While this chapter is not the wedding, it's very important for the story and for the characters. We see some character flaws here and some character growth, and some characterisation for some of the secundary characters that we love so much (Evan and Barty). I'm proud of this chapter.

Oh, and i'm drunk by the way. Enjoy, sorry my grammar in general, I'm not in the position to edit it at the moment. ENjOY!

While Euphemia had told her not to share the whole letter with Regulus in the fears of somehow offending him by saying that his mother's "acceptance" of the relationship by allowing Luna to be Regulus' plus-one at the wedding was a ploy to destroy the little life she had managed to build, or at least a way to prepare to do so in the future, Luna had given the whole letter for Regulus to read. Regulus had agreed with Euphemia without much prompting.

"That does sound like something my mother would do. There's a reason my grandfather likes her more than he likes his own son, my father," he had admitted before starting to create his own plan to deal with his mother's ever going plots.

Which was why they were sitting in the medical corner of the library again, hoping to not be interrupted with several piles of Occlumency books.

"I'm really not as good as I'd like in Legilemency, but I can always try. It'll be good enough for someone that has no shield at all," Regulus said, offering to take the book she had just read from. "We have been reading and theorising how to do this for days. It's time to put this to the test."

"I'll fail."

"That's expected. If you were good in Occlumency right away it would not only be surprising, but really fucking scary," he said with a grin.

The theory of it all was straightforward enough.

Occlumency was the most powerful, ancient and known way of closing one's mind against invasion at will; it was used to protect against an invader to one's thoughts, feelings and memories, therefore also protecting them from being influenced. There were several known and catalogued ways of learning it, but at the end of the day some families had specific notions of how the mind worked and that alongside created family methods of Occlumency. And that included the Black Family.

"Remember what I said, for now you don't need to protect something specific, just make it all blank and empty," Regulus said.

"If I fail, there's a probability that you'll get into my mind," she said, fearful.

He nodded. "Yes. But I promise I won't search it. I'll fall back as soon as I notice I'm in, but I cannot promise you that I won't see or feel something hat you don't want me to," he admitted.

Luna hesitated.

"Regulus, some of the things that I did –"

"If you're talking about him... about Sirius, I know. I knew it beforehand as well, so it's something I'm prepared to encounter even if accidently," he said, though he didn't look too happy about it. "I don't to see it anymore than you want to show it to me."

"I guess it means that I must do a good enough job," she tried to joke.

Her attempt to lighten up the mood seem to work slightly, because he smiled at her, though his smile looked somewhat sad.

"Willpower is important," he said, as if that would add to the joke.

Luna took a deep breath, fixing herself on the chair and turning to him, rolling her shoulders back in preparation. In response, Regulus turned to her on his chair as well and leaned forward, wand in hand.

"It might hurt," he warned.

"Doesn't all first times?" she joked again, though a lot more nervously this time around.

Regulus didn't respond to the joke.

"Legilimens!"

It was like someone had punched her in the face, or it was the closest thing to the pressure and force of a punch without the actual pain. For someone that had been able to deal with a lot of pain, her mind being broken into without resistance wasn't as bad as Regulus made it out to be. But she knew he was inside before she even could get her bearings – as soon as she found herself to be existing, she tried to find a way to think of nothing. But thinking of nothing was thinking already.

As quickly as entered her mind, Regulus pulled back.

"Blankness, Luna, please," he said.

"What did you see?"

"A whole lot," he said. "Nothing that I could understand, but I could feel that you were panicking. Do you feel me inside?"

"Yes," she admitted. "It took me a moment to realise what it was, but I know someone in there. It feels like... a whisper in the ear, someone blowing air to the back of your neck."

Regulus watched her and gave several slow nods, taking in the information.

"That's a lot better than what I expected, actually. Not everybody feels the presence," he said. "Did you feel Dumbledore's when we were at his office that day?"

She raised her eyebrows. "Dumbledore's?" she asked.

"Oh. You didn't know. I thought you'd have gathered that already."

"Well, I can't 'gather' if you don't tell me anything. I was worried about you being so rude and closed-off at the time, and then you gave those noncommittal answers, riddled with nothing at all," she snapped.

Regulus raised his own eyebrows. He was guilty of that after all. He had no intention of explaining Occlumency and the adjacent when they were at that point of the relationship – fake and one-sided pining of his part; besides, Dumbledore had managed to slip into her mind, knowing that the relationship was fake and the reason, that was why he looked so amused when he turned to Regulus, trying to slip into his, but finding a surprisingly strong resistance. He had been so interested in Regulus' mind when he couldn't get in that it made Regulus angry and uncomfortable, so he might have pushed off those feelings on Luna without meaning to.

"Yes, of course. I should've been clearer," he said. "That means that you didn't feel it?"

She shook her head.

"I wasn't looking for it," she admitted.

"From now on, try to always keep some awareness in your mind, always search for another's presence in your mind until you can keep an Occlumency shield up," he said. "Just until you understand what to do completely."

She nodded. "Alright," she agreed.

Regulus pulled his chair back slightly, leaning back on it and cracking his back before leaning forward again.

"Let's try again," he said.

Luna's mind was quick to think of a wall. A white wall.

Regulus' presence in her mind made her shiver silently as she tried to keep focus on the wall. However, as his presence moved around, like a hand brushing against a fence as a child walked by. Perhaps the wall wasn't good enough... perhaps it wasn't white enough... perhaps it wasn't blank enough, empty enough... It was, after all, slightly more off-white than truly blank, neutral white and... it looked like her sitting room wall back in Bristol.

And suddenly she was there.

Remus was sitting on the blue sofa, watching the telly with his feet far too close to her. She was thinking of a way to push them without him getting mad at her and shoving his feet on her lap as a revenge. Besides, she hated Coronation Street. So, to try not to get into a fight with her brother, she looked at the wall... cream-coloured, off-white wall that was so... --

No. She had something else to do.

The wall... the wall... the wall...

Regulus pulled back.

"Good," he complimented. "That's exactly what you need to do. As soon as you noticed you had slipped out, you pushed yourself back in control."

"It wasn't fast enough. You saw my memory, didn't it?" she said.

He nodded, but made no comment on it. "I didn't expect anything different, Luna, really," he dismissed her worries.

She hesitated once more. The conversation was already had, but she was still insecure about it.

"Regulus, if you see something that you don't like –" she started again.

"We don't need to talk about it," he insisted.

"Regulus, I'm scared that you –"

"Luna. I don't want to think about it. I don't want to talk about it. And I don't want you to think about it, because that will bring the memories forth, and then I'll have to see them," he cut her off again, snapping at her.

That made Luna swallow drily, trying her hardest to hold back her fear and her disgust for herself.

"But you won't be mad?" she asked, voice nothing but a whisper.

Regulus, at first, seemed ready to snap at her once more, but one look at her made him soften right away.

"No, I won't be mad at you," he promised.

He took a deep breath, leaning over for one quick peck on her lips before pulling back to look at her face again, he caressed the side of her face with great care, watching her expression for a second before turning back into the boy that was teaching her how to survive, not the boy that was teaching her how to love.

"Alright," he said. "Now that you know what to look for, I'll give you time to prepare. Think of nothing, think of a blank, empty place. Shove me in there if needed. Alright? Let's try again."

The migraines that Occlumency training gave Luna was concerning Regulus. Which meant that he wouldn't leave her bedside even after Madame Pomfrey requested him to go back out there and enjoy the March sun. He continued reading his book beside Luna's hospital bed, looking over at her every now and then to check on her.

He had helped her undo her braids, bringing the crown of hair go down her back again. He even had the honour of massaging her scalp in the minutes afterwards while Madame Pomfrey taught him. He only left her side when Madame Pomfrey moved him to show him where the Migraine Potions were stocked, so he could get it for her if she had another migraine.

Madame Pomfrey had asked a few questions since migraines were only seen nearer the full moon. He had spent a lot of time saying that they had been studying together and, perhaps the stress for the O.W.L.s had been far too grand for her – she had advised a week of rest, which made Luna utter the first few words since she had announced her headache: 'No', and then she had stopped talking and lied still in the bed, eyes closed and even breath.

He thought she was sleeping until the long-suffering moan as she turned to her side, toes curling.

"Are you going to be sick?" he asked, putting the book on the ground and getting up from his small chair.

She denied with her head, terrified of speaking. Then she froze.

And nodded with a short grunt.

Regulus was quick, turning her towards him and quickly shoving a bucket under her chin. He waited, silently, but nothing came. She took deep, quick breaths, but didn't throw up as she thought. With a loud hiss through her teeth, she leaned back and lied on her back, facing the ceiling again.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

Her eyes fluttered open.

"I'm better. The light doesn't hurt as much anymore," she said.

"We should stop our lessons," he said with a frown.

He hated seeing her like that. In the rare moments she had shown him any vulnerability, it had been emotional, besides that moment of physical vulnerability in St. Mungus that she so quickly hid with the emotional one. He had heard of her speaking of her illness and how weak her body insisted on becoming every now and then – he wanted to help her find a way to make it stop, and he couldn't.

"No. Regulus, I want to go to the wedding, I want to meet your family," she said.

"You shouldn't want that. My family is a mess," he said.

"Well, so is mine," she said, eyes closing for a few seconds. "I think most families are a mess in their own eyes. Isn't a public event such as a wedding the best moment for me to meet them? You didn't meet my extended maternal family; they're worst than my parents, so I think I can understand you."

"My paternal and maternal family are the same, in general, so I believe I win," he said.

She smiled just enough to show she had understood it was a joke, but it disappeared when someone walked into the room, talking to Madame Pomfrey in raised voices – a Quidditch accident with the Hufflepuff Chaser during training; unfortunately, Hufflepuff were not known for being quiet in their panic. Luna had her eyes squeezed shut in a second and her hands were covering her ears.

The pain was behind her eyes now, going up her eyebrows and down to her jaw.

But it was slightly better when someone put their hands over her ears as well, caressing the back of her hands gently as the noises became even more muffled, until they died down and Regulus pulled his hands away from her head.

"Someone needs their jaw dislocated to learn to shut up in the Hospital Wing," he grumbled.

"They were worried for their friend," she tried to appease him. "But they should do it quieter," she added when she noticed he tensed up beside her.

He looked at her.

"Luna, perhaps I can do as I did in the day you met my parents. I can go in, lock your memories of choice up for a day or two. You can take another Migraine Potion and we're in the clear," he said.

She slowly shook her head from side to side.

"What if I meet them without a prior warning?" she asked. "Besides, that day you only went into my head about our deal – it was a few memories, and you did it a minute or so. I have much more than that in here that I don't want your parents to know, Regulus."

"Such as?"

"Such as images of me in bed with someone else, or memories of mine throwing my guts from an illness I caught from my brother, or my parents screaming their head at each other in the kitchen in the middle of the night, or the fact that my brother is a creature that most of your family voted on taking the rights away but five years ago," she said, frowning. "This isn't about me. I'm protecting a lot of people by learning this, including you."

"My reputation can take the idea –"

"Of you being a fool for 'believing' I was a pure virginal girlfriend before you and then learning that not only that's not true, but your I was in bed with the one person that your family cannot be lenient about?" she asked. "You'd be more than the fool."

"I can take it."

"I cannot," she said. "I want your family to, if not like, at least tolerate me for your sake."

Regulus looked down, completely unwilling to tell her to give up hope for his family liking her. Luna's surprisingly bright and positive outlook in life was refreshing, especially when he spent most of the time with Evan, who would joke about everything and pretend nothing was serious unless it was life or death, or Barty, who was far too realistic sometimes and crushed every positivity of Evan's and Regulus' rare dreaming states. Toleration and temporary acceptance were the most she could get, and he would be willing to appear satisfied with that.

"We'll try again," he whispered, pressing his lips together. "But we're both learning how to do Migraine Potions."

She smiled at him.

"Deal."

It was already mid-March when Luna's Migraine Potions were rendered useless, because the training and efforts were blooming.

Without someone trying to find anything, just entering her mind, Luna could easily find a way to block or push out the invader out of her mind. It wasn't finessed at all, nor was it discreet, but it was functional. And that was what was important for such a short notice event – Luna was to keep on practicing the mental exercises every night before going to bed and every morning before leaving the room.

"Now that you can throw me off your mind, I'll start searching," Regulus said.

"For what?" she asked.

"Memories that you don't want me to see," he said, giving her a grave grimace.

Luna startled.

"What memories?" she asked.

"I can't tell you that, you cannot be protecting only one of your memories, so I'll go through several of them as fast as I can to see how long it takes for you to block me," he said. He swallowed drily once more. "I know that you're worried about what I see or how I see them, but your memories won't change the way that I see you, I promise."

"I'm afraid they'd change the way you see us," she admitted. "My feelings were strong, Regulus, but I don't feel anything for Sirius anymore."

"Don't focus only of him. Focus on your brother as well," he said, dismissing her feelings. He hoped she would catch the hint that he didn't want to talk about it as he steered away from the uncomfortable conversation. "You organised your feelings and thoughts, and memories, of course, very well. I liked that it was a library. Putting a junction of memories together is a lot more practical and faster than trying to hide one per one; it's smart."

Luna watched him for a moment, clearly wanting to talk more about everything, but not willing to go against his wishes of making both of them even more uncomfortable than they already were.

Besides, talking wasn't much of an idea when they were behind the greenhouses like any other couple with far too much time free after classes and before dinner. Anybody could walk by and overhear them – if they were just another couple sitting in silence one in front of the other, nobody would watch or ask questions.

The humid grass underneath Luna grounded her as she focused before looking into Regulus' eyes for the next attack.

"Alright, I'm ready," she said.

He nodded.

Luna looked at him.

It was as quick as it had been the very first time that he had gone into her mind, but this time he pushed through her first resistance and fingered the books in the shelves, lightly grazing every book – until he felt her fear as he touched the smallest book; black leather, handtied, completely discreet and easily ignored.

The pain book.

Regulus opened the book, feeling the presence of her magic wildly throwing itself against him, begging and pleading in silence for him to leave her mind, leave her shame and leave her pain alone.

It wasn't just physical pain, he noticed as soon as he opened the book and saw the first memory.

Luna was young, just five-years-old, and she did not understand why Daddy was leaving, not looking back at her even while her mother had to hold her back as she screamed, cried and begged – bargained for explanation, promising to stop playing with her dolls after lights were out, promising to be better and never, ever go to the loft while Remus was there in the full moons. She would be a good girl, so he didn't have to leave. If she was a good girl, then he didn't need to work as hard as a Daddy.

He turned the page, not wanting to watch Lyall drive away the blue, old car that was falling apart. Not wanting to realise how deep his eyebags were or how small his suitcase was. He didn't want to watch Luna falling apart in guilt.

She had already found him, now she just needed to find enough strength to push him out.

Luna was even younger now, and the blinding pain was physical as well. Her fever was so high that opening her eyes made her feel like not everything that she was seeing was real, and sometimes she felt like her Mummy wasn't, because she was crying – Mummy only ever cried when Remus was sick, not when Luna was, because Luna would be better the next day, but she was scared because Luna was sick for almost three days at that point and the gashes that were on her torso were hurting a lot. She would cry and cry and cry, and nobody would sleep, because they were scared Luna would die if they were asleep. Luna was scared of sleeping and dying, too.

Regulus thought of pulling back, but he turned the page again. Time was starting to run out, even though he knew that reading two memories was too fast for a beginner.

Still, his grandfather Arcturus was far better than him in entering without being sensed. She needed to do better.

Luna was older, not even she remembered how old she was or why such a memory was so important and painful to her, but her mum wasn't looking at her –

The memory changed on its own.

Luna was fighting back.

Luna was fifteen, it was summer, and Sirius was smiling at her from his side of the bed. They were both naked. Sirius stayed – everybody knows that he wouldn't usually stay much longer after sex, perhaps a bit of aftercare if needed, but he usually would leave after half-an-hour that he was done. But Sirius stayed. Hope was a fire in her chest, lighting up to make her smile no matter what was happening – until he started speaking of Remus... again. And Luna knew. She knew, she wasn't stupid, but she pushed it down and pretended nothing was happening. Perhaps that had been her first exposure to Occlumency. And it hurt –

And it hurt –

And it hurt –

Shame. Pain. Disgust.

Regulus blinked, suddenly out of Luna's mind.

"Three memories," he said, voice hoarse. "Very good timing."

"Regulus –"

"We can try again in a few minutes," he said, getting up from the grass.

Luna's eyes were green, wide, wet with tears and scared. She wasn't scared of him, he knew that, and it was one of his only comforts, but it was certainly something that he didn't like seeing. He didn't want to make her scared.

He looked away.

"Regulus, please," she whispered.

He took a deep breath and looked at her again.

"As I said, I know what I'm at risk of seeing, Luna. I'm not mad at you," he said, as softly as he could manage. He wasn't sure what the name of the feeling in the pit of his stomach was, but he certainly didn't like it. "It was good timing, and it was wonderful swift manoeuvre. It was much better than it was expected from someone that learned it not that long ago. I think I might have taken a year to get where you are."

Tentatively, she forced a smile.

"I'm a Ravenclaw after all," she tried to joke.

"Hungry for knowledge, eager to please," he said with some teasing in his voice. "Please me by doing an even better job next time?"

"I'll try."

It took her less than ten days for him to give her the seal of approval.

They were finally ready for battle.

I hope ya'll liked it! I'll go back to drinking now