I had planned to have this up last week, but between exams ending and holiday planning and work practically taking over my life, this kind of got lost in the shuffle. So I'm posting it today (ridiculously early in the morning, too) so that I can enjoy my first day off from work in a week AND my twentieth birthday in peace!

With Royal Beauty Bright

Pansy Finch-Fletchley has no use for the fanfare or the intricacies of "high society", feeling no need to emulate the weak, ultra-feminine qualities of a pureblooded woman that were instilled in her from birth. She married a Muggleborn and writes books that tell the truth about "crossing blood lines" and the "dirty underside" of Pureblood Society.

At nearly eight months pregnant, she wears nothing but men's pajamas and Justin's old oxford shirts that button down the front (but are never undone past the third button – she might be married, but she is still a lady) and dreams about the denims and skirts and thick wool jumpers she'll wear again once the baby is born.

Her hair is black like her father's, her eyes are green like her mother's, and her skin is pale against the green of the bedsheets, Justin's olive skin contrasting starkly against her own when he presses a hand to her belly, eager to feel the new life growing there.

Her family threatened that she would lose herself if she chose her husband over them; lose her common sense and her decency and her dignity and whatever claim she had on the Parkinson fortune, but it's been five years since her parents erased her from their record books and Pansy still feels the same.

Sometimes, she wonders if it should bother her.

Justin goes to work early one morning, leaving a note on their kitchen table that asks her to pick up some bread and milk and to get a few things for the dinner he plans on making for her at the little grocery store in town. The keys to his car – their car, she has to keep reminding herself, it's their car – are lying next to the note, but Pansy ignores them as she pulls on her coat, choosing to take her broomstick instead. Pansy takes her time as she flies, making lazy circles over the snow-covered road that leads to their house and wincing a little at the feel of the cold wind rushing through her hair.

She lands in the empty car park at the edge of town and hides her broomstick as best she can behind a trash bin. She tugs at her clothes as she makes her way down the street, feeling self-conscious and out of place in the little Northampton village they've settled down in.

Deep down, she knows that she can never pass for a Muggle, but she's still pureblood enough to not consider this a failing.

One morning, Justin rushes through breakfast like a whirlwind, eating quickly and making lots of noise as he does so, but never saying anything. Pansy shoots him a worried look, her words too tangled up in her sleep-addled brain to say anything resembling human speech, and Justin simply straightens his tie and kisses her cheek as he tosses some Floo powder into the fireplace. He gives her a quick wave before the green flames engulf him, but Pansy catches that brief, troubled look that clouds his eyes before he disappears. She's never seen him look so old.

Everyone's grown older, Pansy muses to herself, levitating the breakfast dishes into the sink. For a brief instant, she thinks of the last time she saw her mother, through the glass of the apothecary window as Genevieve Parkinson regally made her way down Diagon Alley, Pansy's younger brother Arden and his pretty new wife trailing wearily behind her. Genevieve had looked the same – not a blonde hair out of place and her makeup immaculate – but she looked tired. She'd looked older, somehow; worn-down in a way that Pansy never remembered her mother being.

She spends her day lounging about the house and ignoring all the work she should be doing, and after the long, luxurious bubble bath she'd been promising herself for weeks, Pansy slides her hand across the steamy surface of the mirror and stares at her reflection for a long time, looking for the family she'd lost hidden in her features.

Her nose still turns up like her father's and her brother's does. Her eyes still have that strange tinge of gold around the iris like her mother's. She looks like proper pureblood breeding stock, hips widening and curves appearing for the child she is about to bring into this world – a child her parents would have drowned the moment it was out of her grasp, had they been given the chance. Pansy absentmindedly places a hand on her stomach and wonders which side of its' family the child will take after.

"It's snowing outside," Justin comments one morning as they read the Sunday Prophet in bed, newspaper scattered across their heavy winter bedcovers and Pansy focused more on the crossword than her husband.

"Is it, now?" she answers distractedly, tapping her quill against the paper as she tries to think of a seven-letter word for "treasure-seeking animal".

"We should go outside today…build a snowman, or something."

"Mm-hmm."

"Andromeda Tonks is coming by tomorrow to talk about a new project she wants to start, and I think she might be bringing her grandson with her. We could always just wait and build it then. I think Teddy would like that."

"Possibly."

"I've also been thinking about names for the baby."

"That's nice, dear."

"I think that Philip James is good for a boy, but if it's a girl I think that Amaranthe Hippolyta would be perfect."

"Mm-hmm….wait, you think what?"

Justin smiles and pulls the quill from her hand. "Come on, now, Pansy, focus. Let's do something fun today."

He kisses her shoulder and Pansy can't help but smile at his touch.

"What?" he asks.

"Nothing. I'm just ticklish there," she says, feeling his fingers on the flesh between her shoulder blades and the strap of her nightgown. The newspaper dangles precariously on the edge of the bed, too caught amongst their tangled blankets to fall. Justin tosses the quill onto the floor and his hand travels down her back.

"Here?"

"Yes! Come on, stop it! It tickles!" Pansy squeals as his hands trace the area again. She falls into the pillows as he kisses her neck, his lips lingering over her cheek, her ear. She shivers and laughs underneath him, his breath warm on her skin. "Justin, stop!"

"Sorry, love, but I can't do that," Justin laughs, a cheeky grin turning up the corner of his mouth. Pansy laughs again, echoing giddily across the few rooms of their house, Justin's hands soft against her skin as his fingers skate across her body. They stay like that for a while, Pansy writhing in gleeful agony until she hits Justin upside his head with a pillow, the two locked in a furious battle over who can make the other laugh more until they fall backwards into the tousled bedding, exhausted.

"This might be one of the best days I've ever had," Justin says, tiredly twirling a lock of Pansy's hair around his finger when she rests her head on his chest.

"Even though you spent most of it in bed?"

"I'm talking about being with you, you daft, silly twit," he says. "Don't you agree?"

"No." Pansy answers firmly, but the smile that spreads itself across her face betrays her true feelings.

At the Auror Corps annual New Year's Eve gala, Pansy and Justin arrive an hour late. They stumble in through the fireplace in the entrance hall, Justin shaking the soot from his clothes and Pansy trying her hardest not to bump into the dessert tray some careless caterer had left in front of the massive hearth.

"You've got lipstick on your collar," she mutters quietly, adjusting the lapel of Justin's suit jacket so that the shirt beneath it doesn't show.

"That's not the only place," he murmurs back, winking at her as he brushes soot off the bodice of her dress. She blushes and grins wickedly – a side effect of the pregnancy hormones, that's all it is, she keeps telling herself – and Pansy starts scanning the nearly-empty hall for a cloakroom or an alcove that they can disappear to.

Unfortunately, Asteria Malfoy sees them first. She lets out a shriek of excitement and rushes over to the fireplace – Draco in one hand and a ginger ale in the other – her hugely pregnant stomach leading the way.

"Pansy, darling!" she cries, grasping Pansy's shoulder and kissing both of her cheeks. "We were wondering when you two would arrive!"

"Er, we were a little tied up at home. Justin got home later than he thought he would, and then I couldn't find my shoes, and, well…one thing led to another, and before we knew it, we were late!"

Over his wife's shoulder, Draco raises an eyebrow. "I doubt you could find anything, trying to look over that stomach of yours, Pansy. You look like you're ready to pop."

"Well, thank you, Captain Obvious. Maybe you should stop harassing poor, defenseless pregnant women and start spreading the word about orange being a fruit and a color."

Asteria snorts into her ginger ale and Justin suppresses a laugh of his own, while Draco only smirks and holds out his elbow for Pansy to take.

"I'm glad to see that the pregnancy hormones haven't completely drained you of a sense of humor, unlike some people I could mention." Draco looks pointedly at his wife, who in turn rolls her eyes and loops her arm through Justin's as they all head towards the ballroom.

"Oh, really. Just because you find the joke about the Healer, the hag, and the Mimbulus Mimbletonia unbelievably amusing, it doesn't mean that everyone else will, too."

The party is in full-swing as the four of them enter the room, and Pansy spends more time fending off questions about the baby than she does doing anything else. Everyone wants to know when she's due (mid-January), if she knows the sex (it's a surprise), if they've thought of names for it yet (again, it's a surprise). Justin is no help, taking the first opportunity he can to rush off with Draco for drinks and never return, waving at Pansy from across the ballroom where he and Draco are leaning against a column, raising their respective glasses of champagne in a mock toast to their wives. The only thing that brightens her spirits a little is the fact that Asteria is in the same position as she is, wearily trying to fend off yet another woman eager to hear the details about the unborn Malfoy child.

"Honestly," Asteria groans, sinking into the chair next to Pansy's. "It's as if these people have never heard of babies before."

Pansy nods, ready to make some mildly cynical comment about the Weasleys and their ever-expanding brood, but something stops her.

"I didn't think that they would be inviting people of your class tonight, Mrs. Finch-Fletchley," a cold, familiar voice says from somewhere behind her. "But then, I guess that blood really no longer accounts for anything, these days."

Pansy turns, and the sight of the speaker makes her blood run cold. Arden, young, handsome Arden, stands behind her with his arms crossed over his chest, a drink in one hand and his wand in the other. He makes pleasantries with Asteria over Pansy's head, making snide little allusions to the life she'd left behind and the people she chooses to associate with, these days, and Pansy can't help but stare at him and wish that she could just fall through the floor. She makes an excuse to Asteria about not feeling well, hoping to escape and hide for a little while, but Arden follows her out through the entrance hall, the pureblood diatribe he spouts making her toes curl. He grabs her, pushing her against the wall, when Justin appears from nowhere, grasping Arden's wrist and pulling him away.

"I think you should leave her alone." He says coolly, his fingers biting into Arden's flesh. Arden shoves him back, hard, breaking Justin's hold, making him stumble. He straightens with lightning speed, and Arden finds himself looking at the end of Justin's wand.

He raises his hands slowly, carefully. "Are you sure you want to do this with a room full of Aurors right behind you, Mudblood?" he asks coldly. "No matter what you think has changed, blood still matters. They won't believe a word you say, you know. Who in their right mind would listen to a filthy blood-traitor whore like her?"

A muscle twitches in Justin's cheek, and for a long, dreadful moment Pansy is positive Arden is about to receive a hexing he won't soon forget. Arden's head rocks back seconds later and he falls, hand going to his face, jaw working to ensure nothing is broken and blood pouring from his nose. Justin stands over him, his wand still clenched in one fist, the other fist empty.

"Stay away from her." Justin's voice is harsh with anger. "If you ever try doing this again, I'll be on you quicker than you can say Protego. Understand?"

He nods stiffly, eyes darting back and forth between his sister and his attacker, and he turns and rushes back into the ballroom like the devil is on his heels, not even stopping to staunch the flow of blood from his nose. Pansy falls then, leaning against the wall behind her and sinking to the ground, her head cradled in her hands.

"You didn't have to do that," she says thickly, unshed tears clinging to her eyelashes and threatening to fall. "I think you broke his nose."

Justin shrugs. "He shouldn't have said that."

"I…I know. I know that you did what you thought was right. But…but he's my brother, Justin! I thought he was better than them! How…how could they change him like that?"

Justin doesn't say anything; simply sitting beside her and wrapping his arm around her shoulder when Pansy bursts into tears. They stay like that for a time, Pansy crying into Justin's shoulder and mourning the family she's lost (for good this time, she keeps reminding herself, there's no going back now), letting him hold her and rock her until she calms down.

"Let's go home, okay?"

Pansy nods, wiping the tears from her cheeks with the back of her hand, and Justin helps her to her feet. She can hear the party guests counting down the seconds until the New Year, and for a brief moment she thinks that she can see Arden's profile standing in the doorway, watching her and Justin gather themselves and leave.

She thinks she sees him, but deep down she knows that it is only wishful thinking.