The day she married Rodolphus Lestrange she was eighteen and both families celebrated. Lord Randolf Lestrange, his father, had paid most of the family fortune for the hand of the eldest, most beautiful daughter of the Black family. Next to Bellatrix's wild beauty, Andromeda was plain and Narcissa tame.
The Lestranges were an old family, although neither as old nor as rich as the Blacks. They held the wedding in the Black's mansion, and everyone of worth was there, from Headmaster Albus Dumbledore to Unspeakable Augustus Rookwood.
House Black returned home that night, and Arcturus and Orion drank together for a good marriage and the survival of the family. Randolf drank the the wedding of his family into a higher social status and the Dark Lord's cause.
~oOo~
Andromeda's wedding was on a rainy summer day in Scotland, when she was only seventeen. She married Ted Tonks and renounced the Black family in one fell swoop. No member of her family attended that ceremony. She was giving them all up. In three days, they would be in a little Muggle apartment in Scotland.
Her father raged. She was to marry Lucius Malfoy that fall, and her rebellion was a great dishonor to her family. He could not find his daughter to share these sentiments with her, however. Instead he petitioned Lord Arcturus to cast her from the family. Andromeda was the second-eldest Black daughter. She was polite, cute, and outgoing. Arcturus agreed that she was a great loss. Bellatrix sulked in her manor, and cut her sister from her heart.
Roldolphus did not dare ask if she wanted him to have Andromeda located, he had never seen her tears before. Narcissa cried alone in her room. Her sisters had been her protection and her best friends. When Lucius arrived to call, her eyes were clear and her face fresh.
~oOo~
Narcissa was beautiful on her wedding day. She was seventeen, and this was a love match. Even before Andromeda's disappearance, Abraxas Malfoy had been petitioning the Blacks to make the match to their youngest daughter. Unfortunately for him, they swapped seamlessly before he knew Andromeda was gone.
Lucius and Narcissa were radiant. Bellatrix hugged her sister tightly, and whispered quietly in her ear that the Dark Lord was very pleased. Lucius was rising quickly within his ranks and Bellatrix was already very close to him. Narcissa had no idea about the politics of the situation. First her mother, then Lucius, had kept her sheltered. Lucius had promised that she would never suffer for this war.
So she kissed him, and said she was his until death.
