Five and a Half Years Later: One Cold Night In February (1/2)
Title: Five and a Half Years Later: One Cold Night In February (1/2)
Author: kanedax
Spoilers: Deathly Hallows & Previous Chapters
Characters: H/G, R/Hr, N/L, and many others
Rating: R for language, nudity, and sex
Summary: Neville and Luna get interrupted
Notes: This one was fun to write. The whole world of post-DH Potterverse is growing beneath my fingers. Which sounds naughty. I don’t own most of these characters, although most of the new Hogwarts professors are my own. Everyone else belongs to JK Rowling.
If you are under 18 or offended by scenes of a sexual nature, please skip ahead to 2/2.
Five Years Later: Harpy Versus Vulture / Previous Chapters / One Cold Night In February (2/2)
Professor Neville Longbottom opened the door to his Hogsmeade flat, the wind and snow howling in the dark outside. He quickly locked out the elements, and a shiver passed through him as his cold body adjusted to the sudden temperature change.
There are a lot of positives about working at Hogwarts, he thought as he pulled his scarf from around his neck and hung it on the coat rack. Having to walk the length of the grounds before you can Apparate anywhere is definitely not one of them.
He supposed he shouldn’t complain much. He sat down on the stool near the door and pulled his boots off, the snow melting from the heels onto the floor in a slushy plop. It’s certainly possible that, under the old Hogwarts regime, he could leave the grounds occasionally. But Neville didn’t think he would have felt comfortable walking out under the watchful eye of Minerva McGonagall, Severus Snape, or even Albus Dumbledore.
Heck, even the wave and wink he got from Hagrid tonight as he passed his hut was enough to make Neville blush and rethink his excursion.
Forget it, Neville thought as he walked out of the entryway and into the small sitting room. Uriela said that she’d cover your post tonight. So just take advantage of the situation.
It was something else that Neville was still trying to get used to in his third school year at Hogwarts: the fact that the professors were now so much younger and more understanding than they were when he was a student. At twenty-three, Neville was still the youngest professor in the school, probably would be for a long time to come. But the gray hair was a lot thinner on the ground than a decade ago.
Flitwick was still there, of course. As was Slughorn. They weren’t getting any younger; Horace was talking about retirement in the next few years and Flitwick was probably thinking it, even if he wasn’t saying it. Hagrid was Hagrid; his half-giant blood kept him looking and acting much younger than his seventy-five years, and would probably let him live decades longer than anyone else he had attended school with. And Professor Binns wasn’t getting any older or younger.
But beyond that… Clearly, the school governors had decided that they would prefer their educators to last more than a few years at a time. Professors Vector, Sinestra, and Trelawney were only in their early forties. As Neville learned in his time as professor, Septima and Aurora had been a year behind Professors Snape and the Marauders, and in the same year as Sirius Black’s younger brother, Regulus.
Jana Allentide, Evelyn Bateman, and Calamus Squall, the new Transfiguration, Muggle Studies, and Defense Against the Dark Arts professors, were around the same age as the Arithmancy and Astronomy teachers. Even the new Headmaster, Tiberius Ogden, was only in his early fifties, and was a classmate of Andromeda Tonks before moving on to a career in the Wizengamot.
The most surprising of all of the new professors, however, was Uriela Clavis, the new Ancient Runes professor. Replacing the retired Bathsheba Babbling just last year, Uriela had turned twenty-seven in only the past few weeks. Much of the conversations she had had with Neville so far revolved around her time watching Ron Weasley’s brother Charlie on the Quidditch pitch, her time as a prefect with Percy Weasley and his now-wife Penelope, and her many experiences with fellow Hufflepuff Nymphadora Tonks. As well, she was very interested in his experiences with Harry and the others, as she had attended Hogwarts with Neville until the end of his fourth year.
Because of the closeness in their ages, and their relative inexperience in dealing with students and classes, Uriela and Neville had developed a kinship in the five months since Clavis started working at the school. So of course when she heard that Luna was in town for the weekend she insisted on taking Neville’s patrol duty, promising to send an owl or stick her head into a Floo and scream her head off if trouble arose.
“My only payment is an ale and a breakdown of the randy details during the next Hogsmeade weekend,” Uriela had teased when she visited the Hogwarts greenhouses that afternoon. The visit between classes had become something of a routine over time, as her five-class workload was so much thinner than Neville’s twelve. Longbottom responded to the snide comment by flicking a spadeful of dragon fertilizer at her.
Neville now looked at the clock on his drawing room wall. Nine pm. I should still have time to change before I Floo Luna, he thought as he walked down the short hall to his bedroom. Xeno doesn’t get too upset about calls before nine thirty or ten. I’ll Floo her, and she can come over, and we can grab a bite and a drink at the Three Broomsticks before…
He froze as he passed through the door to his room.
“Hello, Neville,” Luna Lovegood said as she set her issue of The Quibbler on the bed stand along with her Spectrespecs.
“Hello,” Neville said as his heart resumed its normal pace. “I didn’t expect to see you so early.”
“I used the spare key you gave me over the summer,” she said, crossing her hands serenely on her sheet-covered lap. “You don’t mind.”
“Of course I don’t,” he replied with a smile. “I just thought you’d be going home first, I was going to Floo you in a few minutes.”
“I’ll go home tomorrow,” she said. “I don’t always tell my father when I’m arriving, and he rarely remembers even when I do tell him.”
“Just so long as he gets his article, eh?” Neville asked, sitting down on the end of his bed.
“Just so long as he gets his article,” Luna agreed. “Besides, it’s much easier to be comfortable in your house than in his. You have a nicer bed, and it’s so much quieter without the printing press running.”
“So that’s why you’re here already?” Neville asked, scooting his way up the bed. “Long trip?”
“It was a long trip,” Luna nodded. “But it was nice. Chinese wildlife is very interesting.”
“Is that why you’re naked in my bed?” Neville smirked. “Or are you just topless?”
“Of course I’m naked,” Luna said, looking down at her bare white breasts, illuminated by the single candle on the stand.
“Part of your relaxation?”
“It is,” she said matter-of-factly. “The nights when I stay here and you’re at Hogwarts I usually sleep naked. It helps me relax. I hope you don’t mind?”
“Do you hear me complaining?”
“Usually I’m not naked this early,” said Luna. “But I thought we could have sex first, and then talk or eat or whatever you were planning for us to do tonight. That way, in case we are tired later, we would have already had our sex. And if we’re not tired, we could have sex again before we went to sleep.”
Neville shook his head in amusement. “I love the way you think,” he said. “Right to the point.”
When Luna shrugged, Neville couldn’t help but be transfixed by the bounce. “We have not seen each other since the last Hogsmeade weekend,” she said. “I have been thinking about seeing you again for the past month, and I’ve been aroused quite often because of those thoughts. I didn’t want foreplay tonight, I just wanted to have sex with you as soon as I could.”
“Once again, I love the way you think…”
“You do want to have sex with me tonight, don’t you?”
Neville Longbottom responded the best way that he knew how: by pushing himself to the head of the bed and kissing Luna as passionately as he could muster. Luna responded, her soft lips parting, their tongues meeting in the middle. Her hand slipped around to the back of his head, and as she inhaled through her nose, she pulled back.
“Neville?”
“Hmm?” he said, half in a stupor from the first kiss he had gotten from his girlfriend in months.
“You smell like dragon dung.”
“Wha?” he said, then realized what she was saying. He looked down at his robes and groaned. “Sorry,” he said, pulling it off and throwing it in the corner. “Long day at work. I was going to change before I called you.”
“You did not expect me to be here,” said Luna as she unbuttoned the shirt Neville had been wearing beneath the robe. “So I can accept your odor.”
“We can probably shower afterwards,” said Neville. “Or take a bath. If you’re interested, that is.”
Luna pulled Neville’s grubby button-down flannel from his back and tossed it into the corner with his robe. “Of course I’m interested,” she replied before pulling him back into her kiss. Neville’s hand slid up Luna’s chest, feeling her nipples, so pale that they blended in with the surrounding breast, harden under his fingertips. Luna released a high-pitched moan into his mouth, and four hands struggled as one to unclasp Neville’s belt and remove his pants and underwear.
“One of these days we should just use our wands,” grunted Neville as he fell back into a sitting position and yanked them down to his ankles. “Just make our clothes disappear, or Transfigure them into handkerchiefs.”
“I didn’t think of that,” said Luna. “We’ll have to do that next time.”
“Just our luck we’ll be too turned on,” said Neville, finally removing his boxer shorts. “Lose our concentration. Your bra would turn into a parakeet and fly out the window.”
Luna smiled serenely and took Neville in her hand. He gasped, and felt himself harden even further under her touch. He pulled away the covers of his bed, revealing the rest of Luna’s naked body. He saw the small shadows of goosebumps run along her legs as they were revealed to the bedroom, still cool from the winter air outside. The goosebumps grew even larger as he ran his hand along her hairless pubic area (“To protect from the Nargles,” she said one night, and Neville wasn’t sure if she was joking or not. Either way, neither of them seemed to mind.), and Luna let out another high breathy squeak as he felt her wet beneath his palm.
He looked into her eyes, and she nodded, tugging him towards her. She took her wand, sitting idly by her newspaper, and cast the spells. He climbed on top of her and slid in effortlessly. She released her loudest moan yet, biting his neck as she thrust up to meet him.
The first time didn’t last very long, as it rarely does for two lovers who have barely seen each other’s faces in a good while. But Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood finished together, collapsed together, and held each other. And that’s all that either of them really wanted in that moment.
“Do you feel better?” Luna asked later.
“Well, I felt better from the moment I saw you,” Neville said, his face partially muffled by the pillow. “But this is just frosting on the cake.”
Neville was lying face down on the bed, clad only in his shorts. Luna was straddling his hips, kneading his back, scarred forever from his many encounters with the Carrows, with her fingers. Luna carried a few of her own, slight traces across her arms and stomach, as well as one deep gash on her back from a detention with Alecto that had gotten out of hand, and probably would have been worse had Professor Snape not intervened.
For the most part she had gotten off easily compared to other classmates. She had been in the custody of the Malfoys and at Shell Cottage for most of the school year, and the time that she had been at Hogwarts, she had always had difficulty finding the courage for rebellion that had come to Neville and Ginny so easily.
Even now, the scars were mostly hidden from view. Neville’s fleece, hanging unbuttoned across her otherwise naked torso, was protecting her from the chill that they had both felt after their initial hormonal surge subsided. The only fireplace in the flat was in the drawing room, and neither of them had the energy to get up and light it.
“You don’t have to do this, you know,” he weakly protested as she hit every muscle that had tightened from months of dealing with teenage wizards.
“I enjoy doing it,” Luna replied. “It’s part of my relaxation.”
“Mine, too,” Neville smiled. “I can give you one later, if you want. I just can’t promise it’ll be as good.”
“I like it whenever you touch me,” said Luna, bending over to kiss his neck, her breasts pressed against his back. “Any massage you give me is a nice massage.”
“Where’d you learn to do this again?” Neville asked as he felt his own goosebumps pass through him.
“Japan,” Luna replied. “I wrenched my back chasing a Kyoto Krumpler, and one of the girls on the expedition taught me some techniques after giving me a massage.”
“I would have liked to have seen that,” Neville said with a chuckle.
“She was very pretty,” said Luna. “Short and skinny. Dark hair. She had a bony ridge across her forehead and tusks as long as my wand.”
Neville sat in confused silence for a moment. “Ummm… what?”
“The Krumpler,” Luna explained. “She was a wonderful specimen. I only wish I could have brought photographs home, considering I had only been looking for a Japanese Firebreath. It would have been on the front page.”
“Oh, right,” Neville said slowly. “The… the Krumpler. Yeah…”
“The girl was very nice, too,” Luna continued.
“Well, I wish I had been there either way,” Neville said with a sigh.
“I wish you had, too,” said Luna quietly. “I always wish you were with me. I miss you very much.”
“I miss you, too,” Neville said. The two sat in a silence broken only by the howling wind, which had picked up since Neville had arrived home an hour ago.
“Luna?”
“Yes, Neville?”
“Is this working?” Neville asked.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean us,” said Neville. “I mean, you’re still okay with this? With what we’re doing?”
Luna sat in silence, her massage stopped and replaced with her hands gently rubbing his back.
“I do not know how to answer that,” she said finally. “I do not know if there is a good answer. I’m not okay with this. I’m not okay with being apart from you for months at a time. I’m not okay with falling asleep every night wishing that you were next to me.”
“I know what you’re saying,” said Neville, knowing how many nights he slept in his small unit beside the Hogwarts greenhouse, wishing that Luna were with him.
“But I also know that I love you,” she continued. “And I know that, as long as there’s no one that I love more, no one who loves me more, then I’m okay with this. Because seeing you a few times a year is still better than coming home to no one at all.”
“So there hasn’t been anyone else?” Neville asked. “No one who you’ve turned down because you and I are together? Because I know I can’t give you everything that you deserve, all the time that…”
“There hasn’t been anyone else,” Luna interrupted, tracing his scars with her fingers. “I won’t close my mind to the idea that there might be someone else sometime in my future. If someone comes along who I love more than I love you, then I will make that decision then. And I hope that you would do the same if someone comes along in your life. Love’s too important to throw away, but it’s also too important to ignore.”
“There hasn’t been anyone else,” said Neville. “It’s always been you. I haven’t met anyone who might change that.”
Have I? A face briefly and unexpectedly flashed into his mind. It held for a moment, but he quickly pushed it back.
No one, he responded. No one that I love more than Luna.
“Just keep your mind open to the possibility,” said Luna. “That’s all that I ask of you. I love you too much to trap you. The future’s too uncertain to make promises, especially with what we’ve chosen to do with our lives.”
Neville rolled over to face her. He reached up and caressed her cheek.
“I love you,” he said. “If it makes you feel any better, I can say that I love you right now. But I’ll keep my options open. How’s that?”
“That’s what I want to hear,” she said. “And that’s all that I need to hear right now.”
She bent down to kiss him.
“So how long are you here?” Neville asked when she pulled away.
“Until Monday,” said Luna. “And then I leave for three weeks.”
“For where?”
“Greenland.”
“Well, at least you’ll be closer this time.”
“Yes, I will be.”
“I’ll try to see if I can come down next time you come home,” said Neville. “Everyone’s still trying to gauge Tiberius’s patience about the professors going off for personal holidays.”
“This is a holiday?” asked Luna.
Neville shrugged. “Might be,” he said. “Might just be nothing. We’re still not sure yet. Things have changed post-Voldemort, but we’re still not sure what kind of balance we should have between protecting the students and overprotecting them.”
“Just so long as you’re not getting into any trouble for me.”
“I’m probably not,” Neville said. “Uriela’s supposed to have tonight off, but she’s taking my post so I could slip down here. But just so long as I’m back by breakfast I should be okay.”
“Great Hall breakfasts,” said Luna. “I miss those, too. Father’s not a very good cook, and I eat so much trail food.”
“Do you want to come up with me?” asked Neville. “I mean, visitation’s a little iffy, but I think Filius wouldn’t have a problem with you showing up. He’s still deputy Headmaster, and you were always one of his favorites.”
“I was?” Luna said.
“He says it all the time,” Neville smiled. “Every time I talk about you, he mentions something cool that you did in Charms.”
“So he knows about us?”
“Well, he knows we’re dating,” said Neville. “I’m pretty sure everyone who saw us kissing at the reception knows that we’re dating. But if he knows about the orgasm part, I really don’t want to talk to him about it.”
“It is sweet of him to say,” said Luna.
“You can thank him personally,” said Neville. “Come on, what do you say? Come up with me tomorrow? Say hi to Filius and Aurora? Pop into Hagrid’s hut? And Uriela’s dying to meet you.”
“That would be nice,” said Luna. “But do you think we’ll be able to be awake that early? We still haven’t gone out.”
“Were we still going out?” asked Neville.
“I wouldn’t mind staying here,” said Luna, and Neville felt a bit of wetness against his stomach.
“Yeah, I think I’m in a ‘staying in’ mood tonight, too. If we get hungry later I could always make a quick run over to the Hog’s Head and get Aberforth to make us a couple sandwiches.”
“After we have sex again, right?” Luna asked, rubbing against his stomach.
Neville just smiled. Luna slid down his body, undid the fly on his boxers, and pulled him out. She adjusted herself above him, and slid down with ease. They both moaned in unison. Neville reached up and pulled his flannel shirt away from her breasts, squeezing them and playing with her hard nipples as she bounced up and down on top of him.
“Oh, Neville,” she gasped, bending down to kiss him. Outside, the wind tapped against the windowpane.
Neville kissed her back, one hand running through her hair as his other slid between her legs, his fingers teasing her clit as he continued to move in and out of her.
The wind continued to tap, harder than before.
“It’s really picking up out there,” Neville panted as he moved into a sitting position, Luna straddling his lap.
“It is,” Luna said between kisses. “But there’s an owl outside making that noise.”
“Uriela must be checking on me,” said Neville as the two continued to move in rhythm. “I’ll get it when we’re done.”
“I’m almost… Ohhhh,” Luna cried. “But it’s not a school owl. It’s Artemisia.”
“Arte… Hermione’s owl?” Neville said as he finally stopped thrusting. “But why would she let her out in this weather?”
“It must be something… uhnnn… important,” said Luna, who continued to move up and down even after Neville stopped. “Maybe we should… Oh my God.”
“Are you almost there?”
“Yes, but I just… go, let her in!”
Luna climbed off Neville, and Neville, still at attention, pulled himself from the bed and across to the window. He felt a blast of cold air and snow against his nearly naked body as he opened it, and Artemisia, the larger and more durable of Ron and Hermione Weasley’s owls, flew into the room and landed on his headboard.
Neville reached for the owl’s leg, where a small note was attached, but flinched back. “Ow, stop pecking!” he said. “I’m sorry I didn’t let you in right away. You know how it is.”
“She does,” said Luna. “Ron and Hermione have had sex in the kitchen many times, it’s not anything she hasn’t seen before. I think she’s just cold.”
“Don’t know if that’s necessarily anything I wanted to know,” said Neville. “But thanks for the information.” Eventually Artemisia relented, and Neville pulled the note from her leg. He opened it.
It’s time, the note read in Ron’s sloppy scrawl. Ginny and Harry are at Mungo’s. Meet us there.
“Oh my God,” Neville gasped, plopping down onto the bed.
“Is it what I think it is?” Luna asked as she buttoned Neville’s shirt over her chest.
“I think so,” said Neville, handing her the note. “Unless Ron’s being really cryptic, Ginny’s in labor.”
“That’s wonderful,” said Luna. “We’re going, right?”
“Of course we are,” said Neville, a big grin on his face as he bounced to his feet and walked to his dresser. “I hope you don’t mind.”
“Just give me a moment,” said Luna. Neville watched with wide eyes as she reached between her legs, rubbed for about five seconds, then let out a squeak and a sigh. “Okay, now I’m done. Now we can go.”
Neville stared at her with his jaw dropped as Luna stood up and walked across the room to where her pants and knickers were folded neatly on a chair. “Don’t ever do that again,” he said.
“Why not?”
“Because it makes me want to jump you,” he admitted as he pulled a clean shirt from his drawer. “And I’m not sure we have the time right now.”
“I’m sorry,” she said as she pulled her knickers on. “I needed to orgasm, and I didn’t want to wait till we have sex again tomorrow morning. Do you mind if I wear your shirt? It’s very comfortable.”
Neville blinked, once again trying to clear his mind of dirty thoughts about his girlfriend. “Yeah, go ahead,” he said, walking back to the bed and holding his arm out to Artemisia, who climbed onto it willingly enough. “I’m sorry I don’t have anything for you,” Neville admitted to the owl. “I don’t keep any owl food. If you’re not ready to fly back to Tutshill you can go up to Hogwarts for the night.”
Artemisia gave Neville an impatient glance, but fluttered her wings in consent. Neville opened the window again, and the bird flew out into the night.
“So, are we ready to go?” Neville said as he closed the window behind him.
“You still need pants,” Luna said, pointing to his boxers.
“Oh, right,” he replied. He quickly pulled on the pair he had worn at school before taking Luna’s hand and walking her into the drawing room.
“This is so exciting,” said Luna. “I wonder if it’s going to be a boy or a girl.”
“We’re going to find out soon enough,” Neville replied, handing her the flowerpot. “Ladies first?”
“Thank you,” Luna said, taking a handful of powder and stepping into the fireplace. “St. Mungos!” she said in her loudest voice (only a few steps louder than her quietest one), and disappeared in a burst of green flame.
Neville took a handful for himself and set the flowerpot back on the mantle. As he stepped into the fireplace, that small burst of thought from earlier continued to nip at him. That face that jumped into his mind. The face of Uriela Clavis.
She’s just a friend, he argued to himself. That’s all. I barely know her.
Keep your mind open, he heard Luna say. That’s all I ask.
I will, he decided. Just not right now. I love Luna too much to think of anyone else.
“St Mungo’s!”
Five Years Later: Harpy Versus Vulture / Previous Chapters / One Cold Night In February (2/2)