Slumber
The following morning the talks in the Great Hall were about the Granger & Krum and the second task, but there was another piece of gossip that brought a lot of people talking.
“ARTEMIS FOWL AND LOONEY???” Lavender Brown wailed making anyone near her look at her.
Parvati covered her mouth “Not so loud” she sighed.
“It’s just . . .” the girl was speechless “When did this happen? I didn’t see those two the entire evening!”
“You were in the restroom when they started dancing” the Indian explained “They turned more heads than Krum and Granger”
Overhearing the conversation Ron snorted “Apparently Fowl has lost his mind”
Hermione smacked him “Ron! I’m sure he has an explanation for asking such a . . . girl”
“See!” Ron pointed “Even you think she’s mad!”
“Soo . . .” Lavender leaned forward “Did your sister say anything else?”
Parvati tapped her chin “Well when Luna was trying to comfort her on her bad dates . . .” she turned an eye over to Ron and Harry “Luna tried cheering her up with how she spent her evening with the Slytherins”
Again Ron butted in “Hopefully she infects them with her madness”
“Ron, knock it off!” Hermione groaned.
“We can hear your conversation from here!” Draco yelled from their table and the Gryffindors turned.
Ron yelled back “Well good to see you still have your head with ya”
“Weasley even you can’t handle my brain capacity” Draco smirked.
This made him very mad “Why you!”
“Ron! Sit down!” Hermione said pulling him down.
Harry sighed “Well where’s Fowl? I have to . . . consult him on something”
“Oh, he needs a cleansing of that girl’s influence that’s what” Pansy butted into the conversation.
“If there’s a person who needs proper cleansing that would be you,” Artemis said coming to the Hall and sitting down with his House “And if you continue yelling incoherencies with the other House please do so when I’m far from shouting range”
The Gryffindors then went quiet and back to whispering while the Slytherins looked at their resident genius.
“So . . .” Pansy spoke, “Care to explain what happened the previous night?”
“He did explain what happened last night,” Blaise said raising his glass of pumpkin juice “You just didn’t accept the explanation”
“Well, he chooses her out of a Veela!” Pansy waved her arms “Artemis, I know you don’t care about these kinds of matters but that is just showing borderline insanity”
The Irish boy picked up his utensils “I was taking the lesser evil, if I were to go with the self-proclaimed Veela, yes that wasn’t Miss Delacour, we would spend the evening having a vein conversation on her appearance. If I went for the Drashna, the Ravenclaw, she would start sniffing me inappropriately and probably take a lock of my hair while dancing.”
Draco cringed “Ravenclaws seem to be more avid fangirls than Hufflepuffs”
“And why didn’t you pick Shawcross?” Pansy asked “She’s a decent witch”
“Wait, Shawcross?” Theodore swallowed his ostrich eggs “Wasn’t she the one who gave you the brownies with some love potion in them?”
Blaise laughed “Fowl is such a ladies man”
“Zabini watch your words” Artemis glared “I am not in a good mood this morning”
Draco took a closer look at his friend “You haven’t slept much last night have you?”
“When you’ve got family business to monitor, patents to create and a megalomaniac dark wizard to look up” Artemis ate his pork chops “Sleep is just a bother”
“You are never going to find a woman at this rate Artemis!” Pansy crossed her arms and sighed “You are pre-occupied in too many things”
“Isn’t it a bit too early to think about things like that?” Theodore spoke “I mean we’re just fourteen”
“It is never too early to find love!” Pansy stood up. “Once Cupid’s arrow hits you there is no turning back from it, it is destiny that must be sought out for till the very end!”
Theodore blinked “I think she’s read too much on that muggle book regarding glowing vampires . . . umm, what the title was again?”
“Something probably by Violet Tsirblou” Blaise smiled and Artemis almost choked on his drink.
In the middle of Potions when Snape was outside resolving some urgent matter Ginny went near Luna and nudged her.
“Why didn’t you tell me your date was Artemis Fowl?” the redhead whispered.
Luna just concentrated on stirring her cauldron “He wasn’t initially my date, he just had trouble with Vexenbetes”
Ginny raised her brow “Vexenbetes?”
“Oh they’re like incubuses who crave insomniacs” Luna lifted her rod “Now where did I put that rabbit’s tail”
“I don’t think its rabbit’s tail,” Ginny said “So . . . how was your evening with him, I hear he’s harsher than Malfroy only more composed”
Luna tapped his chin with the rod “He seems like a fine gentleman to me, he simply has a lot to worry about” she then frowned “And I think Nargles are messing with his sleep as well”
The younger Weasley nodded at this new information, though they claim Luna to be a crazy girl with a wild imagination Ginny saw that it was just her way of expressing her thoughts, she knew that underneath her wonder was a very observant and intelligent mind. There was a reason she was a Ravenclaw after all.
So sometimes it saddened Ginny whenever people around her call Luna a crazy loon, even her brothers would tell her to step away from her. But Ginny had never met a person who was so understanding and level headed who ignored the taunts around her and just went on her merry way, and for that she respected Luna greatly.
So she was not quite surprised when she saw her dancing with Hogwarts brightest mind Artemis Fowl.
“I still can’t believe she danced with Fowl,” said a couple of Ravenclaw girls in front of them.
“I know,” said the shorter of the two with red, long hair pulled back to reveal a bony, sad face “She probably did some dark spell on him or something, there’s no way that he would dance with someone so beneath him”
Ginny was about to say something when Luna accidentally dipped the rabbit’s foot in the cauldron causing the concoction to turn to a very dangerous green. “Luna . . . that doesn’t look like the right color”
“Oh, it was the Chippersnappers who made me drop it” Luna then raised a rod which was in fact her wand. All of a sudden green smoke floated from the cauldron making Luna and Ginny step back. The smoke then went for the Ravenclaws in front of them and engulfed the girls.
Everyone in the room stopped whatever they were doing and were looking at the commotion that was going on. Ginny had a very worried look on her face as she didn’t know if the smoke was poisonous while Luna was more confused as to why her stirring rod looked like her wand. Luckily a someone had some sense to try and open the windows to let the smoke out.
The smoke cleared out as soon as Snape entered the classroom and what he saw were two Ravenclaw students who were now covered in warts.
“It looks like you placed rabbit’s foot in your cauldron” the potions teacher sneered “And I expected your House to be more cautious”
“WE WERE!” the redheaded Ravenclaw screamed “IT WAS HER!” she pointed at Luna.
“Yes,” the other girl, a blonde with bulging grey eyes, nodded “She heard us talk about her dancing with Fowl and she did . . . this” she looked at her now disgusting hands.
“15 points off Ravenclaw” Snape crossed his arms “And 5 points off Gryffindor for not stopping this from happening”
The Gryffindors groaned but they knew if they said anything more points would be deducted.
“You two go to Madam Pomfrey after class” the man then went to Luna “And you Miss Lovegood . . .”
The girl just looked at him blinking her eyes in wonder that Snape was somewhat taken aback.
“. . . You are to have detention later this evening”
Ginny gasped “But professor! It was just an accident! You know how Luna sometimes mistakes ingredients”
“Which is why she needs to learn Miss Weasley” the potions master lowered his gaze on the youngest Weasley “Unless you would like to join her”
“An evening in the dungeons” Luna smiled as if she wasn’t given any form of punishment “Well that sounds nice”
“The prefect’s bathroom?” Harry asked as Artemis explained to him how he would be able to get a clue from the egg. For years now Harry has been taking advice from the Irish youth for his survival, he didn’t know why a Slytherin like him would help him and Artemis had told him not to question it if he wanted to stay alive.
They were currently in the library that evening as Harry managed to find Artemis who seemed to be busy doing his Transfiguration assignment. “It’s quiet and there’s no one there to disturb you” Artemis explained. “You’ll need to be underwater to hear their message clearly and I doubt the lake is an ideal choice for that”
Harry nodded “I guess I’ll try that . . . maybe this Thursday”
“Good luck then” Artemis opened a book that was written in a language Harry could not understand “And remember don’t tell anyone I’m helping you, rumors are going around that Bagman has bets on you”
“I understand” and with that the boy who lived left.
Artemis sighed; it was becoming more and more difficult to ensure the safety of Harry Potter as the years gone by. It was from this that Artemis assumed that the Dark Lord was getting stronger and sooner or later the man was to finally make a public appearance.
He normally wouldn’t have a care about a matter such as this but prophecies were simply unbreakable and it did not help that he was not only prophesied by wizards by also by faeries.
And as he thought of it he did not want to be under the control of some snake.
“I need to contact Butler,” he said rubbing his forehead, he hasn’t properly slept in the past three days and it had gone to the point that he passed out in History of Magic classes. Not that he would miss anything since he had a first-hand experience of goblin rebellions.
He had cleaned up his desk and left the library going for his quarters. He was busy thinking of ways to monitor Gringots shares when he stumbled on something and ended up falling down the stairs. Artemis landed face-first and dropped his wand in the process.
The ‘something’ that he had tripped stood up “Oh dear, Artemis”
He did not need to look up to know whose voice that belonged to “Lovegood”
Luna skipped down the stairs “I’m sorry about that are you hurt?”
He managed to lift his face from the floor and he could also feel the warm liquid flowing from his forehead.
“Let me fix that” Luna raised her wand and did a healing charm on his forehead after a few moments the gash on his forehead was gone.
Artemis stood up and touched his forehead “What were you doing there?” he pointed his nose towards the staircase.
“Oh Nargles took my earrings and threw them at the stairs” she explained “I was only picking them up”
The Irish yawned he had no time to discuss Nargles with this girl “I best be off, there are some things I need to take care off”
“Don’t forget your wand” Luna pointed at where it landed earlier.
As Artemis was picking up his wand he noticed something “You’re not wearing shoes again”
“You know Occlumency” the blonde pointed at his wand, Silver Lime, Thunderbird Tail Feather 8 inches “I presume Legilimency as well”
He placed his wand under his robes “You wanted to see my wand?”
“I half suspected you to have Acacia or Elder” she smiled “But you would be quite unlucky if you did”
“Luck or not” Artemis stared at her “Your belongings always get stolen”
Luna stared up the ceiling “The Nargles like hanging them as a guard against evil spirits”
He looked up and saw a pair of shoes tied up against the banister “Even the evil spirits have nothing on cursed serpents and pixies” he then raised his wand to levitate her shoes from the ceiling and bring them to the floor.
“You didn’t have to do that,” she said.
“I don’t want you tripping any more people just trying to get them down” he checked his watch which told him it was a quarter past eight.
“You should go find a Hyponosnipe, they give relaxing ointments that help sleep” Luna bent down and tied the laces of her shoes to her hand “Your mind isn’t going to run forever”
He paused for a moment “I’ll take note of that” he wondered why he had been humoring her this whole time.
Now that her shoes were tied to both hands she stood up “Your mind is your greatest weapon, any infliction no matter how small can damage it greatly and you will be rendered powerless to your enemies” she then did a curtsy “Good evening Mr. Fowl”
“Good evening Miss Lovegood” he stood there for a moment as he watched the girl skipping up the stairs as though she were a little fairy going back home. He shook his head before heading for his quarters “I really need to sleep”
When Artemis reached the common room Blaise and Theodore were playing some card game and Draco was reading a book about Alchemy. The blond looked up from his book “Is it two in the morning already?”
“Huh?” Theodore checked the grandfather clock “Artemis you’re quite early”
“I’m going to bed,” Artemis said heading for the rooms.
Blaise rolled his eyes “Finally remembered you’re human just like the rest of us”
Draco closed his book “Who convinced you?”
“A Hypnosnipe” the Irish boy answered before leaving his friends who were staring at him.