AN: This story is based on the fairytale East of the Sun and West of the Moon. So if you know that story, you pretty much know how this is going to work. I know I should probably be working on my other two stories but I'm not, because I'm excited about this one.
Warnings: This story, so far, is told through different points of view. If switching narrator's bothers you, whatever. Expect as the plot picks up for one character to be narrating a much longer time than in this chapter. This chapter is simply to set the stage. :D Also, this will be HARRY/DRACO. It might take an ass long time for them to actually DO anything, but doesn't suspense just make it so much better?
Disclaimer: I don't own these characters. I'm not making money.
Summary: The end of the war leaves the Malfoys destitute and alone. As they struggle to pick themselves up again, Narcissa becomes fatally ill. When the one creature that can cure her names his price- Draco Malfoy- what will become of them? Where did this creature come from and what does it want with Draco? And why does he seem so familiar?
Lucius
I love my son.
When I first learned that my wife was with child, I'd had no expectations. I was counting only on one thing: that it was a boy. I didn't expect nor desire to love him.
I had planned to live my life as those around me had envisioned it: all tradition, all clean cut and hard edges and nothing to cushion me if I failed. I had planned to tolerate my wife, maybe even learn to enjoy her company at times. Our marriage was to be a solemn affair, more business than anything else. Our marriage was about survival.
But I love my wife too.
I'm a proud man and admitting these two truths does not come easily to me, but they are vastly important.
I know exactly when I began to love Draco. It was the moment the mediwitch invited me into Narcissa's room. There she was, soft and glowing and trembling with fatigue, and in her arms was my son. He was red- the first and the last time I have ever seen him blush- and his face was scrunched up as if he'd had high expectations about the great big world and it had so far failed to impress him. Narcissa was crooning to him some sort of a lullaby and I watched as he drifted off to sleep.
It felt like the first time I had done anything by my own power. No one else had made that child or told us what he must be like- Draco was purely mine and Narcissa's. He would always be ours. I wouldn't allow anyone else to steal him or manipulate him or control him.
Narcissa gave me a sleepy smile from her hospital bed. I think it was the first time I'd seen her smile merely out of joy and not as a mask. She was sweaty and her nose was running and the fact that she wasn't perfect felt like a cup of hot tea on a cold day.
We don't speak of love, Narcissa and I, but if she ever asked I would tell her that that was when I first began to love her too.
That turned us into a family- and I feel perfectly comfortable chalking it up to her runny nose and the drool falling from Draco's mouth as he slept. If I had walked in to a wife that looked like a photograph and a son that looked like a doll… I don't know if I would have felt the same.
We Malfoys are perfectly happy tricking others into thinking we believe in perfection. I certainly enjoyed acting the part of the perfect head of the perfect pureblood household and I wouldn't have wished to be perceived in any other way. But Narcissa and I, we learned each other's shortcomings and follies, and so we learned to trust each other and work together and enjoy our imperfections. As long as it was privately done.
We always lived that way- privately, exclusively, us against the world- as if everyone who wasn't a part of the family was a liar and a traitor.
So when the Dark Lord rose again and the world flipped upside down, we were ready.
When the Dark Lord fell and the world turned on us, we held each other up.
I only hope that it's enough for her now.
Narcissa
I fear sometimes that my husband will never forgive himself.
I see it in his eyes from time to time, when he slips into the past and they go dark and stormy. Then he closes them, and when they open they are a mask- not eyes but ice.
He will not speak even to me of his regret, and he tells me most everything.
He will not speak of it to me but I know.
Lucius is not perfect, as much as he likes to pretend. He is an intelligent man, but he didn't always think for himself. When he was younger he did what he was told and fulfilled what people expected him to fulfill.
During his school years, his classmates told him to be prejudiced and violent. They turned to the Dark Lord and he followed like an idiot dog.
I don't think he minded so much what happened to him, or, when we wed, what happened to me. But then Draco was born and suddenly everything mattered very much.
We had a son, and we wanted the best things for him, but we were trapped in a dangerous circle from which escape meant death.
Above all things, Lucius always wanted Draco to be able to choose his future. But when Voldemort returned, Draco's future quickly became serve or die, as it was for us all.
If it is the last thing I do on this earth, I will see Lucius learn to respect himself again, as I have come to respect him.
Draco
Today was difficult. Father shut himself in the room with Mother and I could hear the low hum of their conversation all day. I was left to bide the time alone in the rest of the house.
In the manor I would have been perfectly fine. I could have read in the library or taken a stroll through one of the gardens.
In this dump, however, there really wasn't anything to do. There are two bedrooms, the smaller one is mine and the larger one is for my parents, although now Father is sleeping on a sofa in the living room. Mother worries about keeping him up, and he worries about making Mother worry, so it's best that he sleep elsewhere until she's better.
There is a kitchen, though we have little food in it at the moment. Once Mother's illness took a more serious turn Father and I became less concerned with such tasks as eating or sleeping.
Sometimes I get very angry, as I did today. If only we were still in the manor, still had money, still had connections. We wouldn't be in this situation, then.
As we are now- alone and penniless- I have little hope.
I suppose it's lucky that my family is still together at all. It could have been worse. One of us could have died in the war, or we might have been sent to Azkaban for the rest of our lives.
We managed to get off with a steep fine: so steep we had to sell the manor and nearly everything in it. And the only reason we got off that lightly, though I loathe to admit it, is thanks to Harry Potter. He was the last person I would have expected to come through for us, but he delivered a rather heroic and touching testimony in our favor that had the Wizengamot kissing his feet.
And so we're still all alive, and all together, but I don't know for how long. Mother is deathly ill and she is not recovering. The few healers who have seen us have all told us the same thing: her ailment is magical and it is eating away at her life force. It is rare and it has no man-made cure.
Her only hope lies in finding a phoenix, a unicorn, or a dragon. Those three creatures have ancient healing magic that humans can only dream of- it's just that they are incredibly hard to locate.
Father and I have been trying for weeks now. We immediately gave up the Phoenix as a pointless endeavor. A wild phoenix would never consent to heal a Malfoy (they're ridiculously noble and narrow-minded creatures, and only help those who they feel deserve it. We aren't on that list.), and Dumbledore was the only man I ever knew of who kept a Phoenix as a pet.
I was both amused and saddened by the irony in that, but I suppose that Dumbledore would have died without my help anyway.
A unicorn would save her. A unicorn would probably have helped the Dark Lord himself- they are innocent and kind to the point of stupidity. But there are few unicorns left and they're very difficult to locate. I'm no virgin, and I'm definitely not a maiden, so attracting a unicorn does have its difficulties. On top of that, a unicorn would never leave its forest, much less journey through muggle London to pay a visit to my mother. Mother is simply too fragile to make a trip to a forest on the off chance that maybe we will find her cure.
A dragon is our greatest hope. They are far more intelligent than unicorns simply because they think in terms of power rather than in terms of good triumphing over the forces of dark. While a unicorn would heal my mother simply because it's the right thing to do, a dragon would only help us if we helped him back.
They're very smart creatures, dragons, and they drive a hard bargain. They covet treasure more than anything in the world, and for a large pay-off, a dragon would deign to heal Mother.
We had treasure, once.
And that simple truth, that we had it, fills me with so much anger that my lungs burn with it and my eyes water.
As we are now, we have nothing to offer a dragon. We can't go off on an expedition to find a dragon with the healing magic anyway because we have to stay here with Mother.
I wish it was as easy as contacting the nearest Dragon reserve- there's a large one in Romania and a few scattered around South America and Africa- but none of those Dragons have the healing magic. Though still wild in nature, they've been tamed and have become dumb and useless as far as I'm concerned.
I'd need to find an old dragon. An old dragon that has been free for its whole life.
The problem is, the old dragons are very good at hiding and usually eat whoever finds them.
I sank into the sofa in the living room, sighing and massaging my skull. I could hear the baritone of my father's voice through the walls, and though I could not make out his words they felt chill, like death.
I must find a way.
AN: There it is! LEAVE A REVIEW GOD DAMNIT. If I get a bunch of notifications for alerts and favorites and no reviews, I'll cry.
Also, if anyone has any ideas for a title, please tell me! I'm crap at titles so right now I'm just stealing the fairytale name.
Seriously.
LEAVE A REVIEW. Please. :D