First Glimpse
The first time that I saw Narcissa Black was also the day that I first set foot on the Hogwarts Express.
I was standing on the platform with Severus Snape, both of us high on nervous anticipation. Severus kept pointing out different magical families that he recognized, a note of awe in his voice whenever he saw a particularly noble or wealthy group of wizards.
"And that—that must be the Blacks," Sev said, pointing at a group of cloaked figures a few meters away. "They're one of the oldest pureblood families in Britain."
"I thought that pureness of blood didn't matter," I said, worried by the note of respect in Severus's voice when he pronounced the word "pureblood."
"It—it doesn't," he said hastily. "But just look at them. Look how…how noble they look."
I followed his gaze, training my eyes on the Black family. I remember thinking that Sev was right—that the Blacks were noble looking, in their own way. They embodied every preconceived notion of nobility that my young mind contained: they were haughty and aloof, dressed in elegant—and clearly expensive—black robes. Precious jewels glittered at the women's throats and ears, exploding in brilliant, multicolored sunbursts whenever the jewelry caught the sun. Both the men and the women were graced with aristocratic features: their faces were a beautiful combination of high cheekbones, full lips, and heavily lidded black eyes. I was just about to agree with Sev's estimation when another figure emerged from the back of the group, dancing into my line of vision with all the unexpected brilliance of a miracle.
In appearance, she was the very antithesis of her relatives. Oh, she was just as aloof, just as elegant and aristocratic-looking as the rest of them. But where the other Blacks were dark and opaque, she was all white light and crystal transparency. She was dressed in robes of the palest blue, her clothing matching her azure eyes with deliberate perfection. Her hair was a silvery waterfall down her back, and her skin looked as white and cold as a virgin snow.
Looking back, I think that it was Narcissa's other-worldliness—her unusual coloring, her cold, untouchable beauty—that first attracted me to her. She was the embodiment of everything that I had hoped the wizarding world would be: a combination of mystery, elegance, and sparkling enchantment.
"Lily? Lily!"
I turned to face Sev, who was practically shouting in my ear.
"Sev, who is that girl?" I asked, pointing behind me. I turned back around to look at the Blacks, searching out the unknown girl; but the lovely apparition had vanished like so much pale smoke in the wind. In her place was a haughty, good-looking boy with long black hair and steely gray eyes. He gave me a curious look, shrugged, and turned away.
"What girl?" Sev asked. Before I could answer, the Express emitted a high-pitched whistle, the last call to climb on board. My best friend grabbed me by the arm and began running towards the train, half-dragging me behind him.
"Come on, Lily," Sev said, "if you don't hurry we'll miss it!"
"Slow down, Sev," I panted, laughing. "We'll be fine!"
A few minutes later we were safely aboard the Express, crammed into a compartment with a group of loud, obnoxious boys (among them the gray-eyed Black boy, Sirius, and James Potter, my husband-to-be). Despite the surrounding commotion, however, the lovely specter of Narcissa Black continued to dance along the edges of my consciousness the entire way to school.
First Meeting
My earliest memories of Hogwarts are a brilliant confusion of light, laughter and noise. Looking back on my first few weeks of school, I can recall only a few key moments: the welcome feast (a memory that is tainted with sadness; at eleven, I was distraught over my forced separation from Sev); meeting my roommates; walking into my first Transfiguration class and seeing Professor McGonagall transform; being asked out by James Potter on the second day of class. The rest is all lost in a loud, colorful blur, obscured by the passing of time.
These indistinct, half-forgotten remembrances are punctuated by one particularly precious memory, after which everything comes back into sharp focus. It is as though this one moment—my first conversation with Narcissa Black—reshaped and redefined my entire world, adjusting it in such a way so as to make the following events unforgettable.
The conversation took place one bright morning in early October. I was sitting alone under an old oak tree in the courtyard, reading an Elementary Potions textbook. I can still recall the warm autumnal smells permeating the air—the delicious odors of crushed leaves and boiling pumpkin juice—and the sharp tickle of grass under my bare feet.
"Lily! Lily, look! There's someone that I'd like you to meet!"
I looked up at the sound of Severus's voice, which rang out high and clear against the golden quiet of morning. My friend was walking towards me, his unkempt black hair falling in characteristic tangles about his face and his ebony robes flapping behind him like the wings of some giant bat. I smiled and lifted a hand in greeting, and then—
And then I saw her.
The beautiful girl from the train station was walking next to Severus—or rather, she was walking slightly behind him, with the air of someone who is being led against her will to complete some unpleasant but necessary task.
She was just as perfect, just as ethereal as I had remembered her. She was dressed in the standard school robes—solid black—rather than the airy blue outfit that I first saw her in, but she was no less striking for it. As she walked towards me her long blonde hair glinted in the sun like so many silver ribbons, and her eyes, when they met mine, were like living crystals.
And then suddenly she was standing directly in front of me, gazing down at my eleven-year-old self (all scrapped knees and knotted red hair) with an unreadable expression on her elegant face.
"Lily, this is Narcissa Black," Sev said, beaming down at me. "Narcissa—my best friend, Lily."
I blinked up at the pair of them: the dark, hook-nosed boy in oversize robes and the fairytale princess with the glittering blue eyes. In terms of appearance, they were the very antitheses of each other. And yet at that moment I was struck by some odd affinity between them—some dark, nameless thing that connected them in a way that I knew I would never understand.
And then the moment passed, and I was left looking up at two very different people—both of whom were currently waiting for me to say something in reply.
"Er—you're Sirius's cousin, aren't you?" I said at last. I felt the heat rush to my cheeks; I knew that Sirius Black's status as a Gryffindor had caused a rift in his green and silver family. I realized too late that mentioning Narcissa's rebellious cousin probably wasn't the best way to ingratiate myself to the older girl.
Narcissa raised an eyebrow.
"You're the girl that James Potter is obsessed with," was her only reply.
"That idiot," Sev said, scowling. "Lily knows better than to hang around with trash like him and your cousin."
Narcissa turned her haughty gaze on Severus.
"Be careful who you call trash," she said. "James Potter might be a blood traitor, and Sirius certainly has his faults—but their blood is unquestionably pure."
I didn't miss the stress that Narcissa put on the word "their." I glanced at Severus—Severus, whose father was the very definition of "Muggle"—and saw that his already pallid face had gone a shade whiter.
"I sympathize with your situation, Severus," Narcissa continued, still looking at Sev. "I know how hard it must be for a half-blood, caught between two worlds like you are. But you have a choice to make—and I want you to know that, if you keep hanging about with mudbloods like your friend here, you'll be making the wrong one."
With that Narcissa turned and walked away, heading back up to the castle without a backward glance. Even though her words had caused the fires of anger to erupt inside of me, I couldn't help but admire her retreating form. Her long blonde hair rippled out behind her, the individual strands twirling gracefully in the wind, and her elegant way of walking gave the impression that she was floating above the earth.
My admiring gaze was interrupted by Severus, who had collapsed onto the ground next to me in an ungraceful heap of black robes and knobby limbs.
"I—I can't believe she said that!" Sev burst out. "Lily, I'm so, so sorry for making you listen to her."
I turned to look at my friend. My anger momentarily gave way to confusion as I recalled the strange name that Narcissa had called me.
"Sev, what's a mudblood?" I asked.
"It's just—it's a name for someone like you. Someone who's Muggleborn. Only it's not—it's not the politest of terms."
Looking back, I can still recall the sinking feeling in my stomach, the way that my confusion began to give way to a horrible, startling realization: Severus had lied. Blood status did matter—to some people, people like Narcissa Black, it mattered a lot.
"Lily, you need to understand something," Sev said, looking at me with a deadly serious glint in his eyes. "There are certain people—people like the Blacks—for whom purebloodedness is a crowning virtue. They believe that people like us—half-bloods and mudbl—I mean, Muggleborns—are beneath them, somehow. And it's not—it's not true. You need to know that. It's not true."
"Sev, why did you introduce me to her?" I asked, suddenly feeling tired. "You must have known what would happen."
"I didn't think she would act like that," Sev said, looking down. "Narcissa has kind of—well, she's kind of taken me under her wing, so to speak. She's been so nice to me, even when some of the others in my house haven't been. And I thought—"
"Are people being mean to you, Sev?" I asked, all of my previous anger returning. How dare they mistreat my friend? After all, he got enough of that from his own father.
"No, no!" he said hastily. "I mean, only a little bit, but it's fine—it's just, you know, normal Slytherin stuff. Anyway, Narcissa has been really great, telling them off for laying into me and everything. She hasn't said one thing, until today, about my blood. And so I thought, you know, that I would introduce her to you. She's kind of my only friend in Slytherin, and I was really hoping that, since you're my best friend and all, well—I was hoping that we could all, you know. Be friends."
I stared at him. Severus was generally an unusually well spoken eleven-year-old, calm, collected, and always ready with a witty comeback or a sarcastic remark. I barely recognized this flustered, white-faced boy before me. I remember thinking, What have they done to my best friend?
Severus and I stayed underneath the oak tree, talking, for hours. He explained the cult of pureblood supremacy that existed in the wizarding world, outlining the dark histories of the Blacks, the Malfoys, the Parkinsons, and all of the other ancient pureblood lines. He told me about Salazar Slytherin and his vendetta against Muggleborns; Sev even went so far as to hint at something called "Slytherin's monster," a creature that lived in the depths of the castle, though to this day I don't believe that story.
When Sev and I finally got up to head back inside, I was looking at the magical world through new eyes. That was the day that I traded my rose-tinted glasses for a new, darker pair. Where my old, childish glasses did nothing to block out the sun of idealism, these new ones extinguished it fully; thus guarded, I was finally able to see the horrible truths of the wizarding world.
Eventually I came to accept these truths, and, with Sev's help, I managed to move past them. And, as the warm summer days gave way to a cold, blustery fall, I slowly forgot my previous infatuation with Narcissa Black.
A/N: Please review and let me know what you think. I'd love to know what works/doesn't work and what makes sense/doesn't make sense, if anything.