Chapter Sixty Three
Sons and Spies
0o0
A preposterously vast buffet of food was already laid out in Maudlin's room by the time Draco returned. As usual, the elves had overdone themselves: platters of fruit balanced precariously on the mantelpiece, a small table—barely large enough to accommodate Astoria's letter and Maudlin's elbows—positively sagged under the weight of several trays of pastry, and a collection of teacups was fighting a losing battle against a vase of ornamental lilies.
Draco had made very quick work of showering and changing. It had taken him less than half an hour to reclaim all of his usual health and vigor, not to mention a hefty portion of his old arrogance. His bruised face—recently purple enough to be considered startling—was his own again; unmarked, restored. Even with a cup of tea under her nose, Astoria could smell the misty perfume of his soap.
"I don't know that I like how smug this sounds," declared Maudlin, who was proof-reading the letter to Mr. Bonaccord over Astoria's shoulder. "My father would call this unctuous, you know."
"He would not," Astoria prickled. "It's clever."
And it was. She had managed to make all of Maudlin's points clearly enough without ever once having to resort to obvious bribery or ill-natured threats. Furthermore, having skipped a bath to cobble together a thankless favor for him, she was not overly anxious to hear the final product abused.
"You've said everything Bonaccord wants to hear!" hissed Maudlin, gesturing with the parchment. "What about my dignity? This isn't a reprimand, it's a love letter!"
"That's the point," said Astoria tartly.
She reached for her tea but stopped herself short at the last minute, conscious of the fact that Draco was standing silently behind her. Illogical though it was, his reappearance had caused a short burst of nervous energy to shoot through her limbs and she was a little afraid that her hands might shake and cause the porcelain to rattle.
Stupid.
"I wanted you to put some fear in him!" persisted Maudlin under his breath. "Really punish him, you know?"
"He's not your enemy," Astoria sighed exasperatedly. "Cassandra is. There's no point in being short with Mr. Bonaccord. Especially not now—you still want something from him."
"Fine," Maudlin grunted, unbuttoning his sports coat so that he could sink into a slouch behind his writing desk. "You look better," he finally called, observing Draco in the doorway. "Everything's set with your father, I take it? Have we got you until the weekend?"
Draco shrugged and raised his eyebrows. It was a subtle sign of agreement, but even at a glance, Astoria could tell that having to crawl home like a wounded drunk had done nothing for his mood. Hidden behind a properly mended nose, Draco's earlier annoyance was almost disguised, but it hadn't evaporated entirely.
Maudlin took his silence for an enthusiastic assent, tone deaf as ever, and returned to the letter.
"Do I have to call him 'sir'?" he sneered, pausing again. "I mean, the man is a walking pumpkin..."
"Only if you want to stay on the museum board!" Astoria finally snapped, groping about for her teacup, officially irritated past the point of nerves. "The letter might look sweet to you, but the poison is meant for Cassandra. Just copy it down."
"It's not like it matters anyway," scoffed Draco, breaking his silence. "Cassandra's going to know that Astoria wrote it."
"She doesn't know everything," clucked Maudlin dismissively. "Why should she guess that Astoria helped me?"
"Because she knows that you're too thick to think fast in a crisis," returned Draco insolently.
Maudlin bristled but, mercifully, a house elf came in at the same exact moment to change the toast rack and distracted him.
"We should be off," Maudlin announced, sealing off the new letter (now written out beautifully in his own hand) before passing it over to the elf.
Astoria heaved a deep breath and prepared to get to her feet. Unlike Draco, who appeared magically refreshed, she was still dog-tired. A ghost of the wine she had consumed the night before was churning fitfully in her stomach, leaving a fog of residual stupidity about her ears. She did not want to go on a car ride. What she wanted was a breath of fresh air.
"We'll have the trunks sent along," Maudlin continued, wrapping a handkerchief around what looked suspiciously like a pocket flask. "We don't have room for the luggage."
"Aren't you driving?" asked Astoria, eyeing the ill-concealed pocket flask uncomfortably.
Merlin, how was he even standing?
"Of course I'm driving," Maudlin scoffed. "No one else here knows how."
"It can't be that hard," sneered Draco, irritated by the insinuation that Maudlin was capable of doing anything that he couldn't. "Muggles manage it all the time."
"Well, it's not hard exactly," Maudlin admitted, missing the nuance of unpleasantness in Draco's tone. "Not when it comes right down to it. A toddler could probably manage it..."
"If he could reach the pedals," rejoined Alec wryly, finished off his scone and getting up. "Let me drive, you're preoccupied. Scrap the flask and bring the bottle."
Astoria let out a tight sigh of relief and turned toward Alec, appreciating this offer for what it really was—a clever safety precaution disguised as a treat. For a person who often required assistance in order to accomplish even the most mundane of tasks, Maudlin could be curiously proud. Alec's trademark air of chilly benevolence was so mild by nature, however, that it was almost impossible to tell when he was concealing an ulterior-motive. It was the perfect tact to take.
"Alright," Maudlin agreed cheerfully. "You play captain."
0o0
Despite being frantic to depart, they were held up another twenty minutes because Maudlin's vanity would not permit him to leave home half-dressed.
While Astoria and the rest loitered on the landing, Maudlin darted off for closets that had stood unused for years, loudly demanding to know where his belongings—clearly stored elsewhere—could possibly be. All the while, seizing their twice annual opportunity to appear productive, elves continued to sweep in and out of the room delivering letters.
These notes, all hastily addressed in Luc's handwriting, were almost enough to drive Maudlin over the edge.
"What does Luc want from me?" he hissed aggressively, snatching the latest bit of post out of the air. "He knows he can't come with us—surely he must? I don't want him there! Is he really going to make me come right out and say it?"
"Ignore the letters!" Astoria insisted, making every attempt to funnel his frantic limbs toward the stairway. "You can write him later!"
"You realize he's trying to apologize, don't you?" sneered Maudlin contemptuously, pivoting about on the stairs. He tripped on a step and teetered dangerously into the railing. "The slimy git says he sympathizes with me! As if that could be true! Everyone knows that Emilie's father is the only reason his schooling was paid off! What would Luc do without her? His own lousy, alcoholic father can't take him anywhere!"
"And where could he possibly find another rich benefactor to assist him?" wondered Alec out-loud, his lips curving upward somewhat sarcastically.
Astoria blushed, unable to laugh. There was a hint of something about Luc's financial status that could almost be applied to herself with very little twisting. She felt no inclination to mock him for it.
For all of Maudlin's loud protestations, his certainty was short lived. He grabbed Alec by the arm as they stumbled into the foyer. "You don't think he actually does agree with me, do you?" he demanded in a low, unsure aside. "That is, do you think it's possible that he doesn't blame me?"
"He's in mourning for his lost vacation," sighed Alec, steering Maudlin toward the front doors. "Don't dwell on it. I'm not..."
The car—an antique sports-model that might have been right at home outside a country house in a high-end jewelry commercial—had already been brought around. Without a word, Astoria clambered into the cramped backseat. Paying thanklessly little mind to the glamour of her new aesthetic, she propped up her knees, breathed in the scent of sun-warmed leather and closed her eyes.
It was fully Astoria's intention to remain groggy and hostile for the rest of the day, but the claustrophobic clamor of other cars began to subside soon after they left the city. Realizing now that Maudlin's route did not seem to be restricted to any major motorway, she reluctantly began to take in the view. Outside, the word was expanding in a blur of glorious, yellow heat.
Loping hills had sprung up in the distance while she pretended to doze off. Now, zooming past them at criminal speeds, the sense of having escaped the grips of something undefinable and tiresome began to take hold of Astoria's spirit. They had done the impossible: they had left the dust of Paris—of home, even—behind. Maudlin's dark cloud of romantic agitation was all but burned off and none of them—not even Draco—could really fight the gleeful allure of their truancy.
Growing looser and more excited by the minute, Astoria unfolded her limbs and let one arm dangle past the window to test the jet stream.
"We should be on the A6," argued Alec, urging Maudlin to consult the glove-box atlas.
"Nonsense," Maudlin snorted, passing the bottle he had pocketed earlier over his shoulder into the backseat. "I've made this drive a dozen times! We'll end up in the right place. I always do..."
Wincing skittishly, Draco snatched the bottle Maudlin was waving before he sustained another unexpected blow to the face.
Whether this was true or not, Astoria did not dare guess. What she did know what that the blazing sunshine had radically reduced most of her desire to complete their journey as quickly as possible. She no longer cared where they ended up so long as it was someplace very far away. She eyed the amber contents of the flask uncertainly, however.
It looked like exactly the kind of velvety-brown scotch that Malfoy himself usually tended to favor; an oak-smooth poison that Astoria had never been able to acquire much of a taste for. Still, despite her reservations (and lingering hangover) she found herself sipping tentatively from the bottle when Draco was finished with it—a decision she regretted almost immediately.
"Eugh," she trembled, fighting back a wave of revulsion. Astoria thrust out her hand to pass the treacherous Scotch along, but Alec would not take it from her. Perhaps driving was slightly more than the child's play that Maudlin had made it out to be?
"What?" snorted Maudlin incredulously. "You don't like it?"
"No," gulped Astoria thickly, raising a hand to her chest. Her lungs felt like fire. "I hate it."
For some reason this struck both Draco and Maudlin as immensely funny.
"You do realize that's what the French Minister drinks, don't you?" insisted Maudlin in his most patronizing tone. "It's good enough for him..."
"Just because two people share the same bad taste doesn't mean it suddenly becomes good," Astoria scoffed, but the insult was toothless; she was smirking into her lap, conscious of the warmth rising in her cheeks.
It was precisely the last thing she should be doing—prolonging her state of witlessness—but their drive (which had promised to be a torturous experience from the first) was beginning to take a radical slide toward hilarity because of it.
Maudlin was in top form; as funny and cajoling as Astoria had ever seen him, delighted by his company and relived of the burden of a girlfriend for the first time since pubescence. Draco, assisted somewhat by the Scotch, soon forgot all about his recent head wound and became nearly as a pleasant as Maudlin.
Such was Astoria's sense of contentment that, when their conversation somehow turned to Belladonna—or, more specifically, to Maudlin's general terror of all things that concerned Belladonna—she did not immediately think to change the subject.
"The woman used to tell these stories about children being drowned in rivers or snatched up in dark alleyways!" cackled Maudlin, clapping a hand against his arm rest. "Do you remember those, Astoria?"
"Yes," Astoria scoffed, wondering if Maudlin had forgotten her current address.
"It's perfectly normal to be nervous around her," he continued. "Even my father thinks so—"
"He does not!" protested Astoria laughingly, knowing full well that Aston was not overly fond of Belladonna, even if he was too polite to admit it more often. "I think he finds her charming..."
"Al-arming, maybe," Maudlin corrected lazily, tossing the handkerchief he had used to hide the liquor out his window.
Astoria watched the fabric billow in the breeze like a ship's sail before sinking down onto the pavement. Lost forever.
"What do you make of her, Draco?" continued Maudlin scornfully. "Am I being unfair? You've met her enough times to form an opinion, haven't you?"
"Hah," Draco jeered, red-faced with amusement. But then he caught Astoria's eye and seemed to remember the predicament that this question put him in. "Well, my father would certainly agree with you," he drawled, rather cleverly managing to press his point without having to outright admit that he found Astoria's aunt unpleasant.
"They don't get on?" asked Maudlin. For a moment, curiosity rendered his features somewhat crafty.
"Not especially, no," admitted Astoria, finally remembering the dangers of allowing her aunt to remain a topic of discussion.
"You might even call it a feud," taunted Draco, smirking in a way that Astoria found extremely annoying.
"Really?" pressed Maudlin, enthralled by the prospect of theatrics. "Why?"
"Some silly thing," Astoria muttered.
Draco let out a nasal scoff but took the hint and fell silent, gazing smugly at the back of Maudlin's head.
"So, what? She hides from him at parties, does she?" laughed Maudlin, unable to let the matter go, clearly savoring the idea of Belladonna in state of panic. "She sees him coming up the stairs and ducks into the loos?"
Astoria paused, bemused by this notion. In all reality, if circumstances ever conspired to arrange a meeting between Lucius and Belladonna at the top of a staircase, Astoria's safe money was on Belladonna sweeping him a magnificently lethal leg halfway up.
"Who knows," she muttered evasively, unsure what else to say.
"No," agreed Draco drawlingly, "I suppose she wouldn't. She's too competitive for that, isn't she?"
Astoria paused awkwardly. Since the beginning, Draco had generally handled the subject of Lucius and Belladonna's fight with an air of vague indifference—as though he found the matter slightly inconvenient and just little boring. He had not gone out of his way to ask Astoria any questions about her aunt, sensing—quite correctly—that he would be treading into dangerous waters by doing so.
But now, for the first time, Astoria detected a hint of inquisition. Was Belladonna competitive, he seemed to be asking? Did she enjoy the hunt? And with both Maudlin and Alec in the car, Astoria could not help but feel how strange it would look if she went out of her way to avoid his question.
"Yes," Astoria finally returned stonily. "She is."
"She sees him and decides the game is afoot?" Draco pressed, talking to Astoria but looking at Maudlin, avoiding her eyes in a way that struck her as being somewhat sly.
Astoria forced a laugh. "She does have a soft spot for an elegant foe," she admitted lightly.
This was more than a little stupid, but it served as a brilliant defuser. Maudlin chortled and Alec, who had been unusually silent all morning, let out a belly-laugh and caught her eye in the rearview mirror.
"Seriously though," sneered Draco, narrowing his eyes.
Astoria tittered and moved forward to jostle Maudlin's arm, certain that his lack of focus would help her change the conversation.
0o0
By the time the sun began to show signs of setting, it was becoming abundantly clear that they had wandered off course. Maudlin thought that they were somewhere near Avignon. Alec said that this was impossible, as they had passed through it hours ago. The only thing that seemed certain was that it was nearly dinner time.
Headlights blazed up and down the road now, casting Maudlin's face into sinister illumination as he checked over his map. In the backseat, Astoria shivered at the sudden change in temperature. There was a low, moist dew in the air that seemed to penetrate the fabric of her dress with bizarre ease; a barometric drop that put her in mind of the sea at night. Hoping this might be a sign that they were finally approaching the ocean, she turned to peer through the windows.
One more road turned into another. Then another. The sloping ground grew steeper. They seemed to be heading South, but there weren't any large towns or signposts to mark the way; only a bumpy, scrubby wilderness made up of low-lying shrubs and fan palms, all burning under the very last rays of a magnificent sunset.
Then, mercifully, just when Astoria was beginning to despair of ever eating again, Alec crested a hill, turned a corner, and the sea came into view below.
"I told you so," declared Maudlin, dusting off his hands and returning the atlas to the glove box triumphantly.
They skirted around the brightly lit casinos and restaurants of Monte Carlo as they descended, then rocketed along the darker, pebbly beaches at top speed. Maudlin seemed to think it was possible that his father would have company—a dinner party after the Minister's Ball was not uncommon. Realizing now that they would be arriving quite late, he began to murmur uncomfortably and become fussy again.
"We'll want to slip in and change right away," he kept repeating. "No time for anything else. Father was expecting us hours ago."
"Of course he was," scoffed Draco. "He thought you were taking a Portkey at noon."
Aston's home, situated at the very top of a high hill overlooking the water, was still a sight to behold even in the dwindling twilight.
Built in the sixteenth century, it had served as a monastery for the better part of several centuries before it had fallen into Aston's hands the year before Maudlin was born. Ancient and constructed largely from stone, it more closely resembled a palace than a villa and the Mendels' influence had certainly done nothing to detract from its imposing face.
Renovations had been made, allowing space for a new standard of luxury while remaining faithful to the building's history—the walls between the Spartan-like dormitories of the monks had been demolished to make way for larger, grand-scale bedrooms, but the structure of several vaulted halls remained untouched, as did the courtyards and water gardens.
The grounds themselves were no less marvelous. Contained in tiers, the lawns and gardens undulated down the slope of the hill toward the beach; a feat of gardening ingenuity and water, which seemed to be the dominant theme here. Expressed in the form of fountains and ancient aqueducts, water was everywhere.
Alec turned in at the gates and made quick work of advancing up the gravel drive. Every single light in the house seemed to be lit; every window from top to bottom blazing outward expectantly.
Maudlin leapt from the car the moment it came to a stop.
"This way," he insisted hurriedly, ushering them all past the front doors and down a well-tended walk, stopping only when he reached a courtyard that dripped with grape vines. "We'll go in through the side. The luggage should be here."
He burst in through a narrow wooden door, jolting a house-elf right off of a rickety foot-stool.
Astoria blinked and adjusted to the rush of heat. They were in a square, sparsely appointed room made up of high-reaching drawers filled with cutlery and wooden cabinets that housed fine china.
"Young Master Maudlin!" the elf screamed shrilly, fumbling to catch a large serving platter before it hit the ground.
But Maudlin had no time for explanations or greetings. He pushed around the elf's ladder at a manic speed and made for the next room, reminding Astoria irresistibly of the way her own father tended to move about at events.
They chased him through the kitchen and up the thin, spiral stairway used by the servants to the second floor.
There was something faintly Hogwarts-like about the halls above; tall and echoey, but paler—stone the color of untouched snow or sun-bleached linen. The floor was carpeted with a lustrous oriental runner as purple as a ripe plum and the tall, leaded windows glistened with the warmth of candlelight on one side and starlight on the other.
Now that they had moved away from the cacophony of elves baking, Astoria became aware of murmured voices below in the house proper. Laugher bounced off of the acoustics of the vaulted ceiling and the hum of polite conversation was almost loud enough to be comprehensible.
"What time is it?" hissed Maudlin, shooting past the main staircase, aiming for his rooms in the east wing.
Draco, for his part, now seemed content to ignore Maudlin. He was busy studying the hall and any visible rooms beyond with a strangely discriminatory eye—searching for a flaw in their styling or quality.
It was Alec that answered him: "Eight," he announced, consulting his wristwatch.
"Good, they won't be eating just yet," Maudlin rambled, talking chiefly to himself. "They'll be on cocktails. If we're quick, we may catch them before they go in. Alec, be expedient—no one cares if your tie matches your eyes. Astoria, wear something purple. Father will like it. And Draco—well, you're sane, I suppose you can do as you like..."
He blasted through his own bedroom door, leaving the rest of them to suss out which suite had been appointed to whom based on the contents of the luggage therein.
Locating her own things in the smallest of the guest rooms near the eaves, Astoria shut the door behind her and tore through her belongings in a rush, shamefully infected by Maudlin's anxiety. She chose the purple, fluttery silk dress she had worn to the Yule Ball and then promptly tripped over her own cases in her desperation to reach the bathroom.
Breathe, she urged herself, pulling the dress over her head. Aston's never yelled at you in his life.
Somewhat calmed, she took her time accessorizing, layering several necklaces of various lengths until she felt that she achieved something faintly glamorous and unique. Content that she was well draped and that her makeup was not smeared, she sat on the edge of her bed and fastened a pair of high-heeled sandals about her ankles, hopeful that for the first time in several months, she would not be forced to jog in them.
Draco was already waiting for Maudlin when she came out, leaning against the wall directly beside her door.
He had changed his shirt and run a comb through his hair, but he had not done much else. Conscious of the fact that Draco typically knew how to schmooze with the best of them, Astoria couldn't help but wonder if he was intentionally going out of his way not to appear especially desperate to please.
"Ironic, isn't it?" he drawled when he caught sight of her. "Rushing everybody around and then taking forever to get ready? I suppose Alec's in there hunting for that bloody diamond cravat pin of his."
"The only thing that sparkles more sinisterly than his eyes," Astoria allowed, smirking repressively.
"Really, though," Draco jeered. "You're a girl and you've finished up first."
As though summoned by the sound of laughter, Alec and Maudlin both opened their doors at nearly the same time.
Alec was as cool and pastel as a lavender dawn. Maudlin, meanwhile, had swapped one pair of ugly velvet loafers for another and was actively tucking something that looked suspiciously like a velvet handkerchief into his breast pocket.
"Time?" Maudlin demanded, tucking and patting at random.
"Eight twenty," issued Alec, eyeing Maudlin's pocket square in a way that seemed to suggest that he was imagining all of the many ways it could be turned into a murder weapon.
This preoccupation with time—while annoying—soon proved to be a somewhat merited. Maudlin had guessed his father's schedule with an almost mathematical exactness. Aston had not yet led his guests in to dinner, and they found him sitting with no less than fifteen people in the library when they came down to the first floor.
"Father!" Maudlin attempted jauntily, striding across the well-lit room. He interrupted a conversation in order to shake Aston's hand, thrusting his body between the couch and an end table.
"You've arrived, have you?" returned Aston mildly, surveying his son with a penetrating gaze. "I was beginning to fear that I had seen the last of you. I waited for nearly an hour this morning before the elves finally came in to tell me that you had decided to drive."
"Did you!?" Maudlin startled, plainly aggrieved by this. "Oh, that is to say—well, we did drive. I certainly didn't think we would keep you waiting..."
Such was Aston's marvelous gift for self-possession that he managed to appear perfectly at ease while Maudlin stuttered and fumbled. By the time he had sputtered out a feeble excuse and fallen silent, even Astoria felt bad for him.
"Astoria, darling!" Aston brightened, turning away from his son. "Come here and let me have a look at you—Maudlin managed to sneak you past me last night and I wasn't there to greet you when you arrived."
Maudlin stepped aside to make room for Astoria looking stunned and faintly intoxicated—two things that Astoria was certain Aston's sharp eyes would not have missed.
Aston, of course, had been born into a very old family, but his own father—a gambler on the best of days, and an addict on the worst—had made it necessary for him to spend much of his youth rebuilding his family's fortune. The fact that he had struggled (and then succeeded beyond any common standard) had long ago gifted Aston with a humility that his son would never posses. But it also—in what could only be described as a cruelly ironic twist—left him somewhat predisposed to disdain idleness, lack of self-reliance and public intoxication. In short, the sum total of Maudlin's very character was made up of every trait that Aston admired the last. It was an ugly truth that both father and son generally endeavored to hide—or at the very least, to overlook.
"You're in purple," Aston chuckled, amused. "You do have an easy gift for flattery."
"It was your son's idea," breathed Astoria, consciously throwing Maudlin the bone.
"Yes, of course it was," Aston snorted. "How delightfully thoughtful the guilty always are!"
Maudlin laughed hollowly and pivoted about to glance across the room, desperate for a distraction. Astoria followed suit politely. Draco had moved away from them. With a nervous lurch, she suddenly understood why.
The library was filled with queerest company she had ever seen in Aston's home: Draco had gravitated toward the fire because Lucius was standing in that quarter, talking busily to Alistair Yaxley. And behind Alistair was Roland Yaxley, his hand fixed politely on Cassandra Rowle's elbow.
Without so much as an exchanged glance, Astoria felt Maudlin's body freeze violently beside her. For long moment—perhaps too long—they both remained stock-still, united in a state of agitated silence.
"Huh," Maudlin finally shrugged, attempting to get ahold of himself. "Well, I need a drink."
He stormed off toward a table of hors d'oeuvres indignantly, determined to turn up a cocktail.
"It's nothing to worry about," murmured Aston quietly, following Astoria's line of sight. "I'll keep the hounds at bay."
Astoria startled. How could he have possibly have known that the sight of Lucius would send a thrill of fear down her spine? Then, a half-beat later than it should have occurred to her, she understood that he had been talking about the Yaxleys.
Belladonna had let Aston in on the secret of the Lestrange inheritance years ago, most likely in an attempt to extract money from him out of pity. Whether or not Belladonna had been successful, Astoria did not know—although a shameful sense of intuition made her think that she probably had—and Aston's conscious pity now seemed to indicate that he had not forgotten Astoria's unfortunate connection to the Yaxley family.
"Is my father here?" asked Astoria, trying to remain calm.
"No," returned Aston mildly. "I'll confess, it never occurred to me that I should invite him. I take it he's been making something of a circuit with Lucius these days?"
He glanced sideways at Astoria, privately amused in the extreme.
"He has," Astoria laughed, charmed by the foolishness of Aston's repressed mirth.
"How thrilling for Belladonna," Aston continued, somehow managing to stare straight ahead without compromising the impression that he was still speaking directly to her. "You will tell me more later, won't you? I've been positively yearning for the tale since Malfoy arrived, but talking to him is rather like consulting an oracle—he never seems speak in anything other than sinister riddles..."
A weird, jittery laugh escaped through Astoria's clenched jaw. For a wild second, she was almost afraid that she would choke on her own spit.
"Astoria!" called Maudlin stoutly. "Do you want something?"
He raised his chin, meeting the brunt of his father's displeasure defiantly.
Astoria hesitated. She was quite certain that Aston would not care if she spent the evening working on a single cocktail, but something about Maudlin's brazenness was uncomfortably suggestive of a challenge.
"Pour her half of whatever you're having, Maudlin," answered Aston coldly, "and leave it at that."
Maudlin snorted and dropped an ice cube into a second glass before recrossing the room.
"Here," he declared grimly, offering Astoria one drink while gesturing over her shoulder with the other. "We'll walk toward the garden. If you fancy it, I reckon there's a cliff on the west side that's high enough for both of us to kill ourselves. I don't think either one of us would be in any danger of breaking the other's fall."
Terribly conscious of the fact that Maudlin was reclaiming Astoria's attention from his own father in a way that felt bizarrely deliberate—to the point that it verged on hostile—Astoria turned toward the patio, hoping to defuse any tension with her own complacency.
They had barely taken two steps forward when one of the patio doors suddenly flew open. In crashed Luc, followed closely by the other-worldly specter of Élise Bernard wreathed in a plume of cigar smoke.
They both stopped short at the sight of Maudlin, and the smile slid right off Luc's face.
"You've got to me kidding me," sneered Maudlin.
"Ho-hoo!" burst Astoria wildly, reacting with a knee-jerk explosion of poorly concealed glee. Well, wasn't this a development?
Blinking rapidly to clear away her shock, Astoria began to search for any sign that might indicate whether Luc and Élise had traveled together. If George wasn't present, then surely they must have? Aston would never have invited Élise on her own...
"Hey," breathed Luc shiftily, leaning forward. "Listen, Maudlin, do you have a minute?"
"No," snapped Maudlin, stepping around him.
Unbidden, Astoria's eyes flitted toward the fire in search of Draco. She was more than a little startled to find that he was already staring at her, ignoring the reappearance of Luc and Élise entirely—or rather, he seemed to studying her closely in order to see what her reaction to them might be.
Unnerved, Astoria followed Maudlin out onto the terrace.
"Can you fucking believe it?" he hissed, closing in on her at once. "The nerve of him!"
"Did you actually tell Luc and Cassandra not to come today?" asked Astoria, unable to account for so much wildly inappropriate behavior otherwise.
"No!" snarled Maudlin. "But after the blow up last night, I'd say it was pretty well implied! At this rate, who knows who might show up? I suppose Emilie is lying in wait upstairs with a knife!"
"Calm down!" Astoria whispered nervously. "They'll hear you—"
"So what?" demanded Maudlin. "Enemies at the gate! If I had it my way, I'd kick the whole lot of them out!"
He closed his hands around an invisible neck and mimed a brutal strangling for the second time in twenty four hours.
"Dinner, Maudlin," announced Aston, interrupting his outburst from the doorway. "We're going through."
0o0
The only thing capable of casting their tense group in an even less flattering light was the restrictive pomp and circumstance of a formal meal.
Seated next to Alistair and directly across from Cassandra, Astoria suffered in silence, alternating between chewing and spying on the guests at the far ends of the table. After the soup came a second appetizer of picked beets and then, to Astoria's horror, a third of tartare. Bored and more than a little anxious, Astoria cleared each plate, eating with the passionless zeal of a robot.
"I am sorry," interrupted a curious voice from very close at hand, "but I think I must know from you somewhere."
Astoria glanced casually to her left. A set of eyes peered directly back at her from the center of a handsome, honey-colored face.
"Hmm?" Astoria jolted, realizing that this stranger was speaking to her. "I'm sorry, what was that?"
"I know you," repeated the man slowly, tapping his soft chin with a well-groomed finger. "I met you at a party—oh, the better part of two years ago now I should think."
"Yes!" breathed Astoria, brightening with recognition. "I met you at the McLaggen's christmas party! You came with Giambattista Valli—you're Vincent!"
"I am!" laughed Vincent, relived to have landed upon such an easy solution to their puzzle. "That's exactly right."
Two years had done very little to change the features of Vincent's face, but his accent had altered considerably. When Astoria had first met Vincent, he had spoken such broken English that they had been forced to rely almost entirely upon their mutual ability to converse in French. Now, however, he seemed to speak Astoria's language as fluidly as Maudlin did—maybe even better because he took pains to be mindful of what he was saying.
"You're perhaps marveling at the improvements in my English," mused Vincent, smiling wryly.
It was on Astoria's mind to deny this accusation vehemently, but something about the clever way that he had read her expression warned her against it.
"Do they make a spell for that sort of thing?" she whispered conspiratorially, sliding her water glass forward so that she could lean toward him.
"No," laughed Vincent, amused by the notion, "but an expanding market in Britain has done wonders for my comprehension. No one can account for the upsweep in spending there! Giam seems quite convinced that you'll all soon be plunged into war."
"You still work together, then?" asked Astoria, determined to keep the subject from turning toward Voldemort. "You and Giambattista?"
"Together, no, never," insisted Vincent brusquely, clearly wishing to stress some kind of a point. "I am still employed by Giambattista, although I no longer work as a tailor. I manage a good portion of his business now—as something of a salesman, you understand. I promote his line to the people he scorns, I travel when he does not wish to. That sort of thing."
From Astoria's point of view, this definitely sounded like a promotion, but the topic seemed to bring Vincent strangely little joy because he did not dwell on it long.
"We are staying in Monte Carlo for the month of July," he told her."The little whitest villa—nothing but a goat path between the terrace and the sea. The new collection is all done in white and blues. Less elegant than the last, but much softer..."
Then, very suddenly, Vincent straightened up as though he had been struck by a brilliant notion.
"You'll come visit!" he decided. "It would do Giam some good to entertain—and you're very perceptive company. That will please him more than anything."
"I'm sure you're both too busy," Astoria stuttered, overwhelmed by such a sudden and fantastical offer.
"Bah!" declared Vincent, waving this thought away. "He hasn't left his room in days...all he does is sketch and bemoan the heat. And he did like you the last time, didn't he? That's key—he never likes anybody, you know. Yes, I think a visit would do everyone a world of good..."
Astoria smiled, unable to think of anything to say. An opportunity to casually glimpse the inner-workings of high fashion was immensely appealing, but a dark thought immediately rose up to cast a pall over her excitement: surely Vincent had miss-judged her age?
After all, Vincent The Tailor had been silly enough to become the victim of a pack of third year Slytherins, but Vincent The Salesman had something of a grown man about him. His suit was pristine, his face neatly shaven, and his eyes heavy with the tedium of daily responsibility. What was more, unlike Alec, who seemed to carry his femininity with the aplomb of a heterosexual imp, there was something much less vested in the way Vincent seemed to regard her. Everything about him, from his posture to his manner of speaking, spoke of an unabashed desire to make it very plain that women were not—and perhaps never even had been—much in line with his romantic tastes.
But if that was the case, then Astoria could see even less reason for him to show such a sudden interest in her. As near as she could tell, Vincent was an educated, gay man at the start of a promising career. What motive could he possibly have for spending any of his precious time and energy on her? And why on Earth would he take the trouble of inviting her anywhere—least of all to the home of his illustrious and very famous boss?
"You'll come tomorrow," Vincent continued rapidly, growing more certain of himself by the second. "Or the day after, if you can manage it. Yes, I really think that is a good idea. Shake him out of the doldrums..."
Willing but altogether baffled, Astoria agreed.
"I'll come and fetch you myself, of course," Vincent reassured her. "I couldn't ask you to come on your own—Lord no! Knowing Giam, he'd dump an ink pot over your head before I could reintroduce you."
He exhaled thoughtfully as plates of lamb were deposited before them.
"...or spit in your bloody eye, the great fool..."
"Sorry?" squinted Astoria, positive that she must have miss-heard.
"Nothing," insisted Vincent eagerly. "You'll write to me and fix the date?"
The lamb was followed by a very unwanted salad of melons. Only when the final sorbet bowls had been cleared away did Astoria feel as though she had finally been given leave to stand, at which point more than three solid hours had elapsed and she had nearly nodded off over her plate twice.
Slightly desperate to escape the dining room and more than a little afraid that someone would suggest coffee and cheese, Astoria was the first person out of her seat. To her immense relief, however, it was nearly midnight and the group was definitely breaking up. Lucius was not staying—that much she had managed to glean by eavesdropping. Astoria watched him get up to follow Aston into the drawing room for a final round of port, safe in the knowledge that he would be gone soon after. The Yaxleys and Cassandra were also getting ready to depart; Roland was saying his goodbyes and Maudlin was struggling to escape before Cassandra could reach his end of the table.
Luc, on the other hand, was now in extremely awkward predicament. It was painfully obvious that he had arrived with every intention of sleeping over. As his invitation had been issued before Maudlin had broken up with Emilie, it could not be immediately withdrawn that evening—but that did not seem to make Maudlin resent him any less.
Eager to confront Maudlin on the stairs and put things right, Luc steeled his nerves and slipped quietly out into the hall. A low, verbal scuffle ensued, undercut with a hint of real violence. Astoria waited until both of their voices had faded away to the second floor before leaving the dining room.
Alone for the first time all night, it now occurred to Astoria that she did not really know what to do with herself. She was fairly certain that Alec had followed Aston—indicating that she was probably more than welcome to join them for port. But if Luc was upstairs battling with Maudlin, then where was Élise? Could she have possibly trailed along behind Alec?
The prospect of having to choke down a glass of wine between Lucius and a glorified call-girl was enough to make her skin crawl. She was going to bed.
The hall was magnificently empty and very nearly dark when she reached it; the somber marble floors were the color a Roman winter and two or three doors had been thrown open near the far end to encourage a breeze. There was something exciting about the air; full of promise. She was halfway toward the stairs when someone called out to her.
"Where are you going?"
Astoria pivoted and spotted Draco. He was leaning against the wall near the open doors—Astoria had missed the shape of him amongst the fluttering of the drapery. Still, his off-hand location was odd; had he hung back to catch her before she could sneak off?
"I don't know," answered Astoria, unable to shake the feeling that she has just been cornered. "Bed."
"Had enough of the veela-girl, have you?" he demanded snidely.
Astoria shrugged, not wanting to admit that her desire to avoid Élise was equal only to her desire to avoid Lucius.
"It's funny," continued Draco, just a bit too keenly, "I didn't think she seemed very interested in Luc. I guess he must have improved on her."
"He must have done," agreed Astoria noncommittally, eyeing the stairs.
"Yeah," drawled Draco, drawing the word out like a threat. "How does she know your father, anyway? I forgot to ask."
"Does she know my father?" wondered Astoria, feigning stupidity.
"She did yesterday," scowled Draco, losing his patience. "Or I suppose you didn't notice that she followed him from room to room giggling?"
"And you're—what?—keeping tabs on my father now?" snapped Astoria, fueled by her discomfort. "How should I know where they met? He probably ran into her a party somewhere..."
"A party for two maybe," sneered Draco. "She didn't want anything to do with Luc until after you talked to her."
Astoria's eyes darted about the hall nervously, checking to see if anyone had overheard. What would Luc do if he knew that Astoria had suggested Élise use him to get back at George? What would Maudlin say?
"No, but seriously," continued Draco in disgust. "What the hell can you possibly be planning?"
"Shh!" Astoria hissed, pushing Draco toward the nearest doorway. She shoved him backward into a music room—decorated with Maudlin's mother in mind, and frequented by absolutely no one. Just as Astoria had expected, there were no candles lit in here and all of the light seemed to be coming from the moon outside. Despite the girly trimmings (floral silk on the couch, beads on the lamps) the room had obviously once served a more practical practical purpose for the monks that had built it. The stone was more gothic in shade here than it was in the hall, and there were several formidable engravings of gargoyles and sea serpents in the moulding that no excess of fine fabrics or delicate artwork could entirely soften.
Astoria snapped the door shut behind her, blinking rapidly to adjust her eyes to the greater darkness.
"Why are you always so loud?" she hissed through gritted teeth.
"Huh?" grunted Draco stupidly, bouncing off the edge of a piano behind him, somehow managing to twist her panic into a confession of the worst sort at the same time. "Don't yell at me. You're the one pushing daddy's affairs off onto your school friends! Do you know how freudian that looks?"
"It's none of your business!" snarled Astoria, more shamefaced than angry. "So stop shouting—"
"None of my business?" repeated Draco nastily. "What fiction do you live in, Greengrass? Your father's all twisted up with mine in this rubbish with your aunt! The last thing anyone needs is for you to be sneaking around throwing punches. I suppose the girl was your aunt's idea?"
Astoria paused, thoroughly taken aback. The possibility that Belladonna might have arranged a meeting between George and Élise on purpose had never occurred to her. Had Astoria accidentally been interfering with her aunt's plans without even knowing it?
She toyed with this idea for a moment in silence, but it did not seem to make a lick of sense. What was the point of foisting an embarrassing love affair onto George? To make him look bad? He already had a reputation and there was no evidence that Élise ever would have told anyone. In fact, until Astoria had stepped in, it was a scenario that played to no one's advantage but her father's. And besides, even if the story had gotten out, there was no proof that Lucius was puritanical enough to drop George simply because he was a rubbish husband.
Draco squinted at her face in the moonlight, plainly surprised by her reaction.
"I mean it," he finally forced out. "Aren't you supposed to be pretending to side with your father, anyway? You were doing a rubbish job before, but this really takes the cake."
Astoria let out a hollow laugh.
"If you don't sharpen up my father's going to notice!" snapped Draco urgently, and there was a real edge in his tone now. So much so that the quiver of his nervousness lingered, trembling in Astoria's ears like a warning siren. With a fresh chill, she recalled how strange Draco's questions in the car had been that morning.
"Are you spying on me?" asked Astoria slowly, horrified despite herself.
""What?" scoffed Draco.
"Did your father ask you to fish around for information?" demanded Astoria, this time less faintly. "Did he ask you to report back anything I might say about my aunt?"
"No," sneered Draco contemptuously. "He has better things to do than obsess over what Belladonna Lestrange is doing in her spare time!"
Everything about Draco's tone seemed to support this story, but there was a stiffness about his jaw that Astoria did not like the look of at all.
"You're lying," she realized dully, and it was suddenly very plain that he was. She could practically smell it on him; Lucius had fully suggested that Draco play the part of an undercover agent. What was worse, the only reason Astoria had noticed was because he had already taken a feeble stab at it.
True, it hadn't been a very solid attempt at espionage—surely Lucius already knew Belladonna's personality traits, or whatever it was Draco had been asking about—but the fact that his instinct had been to rustle up something to report was frightening. For all of the midnight plans and conspiracies that Astoria had mulled over with her aunt, she had never once consented to trick Draco into betraying his father. This difference, however technically small, suddenly seemed to mean a great deal. She groped about for the door-handle angrily, ready to storm off.
"Fine!" Draco confessed repressively. His arm darted out wildly to stop the door. "But really, what did you expect? Something about the woman puts the bloody wind up his arse!"
Astoria blinked and continued to stare at him coldly.
"Stop messing around and I won't have anything to tell him!" Draco hissed, discomfited. "This doesn't have to mean anything to you!"
Astoria pushed her head back. Part of her wanted to claw his eyes out, but another, equally strong instinct was urging her toward restraint. This was a low and underhanded revelation, but Draco was something of a low and underhanded person—and he had admitted the truth to her after less than forty seconds of pressure. Maybe she was jumping the gun?
"Lie to him, then," whispered Astoria quietly, surprising even herself. "If it means nothing, lie to him."
Draco stiffened. His pale eyes swept sharply toward Astoria's face. A ray of moonlight exposed his conflicted expression; a mixture of calculation and unfathomable frustration.
Lying to Lucius was something that Draco did not do idly—especially when the reason for doing so offered him no personal gain. Astoria held her ground, expecting an outburst. When none came, she was forced to hide her astonishment at his eerie silence instead. Perhaps he was waiting for her to offer him something?
"I won't tell anyone..." she pleaded weakly.
"Do you know what a world of shit I would be in if he found out?" Draco finally hissed, sounding curiously annoyed with himself. "No."
"Don't get caught, then," Astoria trembled, uncomfortably conscious of the fact that she was suggesting a very dangerous idea in a very careless way. "You're clever enough—"
Draco let out a sharp noise of contention.
"Nothing would even change for him!" Astoria burst shrilly, trying not to let a lump form in her throat. Somehow the balance of power had shifted; she could feel herself losing control. "I don't care about the lake—I don't care about any of it! I just don't want to live with my father! I swear to God, I'll move in with Maudlin first—"
"Yeah?" recoiled Draco, irrationally irritated by this. "Go beg him for help, then! I'm sure he'd make a faithful little minion—"
"Why bother?" sneered Astoria wetly. "He's so fucking useless. I want you..."
God, what was she saying? Was she going to cry? She had originally intended to yell at Malfoy and retreat to her bedroom, but she seemed to have fallen off the wagon. If she was laying it on too thick, however, Draco did not seem to have noticed; indeed, he was as still as a watchful statue.
"You know I do," Astoria persisted in a small voice, conscious of the fact that she was on the verge of really embarrassing herself. She raised a hand to wipe at her face, but Malfoy's arm was in the way. Confused, he caught her by the wrist.
A pulse of electricity shot through Astoria's chest at this contact, but when she blinked, her eyes were completely dry. There was no need to dab at her cheeks—she wasn't actually crying. With a flash of comprehension, Astoria suddenly realized that, deep down, she knew exactly what she was doing. If there was a villain in the room, it was no longer Malfoy.
Astoria shifted in the dark and her nose accidentally made contact with Draco's jaw. Then, just as she was beginning to grasp the full scope of what her pathetic pleading might bring her, he pushed her back against the wall and kissed her so deliberately that she almost forgot what they were talking about in the first place.
Just like that, in a matter of seconds, the game as Astoria knew it shifted, probably forever. She had begged Draco betray his own family and he had responded by putting his mouth on her—he would never again be able to insist that he wasn't attracted to her and Astoria would never be able to convincingly pretend that she didn't know it. The ruse was up and the result was a disarming, slippery mash of sensation. His touch was possessive, desperate and far more deliberate than she had ever experienced. This was no kiss on a dare; if Astoria let him, he was going to literally devour her.
Confused, aroused and just a little bit overwhelmed, Astoria put a hand out to create an inch of distance, suddenly desperate for clarity.
Draco let out nasal sound of displeasure and she was suddenly back against the wall again.
"I'll say whatever you want," he muttered, breathing just hard enough to stir her hair. "I'll lie—he won't know."He pressed his lips against her jaw instinctually.
It was a bad idea, such a bad idea. So very bad. Astoria let him kiss her again, absolutely positive that her death would one day arrive on the wings of murder. One of his hands was in her hair. The other grabbed at her hips, her stomach, anything he could reach in search of more friction. Astoria pushed herself up against him, giving in to the inevitable—because it was, in a way, wasn't it? A part of her had always known that she was going to do this, she had just assumed that it would take a bit longer to happen. That it would be on clearer terms. That Lucius would not be in the same building...
Her head knocked against the wall again so Astoria pushed away from it. There was a very ugly silk couch near the piano. Draco hit it with the back of his knees and pulled her down onto his lap. Astoria fell against him bonelessly.
Women like Ursula Flint and Tippy Tippman—who both deplored the idea of giving anything away for free when a man could reasonably be forced to pay for it—had spent a lifetime warning girls like Astoria against this sort of thing. It was with the tiniest bit of satisfaction that she realized their efforts had been wasted.
No, the only thing really capable of stopping her from indulging in reckless nudity was fear, but Astoria had never been faint hearted and Draco did not inspire much shame. If he had been a better sort of person—as moral as Harry, or as fiercely kind as Neville—Astoria might have experienced enough self-consciousness enough to become nervous. But he wasn't any of those things, and Astoria could not bring herself to work up enough anxiety to second-guess herself.
Her hand fell on his thigh and sought inward, working at his belt with about as much timidity as a seasoned sociopath. Realizing what she was doing, Astoria only had to fumble once before he finished the job for her. She shivered a little as Draco slid a hand beneath her skirt and pulled her toward him breathlessly.
"If you tell anyone, I'll kill you," she muttered against his mouth, pushing his shoulder back.
Expecting to experience obvious pain or gratification, Astoria was somewhat surprised when the reality of sex turned out to be much closer to faint discomfort. It was not altogether bad, but it strained her in a way that fell just short of properly pleasant. This sensation, like an itch she could not quite scratch, was clearly one-sided, however. Lacking experience, she quite literally fell forward into Draco's chest, but it seemed as though she would have to try much harder to make Draco actually dislike what she was doing, no matter how ungraceful she was; writhing wildly didn't appear to bother him in the slightest.
Despite the edge of penetrative pain, Astoria was still drawing Draco closer rather than pushing him away, compelled by a primitive urge to rock against him (the only rhythm she seemed capable of establishing) in a way that made her knee bump against the arm of the couch and Draco lurch forward with shivery spasm. He grabbed at her, pulled on her, as if by delving deeper he might somehow discover the piece of Astoria that eluded him for so long.
One of her hands was tangled up near the collar of his shirt. She was yanking his tie askew, but if she was choking him, he didn't seem to care—a sharp contrast to the boy who was often fussy enough to avoid anything so off-putting as a mess in potions class. Every movement now seemed preposterously, burningly slow, categorized by baited breath, elated wonderment on Draco's part, and a mortal terror of being discovered on Astoria's
They tilted sideways. Astoria wrapped a leg around his waist in an attempt to stabilize herself. Draco's choppy breathing—heavy with a repressed moan in the back of his throat—gusted against her hair as she struggled underneath the bulk of his sudden weight. One of her hands remained trapped his shirt. Draco pressed the other into the cushions by her side.
Astoria pressed her face against his neck, sucking in a gasp of genuine excitement. He was unusually sweaty; his skin smelled as salty and reassuring as the sea breeze at the bottom of the hill.
Then, with an undignified sound that Astoria was positive Draco would regret making later, it was suddenly over before she even knew what to think. Strangely sedated, Astoria blinked into the darkness against Draco's neck, conscious of the fact that a major milestone had just rushed by without ceremony. She waited silently for a wave of regret to wash over her, but it did not seem to come. Bemused, Astoria struggled upwards. The sound of Draco's rapid pulse—like an earthquake underground—made her own body tremble with its residual urgency.
0o0
Ok, so seriously, I take a lot of liberties with this story—the life choices of the main characters are chronically hazardous and I've gotten pretty spoiled because you guys give me an amazing amount of artistic leeway to work with. Still, I feel like I have to tag a warning on the end of this one: please don't drink and drive! Maudlin's character is literally Darwinian—without money, I'm convinced he would die trying to feed himself, (so I think it's safe to assume that he probably would drink in a car) but yikes! Remember what a terribly foolish and preventable thing it is in real life! Appreciate fiction, but always be safe!
Anyway, moving along: Hello, friends! It's been a while! (Actually, this might be the longest I've gone between updates.) The truth is, I've had a fairly hectic end of summer-shift into fall. There was a lot of moving. And a lot of me being tired and therefore heinously lazy. I really am sorry, but I'm settled in now so posting should go back to something more closely resembling normal! The next chapter, if all goes as planned, should be especially hillarious.
Oh, and sorry to dive back in with a (hilariously awkward?) sex scene. Honestly though, this story has been rated M for a while, and I'm getting to the point where I'm really over the kind of fanfiction where the main character has sex for the first time and the whole thing reads like a highly glossed-up and choreographed montage. If you're the type of person that likes smooth, mentally-stable romantic scenes, you may have to wait a while longer. If, however, you are the type of person that likes awkward grunting sounds and a preposterous amount of plot-based angst, then this next section of the story is for you. (You have my apologies if you howled in agony. Lord knows I chuckled while I was editing it).
As always, reviews are just the best. :)