"To be great is to be misunderstood." - Oscar Wilde

“She’s barking!” Ron hissed. Harry tried to ignore him, which was easy giving the blinding obviousness of his statement.

The ‘she’ in question was Luna Lovegood, DA member and Hogwarts School’s resident eccentric. It hadn’t been her intention, but her arrival in the library had caused everyone to look up from their Potions essays and Transfiguration homework.

Luna often had that sort of effect on people.

The Hippogriff feathers currently platted into her long blonde hair probably didn’t help.

“Hello, Harry,” she said, giving him a bright smile as she’d wandered dreamily past on her way to the Divination books, “Hello Hermione. Hello Ronald.”

Harry nodded, and returned the smile. It was so bright, so utterly innocent, that ignoring her would have been like kicking a kitten. Even Hermione managed a weak ‘hi’.

Ron continued to stare at her, aghast.

Luna didn’t seem to notice, and drifted past, her robes billowing around her. Strange how her robes seemed to billow. They were the same school robes as the rest of Hogwarts wore, but they looked different on Luna. Ethereal, as if she was an all-too-solid ghost hovering through the castle.

No ghost would wear radishes as fashion accessories.

“She’s barking,” Ron repeated, allowing his voice to rise a little now Luna was out of sight behind the bookcases.

“Ron!” Hermione exclaimed, glaring at him, “She’ll hear you.”

“So?” Ron shrugged, looking a little sheepish, as he so often did when Hermione berated him (despite his best efforts to remain unmoved). “I don’t mean it in a bad way. She’s our friend. But, I mean, come on, Hermione, she must know she’s utterly insane.”

The ghost had drifted around the bookshelves while he was talking/ Ron, pink cheeked, opened his mouth to apologise, but it was rather redundant. Luna looked delighted. He’d called her a friend. He could have added several spiteful and intelligent adjectives after that, and she wouldn’t have cared. A real friend.

“To be great is to be misunderstood,” she said, pleasantly, before slipping past them and out of the library, a battered book clutched to her chest. They could hear her footsteps on the cobbles as she skipped along, but then she rounded the corner and disappeared out of earshot.

“I suppose it makes a chance from ‘wit beyond measure...'” ventured Harry, helpfully.

Write about a conversation when what you said wasn't what you were thinking.

August hadn't been as warm as usual. In fact, it had been downright cold, with unseasonal fog and very little sunshine.

Despite the poor weather, and even poorer circumstances, Luna was still packing for Hogwarts. Her father sat on the end of her bed, watching as his only child piled odds and ends only she would consider packing into an already bulging trunk.

It was all too normal. The Ministry had fallen. Albus Dumbledore was...gone, so Hogwarts was probably no more than a shell of what it had once been. The wizarding world was crumbling around them, and although Luna wasn't actually in the centre, she was too close to it for Xenophilius.

"I don't think you should go back to Hogwarts," he said, suddenly. It was a moment of uncharacteristic seriousness, so much so that Luna dropped the gurdyroots she'd been holding all over the carpet.

The worst thing was that she knew his worry was not unfounded, even before he present the carefully constructed argument he'd prepared.

Hogwarts had always been considered safe (or at least as safe as a school for under age, untrained hormone-driven witches and wizards could ever be). Regardless of external events, the students within had always learnt in safety and security.

Things had changed over recent years, of course, what with the Chamber of Secrets, and then that business with Sirius Black. But over all, Hogwarts had remained steadfast.

Now Severus Snape was in charge, with You-Know-Who pulling the strings.

Though she wasn't a Gryffindor, Luna was braver than a lion when she had to be, and smart to boot. It wasn't that Xenophilius didn't think she could look after herself. It was just that you only had to glance at the paintings on her wall to see how much she cared for her friends.

She'd died for them. And, since of those friends was Harry Potter, the chance of that happening was worryingly high.

These were all things they both knew.

What Xenophilius didn't know - or didn't want to admit he knew - was that asking such a question was fruitless. Luna had opened up when she'd found herself actually having friends, like a flower which had been waiting for just the right burst of sunlight. She'd no more betray them than stop breathing.

"I'll be fine," she assured him, and, even though she was thinking the absolute opposite, she knew it was worth the risk.