Loyal to a snake?

Chapter 1 - The journey to Hogwarts

"Hey Lucy!..."
I turned to see Luna walking towards me, smiling. "Oh, Hi Luna," I smiled back. "How are you?" She stopped in front of me. "Good! The quibbler is doing pretty good at the moment." I'd always found her father's magazine pretty entertaining, though I didn't believe horoscopes and quizzes to be that accurate. "Do you have some with you? I'll buy one if that's alright." She lit up. "Yes of course! I'll come by your cabin... where do you sit?"
I used to sit with Cedric, but now that he was gone I was pretty shy to ask to join anyone.
"I don't really know..." I looked down. Luna probably understood, because immediately she asked me to sit with her. "I would love to!"
However, as I was about to walk further, I stumbled into someone. I lost my grip and fell down on the corridor floor while bringing the person down with me.
"Ow..." I grunted. I looked up to see a pale, blonde guy over me. He got up and I recognized him as Draco Malfoy. He tightened his green and silver tie and reached out a hand to me. Surprised, I blushed and took his hand.
After helping me up, he smirked. "Wanted me to fall for you or what?" Stunned at the flirty comment, I couldn't reply properly. "Oh.. I.. I just, fell.. uh, sorry I guess?" He laughed. "Don't worry. I'd never fall for a mudblood anyways." He was about to head off when Luna interrupted him. "You shouldn't call muggleborns that. It's a very mean thing to say, you know..." He just looked annoyed at her. "Well I guess I'm mean then... a mean Hogwarts Prefect... so be careful.." he said with a smirk. For a split second we made eye contact, and then he walked off.
"He's a bit of a jerk, that Draco Malfoy," Luna said. "Yeah..." However, I couldn't help but feel something. I wasn't sure what it was, but it was something.
"Let's find a cabin, shall we?"

We spent a lot of the train ride talking, reading and eating snacks. We talked about everything from chocolate frogs to dementors, to potions.
"Oh on the subject of potions, have you ever though about what a love potion really does?" I asked. Luna thought about it for a moment. "I guess it would make you obsessed with someone? I hardly think a potion could create love, but that it would rather create an illusion of it. I should have my dad write about something like that in the quibbler..."
It made sense. A lot of people would think of Luna as "Loony". However, most of what she said made sense, at least in my opinion. She was very wise for her age. It felt like she was in my grade, and not one below.
Before now, I hadn't really spent much time alone with her. I was glad to finally have the pleasure to do so.
"Who would you have liked to give it to?" Luna looked curiously at me. "Huh? Oh, no one, I was just curious." She searched my face to see if I was lying or not.
"Okay, good. I don't think anyone deserves to be given one, really... for a moment I was afraid you'd want to give one to Draco..."
I let out a bit of a nervous laugh. "No, I don't think anyone deserves love by a potion either."

After changing into our uniforms, we slowly made our way to the carriages. As I went into the carriage, Luna went in front of it. "Luna? What are you doing?" I looked confused down at her. "Oh. I'm just petting the Thestrals," she answered casually. "Petting the what?" As far as I could see, she was petting the air. "You can't see them if you haven't seen anyone die." Again, she said it so casually like she was perfectly used to seeing people dying. "Oh..." There wasn't really much use to a reply to that, so I just waited in the carriage. A moment later she joined me.

"Excuse me," a female voice said. "Is it okay if we join your carriage?"
We both looked down to see Hermione Granger accompanied by Ron Weasley and Harry Potter. "Sure you can," I smiled.
They sat down, all of them a bit awkward. "Harry, Ron, this is Loo...Luna Lovegood, Ravenclaw," Hermione said her hand directing towards Luna. "And... Lucy, right? Hufflepuff." I nodded. At the sound of Hufflepuff, Harry looked over at me. He looked me over for a moment. "You knew Cedric, right?" Hermione looked annoyed at Harry and mumbled to him: "Harry! It's probably a sensitive subject!" I smiled sadly at Harry. "Yes I did, he was a dear friend of mine." Harry nodded. "I'm sorry."
"Sorry for what? He's probably on everyone's mind... at least now most people should believe you-know-who is back..." Hermione smiled somewhat sadly at me.
"I knew there was something fishy about the tournament... especially when you were selected, Harry.."
He looked up at me. "You believed me? That I didn't put my name in the cup?"
I smiled at him.
"Why would you? You didn't need to prove your braveness, having faced you-know-who multiple times... and no one else underage managed to do it..." Luna put away a magazine of the quibbler she had been reading. "Are you sure you aren't a ravenclaw?" I laughed at that. "Hufflepuffs can be sensible too, you know!" I teased her.

"I hoped and tried to get Cedric to drop out somehow... but he wouldn't do it..."
Hermione looked concerned and confused at me. "But Lucy... you know he couldn't have, right? He had no choice once he was picked..."
I thought about it for a second. "No, I believe we all have choices. I believe he could've done something, survived somehow..."
Ron, Harry and Hermione all looked awkwardly at each other.
I let out a laugh. "Oh sorry.. cheer up now, he wouldn't have wanted us to dwell so much on the past, but rather make it mean something... " I opened my small, black and golden purse and reached my hand down to grab a box of sugary candy. "Want some?" They all took a piece of candy and the rest of the trip to the castle went quite smoothly.