lords first steps
“NO! Of course not, Hermione! You’re my friend! I care about you, I don’t want you as a follower!”
Harry’s voice cracked with desperation, the words bursting out before he could stop them. He didn’t want to lose her to this obsession. She couldn’t keep pushing herself like this.
Hermione’s hand clenched around the timeturner. Her fingers twisted it in agitation, spinning the small device with an almost frantic energy.
“NO!” harry snapped , his voice tight with fear.
Harry lunged forward, desperate to stop her from spiraling any further. In a single motion, he grabbed the timeturner from her hand, the cool metal shocking his palm. Without thinking, he looked at her, turned and ran.
He raced
past the corridor,
through the doors
and straight into someone.
The collision was sudden, and Harry stumbled back, heart racing.
“Sorry luna, ! didn't see you there.” he spoke softly, thinking he had gotten away from hermione enough..
blinking as he looked up right into Luna Lovegood’s wide, expectant eyes.
"it's quite alright har- .. Harry?!"
luna and harry, were shoved through swivelling lights and flashing colours as the time went by.
…
“Harry? Are you okay?” Luna’s voice was soft, but something about it felt distant, as if she were speaking to him from the other side of a veil.
There was a ringing in his ears. A high-pitched sound that drowned everything else. He couldn’t focus on anything except the sharp, searing pain in his scar.
It burned. It burned like fire, like his skin was being pressed against a hot stove. A violent, gnawing pain. His breath hitched, his chest tight with each pulse of agony.
He didn’t know when the tears started. But they came, hot and relentless, and he couldn’t stop them.
Luna’s arms were suddenly around him, pulling him close.
Her embrace was warm and gentle, but even that felt distant in the fog of his pain. She was there, holding him, but her words were muffled. “Harry, you’re… you’re hurt. In pain.. It’s okay… I’m here.” But the pain.. his scar felt like it was writhing, twisting inside him, an insatiable burn. And then, as quickly as it came, it began to fade.
The agony ebbed. Slowly, as if the pain was being drawn away, sinking deeper into his skin.
His scar was... disappearing.
Luna gasped softly. “Harry... Your scar... It.. it’s uhm..”
Harry looked up at her in confusion and pain.
“ ..disappearing??”
Harry’s hand flew to his forehead in an instant., instinctively touching the scar, but it didn’t feel the same. The skin was smooth.. no roughness, no ridge. His heart raced as he pressed harder, feeling for any sign that it was still there. But there was nothing. It was gone.
The scar was gone.
His scar, was gone
how . the actual . hell.
Luna’s arms tightened around him, but he barely noticed. The pain was gone. The scar that reminded who everyone thought he was, that had plagued him for years was... simply no longer there.
“Luna... What happened?” His voice came out broken, almost hoarse from the strain of it all. it was still serious, as much as it could be anyway.
Luna blinked, a dreamy look crossing her face as she tilted her head to the side. “Well, I was looking for my items,” she began in that peculiar way of hers, as though nothing strange had just happened.
“Quite a few people have stolen things from me when you bumped into me. But, it’s okay. We got... well, sucked into something. And you landed on the floor, quite funnily, actually." She chuckled softly, as if she were telling a story about a minor accident, her voice distant and casual. Harry blinked at her, still trying to piece together the fragments of his thoughts.
"...The timeturner," he gasped, his heart thudding in his chest as he glanced down at the broken chain in his hand. The timeturner..
the one Hermione had been holding, the one he’d grabbed in desperation, had snapped clean in half. A thin, jagged crack ran through the delicate glass, and the once-twirling device was now useless. It had shattered under the strain, just like everything else.
His stomach dropped. "It must've... sent us back," Harry claimed, barely believing the words coming out of his mouth. Had it really? How far..?
Luna’s eyes flicked to the broken timeturner in his hand, her expression unreadable. “I’m not sure when it left us.. but I’m glad it stopped the pain.”
“Yeah...” Harry muttered, still trying to absorb what had just happened. His fingers pressed against his forehead again, but there was nothing. No scar. Not even a trace.
He sat there for a moment, trying to calm the whirlwind in his mind. The letter, is that what it meant?
“Luna, I..” He paused, his voice faltering. “I don’t understand. This is… it’s impossible, right?” pointing to his scar, he knew that it had been seen by many many professionals and all said it would be a permanent scar from the killing curse.
She tilted her head at him with that gentle, almost serene expression. “I don’t know, Harry. Magic’s strange sometimes.”
Magic.
…
Strange.
“Indeed it is..”
..they stared at eachother a bit.. unknowing of what to do..
"uhm.." they both said, in unison.
Luna suddenly gasped. “Oh! I see someone. Would you like me to ask them when are we?”
Harry chuckled a bit at how she said that. “If you could, yes.. But try to make sense. Not that you don’t, but sometimes people aren't as… open eyed as you.”
Luna nodded and skipped the entire way, and spoke to.. Someone rather familiar looking.
Harry watched from afar. She spoke gently to the person, thought that person seemed quite confused.
He still told her something.. And she was … taking it in
She was.. Shocked. Luna walked back quickly, and jumped into his lap, quickly holding his head close.
harry almost toppled over from her speed. he quickly tried to hold himself up, curious of what she was trying to tell him so quickly.
the ravenclaw whispered in harry’s ear.
“Harry.. We are in 1943”
They both know what that meant. Harry knew what that meant. Luna.. she knew.
Tom Riddle was alive, and not yet Voldemort.
they had to hide somehow. What was he to say to the headmaster? How was he to stay in hogwarts?
Harry grabbed Luna's arm.
“Oh, where are you taking me harry? Away from the nargles i hope. There are much more than there are in our year.”
Harry ran. He ran all the way to where hagrids house.. Will be. And ran into the forest.
–
They ran into the forest. And they stopped.
Harry sat down, on a rock. And luna joined next to him.
He didnt know what to do.
Harry sat on the rock, his head in his hands. The weight of everything pressed down on him.
Luna, as always, seemed far calmer, though her wide eyes darted around the forest, observing their surroundings as if she were searching for something unseen. “We can’t stay here forever,” Luna said, her voice soft but certain. She tilted her head, studying Harry. “We wouldn’t want to disturb the snorkacks.”
Harry nodded slowly, though his thoughts were spinning. “I agree... How are we supposed to blend in, though ?” he muttered. “We don’t belong here. If anyone finds out… especially.. Him. ” His voice trailed off, the unspoken name hanging in the air like a shadow.
Luna touched his arm gently. “Then we don’t let them find out.” Her eyes sparkled with a quiet determination. “We’ll figure it out, My lord. We always do.”
Harry looked at her, struck by how calm she seemed , and what he had just called him. “Do you ever worry, My Luna?” he asked, his voice quieter now.
“Oh, all the time,” she replied, her tone breezy. “But worrying doesn’t help. curiosity does.”
Her words struck a chord, and Harry found himself nodding. “Right,” he said, sitting up straighter. “Okay. First things first. “ he took a glance at luna, to check if she was listening.
Luna nodded and sat up like a soldier called to Attention.
“we need to figure out what’s happening at Hogwarts right now. Blend in with the events and such.. If we’re lucky, Dumbledore’s already a professor.”
Luna’s face lit up with recognition. “Ah ! He is! Transfiguration, I think. Im not sure if he’ll be good help.. He usually decides his own students fate.. much to their.. demise.” she stares up at harry, and he.. Picked up what she put down.
“Let’s hope not..” Harry muttered, his mind racing. “But we can’t just show up looking like this.” He gestured to their robes, which were clearly out of place compared to what students of the 1940s would be wearing.
Luna pursed her lips in thought, then brightened. “The Room of Requirement might help. It’s always good for things like that.”
Harry frowned. “Do you think it exists now?”
“Only one way to find out,” she said, hopping to her feet.
She offered him her hand. “Shall we, my lord?”
Harry hesitated, glancing deeper into the forest. The thought of leaving their temporary cover felt risky, but staying here wouldn’t solve anything. He took her hand and stood. “We’ll need to be careful. No one can know who we are. we aren't even alive yet.... to them atleast.”
Luna smiled. “Of course not. I’ll be someone else. You can call me... Lune Starling.”
Harry blinked at her. “Lune Starling?”
“Yes, it’s a lovely name, don’t you think?” she said, her tone airy as ever. “And you can be… oh, something very ordinary. Like… Harrison Evans. That should do nicely. It's your mothers last name, too. You’ve never gotten much use out of it.”
Harry let out a reluctant chuckle. “Harrison Evans…. And I guess you're right.”
He stared at her gentle, soft smile before finishing his sentence. “Great. Let’s go before I change my mind.”
They set off, weaving through the forest as quietly as they could. As they neared the edge, the towering silhouette of Hogwarts came into view, its familiar spires a comforting sight even in this strange time.
The castle looked both the same and somehow different.. less worn by time, more kept.
Harry took a deep breath. “Here we go,” he said, gripping the broken Time-Turner in his pocket as if it were a lifeline.
Luna smiled beside him, her steps light and sure. “Don’t worry, Harry. We’re exactly where we’re supposed to be.”
He wasn’t.. so sure about that, but for now, it was enough to keep moving. Together, they slipped out of the forest and into the shadows of a Hogwarts that felt like another world.