Author's Note:
I apologize for having to do this but I'm gonna have to make updates for this story be every TWO weeks instead of every week. These chapters are just very long and I'm not churning them out as fast as I would like. If there does come a point where I end up very far ahead again then I will return to doing it once a week. Hope you guys understand :)
CHAPTER VI
Spring, 1974 – Summer, 1974
"I'm sleeping with Lucius again."
Bellatrix just stared at her, one hand holding open the front door as her body blocked Narcissa from entering her home. "Congratulations," she responded dryly, trying to appear as though that information didn't faze her in the slightest. "I hope whatever hell spawn you two create rips you open on its way out."
Narcissa narrowed her eyes. "I said I was sleeping with him again, not that we were trying for children." There was a very, very important distinction between the two, which was clearly indicated by how strained the word 'children' came out of her mouth. Narcissa cleared her throat though, hoping her sister didn't notice as she straightened her spine and continued, "Besides, I thought you would want to know; you were very adamant that we reconcile, after all."
"The only reason I wanted you to get over your little hissy fit was so that you wouldn't end up divorced, shamed, and hanging by your neck from a fucking tree, Narcissa," Bellatrix shot back, knowing exactly how her sister would take to being tossed aside like that; and it was in no way well. "Believe me, I really do not give half a sod about the state of your relationship otherwise."
Narcissa exhaled an irritated breath. "Fine," she responded tersely, wishing Bellatrix didn't feel the need to always make everything so bloody hard. "Sorry for thinking my sister would take an interest in my life, clearly I was wrong."
"We spent the better half of last Monday screaming at each other over torn loyalties, and yet you come here believing I would rejoice over the fact that the ponce that has the other half of yours is now penetrating you again?" Bellatrix asked, disbelieving and angry and, alright, that was probably fair. Narcissa honestly didn't think this through very much, but she wanted to just ignore their fight and pretend that everything was normal between them again. Obviously Bellatrix did not share the same sentiment.
"I just wanted—"
"I don't care what you 'just wanted'," Bellatrix interrupted, completely disinterested in Narcissa's desire to pretend as though nothing had happened. "You know what I want? A fucking apology. I'd love for you to get on your bloody knees and kiss my arse and tell me all about how wrong you were, but I don't have time for that right now. So why don't you do me a favor and piss off until I decide that I might actually have need for that mouth of yours after all."
It was such a horribly rude thing to say, but it wasn't as though Narcissa wasn't expecting it. Her sister wasn't exactly delicate when she was angry, after all. Still, at least she wasn't screaming at her, which was… actually rather unexpected, and something Narcissa didn't understand until she tried to push with, "Well then let me in and make time," to which Bellatrix responded to with, "I can't." Her voice was low, hushed and frustrated. "You think I've been keeping you out here because I enjoy the fresh air? I have company, you twit. Now sod off, will you; this has taken too long as it is and I don't want her coming out here and seeing you."
Almost instantaneously, Narcissa's instinctual jealously jumped from zero to sixty. "Her? Her who?" And why the hell wouldn't Bellatrix want this woman to see her? They were sisters; it was perfectly normal for them to spend time with one another, so it wasn't as though they had anything to hide in that aspect.
"Do I look like I'm in the mood to give you the details of my life right now?" Bellatrix shot back, far beyond frustrated as she moved to close to door in her face. "Fuck off, Narcissa; this isn't up for debate."
"Bella—!"
Narcissa was loud, insistent, and it seemed to draw the attention of whoever was inside because suddenly the blonde heard a rather broken sounding, "Is that Narcissa…?" She couldn't place the voice right away though, it being far too distressed and soft for her to realize who it belonged to. Once the woman's figure appeared in the front hallway behind her sister though, Narcissa felt her stomach drop to the floor.
It was Gwendolyn.
The woman looked a wreck; eyes red and puffy like she had been crying as she quite literally tried to hold herself together, her small arms wrapped around her torso as she tentatively approached the two women. Bellatrix steeled her jaw though, looking more pissed off by Gwendolyn revealing herself than guilty about it, which confused Narcissa quite terribly because she now couldn't even begin to fathom what was going on.
If they were back together again, certainly Gwendolyn would seem happier? But she looked absolutely terrible, and Bellatrix's expression didn't indicate that she knew she had been doing something that would cause her sister to break down on the spot, and so Narcissa was uncertain how to even react. She kind of just stared at her.
"She was just leaving," Bellatrix told her ex shortly, attempting once more to shut the door in her sister's face. But suddenly a desperate expression crossed Gwendolyn's face and she exclaimed, "No!" as she stopped Bellatrix from shutting Narcissa out.
Which, honestly, might have been the most surprising thing of all.
"Bellatrix, let her in. She's one of us, she should know—!"
"She doesn't need to know anything!" Bellatrix snapped, furiously rounding on the other woman in warning. "I'm not going to let you needlessly scare my sister, Gwen; she's not—"
Gwendolyn looked frantic. "Her husband is a Death Eater just as yours and mine are, is he not?" she countered, voice shaking with emotion as her hand fisted protectively in the fabric of her robes against her abdomen, begging for Bellatrix to understand. "Please; if Rabastan is allowing this, then Lucius might too, and she deserves to—!"
"I said no!"
"Bellatrix, shut up, I want to hear what she has to say!" Narcissa exclaimed as she quite literally pushed her sister to the side, forcing herself into Bellatrix's house. Her stomach was clenching in her gut from the way Gwendolyn was acting; whatever was going on, it certainly wasn't good, and if it bore the chance of being relevant in her life as well, then she damn well deserved to know about it.
Bellatrix violently slammed the door behind them, furious that both of the women in her house were ignoring her wishes. "Your husband's idiotic life choices was what got you into this predicament, Gwen; this wasn't random. And while Lucius Malfoy might not be my favorite person in the world, I know well enough that he would never jeopardize his life with my sister so senselessly; therefore, the only thing your little 'warning' is going to do is scare the piss out of her, and I will not—"
"This isn't random!" Gwendolyn burst out, voice tinged with distress and helplessness as she tried, desperately, to get some sympathy and help from the woman she once loved. "He preyed on us, Bellatrix; and he'll prey on you, prey on her if either of you find yourself desperate enough to take his help. Don't you realize what he's robbing us of; don't you care?!"
"You say this like I didn't gladly try to give Him what he desired," Bellatrix hissed, which made Narcissa's stomach tie into knots as she began to realize what they were speaking about. Gwendolyn was holding a protective hand over her abdomen as she spoke, and Bellatrix telling her that she had tried to give the Dark Lord something left little else to interpretation; there was only one thing Bellatrix tried, and failed, to give Voldemort. "But I couldn't, and yet you have the audacity to stand in front of me and act as though this is some terrible fate, when I would've gladly killed for such an honor? Fuck off, Gwen; you have absolutely no idea what you're taking for granted, do you?"
"This is my child, Bellatrix!" Gwendolyn screeched, desperate for the woman in front of her to understand and seemingly at a loss because she just could not, for the life of her, figure out why Bellatrix didn't. "My child; a living, breathing part of me that's going to be ripped from my arms the second after it's born for God only knows what reason, and you call that an honor? It might die!"
Bellatrix shot the shorter brunette a look like she believed she was being overdramatic. "So? You'll have more, won't you?" Like she actually, legitimately, believed that would somehow make up for the loss of her first.
Narcissa felt like she couldn't breathe.
Her knees buckled from under her, and thankfully she was near a chair because if not she would have fallen straight on the floor. As it was already she barely made it into the upholstery, and the loud clamber as she tried to steady herself on the armrest enough to break her fall garnered both women's attention as Bellatrix swore, "—Shit," and hurried over to her sister whilst simultaneously shouting at Gwendolyn, "See, what the hell did I tell you?! You're bloody scaring her half to death!"
But it wasn't the information that Voldemort was taking children that caused Narcissa to nearly collapse; even if her sister hadn't mentioned once that she tried to conceive a child for him, she was already painfully aware of that information. It was… it was how Bellatrix was acting; as though she didn't even care. She had been in love with Gwendolyn once, and even if she wasn't anymore, Narcissa knew she still held a level of care for the other woman; and yet because Voldemort wanted something from her, suddenly his wishes were more important than her distress?
How then, would her sister act if she knew that she too, had promised him her first born? Would she be this callous, this cold? Because just the thought of that happening made Narcissa to want to die. Perhaps she hadn't yet trusted her sister with that information, as it made the situation all too real, but she knew that the day would inevitably come when Bellatrix would need to be told, and she needed— she needed her sister to protect her; to fix it… somehow, someway, she needed Bellatrix to make it all better because that's what she did, but could she? Would she?
Clearly she did not care about the fate of these children, and who they came from seemed to bear no difference at all.
"I think I'm going to be sick," Narcissa gasped out, her face paling as she held a hand over her mouth to try to force her bile to stay down. Bellatrix was trying to help her into a better position on the chair so that she wouldn't fall, smoothing her hair back from her forehead as she tried to convince her that this had nothing to do with her.
"No, Cissy, it's not—He won't take yours, alright? Listen to me, look at me," she pleaded, not wanting Narcissa to spiral into something that she assumed held no bearing on her life. If she only knew. "The Dark Lord won't take anything from you without permission, and I know how important children are to you and Lucius; you would never trade something like that. So this, what's happening right now with Gwen and Rabastan? It doesn't affect you; it would never."
If possible, Narcissa grew even paler at those words. Bellatrix was so adamant that Narcissa would never do something like that, that it caused her to grow even sicker because she had. She traded her child's life, and she was—she was such a terrible person for it; she was such an awful, awful human being, undeserving of being a mother…
"I never gave permission for him to do this; for him to take something like this from me!" Gwendolyn practically shrieked, still hysterical about her current predicament. She was crying now, looking at Bellatrix like she didn't know who she was anymore, and for the first time in Narcissa's life, she actually felt terrible for the woman. She didn't deserve this. None of them did.
"Well your idiot of a husband did, so if you bear issue with it then perhaps you should start with him!" Bellatrix snapped, turning away from Narcissa momentarily to meet her ex lover's gaze. "You should have known Rabastan was going to bury you in debt eventually; you knew he had a problem and you never once did anything to make him stop. You brought this on yourself."
"What was I supposed to do?!" Gwendolyn exclaimed, looking so terribly gutted by Bellatrix's assessment of her life. She no doubt came here to get support, to get help, and Bellatrix was practically spitting in her face. "He's my husband, Bellatrix; he's a man, and he doesn't answer to me. Maybe Rodolphus treats you as an equal, but not all of us are so lucky! Of course I told him that he needed to stop gambling away all our money, but he didn't listen; instead he caused us to lose our fortune, to nearly lose the house and he didn't… he didn't know what else to do…"
"If you understand why he did it, then why are you complaining about it?!" Bellatrix shouted, like she couldn't make heads or tails of Gwendolyn's distress. "You have money now, don't you? A place to live? The Dark Lord saved your life, so quit bitching and thank Him for it by giving Him what He wants!"
Gwendolyn just stared at her, hurt and completely horrified by how Bellatrix was acting. "Who are you…?" she asked, unable to comprehend how the other woman could be so callous towards her distress and honestly, Narcissa couldn't either. How could Bellatrix be this cruel? No matter her loyalty to the Dark Lord, she should care enough to not want to see the woman she once loved in this much pain.
"The person who's trying to get you to understand that whether you like it or not, you made an agreement that you can't back out of!" Bellatrix shouted and, for the first time in this conversation, actually seemed like she cared. Her voice was suddenly high and a little frantic as she told her, "Do you understand me? If you try to go back on your word, if you try to abort this child or run, He will find you, and He will kill you! So stop caring; just stop fucking caring!"
Gwendolyn exhaled another sob as she covered her mouth with her hand, looking as though she might fall apart on the spot. Bellatrix stared at her for a long moment, as though she were debating on what to do before she finally exhaled a defeated sounding, "—Shit," glancing back at Narcissa as she apologized to her with her eyes. She pulled away then, crossing the room to meet Gwendolyn before she finally did the first right thing since this conversation started, and pulled the trembling, crying woman into her arms.
"For fuck's sake, Gwen, just please—please stop bloody caring so much," Bellatrix begged softly, voice barely above a whisper as she curled her fingers in the other woman's hair. "Because I know you, and I know you'll do something stupid to try to protect it, and you can't. Do you hear me? You can't."
If this was any other day, if this was about anything else, then Narcissa probably would have been filled with a jealous rage at just the mere sight of Bellatrix comforting her ex like that. But she understood exactly what Gwendolyn was going through, more so than either of them even realized, and so Narcissa felt her own eyes begin to mist over with tears as she breathed, "I'm so sorry…" to the woman she had spent half her life hating, not knowing what else to do, what else to say. There was no way to make this better, and all three of them knew that.
And that terrified Narcissa, because when the time came when she was the one having her first child growing inside of her, would she be able to change its fate; or would she be just as helpless as Gwendoyn was, unable to do anything but sit and wait for it to be stolen straight from her arms?
[x]
June was unusually warm early on in the month, and Narcissa sat outside on her patio with an abundance of letters scattered before her on her lawn chair, the start of a migraine beginning to throb in her temples. If the first one she had read hadn't given her enough of a headache to begin with, the second one surely had, and right then all Narcissa wanted to do was drink in order to try to dull the pain in her temples.
"Dobby!" she called out, and within seconds the house elf appeared before her, eager to please his mistress before she told him, "Fetch me a bottle of wine. Red, if we have it. I'm not particular about the brand."
"Of course, Mistress; Dobby is always happy to serve!" the elf responded before disappearing once more with a loud crack. Another followed shortly afterwards though, and Narcissa was about to wonder how on earth the creature managed to oblige her that fast before she looked up and realized it was her sister who now stood before her.
"You're late," Narcissa told her, sounding rather exhausted as she pulled her hat down further, trying to keep the sun from blinding her as she looked at the woman in front of her.
"I was at Gwen's."
Once more, Narcissa's innate jealousy over the woman did not come. Instead, she just pursed her lips in sympathy and asked softly, "How is she?" because she couldn't bear to diminish the woman's distress with something as shallow and selfish as her own possessiveness. In the long run, it just didn't compare; it could never. Perhaps she was finally growing up, or perhaps she was just merely unable to stomach the thought of being horrible about a woman who was going through the same thing that she would soon be herself, but either way, Narcissa realized that some things just mattered more.
Bellatrix moved the pile of letters to the nearby table before she straddled the end of the lawn chair, hooking her legs around her sister's as she sat facing her. "She's starting to show," she told her, sounding exhausted herself as she exhaled a long, frustrated sigh, her fingers tangling in her own mess of unruly curls. "It's making her go fucking mental. Rabastan had to send an owl to Rodolphus because he couldn't get her to calm down, so I had to go over there and do it because apparently both of them are bloody useless at making a damn Calming Draught. Honestly, it's not that sodding hard."
A loud crack nearly made Bellatrix jump out of her skin then, but before her sister could scream at her elf about startling her, Narcissa interjected with a quick, "Thank you, Dobby; that will be all," as she took both the glass and bottle from him. The elf grinned at her, happy to have pleased her, before he was suddenly gone with another crack. It was then that Narcissa realized that perhaps she should have asked him to get another glass.
Bellatrix didn't seem to much care for one though, as she took the bottle right out of Narcissa's hands after she had opened it, telling her in a disapproving, "You're too nice to that thing," before bringing it to her lips and drinking the contents straight from the bottle. Narcissa's eyes narrowed.
"And you have absolutely no manners. I could get you a glass, you know."
"You say this like I'm supposed to care."
Narcissa sighed softly. She didn't know why she bothered.
Bellatrix eventually handed the bottle back to her though, allowing Narcissa to finally pour herself a glass of wine. "I do hope you weren't awful to her this time," she mentioned, shooting her sister a look that was clearly disapproving before she took a small sip of the red liquid.
Bellatrix looked at her like she had five heads. "Why do you suddenly care? Last I checked, you hated Gwen."
"Because I'm a person, Bellatrix!" Narcissa responded incredulously, her stomach twisting hard in her gut as she found she was unable to separate Gwendolyn's situation from her own. "Because I'm a woman and it's—it's awful, what she's going through. I understand where your loyalties lie, Bella, but there's no reason for you to act as though something like this could ever be construed as a good thing. You might be cruel enough to give up your own child without care, but the rest of us, we're—" Her voice choked up with emotion then, unable to get ahold of herself as she told her distressingly, "We're not. We're not, we're just not…" A tear slipped down her cheek then, and her sister's hands were on her immediately as she squeezed her thighs, trying to get Narcissa out of her own head.
"Hey," Bellatrix tried, attempting to garner her full attention as she caught her gaze. "What did I say before? This isn't happening to you; this will never happen to you, so stop mentally putting yourself in her position before you end up falling to fucking pieces, alright? Jesus, Cissy; I get that your working uterus is making you sympathize with her right now, but pull yourself together. You can barely tolerate the woman, yet now you're blubbering over the fate of her unborn child? Surely you realize how insane that is."
"Sod off," Narcissa snapped as she pushed her sister's hands off of her legs, pulling them to her chest instead as she held them. "It sickens me, how little care you have for this. Sometimes I honestly forget what a terrible person you are."
"I care about what's important, Cissy; and that's that she doesn't do anything stupid to try to save this child and forfeits her fucking life in the process," Bellatrix snapped, apparently offended that Narcissa didn't think she cared. "Whether she likes it or not, Gwen made her own bed and now she has to lie in it; I hate that it's making her fall apart, but it isn't like she can't have another child or something."
Narcissa's expression washed over with disbelief. "Children are not possessions, Bellatrix!" she exclaimed, horrified that her sister would think so. "You can't just replace one with another; that's not how it works!"
"How would you know? You don't have any."
Narcissa just stared at her, unable to comprehend the sheer stupidity and callousness of her own sister. She went to move from the chair then, telling her in a helplessly perplexed tone, "I just—I can't be around you right now," but Bellatrix wouldn't allow her to get very far as she snatched the blonde's wrist in her hand, keeping her from going too far.
"Jesus fucking—shit, I'm sorry, okay? I just don't fucking get what the big deal with children is."
"Then it truly is a miracle that you can't have any," Narcissa shot back, her voice still heavy with upset as she stared accusingly at her sister. Bellatrix sighed.
"I'll be nice, alright? Christ. But excuse the hell out of me for trying to keep some emotional fucking distance between me and Gwen, solely because I know how much it would upset you if I didn't," Bellatrix responded, looking irritated about being attacked when apparently she was 'trying to do the right thing'. "But apparently you're now all gung-ho about me being all over her for some bloody reason, so maybe I should just—"
"I didn't say be all over her, Bella; stop putting words in my mouth just to try to get a rise out of me, it's childish," Narcissa snapped, not up for this kind of emotional manipulation today. "I'm telling you to be a decent fucking human being, but part of me is starting to wonder if that's just too much for you to manage."
"Screw you."
"If only you should be so lucky."
Bellatrix's eyebrow quirked at that, suddenly looking a little amused by the comeback and what she no doubt perceived to be a challenge, but Narcissa shot her a look like she wasn't kidding as she told her, "No. Don't you dare try to negate your shitty personality with sex; you're not half as good as you think you are."
Bellatrix scowled at the blatant insult, violently grabbing the bottle of wine out of her sister's hand. "I'm starting to enjoy this backbone you've grown less and less, and if you're not careful, Cissy, I'll be sure to be the one to rip it straight from your spine."
"I'm terrified," Narcissa deadpanned, her reddened eyes still glaring at her over her glass of wine. It was slapped out of her hand immediately after that though, the sound of the glass smashing against the surface of the porch making her jump. "That was part of a set!" she screeched, infuriated that her sister's first instinct was always violence, and that her possessions were always on the receiving end of her wrath. Honestly, could she communicate no other way?
Her blouse was being fisted in Bellatrix's hand then though, her sister having shoved her against the back of the lawn chair as she practically got on top of her and shouted, "No, you don't get to do this to me, Narcissa!" She sounded infuriated that somehow this all got turned around on her, when somewhere in her deluded mind she actually believed she was doing the right thing. "You don't get to sit there and act like I'm the shittiest human being on this earth, when I let you get away with that crap you pulled the last time we fought just because I felt fucking bad that you had to see me with Gwen again."
Which was true, Bellatrix had abandoned her anger with her after that day, allowing them both to act as though the conversation about loyalty and the harsh reality that followed thereafter had never happened. Which Narcissa was grateful for, of course, as she didn't know how to make it better save promising Bellatrix a loyalty that she could not actually give her, but it wasn't as though she asked her to do that. She just thought that Bellatrix didn't want to go into it again as much as she didn't.
"I think about your stupid, ungrateful arse more than you even bloody realize, and considering the reason I'm not spending every damn day with the woman I once loved in order to help her deal with this crap is because of you, I think you should maybe take a second to realize the kind of shit I'm sacrificing for you and then shut the fuck up about anything else."
"I never asked you to!" Narcissa exclaimed, infuriated that Bellatrix would blame her horrible nature on her. "I would never tell you to stay away from her; not while she's going through this!"
"You told me to stay the fuck away from her for seven bloody years, Narcissa; how the hell was I supposed to know that you'd suddenly decided to stop being a selfish piece of shit?!"
"Because you know how I am about children!" Narcissa shrieked, wildly upset at this point as she shoved her sister off of her. Another tear slipped down her cheek then, unable to contain her upset as all of this hit way too close to home as she exclaimed, "You know how I am about children, and you—you need to fix it, Bella; you need to do something, you need to—!"
Bellatrix just stared at her, her breathing coming out in heavy, uneven bursts as she tried to calm herself down, realizing that Narcissa wasn't in any condition to scream at. She looked like she was falling apart. "…I don't think I can," she told her finally, softly; almost a little regrettably. And it was then that Narcissa burst into hysterical sobs, unable to differentiate Gwendolyn's current situation with her own future one as she curled herself into a ball and shook with helplessness and fear.
It took quite a long while to calm Narcissa down after that, and Bellatrix ended up bringing her inside so that passersby wouldn't bear witness to her sister having a complete and utter breakdown in her own back yard. Eventually the two women found themselves in Narcissa's bedroom, the blonde lying on her side as she stared helplessly at the far wall, her sister's protective arms around her abdomen as she held her while she cried. It took some time, but eventually Narcissa felt herself begin to run out of tears, and as she gently hiccupped as she tried to calm herself down, she heard her sister take a sharp inhale of breath behind her as she finally asked the question that Narcissa knew was coming after that little display.
"Cissy," Bellatrix began softly, her voice sounding strained as she no doubt prayed that what she was thinking wasn't true. "…Is there something you're not telling me?"
And Narcissa wanted to tell her; she wanted to admit that Gwendolyn wasn't the only one who was doomed to such a fate, but she couldn't get the words out. Once she finally voiced it out loud then it would be true, and there was no escaping it anymore. But if she didn't, if she kept it to herself, then maybe she could pretend, at least for a few years, that this wasn't going to happen to her; and right then, Narcissa knew that that would be the only thing that saved her sanity.
"No," she lied, but her voice cracked around the word, forcing her to clear her throat. "I'm sorry," she breathed instead, not knowing how to else to explain the severity of her reaction. "You're right, I'm—I'm putting myself in her position, and I shouldn't because… because Lucius would never do that to me. It's just that… children, they're all that I ever wanted, and just the thought of being forced to give one up is making me…" But she didn't finish her sentence, trailing off instead as she believed her current emotional state spoke for itself anyway. "I'm sorry," Narcissa apologized again, not knowing what else to say anymore.
Bellatrix pursed her lips, silent as she no doubt wondered if she should believe her sister's explanation. It was a long time before she spoke, but when she did, she obviously still suspected the truth of it as she demanded softly, "Tell me what you promised Him." Because Bellatrix knew; she had known for two years now, that Narcissa had promised the Dark Lord something in order to cure her sister of her madness. She just didn't know what; Narcissa had refused to tell her.
And even now, when her sister was finally starting to put the pieces together, Narcissa could not find it within herself to tell her. She didn't want this on her sister's conscience. She didn't even want it on her own. "You know I can't do that," Narcissa whispered sadly, another tear leaking from the corner of her eye as she continued to stare at the far wall.
"Cissy!" Bellatrix pleaded, one firm hand on her arm forcing her sister on her back so she could make eye contact as the brunette looked down at her. She looked frightened for her, sick for her, and it was so unlike how she seemed to care for Gwendolyn's predicament that it caused Narcissa's stomach to tighten in her gut. "We're not playing this fucking game anymore, do you hear me? It's not your sodding job to protect me; it's mine to protect you, and you need to just—you have to tell me, Narcissa. I can't protect you if you don't!"
"Like how you're protecting Gwen?" Narcissa countered softly, unable to help herself. It wasn't as though she wanted Bellatrix to spend every waking moment trying to save the other woman, but the fact that she was only feeding the other woman Calming Draughts instead of just being there for her caused Narcissa to irrationally fear that her sister would do the same with her. She claimed to have once loved them both, after all.
"I made a choice, Cissy," Bellatrix strongly reminded her, needing her sister to understand that it was a completely different situation. "You wanted real love, a real sodding relationship, and while I might not be the world's best girlfriend, I'm not stupid enough to think that we could have that if I continued to see her. So yeah, I made a fucking choice, Narcissa; I chose you, so don't you ever fucking think for one second that my reaction to you would be the same, because it'd be so bloody far from it."
Narcissa swallowed, looking up at the other woman with watery eyes. Sometimes, her sister really did do everything right; even more so than herself at times. She hadn't realized that Bellatrix was actually trying to be monogamous with her; at least emotionally. In the end, she still had no idea, nor did she even care to know, if Bellatrix was still sleeping with whores on the side, but the fact that the other woman realized that in order to have a better relationship with her sister, she needed to stop finding herself emotionally attached to another person, spoke volumes to Narcissa. It was more than she could offer her herself, after all. She still had Lucius.
"I love you, Bellatrix," Narcissa breathed, reaching up to gently cup the brunette's cheek in her hand as emotion crinkled the corners of her eyes. She needed her to understand that she appreciated that, appreciated her. "And I love that you're trying to save me, but you can't. I'm sorry. I can't—I just can't tell you; not right now. I can't bear to make it real."
"It's real whether you like it or not, love," Bellatrix breathed, looking so utterly helpless as she stared down at the woman beneath her. She wanted so desperately to help her, but just didn't know how. It broke Narcissa's heart in half. "And I can't help you unless you tell me what's going on."
"It's nothing," Narcissa lied, but her voice was still strained with emotion, with the weight and guilt of lying to her sister like that, but she just… she couldn't tell her; not then. Even if she didn't want to make all of this real, there was a part of her that felt like taking her sister's attention away from Gwendolyn right now would be cruel. Even if Bellatrix wasn't allotting the other woman much, she was all that Gwendolyn had, and this situation was making Narcissa be more sympathetic to the woman than she had ever been in her entire life.
She couldn't help it; she felt for her. She was her… or she would be, come a few years' time.
"I'm just… I think I'm just projecting, and I shouldn't be—"
"Narcissa," Bellatrix interrupted seriously, not beating around the bush anymore. Her expression was masking over with distress, knowing exactly how terrible this would be for the other woman should it be true; how devastating it would be, if Narcissa had to give up the only thing she ever wanted in life. "Did you promise the Dark Lord your child?"
Narcissa's throat felt like it was closing up, and she didn't know what else to do but sit up and try to push her sister away from her as she frantically lied, "No, okay? Now stop asking!" But she knew Bellatrix wouldn't stop, and so in a desperate effort to change the subject, she suddenly burst out with, "—Sirius ran away from home!"
"—What?" Bellatrix asked, looking as though she couldn't fathom where the hell that came from. "Narcissa, don't change the damn—"
"And Walburga sent a howler this morning, demanding that if we're hiding him that we return him immediately; like Lucius and I would ever risk our standing with my family name over that mudblood-lover," she continued, her voice rushed and desperate as she tried to make her sister think of anything else but their previous conversation. Her hands were in her hair, fisting it due to her own frustration as she continued to let out the causes of the day's previous migraine on her.
"And then I got a letter from Cassie, who said that Goyle boy proposed to her on the last day of school and she—she accepted, which just makes me feel like such an utter failure as a friend. God only knows what their children are going to look like; I can't even stomach the thought right now."
"Narcissa—"
"And she wants me to be her maid of honor, but how am I supposed to do that, how am I supposed to accept that when I can't even condone who it is that she's marrying?! It's so bloody shameful that, God, I don't even know where to begin," Narcissa exclaimed, looking at Bellatrix helplessly. "And I just—there's so many things that I just cannot deal with right now; I've had a migraine for over an hour, and I can't—I can't do this with you right now, Bellatrix; I just can't…!"
"Alright, alright; hey—" Bellatrix tried, looking a little overwhelmed by how frantic her sister had suddenly become. "Fucking take a breath, yeah? First, who gives a fuck where Sirius is; that's not our bloody problem, and second, if you're so damned ashamed by who that girl decided to marry, then why don't you just drop her as a friend?" Exhaling an exasperated breath, Bellatrix looked at her like she couldn't fathom how she constantly managed to always get herself so worked up as she exhaled, "Damn. It's like the end of the world over the simplest things with you sometimes. You're gonna pop a fucking aneurysm one day, Cissy; I swear it."
"I can't just… I can't just drop her as a friend, Bellatrix," Narcissa responded, looking at her sister like she couldn't honestly be serious about that. "She's the only platonic relationship I have that I trust completely, and even if—even if I was awful enough to just toss her aside like she was nothing, you seem to be forgetting that she's marrying one of my husband's best friends. I'll still see her all the time, and that would be… incredibly awkward."
"Well then take comfort in the fact that it must be meant to be if your best friend has as shitty of taste in men that your husband has in friends," Bellatrix responded impatiently, clearly not warranting this 'crisis' of Narcissa's to be worth much sympathy. "Honestly it's like you—shit," she hissed suddenly, interrupting her train of thought as she grasped onto her forearm, looking down.
Narcissa's stomach dropped. God, she didn't need this, not right now.
Bellatrix frantically pushed up the sleeve on her robe, seeing the mark on her arm burn as black as the night's sky. "Shit, I have to go—" And it wasn't as though Narcissa didn't know that her sister was frequently called to the Dark Lord's side, but it had been so long since she had been around for it that it kind of took her aback, because she hadn't been subjected to this in such a long time.
But Narcissa was older now, able to understand the fatal repercussions that would follow if Bellatrix didn't do exactly as she was ordered, and so she didn't try to guilt her into staying. She knew she would never be able to, no matter how much she might wish to. Still, seeing the mark reminded Narcissa of something her sister had told her not a few months prior to that, and as Bellatrix quickly climbed off the bed, she implored with, "—Wait!" needing to know why she was being told one thing, yet shown another.
"Cissy, I can't—"
"I just…" Narcissa tried, sitting up straighter as she looked at her sister, begging her to explain one thing to her. "You told me that the war had begun." And seeing the mark burn hot on Bellatrix's skin, it made that statement go to the forefront of her mind for the first time in months. "Was that the truth, or were you just trying to scare me? Because nothing seems different, Bella, and I don't understand—"
"Narcissa, I can't do this right now," Bellatrix responded impatiently, grabbing her wand out of her robe's inner pocket. "You want answers? Try looking a little harder at the things you've already seen." And then she was gone without another word, a puff of sickening black smoke enveloping her body as she answered her Lord's call.
And Narcissa honestly didn't understand what she meant; at least not until a few days later.
The following morning there was a death announcement in the Daily Prophet for the Head of the Department of International Magical Trading Standards, which didn't seem odd in Narcissa's eyes (the papers had claimed he had died of a heart attack) until, suddenly, Lucius was offered the job. Which was strange considering not only was Lucius not associated with that department at all prior to the job offer, he was still rather young; to be appointed Head of a Department without any prior experience was rather unprecedented.
It made Narcissa wonder if perhaps the Dark Lord had members of the Ministry under the Imperius Curse, and was quickly moving Lucius up the ladder to where he needed to be once the war was finally on its precipice. She was certain, after all, that while this was a large step up, that the Department of International Magical Trading Standards was not meant to be Lucius' end position. Perhaps the Dark Lord was grooming him for the title of Minister of Magic, and while that would be something Narcissa could stand behind, it sickened her that there would no doubt be a trail of bodies in the wake of her husband's success.
And so days later, when her husband came home from his first day of his new job, Narcissa just looked at him and asked, "This was Bellatrix's doing, wasn't it?" Lucius looked perplexed at first, not understanding where this was coming from or what she was even talking about until Narcissa explained, "That body you stepped over to get to where you are… Bellatrix killed him, didn't he?"
Because her sister left to take care of something for the Dark Lord, and suddenly the next day there's a dead body and a great job opportunity for her husband? It was too perfect to be coincidental, and Narcissa wasn't stupid.
Lucius was silent for a moment, unsure of whether or not he should share the Death Eater's activities with his wife. But finally he decided on being honest as he responded with, "Your sister dirties her hands so that I don't have to," and it sounded, almost for a second there, like he was actually grateful for that; which was the strangest part of all, as Lucius had never been grateful for anything Bellatrix had done before.
Her husband never did have the stomach for murder though.
"My sister dirties her hands because she enjoys it, Lucius," Narcissa responded with a tired voice, admitting the harsh truth out loud. And yet even still, though it should distress her, it didn't; perhaps she was just too numb to her sister's violence to care anymore. "She doesn't do it for you."
But it was that act that caused Narcissa to realize the truth of things; to realize that things were changing, but that the Ministry was just trying to bury it. Because there was no way that they would misdiagnose a heart attack when a Killing Curse was used; they were covering it up, trying not to elicit panic by the slew of random bodies that seemed to be popping up more often than usual lately. All natural causes, the Daily Prophet had claimed; each and every single one of them died from natural causes, but Narcissa knew better than to believe a word of it, because she knew exactly what this was.
The Dark Lord was finally making his move.
TBC…