Disclaimer: Harry Potter isn't mine. If it were, I would be the happiest woman alive. As it stands, I seek to make no profit... I'm just a poor English student having some fun!
"Draco, love," Narcissa Malfoy said on a gloomy, late summer evening in 1996, one of the most miserable years of her life. She stood tall outside her son's bedroom door, one hand flat on the ebony wood, and traced her finger around the silver, engraved plate on his door that bore his name and date of birth - Draco Lucius Malfoy, 5th June 1980. She waited for him to answer, then threw caution to the winds and pushed the door open. Her son was standing by the window, arms braced on the sill, looking out over the Wiltshire countryside and the driving rain that fell. He seemed not to have heard her, so she crossed the room and placed a long, bony hand on his shoulder, wincing when he jumped so hard you'd have thought he'd been scalded. Draco turned wide, anxious grey eyes on her, and the fright barely dimmed when he registered who it was.
"Mother," he breathed. "I'm sorry, did you knock? I didn't hear-"
"It's alright," she said, standing next to him and placing a hand over his on the sill, turning her head to follow his line of sight. The peacocks in the gardens looked miserable, drenched and soaking, white feathers in disarray.
"Horrible weather, isn't it?" She commented ineptly, then shook her head and straightened. Narcissa Malfoy was not inept – she was steely, hard, unyielding, and she could say what needed to be said, couldn't she? "Draco, I came to ask you to come downstairs. There's someone here to see you."
It broke her heart, then, to have to watch her son's shoulders rise, watch him crack his neck and pull at his tie, before trying to compose himself.
"Who, might I ask? Aunt Bellatrix?"
And how horrible, Narcissa thought, that the name Bellatrix be infused with hope and longing, only because there was just one more worse alternative.
"Yes, she's here, but... No, Draco. Some – someone else is here for you."
"Him, then."
"Yes."
"Why's he here?" Draco asked, and sounded like he had at six years old when the Notts had come for the evening – Theo had been a brat, and at their last meeting had knocked out one of Draco's baby teeth. No wonder he'd not wanted him there, but now Narcissa would bet her life that he'd much rather Theo than the snake-like figure pacing the dining room downstairs. Narcissa reached out and took her son's left hand, pushing back the sleeve of his black shirt and raising her eyes to his. He seemed to freeze.
"Oh." He breathed. "Not that I'm not – pleased... but so soon?"
"It has to be," Narcissa said. "You start school in less than two months. This has to be done before then, as you understand."
"I understand." Draco murmured, yanking down the sleeve of his shirt again and seeming to steel himself. He picked up his suit jacket from behind the door and shrugged into it, before turning back to his mother.
"How do I look?" He asked, voice wavering. Narcissa tried to smile.
"Very smart," she said, before crossing to straighten his tie and smooth the lapels of his jacket. "If possible, Draco, I'll be staying with you. Because your father won't be there, I'm hoping I will be allowed to stand in his place, but I'm not clear on whether I'll be permitted..."
He nodded again, but something flickered in his eyes along with the ever-more-present nerves, too fast for Narcissa to really discern - but there was certainly a hint of anger at his father's enforced absence. It was an awful thing, but she was relieved to see her son feel something other than anxiety, even something negative. They walked downstairs together, arm in arm, almost as if entering a dinner party or a formal event, and how happy either would have been to have that be the truth. At the foot of the stairs, Bellatrix was waiting, hooded eyes almost imperceptible in the Manor's dim light. She smiled and stood up straighter, tilting her head.
"Draco," she murmured softly. "Brave boy. Come along."
She reached out a hand, long, dirty nails and rings and practically skin and bone, and Draco stiffened.
"Come along, sweetheart," His aunt repeated, but her voice took on a dangerous tone.
"Mother?" Draco questioned, taking a step forward but casting an anxious glance back. Narcissa made to move, but Bellatrix held up her other hand, a smirk on her face.
"No, no, Cissy. This is a Death Eater only do, I'm afraid."
"Bella, please -"
"No." Bellatrix's tone rang with finality, and Narcissa and Draco both jumped. "Now get moving, Draco, darling, the Dark Lord won't be kept waiting."
Draco glanced again at his mother, but Bellatrix grabbed his arm and pulled him forwards, and then they were gone, vanishing into the large dining room and letting the doors slam behind them.
Narcissa sat down on the bottom stair of the grand staircase and set her head in her hands, resolving to stay until her son came back through the doors. And, as the minutes passed, she began to worry. There was no noise – well, nothing other than the barest minimum of murmuring voices – and she could have sworn it was killing her. Every second that went by without her understanding the progress going on behind the doors felt like walking on needles, or sticking her hand in a flame, or drawing her arm across broken glass like the ghost in that ghastly Muggle book she'd once picked up. Her whole body ached until she couldn't bear it, and she had been about to open the door when she heard Draco scream. Almost worse than that had been his silence afterwards – even when she pressed her ear to the door, Narcissa couldn't hear him. She seized the handle on a sudden impulse but there had clearly been a charm placed on it, as her hand burned white hot instantly. Heart thrumming in her chest, she retreated, trying to quell her anxiety and failing miserably. Almost another hour passed before the doors burst open, threatening to send Narcissa's already fragile state-of-mind into overload. Draco was surrounded by Yaxley, Dolohov, her brother-in-law Rodolphus, Knott, so tightly that she could just barely make out his white blond hair amongst their shoulders. Bellatrix bobbed happily behind them, practically glowing, eyes unnaturally wide and smile even more so.
"Just one little scream, Cissy!" She gushed, sending the others up the stairs to Draco's bedroom with one dismissive gesture. "Just one scream – nobody's done it without screaming right through in – oh, in ten years – more – not since me – Oh, I'm so proud!"
Narcissa felt sick.
"How – how was he? How is he?"
"Oh, he's fine, had a little bit of a faint afterwards, understandable – so young," Bellatrix said with relish. "The Dark Lord is very impressed at his eagerness, very very impressed." And here Bellatrix's chest was heaving with some sort of emotion – pride, Narcissa supposed, at supposedly being back in the Dark Lord's favour. Meanwhile, she simply wanted to see her son, to hold him, to tend to him – make sure he was alright. She turned away from her older sister and made to move up the stairs again, but found herself caught in a tight, skeletal grip.
"Where do you think you're going, Narcissa?"
"To see my son, if that's permissable in my own home," Narcissa replied as haughtily as she dared, fine, narrow nose turned upwards. Bellatrix laughed.
"Your son? Oh, no, he's not yours anymore, Cissy," she smiled, and spun her sister to face her. "He's not your son anymore – he's the Dark Lord's property, as we all are."
"Well, not I," Narcissa breathed. "In case you'd never noticed, Bella, my arms are bare, I've never sworn an allegiance -"
"Which you should have," Bellatrix growled.
"Which I did not," Narcissa repeated. "And I'll be damned straight to hell if I let you tell me what I can and cannot do under my own roof. Now let me go, or I'll hex you right to next week – have you forgotten how we fought as children, or do you need reminded?"
"Didn't think you had it in you, Cissy," Bellatrix laughed harshly – but she let go.
Narcissa all but fled, pausing only for a second to remove her shoes – the flagstones were cold beneath her feet, but she couldn't move for the height of her heels. Draco's door was ajar when she reached it, and the four Death Eaters who had brought him upstairs were waiting outside, faces impassive. All it took was one arched eyebrow from Narcissa, a pursing of her lips and the word 'Well?', and they scattered. People had often said she looked like Bellatrix when she pulled such faces, and she couldn't help but be grateful now. Stepping into her son's room, Narcissa slammed the door and locked it with shaking fingers, and forced herself to look.
Draco was doubled over on hands and knees on the rug by the fire, vomiting pitifully – a thin stream of acidic bile, because he hadn't eaten properly in days. His skin was waxy, grey in the firelight, and his whole body shook like it would blow apart any second. Narcissa dropped to her knees beside him, placed one hand on his back and used the other to summon the washbasin from his nightstand so that she could shove it beneath his mouth.
"Brave boy," she echoed her sister's words and meant them, pressing her mouth to his temple. "Brave, brave boy. Well done."
"I-" Draco began, then choked as another violent retch closed his throat. "God, it hurts."
"I know, I know," Narcissa replied. "Here, Draco, sit back."
She rested back on her heels, pulling her son with her. His eyes were heavy and red, and he seemed to have trouble focusing. When she pulled away to stand, he tilted violently, and only Narcissa's bony white hand behind the crown of his skull stopped him from smashing it open on the corner of his fireplace. Do not cry, she willed herself, a Malfoy doesn't cry, a Malfoy doesn't cry-
And then Draco sobbed and didn't stop, and her whole world collapsed in and sprung back up, all strange shapes and shadows and horror.
"Mother, please, please, help, it hurts, I can't -"
Draco rolled and vomited again, all over his mother's bare feet. She didn't care. What she did instead was move to his bed, pull back the duvet, fluff the pillows. Then she went to Draco and pulled him to his feet, which was harder than it might have looked – he was slight, certainly, but he was also six feet tall – and bundled him across the room, dropping him like a stone onto the mattress. It was off with his shirt, and Narcissa couldn't help but let out a little sob when she saw his arm, his pale skin scarred and black with the Mark, red with anger and hatred and everything that she never wanted him to have to bear. Draco looked like if he could talk without emptying his poor raw stomach, he would tell her to stop, not to cry, to – to something. So she did. She helped him lie back onto the bed and pulled up his duvet, tucking it around his chest. He cried out, and Narcissa remembered the Mark, so she pulled his arm above the covers and set it carefully where nothing could touch it. She took a moment to press her palms into her eyes, indulge in wishing for Lucius - and God forbid it, but she actually missed Andromeda – more than the usual repressed ache, because what came back to her now was how good Drom was in a crisis.
"Mother," Draco mumbled again. "Mother, it's alright. I'm alright."
His tone belied the fact, but Narcissa pulled herself together all the same and perched on the edge of the bed. Draco simply watched her, and she watched back. His eyes were like saucers, like glass, and a thin sheen of sweat lay across his forehead. She kissed it carefully, and was surprised when, a moment later, a thin right arm snaked around her and a white head was buried in her shoulder and her son cried like he hadn't for years. She sighed and her mouth and eyes fell shut, and she buried her nose in her son's hair and wrapped her own arms around him, and marveled at how even after 16 long years, to hold her son still felt like the most natural thing in the world.
Narcissa looks at her boy now, nineteen in a week. He's still thin and bruised around the eyes but there's less of the air of sadness and fear that hung around his frame these days. He's sitting in the garden, a cup of tea by his left hand on the table under the oak tree, and Narcissa can't help but smile as he fidgets and worries at the sleeve of his shirt.
"Good afternoon," she says as she reaches him, pulling her long skirt up from under her heel and sitting down. "You don't mind if I sit with you for a while, do you?"
"No," Draco smiles a little, and Narcissa conjures another teacup, pouring herself a drink from the teapot between them. They sit in silence, but that's alright, just as it's alright when Draco eventually pipes up that he's going inside, but not before kissing his mother's cheek. They're closer now, post-war, and it shows, even in simple little gestures. Narcissa's glad. She never gave up on Draco, not really, not through anything – and now she sometimes thinks it's the reason she can still hold him at all.