a perfectly good unknown contact, don’t you think?”
He tried to think of a viable solution, but she managed to distract him thoroughly by nipping at his neck and sliding her small, warm hands under his jumper to the muscles of his back, which leapt in response. When she reached down to cup him through his trousers, he groaned, wanting nothing more than to push her against the wall and bury himself in her body. Amazingly enough, she seemed to have the same idea, because she was fumbling at the fastening, reaching inside to draw him out, pulling his cock out of his trousers with her small, warm hand.
“Beautiful,” she said, circling the tip with her thumb, bending down to lick off the bead of moisture that she found there. Viktor groaned as she wrapped her lips around him, still laving the tip with her tongue. He seemed to have lost the feeling in his legs as he stumbled to lean back against the wall, burying his hands in her hair. It felt heavy in his hands, despite the appearance of wispiness, and he thought that someday, he wanted to see her walk in the moonlight, clad only in this long, luxurious mass.
She took him deeper into her mouth, her tongue sliding back and forth on the underside of his cock, and his fingers in her hair tightened as he felt his eyes roll back in his head. Somewhere in the back of his mind it occurred to him that there was nothing uncertain about the movement, and he felt a stab of irrational jealousy as he wondered who else she had allowed to teach her things, who else had experienced the wonder that was her body.
Something primal in him took over. It wasn’t enough to have her give him pleasure; he wanted to make her scream, to belong to him, if only for a few minutes. Withdrawing from her mouth, he pulled her up to her feet and spun around until he had her pressed against the wall. He kissed her again, a kiss that had very little subtlety, he knew, but he wanted her enflamed, writhing against him. He thrust a hand under her blouse, finding bare skin and an already hardened nipple, which he rolled between his thumb and forefinger, pinching gently and then firmly as she gasped against his mouth. Like the first time, she seemed almost desperate to find connection with him; one hand was back on his cock and the other was grasping his hair almost painfully. Viktor pulled free of her grasp, kneeling down to unbutton her blouse, briefly replacing his fingers with his mouth. Once unbuttoned, he reached under her skirt, pulling down her knickers and putting them in his pocket. He slid his hands up her thighs, raising her skirt slowly until she was bared to his gaze, and he nuzzled her with his nose, breathing in her scent, remembering.
He lapped at her clit for a moment, pausing to enjoy the vision of Luna arched against the wall, moaning like she did the last time, when he knew that he had been the first to make her feel such things. Allowing his fingers to wander, he traced circles over the silk of her thighs, and then drew a line back and forth from the place where his tongue met her clit to the warm, moist folds that just seemed to beckon the invasion of his fingers and beyond.
He looked up to find her gazing down at him with those eyes that always seemed to drive him to distraction-so serious, so full of yearning. He watched her face intently as he pushed his fingers inside her-he watched and groaned as she closed her eyes and reached out to touch his cheek.
“I want…” she said, and broke off in a gasp, but the feeling of her; slick and hot and tight around fingers told him everything. He rose up from his knees, kissing her roughly, picking her up by her arse and planting her on his upper thigh as he fumbled with her skirt and dropped his trousers the rest of the way down. It occurred to him that there was something to be said for being outdoors and partially clothed, because the contrast of the cool air on his skin and the sudden, molten heat of her body was something he knew he was never going to forget. Nor was he likely to forget the way her eyes seemed to glaze over as he entered her, and the way that she bit her lip and wrapped her legs around his hips.
Looking at her flushed face, her unfocused eyes, and the bouncing breast that was just visible within the gap of her blouse, just begging him to hold it, got to be too much, so he bent his face to her neck, fastening his lips to the soft skin there, determined to make a mark on her. He thought about her discovering it after she left, involuntarily remembering this night, and perhaps-for a few days, at least-she would still be his. He wondered if she would remember the animal grunts that were coming from his mouth, so close to her ear, and if her back would be bruised by the unyielding brick of the wall. He liked the idea of her looking at herself in the mirror tonight, counting all the marks he had left on her, from the handprint-shaped marks she would undoubtedly have on her arse to the thick, warm liquid that would be running down her leg as she made her way home. That thought was nearly enough to push him over the edge, but it was the way that she screamed his name, loud enough for half the city to hear, that finished him off. For a long moment, they clung together, shuddering as they waited for their bodies to calm, unwilling to give up that last bit of physical connection before the cold night brought reality and responsibility with it.
She only let him walk her part of the way to her hotel room, and kissed him lightly on the cheek in farewell. Once he’d lost the reassurance of her small, warm hand in his, sadness began to creep in, along with doubt. He had behaved like a madman, taking her like that in a public place. Any photographer could have found them there, and he might very well see the image of his bare buttocks all over tomorrow’s papers. A small, insidious voice whispered to him that she herself was also a reporter, and that the photographer that was supposed to be on a ‘hot date’ could very well have been lurking behind them all evening. By the time he reached his own room, he had worked himself into a panic. Then he emptied out his coat pockets, finding her underpants, and a small, tightly sealed note with the name “Charlie Weasley’ on it. Once again, apparently, their encounter had been arranged for a purpose, but he wanted with all his heart to believe that she had fucked him because she cared for him.
------------------------
The next time he saw her, it wasn’t in a crowd, it was on a train, when she was again accompanied by the tiny photographer, ostensibly on her way to cover the Ministry elections in Russia. Viktor was on his way to meet some distant relatives for a brief holiday-a respite from the glare of publicity. He was traveling the Muggle way just for the opportunity to catch his breath and admire the scenery. Luna gave him a polite handshake when they met, offering to let him join her and her traveling companion in their compartment. Because the train was crowded they had to share their cabin with another couple, so discussing anything important was out of the question. Still, when Viktor made his way to the toilet, Luna found a way to follow him and they managed a few moments’ feverish kissing between compartments.
For once, this seemed like a truly random encounter, and Viktor would later find no notes buried in his clothes. Luna refused to talk about the state of the war, and Viktor had no information to offer her that would be helpful. She did mention that the war effort was costing a lot, in both lives and money, so he made certain that this time Luna was the one who found something in her pockets-a letter that would allow the Order access to what amounted to a full year of his salary.
He didn’t run into her again, though there were other messengers that came to him from time to time. He always asked about her but they never had much information to give, other than that she was still alive, as far as they knew.
The English papers were even less informative. As the news got worse and worse, he felt a sense of dread and panic overwhelming him. Finally, nearly a year after the train episode, he got an urgent message from Charlie Weasley saying that the Death Eaters had Hogwarts under some sort of a siege, and that one (or possibly two) of his siblings were trapped inside. Viktor arranged the next possible Portkey to Scotland, where he managed to join in on the chaos of what ended up being Voldemort’s last stand. He fought with everything he had, hoping and then dreading the possibility of finding a head of long, wispy blonde hair among the fighters-or worse yet, among the dead.
The aftermath was even more chaotic. Nobody had any idea where anyone was, but he finally had word that Luna might have been among the wounded, sent to what was left of St. Mungos Hospital. By the time he got there, it too was a madhouse. He had no idea where she was, and those he knew in the Order (the Weasleys in particular) were too busy dealing with their own losses to know where anybody else was. He waited in the lobby for a long time, searching desperately for a familiar face. The one he finally did spot-the diminutive photographer-came in on a stretcher, looking like he was moments from death. The dread in Viktor’s gut spread to the rest of his body. He finally decided to make a ward-by-ward search of the hospital, but was unsuccessful. When he reached the top floor, he had no choice but to go back down to the lobby and wait. He hung his head in the elevator, losing hope rapidly. One by one, the occupants got off until the only one left was a young man with a friendly face and a partially healed gash on his cheek.
“Are you…Viktor Krum?” he asked softly.
Viktor nodded, trying to place the face that now seemed vaguely familiar. The man held out his hand. “I’m Neville, Neville Longbottom. You probably don’t remember me, but…”
“Yes,” said Viktor. “That name…I know it. I think, I think I saw you…Luna-she carried your photograph, yes? She is your friend?”
Neville smiled. “Yes. She’s a good friend.”
“Tell me, Neville.” Viktor reached out to grip his shoulder urgently. “She is…alive?”
Neville nodded, smiling sympathetically. “Yes, I just saw her a few hours ago. They sent her home. I stayed to spend some time with my parents, tell them what happened and all that.”
“Neville,” Viktor said, “Please vill you, vill you tell me where she lives? Is very important.”
Neville looked him up and down, appearing to size him up and find him acceptable. “I’ll take you to her myself.”
--------------------
Luna lived in a small, thatched cottage situated in a quiet, shady glen. When Neville knocked on the front door, a vague, dreamy familiar voice called him in. Luna was seated on the sofa under a tartan blanket. She was very pale, and a bandaged foot stuck out from under the edge of the blanket. Her eyes appeared sunken and tinged with grey, but they widened when they recognized Viktor.
Neville walked over to her and whispered for a moment, then pulled away, stroking her hair affectionately. “Well, I suppose I’ll leave you to it, then.”
As soon as he heard the door close, Viktor made his way to her in quick strides. He pulled her into his arms, despairing at how thin and sickly she seemed.
“What are you doing here, Viktor?” she asked, looking at him through tear-filled eyes that also managed to be hopeful.
“I vant to take you home,” he said. “I vill take care of you.”
“I’ll be all right,” she said. “I can take care of myself, you know.”
“But vy should you?” he asked. “I loff you.”
She really did cry then, and said the oddest thing; “I hoped so, but it didn’t make any sense so I was afraid to believe it.”
“Vat doesn’t make sense? That I loff you?”
“Yes. You could have anyone.”
He laughed wryly, shaking his head. “Not true. I think, perhaps, you overestimate the appeal of a famous name. I’ve never been…vat is vord? Charming? Never know right vords to say, even when language is not an issue. Vomen say I am bad-humored, dull.”
Luna laughed, but it ended up causing a coughing fit, and he had to fetch her a glass of water.
‘You’re not dull,” she finally managed. “You’re perfectly lovely.”
He shook his head at her choice of words, but reached out to touch her face. “Beautiful girl. You care very much, too much. And you see everything. You see me, inside.
“I love you,” she said, and her face broke out in a genuine smile. For him, it seemed like the sun had finally come out after a very long winter.
“Good,” he said. “Then you come vith me. I make all the arrangements, get you the finest care.”
“I can’t leave,” she insisted, shaking her head in regret. “Not forever. My dad is sick-he can’t run the paper on his own. He needs me. And you-you have obligations too.”
He did and he knew it, but he wasn’t about to give up, and let her slip through his fingers again. “You come vith me now. You heal, I help. Then, at the end of season, I play for England.”
Luna beamed. “You would do that?”
“I vould do anything in the vorld for you, Luna. Vith you is my home.”
FROM: ANONYMOUS
TITLE: Shelter
WORD COUNT: 8352
PAIRING: Luna/Viktor
RATING: NC-17
SUMMARY: Over the course of the war, Viktor has several memorable encounters with Luna Lovegood.
WARNINGS: None, except possible tooth decay at the end
KINKS USED: Awkward but ultimately satisfying sex, conversation, complications and misunderstandings, first times, desperation, partially-clothed sex, plot.
DISCLAIMER: Not my characters. Never will be.
AUTHOR NOTES: Thanks to E for the beta and to I for listening and encouraging. To my recipient: You have provided me with countless hours of enjoyment as a reader. I hope this one is an adequate testament of my admiration.
The first time he noticed her was at a wedding. Although, he might never have given her a second glance her had she not approached him first. He was sitting there, apart from the crowd, wondering what he was doing there. Really, he hardly knew the bride, and the groom even less. He knew the two best friends of the groom’s youngest brother; in fact he had even kissed one of them. The other he had competed against and come to admire his courage.
But those two-those three, actually, seemed uninterested in catching up with old acquaintances or would-be lovers. Their bodies were present, but their minds were elsewhere, and any hopes that Viktor had had of sweeping the clever young English girl with the fire in her eyes off her feet were soon given up as a lost cause. He had never understood the dynamic of those three. It might have been understandable if it had been some sort of a sexual thing, but somehow he doubted it. They were more like a team, he decided, each of them always aware of the other two, speaking without words, having the same goal in mind.
Viktor understood teams, even though on his own team he sometimes felt like a man apart, always above the activity, with a task of his own that was completely separate from the goals of his teammates. Oh, they carried him on their shoulders as the game was won; they patted him on the back and raised their glasses to him. But genuine comradery was something he hadn’t felt since school. And even then, he was kept apart. His Headmaster’s pampered pet, his prize to be displayed. Karkaroff had let him down in the end. A coward, running off and leaving his charges in foreign hands. A pawn, never quite choosing loyalties. And pawns were easily disposable, were they not?
And so Viktor had made his solitary way in the world-a celebrity, and the crown prince of his country’s magical community. And still he was alone, because every one around him only wanted to grab a piece of his glory. No true friends, no real love. His parents, simple and old-fashioned, were unable to understand the life that their son had been thrust into. They loved him, but they did not know him.
But he had belonged, once-for a very brief moment, at that school in the Scottish mountains, when he had been one of four, and then, sadly, one of three. And so, when the invitation arrived to be part of that trio again, to be able to speak of the fear and devastation of losing one of their own, of finding out they had been pawns in someone else’s game, to renew promises of lifelong friendship, he had come at once. He did not regret it as he sat alone, apart, separated from the happy throng by barriers of language, of celebrity, of the horrors that most of the group had witnessed in the years since he had seen them. He did not understand it, but it was relatively easy to spot the groom’s ravaged face and the pain in the eyes of so many, even the young-especially the young, who should have been thinking of nothing more than who they should dance with and whether or not to find a chance to break away and kiss in the shadows.
As he sat alone at his table on the outskirts, watching Hermione as she became more and more dazzled by the redheads that led her in turn to the dance floor-dazzled, but never taking her eyes off her two best friends for long-he thought about these things, and found his musings interrupted by the presence of a small girl. Or at least he took her for a girl, appearing suddenly as if she has just made a silent Apparition. The long, wavy hair was decidedly girlish, and the shimmering robes just a little too showy for anyone but an adolescent. But when she turned to him, watching him speculatively, he discovered that her eyes seemed years older than the rest of her face.
“You’re Viktor Krum,” she said, and the question (or was it even a question?), though one he’d heard hundreds of times, was asked with such sobriety, such sincerity, that he was taken aback. She didn’t seem discouraged by his lack of response. Instead, she sat there staring out at the crowd, finally observing, “You don’t really fit in here, do you?”
Viktor did not know how to reply. It was certainly an accurate statement, but also one he could easily have taken offense at.
She continued, “I don’t fit in anywhere-but they do try to include me-at least now.”
“Vy now?” he asked before he could stop himself.
“Haven’t you noticed?” she said in an airy, almost ethereal voice. “We’re all in the same fight now. They need all the support they can get.”
“A fight?” he asked, even though it had been obvious from the moment he arrived.
“You were there,” she said. “At the beginning. When he came back-you saw what he did.”
“Vat who did?”
“The one who killed your Headmaster, of course,” she replied.
“My Headmaster vas a coward,” Viktor spat. “He died running avay.”
“My Headmaster died at the hand of a friend,” Luna said, shaking her head sadly. “But it was all part of the same plan, wasn’t it?”
He stared at her for a long moment. Who was this odd child/woman, and what did she want from him? They always had an agenda, didn’t they?”
“I must be going,” he said, pushing his chair back, but her hand on his arm stopped him. The movement was so unexpected that he felt a jolt of what seemed like electricity radiating from her light touch.
“Don’t you want to find out why they invited you?”
Viktor scowled. “Ve shared much in our months of competition. I vill alvays remember my Trivisard friends.” Secretly, he believed that the self-absorbed bride wanted a bit of celebrity to spice up her guest list, but he wasn’t going to admit this to the strange person with the unnerving stare who managed to ask astoundingly personal questions without seeming to blink.
“Stay,” she said simply. “Stay and listen with an open mind when they talk to you. You have to take a stand now, before what has ruined things here comes to devastate your country. It’s only a matter of time.”
“I don’t-” he started.
“I’m sure you read the English papers for months after you left here. Years, maybe,” she said, and he couldn’t deny it. “You know what we’re up against, and you can help. More than you could ever imagine.” With that, she left, seeming to float away with the evening breeze.
Viktor shook his head in bewilderment, but couldn’t seem to leave his seat. Sure enough, moments later, the bride and groom came to sit beside him, laughing, and talking, and kissing each other embarrassingly, while the groom’s father spoke to him in an undertone-his manner calm, his face pleasant and forgettable, but his words chilling to the bone. They needed him. They needed his ability to travel freely, virtually unnoticed, his connections, and the power that came with his notoriety. He marveled later at the brilliance of their plan, but lost a little respect for them for choosing a remarkably effective child/woman to soften him up. Perhaps they remembered his attentions to a fourteen-year-old English girl-his courtly, almost completely innocent attentions, of course, but they didn’t necessarily know that. Viktor was no pedophile. He recognized in Hermione Granger an old soul, not unlike himself. And he’d seen it too in the unearthly blonde girl, whose name he somehow had never caught.
He had trouble pushing her from his mind over the next year or so. He played; bringing glory to his national team, keeping his personal life above reproach. Occasionally he would meet with some strange foreigner or another, with notes to pass on or instructions to follow. Information was a precious commodity. He wondered, sometimes, if he was doing the right thing, but kept his eyes open, reading the English papers as well as the Bulgarian ones, and he worried about the people he’d met at the wedding, particularly the ethereal girl who’d seen right through him.
One rainy February day, he found the trio he had watched so carefully at the wedding on his very own doorstep, wretched and tired and desperate for his help. Naturally, he did everything he could, finding them a safe place to stay completely unconnected with himself, giving them money despite their protests. He stopped in on them as much as he dared, given his high profile, and they seemed to be recovering, but they also seemed to be working on something very secret. He offered to help in any way he could, but other than a few intriguing question about Durmstrang, they didn’t seem to need him much.
During this time, he saw her again. He would have recognized her anywhere, even though she was dressed as one of those Muggle backpacking students who prowled about Eastern Europe every summer. He saw her at the edge of a crowd, fixing him with that unblinking stare. Once she caught his eye, she looked pointedly at the building across the street, a nondescript Muggle hotel with a restaurant attached.
It took some time for him to break away. How she had managed to infiltrate a press conference, he didn’t know. The reporters that followed him doggedly on most days were unfortunately more persistent than normal that day. He finally wound up having to go back to his own home and Apparate to the alley next to the hotel. He hoped he hadn’t missed her, or worse yet, misinterpreted her signal. Or, perhaps he had imagined the entire incident.
But there she sat in a corner booth, and he felt an odd wave or relief and excitement as he spotted her long hair from the corner of his eye. “Hello,” he said, feeling exceedingly foolish. You still don’t even know her name.
She met his eyes, and though her expression was friendly he could see that somehow her eyes carried more sadness, more wisdom than before.
“Hello again,” she said. “Thank you for meeting me.”
‘I’m not-Did you vant something, or vas this just…vat is word…co-vinsidance? “
She smiled then, and he wondered if he’d seen her do it before. It completely transformed her face.
“Yes, I decided to take a holiday in Bulgaria while a war is on. And while I’m here, why not look up the only Bulgarian I know, who happens to be a celebrity and rather difficult to find.”
It took him a moment to realize that she was joking. There was certainly not a lot of laughter in her eyes to back it up. “No,” he said, “is not likely.”
The waitress came up to the table then, glancing over the pair with little interest. It should have been a common enough scene, two young people having a tasteless meal in a tourist trap of a restaurant, thinking they were experiencing the local culture.
He wasn’t certain of her plans-did she want him to share a meal with her here, or was this just a starting off point? She seemed to read his mind as she turned to him and said, “I don’t know my way around the menus here yet. Why don’t you order us some drinks and we’ll see.”
The waitress turned to Viktor with a sigh, clearly changing her assumption to a local boy, trying to get somewhere with the naïve English tourist. He ordered quickly, anxious to get her out of the way so that he could work out what the girl across from him wanted.
“Vat is your name?” he finally asked.
“Luna Lovegood,” she replied.
“Is nice-pretty. Like the moon. Is fitting you, I think.” He hadn’t expected that to faze her. She watched him with puzzlement in her eyes, not uttering another word until the waitress set down their glasses of boza irritably. He dismissed her, watching as Luna took a drink, holding the liquid in her mouth for a moment experimentally before swallowing. “Is good?” he asked.
“Yes, she replied. “Different. It is alcoholic?’
“Just little bit,” he replied. “Very mild.”
She continued to sip her drink, and while he grew increasingly anxious, she seemed to grow calmer. As he saw the waitress begin to approach again, he decided to ask, “Ve vill stay to eat, or no? I take you someplace, food is better, if you like.”
“No,” she said, “I want you to come upstairs to my room.”
He felt his jaw drop open. Surely she couldn’t mean…
In a daze, he asked the waitress for their bill once she arrived.
His mind raced as he followed her into the creaky elevator with its fake wooden panels and bits of international graffiti carved into it. It wasn’t as though this was an unusual occurrence. Viktor was used to bald invitations from Quidditch groupies all the time. He just didn’t see her in that light, though-there had to be something more to it. Still, she led the way into her room, where he felt a noticeable current on his skin as he passed through powerful wards. The only attempts to distinguish this from any typical chain hotel room were the gypsy fabrics on the curtain and bedspreads, and the local photographs framed on the walls.
“Is nice,” he lied, looking out the window at the dingy alley below.
“No, it isn’t,” she replied. “But it will do.”
Viktor turned to her, unable to resist asking, “Vat is it you vant from me? “
“Just a minute,” she said, walking to the window and closing the curtains. She reached behind her, and for a breathless moment he thought she might be removing an article of clothing, but she came away with a wand in her hand, which she used to tap at various surfaces around the room. He stood watching her, completely bewildered.
“Sit down,” she said, rummaging through her backpack and pulling out a white rectangle with two small holes in the center, which he recognized as one of those objects the Muggles used to store music. She tapped it once with her wand, and it tuned into a small folded parchment.
“It’s for Harry,” she finally said. “Information he requested from the Order. I understand you’d be able to get it to him.”
Realization dawned, and Viktor felt rather foolish. Sitting down weakly on the bed, he said, “Yes, of course. But how did you know…?”
“I don’t know,” she corrected. “I don’t want to know. It’s rather crucial that no one can connect me to him.”
“Yes,” he said, nodding. I vill be…stealthy…no, discreet is the vord. I will guard this very carefully. Thank you, Luna.”
As he began to rise, stuffing the letter into his pocket, she stopped him. “No, please don’t go. Not yet, anyway. If anyone is watching…Well, it would look suspicious, you see. At least if you stay, it will look like…” She broke off, and a faint blush stained her cheeks.
“Oh, I see,” he said. “Of course.” Not knowing what else to do, he got up to use her bathroom. When he returned, she was lying on the single bed, watching the Muggle television in the dim room. He sat down stiffly on the chair across from her. She was changing the channels of the Muggle contraption that even he could tell was rather ancient with her wand.
“They’ve come up with a sort of wand that does this for them,” she explained. “But this room doesn’t have one.”
“You…like television?” he asked.
“No, not really, she said. “But we do have time to spare, so…”
For a few long moments, she flipped around the channels, finally settling on a football match broadcast in Spanish. He wondered if she’d left it on for his benefit. He’d lost interest what little interest he’d ever had in Muggle sports long ago, finding them far too one-dimensional for his enjoyment. Taking a chance, he rose and sat down on the corner of the bed next to her. “Ve talk instead-is good?”
Luna looked over at him in surprise, lowering the volume of the television. “Yes, of course. What would you like to talk about?”
“You tell me about yourself, about English var-what I don’t read in newspapers? Is worse than I think, perhaps?”
Luna sighed. “Yes, far worse, I imagine. Our numbers are not good. Most people are too afraid to take a stand.”
“And the school, do you still attend?”
She shook her head sadly. “No, I left early. There wasn’t much point, though I tried for nearly a year after Professor Dumbledore died…”
“And now? Vat is it you do?”
“I work for my father, mostly. But I do things for the Order as much as possible.”
“How old are you?” he asked, burning with curiosity.
“Eighteen,” she replied.
“So much sadness in your eyes for one so young,” he said. “War should not be fought by children.”
“I’ve seen terrible things,” she said. “I haven’t been a child for a very long time.”
At that, she stared at the moving figures on the screen for a time. He felt like offering her comfort, but didn’t know how she would respond. There was a stillness about her that he found puzzling.
“This Veasley man-the one who spoke to me? He said that this var-it vill spread until it covers our vorld. People here, they visper, shake their heads about the news from England, but do nothing. They should have learned-sixty years ago-vas similar. This evil, is like monster-tentacles-vat is vord? Slithering, insidious.”
“Yes,” Luna said, her eyes glittering in the reflection of the television.
Impulsively, he reached out to take her hand, and then withdrew it. For some reason, it was important that she did not think he was the kind of man who would try to turn a situation like this to his advantage. She turned to give him a long, speculative look. Then, to his utter amazement, she sat up and kissed him-a kiss that seemed at first to be as light and inconsequential as a butterfly brushing past his lips, but it grew in intensity until he found himself shaken to the core. As she pulled away, she lowered her eyes, murmuring an apology in a voice he had to strain to hear.
Viktor would have none of it, though. He pulled up her chin, willing her to see the need in his eyes. “Is my pleasure,” he said. “You are beautiful girl. I think, perhaps, ve understand each other.”
He bent to kiss her again. The kiss was meant to soothe, to reassure, but he found her so welcoming, so generous with her responses that he very quickly found his body betraying his good intentions.
“Lovely girl,” he murmured against her ear, and within a few startling minutes, found himself the victim of a sensual assault: of soft lips that unerringly found his weakest points, of strong, silky limbs sliding against and wrapping around him and fumbling fingers tearing away her clothes, and his. He tried to slow her down, but she seemed almost desperate for physical connection.
Perhaps it ought to have registered that her movements were inexpert, but he wanted to believe that she was as astounded by the sudden heat between them as he was-that she forgot any skill she might have previously learned. Certainly, she didn’t give him much of a chance to display any finesse, and her enthusiasm left him very little room for conscious thought.
But sensations, those he doubted he’d ever forget: the warmth of her hand on his cock, the way her finger traveled over the expanse of his back, tracing the line of his spine, only to rest halfway into the cleft of his buttocks, the way her breasts felt under his calloused hands, the high pitched whine she made as he took a nipple in his mouth, those absurd, garishly-coloured knickers and how damp she had been under them, the way her mouth formed a perfect ‘O’ when he dragged his thumb across her clit, and the way his whole body shook as he plunged into the wet heat of her body.
Eventually his sanity returned, of course. He caught his breath and looked down at the girl who was clinging to him, her hair a tangled, sweaty mess, her body slick with perspiration, her pale skin nearly blue in the flickering light of the television. When he reached down to brush her hair away from her cheek, he noticed the tears in her eyes. For some reason, he felt an urge to apologize, but instead he pulled her chin up to look at her more closely. “Is good, no? Ve-you are vell with this? Not to regret?”
“No,” she said, touching his face hesitantly. “I’m a little sore, but I don’t mind.”
“Sore?” he asked. Sometimes the English language-and its words with multiple meanings-gave him trouble. “I vas too hard…?” No, that wasn’t right, he knew. “Rough?”
“No, you were fine,” she said, with an odd little laugh. “I wanted rough, I think. If I’d wanted gentle, I might have chosen someone else.”
“Chosen?” There was something about her that made him think that he would have had trouble comprehending her even if there hadn’t been a language barrier between them. To him, it had seemed a purely spontaneous act.
“For my first,” she said simply.
“First?” he breathed, with a dawning horror growing in him. “Not-not your first…lover?”
“Yes,” she said, giving him a soft smile and turning her back to him, inserting one of her feet between his calves.
Viktor groaned. “But…but I never think-you should have told me. I vould have-”
“Made too much of it, probably,” she said with a sigh. “Felt like you owed me something.”
Viktor shook his head vehemently. “Made it better for you-made it…” Gentle, he wanted to say, but she had already managed to diminish that word’s effectiveness. “Easier-to give you pleasure…to make special…unforgettable.”
She turned onto her back and looked up at the darkened ceiling, giving out an odd little laugh. “I’m not likely to forget this, am I? And besides, who makes these rules, anyway? It’s not as though you love me or anything, is it? But you did want me, and that was enough. Perhaps I like that kind of power-knowing that I made the great Viktor Krum tremble.”
He felt a twinge of disgust. This was something that he’d had some experience with, after all.
But-he remembered what he’d noticed in her remarkable eyes when he had kissed her in return-the longing he had seen there.
It was self-preservation. Somehow he was certain of it. His initial impression of her-the loneliness, the sad, otherworldly eyes-returned in full force. He stood up abruptly and went to the bathroom attached to the room.
When he returned with the objects he had sought, he found Luna buried under the covers, her face turned toward the window, her back to him. Whatever doubt he’d had left over was erased. This was self-preservation if he’d ever seen it. He set down his burdens carefully, hesitantly touching her shoulder. “Luna. Please vil you look at me?”
After an agonizingly long delay, she turned again to her back, but once again avoided his eyes, looking up at the ceiling.
“You think you are the first to give me invitation like this? To hotel room, I mean-though you do not know me. But you are first in very long time I accept. I think-thought of you since that vedding. I vondered vy you spoke to me. At first, I think you work for these-this Order; to test me, prepare me. But I think perhaps you had other reasons. Like you see something. Not unlike a mirror. You feel very alone, yes? I see this, the last time we speak. Ve feel like outsiders, like drifting-vith no control of our lives. Disconnected-from people most of all. You are remarkable girl-woman-much to offer, but few can see this. That is vy I follow you here. That is vy I make love to you. You make me tremble because you give me pleasure. I vanted to give pleasure to you.”
Luna turned to him, fixing him with the full force of that penetrating gaze of hers. It seemed to him that she could do what Legilimens only wished they could do. It was as if she could see his soul, with all its flaws and finer points laid bare.
She didn’t give him any sort of answer, just reached out to touch his hand. In response, he leant down to kiss her gently, pulling away to search her eyes, encouraging her to open up to him and not just with her body, though he was hoping for that too. He cupped her cheek, kissing her forehead, her nose, her chin, murmuring under his breath in Bulgarian endearments, waiting for her body to relax under his. When it did-when her arms slid around him again, when he felt those soft lips that had driven him mad earlier begin to nibble along his sharp chin, he felt something very much like the moment that he had felt the snitch in his hand at the World Cup. He leaned over her on one elbow, drawing the sheet down to reveal her body little by little, kissing random bits of luminous skin as it was revealed to him.
“This light,” he said. “Is not right. Is too cold.” He reached for his discarded wand, shutting off the television and conjuring a candle onto the nightstand. Afterwards, he reached for the plastic ice bucket he had brought in, drawing from it a warm wet washcloth. He parted her legs, pressing the cloth against her intimately, doing his best to soothe the ache he had caused, cleaning away the sticky mess. She sucked in a breath as she watched him, closing her hand over his, at first, he thought, to stop him, but then to encourage him to continue. When he began to use his fingers to stimulate, rather than to soothe, she dropped her head back on the pillow, sighing in response. When he lowered his mouth to her, she moaned, slipping her fingers into his hair, wrapping silky thighs around him as if in encouragement.
He drew the experience out for as long as he could, every now and then pausing to raise his head and get another look at her. The best parts were when she met his eyes with her own remarkable ones-watching him with a mixture of passion and wonder, her hand gripping her own breast reflexively, his fingers buried inside her, slick and hot and utterly perfect.
And when she finally clenched around his tongue, tugging on his hair reflexively, crying out his name, it was better than having an entire stadium full of screaming fans. He meant to simply pull her close afterward, letting her drift off to sleep in his arms, but she rose above him, taking him deep inside, riding him like a woman possessed, still twitching from the aftershocks of the pleasure he had given her, and he was lost.
When he woke up the next morning, she had completely disappeared.
------------------------
The next time he saw her was at the Quidditch finals in Prague. Again, he spotted her in a crowd, but this time she had a press badge and was speaking to a diminutive photographer, who was busy taking pictures of the stadium. When she spotted Viktor, she smiled and waved.
He could only manage a quick word with her, as eagle-eyed reporters were everywhere around them. They made arrangements to meet at a nearby bar, and he found himself shaking with nerves as he got dressed. It was ridiculous, he knew, but their last encounter had left him foundering a bit.
She’d arrived before him, and sat at the bar sipping a ridiculously elaborate drink-pink, purple and blue liquor adorned with twirling umbrellas stuck into a slice of pineapple and a flamingo-shaped straw. He would have preferred to sit in a corner booth as he had things to say and didn’t want them overheard, but decided not to ask for too much. She struck him as…elusive, but perhaps that was because she had disappeared so suddenly last time.
He sat down next to her and was about to greet her, but the look on her face effectively silenced him. A moment later, the bartender approached. Viktor chose a drink strong enough to hopefully numb some of the warring emotions he was feeling.
Once the drink was brought, she turned to him. “How are you?” she asked, and than sent him into a tailspin by adding, “I’ve thought about you, from time to time.”
“I’m…I am vell…the team-vell, obviously, ve are having success. I vorry about you, Luna. The news from England…is alvays bad. You vil tell me the truth, is there hope?”
She looked at him for a long time, and he saw that her eyes looked even older than they had seemed the last time. What had happened to her since that night in the cheap hotel room? She said she thought about him; did she miss him? What would she do if he asked her to stay, here, out of immediate danger? Would she consider it, if it meant staying with him?
Her next words stifled any offer of the kind he might have made. “It’s bad-very bad. But there are small victories. We are gaining people on our side faster than the Death Eaters can dispose of them. And there are things going on, unseen by most, that may just …well, it could turn things up on end.”
He reached out to touch the hand she’d rested on the bar. For a long moment, it was completely still under his, but she eventually turned it slightly until it was clasped with his. He felt his heart race, and tried to think of something to say that wouldn’t make him sound like a lovesick boy. “You are part of the press, no?”
“Yes,” she said. “My father has a paper, and I work for him. It gives me a viable excuse for all the traveling I do.”
“Oh,” he said, nodding in understanding. “And the man you vere talking to-he does same sort of work?”
“Colin? Yes, we work together a lot. Partners, I suppose you could say. I don’t know what I’d do without him.”
Viktor gave her another nod, this one perhaps a bit more curt. After a long swig of his drink, he tried to come up with something else to say, but she saved him the trouble.
“Thank you…for what you did, Viktor.”
He turned to her in surprise. Surely, she wasn’t thanking him for…that?
Not for the first time, he wondered if she was reading his mind, because she gave an odd little laugh and said, “That message you delivered. It helped more than you can possibly know. And the other things I know you’ve done. You’ve been a great help…to us.”
“I vould do more,” he said. “I vould fight…”
“No,” she said. “It may come to that, but for now…you ought to keep doing what you’re doing.”
Her drink was nearly finished, and she was making these little slurping noises with her straw.
“You have…another,” he said. “Or perhaps, we eat…somewhere else.”
“There are reporters everywhere,” she said, “even scoping out the Muggle places. You really don’t want to be seen with me.”
When he was about to protest that sentiment, she stopped him. “For several reasons, Viktor. You’ll have to trust me.”
“Is it…this Colin…he vould not understand?”
She laughed merrily at that, but didn’t explain.
He took her hand again, this time with more confidence. “You come, ve find a place to talk. I know this town…ve find good place.”
After slapping some coins on the bar, Viktor took her arm to lead her outside. They ended up finding a park bench, where he cast warming charms around them and she cast a Muffliato spell to keep their conversation private. She was hesitant at first, but he managed to convince her to open up, and the tale she told of the war and her losses was a difficult one to hear. She kept trying to turn the conversation back to him, and he obliged her by telling more about his life and feelings than he had ever told anyone outside of family. Once again, he marveled at the uncanny connection he felt with this young woman he appeared-on the surface, at least-to have so little in common with. They seemed to be stepping carefully around the topic of their last encounter, though as the conversation wore on he found himself remembering it more and more.
When he leaned in to kiss her, the intensity of her response made him suspect that she was remembering as well. Once again, he found himself hit with an emotion so powerful, so consuming, that he felt as if he didn’t have her immediately he might die from want.
“Come vith me,” he said, and it sounded more like a command than a request.
She clung to him, burying her face in the crook of her neck. “Yes,” she said, and followed him meekly as he made his way to the back of one of the park’s public restrooms. Here, she finally seemed to recover her senses. “Where are we going, Viktor?”
“Ve Apparate to my hotel room.”
“Don’t they have wards around the hotel?” she asked.
“To outside,” he clarified.
“Which will be full of reporters. Honestly, Viktor, It is not good for us to be seen together.”
He wanted to growl with frustration. “Then your room.”
“I’m sharing with Colin,” she admitted.
“And you don’t want him to know,” he said, shaking his head in irritation.
“Oh, no,” she said, and she seemed pleased and amused at his thinly veiled jealousy. “It’s just…he has a date-with the Keeper for the Czech team, actually. I suspect I can’t go back there for some time.”
Viktor knew the man in question, and raised his eyebrows, shaking his head at this new information. Soon enough though, the immediate problem was back at the front of his mind, and he said, “Ve get another room, then.”
“During the Quidditch finals? Not very likely, I’d say. Even the Muggle places are full up.”
Viktor sighed, but Luna suddenly seemed to be giving him a speculative look. She approached him again, sliding her arms around his neck. “I don’t care, Viktor,” she said, and his heart sank at the words. “I just want you to make me feel again how you did that day. I’ve never been able to forget it.”
His heart, which had begun taking up residence in its proper place again, seemed about ready to burst from his chest. “I vant you, Luna. I don’t care what the reporters make of it. I vant you to stay for a vile, to give us a chance to be more.”
“I must leave tomorrow, she said. “And it’s not that I mind people knowing we were together, but I don’t want you associated with Order members any more than you have to be. It would be a waste of a perfectly good unknown contact, don’t you think?”
He tried to think of a viable solution, but she managed to distract him thoroughly by nipping at his neck and sliding her small, warm hands under his jumper to the muscles of his back, which leapt in response. When she reached down to cup him through his trousers, he groaned, wanting nothing more than to push her against the wall and bury himself in her body. Amazingly enough, she seemed to have the same idea, because she was fumbling at the fastening, reaching inside to draw him out, pulling his cock out of his trousers with her small, warm hand.
“Beautiful,” she said, circling the tip with her thumb, bending down to lick off the bead of moisture that she found there. Viktor groaned as she wrapped her lips around him, still laving the tip with her tongue. He seemed to have lost the feeling in his legs as he stumbled to lean back against the wall, burying his hands in her hair. It felt heavy in his hands, despite the appearance of wispiness, and he thought that someday, he wanted to see her walk in the moonlight, clad only in this long, luxurious mass.
She took him deeper into her mouth, her tongue sliding back and forth on the underside of his cock, and his fingers in her hair tightened as he felt his eyes roll back in his head. Somewhere in the back of his mind it occurred to him that there was nothing uncertain about the movement, and he felt a stab of irrational jealousy as he wondered who else she had allowed to teach her things, who else had experienced the wonder that was her body.
Something primal in him took over. It wasn’t enough to have her give him pleasure; he wanted to make her scream, to belong to him, if only for a few minutes. Withdrawing from her mouth, he pulled her up to her feet and spun around until he had her pressed against the wall. He kissed her again, a kiss that had very little subtlety, he knew, but he wanted her enflamed, writhing against him. He thrust a hand under her blouse, finding bare skin and an already hardened nipple, which he rolled between his thumb and forefinger, pinching gently and then firmly as she gasped against his mouth. Like the first time, she seemed almost desperate to find connection with him; one hand was back on his cock and the other was grasping his hair almost painfully. Viktor pulled free of her grasp, kneeling down to unbutton her blouse, briefly replacing his fingers with his mouth. Once unbuttoned, he reached under her skirt, pulling down her knickers and putting them in his pocket. He slid his hands up her thighs, raising her skirt slowly until she was bared to his gaze, and he nuzzled her with his nose, breathing in her scent, remembering.
He lapped at her clit for a moment, pausing to enjoy the vision of Luna arched against the wall, moaning like she did the last time, when he knew that he had been the first to make her feel such things. Allowing his fingers to wander, he traced circles over the silk of her thighs, and then drew a line back and forth from the place where his tongue met her clit to the warm, moist folds that just seemed to beckon the invasion of his fingers and beyond.
He looked up to find her gazing down at him with those eyes that always seemed to drive him to distraction-so serious, so full of yearning. He watched her face intently as he pushed his fingers inside her-he watched and groaned as she closed her eyes and reached out to touch his cheek.
“I want…” she said, and broke off in a gasp, but the feeling of her; slick and hot and tight around fingers told him everything. He rose up from his knees, kissing her roughly, picking her up by her arse and planting her on his upper thigh as he fumbled with her skirt and dropped his trousers the rest of the way down. It occurred to him that there was something to be said for being outdoors and partially clothed, because the contrast of the cool air on his skin and the sudden, molten heat of her body was something he knew he was never going to forget. Nor was he likely to forget the way her eyes seemed to glaze over as he entered her, and the way that she bit her lip and wrapped her legs around his hips.
Looking at her flushed face, her unfocused eyes, and the bouncing breast that was just visible within the gap of her blouse, just begging him to hold it, got to be too much, so he bent his face to her neck, fastening his lips to the soft skin there, determined to make a mark on her. He thought about her discovering it after she left, involuntarily remembering this night, and perhaps-for a few days, at least-she would still be his. He wondered if she would remember the animal grunts that were coming from his mouth, so close to her ear, and if her back would be bruised by the unyielding brick of the wall. He liked the idea of her looking at herself in the mirror tonight, counting all the marks he had left on her, from the handprint-shaped marks she would undoubtedly have on her arse to the thick, warm liquid that would be running down her leg as she made her way home. That thought was nearly enough to push him over the edge, but it was the way that she screamed his name, loud enough for half the city to hear, that finished him off. For a long moment, they clung together, shuddering as they waited for their bodies to calm, unwilling to give up that last bit of physical connection before the cold night brought reality and responsibility with it.
She only let him walk her part of the way to her hotel room, and kissed him lightly on the cheek in farewell. Once he’d lost the reassurance of her small, warm hand in his, sadness began to creep in, along with doubt. He had behaved like a madman, taking her like that in a public place. Any photographer could have found them there, and he might very well see the image of his bare buttocks all over tomorrow’s papers. A small, insidious voice whispered to him that she herself was also a reporter, and that the photographer that was supposed to be on a ‘hot date’ could very well have been lurking behind them all evening. By the time he reached his own room, he had worked himself into a panic. Then he emptied out his coat pockets, finding her underpants, and a small, tightly sealed note with the name “Charlie Weasley’ on it. Once again, apparently, their encounter had been arranged for a purpose, but he wanted with all his heart to believe that she had fucked him because she cared for him.
------------------------
The next time he saw her, it wasn’t in a crowd, it was on a train, when she was again accompanied by the tiny photographer, ostensibly on her way to cover the Ministry elections in Russia. Viktor was on his way to meet some distant relatives for a brief holiday-a respite from the glare of publicity. He was traveling the Muggle way just for the opportunity to catch his breath and admire the scenery. Luna gave him a polite handshake when they met, offering to let him join her and her traveling companion in their compartment. Because the train was crowded they had to share their cabin with another couple, so discussing anything important was out of the question. Still, when Viktor made his way to the toilet, Luna found a way to follow him and they managed a few moments’ feverish kissing between compartments.
For once, this seemed like a truly random encounter, and Viktor would later find no notes buried in his clothes. Luna refused to talk about the state of the war, and Viktor had no information to offer her that would be helpful. She did mention that the war effort was costing a lot, in both lives and money, so he made certain that this time Luna was the one who found something in her pockets-a letter that would allow the Order access to what amounted to a full year of his salary.
He didn’t run into her again, though there were other messengers that came to him from time to time. He always asked about her but they never had much information to give, other than that she was still alive, as far as they knew.
The English papers were even less informative. As the news got worse and worse, he felt a sense of dread and panic overwhelming him. Finally, nearly a year after the train episode, he got an urgent message from Charlie Weasley saying that the Death Eaters had Hogwarts under some sort of a siege, and that one (or possibly two) of his siblings were trapped inside. Viktor arranged the next possible Portkey to Scotland, where he managed to join in on the chaos of what ended up being Voldemort’s last stand. He fought with everything he had, hoping and then dreading the possibility of finding a head of long, wispy blonde hair among the fighters-or worse yet, among the dead.
The aftermath was even more chaotic. Nobody had any idea where anyone was, but he finally had word that Luna might have been among the wounded, sent to what was left of St. Mungos Hospital. By the time he got there, it too was a madhouse. He had no idea where she was, and those he knew in the Order (the Weasleys in particular) were too busy dealing with their own losses to know where anybody else was. He waited in the lobby for a long time, searching desperately for a familiar face. The one he finally did spot-the diminutive photographer-came in on a stretcher, looking like he was moments from death. The dread in Viktor’s gut spread to the rest of his body. He finally decided to make a ward-by-ward search of the hospital, but was unsuccessful. When he reached the top floor, he had no choice but to go back down to the lobby and wait. He hung his head in the elevator, losing hope rapidly. One by one, the occupants got off until the only one left was a young man with a friendly face and a partially healed gash on his cheek.
“Are you…Viktor Krum?” he asked softly.
Viktor nodded, trying to place the face that now seemed vaguely familiar. The man held out his hand. “I’m Neville, Neville Longbottom. You probably don’t remember me, but…”
“Yes,” said Viktor. “That name…I know it. I think, I think I saw you…Luna-she carried your photograph, yes? She is your friend?”
Neville smiled. “Yes. She’s a good friend.”
“Tell me, Neville.” Viktor reached out to grip his shoulder urgently. “She is…alive?”
Neville nodded, smiling sympathetically. “Yes, I just saw her a few hours ago. They sent her home. I stayed to spend some time with my parents, tell them what happened and all that.”
“Neville,” Viktor said, “Please vill you, vill you tell me where she lives? Is very important.”
Neville looked him up and down, appearing to size him up and find him acceptable. “I’ll take you to her myself.”
--------------------
Luna lived in a small, thatched cottage situated in a quiet, shady glen. When Neville knocked on the front door, a vague, dreamy familiar voice called him in. Luna was seated on the sofa under a tartan blanket. She was very pale, and a bandaged foot stuck out from under the edge of the blanket. Her eyes appeared sunken and tinged with grey, but they widened when they recognized Viktor.
Neville walked over to her and whispered for a moment, then pulled away, stroking her hair affectionately. “Well, I suppose I’ll leave you to it, then.”
As soon as he heard the door close, Viktor made his way to her in quick strides. He pulled her into his arms, despairing at how thin and sickly she seemed.
“What are you doing here, Viktor?” she asked, looking at him through tear-filled eyes that also managed to be hopeful.
“I vant to take you home,” he said. “I vill take care of you.”
“I’ll be all right,” she said. “I can take care of myself, you know.”
“But vy should you?” he asked. “I loff you.”
She really did cry then, and said the oddest thing; “I hoped so, but it didn’t make any sense so I was afraid to believe it.”
“Vat doesn’t make sense? That I loff you?”
“Yes. You could have anyone.”
He laughed wryly, shaking his head. “Not true. I think, perhaps, you overestimate the appeal of a famous name. I’ve never been…vat is vord? Charming? Never know right vords to say, even when language is not an issue. Vomen say I am bad-humored, dull.”
Luna laughed, but it ended up causing a coughing fit, and he had to fetch her a glass of water.
‘You’re not dull,” she finally managed. “You’re perfectly lovely.”
He shook his head at her choice of words, but reached out to touch her face. “Beautiful girl. You care very much, too much. And you see everything. You see me, inside.
“I love you,” she said, and her face broke out in a genuine smile. For him, it seemed like the sun had finally come out after a very long winter.
“Good,” he said. “Then you come vith me. I make all the arrangements, get you the finest care.”
“I can’t leave,” she insisted, shaking her head in regret. “Not forever. My dad is sick-he can’t run the paper on his own. He needs me. And you-you have obligations too.”
He did and he knew it, but he wasn’t about to give up, and let her slip through his fingers again. “You come vith me now. You heal, I help. Then, at the end of season, I play for England.”
Luna beamed. “You would do that?”
“I vould do anything in the vorld for you, Luna. Vith you is my home.”