AN: TRIGGER WARNING for domestic violence and rape (non-graphic). I don't own Harry Potter. For those waiting on the Exceeds Expectations series, I will be resuming regular updates on Monday.
Speak
There is a beast in my gut, I can hear it scraping away at the inside of my ribs. Even if I dump the memory, it will stay with me, staining me.
-Laurie Halse Anderson, Speak
"What happened to the sweet little girl I married?"
My throat closes up.
I'd begged for that debutante ball. They'd been falling out of fashion, even with the most traditional of Pureblood families, but I still wanted one more than anything. Bella's and Andy's had been terrible debacles.
She comes home the next day. I try to slap her. It doesn't even leave a mark. I'm still weak from the night's interrogation.
"They thought I knew."
We're close, but not close enough for me to be able to explain why Andy skipped her own debutante ball.
"I'm sorry, Cissa."
"Don't talk to me."
The ballroom was decorated in pale blues and gold accents, and I wore white robes with gold embroidery to match. I was so enchanted with my own reflection that my mother had to physically pull me away from the mirror. It's endearing in retrospect, in a pitiable kind of way.
It was Easter break. All of my well-bred schoolmates attended, along with some children from lesser families, because us Blacks are the generous type. Bella was on her best behaviour; Andy, predictably, was nowhere to be found. I danced with every boy in the room, and not once, not twice, but three times with Lucius Malfoy. He was charismatic and attentive a way that most older boys weren't. He listened when I spoke. He kept his hair shorter back then, and he didn't have his trademark cane yet. His father gave him the cane for graduation.
Slam! I jump out of my skin. A chuckle at my expense.
"Impressive, isn't it?"
"Indeed." Weakly laughing, heart still pounding. Father likes to bang things, too. Mother prefers a wand.
The courtship was quick and passionate, a whirlwind, to use the cliché. Fifteen was young to be engaged, even back then, but we always knew we wouldn't wed until I'd been graduated. The other girls in my dorm all turned green with envy when they heard the news. I was the first to wear a ring on my finger, and the match itself was nothing to scoff at. I quietly revelled in their jealous admiration.
Lucius graduated that year, along with Bella, who immediately married into the Lestrange family. Our parents arranged her marriage, the result of months of owls and formal dinners and negotiations. Rodolphos was hard to read on principle, but he seemed indifferent to her. She was certainly indifferent to him. For a while after my own wedding, I thought I'd lucked out by marrying into both social standing and affection.
"What happened to the sweet little girl I married?"
It seems to be a rhetorical question. Thank Circe.
Lucius obtained a position working at the Ministry halfway through that summer, but he always found time for me. In the evenings, we went for dinners at fancy restaurants, and then returned to Malfoy Manor for a stroll through the lush garden, under the careful supervision of our parents. Lucius gave me a feather from the peacocks that roamed free through the grounds. He took to calling me "Cissa." Only Andy ever called me that.
He proposed in that garden. The ring was a family heirloom, one of many from the Malfoy vaults. Tiny pearls surrounded the gem in the centre, and the delicate band was an unusual shade of rose gold. He said something silly about "a pretty ring for a pretty girl," but he said it so earnestly that I couldn't bring myself to laugh.
"I'm scared." The voice that came out sounded like it was produced by a child.
His eyes softened.
The only point at which I had doubts was the wedding night. Like any good Pureblood girl, I was a virgin. Like any girl who went through adolescence in a boarding school, I'd also heard stories about and from the girls who had decided to do some early exploring. Enough of the talk was negative that I grew nervous as the night drew on.
"Did you really sleep with that mudblood boy?"
"Don't call him that."
"Did you?"
"Perhaps."
"What was it like?"
"Painful. The second time wasn't so bad, though."
"Twice?! Andy!"
Lucius noticed my unrest. He's always noticed everything; I can't hide anything. He asked what was the matter, and I, blushing, eyes averted, stammered out an explanation. He was sweet.
"Let's have a nightcap. It will relax you."
I'm not usually a lightweight, but the alcohol combined with the excitement of the day and the warmth of the fireplace had my limbs feeling like stones after only a few sips. I dozed off, only to open my eyes again when I felt the light tingle of someone else's magic on my skin. Lucius was silhouetted in the dim light from the hallway behind. He closed the door, and there was a moment of darkness before he lit the candle on the bedside table. Nimble fingers worked their way down the long line of buttons on my robes. It seemed like there were hands everywhere, but that can't be right, because he only had two. I couldn't wake up properly.
"Mmm?" Trying to wriggle away from the hands.
"Shh. Relax."
The pain was bad enough to break through the fog created by the alcohol - and the sedative that Lucius had mixed with the alcohol.
"You're so beautiful, Narcissa."
Someone is sobbing.
Lucius held me afterwards as I wept, promising that the worst of it was over, that next time I would enjoy it. It turned out not to be true, but he is not a man to be contradicted.
It wasn't that he changed drastically after we were wed; he was still sweet most of the time, and sometimes he still is. The problem was me. I suddenly became a wife, a role that came with more responsibility than I was initially aware of. Once we were married, my lack of knowledge was an embarrassment, and I proved to be a slow learner. Lucius is quite particular about how he likes his household run. Although we eventually fell into a routine, sometimes, years later, I still make mistakes.
One finger, two fingers.
"Stop, please stop, I can't-"
The worst was right after we had Draco, when it hurt from delivery and I tried to refuse him. I wore long sleeves and high collars all season to hide the hand-shaped marks that stubbornly lingered around my neck and wrists. I should have returned to the healer to have the tears from labour re-stitched, but I never did.
"Begging doesn't become you, Narcissa."
The tangy taste of blood from somewhere, my lip or my cheek or my tongue, because screaming doesn't become me either.
As far as I'm aware, Lucius has never struck Draco. He is a harsh disciplinarian, but he reserves that form of correction for me. Fair enough; Draco is just a boy.
"I'm sorry, Cissa. You know I wouldn't have to be so harsh if you didn't fight me."
The same hand that bruised my hips only moments ago rubs my back.
I saw Andy in Diagon Alley once, with her mudblood and a little girl in tow. Lucius was at work. I'd brought Draco with me on my errands, because I couldn't bear to just leave him with the house elves, like Lucius told me to. If Andy noticed me, she pretended not to. Her husband said something, and she tossed her head back as she laughed. She'd cut her hair short, and she wore muggle-style trousers. She looked less like Bella than I remembered. Her husband grinned and raised their clasped hands to plant a kiss on the back of her fingers.
Staring. Stop staring. I hated her. I told her so. I keep staring.
"Me too! Me too!"
The mudblood lifted the little girl into his arms and gave her a kiss on the forehead. Her hair suddenly changed from black like her mother's to sandy brown like her father's. I gasped loudly enough to catch Draco's attention, but thankfully not the attention of the family who had caught mine.
"Mummy? Mummy, who are they?"
"Hush, Draco, use your indoor voice."
"But who are they?"
"Nobody, sweetheart. They're nobody."
I was angry. Andy betrayed the family and left me alone in that house, and now she had the fairy tale I always wanted. It wasn't fair.
After that, I sometimes caught myself wondering if Lucius still loved me, but I know that he wouldn't work so hard to fix me if he didn't. The horrible truth is that the only thing wrong with our marriage is my own naiveté.
"What happened to the sweet little girl I married?"
There are so many things I could say. Instead, I am silent.
Lucius raises his wand, and I flinch, but he simply extinguishes the hearth and leaves the room.