Bonds of Blood and Magic By Duelist

Chapter 8: Interlude

On 31 July, late in the morning, Luna sat sprawled in a bean-bag chair in her loft bedroom staring at her ceiling mural when she felt her DA galleon heat up. She wore it in a pouch that hung from a cord around her neck, which was long enough to suspend it below her breasts so no one could see it.

She pulled the pouch out of her blouse, ripped it open, and grabbed her coin. It was her link, her symbol, of having friends. She wore it constantly, and never let it out of her sight. She immediately understood Harry’s emergency message, and laughed at the cleverness of whoever sent it.

She bounced up from her chair and ran downstairs to find her father.

“Daddy, guess what! I’m not going to Hogwarts this year!!”

Xenophilius Lovegood didn’t look nearly as excited as his sixteen year old daughter, until she mentioned that maybe they could go on an extended Snorkack expedition. Of course, she’d need to be able to come back if Harry needed her to fight Death Eaters again.

They immediately began making plans.

***
Hermione felt the gold galleon in the pocket of her jeans heat up, like it had so many times during fifth year. It hadn’t carried a message in so long, she jumped from the surprise. Her parents looked across the breakfast table at her questioningly, as they saw her face pale.

“H … Harry! He’s alive!” Then her face clouded, and she started digging in her pocket. “Or Ginny is…”

“What is that, Hermione?” asked her father when she pulled out a large gold coin.

“Oh, it’s a … way of sending messages to other members of the DA.”

“The … DA?”

“Our dueling club at school, Dad. Really, it’s more than that, but that’s what we call it.”

“So, Harry might be alive, or Ginny. How would that tell you?”

“Because there are only two master coins — mine and Harry’s. I don’t know if he had his when he disappeared, or if Ginny had it, though.”

“If it’s Harry’s, why would Ginny have it?”

Hermione rolled her eyes. “Harry might have given it to her, because she’s his girlfriend.” ‘Whatever he might have said at the end of the year,’ she added to herself.

“Ah. Well, what does your messaging penny say?”

“It’s a galleon,” she replied distractedly. She read the message on her coin again.

“It says, ‘All — do what free elf told HP year two.’” She furrowed her brow.

“Kind of cryptic isn’t it?” asked her mother.

“Not really, it’s pretty clear.”

“What? That’s clear?”

“Well, only if you know who and what it’s talking about. The ‘free elf’ is a little house elf named Dobby. Harry tricked his owner into freeing him at the end of our second year. He’s the only free elf I know who likes it, and he’s the only one who told Harry anything in second year.”

“So, HP is Harry Potter, then?” asked her father.

“Right.”

“So, what did he tell him?” prompted her mother when Hermione didn’t say anything more.

“Oh, sorry. He told Harry to stay away from Hogwarts, that it was too dangerous to go there…”

Mr. and Mrs. Granger exchanged a look, and then Mrs. Granger asked, “So, what are you going to do?”