Chapter Twenty Six

A/N: Thank you to Nevaeh -Rose Malfoy for reviewing the last chapter.

Narcissa's eyelids flickered, the light almost blinding after so long in darkness. For a moment, her heartbeat pounded fierce in her chest, her survival instinct telling her that she must stand and fight or die, but when she tried to sit up, she felt a pair of hands gentle on her shoulders, lying her back against the pillows.

"What's happening?" she managed to breathe, looking around her for any kind of clue. The stone walls and waving banners of the arena were gone now, replaced with clean white walls and stark lighting. The hospital wing.

"You collapsed during the Challenge, they had to rush you out." came the murmured answer. Narcissa smiled gently at the sound. Even in the worst of situations, Lucius' voice was cheering. "Honestly, you'll do anything to get out of a bit of hard work."

"I can't remember." Narcissa stated, frowning as she searched through the recesses of her mind. The last thing she recalled was seeing the arena, then nothing.

Lucius nodded in acknowledgement. "You must have hit your head when you fell. I couldn't see very clearly, the angle from where they were keeping us was awful. Probably thought we wouldn't want to see."

"What was the Task?" Narcissa questioned. Lucius shifted in his seat, his eyes suddenly not meeting hers. The girl almost regretted asking.

The young man took a deep breath before he answered, as if he was steeling himself for a battle. "Boggarts. That's what they told me afterwards. Quite tame for a Triwizard Challenge, I know… I guess it just depends on what you see."

Narcissa's mouth opened and closed, but she could not force the words from her throat. Suddenly it all made sense, the pieces falling into place. She still could not remember what Boggart she saw, the blow to the head knocking the events from her mind, but she did not need to remember. There was only one thing it could be.

"I saw my father." she blurted, louder than she ought to have. Lucius looked up at her, frowning. All of a sudden, she remembered. He did not know. "I must have done. He's the thing that frightens me most in the world. I haven't seen him since I was a little girl, but the way he treated me then… I still dream about him sometimes."

"That explains it." Lucius breathed, so quiet she almost did not hear him. "When you fell, you weren't trying to fight the Boggart. You were running away."

A brave Champion, the chosen representative of a great magical school, would have been horrified at the prospect. Narcissa, who had never asked to be chosen in the first place, merely nodded.

"It doesn't surprise me." the girl confessed. She could not quite bring herself to look Lucius in the eye, instead focusing on the door at the far end of the room. As if she feared someone would burst through at any moment, ready to hurt her. "I would never want to see my father, let alone be right beside him."

When she finally looked back at her friend, she saw the sadness in his eyes. He did not ask the question himself. He did not need to.

"When I left with my mother, after my parents' divorce, my father wrote to the Ministry, accusing her of stealing me." The words felt strange in her mouth, heavy. She had never spoken of what she endured to a stranger, not since the day of the trial that had finally freed her from his clutches. But Lucius did not feel like a stranger to her. Not anymore. "She had no choice but to send me back to him, and try to gain custody through the courts. She didn't realise what would happen. He was a bully, sharp-tongued and vicious, but he was never violent. Not until me."

Her eyes flickered upwards, taking in Lucius' reaction. She saw the horror behind his eyes, the intensity with which he bit down on his lip to stay silent. It looked like it took all the strength in the world for him not to cry out.

"I was only with him a few weeks." the girl continued, hoping it would be of some comfort. She did not know quite why she was thinking of his feelings, when she had been the one who had suffered. "But one night, he drank himself into oblivion, summoned me to see him. When I took too long to arrive, he was angry. He screamed at me, threw me into a wall. And I don't know how it happened, but the room caught fire, and I nearly burnt to death. He didn't care, when he finally sobered enough to realise what had happened. He was furious with my sisters for pulling me out of the blaze; he would have rather they let me die."

"Monster." The word was quiet, but Narcissa heard it all the same. She looked up at Lucius, her eyes wide with shock. "What kind of man could nearly kill his own child and feel nothing?"

"He didn't feel nothing." Narcissa reasoned. She would have so preferred it if her father had felt nothing. Nothing would not have been so painful. "He just didn't regret it, or feel guilty about it. When he found out I was alive, he still wished I was dead. He probably still does."

"Well, I'd imagine a lot of people think the same of him, after what he did to you." Lucius could barely force the words from his throat. His eyes were blazing with fury, bright as the flames that had licked around her that night.

"And maybe one day, that thought will come true." Narcissa suggested. Lucius looked up at her, blinking with surprise, the anger dulling. He could not believe she had spoken those words. In truth, Narcissa could not quite believe it either. "I'm sorry, but I can't help but feel that way. If he died, I wouldn't mourn him, I wouldn't cry. I don't think anything in the world would make me happier than to see him pay for what he did to me."

Lucius pulled Narcissa into his arms, cradling her like a china doll to avoid worsening any of her injuries. As the young woman clutched onto him, she felt safe, protected, all those things she had never felt when she was at her father's mercy.

What she did not see was the violent gleam in Lucius' eyes, a silent promise that he would do whatever was in his power to right the wrongs Narcissa had suffered.

A/N: And so Narcissa has told her story for the first time, but I don't think she's quite expecting the consequences. Hope you enjoyed and please review!