A/N: In response to ix3youlots's "Colorful Phrases" Competition. My prompt was "Red Carpet Treatment" with the paring Lucius/Narcissa.

Since third year Narcissa had held a place in her heart for Lucius Malfoy, but today she found herself feeling extremely disenchanted by his newfound Death Eater status. She should have seen it coming, really, what with the rumours of his father's approval of their movement, and the definite implications of his membership. For one reason or another however (she suspected love-blindness), she had refused to consider the possibility that Lucius' adoration of his father would lead him quite so far. Oh, he'd always expressed his father's views on Muggles and Muggleborns, but she'd agreed with those, too, to a certain extent. To run off terrorizing the continent because of it, though… Well, she just couldn't get her head around the supposed justification for that.

Now here she was, staring blankly at the arm of the man she loved as he proudly displayed the hideous mark of the Dark Lord. And he was waiting for her praise.

She had two options of course. She could express her opinions—as a witch with intelligence and independence—, or she could keep her mouth shut like she was expected to, and fawn over his newfound status that would lend weight to their future together. What sort of weight though, she couldn't be sure, and she wasn't just some dumb blond pureblood girl. She was Narcissa bloody Black, and the Blacks were well known for their inability to keep their mouths shut, even when they likely ought to.

"I—You're a Death Eater."

He looked at her as though she'd lost her brain, and perhaps she had. "Evidently, Narcissa. Are you quite alright?"

"I—No, Lucius, I'm not." He waited for her to continue and she struggled to find the words. "Why didn't you tell me this was—? That you were going to be—?" She paused to recover her composure and her eloquence. "You didn't think I might like to have a conversation about this?" Her tone was soft but beneath it lay a certain steely challenge, which she knew he wouldn't like.

His eyes narrowed. "Don't tell me you didn't see this coming. That would be preposterous."

"Well maybe I didn't want to!"

"You're displeased with my decision then." His voice was ice, and she had to force herself not to flinch.

"Lucius, I just—. What—," she sighed heavily. "Yes, I'm displeased."

"I knew you didn't agree with the movement, Cissa," he replied with a tinge of frustration, "but I had hoped you would have the foresight at least to accept that this will be good for us. For our future."

"Yes, yes, I know," she said tiredly. "The Dark Lord wins, and the entire wizarding world treats us as victors, celebrities; we'll be swimming in galleons; we'll be the social elite of society; people will practically bow to us in the streets. I've heard it all, Lucius. You've said it all. And what if the Dark Lord loses? What then? We'll be pariahs; we'll be loathed; we'll be the lowest, most shamed fraction of society; we could end up in Azkaban; we—"

"The Dark Lord will not lose," he hissed, looking furtively around them. She was surprised by the fear masked behind his eyes.

"Oh, Lucius, just suppose he does. What then? What for our children?"

"Our children," he said, a little softer at the thought of their family, "will be proud to know that their parents fought for the purification of this world—for the bettering of their future. They will grow up with our values, and they will carry them on, until the movement one day succeeds." He seemed to deflate a little, and he tugged his sleeve back down over the mark he'd forgotten was exposed.

"I don't… I don't entirely agree, Cissa, you must know that, but no one else. Killing so many people… The things I'm going to have to do. A war when we could just—." He shook his head. "But I couldn't deny my father this. He's dying, Cissa, that's why I didn't warn you—I didn't know. He just called me home for the weekend. He has dragonpox… I won't see him again, and I couldn't disappoint him the last time I did."

For a moment he appeared to her as a small and helpless pawn upon a chessboard blackened by war, and her heart and her defiance together crumbled and she slid into his arms to kiss him softly. "I'm so sorry, Lucius. I know you respected him terribly much."

There were no tears in his eyes, but she knew he must be devastated beneath the stoic façade. "We'll be alright, Narcissa, I swear to you. Even if the Dark Lord fails, and we're viewed as criminals, and the Malfoy name is run into the mud. Because I'll still treat you like a Queen, and our children like princes and princesses, and we'll still have galleons beyond count, and the other Purebloods of the cause will look upon us with respect—with reverence—, and we'll be just fine."

And she rather thought this perspective was awfully naïve, for all that it was sweet, but she couldn't bring herself to argue with him anymore. Not when he was trying so hard. Not after that glimpse of the truth. Not when it was too late anyway.

So she set aside the suffocating feeling that the mark on his arm meant something awful and irrevocable for them. She set aside her worries and her concerns and her own personal values. And she comforted her fiancé as a good wife was wont to do. But even as she did, she felt as though a dark cloud was creeping upon them and she was the only one who could see it.