21.
No Italy, that winter. It was going to be all Greengrass Manor and the Dark-Lord-knows-who's-Manor and the Ministry and she was stuck and doomed to spend time with Astoria and her mother, who, even without being actually there, had already trapped her in a knee-long black velvet dress with long sleeves and a round neck that exposed her still flat chest. She hated it. Both her chest and the dress.
Her black leather ballerina shoes kicked randomly on the dark green carpet of her father's studio, Daphne had sunk in the massive green suede couch, and was immerged in the reading of Contes de Nacre et deRubis .
"Listen to this one, father" she said, turning the page to where the poem she just read started. "C'est l'instant heureux, qui déjà n'est plus, le present réel est douleur, regret; Et toujours la vie vers la mort déflue, L'infini du temps nous tient en ses rets."
Lord Dorian Greengrass lifted his eyes to stare at his oldest daughter.
"Very nice, Daphne. But I'd like it better if you quit reading those filthy Mudblood books, regardless to the flush of genius that happen to hit their inferior minds every now and then."
Daphne nodded. "You're right, father. But still, that flush of genius that every now and then graces Muggles, don't you find it charming? This Baudelaire man, he seems to have perceived that that stuff he writes about exists. He talked about things that are actually real. Not for Muggles, of course. But don't you find this, euh, this curse poets are blessed with rather amazing? They know. They are slightly superior to the rest of their stupid race, and they are condemned as fools or are simply misunderstood, if they're lucky. Isn't it amusing?" she hinted at a faint smile.
"Don't mock the condition of those inferior minds, Daphne. It's cruel." Stated the handsome man scribbling something with a big, red quill.
"Yes, father." Daphne replied, before getting lost again in the delirium of that crazed Frenchman she had recently discovered.
"Have you seen your mother yet?" he inquired distractedly.
"No, father. I think she was out somewhere with aunt Narcissa."
"I see."
"When are Astoria and Federico coming home, father?"
"Before noon. Lucius will be here for tea. Don't you have schoolwork, Daphne dear?"
The girl shrugged. To hell with homework. This was a pathetic excuse to make her leave the room. She decided to stay until he explicitly asked her to leave. The last time she had seen her father had been while still in school, when he had broken into the infirmary wing. She had misbehaved then, but when she kept quiet and vague, and addressed him the way he wanted her to, a civil relationship on acquaintances terms with Lord Dorian was possible.
Her father was a handsome man, and strict and severe as much as he was handsome. Longish dark hair fell in straight locks that covered his forehead and went past his neck. His eyes were black, and Daphne often
wondered how it was possible for someone to have black eyes. Did he charm them? He was the only person in the world she knew with black eyes. Dorian Greengrass was very young; he had married Lucrezia Da Carrara the very summer of his graduation from Hogwarts. Theirs was an arranged wedding, but Daphne thought that it was a lucky case. He seemed to adore the very ground on which his wife walked, and Lucrezia, Daphne had noticed growing up, had a sort of special smile and a look that she flashed to her husband, and only to him, which lit on her features and stoic Dorian Greengrass simply couldn't resist.
Wow. Seen like this they seemed a very loving family. But if one scratched under the surface… can a couple of Death Eaters raise a loving family? She longed for her dorm, for the library, for the Common Room, for the dungeon. For everywhere, anywhere but Greengrass Manor.
All Daphne knew was that she was kind of alright with seeing her mother for less than a month a year. And the same went with her father. The less, the better. If only she could avoid Astoria as much as she avoided her parents…stupid girl with no mind or ideas of her own.
The door opened, and a beautiful lady with dark hair and stunning chocolate eyes entered the room.
"'Rezia" lord Greengrass said.
"Mamma" Daphne stood up and walked to her mother, letting her hug her.
"Daphne, cara" her mother hugged her and kissed her three times on the cheeks, in the Venetian fashion. Physical contact disgusted Daphne, no matter who she came in contact with. "Sei cresciuta? You look taller to me, than last time. Taller, and thinner. Do they feed you, in Hogwarts?"
"Si, mamma" Daphne replied, her mind wandering back to the dreadful food poisoning experience. Bloody house-elves. And no one had done anything to them yet. She would have to take care of it by herself.
"Bene, Daphne cara. Don't cover your face with hair, what are you ashamed of. Astoria never has her forehead covered." Lucrezia placed the locks of her daughter's fringe behind the small ears, not hiding a disgusted grimace when she noticed the third pair of earrings on Daphne's lobes. She put a hand under her chin and raised it, the girl almost imploding with nervous. "Keep your posture elegant, Daphne. You don't want to look like an house-elf. Speaking of which" she let go of her daughter and placed her hands on Lord Greengrass' desktop "Dorian, we should really do something about those house-elves of ours. Those…things they wear are dreadful, really. Can't we just give them something more decent?" she pleaded.
Dorian and Daphne stared at her mother as if she was crazy.
"Lucrezia, giving the house-elves clothes to wear?" the man repeated, astonished. "So they can happily claim their freedom?"
"Well, can't we just, euhm, non saprei, drop some clothes here and there? They might wear them, Dorian. I don't want Cissy and Lucius to see such a revolting sight. And they stink, Dorian."
This was one of the times she wanted to seal her mother's mouth with a charm. And she knew that her father was thinking the same.
"Lucrezia, this is nonsense. Those are house-elves. Servants, my dearest. Servants." The man shook his head, passing a hand through his hair to comb them.
Daphne's heart jumped at the sight, but she quickly sent it back to place. Diggory. The blasted Hufflepuff.
"But Dorian…"
The look. Her father swallowed hard.
"As you wish, Rezia, as you wish. I know you'll take good care of this." He sighed, sitting again and going back to his paperwork.
As she watched her mother smile triumphantly, Daphne couldn't help but feel that a considerable amount of respect for her father had gone. Vanished into thin air. He was a bossy ass only with her, huh? Awesome. An Avada Kedavra and a hug, that was her father.
"Vieni, Daphne. Let your father work." Her mother headed to the door, making her sign to follow her with the hand.
There was something wrong with her mother. Something weird. Something plain wrong. And not sarcastically. But Daphne couldn't quite catch what.
The Slytherin girl slipped on her ballerina shoes and followed her mother, closing the studio's door behind her.
Lucrezia made her daughter seat in the living room, and asked an house-elf to bring some pumpkin juice for the girl and a glass of pinot grigio for her.
"How are things with Theodore, Daphne?" her mother asked her distractedly sipping her wine.
Daphne gave her a weird look. "We broke up last summer, mamma."
"Oh." Lucrezia seemed lost for a few moments, maybe thinking back to something happened long ago, when she was a schoolgirl. "And are you dating someone else, cara?"
"No, mamma." Daphne could see where this was going. But she didn't care much, busy as she was in studying her mother's figure for that particular that she couldn't quite grasp yet but made the whole picture look different.
"And are you interested in someone?" the lady dropped casually.
"No, mamma."
"I see." Her mother sipped some more wine.
A painted portrait of Daphne on the wall, a wizard one, made silently sign to the flesh-and-bones Daphne to look at the photography framed beside it on the wall.
The girl followed with the eyes, and found a photo of her mother and father with Daphne, Federico and Astoria sitting at their feet. That had been taken last summer, before her and her siblings left Italy for school.
Her mother was wearing a white dress, which made her Italian skin look darker. Her mother was pale, right now, as she sat on the pink damask couch, her body dressed in exquisite thick dark green silk. But it wasn't the dark color of the dress that made her look pale. She was white. Whiter than her father, whiter than that
Sanguini vampire that she had once spotted in Honeydukes while buying those blood-tasting candies. And her cheeks, smooth and rosy in the picture, were so lifeless and empty as the girl stared at the real Lucrezia. Just what was happening to her mother? She seemed ill.
"Daphne, I should be grateful if you stopped staring at me, mia cara."
Daphne jumped, and apologized quickly to her mother, saying something about head on the clouds or something.
"What about Cedric, tesoro?"
Once again, she jumped at her mother's words. "Ce…dric, mamma?" Daphne stuttered.
"Cedric, Daphne, the young Diggory. Cissa told me he is very handsome, and such a talented little wizard. He is not on our same social level though, what a shame. "
Lady Greengrass held a few letters in her hands. The Slytherin girl knew very well those kind of glossy envelopes, with shiny cards on the inside. Invitations to parties and balls, most likely.
Her mother handed her a letter rather different from the rest.
"We have mail from Miss Diggory, Daphne."