Harry was getting dressed in their shared bedroom, deciding between green or navy robes. He found in the wizarding world there was an unspoken convention of houses having their own dress code, whether more or less magical. Harry decided Grimmauld Place was for anything, but as he was going to Luna's house over near the Weasley's, he thought Xenophilius being away didn't change the Lovegoods' preference for magical style.
Ginny wandered into the room, her head stuck in her diary. "Go with the green. It suits you." She said, smiling. She always liked watching him dress. Partly for the nudity, partly for the pride in having someone wear what she bought them. Harry made a fake huffing sound and added. "I'll make my own mind up thanks very much." He made sure to add a cheeky smile to let her know he was joking. She rolled her shoulders in a light shrug as if she didn't care at all.
"So this thing you're going over to do. What actually is it?" She inquired as she watched him dress, slipping quickly into casual underclothes and his robes. He flicked his wand and the laces did themselves. "Basically I'm just helping her cast freezing charms while she studies them mid flight. But because she's bad with a broom I also have to fly so she can see. It's tricky.' He said, looking over at her as she studied him.
"I approve." She said, flashing a thumbs up. "Well it sounds like fun. Luna always gets excited around those things." She had moved from where she was hovering near the doorway to stand next to him, admiring them as a couple in the mirror, as did Harry. He was proud of where they'd gotten to, and despite feeling the curse bubble up in him again, he sighed and furrowed his brow. Ginny looked up at him and tilted her head quizzically. "What's wrong love?" He stroked her head gently as he hugged her. "I just don't want to ruin this. Things feel perfect aside from the dark magic tingling along my spine." Ginny laughed a little, allowing Harry to sway her gently.
She disentangled from their embrace and cupped his cheeks, staring up at him. "For the last time, I'm not asking you to desire to cheat on me. I'm cleverly exploiting a nasty curse in hopes it can sate an urge of mine. Okay?" She said, smiling sweetly and kissing him when he nodded. "Come on, I need to teach you the warding spells, they're tricky." She tugged on his hand and led him into the sitting room. Kreacher hadn't quite finished this room, and it was odd to see what he considered worth cleaning first. A set of dentures belonging to a Black ancestor had been lovingly polished and put in a glass display case before the sofa had been cleaned an inch.
Ginny went about teaching Harry the shield needed to sever the magical link and the spell to sate his urges for a time. It went quickly, the two used to paired practice due to their time in Dumbledore's Army. Harry was also a naturally quick study, and soon the two were sitting in the kitchen, chatting away as Ginny sipped on a glass of red wine. It was 6pm, which in the wizarding world was plenty of time for traveling somewhere by 7pm. Harry had cast the warding charm on himself, meaning he had around 6 hours of protection. It didn't fully satiate his urges, but it did suppress them. He was busy playing with a gift he'd received for Christmas. It was a type of device almost like a coin separator that sorted things on a scale of mundane to extraordinary. Having supposedly been invented to sort alchemy ingredients, Harry was pouring in a bag of coffee beans, watching as the brass flaps sorted it into piles of one to five. He ground the beans from the "five" slot into a fine powder and brewed a coffee, sitting next to Ginny. She was reading a book titled "Witches of Westminster", a diary of scandalous but historically interesting clashes in Muggle politics from witches.
Harry sipped at the drink, having added milk and one sugar, and blinked. It tasted great, but he felt he was lacking something. "I suppose whatever makes coffee taste right doesn't depend on all the beans being 'extraordinary'." He said to Ginny, peering at the cup. She snorted a laugh and looked over from her book. She uncrossed her legs and placed her feet in his lap, wiggling her rose-painted toes at him. He acquiesced and started to give her a massage, the young witch cooing as he pleasurably relieved some stress.
"So, Luna's. Do you think she'd want to?" She asked teasingly. Harry pressed a knuckle hard into the arch of her foot, making her gasp and frown at him. He smirked. "I dunno. This curse is powerful but with the protections she'll have a clear head. If she wanted to at that point, it depends on how much of a hold on me the curse has." He frowned at that. "I hate that it sort of takes me over. But also I don't want to... let it win? I suppose." He shrugged.
Ginny laid a hand on his knee sympathetically. "I know. But magical society is different. This is only one of millions of other horribly embarrassing and even risky situations that exist with magic around." She let him resume his foot massage, as he'd stopped to drink his coffee. "You'll need to tell me more about that later." He said, raising his eyebrows. He'd heard of many stories, but not so many from the Weasleys, having been embarrassed by Harry's fame. "Of course." Ginny said wickedly, having pressed her foot into his crotch. She'd really become a vixen, Harry thought. It was then that Harry checked his heirloom watch and frowned. Ginny withdrew her feet and sipped her wine.
"Time to go. I don't want to be late. I don't know what happens these things if you don't do it on time." Harry stood up and straightened out his robes. "With the stuff Luna likes researching, it kind of scares me." He grinned. Ginny gasped. "The man who defeated Voldemort, afraid of flowers?" He laughed at this, bending down to kiss her cheek. "Sure, and Devil's Snare is just a vine." Harry stood up and drew his wand and apparated to the border of Luna's home.
Walking towards the rook-shaped building in the dying sunset of autumn, Harry looked around. Since being repaired painstakingly after the destruction at the hands of the Death Eaters, Luna's hard work at cultivating the land had paid off. There was a veritable wilderness surrounding the home, with a neat path that winded toward it, crossing magical greenery and small ponds.
Harry went to the front door and knocked, awaiting a response. He could hear the blasting of a tinny radio inside, playing some sort of eastern European folk music. He heard the noise of footsteps before the door opened. Harry nearly jumped back as Luna quickly thrust a crow into Harry's arms, the strangely docile corvid simply perching in his arms. "Hi Luna!" He said, louder than he intended from the sheer bewilderment of what was currently happening. "Hello Harry." Luna said dreamily as she pulled out her wand. The crow opened its beak as Luna muttered a spell, inaudible due to the radio. The crow cawed as a tiny little bell flew out into Luna's hand, curiously making no noise as the crow then began to caw loudly.
It flew off Harry and into the garden, weaving into a tree. Luna stowed her wand in her jeans and the bell into her back pocket. Harry smiled at her, with no idea what to say. "Its good to see you Harry. Thank you for your help with him." She said, rolling her eyes in the direction of the crow that had taken flight. "Oh no problem Luna. I'm almost used to it." He grinned. She beckoned him inside and hurriedly rushed him up the spiral staircase into a room that was a kind of researching studio. It was covered with plans, charts, calendars and a large chart of the cycle of the moon. Another part had tanks and cages, none currently occupied other than a single toad in a tank.
Luna bent over her desk, ruffling through some papers, which gave Harry a chance to get a proper look at her, as their interaction had been so hurried up to this point. He hadn't been concerned about wearing wizarding attire. Luna was dressed in a comfortable long flannel and a rather distressed hoodie. She wore pale blue jeans and comfortable black shoes. He suddenly felt overdressed. She turned to him and smiled as he stood awkwardly in the middle of the room.
"Sorry about that. I get carried away in research. Albert took a bell I use for uninterrupted study." She handed him a sheet of paper, which was her own notes on the plant they were studying. "Floating Lilies are these beautiful tiny lilies that grow undetected hidden among mundane muggle pondlife. Witches and wizards can see them though, wrapped around other plants. On each full moon they blossom and then detach, floating in the sky toward the moon. We actually don't know how far up they go." She was explaining the page slowly, as it was mostly pencil diagrams. "But this one is the hunter's moon. They're dangerous at this time as their migration toward magical sources poses a risk."
Harry looked at a diagram of a pixie plucking one. "Why?" He asked, finding it unclear from the diagrams. Luna explained while she strapped on a small bandolier of glass bottles. "They release a magical aura of confusion, as a defence mechanism of some kind. But we don't know what for yet." Luna had become more confident after everything, now every bit the determined researcher she has sought to be. "Can I ask, Luna..." Harry coughed nervously. "Aren't you worried about proximity to me? With this curse? Ginny did explain it right?" He blurted, sounding a little too quick. Luna smiled at him with that far-off look she got replaced with a look of attention. "I think it merits some study actually." She said, holding up a blank notebook.
Harry swallowed nervously, Luna's vagueness meaning she could just mean a questionnaire for all he knew. Harry reached into his moleskine bag, still unbelievably useful post-adventures, and summoned his broom. "So, are you ready?" Harry asked, Luna nodding as she followed him out into the garden.
Harry stopped at a clear patch of grass before the spiraling trees, shrubs and vines. Beyond them, inaccessible by foot on purpose, lay the lilypond, explained Luna. Harry mounted his broom and Luna climbed atop, hugging onto his waist with one arm as she settled up against him. She drew her wand, trembling a little. He turned to her, smiling. "Hey, it's okay. I'm an excellent flier. I don't mind bragging about this one thing." He said confidently. Luna smiled and Harry gripped the broom, taking them soaring over to the lilypond.
It was staggeringly beautiful, the pale orange lilies winking dreamily in the moonlight. "They change colour to the season." Explained Luna in his ear, her breath hot against the cold air. He took them down to hover a few meters above the pond, Luna checking her watch and looking at the sky. "It's happening about now." She said, looking down at the patch. "Oh! Look!" Luna exclaimed, pointing at a lily that had broken free of its stem, floating upward as if carried by an invisible thread. Harry got them in closer and cast an immobulus charm, allowing Luna to snap some photographs and prod it with her wand.
Luna pointed them out to Harry as he deftly weaved between ones that moved too fast and froze those that he could. Luna set about using some charm to make them safe to handle and stored them in the bottles in her bandolier.
Soon they had filled the bottles and Harry was letting Luna study them in stasis up close. It was then that the curse reared its ugly head again. Harry became acutely aware of Luna's cinnamon scented breath on his neck. He felt her warm breasts squash up against his back and her thighs hugging his. Determined not to fail her, he kept his composure until Luna patted him twice on the shoulder. "Take us back."
Harry complied eagerly, taking them back a bit too quickly and causing Luna to squeal a little in fear, her pale blonde hair fluttering quickly in the wind. They landed gracefully, Harry letting her dismount as he then allowed the broom to float alongside him. "Sorry about the quick exit. I started to get... flustered." He admitted. Luna was admiring some toadstools that had caught her eye, mainly due to the ones they themselves had.
"Don't worry." Luna said as she stood up. In the moonlight she looked ever the ethereal witch, her beautiful pale skin practically glowed in the moonlight. She had a pretty face, and with the far-off look in her eyes she looked picturesque. "I thought this might come up." Luna beckoned him to follow her back to the house.