DISCLAIMER: Anything that you recognize and have read before belongs to our beloved JKR, and I do not intend to use it for my profit except for scores in QLFC.

A/N: This is Beater 2 from Falmouth Falcons.

# PROMPT: Falcon

# ADDITIONAL PROMPTS USED:

3. (dialogue) "Sometimes I really dislike you."

8. (colour) lilac

# WORD COUNT BRACKET: 1750-2000

# WORD COUNT: 1892

# Thanks to my betas, Malhearst and whitetiger91

A Falcon or a Hawk?

Luna Lovegood skipped toward the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom. Turning around the corner, she bumped into a mass of red hair.

"Oh, I'm so sorry," the girl said. The badge on her robes matched the colour of her hair.

"Hello, I'm Luna Lovegood. You must be Ginevra Weasley," she said in her usual singsong voice.

"I am," Ginny replied, cursing her luck. She was late for class, and of all people she could've bumped into, it had to be Loony Lovegood. Both girls moved towards the staircase.

"Thankfully, Professor Lockhart isn't here," Ginny huffed as she searched for a seat. Unfortunately, the only seat empty was next to Luna. Lady Luck was against her today.

Irritated with Luna's humming before even sitting down, she wondered how was she going to spend two hours in this class, until an answer appeared: Fred and George!

"Good morning, class," Lockhart said as he entered the classroom. He turned around, flashing smiles to the girls.

Meanwhile, Ginny was busy fumbling with her bag. Finding a piece of candy and chewing on the orange part for a while, she suddenly started puking badly—very badly. "Sometimes I really dislike you, Fred and George," she muttered to herself.

"Here, little sister," Fred said to her urgently, pressing a handful of candies in her hand.

"If Hogwarts becomes too much pressure, just pop in the orange part, and you can get out of class—with permission," George explained.

Ginny's eyes widened. "No." She shook her head.

"You are lucky. Ron never had those," Fred told her.

"Or else, he could have easily asked for a time-out from You-Know-Who last year," George said, grinning.

"Do they work?" Ginny asked.

Fred and George looked at each other.

"Yes, they work," George stated.

"Too perfectly," Fred added as she pocketed them.

"Eat the purple part whenever you feel the need to stop the—process," George shouted over his shoulder, as the duo marched away.

Now she understood what Fred had meant by Too perfectly.

"M-Miss—" said Lockhart, panicking.

"Weasley," Luna said. "Must be the Wrackspurts buzzing in her head," she mumbled as Lockhart asked Ginny to go to the hospital wing.

Suppressing a need to roll her eyes at Loony, Ginny collected her stuff.

"You should leave your stuff here, Miss Weasley. Miss—"

"Lovegood."

"Miss Lovegood will bring it later."

.oOo.

Luna had been looking around for Ginny everywhere, but she couldn't find her. Sighing, she decided she would return Ginny's things tomorrow and went back to her dormitory.

She peeked at the bag; hearing some buzzing sounds from the inside, she opened it. Luna pulled out a small diary, which was surrounded by Nargles. It opened to reveal yellowed parchment, but not a speck of ink was there.

Suddenly, an ink bottle toppled and fell into her lap, splashing ink everywhere.

"I'm s-sorry," said Marietta, looking at her. "I can clean this right away."

But Luna's gaze was transfixed on the diary; there wasn't a single blot of ink on it. What does this mean, she thought. Maybe a magical way to talk to far-off friends, her mind supplied.

Luna picked up her quill, opened the diary to a random page, and wrote down the first thing that came to her mind. 'Why are so many Nargles surrounding this book?'

Almost immediately, the diary wrote back, 'What are Nargles?'

Luna gasped. What a wonderful invention to talk to someone, she thought. Would her father be able to make a similar thing for them to talk?

'Who are you?' she scribbled.

'I'm Tom,' the diary wrote back. 'You're not Ginny,' it added.

'No, I'm Luna Lovegood. Are you a friend of Ginny's?'

'Yes. So, why do you have this diary with you?'

'Ginny got sick in the class, so I have her stuff,' she wrote down. Suddenly, Luna felt bad that she was basically using Ginny's diary without her permission, but then decided she was just helping in removing the Nargles. Still, she closed the diary without waiting for a reply.

Putting the diary aside, she settled down on her bed. Taking out her Defence Against the Dark Arts homework, she spent an hour trying to learn what Lockhart's favourite colour and ice-cream flavor was. Getting bored after a while, she decided to talk to Tom again. 'What are you doing, Tom?' she asked.

'I'm trying to conjure a Patronus,' the diary wrote back.

A Patronus, Luna thought. Her mother had told her about those. She had seen her mother conjuring a hare made up of silvery smoke.

'Are you a NEWT student?' Luna wrote.

'Yes,' was the short reply.

'Do you and Ginny often talk like this?' Luna asked.

'Most of the time,' Tom replied. 'But sometimes I show her things as well.'

Luna scanned through her mind, trying to think of anything analogous to this diary. Sighing, she wrote a single curious word. 'How?'

'Let me show you.'

Before Luna could understand what was happening, the pages started flapping around as though caught in a high wind. Her jaw dropped open; the little square for January fifteenth seemed to have turned into a minuscule window, which was widening. Before she knew what was happening, she felt her body leave the bed, and she was sucked head-first through the window, into a whirl of color and shadow.

Luna looked around, and found herself standing by the Black Lake. A thick crust of snow covered the grounds, yet the sky was clear; the sun was at the horizon, and a lilac hue spread across the sky.

In front of her, a tall, handsome boy was standing. She could not spot anyone else nearby, so she assumed that this must be Tom.

"Expecto Patronum," said the boy, as he flicked his wand. He cursed under his breath when nothing happened.

He turned around, and looked at Luna—no, at the castle—straight through her. She noticed a small group of students—probably third years—walking past her, the snow crunching under their feet as they moved. One of them stuck out in particular. He was taller than any of the people she had ever seen, except for Hagrid. Luna looked closely, and found that this was indeed the friendly half-giant—Hagrid in his Hogwarts days.

This is the past, she realised, as she turned and looked at the castle herself. How long ago, she did not know.

Fascinated, Luna watched the frozen lake, the Hogwarts building, and the tree-line that marked the boundary of the Forbidden Forest. Though it was winter, and everything was covered in a thick layer of snow, it was still very much alive.

She had always imagined the past to be a black-and-white, two-dimensional image, like the old photographs in the albums. Seeing it all in person was a totally different experience. She tried to capture everything in her eyes; she wanted to lock all the images in her mind, forever. The past was lighter and brighter than the present, she realised.

She focused her attention back at Tom. His face was set in a mask of concentration, and he continued to try, with no success at all. His handsome features twisted into a frown, which deepened with each try.

Luna continued to watch him for a long time, and eventually got tired. Before long, the boy made his way back to the castle, and Luna found herself back on the four-poster bed.

'Everyone but I can do that spell,' the diary wrote.

Luna felt sympathy for the boy, but she knew better than to pity him. She scribbled down, 'What do you think your Patronus would be?'

This time, the words did not appear instantly. As though he had made up his mind, Tom replied after a few moments, 'I think it would be a bird of prey.'

'Like a Hawk?' Luna asked.

'No.'

Luna started to write back, but more words appeared. 'A Hawk eats with its beak, but its survival depends on its claws. If its claws are broken, it cannot hunt, and eventually falls prey to the hunger.'

Luna nodded in agreement, though there was no one to see that.

The words continued to string together into sentences. 'I have never—will never rely on anyone but myself, so I think my Patronus would be a Falcon. They hunt, intake, and swallow through their beaks only.'

Luna wanted to comment on this, but decided against it. 'Which happy memory did you concentrate on?' she asked.

'Happy memory?' the book asked. 'Only a fool would focus on happiness. It makes you weak, unaware. A falcon needs to stay sharp.'

Luna looked at the book in horror. How can a person not appreciate happiness, she wondered. 'A Patronus Charm works on happiness and love, Tom,' she wrote down; her mother's wisdom, which ran in her veins, speaking through her. 'Love and happiness is what binds us all together, and repels the darkness.'

Not giving Tom a chance to reply back, she continued writing. 'No one can live an independent life, Tom. Yes, the falcons don't rely on their claws to fill their stomachs, but they wouldn't have been the birds of prey if not for their strong wings and keen eyesight.

'Even the strongest of wizards depend on their wands for magic. A child does not learn how to walk and speak by itself; his parents are there to teach him that.'

'I'm an orphan,' Tom cut in. Though Luna could not see his face, his handwriting wasn't the neat, perfect cursive as it had earlier been. It had a cold, dark aura around it.

'You depended on your teachers to learn about magic spells,' Luna countered. 'It was Hogwarts who taught you how to make things happen with mere words and wand-movements; it was Hogwarts who taught you how to bottle up potions and poisons.'

'ENOUGH!' angry words were written in an untidy scrawl across the page in blood-red ink. They glowed, and Luna closed her eyes shut as a reflex to the blinding red light.

'O-B-L—' the letters began to form, as Luna opened her eyes.

'—I-V—' Luna clutched the covers of the book.

'—I-A-T—' she slammed the diary shut and dumped it inside the bag. Her breath came out in shallow huffs, and she felt her eyes roll back into her head.

"Luna, Luna," she heard someone calling. Someone was shaking her violently, and she could feel her hair drenched to the roots.

"Luna!" She opened her eyes, and shut them almost immediately to the blinding light. Then she realised the light was white, and not red. Feeling a bit relaxed, she peeked one eye open, and found herself staring into the face of Rolf Scamander. She could hear Lysander crying, but right now, Rolf had his attention on her.

"What happened, Luna?" he asked her.

"N-Nothing," said Luna, as she reached around for a goblet of water.

"Here," Rolf said, handing water to her. "Bad dream?" he asked, his face masked with concern.

Luna nodded.

"Want to talk about it?" he asked.

She shook her head. She had been having these dreams since the day Ginny had told her about the diary. 'I have to talk to Ginny,' she decided, just as she was swept away into the world of dreams—and nightmares—once again.