The Daily Prophet lay unopened in the centre of the Malfoy breakfast table. Full of concern she hesitated to show, the youngest Mrs Malfoy watched her husband deliberately ignore the newspaper. He'd been like this for ages – ever since it happened; not wanting to read the daily screed, but unwilling to cancel their subscription or turn away the delivery owl.
As she had every day for the past six weeks, Astoria barely waited till Draco was out the door and Apparating to his Ministry-mandated job before she snatched up the paper and began to read.
Stumped Aurors Stall Investigation Into Apparent Murder-Suicide
Gawain Robards, Head of the Auror Office, yesterday gave an update on the continuing investigation into the mysterious deaths of Mr Lucius Malfoy and his recent bride, Dolores Malfoy, née Umbridge.
"We're still hard at work figuring out exactly what happened to Mr and Mrs Malfoy," Robards said during a brief press briefing. "My Aurors are following all leads on the case. I can now tell you the Malfoys succumbed to a fast-acting poison of uncertain origin. As soon as we are able, we will share what we know. In the meantime, we are interviewing all apothecaries, potioneers and herbologists, in hopes of solving this case."
As reported earlier in this paper, Mr and Mrs Malfoy appear to have met their ends simultaneously, so it remains unclear who set in motion the fatal events. The note left behind stating, "I've stood all I can stands, and I can't stands no more!" (apparently a reference to an American Muggle animated character) was written with a Dicta-Quill and so offers no leads.
With a weary sigh, Astoria dropped the paper back onto the table and left to relieve the House Elf nanny of her newborn son.
Two small, wrinkled figures – each with monogrammed tea towels neatly protecting his or her modesty – popped into the abandoned breakfast room.
They set about swiftly clearing the table, not stopping until the smaller, more wizened of the pair spied the headline glaring from The Prophet's front page.
"You isn't to be fretting about Old Master Malfoy, Hanky," admonished his younger companion. "We's only doing what he was asking when we was doing what we did."
Hanky noticed she was fretting, herself, but didn't say anything about it.
"Oh, yes, Nappy!" Hanky assured her. "But, I's isn't being certain Master was meaning that when he was saying 'Kill me now'. Maybe we were being too fast to follow orders."
"Hanky!" Nappy was clearly put out by this line of reasoning. "We is good house-elves. Good house-elves follows orders right away!"
"Of course," said Hanky. "You's right, Nappy. Like you always is."
A/N: Written for Kyria's The Petulant Poetess Saturday Night Drabble prompt: Molly Weasley has strung mistletoe all over the Burrow. Who gets caught under it? (Rare pairs only)