Five thousand three hundred and forty-seven, five thousand three hundred and forty-eight, five thousand three hundred and forty-nine…

If Narcissa brushed for much longer, her hair would begin to fall out. But the motion was soothing and repetitive, and it was something to do to keep her hands from the Floo powder and her mind from wandering. Where was he? She wrenched her thoughts back to the task at hand. Five thousand three hundred and fifty. Why had he not returned? Five thousand three hundred and fifty-one. What was happening to him? Five thousand three hundred and fifty-two. No, she refused to contemplate the images that rose unbidden, threatening to overwhelm her mental barriers.

Five thousand three hundred and fifty-three, five thousand three hundred and fifty-four…

She was up to six thousand eight hundred and thirty when the house gave a relieved sigh, and she knew that he was home. He would come into this room as he always did, and he would throw his cloak and mask on the green chair, and he would hold in his eyes a gleam that she had not seen for years, and she would hold his head in her lap and stroke his hair and perhaps his arm where the Mark still smarted, and he would close his eyes and would not speak to her, and everything would return to how it used to be fifteen years before.

But why was Lucius taking so long tonight? The doors between them swept open at her impatience. Soon she heard slow heavy footsteps in the hallway, and she knew that something was amiss. She hurried out to her drawing room then, where she saw him leaning against the doorway, and soaking his cloak and clumping his hair there was something dark that shone in the firelight. She came to him, and he flinched away from her, murmuring with rough and laboured breath, "Not at my best, tonight." He attempted a sneer that turned out tired and bitter and utterly defeated, and suited the scent in the air that she recognised now as Fear.

A metallic tang clung to him, too. When she put her arms around him anyway, they came away sticky and red. Looking down at her sleeve as in a daze, he said without much assurance, "Don't worry; not mine."

She helped him onto her bed, a laborious process as he deemed it improper to be levitated. Lying atop the blankets, quivering with exhaustion and something else that she refused to consider, he whispered, "Do be a dear," and into her head popped the faint and fleeting image of her bathroom cabinet.

Three spoonfuls of Invigoration Draught later, his breathing calmed a little. Although his eyes were closed, he turned his head towards her, seated leaning against the headboard, and said, "If anything should happen to me—anything at all—trust Severus completely. Seek protection from him. Whatever happens—whatever he may have done—he will always be loyal to us."

And it was true, of course; she thought back to the darkest, loneliest corner of the common room, of the little half-blood son of that blood-traitor daughter of the Princes, with his over-sharp eyes and his bitter mouth; she thought of him always watching Lucius, her Lucius, and of the day that Lucius had grown tired of Rabbit's teasing and called the boy out of his corner, and said, "I don't recognise your name."

"My mother is a Prince," he had snapped, but it was obvious that he was ashamed.

Lucius had almost smiled at him, and had made Evan move over to make him room, and had said to him with a smirk at Rabbit, "So you must be the half-blood Prince, hm?"

Severus had mumbled something inaudible; but he had sat down, and there he had remained all these years. Severus had not changed at all.

Then Narcissa realised what Lucius had said: If anything should happen to me… and she realised what the quiver in his voice had meant. She should have given him the Draught of Peace as well. They had always known that it was only a matter of time, but now that it had actually happened—the words tripped over themselves: He knows, He knows, He knows…

"So—so He knows, then."

Lucius reached out an arm towards her, but although she stared at it for a long time, there was something cold and heavy inside her that prevented her from taking his hand and giving him any comfort. After a while, he turned away from her to murmur into the pillows, "I am so sorry, Cissa."

They had a plan, of course, as they did for every occasion; which is to say that Narcissa had a plan, if only Lucius would agree to abide by it. "We have information."

Lucius turned back, then, and opening his eyes he looked at her in the way that he had that was for looking at other people, other people that were not his Cissa. Firmly, though weakly, he said, "No."

"Why not?" They were retreading the same tired argument, but Narcissa was compelled to persevere. She always won.

"He is your cousin."

And he was, of course, her cousin.

He had been her cousin when he had planted himself in front of tearful little Reggie, scowling and shouting and scrabbling at Bella's robes as she, once again, amused herself by levitating Reggie's favourite puffskein just beyond reach.

He had been her cousin when that frightful Jamie had cursed Reggie's robes to tear off in strips, right in the middle of the Entrance Hall, and while he had not laughed along with all of Jamie's other sycophants, nor had he tried to stop him. And later, when Reggie whimpered, "But he's supposed to love me—he's my brother…" he had been her cousin too.

And he had been her cousin still when he had left for the Potters', and when, three days later, Mummy had taken them to Auntie Wally's house to help clean up the mess. Fixing the broken china, Narcissa had caught sight of Auntie Wally at the kitchen table with her hair down and shoulders hunched over the single teacup that she had managed not to shatter, conversing despondently with Kreacher.

When Narcissa became bored with it all and went upstairs, she found Reggie huddled in a corner of Puppy's bed, burying his face in his drawn-up knees. He was her cousin, and Reggie missed him enough to cry, but Narcissa had been missing the real Puppy for years.

When they went home just before dinner, Auntie Wally was still deep in conversation with Kreacher. She was never quite the same after that, and even Uncle Orion could not fix her. Even so, Puppy remained her cousin. And yet…

"He is safer where he is than you are: look at you. The Dark Lord does not want him, and he cannot do anything to him in Uncle Orion's house."

"If one could but keep him there. But he leaves the place, Cissa."

"I should think that no cousin of mine be so stupid as to do so now. Did you not have Severus warn him? And Draco, through the Potter boy?" She really was tired of this argument. Lucius opened his mouth, but she cut him off before he could speak: "You tell me that the Dark Lord does not forgive, but if you do this, he will be pleased with you. How can a Muggle relic compare? No harm will come to Puppy, the Potter boy will fall into any trap the Dark Lord sets for him, and we shall be safe."

"No harm may come to Puppy; we may be safe." This was the part when the argument would collapse each time, but tonight, Lucius added softly, "You have already lost so many."

He looked very tense now, and suddenly Narcissa could tell that this time he wanted her to win, he wanted this chance to earn the Dark Lord's favour, but he would offer her the choice, because it was for her to choose between her cousin and her Lucius. There was a certain defeat that began to gather in his eyes, as if he dared not hope that Narcissa would choose him, the idiot, and she realised that she had never loved him more than she did now, when he doubted that she loved him best.

So what could she say but, "I'd rather keep you than a good-for-nothing traitor to my blood."

He attempted to argue, but she had had enough. If he would not do it, then she would. She waved her fingers over his eyes, and it was testament to his weakened condition that he had fallen asleep almost before she wished it so. She stood, pulled her robes more tightly about her, and made her way to her study, where she gathered parchment and quill, and began to write to Bella.

Author's Note: Thank you very much to my lovely beta reader Coshie, and my long-suffering alpha reader rxlcrab.