Chapter 1: Meeting Luna

Harry was wandering around the castle under his invisibility cloak, a habit he had acquired shortly after his name had come out of the Goblet, and his dormmates had made it clear he was not welcome. Or rather, his supposed best friend Ronald Weasley had said so, and none of them had voiced any disagreement.

He stopped when he heard crying, and looked around to see if he could determine where it was coming from. He soon identified it as coming from a nearby cupboard, and went over and asked "Are you OK?"

"Please help me".

Harry grabbed the handle of the cupboard and was surprised to find it locked. He wasn't going to leave someone in need locked inside a dark cupboard, and so he gave the handle a hard yank. Magic in its purest form is simply the manifestation of the user's intent. Even though numerous locking charms had been used on the door, they all fell away at that moment. Harry did not believe himself to be a strong wizard, but he did believe strongly that no-one should have to be locked in a dark cupboard, and it was the strength of this belief that allowed him to overcome the locking charms with ease.

After opening the door, Harry was shocked to see a thin and naked girl with blonde hair. Embarrassed, he quickly pulled off his invisibility cloak and threw it to her, then turned round to give her a chance to cover up. "It's OK, you can look now". Harry turned around, and saw that the girl had wrapped his cloak around herself, leaving her head hovering in the air. He vaguely recognised her as being a Ravenclaw in the year below him.

"I'm afraid I don't know your name."

"Hello Harry Potter, my name is Luna Lovegood, thank you for rescuing me"

"Who did this to you?"

"The other girls in my dorm ambushed me after my last class today and stunned me, and I woke up locked in here. I don't think I want to go back to my dorm"

"I'm not welcome in my dorm either, would you like to stay here with me?" said Harry, lying down on the floor of the cupboard as he did so. Rather than lay down nearby, Luna choose to lay on top of Harry and cuddle into him. As she did so, her stomach growled with hunger. Frowning, Harry realised that Luna had not been able to have dinner.

Although it had become increasingly detached after decades of uncaring headmasters, the castle itself responded to the distress of its two most powerful students in centuries. Dobby popped next to pair and said "Hogwarts is asking house elves to be helping you. Dobby be here to help you."

"Dobby, Luna here was forced to miss dinner, could you bring something for us to eat?"

"Dobby can be doing doing that." Dobby popped away, and was soon back with plates of fruit, biscuits and cheese, along with mugs of hot chocolate.

The pair were quiet while they ate. Unknown to Harry, Luna had not eaten since breakfast, as she had been forced to spend her entire lunch tracking down the books required for their afternoon classes.

Luna was still only wearing Harry's invisibility cloak, and was surprised to notice that she had warmed up and stopped shivering. Invisibility cloaks were not known for their warmth, but Luna had noticed as soon as she put it on that it was no ordinary invisibility cloak. Harry had lent it to her with the intent of it being a suitable substitute for her missing clothes, and the invisibility cloak of Death himself was more than capable of responding to Harry's intent.

"I've been locked in a cupboard before, you know." Luna froze when hearing this. The Boy-Who-Lived, locked in a cupboard?

"When I was growing up with my relatives, they locked me up in the cupboard under the stairs each night to sleep. They told me it was my punishment for being a freak, and they'd stop doing it when I stopped being a freak. They let my cousin Dudley beat me up, and uncle Vernon thrashed me with a belt until I was bleeding severely, and poured salt into the cupboard where I slept. They said it was from my own good, that they'd get the freakishness out of me. I tried to stop being a freak, I wanted to stop being a freak, but I couldn't and the freakishness kept on happening. When my teacher's hair turned blue after she accused me of cheating off of my cousin, my Aunt Petunia said that it was obvious I was far too freakish, and she was going to make sure I was reminded of it every day. She heated up a fireplace poker and did this to me" Harry pulled up his shirt, and among the other scars, she could see burn scars on Harry's side spelling out the work FREAK.

This was the first time Harry had talked about his childhood so openly, and he had started crying by the end of it. Luna cuddled into harry and tried to comfort him "You're not a freak Harry, you're a very nice wizard, you rescued me, and I like you very much. I've been called a freak as well. It was shortly after my mother died. The girl living near me, Ginny Weasley was trying to comfort me, and was hugging me, and her mother burst into the room I was in and chased me out with a broom, she said that she wouldn't let an unnatural freak corrupt he daughter"

Harry was less shocked than he would have been about Molly Weasley's behaviour. After his name had come out of the Goblet, he had received a letter with a stern warning stay away from her family, and that she should of known what an untrustworthy halfblood he was, given his mudblood whore of a mother. She did however show her true colours by also saying that she would still be willing to allow him to marry her daughter, so long as he provided a bride price of 500,000 Galleons.

Dobby and another house elf had popped in just as Harry started telling Luna about his time growing up, and rather than interrupt, they had listed to the story. They could tell that Harry was telling the truth, and that he had omitted the worst of it. As his story went on, the house elves respect for Harry grew. Dobby had always though that the great Harry Potter sir was a great wizard, and now the rest of the house elves at Hogwarts would share that opinion.

Harry had been through worse than the most abused house elf, and was not a murdering psychopath at the end of it. It was not well known, but house elves could turn on their masters. Simple physical abuse wouldn't do it, with the extremely fast healing and high pain tolerances, it was not enough to break their bond with their master. However, kill one of their children in front of them, and you would not live long enough to regret it

"Dobby and Hokey be sorry it be taking so long. Here are all Miss Luna's things, cleaned and repaired. Miss Luna should be calling Hokey if she needs anything" Luna saw that the elves had brought her trunk, and it was full with all her possessions, even the ones she had long thought lost. On the top of her trunk, there was a picture of her and her mother that the older ravenclaws had torn up and thrown into the lake in her first year. This left Luna with a new respect and appreciation for the house elves.

"Thank you, this is one of the nicest things anyone has ever done for me".

"It is being no trouble. Any true friend of the great Harry Potter Sir is being a friend of Dobby. Dobby is being glad that Dobby could help"

"Hokey is also happy to have been able to help."

"Friend? Would you you be my friend Harry Potter?" "I think I'd like that". Harry briefly stood outside the cupboard to allow Luna to get dressed. The house elves brought the pair pillows and blankets, and the pair drifted off into a deep sleep cuddled up to each other, both feeling better than they had in a long time.