"Sirius Black is so handsome!" Amanda sighed dreamingly across from Luna at the feast table. She was looking over Luna's shoulder, staring at the boy on the other table, laughing with his friends. "You're so lucky, Luna."

Luna looked up from her plate, taken aback and raising her eyebrows.

"What do you mean? I barely talk to him," she quickly said.

Pandora sipped her juice in silence, eyes stuck on the Slytherin table, where her brother was trying to talk to her from across the room. She couldn't understand him, but she didn't look away from him, narrowing her eyes in concentration.

"I mean that he's such good friends with your brother that he probably knows your name," Amanda said.

"Oh. Yes, I suppose he does," Luna mumbled.

Even in bed, Sirius didn't say her name very often, too lost in his own pleasure. At the first few times they were together, she got upset about it, but after a while, she just tried to take it as a compliment. Not that it worked, but she did try.

"Didn't he help you with your bags today at the train station?" Pandora said, finally looking away from Evan and towards Luna.

Amanda's eyes looked away from Sirius, also looking at Luna now.

Luna looked around the table discreetly, trying to see if anyone else had heard Pandora, but apparently the only person that was interested in their conversation was Rosalie, who was sitting beside Amanda. Thankfully, Marta was too busy with her boyfriend, Morris Koch, to care.

"Well, his mum – I mean, Potter's mum – asked him to help me. You see, my brother had his own bag while the others had already put theirs in the luggage session," Luna smoothly lied. "Sirius just was polite."

Amanda's eyes narrowed, suspicious.

"I mean, it makes sense," Rosalie said. "Still, lucky you."

Luna forced a smile and looked down at her plate again, all her hunger disappearing. She pushed the gravy and the chicken to the side, sticking to the salad in her plate.

People so easily believed that Sirius was just helping her because to think he would ever do anything more to her would be completely unbelievable. She wasn't pretty enough for Sirius, especially when compared with the other girls that he had gone out with in public. Luna was, for everybody else (and maybe to Sirius himself) just Remus' sister. Much like it was at home with their mother, Luna felt like her whole being was being swallowed by Remus' being and who he was (and, sometimes, what he was).

"Luna," Rosalie called once more, making her stop poking the lettuce and tomato in her plate. "If I may ask you a question..."

"Go on," she said, mood already spoiled.

"Is your brother single?" Rosalie asked.

Luna shrugged.

"I guess," she said.

"You don't know?" Amanda asked, surprised.

"I never asked," she admitted.

Pandora glanced at her brother across the room again.

"Do you think my brother is single?" Pandora wondered, out loud.

Luna looked at Evan Rosier as well. He was a handsome man, or he would be if he wasn't always so angry – frowning and glaring at everybody and anything. He had darker blond hair than Pandora almost platinum-coloured hair and his eyes were brown, not blue like Pandora's. Still, they really looked alike, both lanky and just not getting out of the physically awkward phase of adolescence.

"Probably," Luna said. "The only people he talks to is Regulus Black and Barty Crouch."

Pandora looked at Luna and blinked, confused by her answer.

"Maybe he's dating one of them," she offered the possibility.

Luna reached for Pandora's leg under the table and squeezed her knee lightly. A warning, which she was used to giving at that point, that she had just said something that shouldn't be said out loud in public.

"I don't think so, Panda," Luna dismissed.

She didn't have a problem with men liking men or women liking women, however she did know who had a problem with that: the Rosier family, even if it was a passing comment. They had a problem with a lot of things, especially if their children were involved. They barely allowed Pandora to be Luna's friends, the only reason they accepted their friendship was the fact that Luna was Pandora's only friend.

Pandora sighed loudly (and clearly falsely), as if the idea of thinking any other possibility was tiresome. She had never been a good liar.

"Anyway," Luna said, getting Amanda's and Rosalie's attention again, "I'm pretty sure Remus is single. He never mentioned anyone to mum, which he probably would do if he had someone." Rosalie smiled to herself. "You cannot tell me you are actually interested in my brother," she looked over her shoulder to Remus, who was busy putting even more mashed potatoes inside a piece of bread and eating it without spilling it everywhere. "I mean... look at him..."

"I am looking," Rosalie said, smile growing.

"He's disgusting."

"He's hot."

"He's my brother!" she said, voice warning.

Pandora's lips turned up in a contained smirk, thinking her friend's reaction was funny.

"He's very polite," Pandora added to the conversation.

"And you are a very engaged woman, Pandora," Luna said in good humour. Pandora just giggled. "And he's not that polite, please."

She grumbled, disgusted.

Rosalie cleared her throat.

"Could you... go and ask him?" Rosalie asked.

Frowning, Luna shook her head.

"No, I cannot," she answered.

Rosalie leaned forward, eyes widening.

"Oh, come on, Luna, please!" she said, voice wavering in her despair. She reached out to hold onto Luna's hand. "Please, I just want to know."

Sighing, Luna looked at Rosalie. If she said no, Rosalie would use all passive-aggressiveness that she could muster to annoy her until the end of the year, that was when she usually apologised for everything she did over the year and 'started anew' to become 'a new person', and then made all the mistakes again.

"Fine," Luna said for her sanity's sake. Rosalie smiled and let go of Luna's hand, looking at her in expectation. "Oh, you mean now? Like, right now?"

Rosalie nodded.

Pandora gave a careful eye to Luna, unsure of what she would do, but said nothing when her friend got up with a loud grunt and turned, throwing one of her legs over the bench to climb to the other side.

Luna stood in the corridor between Hufflepuff's table and Ravenclaw's before going around the table and walking towards Gryffindor. She could feel some people looking at her in curiosity, but nobody stopped her – she wasn't the first to ever walk to another table; some even dared eat in other tables sometimes, just not usually during the Welcome Feast. Taking a deep breath, she stopped right behind James Potter and Peter Pettigrew, who were sitting across Sirius and Remus.

Sirius tensed up his whole body and locked his jaw in silence.

Remus looked at her with his eyebrows raised.

"What do you want?" he asked.

James looked over his shoulder and gave Remus a warning glance, clearly not liking the way that Remus was talking to his sister. His eyes went, then, to Sirius, watching him in silence. Peter looked over his shoulder but did not look away from her.

"I got a question, well... not really. My fried has got a question and I was sent to ask it," she answered.

"What?"

"Come on, mate. Be nice," Sirius grumbled.

Remus glared at Sirius by the corner of his eyes.

"Rosalie wants to know if you're single," she said.

That caused a reaction.

Remus' face went bright red, which made the scars on his face look even whiter against his skin, but his friends didn't seem as flustered as he was – James started laughing, turning to look at Luna again as if he was really liking her joke, but his smile died down when he saw her confused face, and Peter was smiling at her as if he had not heard what she had just said. Sirius, however, looked rather annoyed by the question, raising his eyebrows at her as if that question was somewhat immature; he always gave her that look when she said something that he didn't like.

She looked down at her feet.

"Should I say you're not single?" she asked.

"Just... say I'm not interested," Remus managed to choke out, though he didn't seem to be breathing.

Luna's eyes narrowed at him, interested in his odd reaction.

"Shall I answer why?" she asked.

She didn't know why, but she could bluff (and scare him).

Remus scoffed.

"Because I'm not interested, that's why," he said quickly. Luna, already exhausted of the conversation, just shrugged, and turned her back to him to go back to her own table. "Luna!" Remus called out once more. He looked at her. "Please, just... if any of your friends are interested in me, tell them that I'm not interested. I'm not into the idea of going out with anyone now, alright?"

"Alright, then, that's your life. That's your problem," she quickly dismissed. "I don't care."

Remus rolled his eyes and Sirius gave her a warning look as well, not liking her rudeness either.

As she walked away, she was quite sure that she heard Remus mumbling something about that being as supportive as someone in their family could be, she wasn't sure why that made her so angry, but she continued her walk back to her table, not looking back.

Sitting down beside Pandora, who was busy with her plate, again, she noticed that Evan Rosier was trying to get his sister's attention, but once it didn't work, he tried to get Luna's attention. He made a little motion of drinking something and pointed at Pandora. Unsure if she was meant to decode his meaning, Luna poked Pandora at the ribs.

"Your brother's trying to talk to you again," Luna said.

Pandora looked up and made an annoyed noise before nodding in an exaggerated manner before looking away.

"He keeps telling me to not forget my potion. It's already on my routine calendar, it isn't like I'll forget," she said annoyed.

"He's just worried about you," Amanda said, looking over her shoulder at Evan Rosier, who was back to glaring around. "I think it's rather sweet."

Luna nodded.

"I wish my brother cared at all," she grumbled. "And, by the way, Rosalie, he said he's not interested in going out with anyone at all now, so I wouldn't try if I was you."

Rosalie pouted pathetically but said nothing in return.

"Your brother does care, Luna," Pandora said, looking at her friend. "He's always in Hospital Wing when you get sick."

"Because he's usually sick as well, it doesn't count," Luna grumbled.

Amanda nodded, leaning forward.

"That's something that I always thought to be odd. I know you have a heart-condition, don't you? Does your brother have the same? Why does he get sick so often?" she asked.

"I have a heart condition; he has an immune-compromised body. We didn't have much luck in that area of life, I suppose," Luna lied smoothly once more. "He gets sick, but I am sick."

Rosalie pushed her lips into a straight line.

"I'm glad Professor Flitwick gave us first-aid training in our first year because of you, though, it was terrifying to see you when you got sick that one time in third year," Rosalie said. "I have never seen a convulsion before. It was traumatising."

"Yeah, it wasn't fun," Amanda agreed.

Rather offended that they were talking about how difficult it was for them, Luna's lip curled as she blinked at them in shock.

"Yes, it wasn't fun," she repeated, looking directly at Amanda.

They seemed to catch on to where Luna was trying to get at the same time, because they started babbling over one another. Pandora cringed at the sound, but didn't get into the conversation, just watched everything happening.

"It must have been a lot worse to you, of course. I never meant to say that you did it on purpose or something like that," Amanda was quickly saying, hoping to not offend someone that would still sleep in the same bedroom as her for a couple of years still. "I cannot imagine what it is for you."

"Yes, I'm sorry if it came out wrong, Luna," Rosalie said, looking around as if she hoped nobody had heard her slip. "It was scarier for you than for us. We were just young, that's what I meant. Besides, 'first aid' is always something that looks good in our resume, so I can't complain about it."

Luna rolled her eyes and looked at her plate.

Not even her salad looked good anymore.

"Just leave it," she dismissed, lying her head on the table. "It's nothing. I know it was just a joke."

Pandora looked at Luna, knowing that she was lying, but said nothing. She kept on staring, hoping that Luna would look at her and give her some reaction that she could read, but Luna didn't raise her head from the table. She did look away only when the deserts came to the table.

There was pudding. Pandora really liked pudding, but it didn't taste good that night.

There was little surprise that, when the girls got to the dorms, Marta and Amanda started talking about their summer and Rosalie lied down in bed, reading through the letter that her little brother had put on her trunk before she left home. That left Pandora and Luna to climb onto Luna's bed and close the curtains to spell the ceiling above Luna's bed for stars.

"You're not good in Astronomy, just let me do this!" Luna was arguing, pushing Luna's wand away from the ceiling before she messed up the Libra constellation again. "You're really bad at this."

"Well, you refuse to tutor me. How could I get any better at this if you refuse to teach me?" Luna said, bitterly.

"By paying attention to class," Pandora answered.

Luna huffed as if the idea of paying attention to Astronomy class in itself was very exhausting.

"I have so much to do, though. This year we'll have O.W. Ls and there's just so much to study, I can't afford to fail Astronomy if I want to go into Alchemy full-time once I leave school, Panda," Luna complained.

Pandora nodded, understanding her side of things. When compared to Luna, Pandora had things easy – if she chose to never work again, she could; the price her parents would pay Xenophilius once they were married was enough to keep them well for the rest of their lives, besides Xen already worked as a journalist in the Daily Prophet, at first as an intern during the summer before his seventh year and now as a real employee. They would be fine. Sure, she had plans to become an Herbalist once she was out of school, but that job was something that she could tackle once time came, with patience.

Luna, in comparison, did not have such luck. Coming from a middle class (or so she insisted), Luna would have to work to try to keep the house afloat as soon as she was out of school unless she married rich, which Pandora was surprised to hear was not her plan and not even an option that Luna had thought about until the year before when Pandora brought it up. The truth was that Luna's mother was a muggle and therefore didn't understand the rush she had to get a good job right away, and her father worked for the Ministry (as so many others did) and used to be very popular, with support for his entering in politics, and had disappeared when his children were small – anyone that knew them well enough would find out it was after Remus had been bitten, but those that didn't just saw that his divorce came and his patrons and supporters disappeared after that.

Divorce was still something that Pandora didn't understand and had never heard about before Luna.

"I don't know how to teach you, I tried," Pandora said. "I don't want to try anymore."

Pandora was not a good teacher, they both agreed on that.

"I'll just ask Professor Sinistra," Luna said, moody. "But I don't know her! She's new. It's embarrassing."

Professor Aurora was in her very first year and was wonderfully fit. With dark black skin, hair pulled back and tied up (hidden under cloth and her witch's hat) in a very similar hairstyle than McGonagall, she was just 20 and had many boys (and some girls, including Luna) drooling over her when she smiled all white teeth and excitement.

"Why would it be embarrassing?" Pandora asked.

"Because she'll think I'm stupid. I don't want the professors thinking that I'm stupid," Luna answered.

Pandora's eyes narrowed.

"There's something more," she said, though not sure of what it was.

Luna blushed a bit.

"It might be that I don't want such a beautiful professor to think that I'm stupid," Luna added to her answer. Pandora laughed a bit, but continued shooting stars to the ceiling, hoping it would make Luna remember all those stars and their use in potions and alchemy. "I have so many plans, Panda. They can't be messed up because I can't remember the moon-phases, what they do and why the blood stars need to be aligned."

"Well, you know one already," Pandora said, pointing to a very shiny star. "Do you know which one is that?"

Luna rolled her eyes.

"It's Sirius. But one star doesn't help me." Luna looked up and saw another one shining. "And that one?"

"Which one?" Pandora asked. Luna pointed. "Oh, that's Regulus."

"I thought it was part of a constellation," Luna said.

Pandora blinked, confused.

"It is," she pointed. "See? That's Leo."

"It looks like a lone star," Luna mused in return.

"It's because it's so shiny, it sticks out," Pandora explained. "If you were to look up at the real sky right now, you wouldn't see him. Regulus isn't one to be spotted in August and September, you see, too close to the sun, it swallows up his shine. It's like putting a rose beside a honeysuckle, you wouldn't be able to smell the rose at all." Though Luna didn't need the flower analogy, she understood what Pandora was trying to say. "One day, Regulus was visiting –"

"The star?" Luna asked, confused.

"No, the real Regulus. Regulus Black," Pandora answered, rolling her eyes as if the explanation was obvious. "You see, one day he was visiting Evan, and I was outside during the night because there were a few night-blooming jasmines near my house (my mother already got rid of them, though) and I pointed out Regulus, and now I'm talking about the star, to them and Regulus, the person, laughed. He said it wasn't it."

"And why is that? What did you confuse it with?"

"Venus," Pandora said, finished with the spells. "Venus passes right through where Regulus would be. You need to be very careful not to confuse one another. Sometimes it occults Regulus, it's really nice – Xenophilius has photographs from when it happened in 1959!"

Luna didn't tell Pandora that it would be hard for him to have photographs of the night sky from the late 50s given the state of cameras the time (and that included wizarding cameras that sometimes looked far older than Muggles'), just nodded along and smiled in excitement for her friend. Pandora had always liked stars.

Like many purebloods, there was knowledge that came 'naturally' (or so they tried to make it look to others) to Pandora, like so many of them: Astronomy, etiquette, dancing, arts, and Potions. Astronomy was taught through bed-time stories, especially in families such as the Blacks, where their names were a reminder of their station, in the sky, above all else. Etiquette, dancing, and arts were expected to be something that purebloods were well-versed by the time they were ten, before they were sent away to Hogwarts. Potions, the only type of magic that children were allowed to help on in the house before they even went to school, was like cooking, something one watched parents do and hoped for the best once they started doing it themselves.

Luna was making a statement in following in Alchemy, where two of the main subjects that were the base of its knowledge were easy for purebloods to follow.

"Did you know that my name was supposed to be Lyra?" Pandora said, suddenly.

"No. You never told me that before."

"Yes," Pandora said. "I'm cousins with the secondary branch of the Black family my aunt's marriage. Aunt Druella married Uncle Cygnus, my mother wanted to do something to celebrate it because Aunt Druella was older than most brides and everybody thought that they were never going to have children, but they had three girls, so Mama said that she would name me after a star as well."

"Why did she change it?" Luna asked. "Lyra is such a pretty name."

"They thought it would be too sad because of Orpheus' story, and they wanted me to have a happy life. But it's my middle name now."

Luna almost burst out laughing.

"You have a middle name? You never told me!" Luna said, surprised.

"I do. What is yours?"

Luna blushed. She had no shame to be Welsh and she spoke the language with her father and grandmother, sometimes even in some stores around town with the use of the language coming back. However, Pandora had no contact with the language whatsoever, the poor girl was always using only English at home even with the French roots her family did have.

"Briallen," she said. "Luna Briallen Lupin. It means 'primrose', as the flower that you like."

"Bri-ath-len," Pandora carefully said, trying to make sure the pronounce was good enough. Luna smiled. "It's pretty as well. Do you know what primroses mean in the language of flowers? It means 'I cannot live without you'," she answered without waiting for Luna's answer and smiled.

Luna's lips twitched as she held back a smile.

"I should buy a bloody dictionary of flowers, there are just so many that you tell me, and I always end up forgetting," Luna said.

Pandora shrugged.

"I can always remind you," she said, kindly.

Had Pandora been anyone else, Luna would've thrown herself in her arms again, but their hugs had always been quick and sparse even though Luna had always been someone that liked touching the people that she loved – she had learned not to, and that didn't mean that her love was any smaller.

Pandora had taught so much about love to Luna, though she had always thought that she knew enough of it. There is never enough love, one cannot ever have too much of it and it only counts when it's true. The love between them counted, and had Pandora liked women, Luna believed that they would end up together at some point (maybe, then, love would die, because there was only one type of love that didn't work out: romantic).

Surprisingly, it was Pandora that opened her arms.

"It's alright if you want to hug me," she said.

Luna's smile didn't hold back the excited giggle that followed as she threw herself forward, into the waiting arms of the other blonde girl.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you," she whispered against her shoulder.

"It's quite alright. It's not as terrible if it's you," Pandora said in return. "That's the best-friend effect, I have noticed."

Evan Rosier tried not to sigh too loudly as Barty helped Regulus out of his shirt. Regulus never really liked when he reacted loudly to any of the bruises and wounds that he would come to school with.

"Yeah," he said, trying to sound as casual as he could. "That's a broken rib alright, mate. Who did that to you?"

Regulus looked at him over his naked shoulder.

Evan was standing a few feet away from him, leaning against his own bed's column with his arms crossed, trying his best not to stare at the black and blue blossoming bruise in Regulus' ribs, the size of a punch (at least this time it didn't look like a kick). The rest of his torso and his face seemed alright.

Barty stepped away once Regulus' shirt was taken off by him, standing near his own bed and holding Regulus' clothing in front of his body as if he was some sort of servant, unsure of what to do with it.

"Father was drunk," he said in a quick explanation. "But he can't cross any lines with me anymore. Not without Sirius there."

"I wouldn't count on it, Regulus. You know how your father is when he's angry and drunk," Barty said, frowning in worry. "He's not very logical, especially when your mother isn't there to stop him."

"I'm his only son now and the Heir to the house. He can't hurt me too much without worrying about me running away as well," Regulus said. "He even apologised to me after he did it; sobered him right up."

He tried to pretend that it wasn't terrifying; that it wasn't the first time his father had been so angry at him. Regulus had always been the good boy, never the one under Orion's cane.

Barty shook his head, some disappointment at Regulus' nonchalantly manners as the boy sat in his own bed, leaning forward carefully to take off his shoes, glaring at Barty when he moved to help him once again.

"You don't even have where to go if you ran away," Evan said, rolling his eyes.

"Well, he doesn't need to know that," Regulus dismissed.

"If Regulus wanted, he could easily hit him back, though," Barty said to Evan.

Though pureblood, the dynamics in the Crouch family were quite different from the ones in the Rosier household, let alone when compared with the Black family. If Barty screamed back at his parents, it would be seen as some sort of rebellious phase and his mother would be more than happy to get involved to calm down the nerves in the family, but if Evan or Regulus did that, it would result in a stronger beating, more screaming and – most likely than not – days of being ignored after the issue had been resolved, as some reminder of their failings.

Still, Barty was right.

Regulus could hit Orion Black, his father, back if he truly wanted to. Though Orion usually had his cane with him, and his fists were known for doing some damage, Regulus' were far scarier.

There was a reason for even the older students to get out of Regulus' way when he walked in the corridors and it wasn't just for his surname, but for the way he was known for jumping over someone and not stop hitting until he was taken off of said person – being hit the 'muggle' way was a lot more humiliating for wizards, and Regulus knew that; he never gave them the opportunity of defending themselves in the 'wizarding' way before they were in the ground, punches after punches being thrown at their face.

"But I won't," Regulus said. "Mother talked to him. They are doing pretty much everything that I want since Sirius left, so I'm rather well back at home. I would've been canned for being rude at Bellatrix last year, but now it was just a punch in the ribs – the thing is that Father was holding his wand; that makes the punch worse, you know, when you're holding onto something. I'll be well. I've been mended, Mother just left the bruises, but the rib is fine now."

Evan was still surprised that Orion had not punished Regulus for his constant brawls and often wondered if someone was keeping this news away from him.

"How is Bellatrix anyway? I've heard that she got married in June," Barty said.

Evan sighed loudly.

"Crazy bint," he grumbled. Regulus smiled, clearly agreeing with his opinion. "Did you know that she only invited the people that she was forced to? At least she's logical enough to not want anybody seeing her with that hateful man."

"Rodolphus Lestrange, right?"

Regulus nodded.

"He likes to be called 'Roddy' now that he's family," he said, rolling his eyes. Evan snorted. "If I ever thought my cousin was crazy, I shall apologise to her, because this man is insane. When she leaves this marriage, if she's still sane, I shall admire her."

"If she leaves," Evan said.

"He'll end up dead at some point," Regulus said, something alike hope in his voice. "There's a reason I've sent her a book on uncommon and untraceable poisons for her once I've heard she was engaged to him."

Barty ended up laughing at that.

Evan groaned.

"Did you know his brother is interested in Pandora?" Evan asked.

That caused Regulus to look sharply at his friend and Barty got up from his bed, suddenly feeling the weight of pity in the deep of his stomach.

"Isn't your sister already engaged, though?" Barty asked, some worry coming through his voice.

"She is, to Xenophilius Lovegood of all people," Evan said, voice betraying some of the disgust that he wanted to show. "They don't have a lot of money, nor a lot of power and Mama was worried that it wouldn't be enough for Pandora to have a good life in society, but Xenophilius and my sister get along well enough. I'm against breaking the engagement and I was vocal about it this summer when Papa called for my opinion in his study; I don't think Pandora would be well-treated by Rabastan Lestrange, nor that she would be happy in the match. I hope he hears me."

"Your sister looked rather calm," Regulus said.

Evan looked down, blush appearing on his cheeks.

"We didn't tell her," he admitted.

Regulus sighed, looking at the ceiling. He had always been against hiding information from the women in the family, constantly going against his own parents to pass information to his cousins when he was small, after all they were ever so smarter than him and there was no reason for them to be kept in the dark about any matter at all.

"Are you going to tell her?" Barty asked.

"I'm not sure," Evan said.

"You should. She deserves to know, Evan, it's her life in the balance," Barty said.

"My sister is very... sensitive, Barty," Evan said, carefully with the wording. "To tell her something like this before it was resolved would leave her in quite a state."

"But it's her life!" Barty said, confused by Evan's hesitation.

Regulus shook his head.

"Evan is somewhat right, though," Regulus said, causing surprised and outraged looks from Evan and Barty. "Have you ever talked to Pandora before, Barty?"

Barty frowned.

"No," he admitted.

Evan narrowed his eyes at Barty and Regulus.

"Well, he didn't have a reason to talk to my engaged sister, Regulus, something that I catch you doing quite often," Evan said, accusation slipping into his tone, but instead of making Regulus uncomfortable, it made him laugh a bit. "Why would Barty talk to my sister anyway?"

"Your sister's great, Evan," Regulus said, rolling his eyes with a smile still on his lips. "She's rather funny and really smart. It's hardly a sacrifice to talk to her when she's alone – and that's rare, because that girl is always around her."

The truth was that sometimes Regulus would end up talking to Pandora when she was alone because he feared what the other students were capable of doing when they caught her alone, ever so lost in her own dream world and not ready to defend herself from the endless bullying that some students seemed eager to find joy in. Not many people seemed eager to defend Pandora. Though, Regulus was quite happy to know that she off-limits to the Marauders, Remus Lupin finally doing something good and keeping his friends in check at least to protect one innocent student of their merciless and unfunny pranks.

Evan's lips twitched.

"That girl," he repeated in a mocking tone. "We both know that you know who the hell Luna Lupin is, Reggie."

Regulus ignored the joke, focusing on undoing his belt and throwing it to the side before unbuttoning his trousers, getting rid of it quickly to get his pyjamas, wanting to be dressed when the other boys from the Slytherin House of their year got to the dormitory after the small gathering that was happening in the common room, which they had decided not to participate.

"Miss Lupin is hardly any of my business," he dismissed. "However, she does end up catching my attention sometimes. She is the best student in Transfiguration and Potion, or at least sometimes in Potions – there's a reason we are always competing for number one there."

Barty chuckled.

"Last year, you barely stopped talking about her," Barty accused.

"Last year, we ended up splitting first place because of my Transfiguration grades, it was never my best subject anyway," he said. "But, at least, she's absolutely criminal in Astronomy. It evened out our scores."

Evan sat down in his bed, legs stretched out in front of him, shoes hanging out of the bed so not to spoil the sheets.

"You are the weirdest man that I know, Regulus," he said. "I have never heard of anyone flirting with a girl by trying to beat her grades as if it was some sort of competition. Have you asked yourself if she knows that you're trying to beat her there? Because it doesn't look like she knows it."

"I'm not trying to flirt with her!" Regulus said, outraged.

"Yes, you are, and it's odd that you haven't realised that yet," Barty added to the conversation.

Regulus glared at both of his friends, unsure of where they were trying to get that conversation.

"I'm certain that you both don't share that opinion and are just trying to tease me, or so I'd like to believe," Regulus said, trying to sound casual and distracted, but it sounded forced. "I'm not flirting with Luna Lupin. Everybody knows that she's in love with Sirius, and that says a lot about her bad taste in men."

"I never saw them talking," Barty said.

Evan looked at Barty as if he was the gentlest thing that he had ever witnessed, some theatrical pity in his eyes.

"Oh, my dearest boy, you have been lost in your romance novels this summer, have you not?" Evan teased his friend, turning on the bed to stare at him. "One does not need to talk to another to have a fancy on them, especially teenage girls. The idea of love alone is easy to fall in love with."

"You seem to know a lot about it," Barty teased in exchange.

"Maybe I read some of the novels you wrote to me about," Evan said, shrugging.

Barty's face blushing quickly told Regulus a lot about the sort of novels that he had wasted his summer in.

Now, dressed in his pyjamas, Regulus sat near his pillow, kicking the covers until his legs were under it and fixing the pillow behind his back to continue talking to his friends, glad that the conversation was no longer around Luna Lupin.

"I made a deal with my mother," Regulus announced, somewhat excitedly. "If I get a tutor in Transfiguration and go up to at least an 'E' in the exams, I'll get a new broom – well, not exactly, she said that I could get something that I wanted. She said that if I kept it up until the O.W.L.s, I'd be able to do anything that I wanted on my birthday."

"What are you thinking about?" Evan asked, turning to him.

Regulus' lips turned up.

"What do we think of going to the pre-Quidditch World Cup next year? Some of the games will be held in August, near my birthday," he said. "It'll hosted in France. The preliminary matches are quite nice to watch, and England will be playing against France."

Evan almost screamed out loud but put both of his hands in front of his mouth and made a muffled choke noise. "Fuck. We need to find you a bloody good Transfiguration tutor. Who's the best in Transfiguration?" Barty asked, eyes widening.

That caused Evan to raise his eyebrows at Barty as if he already knew the answer of that, which caused Regulus Black to groan as he said the expected the name:

"Luna Lupin, of bloody course it is," he grumbled.

As you have noticed already, the premise is pretty clear and I'm quite happy about it. I think I'm doing good with the timing, thankfully. The next few chapters will be slightly more filled with content that will make the story go by faster. Besides, now we have Regulus and his little gang!

I hope you all liked it. See you all soon enough.

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