Harry Potter - Series Fan Fiction ❯ "Because She Told Me To!" ❯ The Obsessions of Claire Savelle ( Chapter 4 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

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"BECAUSE SHE TOLD ME TO!"
Chapter Four:
The Obsessions of Claire Savelle

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It was completely unbelievable, but it was true.

Only a few days after Loony Lovegood had played a minor role in the huge Ravenclaw Scandal (with Claire Savelle and Marietta Edgecombe in the main roles), she was in the middle of the public eye again; this time for a completely different reason.

Harry Potter -- the Chosen One, the Boy Who Lived, the greatest hero among Hogwarts students, had asked her to go to Horace Slughorn's Christmas party with her. And she had accepted.

Already a few hours after the news had been broadcast (by Peeves the poltergeist, no less) rumors were flying that they were madly in love with each other and were going steady.

Claire Savelle watched from a distance as Potter walked with Luna up to Slughorn's office, surrounded by a bunch of other girls who looked upon them both with more or less concealed looks of contempt.

What a bunch of morons, she thought resentfully, noticing that a fair number of Ravenclaw girls were among the onlookers. Don't they realise that Potter is hardly good boyfriend material? Maybe they've forgotten the horror stories Cho fed them with last year...

Claire Savelle had never quite understood what exactly the big deal was with Harry Potter. Of course, he was a good wizard and a brilliant Quidditch player -- that much was obvious to everyone with a pair of eyes. And of course he had accomplished a lot of impressive things over the course of the years. He would certainly have been a credit to Ravenclaw, had he been sorted there... and now that he wasn't so small and skinny anymore, he didn't look too bad either. (Not that Claire generally went for the boys, mind.)

Fine, there were many admirable things about the Boy Who Lived. But he wasn't the only skilled, athletic and accomplished student at Hogwarts. He certainly wasn't the most handsome either. So what was the extra big deal?

"You're Muggle-born," Padma Patil had once told her. "You just don't have the proper background to truly appreciate what Harry Potter has done for the wizarding world!"

Fair enough, Claire had thought before changing the subject, because Padma clearly hadn't been able to see her point of view. She had, like all people born in the wizarding world, been filled up with Harry Potter propaganda for fifteen years and couldn't possibly imagine that Claire didn't give a flying fuck about You-Know-Who.

Even now that the so-called Dark Lord was, allegedly, back, Claire wasn't too worried about it. Even if she herself was Muggle-born and would be among the main targets of the Death Eaters, the threat seemed somewhat lessened by the fact that these Death Eaters had a leader that had failed to kill a one-year-old baby. Hardly the stuff of anyone's nightmares.

She never said this to anyone else, of course, because she was fairly certain that it would have resulted in a long and stern lecture about the dangers of You-Know-Who, and she could very well live without that. But surely everybody knew that people who were prejudiced against Muggle-borns, like the Death Eaters, were a group of morons?

After all, she was a Muggle-born, but had managed well at Hogwarts; she seemed to have a natural knack for picking things up easily, and had gained a minor reputation for being exceptionally talented and intelligent, even for a Ravenclaw.

In fact, she'd grown a little bored with the standard education at Hogwarts, and had set out to learn more complicated and far more interesting spells on her own...




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It had started during the Christmas holiday in her fourth year, shortly after her fifteenth birthday.

Since Claire lived in London, it was easy enough for her to visit Diagon Alley as often as she liked -- sometimes accompanied by her parents, (who, though completely Muggle in any way, were very interested in magic), but more often on her own.

After all, no fifteen-year-old wants her parents to be around all the time, and it was simply easier for Claire to fit in when not accompanied by two Muggles.

And it had been during one of her solo ventures into Diagon Alley that she had, while browsing all the different books in Flourish & Blott's, found the small and discreet section in the back of the store dedicated to books about a branch of magic neither taught nor really accepted at Hogwarts: The branch of sexual magic.

Just the thought that there was a whole branch of magic dedicated to sex had captured Claire's interest and imagination straight away. She'd spent an informative and exciting twenty minutes thumbing through these books and pretending she was browsing for something else... and oh, such books they were! Detailed and graphic descriptions of sexual charms and their effects, with colour-filled, moving illustrations...

Finally, the storekeeper had discovered what she was doing and asked her (politely, she'd give him that much) to leave those books alone, because she clearly wasn't old enough for them.

But Claire's curiosity, coupled with the classic Ravenclaw determination to never pass up a chance to learn something new, refused to let her give up that easily. The next day she returned to the store under the effects of an Aging Potion, making herself to appear in her late forties(thankfully, the Ministry had no way to check underage magic in places like Diagon Alley), and though the shopkeeper had looked at her somewhat suspiciously, he had let her buy the two books she'd wanted.

The Art Of Pleasure: Magic And Sensuality and Everything You Wanted To Know About Sexual Charms But Were Too Shy To Ask.

For the rest of the holiday, she had read the books in secrecy whenever she had the chance, and had found them both extremely fascinating. How many ways there were of gaining sexual pleasure through magic...!

Of course, thanks to the strict prohibition of using magic outside school before you were seventeen, she hadn't been able to actually try anything out before she was well back at Hogwarts... and of course she hadn't dared doing anything before late at night, when she was quite sure that all the girls in her dormitory had gone to sleep.

Her first experiments with the simplest charm, the Sensualis, had quickly convinced her to use a Silencing Charm on the curtains around her bed whenever she felt like experiments; her moans has woken her dorm-mates, who thankfully just thought she was having a nightmare or something like that... even though it took a long time for Claire to shake the feeling that they all knew what she had been up to and were either laughing at her or scoffing at her behind her back.

After some time, though, she grew more daring, more secure in the knowledge that nobody knew what she was up to, and began exploring herself and her own sexuality more thoroughly. She read her two books almost religiously for ideas, she brewed potions for herself (nicking ingredients from Potions class when Professor Snape wasn't looking) that gave her highly detailed erotic dreams that ended in orgasmic bliss; she conjured up various toys and Vanished them again when she was done, she discovered charms and spells that heightened or lowered sensations as she wanted it.

It was thrilling, really. By day, she was still the same old Claire; an attentive and talented student who sometimes heard she was a little too smart for her own good. By night, she was... a different Claire, a private Claire; a deliciously, fucking naughty Claire...

Every night, or at least almost every night, a new orgasm, a new little bit of ecstasy, a new gloriously detailed fantasy.

But, as she was soon to discover, over-indulging often becomes a habit, and habit becomes routine, and routine becomes... boring. Though she kept trying to vary herself and even thinking up new things and challenges that added to the thrill (such as the time she let herself be fucked by an enchanted dildo in the empty common room after everyone had gone to bed, the extra risk of discovery making it even more enjoyable); she nevertheless slowly found herself getting tired of it all.

And so, inevitably, one late night at the beginning of her sixth year, after she had just gone to bed and was lazily going over her options for getting off, the thought struck her: Why bother?

The thrill was completely gone, the excitement dead. And so she ended up not bothering that night, instead immediately rolling over on her side and going to sleep.

This repeated itself the following night, and the night after, and the night after that. Why bother? she thought, and she just didn't.

By the second week of this, she was beginning to miss the thrill of it, but she just couldn't get herself excited about her solo indulgences anymore.

What she needed was a change. Or, ideally, someone she could have sex with. Until now, she had been set on keeping her secret sex life a, well, a secret, a special time only for her -- no others wanted or needed. But all the boys at Hogwarts were so... immature and gross, and obviously not worthy of her.

She was lying awake in her bed, thinking about this, when she got a sudden idea.

Raised herself and carefully pulling the of curtains of her bed aside, she peered out in the dark and silent dormitory. All she could hear was the silent breathing of her dorm-mates... oh, and Marietta Edgecombe muttering something in her sleep.

Maybe that was what settled the matter. Silently, Claire grabbed her wand from her nightstand before she put her feet on the floor and tip-toed over to Marietta's bed, pulling the curtains slightly aside to see the girl lying on her side, with her eyes closed and murmuring... something about turtle scrubs.

Claire stifled a giggle. Then, before she really knew what she was doing, she had climbed into Marietta's bed, pulling the curtains closed behind her.

The other girl stirred a little, but after a second or so just sighed and rolled over on her stomach. Marietta was a heavy sleeper, even if she wasn't a silent one.

"Silencio!" Claire whispered, directing the charm to the curtains. Her heart was pounding in her chest; she knew she was doing something she shouldn't, and that excited her more than it should have. She was feeling the thrill returning to her, like an old, dear and sorely-missed friend, blocking out any doubts or feelings of reluctance she might have had about this.

It wasn't a bad thing to do. She was just ensuring some sweet dreams for her dorm-mate, after all.

A few muttered words and wand movements later, Marietta had slid into a deep, enchanted sleep that she wouldn't wake up from for as long as Claire needed, and then...

"Sensualis!"

Marietta's murmurs turned into heavy breathing and eventually blissful moans, but she didn't wake up. Not even as she gasped herself through a powerful orgasm -- and Claire herself, masturbating frantically to the sight, came so hard she saw stars.




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The next morning, Claire woke up in her own bed again, and knew two things.

One: She was a sick, sick individual who should be expelled from Hogwarts and thrown into Azkaban.

Two: Marietta Edgecombe was the most beautiful, most desirable girl she had ever seen.

Claire had never been in love before. She'd sometimes wondered what it might be like, but with all the gross and immature boys around, she'd never actually felt the need to get someone to fall in love with. But all of a sudden, it seemed like Marietta Edgecombe had a much bigger place in Claire's mind than before. The way she walked, talked, laughed... the way the moaned in ecstasy...

In other words, Claire had gone and fallen in love with another girl.

Her nightly sessions changed slightly in nature. All fantasies and erotic dreams -- which, until now, had focused mostly on Claire herself and only involved vague ideas of other, nondescript people -- began involving Marietta. Naked Marietta in every single conceivable position.

Both The Art Of Pleasure and Everything You Wanted To Know About Sexual Charms mentioned girl-girl sex (as well as boy-boy sex, but that wasn't important right now), but had slightly different attitudes towards it.

The Art Of Pleasure seemed slightly condemning in the way some written texts get when the author disapproves of a subject, but doesn't want to seem intolerant. While it acknowledged the existence of same-gender sexual relations, it would spend a bit of time underlining that most people found the classic male/female sex that much more satisfying and natural.

Everything You Wanted To Know About Sexual Charms, on the other hand, condemned absolutely nothing. In fact, it got a little overly enthusiastic when talking about having feelings (erotic and otherwise) for people your own sex, and had dedicated entire chapters to charms specifically designed for same-sex couples.

Claire had read it all before, of course, but she had never really thought of those parts of the books as being about her. But... they were, weren't they? Her attraction to Marietta made it clear beyond any doubt that she was a lesbian...

...a sick, sick lesbian who belonged in Azkaban, she reminded herself at the thought of how she had gotten off on bringing a sleeping girl to orgasm. She could never tell Marietta about this, never. It was just too... too... sick.

It was disgusting. She was worse than an animal.

She had to do it again.

So a few days later, before bedtime, Claire "casually" offered all her dorm-mates one each of her "special" peppermints -- sweets that she had carefully preparated with a simple sleeping potion. They all happily accepted, of course -- she had yet to meet a single wizard, especially not a student, who wasn't crazy about sweets. (Maybe being obsessed with sweets was a sign of magical blood? Professor Dumbledore, the most powerful wizard who ever lived, was also the biggest sweet-tooth Claire had ever seen. That was a subject worth thinking more closely about some other time.)

It only took a few minutes before all the girls (most importantly Marietta) had sunk into a deep sleep, and Claire, satisfied that neither of them would wake up for several hours no matter what happened, once again tip-toed over to Marietta's bed. With her heart beating furiously -- what if the potion stopped working and Marietta woke up? -- she slid the bedcovers aside and carefully began undressing the girl.

It was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen, she thought as Marietta lay there naked and uncovered, and still asleep, in front of her. The perfectly-shaped face, the round and perky breasts, the graceful curve of the hips, the flat stomach... and of course, the neatly-trimmed curls between her legs...

"Sensualis!" she commanded, and watched the sleeping beauty twitch and gasp and moan herself to yet another orgasm, every single movement a work of erotic perfection.

When everyone woke up the next day, nobody showed any hint of knowing they had been drugged, although Marietta seemed to wonder why she wasn't wearing her nightgown -- because Claire had quite forgotten to re-dress her after the nightly session.

"Wasn't it hot tonight?" said Claire hurriedly, and as casually as she could, as Marietta crawled out of bed, naked and with a vaguely confused look on her face. "I think the house-elves got carried away with the firewood or something. I had to take off my nightdress for a while, I was so warm!"

Marietta blinked. "Oh. Was that what it... I was a little confused. I can't remember taking anything off, though."

"You probably just woke up half-way, because it was too warm," said Claire. "And then your mind decided that you should sleep naked, and you undressed and went back to sleep. And since you weren't quite awake, you don't remember it now."

"Yes... yes, that makes sense," Marietta said. "It explains why I felt all... sweaty and icky when I woke up, too. I'd better go take a shower..."

Claire breathed a silent sigh of relief, and promised herself that for the future, she would remember to re-dress Marietta before going back to her own bed.

Already, her sense of guilt was vanishing; nobody was getting hurt, after all. There was
nothing but pleasure to be had for both parties. And if Marietta didn't like girls that way... well, it didn't much matter, since she'd never remember any of it. It was just like Obliviating Muggles when they'd seen magical things -- better in fact, because Marietta never knew anything in the first place.

And it wasn't as though she would do this every night, or even every week. She'd keep it to rare occasions, so as not to arouse suspicions. If she started going to Marietta every night, it would only be a matter of time before she was discovered, special peppermints or no -- and even Marietta might eventually catch on. No, better to keep it as a rare treat, her own special secret indulgence.






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Over the next year, Claire kept herself going with her secret love and even more secret night visits, becoming almost as familiar with Marietta's body as she was with her own.

The only thing that hurt a little was, well, the knowledge that Marietta didn't know anything about it. Claire longed to declare her love for the girl, but knew that she would never be able to do that. The thought of rejection, of maybe finding out that Marietta thought lesbianism was wrong and unnatural, was far too frightening a prospect.

And Marietta really had enough to think about. Sometime after Christmas that same year, Claire was shocked to see the girl suddenly, and for no reason at all, began sporting the nastiest, ugliest acne she had ever seen -- acne that on top of it all spelled the word SNEAK in big, clear letters across her face. The girl was devastated and spent a lot of time hiding out from the rest of the world. When she finally, and with the help of Cho Chang (whom Claire suspected knew more about the entire ordeal than she let on), managed to gain enough courage to go out in public again, Marietta had changed from a cheerful, giggling girl to a withdrawn, introverted young woman almost constantly on the verge of tears, who seldom smiled and never laughed, and was the subject of nasty comments wherever she went.

And she wouldn't -- or couldn't -- explain what had happened or how her face had got that way.

Claire suspected a particularly nasty magical prank by either the Weasley twins or one of their accomplices (it was more than suspicious how Fred and George escaped from the school shortly after this event, anyway), but it seemed that no-one could prove anything, so whoever the culprit was, he or she went unpunished.

It was the most unfair things Claire had ever experienced. What if the acne never went away -- Marietta would have to walk around for the rest of her life as a 'SNEAK'! How cruel was it possible to get?

It was shortly before the summer holidays at the end of their sixth year, during the term's very last nightly visit to Marietta, as she watched the sleeping girl squirm and buck under her Sensualis charm, the great beauty only marred by the acne (what a terrible thing it was to use magic to destroy a young girl's life like this!), that Claire made a decision.

She would find out who was responsible for this ordeal, and she would make them pay.

"Don't worry, Marietta," she whispered to the silently orgasming girl, "I'll punish the ones who have done you wrong."

Now, how could she find out who was responsible, and how? Everything pointed to the Weasley Twins, but how could she make sure? It was common knowledge at Hogwarts that Fred and George Weasley were not the sort of people you liked to be on the wrong side of, and trying to pursue them without any real evidence would be foolish.

She hadn't really considered using Luna Lovegood before she overheard a brief conversation between two Slytherins, who were observing Luna together with Ginny Weasley and loudly speculating upon whether the two were lesbian lovers or something.

The idea fell down into her head at once. If Loony Lovegood was really the lesbian lover of the sister of her prime suspects, then Loony Lovegood would be in the ideal position to either find out more of the Weasley twins' involvement in the case, or perhaps she already knew. Maybe Ginny even had told her everything and they were both laughing at Marietta behind her back?

If Loony was a lesbian, that is...

Claire had long been aware of the little game that went on between some of the older Ravenclaws concerning Luna Lovegood; on how to get a reaction out of her. The problem was that Luna was by now so used to Ravenclaws making fun of her and humiliating her that she didn't bother reacting
overly much. It was different, Claire noticed, if someone from either Gryffindor or Hufflepuff said something hurtful to her. Luna wasn't prepared for that the way she was prepared for Ravenclaws, and to a lesser extent Slytherins, to say the same things. Which was why she would get directly annoyed when Hermione Granger said less-than-pleasant things about The Quibbler or the Crumple-Horned Snorkack, while similar comments from (for example) Claire would mostly be ignored.

From this, it wasn't too hard to deduce that Luna had problems dealing with things that were unexpected. She wasn't as good at handling things she wasn't prepared for, and was quite likely to be thrown off-balance when confronted with such things. And an older Ravenclaw seducing her would probably count as "such things."

Of course, it didn't hurt that Luna was, in her own big-eyed, scraggly-haired way, fairly nice-looking. She was no Marietta Edgecombe, true, but she did have a certain something about her that made Claire curious as to how she might look squirming in pleasure.

It was with this in mind Claire spent a great deal of the summer holiday making plans for the seduction of Luna Lovegood.




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Th e first few days back at Hogwarts after the summer holidays were generally hectic, and even moreso for a seventh-year, but Claire did manage to spend at least some time watching Luna and planning her first strike.

She had gone through her plans and schemes several times, creating a few backup plans in case they would be needed. After all, she didn't know that Luna was a lesbian, she just guessed, and in case she was wrong, it would be a good idea to have some alternate routes to go. Weak love potions, bought from Weasely's Wizard Wheezes (what delightful irony!) were ready in case Luna should need that, lust-inducing charms, from Magic and Sensuality, had been meticulously rehearsed, and in case everything failed, Claire now also knew how to modify people's memories -- after her seventeenth birthday, she could practice magic freely outside school, after all, just so long as no Muggles outside her family saw what she was doing.
As Claire watched Luna -- naive, completely oblivious Luna -- and thought about what she was going to do, she felt a thrill that was almost as strong as the one she had felt at the beginning of her secret "relationship" with Marietta. If she wasn't careful now, she'd forget the real reason for why she wanted to seduce the girl and just do it for the sheer excitement of it...

The perfect opportunity presented itself already on the first Friday of the term, when she got to sit next to Luna at the dinner table (not that this was particularly hard; it wasn't as though there were a lot of people eager to sit next to Loony Lovegood) and make a few small preparations.

A specially-prepared carrot, acquired from the kitchen (where very eager house-elves were more than willing to give her anything she wanted) and dipped in a flavorless lust potion was all ready to be placed on Luna's plate -- the girl was sitting in her own thoughts as usual, eating her food with that characteristic dreamy look on her face, and wouldn't notice -- but just as Claire was to do this, she noticed that quite a few of her fellow Ravenclaws were looking at her.

To avoid unpleasant question, she decided to make a clown out of herself and instead snatch Luna's wand from behind her ear, with a gruff Mad-Eye Moony imitation: "Constant vigilance, Loony!"

Potential suspicion turned to laughter and amusement in the other Ravenclaws as Luna responded, rather predictably, by turning over to Claire and ask, while looking so dreamy that she might as well not have been paying attention to any of the goings-on: "May I have my wand back, please?"

Still in her role of a clown, Claire decided she might as well tease the girl a little extra. The trick with the carrot had failed, obviously, but at least it didn't arouse any suspicion... and it might serve to knock Luna even more off-balance when Claire started the actual seduction. "I don't know... maybe I should just let you keep the carrot."

"But I really do need my wand," said Luna. "I can't cast any spells with a carrot, you know. I've tried before, but carrots are too unmagical."

"Oh, but this is a special carrot! It's a Crumple-Horned Snorcarrot," said Claire, to the obvious delight of the others, who had all suffered through Loony Lovegood's constant claims of the existence of the Crumple-Horned Snorcack more than once. "You can power it up by keeping it behind your ear!"

The session was, however, cut abruptly short by the interference of Professor McGonagall, who took five points from Ravenclaw for "not behaving in a way becoming of Hogwarts students."

An annoyance, to be sure, but it did give Claire a perfect opportunity to "vow revenge" on Luna, in a fake jovial tone.

"We'll just have to make up for it with some entertainment before bedtime, won't we? When there are no teachers around to spoil our fun?"

Designed to sound like it would be another round of humiliation for Luna, these words had apparently worked a little too well, because the younger girl managed not to show up in the common room after supper, and stayed away for several hours.

Still, Claire wasn't worried. Luna would have to show up sooner or later -- and as it turned out, the lateness actually worked to her advantage, because it gave her time to prepare and improve upon her original plan. Obviously, since she hadn't eaten the carrot, Luna would not be overcome by passion and let herself be dragged away to the empty dorms to be fucked like a good girl, but there was nothing wrong with turning the seduction into a slightly grander performance either.

The Ravenclaw common room, with its airy mystique, would be an excellent stage.

Just as Claire had hoped, thanks to the hectic first week, most of the Ravenclaws decided to go to bed early that night... and the few that had decided to stay up to read or play chess changed their minds easily enough thanks to Claire's generous offerings of her special peppermints.

Thank goodness it's not Saturday, she thought as she watched the last half-asleep students stumble up to their dorms -- probably to fall asleep fully-dressed on their beds. I wouldn't have had enough peppermints to give to all the people who'd want to stay up all night on a Saturday.

She found the bottle of love potion, hiding it under a convenient chair in case it would be necessary. She made sure all the curtains were pulled away, letting the moon shine in on the room -- a pity that it wasn't a full moon tonight, but even a waning crescent did a lot to help set the right mood -- and she made sure to have her wand within reach, after a quick trip up to her dormitory to change into her nightgown and place Silencing charms on all the dormitory doors (just in case), she could settle down in a chair in the secure knowledge that the stage was set and all that was needed now was the other actor in the drama.

And said other actor showed up, eventually, long past midnight... when Claire had almost drifted off to sleep herself.

She shook herself awake just in time to see the silent, scraggly-haired figure make its way through the midnight-blueness of the room.

Showtime. "Hello, Loony," said Claire, smirking as she saw the look of mild surprise on the girl's face. Clearly she'd hoped that nobody would be around at this hour. "I thought you'd show up if I just waited long enough."

"Oh," Luna murmured.

"We missed you terribly after supper, you know," Claire continued, noting that Luna was withdrawing into herself again, beginning to stare out the window instead of looking at Claire. She thinks she knows what's coming. Good -- let's confirm her thoughts for a while, then knock her off-balance. ""It's not nice to ignore people when they're talking to you! Didn't your Mummy ever teach you that before she went and blew herself to bits?"

Luna looked at her again, no trace of anger or sadness in her dreamy eyes.

Claire rose, ignoring the woolen blanket she'd wrapped around herself as it fell to the floor. Keep to the plan. Keep her confused, disoriented... don't give her time to gather her thoughts.

And when she kissed her, hard and forcibly, she was delighted to find that Luna was responding to all her signals, even better than she had hoped. She stumbled back, panting and supporting herself against a table, looking flustered and confused, and... was it Claire's imagination, or was there just a hint of excitement there in her usually-dreamy eyes?

She went with it, grabbing the girl and ordered her in no uncertain terms to stay quiet, and Luna seemed too overwhelmed to do anything but obey as Claire dug into her pockets and confiscated her wand... and, to her amusement and surprise, found the carrot from dinner in the same pocket. It seemed like Loony had taken the carrot as well and forgotten about it.

Let's just see if the potion still works, Claire thought before shoving the carrot into Luna's open mouth and telling her to suck on it.

Dazed, Luna obeyed.

Come on! Come on! Claire thought to herself, hoping desperately that her mask of calm wasn't breaking. If she appeared as anything less than completely in control, the illusion would break, and Luna might regain her senses enough to leave before the potion took effect.

She allowed her just enough time to realize what she was doing before delivering the next blow to her balance.

"Evanesco! she commanded, causing Luna's robes to vanish and reveal a fairly nice-looking body dressed in some really ugly purple underclothes that clashed marvellously with the Butterbeer-cork-necklace and the radish earrings Luna was always wearing. Luna's eyes widened in surprise and fear, and she began shivering slightly.

Any moment now, she'd know whether this was going well or not. Don't give her time to think!

"Evanesco!" The horrible-looking undershirt vanished, thank goodness. Even in a purple bra and knickers, and stockings that just shouldn't be allowed, Claire could definitely appreciate the nicely-rounded shapes of Luna's body. They were nothing spectacular (Marietta was much sexier), but certainly easy enough on the eyes, as the girl stood there, motionless except for the shivering and the sucking on the carrot.

"Evanesco!" The bra disappeared. Luna's breasts jiggled slightly at their sudden release from their purple prison, and Claire couldn't help herself; she had to reach out and touch them. She was rewarded with a silent gasp from Luna and a hardening nipple...

The potion was taking its effect.

You're mine. Claire was so aroused she felt like she might burn up. As fast as she could while still keeping herself "casually seductive," she pressed herself against Luna and stroked her breasts and stomach before slipping her hand down her knickers, her fingers stroking moist, curly hair...

Luna gasped again, much louder, and bit off the carrot.

YES! Claire had to bite her lip in order to refrain from giggling. You're definitely mine! "Didn't I tell you to keep that in your mouth?" she said, pointing at the suddenly floor-bound carrot with Luna's wand and forcing herself to sound stern and scolding. But by now the act was getting harder to keep up, and Claire slipped back into being the sultry seducer as she removed her hand from Luna's knickers, smelling her arousal on her hand. "Oooh, but I can see why you did it. You're hornier than a bunny rabbit, girl! You're going to drench your knickers if you keep them on..."

With a point of the wand and a whispered "Evanesco!" the knickers were gone, revealing a surprisingly dark and thick triangle of soft curls. Apparently, and quite unlike Marietta, Luna didn't bother to trim her pussy hair -- not surprising, considering the lack of care she showed towards the hair on her head.

She offered no resistance as Claire gently pulled her down on the floor, and her body was soft and warm and her breath came in small gasps and drove Claire quite wild; she got caught up in the moment and all thoughts of her intended interrogation of Luna completely vanished from her mind.

The thrill had overwhelmed her completely -- she had never felt it so strongly as right there and then, fucking Loony Lovegood on the floor of the Ravenclaw common room with only the waning moon and the blindly starting statue of Rowena Ravenclaw as witnesses.




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W hen Claire returned to her senses some time afterwards, remembering that she was supposed to be asking Luna some questions, Luna was beyond answering anything. She was lying limply on the floor, covered in sweat and various other fluids, her eyes closed and her breath now coming in soft snores.

"Wore you out, did I?" Claire muttered, stretching herself and allowing herself to bask in the afterglow for a couple of moments.

It was all too obvious that Luna had been a virgin; even in her potion-induced lust haze, the younger girl's movements had been somewhat awkward and clumsy, although she'd responded very nicely to everything and the long, silent, drawn-out "Ooo-oo-ohhhh" as she orgasmed, her cunt tightening around Claire's hand like a vice, had been extremely satisfying.

Claire studied the lightly snoring Luna, letting her eyes roam all over the girl's body. She was actually very cute when she was asleep, even in her current, slightly messed-up state... Not that she could hold a candle to Marietta, of course....

...speaking of which...

"Loony..." she grabbed the girl's shoulders and shook her slightly. "Wake up! I need to ask you something!"

The only answer was another light snore. Only when Claire grabbed one of Luna's nipples and pinched, did she open her eyes with a gasp of pain, looking up with dull, drowsy eyes.

"Loony," said Claire. "What do you know about Marietta's acne problem?"

"It was... It looks like someone's written 'SNEAK' on her face," said Luna in a voice so far away that it was obvious she wasn't quite awake.

"Yes! Do you know who did it? Was it the Weasley twins?"

"No, silly," Luna murmured.

"Well?! Who was it?"

"Nargles..." Luna closed her eyes again.

"Nargles?!" Claire groaned in frustration. Of course that lunatic would blame some idiotic creature that no-one but her had ever heard of. From the sound of it, she was just as much in the dark on the cause of Marietta's acne as Claire herself was. Furthermore, it now seemed rather unlikely that she was Ginny Weasley's lesbian lover anyway -- not with her obvious lack of sexual experience.

"Well," she finally said, looking over at Luna, "we'll just have to find something else to use you for, don't we...?" She felt a wolfish grin form on her face. "If you can't help me with Marietta, at least you should be good for the occasional fuck..."

Luna didn't answer. She was fast asleep again.

Claire felt the old thrill again as she thought about the opportunities she had here. "Yeah," she said. "We can definitely get some use out of you. Give Marietta a rest, at least. Don't tell anyone this," she added, leaning down to whisper in Luna's ear, "but I think I'm going to seduce you again. And again. I'm going to teach you to love that pussy of yours so much, you'll want to play with it all the time... But before that, I suppose we had better clean you up a bit. You're much too heavy for me to carry up to your dorms, but the chair over there should be comfortable enough for one night."

A few Scourgify charms saw Luna fresh and clean again, and an Evanesco took care of the horrible stockings (which were drenched with sweat anyway). Amazingly, Luna slept through it all, and didn't even wake when Claire lifted her up and carried her over to the chair, wrapping the woolen blanket around her.

Perfect. If anyone came down here now, they would just assume that the girl had either been sleepwalking or simply come down to the common room and fallen asleep in the chair.

"And completely naked at that," Claire grinned. "This is definitely going to help your reputation as a complete lunatic. Sweet dreams, Loony." With that, she gathered up her nightgown, her wand, the half-carrot and the love potion that hadn't been necessary after all, and was just about to go remove the Silencing charms on the dorm rooms, when she got another idea. She might as well strike again at the earliest possible opportunity...

After removing the Silencing Charms on the doors, she silently entered the fifth-years' dormitory and found Luna's bed, placing a Silencing charm on the curtains around that and snuggling down under the blanket for a few hours' well-deserved sleep while she waited for Loony to wake and show up...




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Claire hadn't been completely certain whether Luna would be as easily dealt with after the potion had worn off, but as it turned out, she needn't have worried.

When the girl came back up to her bed and woke Claire up with her asking for her wand back, it took only a few choice words and an open-mouthed kiss to get her on her back and ready to be fucked once again -- even though the potion (especially since it had been such a small amount) couldn't still be in effect after more than six hours.

When Luna came back from the hospital wing after Claire's creative way of 'returning her wand,' and was just as easy to get naked and moaning, it just confirmed it: Somehow, seducing Luna had given Claire power over her. Some level of control that might just be a result of Luna's oddball personality, but was still amazingly... firm.

Claire began to experiment with the control, ordering her to do more and more things. First, it was only during sex -- while Luna had originally been rather passive (only a step up from a sleeping Marietta, in fact), under Claire's guidance and orders she soon became a rather active participant in their 'sessions' together, giving almost as well as she got. But soon, Claire began ordering her to do things outside the sex as well: Finish my homework, only eat carrots for dinner tonight, run once around the castle wearing only your robe and no underclothes, and then meet me in Greenhouse Three for a spanking.

Luna did it all without protesting.

For the first few days, Claire felt, deep down, a little guilty about it. Not because she felt bad for Loony Lovegood, of course; that girl had nothing to complain about with all the orgasms she was receiving. But somehow, it felt like she was betraying Marietta whenever she was with Luna. It had started as a way of helping Marietta, of course, but... even Claire had to admit that what she had going with the younger girl now was unlikely to help Marietta in any way.

Still... it was so easy to seduce Luna, and it made Claire feel so, well, so powerful to have that much control over her. She didn't even have to use the Sensualis Charm, or even any more lust-inducing potion, to get Luna up and going, all she needed was a few touches on strategic parts of her body.

It was seductive, really, the way she could use sex to make Luna do almost anything for her. She couldn't just stop doing it!

But maybe those vague feelings of guilt was why she finally took the step with Marietta.

It started one Tuesday, just after lunch, when Claire had told Luna that she was not allowed to use a plate, or a goblet, today; and Luna had in equal parts amused and disgusted the students at the Ravenclaw table by eating her sandwiches directly over the table and drinking pumpkin
juice straight from the pitcher.

("You're going to give us all Loony germs!" Michael Corner had snapped.)

Most of them had seemed to just take it as a normal, if slightly more extreme, result of Luna's natural dottiness, but Marietta Edgecombe had looked thoughtful. After lunch, she had asked Claire directly:

"You were the one who told Loony Lovegood to behave like that at dinner, weren't you?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about," said Claire, realizing too late that she was using the exact words that people do when they know exactly what is being talked about.

"Come on," Marietta giggled. "I'm not stupid, you know. I am a Ravenclaw, after all, although people keep telling me I shouldn't be... I've noticed how Loony is always doing what you're saying lately. You obviously have some kind of hold over her, because I haven't ever known her to follow anyone's orders without asking fifty absurd questions first. What's going on?"

Claire looked at her, trying to figure out whether Marietta was condemning her behaviour or approving of it, but all she could read in the girl's eyes was honest curiousity.

"Well," she said, thinking fast. After all, it wouldn't do for Marietta to find out what was really going on. "Before I answer that, can you tell me something?"

"Er, all right."

"How many people have noticed?"

"Oh," said Marietta, looking a little relieved. "Just me, I think. Nobody really pays attention to Loony Lovegood, you know... I've noticed it because..." She paused, her cheeks turning slightly read behind acne and layers of make-up. "Well, it doesn't matter."

"Right," said Claire, feeling about as relieved as Marietta looked. "All right, I'll tell you." She lowered her voice. "Loony Lovegood is a lesbian."

Marietta blinked. "She is?!"

"Told me so herself. She was so ashamed of it, but it seems like she went ahead and fell in love with me." Claire smiled, a little sheepishly, and hoped the story would hold. "She had to tell me, she said, because she couldn't keep it a secret from the 'person she loved' anymore, but she knew that if she was outed, she'd be looked upon as even more loony than she already is. So when I told her I wasn't in love with her, she begged me to keep her secret. Well, of course I did that."

"Oh." Claire looked at her with huge eyes. "Loony Lovegood, a lesbian. Well, I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but..."

"I know."

"You'd think she wouldn't care if people knew, though. She certainly doesn't care that everyone thinks she's a nutter."

"I guess even she has her limits." Claire shrugged. "I know I shouldn't be using it against her, but I think she enjoys doing what I say. In her messed-up mind, I think me giving orders to her translates as some kind of declaration of love. Or at least attention."

"That's a strange way of looking at it," said Marietta, frowning.

"We are talking about Loony Lovegood here," said Claire.

"True..." Marietta nodded. "Yes, it sort of makes sense that she'd think like that... I never really pictured her as a lesbian, though. I thought she was in love with that Ron Weasley or something. She talked a lot about him last year, at least."

"Yes, but that was just Loony being her usual odd self," said Claire with a smile. "She does talk about things, and about people... Actually, it's a little flattering that she's in love with me. Pity that she's so strange, though."

Marietta bit her lip. "My mother says it's unnatural for a girl to be in love with another girl..."

"Many people think like that," said Claire carefully, not really liking where the conversation was heading. Not that she was afraid that Marietta would remember anything, but still... "But then, many Muggles say magic is unnatural. The ones who believe in magic, anyway, say that all magic is evil."

Marietta giggled. "You're joking."

"I'm dead serious. I grew up with Muggles, remember? I know several Muggles who would call me 'Spawn of the Devil' if they knew I was a witch."

"Wow..." said Marietta.

"It's not like wizarding society is much better," Claire went on. "You know how many wizards shun Muggle-borns and think they're unnatural. You find prejudices everywhere, I'm afraid... and if Loony Lovegood happens to like girls, I'm not going to hold that against her. She is an oddball, but that's not the reason why." She paused, looking around. "Don't tell anyone I told you about her, all right? Not even her... she'd be devastated if it came out."

Marietta nodded thoughtfully. "I won't tell anyone," she said, looking as if she had something more to say but didn't really know how to begin. "You... you didn't think it was disgusting that she was in love with you, though?"

Claire shook her head, relieved that the story seemed to be believable enough to Marietta. (Well, parts of it was true -- there were prejudices everywhere, and Claire certainly wouldn't have found it disgusting if Luna had been in love with her. That would just have been hypocritical, all the time she herself was in love with a girl...)

"What if..."Marietta's voice was almost inaudible. "What if it was another girl...?"

"Another girl?" said Claire.

"Yes... another girl that... was in love with you..."

Claire's heart skipped a beat. "Marietta!" she exclaimed."Are you saying...?!"

"It just happened!" Marietta whimpered, looking afraid. "It started last year when I began having these dreams about you... not every night, but a few times a month... I dreamt that you came into my bed and... did things to me. I was so disgusted with myself every time I woke up, but... I started noticing you more, and... and... I think... I think I'm a lesbian too..." The last part came out as a barely audible whisper.

Claire could only stare. Oh, my GOD.

"You hate me," said Marietta miserably. "I shouldn't have said anything. I wrote to my mother for advice, and she replied that it was unnatural for two girls to be in love and that it was probably just a reaction to this stupid acne because no boy will look twice on me now and that I should just forget about it..."

"I -- I don't hate you!" said Claire hurriedly. Oh, my GOD! "Really, I -- I was just a little startled!" OH, MY GOD!! It's not -- it's not -- You're really a lesbian?!"

"I think so," said Marietta. "I just... at night, I'd dream of you... You were... you were so good to me... I couldn't help myself. I'm sorry... I didn't mean to fall in love with you... it just happened..."

OH. MY. GOD! Claire swallowed several times, trying and failing to speak. All those times I...! I didn't realise she'd begin dreaming about...! OH! MY! GOD!

"Sorry," Marietta muttered. "I mean, you already have Loony Lovegood in love with you and now it's Marietta the Sneak..."

"It's...not...that," Claire managed to croak. "It's just... would... would you hate me if I kissed you?"

"What?!" Marietta's eyes were wide.

One moment later, their lips met. And the rest of the world stopped mattering for a while.




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The next few weeks were the happiest in Claire's life. Of course, once the first kissing was over, she had to tell Marietta how she had been in love with her since their sixth year -- leaving out a few compromising details, of course, and making it sound more like she had fancied her from afar, but been too shy to tell her. (Which was, on the whole, no more than the truth, and Marietta didn't need to know that her dreams hadn't just been dreams.)

They had agreed on keeping the relationship a secret. After all, Marietta's mother would never approve of her daughter having a girlfriend, and since said mother was a Ministry official, it wouldn't take a lot of effort for anyone who wanted to hurt Marietta to find out how to contact her mother with the news.

"Particularly the Gryffindors," said Marietta gloomily. "I don't know if you've noticed, but Harry Potter and his crowd don't seem to like me, for some reason. And Loony Lovegood... if she finds out, she'll just tell her father, and he'll print it in that Quibbler rag. He's always had it in for the Ministry."

"Relax," said Claire, kissing her. "I promise I won't tell."

She did anyway, in the middle of the night, while visiting Luna's dormitory. But it was all right, she reckoned, because she told the girl purely to give her strict orders to not tell anyone else. After all, Loony could have figured it out herself any time, and then gone blabbing to anyone. Not that anyone would believe her, of course... but still.

"You're not to tell anyone about Marietta and me," she said, stroking Luna's naked body all over.

"I promise," said Luna, lying back on her bed and spreading her legs slightly.

"You're not to let on to Marietta that you know," Claire continued, concentrating on the spots she knew Luna liked best to be touched.

"I won't..." Luna murmured.

"And you're definitely not to tell Marietta, or anyone else, about yourself and me." Claire stroked the thick curls between Luna's legs before starting to play with her clitoris.

"I won't tell!" Luna gasped.

"Good. Because if you don't keep your promise, anyone who finds out will blackmail you into fucking them as well. You remember how I told you about that, don't you?"

"Mmm..."

"So no telling anyone about anything. Are we in perfect agreement?"

"...yes."

"And no getting jealous just because I start spending more time with Marietta than with you."

"Jealous?" Luna gasped. "Why would I be jealous? I'm not in love with you. I don't even like you all that ...AH!... much."

"Ooooh, but you like this, don't you, slut?"

"Nngh."

"And this?"

"Yesssss...!" Luna squirmed and bucked against Claire, clenching her teeth. "Fuck, fuck, fuck...!"

"Promise me, then. Or I'll stop."

"I promise!" said Luna hurriedly. And heaved for her breath as she orgasmed slightly less than ten seconds later.

Claire's relationship with Luna changed slightly after this. While she didn't want to give it up -- the feeling of power she had over the other girl was too intoxicating -- she toned down the sex part of it enough that Marietta wouldn't get suspicious. And more often, her orders to Luna were along the line of 'sit there and don't move until I come back, so you're out of my way while I go spend time with Marietta.'

Of course, she still had to set off some time for sex with Luna in order to keep her an obedient little slut. Controlling Luna through the use of sex meant that there at least had to be some sex involved, after all. So at the times when Marietta was either busy or asleep, Claire would go and seduce Luna and give her some orders just to remind her that no matter what, she was still Claire's naughty little slut.

This did mean that her relationship with Marietta was far less sex-filled than it might have been otherwise, which seemed to suit the much shyer Marietta. They kissed a lot, experimented with some light fondling and sometimes slept in the same bed, snuggled up close to each other, but they hadn't actually crossed the line. (Well, once Claire did charm Marietta asleep and brought her to orgasm with Sensualis just because she missed how the girl sounded when she climaxed, but that hardly counted.)

It was an ideal situation, Claire thought. She was dating the world's most beautiful, desirable, wonderful girl, and didn't have to worry about her own twisted sexual desires ruining the relationship because she could do anything to Luna she couldn't bring herself to do with Marietta.

The next step, she began fantasizing, would be a threesome. Of course, first she had to work on Marietta's shyness and inhibitions, and then perhaps make it appear to her like it was her idea... possibly she could begin whisper suggestions to her while she was asleep... Yes, that would work wonders for Marietta's low self-esteem, if yet another girl, even if that other girl was Loony Lovegood, was to find her sexually desirable.

But then, before any of these plans could come to fruit, and without any warning, Luna suddenly started rebelling.




-------------------------------- ----------------------------------------




I t began shortly after the day Claire, drunk with her plans and her power, had decided to be a little extra careless and fingered Luna to orgasm during dinner, while Marietta's attentions were elsewhere.

Afterwards, she had told Luna to stay at the dinner table and not move, but when she returned later on, the girl was gone. She didn't return to the common room until much later, and then wouldn't say where she had been, even though Claire demanded to know.

"I'm a hero," was all she'd said. "Heroes don't reveal secret information, not even if they're threatened by a wild Munchosaurus."

Claire might have chalked it up to the girl's nuttiness, which had started acting up again a lot more lately -- but a few days later, she vanished for several hours, only to comeback and reveal that she'd been to the hospital wing.

"Hospital wing?" said Claire. "You didn't tell me you were sick."

"I wasn't sick. I was just fulfilling a promise to a friend," was all Luna would say.

Claire was shocked to find that her control over the girl was slipping away. To remind her that theirs was not a relationship between equals, she forbade Luna to go to the Quidditch match between Gryffindor and Slytherin the upcoming Saturday, but instead stay naked in bed.

When Luna appeared at the match anyway -- fully clothed and with that ridiculous lion hat of hers, too -- Claire decided that it was time to teach her a lesson. And for the first time, she used the Sensualis charm on Luna. Not only that, but she made sure to use the continuare
variant, the one that would keep the girl on the brink of orgasm but refuse to actually let her come, and then left her alone, figuring a few hours of sexual torture would teach the Loony-slut her place.

She wondered a little if she had overdone it when she later heard that Luna had been taken to the hospital wing and was to stay there for the rest of the weekend, but she figured that it would at least have destroyed any further thought of rebellion the younger girl might have had.

Marietta was in a terrible mood that night. "You're growing obsessed with Loony Lovegood," she complained as she stood by her bed and pulled on her nightgown.

"No, I'm not," said Claire, secretly cursing herself for being so obvious about it -- Marietta might not be the most quick-thinking witch around, but she was dangerously perceptive sometimes.

"Don't you lie to me," said Marietta. "You were watching her during the entire Quidditch match, and I know you went to talk to her afterwards. It's not that I can blame you," she added, a tad bitterly. "She's a nutter, but we both know she's a lesbian, and in love with you, and she is very pretty. Much prettier than me."

"Nobody's prettier than you," said Claire. "Certainly not Loony."

"She doesn't have 'SNEAK' written across her face."

"You could have the world's nastiest curse words written all over your body and still be the most beautiful girl in the world."

"Hmm," said Marietta, not seeming to know whether she should believe that Claire was sincere or not. "Have you told her about us, though?"

"No, I haven't!"

"Are you sure? Because it seems a little strange how she always vanishes whenever you hint that you want some time alone with me."

Damn, Claire thought. "I -- I promise you I haven't told her," she said out loud. "I didn't forget my promise. I haven't told anyone."

Marietta sighed. "I want to believe you," she said sadly. "But I just have this feeling that you're hiding things from me..."

"I'm not," said Claire, trying to lighten the mood with a joke. "Unless you count the fact that I once stole a biscuit from the biscuit tin when I was four. I never told you about that. It's my deepest, darkest secret -- I was a hardened criminal already as a child!"

Marietta chuckled, despite herself. "Promise that you're not keeping anything else from me?" she said in a small voice.

"Promise," said Claire.

"And you haven't told Loony Lovegood about us?"

"No, I haven't."

"All right then." Marietta sighed and sat down on the edge of her bed. "I'm sorry. I'm just so scared that people will find out. My mother would go spare... She hates homosexuality, you know. Says it's unnatural and disgusting."

"Well... I don't think it is," said Claire softly. "I think it's beautiful. If your mother can't see that, she's missing out on something."

"I am your girlfriend, you know," Marietta whispered. "There shouldn't be any secrets between us... even if we have to keep our relationship a secret to the rest of the world. I trusted you with my biggest secret, after all..."

Once again, Claire felt a little guilty.

To make up for it, she gave Marietta an extra nice, long orgasm courtesy of Sensualis after she had gone to sleep. Afterwards, she lay down next to her and began whispering in her ear how much she loved her, how lucky she considered herself to have someone like Marietta, and how
much she wanted them both to be happy. She knew now that while her girlfriend might not hear it with her awake mind, the word drifted into her dreams and stayed there.

After a while, she also began whispering suggestions about Luna Lovegood, and how much fun they could have with her.

Things were definitely looking up.

Two days later, they came crashing down.




------------------------------------- -----------------------------------




"I KNEW IT! YOU TOLD LOONY LOVEGOOD!" Marietta screamed, so hard that Claire was afraid she'd go deaf.

"I -- I didn't," she tried to protest. She had never seen Marietta this angry before, and had already decided that it was not an experience she was eager to repeat.

"STOP LYING! I talked to Neville Longbottom from Gryffindor just now, and he knew! He even said that you had told Loony!" Marietta turned to the rest of the students in the common room, looking so furious that several of them backed away. An army of Death Eaters would have backed away. "YOU ALL KNEW, DIDN'T YOU?!" she snarled. "You were having SO much fun laughing behind my back all along, weren't you?! HA HA, MARIETTA IS A LESBIAN! Let's all spread rumors behind her back! When does the Daily Prophet come out with the news?! 'Daughter of Ministry official disowned because she's a DYKE'!"

"Marietta," Cho began. "We didn't --"

"Don't you talk to me!" Marietta snapped. "I haven't asked for much, you know! All I ever wanted a girlfriend I could trust! Someone who wouldn't go blabbing about me to the daughter of The Quibbler's editor!"

No matter what anyone said or did, Marietta refused to calm down. Claire tried to defend herself a little, but this only resulted in more screaming, before Marietta finally ran out of the common room.

Nobody made a move to follow her.

Finally, Padma Patil looked to Claire. "Were you really her girlfriend?" was all she said.

"Can't exactly deny that now, can I?" Claire muttered.

"She hasn't really been herself since they placed that Memory Charm on her," said Cho quietly. "She's been a lot more moody... almost unstable. But I've never seen her like this."

"What Memory Charm?" said Claire.

"It was... Oh, it doesn't matter!" said Cho, a little more harshly than before. "You'd think that someone's been messing around with her brain again, though, the way she blew up at everyone now. I've never seen her this bad."

Claire suddenly felt even worse than before.




----------------------------------- -------------------------------------




Now, three days later, as she watched Luna and Potter walk down the hallway to that damn party, she still felt pretty awful about everything, but the feeling of guilt had, as it always did, faded after a couple of days.

The ones that are really to blame, she thought bitterly, are Loony Lovegood and Neville Longbottom.

All right, maybe Claire shouldn't have started planting suggestions in Marietta's mind -- she'd have to take at least that part of the blame -- but Loony had deliberately broken her promise by telling Longbottom about her and Marietta. And that idiot Longbottom had decided to talk to Marietta about it. If it hadn't been for them, Claire would still have had Marietta as her girlfriend, and everyone would have been happy.

Marietta had calmed down after Madam Pomfrey had given her a powerful Draught of Peace, but she was still furious with Claire and refused to talk to her. And the worst part was that Claire couldn't really blame her.

Not her. Marietta was completely innocent in all this.

Loony and Longbottom, though... they'd pay. As soon as Claire found a good way of getting revenge on them without evoking the rage of Luna's new boyfriend, Harry Potter, anyway.




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A uthor's notes: Whew! The longest chapter in the story is now finally over! (Average chapter length in this story is a good deal higher than in most of my stories, in fact, but this one has them all beat at more than eleven thousand words -- easily twice as long as an average chapter from my other stories!)

The main reason why the chapter is so long is, of course, Claire Savelle. I wanted to present a few scenes from her point of view as well, mostly to give the viewer a clearer idea of who she was than just "bitch of an OC who torments Luna." She turned out to have so much to say, though, that in the end I just decided to give her the entire chapter, and present the story such as she saw it... and she, of course, saw things very differently from how Neville or Luna, or me.

Tied up with Claire's story was also the story of Marietta Edgecombe, of course. Now, when I first started this story, Marietta wasn't even going to be in it; it was all going to be Luna, Neville and Claire. But then, as I wrote the first draft of chapter one, Marietta showed up and altered the course of the story completely. At first, she was there purely because Claire needed a girl to snog so that Neville had an excuse to go talk to Luna and get the plot moving (and since I really didn't want to introduce another OC, Marietta was just convenient -- one of those minor Ravenclaw characters I could write as a lesbian because so little about her was known in canon). But then, as so often happens to me, I began thinking more about what it was like for the characters in question.

The story that unfolded surprised even me, as Claire fell hopelessly in love with Marietta and began obsessing over her in more disturbing ways than I had planned... and Marietta herself became a very tragic character, a very weak person who was manipulated and used not only by Claire but by the canon characters as well (Hermione's 'SNEAK' jinx and Kingsley's Memory Charm, both in OotP), without ever quite knowing what was going on.

I think I ended up having more sympathy for the poor girl than J. K. Rowling ever did -- not that this stopped me from putting her through even more traumatic experiences... but in the end, she was lucky to get out of her relationship with Claire. Though Claire's love for her was no doubt genuine, the relationship would, had it been allowed to continue, no doubt destroyed Marietta completely.

I hope you enjoyed this little look at the story from different perspective! The next chapter will center on Neville and Luna again... and it'll also have special guest appearances by Fred and George Weasley and Augusta Longbottom! (...no, not in a sexual way...)