A/N: Firstly, thanks to all my reviewers. I hope I've remembered to get back to everyone individually (if you reviewed anonymously the replies are on my profile).
Secondly, I hope you like this chapter. As you'll probably figure out, stuff in italics is a past memory.
Enjoy the chapter!
Dear Diary,
Well, it seems I am writing in here again sooner than I anticipated. I took this diary in my bag to Bella's, I am not sure why as I was not expecting to use it.
We arrived, after going through all the security precautions to get in. Bella was waiting to greet us.
"You look terrible, Narcissa," were the first words out of her mouth.
Isn't it just wonderful to have such a kind and complimentary sister?
"You're not still fussing about this, are you?" She continued. It was clearly supposed to be a rhetorical question, as she never gave me time to answer. "I can't understand it. Draco will be fine, and when Lucius returns he'll be pleased to find the Malfoy family back in the favour of the Dark Lord."
"Bella, can we please discuss this later, if we must at all?" I said wearily.
She turned from me to Draco by way of an answer. "You look better than she does, at any rate," she said after a quick glance up and down. "How are you?"
"Fine, thank you Aunt," he replied formally.
"Excellent." She turned back to me. "Cissy, you can wait in there if you want."
"I can't watch?"
"Don't be silly, he's sixteen, he doesn't need his mother fussing over him all the time. You trust me, don't you?"
"Yes, but…"
"Well, that's settled then. Don't look at me like that, Cissy, go and find a book to read or something."
I did not see any point in arguing, so I kissed Draco, drawing a: "Mother, I'm sixteen and I'm going to be in the next room! Get off!", and then went away to wait.
Poor Bella. I was shocked when I first saw her after Azkaban, much as I was prepared for something shocking. My beautiful older sister, reduced to a shell, a skeleton. The transformation on the inside, of course, had been going on since before Azkaban. I know the big sister I loved is in there somewhere: it shows in her actions if not her words, but I worry that one day I will lose Bella completely. I'd seen the same sort of thing with Lucius, and I am terrified it will happen to Draco. I pray it won't, but I know that is futile. It's almost inevitable if he becomes a Death Eater.
No. I refuse to waste more paper going on about this subject yet again. Perhaps I should recall happier times, when Bella was still the older sister I admired, and there were still three of us.
One of my earliest complete memories is my fifth Christmas. I can remember quite clearly my eagerness to help decorate the huge pine trees that were brought into the house to celebrate the festive season. Yes, perhaps I will write about that as I remember it.
I watched as Freacher, our house-elf, aided by my mother, finished putting out the four enormous Christmas trees in the four main rooms of the house. One stood in the large sitting room, beside a tapestry of our family tree. The second, in the dusty library, which was crammed from floor to ceiling with old books, most of them about dark magic or magical history. The third rested in our dining room, and the fourth and largest had pride of place in the hall to welcome the family members and guests who would arrive on Christmas Eve.
I watched as Freacher and mother set down the final tree and Freacher began to get out boxes of decorations. Unable to contain my excitement, I pelted upstairs.
"Bella! Meda! They've got the trees!" I gasped, out of breath after my run up the stairs.
Seven-year-old Andromeda threw open her door immediately. "Can we help?" She asked excitedly.
"I don't know, I haven't asked Freacher yet. But she can't say no, can she?"
A door further down the hall opened and a girl of nine stepped out. Her hair was long and dark and was plaited down her back. She walked towards us, smiling in a superior way.
"What was that, little Cissy?"
She surely could not have missed hearing me! I spoke again.
"The trees, Bella! They've brought the trees! We're going to go and help Freacher decorate them. Are you coming?"
Bellatrix smiled at me superiorly. "Well, I'm not too sure I will. I think I'm a little old for that now."
At that time, I took her at her word and my face fell. Andromeda, slightly older, knew she was only teasing.
"Don't tease Cissy, she's believing everything you say."
"I am not!" I replied, having enough sense to understand from Andromeda's comment that this was a bad thing. "So you are coming?" I asked of Bella.
She laughed. "Of course I am, silly. I wouldn't miss it!"
"Race you to the library!" I yelled.
We all galloped into the library, and of course despite my head start I was last. Well, I was the smallest.
"We want to help." I announced.
Freacher looked nervous. "Well, misses, maybe it would be better if you just watched me. I don't need any help at the moment, you see."
"We want to help!" We cried.
Freacher sighed. "Oh, I suppose so, then. Get some decorations and start, but don't put them all on one side of the tree like you did last year. They need to be spread EVENLY. And try not to break anything." She cast a glance at Andromeda as she said it.
Andromeda promptly grabbed a box of decorations and sent a number of other boxes tumbling to the ground. I heard the tinkle of breaking glass.
"Ooops."
Freacher sighed, hopped down from the ladder, walked over to the box and repaired the decorations by magic.
"Rule number one, do not pull out a box of decorations that is piled underneath another box of decorations."
"It wasn't," Andromeda protested. "It just fell down."
"It fell down by itself, did it?" My mother's voice came from the doorway. We all looked around.
"Well I really don't know how it happened! It…"
"Andromeda, be quiet. Don't speak until you are told to. I hope-"
"You asked 'Meda a question, though!" I said, confused.
"Narcissa! Perhaps one day you will learn the meaning of a rhetorical question. For now do not speak about things that you do not understand. Now, Andromeda, I hope you will show a little more grace in front of our guests. Why, you could be any Muggle child."
My sister hung her head. She hated being told off, although it happened so often you'd have thought she'd become desensitised to it. "'M sorry," she mumbled.
"Hold your tongue! You are a Black, Andromeda, and if you do not start behaving like one you will undermine the family reputation. It won't be that long before you are going to Hogwarts, and you will need to have grown up a lot by then." My mother turned and walked away.
Andromeda scowled and began pulling decorations from the box with unwarranted venom.
"I hate her!" She grumbled. "I only knocked one box over! "
"Don't speak about my mistress like that," Freacher said sharply. "She is right. You're going to stop being a child much sooner than you think."
"Oh, not you, too!" Andromeda grumbled. She promptly dropped a glass decoration, which shattered on the cold stone floor.
"Maybe you should all go upstairs now," Freacher said exasperatedly, as she repaired the decoration using her house-elf magic.
"Sorry I ruined it for you both," Andromeda mumbled when we were all back upstairs.
"Don't worry, Andy. You'll grow out of this clumsiness, I'm sure. It's because you're growing so fast!" Bella said, drawing a small smile from her sister.
"You didn't ruin it. I was bored of it anyway," I lied.
"Nice try, Cissy," Bella said, smiling. "You're not the world's best liar…"
"…but it's sweet," Andy finished with a laugh.
I walked back into my room, the events of the past half-hour running around my head. I often wished I was like Bellatrix, that I was so strong, so certain, so brave. She had always been there for me, and I didn't know how I would cope when she went off to Hogwarts. Andromeda and I both looked up to her, although I slightly more, I think. Certainly she was always fiercely protective of both of us, although she had a hot temper and she'd fought angrily with both of us on many occasions. I looked up to Andy, too: she wasn't as forceful a personality as Bellatrix, but still strong in her own way. I was always weaker than both of them, I felt. Shy with strangers, and our parents. I always felt a need for them to protect me, and later for Lucius to fulfil the same role. Now he's in Azkaban I have to be the protective one, for Draco, and this frightens me.
Well, as they say, speak of the devil. Bellatrix put her head around the door as I was writing the above paragraph.
"We're finished, Cissy. What are you writing about?" She asked.
"It's nothing," I said, hastily closing the book.
"I didn't think you were the sort for diaries," she said after inspecting the cover.
"I'm not: I was sent this, this morning."
"Who sent you it?"
"I don't know."
She narrowed her eyes. "You were silly to open it: it could have been dangerous."
"I didn't know it was from an anonymous sender until I opened it, did I? And who'd send me something dangerous?"
"You can't be too careful. Some idiot may not be able to make the distinction between Lucius and you; and people don't like confirmed Death Eaters."
"I'll be more careful next time," I said to put her at ease rather than because I had any intention of the sort.
We left the room and met up with Draco in the hallway. He looked tired and thoughtful, but unharmed, as I knew he would be.
"I'll expect you back tomorrow," Bella told him. She squeezed my shoulder. "Stop looking so worried, Cissy. I'll see you tomorrow, if you're able to come."
"I'll be here, Bella," I replied. "You know I will."
She nodded. "Well, get along then."
We Flooed back to a secret room in the manor, the only fireplace we can connect to Bella's. Again, there's heavy security at both ends.
"How was it, Draco?" I asked as we walked back into the main manor.
"Fine."
I sighed. "Please, tell me."
"I'm crap at Occulumency," he muttered grumpily, after a pause.
That was what she'd been teaching him?! Bella must not be as confident of his task being set as an honour as I had thought! But then I realised Dumbledore was a skilled Legilimens as well: she could easily have been teaching him to keep Dumbledore from discovering his task, rather than to arm him against the Dark Lord.
"You'll get better. That was only the first lesson."
"I want to learn some proper curses to use. I'll need those: we do enough silly self-defence stuff at school."
"But not Occulumency." My son's eagerness to learn the darker curses disturbed me greatly, but I wasn't about to let him know that.
"No," he admitted. He sighed in frustration. "It's embarrassing, though. Having someone perform Legilimency on you."
"Well, it's the best way for you to learn. Why, what did she say? What did she see?"
"Nothing!" He said a little too quickly. "It's just the principle, that's all."
"Should I call the house-elf to make dinner?" I asked, deciding it would be useless to pursue the subject.
"Alright," he replied listlessly.
Anyway, the dinner is ready now, I had better go and call Draco. He went straight to his room after that last exchange, and I have been whiling away the time by writing for over an hour.
Until my return,
Narcissa Malfoy.
PLEASE REMEMBER TO REVIEW! In particular this chapter, I'm hoping for your opinions on characterisation of both Bellatrix and Draco. I did intend for them to seem a little different from the books, on the grounds that this is through Narcissa's eyes and not Harry's. However, please let me know if either of them are OOC beyond good taste. Thanks!
