Chapter 2: Luna Love Good

Luna Lovegood arrived in Kingsley Shacklebolt's office at nine in the morning to find that the minister was already there. He looked up as she entered.

"Take a seat," he said, and pointed to a chair in front of his desk. "Now what concerns you about this article and why should it concern the ministry?" He asked.

"It is the fact that the doctor who did the inquest could find no valid cause of death for any of the children," replied Luna. "Nor could a cause of death be discovered in the earlier case the Muggle policeman mentioned in his report."

"So why does that bother you?" Queried the minister.

"Because I think I could have an explanation for those events and if I am right," said Luna, "then I think it could endanger our attempts to keep our existence a secret from the Muggles."

"Why should the statute of secrecy be endangered by a crime in the Muggle community?" Shacklebolt asked.

"Well this could be a serial killer at work in their midst and if the killings continue they will leave no stone unturned in their attempts to find him." Luna declared. "What worries me is that it might be a wizard acting outside the magic community who is doing this to satisfy his own perversions. He would know he had a better chance of remaining undiscovered there than he would in the magical world."

"That might be true" Kingsley accepted. "But what makes you think it is a wizard?"

"Well", Luna replied, "We know that the 'Avada Kedavra' curse can kill without leaving any evidence regarding the cause of death. If you do not know or believe in curses being able to kill, then it would seem that they had just died for no reason. The Muggles would certainly fall into that category, don't you think."

"You have a point", the minister conceded. "But even if that were true, how would that endanger the secrecy of our existence?"

"It might not minister," agreed Luna. "The Muggle police may never find the man if he is a wizard, Even if they did, he could still escape them by wiping their memory or putting them under the 'Imperius Curse' If he did that he could control the investigation and continually have them perform fruitless searches."

"So I ask you again," said the minister, "why should we get involved?"

"I think you know the answer to that as well as I do" said Luna. "The Muggles may never know who or how he is doing it, but we do. It would go very much against the grain to leave them at the mercy of such a man. It could even be a group of men. We would not like him or them to think that they could get away with such crimes merely because they are performed against the Muggle community. Isn't this one of the reasons why we fought against Voldemort?"

"You are right of course." Kingsley replied. "The question is, how do we go about finding out if it is a wizard."

"That is where I can help Minister," Luna declared. "You could get me a Muggle press card through your contacts. If I had that, I could seek an interview with this inspector who is in charge of the case. Perhaps then we would have a clearer view of where things stand. We would also be in a better position to decide whether or not we had to pursue the matter and how we should go about it."

"If you are willing to undertake such a task, Luna, I will see about getting you the documents you need. I will let the Prime minister know that we might have an interest in this case. I am sure when he learns of our concern he will do all he can to help you in this matter" Kingsley promised,

"Good" replied Luna. "I will wait to hear from you, minister."

Dudley Dursley could not sleep. His mind kept worrying away at the problems he was facing at work and in his private life. He suspected he was facing an ongoing investigation that indicated a serial killer was at work. If this proved to be so, it would become a high profile case with ever increasing press publicity.

This meant that he would be under pressure to come up with some evidence that would point to progress being made in the investigation. If he did not, then they would probably put in a chief inspector or even a superintendent to take over the running of the case. That might happen anyway and would certainly relieve him of some of the pressure, but he did not want it to happen because of his lack of progress. He desperately needed some kind of break that would point to the criminal involved.

Then there was Petunia. He was fairly sure that she was showing signs of magical ability. There was certainly the potential for this being so since her aunt had been a witch. Did this kind of thing run in families and if so how often did it show itself? He had no idea. One thing was sure he would have to come to terms with it in a better way than his mother and father had done. Perhaps he was better equipped to deal with it because he had seen that it could be handled and could lead to a useful life because he had lived with Harry.