Chapter 5: cold as ice by foreigner (july 1977)
Hello all! This chapter really starts to lean into the historical events aspect of 1979. I was going to post this on Friday, but given that this small selection from a fic I'm estimating to come in at ~50 chapters now has the most kudos of anything I've ever written, I've decided to celebrate. You all are so inspiring and brilliant in your comments, again you have forced me to go over my record word count for chapters. Enjoy!
MONDAY, AUGUST 20, 1979
Walburga was beginning to regret not inviting her goddaughter to tea. Andromeda, despite her poor romantic choices, was at least timely. Her sister-in-law had her lips pursed, staring at the two empty chairs across the table from them—Narcissa had an excuse to be late, Bellatrix did not.
"Lady Powys, my ladies," the Madam of the Jarvey sniffed, her spine ramrod straight with decades of decorum that it was very clear the Lady she was escorted did not care to possess.
"Do you have any idea how upset Sandy is?" Bellatrix stalked over to the table in a great tornado of black lace and silk. Her curls weren't styled, her mother internally sighed, eying the wild thing that was her eldest daughter's hair. The Black curls had to be managed, they couldn't just be free.
"I don't much care what Lady Cassandra feels, what about your little sister's feelings?" Druella snapped.
"Cissy started this whole mess, what the hell possessed her to take this out on poor Lucius?" Bellatrix sipped her tea like some Great Lady.
"Poor Lucius?" the warning note in Walburga's tone really should have caused a swift retreat on Bellatrix's part.
"Cissy always believe that her husband would be some dashing prince who would grow to love her, these hysterics had to be the influence of Cousin Siri," she ordained, snatching a scone.
"Poor Lucius is right, he's to be dearly sorry if he wants to grovel for your sister's galleons," Walburga sneered.
"I don't know why we are kicking up such a fuss, infidelity isn't the end of the world," Bellatrix stated. "It's not how things are done."
"I didn't realize you were such an adherent to the rules, niece," Walburga narrowed her eyes.
"Infidelity can be looked the other way on after the nursery is filled," her mother commented. "Besides, I don't know why you are pitying Lucius so much, do you really believe your sister's unhappiness is worth less than his?"
Druella wasn't a Black, but she did have this way of stating something so blandly you missed the knife until it was already in your back.
As Bellatrix grasped for an answer, Narcissa was led into the room by the same matron, who could not quite figure out what to announce her as.
"The conquering queen returns, tell me, darling, how was court today? Anyone get too terribly angry?" Druella leaned over to wrap one arm around her younger daughter's shoulder in a side-hug, shooting her eldest a stern stare all the while-imploring her to mind her tongue.
Narcissa put on that sanctimonious little smile of hers that Bella had always loathed.
"Well, the man on trial of course did, when Sirius proposed the best way to test if the union would be… fruitful," her evil little smirk ruined her aura of feigned innocence.
"Why the hell was Sirius proposing it? He doesn't care a fig for tradition, hell if you both heard the stories I've heard about his love life…" Narcissa shot her sister a sharp look.
"Because Daddy thought it would get the best reaction," the blonde said. "In these kinds of proceedings, it's all about appealing to two courts—the high court and that of public opinion."
"You'd do well to remember your father does hold a legal degree from the finest collegium in magical Europe, Bella," her mother chided her. "He knows how to manipulate for the outcome we want."
"Why the hell do we want to break off the Malfoy alliance?" the Lady Lestrange complained. "Good lineage, no other direct heirs, I doubt Cissy could do much better."
The sisters exchange polite smiles that really brimmed with poison. Narcissa's eyes darted to the inside of her sister's forearm, Bellatrix's dark grey eyes widening in surprise then narrowing in suspicion.
"Because, unless you'd like to go to that fertility clinic in Switzerland or be a six-month stay with Cousin Aradia," Walburga warned her. "Narcissa is the Black Bull's best chance at an heir."
Aradia Crouch, the daughter of Charis Crouch, had taken up the Crouch Crone mantle—a distinctive line of midwives and mystics who had even more acclaimed than her ancestors. Nobody had thought the Greengrass blood curse would allow Bartimaeus Crouch's' wife to carry to term, but low and behold, Jonquil had given birth to a fine baby boy the year after Walburga delivered Regulus into the world.
Bellatrix did not look away from her sister, who met her stare with a cool gaze. Narcissa once cowered at that gaze, especially when it concerned her duty to the family. Bellatrix had wondered if some resentment had always been behind those lowered eyes, a question in her little sister's head about why she was the chosen brood mare of the family.
Yet, now, the eldest daughter of Cygnus Black had never seen the youngest so calculating, so, dare she say it, adept at playing political games. Yet, based on how her owl grey eyes had slid over her covered forearm in frigid disgust, it wasn't on her sister's side.
"Am I allowed to suggest any of my husband's friends to suit the role?" Bellatrix tried to move the conversation to a polite place, probing if the rest of the House of Black suspected, dare she say knew.
"Her last husband was one of those and look at how poorly that turned out," Druella chirped. "No, no, we'll be looking in all of the Sacred 28, abroad if we can't find a suitable match."
"One can always find an Italian who isn't too picky," Walburga laughed.
"You'd curse my daughter to be Madonna Narcisa Lucrezia? Walburga, you know how careful we have to be in this family about names," Druella hadn't given her daughters Rosier names. Names were power when applied to Black bones, only stars and stories befit their line. "You're braver about the curse of the Black Blood than I am, but I suppose you realized it wasn't that bad."
The Lady Hwicce had a teasing expression on her face as Walburga turned a impressive shade of magenta.
"Druella! That is quite untoward!" she blushed.
"Oh come on the girls are married, they know you broke off your engagement to Titus Fawley to be with Rion, I was in my first year when you and him got caught in the Prefects' bathrooms," the older blonde woman giggled.
"There is no reason to discuss past history, Druella, lest I air your youth to your daughters," Walburga threatened. "Besides, it's not just Italy, Narcissa dear, didn't you say something about the prospect of a West German Margrave?"
"Yes, Lady Bernicia offered to make my introduction, he's currently serving as an attaché in her office," Narcissa said in an even voice.
"Berenicia… Surely you don't mean Frank Longbottom's wife?" Bellatrix said surprised.
"Yes, Lady Alice was a good friend of mine in school," her sister replied. Bellatrix put it together, the pretty brunette child in Hufflepuff yellow who had tugged the baby snake to the greenhouses was the same woman who had cursed Gibbon so badly he had to go to Mungo's.
Bellatrix could feel dread rising in her throat—Wednesday was when the Dark Lord was set to return to Britain and she would have no pleasure to report her family, while perhaps not blood traitors, were not nearly so enthusiastic to the cause as she.
However, the threads of House loyalty still tugged at her. She vowed to not raise anything of the sort to the Dark Lord if asked, she'd likely deflect and throw the blame at Lucius's unfaithful feet. Who knows, maybe it could help her rise in standing within the Inner Circle.
TUESDAY, AUGUST 21, 1979
"Never thought I'd see you in a skirt," Sirius hated the formal cassock robes of the court, although he did enjoy that his station dressed in him scarlet.
He turned to find the source of the voice, discovering Remus Lupin leaning against the doorframe with a hungry expression on his face.
"It's not a skirt, it's traditional robes and they're a family heirloom!" Sirius complained, yet his actions said otherwise, practically tearing at the buttons of the cassock.
"Oh really, well, they look like Cardinal's robes," Remus allowed his eyes to trail his ex-boyfriend's figure.
"That's because they were. Once." Sirius shook out his wavy hair as he lifted the mantle over his head and allowed the cassock to drop to the floor. Remus cocked one eyebrow in surprise.
"I thought you Blacks were sinners of the highest order, now you're telling me one of them deigned to walk amongst saints?" Remus was a good Catholic. His mother, Hope, had raised him that way. But, his parish priest hadn't been a sexual awakening for him like Sirius in ecclesiastical robes was.
Fucking hell, this better be a Sirius thing and not a bloody priest kink, the werewolf swore to himself.
Sirius barked out a laugh that reeked of an inside Black secret.
"Trust me, before the Statute, the Blacks liked to… merge with almost every depraved dynasty it could get its grubby hands on," Remus met his eyes in the mirror. Sirius smirked.
"You're telling me a Cardinal was depraved?" he came up behind him, his reflection raising his eyebrows.
"Any Cardinal related to me had to be, but hell none of my ancestors believed in God, they believed in themselves and fortune," Sirius allowed the red silk to fall to the floor, just a pair of boxers underneath the robes. "The cloth corrupts, I suppose that's why we are C of E, the Church would probably throw me out on birthright alone."
Sirius tangled his fingers in the collection of glittering gold chains, selecting the pearl-studded letter B and a charging bull encrusted with red rubies, rather than customary white of his grandfather or black like his uncle used.
There were others, Remus had always been fond of the Florentine coin, avoided the greyhound in mid-snarl, dodged the golden fleece, and side-eyed the boar. James had always complimented the lion, saying Sirius had been destined for the House of the brave. The Black heir would retort that it was a family emblem of the most Slytherin, power-hungry bastards England had ever been cursed with.
Sirius himself had been partial to a simply stamped with a laurel and some Latin inscribed on the other side of the round disc. Sirius would rub it, whenever he was worried.
Their hands met in the midst of the necklaces, involuntarily on Remus's part. Sirius leaned forward, one of his sardonic grins on his face.
"We can't Sirius," he whispered longingly, taking a few steps back from the scent of expensive cologne and cheap cigarettes.
Sirius pouted, looking through his long lashes in a flirtatious expression. Remus steeled himself, shoving the stirring of longing in him.
"Did you ask me to come over this afternoon to tempt trouble or did you have an actual reason?" Remus asked irritably, as if Sirius's request hadn't made him think the same thought a thousand time since last night's dinner at Lily and James'. It had felt almost back to the way things used to be, just the five of them.
Sirius sighed and moved away from Remus, striding over to the overflowing closet. Selecting a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, he threw them on the bed before walking over to the writing desk and opening a drawer. He withdrew a thick cream envelope and placed it on the desk.
"Well, if I can't give you that kind of gift, this may be a good substitute," he said, tugging the jeans over his hips.
Remus approached the desk and ripped open the thick envelope, his eyes widening as he read.
"What the hell is this?" he asked, turning to the other man, whose t-shirt had just glided over his head.
"An acceptance letter for one Remus John Lupin for admission to University College London, Fall Term 1979," Sirius smiled waggishly at him.
"The term that starts next month? I can't just leave the Order, Dumbledore…" Remus protested.
"The shit the Order has you doing is a waste, besides, then you can move down to London and live with me," Sirius clearly thought the idea was rather brilliant, moving towards the werewolf to wrap his arms around him.
Remus took a step back, holding his body rigidly.
"Are you trying to buy me?" he questioned.
"Not like that, but I would call it an investment," Sirius tried to touch Remus affectionately again, his grin making it clear that he thought his former lover would be pleased at his little joke.
Remus reared back as if he had been stung.
"Like a kept man, Pads? What I'm doing for Dumbledore isn't a waste, I'm the only person who can do it," Sirius hadn't liked the assignment when Dumbledore had proposed it (a reason of many that they had mutually agreed to 'take a break' but Remus had thought he made him understand why he had to do it.)
"Of course, you are, notice any other werewolves admitted to Hogwarts," Sirius had a sour edge as he spit out the words.
"What the hell are you implying? I'm grateful that he allowed me in the first place," Remus snarled.
"That Dumbledore doesn't deserve your gratitude or your life!" Sirius shouted. "You deserve to have your own life, not repaying a 'kindness' that you were owed as a wizard."
"Well not all of have a fucking birthright that they're entitled to!" Remus roared. "I am a fucking werewolf, I don't have a life if I don't fight against their side."
"But, don't lay down yours for them!" Sirius seethed.
Both men were breathing hard, their eyes shiny with anger. Remus took a deep breath and collected himself.
"Where the fuck is this coming from? Are they convincing you of some merits to the Dark Side?" he said in a deadly calm voice.
"No, but my family reminded me that this isn't some us versus them shite—we can choose the side of ourselves," Sirius tossed his head haughtily at the declaration.
Remus let out an acerbic laugh.
"I guess I had forgotten, Black," he jeered. "As much as you like to pretend otherwise, you are just like them. Selfish, amoral, self-pleasuring snobs."
"They aren't that bad! You've met us, the real us, there is nothing wrong with looking out for yourself in times like these!" Sirius protested.
"Oh Sirius, look how far you've fallen," Remus chuckled darkly. "By your definition, there's nothing wrong, but hell, have you bought into their pureblood mania."
"I have fucking not!" Sirius dissented. "Ted was over for dinner last night at Noire."
"What? So, I take the spot like a good little pet and be Black's token werewolf?" Remus scoffed. "Points for diversity, Pads, I'm sure the family Hunt could use something like me—or am I exotic enough to be prey?"
"Don't be ridiculous, they aren't like that—we aren't cruel!" Sirius corrected him.
"Aren't you?" Sirius didn't like the deadly glint in his friend's eyes. Remus's weapons had always been his words and based on his expression alone, he was about to go for the jugular. "You told Snape my secret as a joke, you lot aren't cruel—you're brutal."
Sirius opened his mouth to object, but Remus cut him off.
"Brilliantly savage, with guile and calculated charisma to make all of us look the other way, but that's because you're better than the rest of your family, aren't you Sirius?" Remus was circling him now.
"I'm the Gryffindor," Sirius weakly tried to correct him.
"Oh, but of course, that just means that you are brave enough to push the boundaries, really, what kind of man thinks of feeding his enemies to a werewolf?"
Sirius didn't answer. If he went to the portrait hall in Castle Black, he was certain that there would no limits to the pride expressed. The whole family was savage—highly educated savages, brilliant minds utterly attuned to humanities' basest instincts.
"Ah another one of those Black family secrets then, the empire of evil, built on a web of lies. I've never smelled a stronger scent of secrets, even if I didn't have this nose, I'd know based on the looks alone there's nothing above The Family," Sirius had had enough of the inquisition.
"You're my bloody family too, Remus!" he cried, desperate to help his friend (his lover) see that he just wanted what was best for him.
"No, you'd make me your charity," Remus wrenched open the door. "Keep your fucking money, some things don't have a price."
He stalked out the door, Sirius scrambling to follow him.
"Remus, wait, we can still talk about this, you don't have to go—" the look Remus sent Sirius from the front door could have frozen hell.
One of Alphard's old amps that they used as a doorstop fell over as Remus slammed the door. The guitars hung on the walls rattled from the impact, almost masking the werewolf's crack of apparition.
Sirius took deep breaths, pressing his forehead against the doorframe, blinking back tears.
This hadn't been how he imagined it going—he had asked his grandmother to call in a favor from the Chancellor, the Queen Mother, who was an old friend of Irma's mother. Sirius had assumed Remus would be shocked, but delighted—he had always dreamed of being a professor. The Marauders had even gotten him a trunk, as a graduation present, embossed with Professor R. J. Lupin.
But, fuck, was Remus right? Was he no better, was he the worst of the Blacks?
"Rus… are you alright?" a small voice asked him.
Sirius whirled around to see Narcissa perched in a frozen seat on the sofa, legs demurely crossed with a pinched worried look between her eyes.
His mouth twisted into the poor imitation of a smile as he leaned against the door.
"I'm sorry you had to hear all that," he didn't have to ask what parts she had missed, the way she sat told him she had been there for the key points of the argument—the accusations of the crime of being a Black straightening her spine with iron amid humiliation.
"I've heard worse, about us Blacks," she attempted to make the statement less melancholic, yet the awful resignation remained.
She approached him, gently grabbing one of his hands and pulled. His feet moved involuntarily, allowing her to lead him towards one of the chairs. The cushion emitted a sound as he sat heavily in it.
"Do you think it was wrong of me to offer him that?" Sirius asked her turned back as she busied herself with the tea service.
"I'd be glad if someone wanted to give me opportunity to have my own life, but I'm not the recipient of the gift," she replied tactfully, removing the whistling kettle from the stove and pouring it into the silver teapot that had once belonged to their Great-Great-Grandmother Ursula.
The strong scent of black tea wafted with her as she crossed the threshold from the kitchen to the parlor.
"But, Sirius, I think you need to respect that he wants to be a spy, as much as he has been misguided, you can't make him see it as you do—as we do," she slid her long white linen jacket from her shoulders, sighing as the cool air hit the white silk of her simple dress underneath.
She had skirted the line of magical and muggle in court today, thrilled that today would hopefully be the last time she had to have her hair pinned up as Lady Malfoy.
"I'm not against the Order, I'm against Dumbledore—if anyone could understand the bloody difference," he voiced his frustration, slamming his hand on the coffee table. The willow blue china cups rattled.
She stiffly sat down next to him as if he hadn't just had a violent outburst, leaning over to the tea service. With the tongs, she put two lumps of sugar into each of the cups.
"It will be difficult for them to understand because they all are from Light families; for us Black, we are always considered guilty until proven innocent," Narcissa poured tea with the kind of placed grace that could only be trained in the finest Pureblood ladies—a credit to her mother.
Bellatrix hadn't excelled at those kind of etiquette lessons, Andromeda had always had almost too steady of hands, yet Narcissa had the kind of light touch and daintiness that would have made her salon the finest in London.
"But, what if we're not innocent?" Sirius confided, the guilt bubbling up in him once more.
It wasn't guilt over what he did to Snape, no, that was the problem. How his friends had acted, how James had acted saving the ungrateful prick had told Sirius there was something wrong with him, that he felt regret that Snape hadn't died.
He felt guilty that he had hurt Remus, but fuck all that time spent in the Black Library as a child (hiding from the nasty governess) lead Sirius's development a particular conception of justice apart from the Family's idea of the blood picks the punishment.
Sirius had synthesized his own schema, ironically, in nominally muggle literature, with wizards behind the curtains and gracing the pages.
'One Judges By the Result' had been the central cornerstone: if the result was virtuous, the means were therefore good as well. Tyrannical means lead to good ends—which he applied often to Slytherin pranks. He had been called a terror too many times to not enjoy it a bit.
'It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest' had been the right cornerstone, honed by years of other purebloods saying one thing to his face, another to his back: the cold eyes of the Headmaster who never let him forget who vouched for his supposed 'Lightness.'
'Happiness is the sole end of human action' had been the left cornerstone—forged by the Runaway Bride of 1973 and years of pondering why the hell they went through the motions of society, if it was so clear it made no one happy.
He may have boarded that train and been swayed to Gryffindor by the trusting hazel eyes of James Potter, but Sirius Orion Black had vowed long before he would force the decaying dynasty of the Blacks back to greatness.
"Sirius? You still there?" Narcissa startled him out of his thoughts.
"Do you remember when we got sent to the country, during the Squib Rights Marches?" Of course, she did, her own home was picketed in front of, her father's offices vandalized.
Her mercury eyes bid him to continue.
"What did I say that got me sent to bed without dinner by Grandfather Pollux, that first night at Mansion Noire?" he asked her.
"Adapt or die—if we don't change, their black hole threatens to swallow the stars," she recited solemnly.
"And what," he knit their fingers together, their Black rings aligning. "did I tell you and Reg when you snuck me in your dinner rolls?"
"Revolutions behead people like us if we do not carve out an empire of our own," nine-year-old Sirius had seemed very grown-up with the statement, the moonlight carving a far more adult face from the baby fat.
"And you took that pendant from about your neck and told me beware of the Ides of March," she smiled fondly and drained her tea cup, looking for the laurel engraved necklace.
"You thought I a fool, then, thinking I would be emperor, issuing edicts of equality or building a kingdom that reflected my vision," he combed his right hand through his sable locks, laughing a bit.
"A dramatic fool, but I never doubted your convictions, Sirius," she said kindly. "Reggie or I never did, they were a bit braver, a bit…"
"No, no, no, no," he set down his cup onto the tray. "It is not either of your responsibilities to conquer a kingdom, just…"
"We should have supported you," she insisted. "Then, you know we do now, but you were an island onto yourself then."
She sighed deeply, heavy with regret.
"And now you lot are the only people on the island with me," Sirius barked out a laugh. "Ridiculous that the very people that I spent my life trying to change are the ones trying to institute it with me. You're the only ones who even see how we could change it."
"There is lightness and darkness in all of us," Narcissa and Sirius were often compared as such, the chiaroscuro Blacks of 1959, always paired together like the sun and the moon.
"I've chucked love out the window to paint the town grey then," he said morosely, turning to face her fully. "I said once impossible loves are addictions and fuck if I'm not a destructive addict."
"Oh Rus, you did always think in absolutes," she brought her hand to cradle his face, tracing the strong jawline that she had failed to inherit. "You must promise me one thing,"
"Ask and it's yours," he leaned into the touch, smelling the scent of her perfume: ylang-ylang, rose centifolia, and jasmine dabbed onto the sides of her wrist.
"There is one your heart must find room for," her titanium eyes searched the planes of his face.
"Are you getting religious on me, Cis?" As children, they had giggled through church together, to fierce glares from their mothers.
"Never, Rus," she quirked a smile that would have been mistaken as timid if he hadn't known her his entire life.
"So, who is the one I must love then, sweet Cis?" he implored her. A traitorous thought entered his head, making him half wish that she demanded his heart make space for her, as if there wasn't a dedicated corner for it already.
"Yourself," she never showed this gentle kindness to anyone other than the Family, relying on an icy mask to the rest of the world.
There was something so Black about her words, they were vain lot, yes, but there had always been this overarching force that drove the family to only express affectionate to one another, in the privacy of their homes, away from others who may weaponize it against them.
Love was weakness to a Black, a weapon that you handed your enemy. Yet, family beliefs went that another Black could not, conceivably, be a foe.
Even when his arguments against the Family were at its worst, even he ran away, they hadn't betrayed him. They may not have agreed with what he did, with what he said, but it was evident that there had been this undeniable allegiance that they had espoused.
(Sirius wasn't letting his father's attempt to get him into the Academy go for a long time. The approval, the love, the faith Orion had must have had in his decision… Sirius hadn't cast a Patronus since Regulus had trespassed that cave, but good god was he tempted to change the memory thought of to that night.)
That was what had shaken him so much by Remus's reactions. Sirius was accustomed to the Family, his loved ones, standing by his actions, regardless of their own opinions, regardless of a moral framework. If he did something, it must good and right and just.
Delicately, carefully, chastely, he pressed his mouth to hers.
"What was that for?" Narcissa acted as though his gentle kiss had crossed some sort of line (as if they hadn't blurred it long before.)
"A mere gratitude, my lady," he tried to affect his most mocking gentlemanly tone.
Yet, she frowned at him.
"Don't make me be a replacement for another, again," she whispered, unshed tears making her eyes misty grey.
He drew his arms around her in a hug and whispered an apology into her hair.
She sighed into it, feeling the burden of her left hand's ring finger.
"Only a day longer, my love," he vowed into her curls, knitting his hands in her own.
THURSDAY, AUGUST 23, 1979
"And curtesy!" Narcissa instructed the mirror, watching as a dozen waist-high children copied her moments a half step behind her, bending their back leg behind them and moving their arms in a well-placed circle.
Or at least that's how Narcissa did the move—the young girls seemed to take their own creative licenses with what constituted the ending to the floor combination. She met the eyes of the other aide in the mirror, sharing badly hidden laughter behind their smiles.
"Alright girls, let's break for lunch," the other woman directed the class, unfreezing them from their teetering curtsies. The dozen children scuttled off, their ballet shoes thrown every which way as they threw them off, racing out to the school yard where a line was already forming.
Nymphadora looked back at her aunt, adorable in her fretting that Narcissa was going to be forced to eat alone at her first day. Her sorting was already practically written in the stars.
"Come ON Dora!" shouted one of the other girls from the outside.
She beseechingly looked at the blonde, her hair scarcely contained in a bun.
"You have no need to worry that Miss Cissa will be all by her lonesome, Nymphadora," the taller blonde aide knelt down before the diminutive girl, brushing wisps of hair from her forehead. "I'll make sure Madame doesn't eat her for lunch."
"Thank you, Miss Di!" she exclaimed, sprinting out the doors. Narcissa handed her co-instructor her cardigan at the door with a polite smile.
"She's a sweet child, the family was all so worried for my first day, I suspect they projected it off onto her," Narcissa excused her niece's clingy behavior.
"Your husband is worried about you working?" the other aide asked, locking the studio doors behind them as they made their way to the canteen.
Narcissa visibly stiffened. From where she was locking the doors, it was easy for Di to examine the other woman's left hand. The large emerald engagement ring and the small gold wedding band were missing, only a demure black diamond ring on her middle finger.
"I don't have a husband anymore," her jubilance was odd to the younger woman. "My annulment proceedings concluded yesterday."
"Oh, I apologize, I had thought you were married to Lord Black," the woman's blue eyes were wide with a kind of earnest apology Narcissa so rarely received from the vicious pureblood ladies whom she had dormed with at Hogwarts.
"God no, I'm the daughter of Earl of Hwicce, Lady Narcissa Black once more," Narcissa extended her hand in a joke, something the pretty 18-year-old took sincerely.
"Well then, Lady Diana Spencer, daughter of the Earl of Spencer, is delighted to make your acquaintance," they shook hands, devolving into giggles at their stilted formality.
Within the course of luncheon, Narcissa had ascertained that the 18-year-old girl was definitely sweet, simple with no head for books, but had been unable to discover if she knew the true meaning of the name Black.
Oh, they had gossiped about a variety of shared members of social circles like theirs, but either the girl remarkably deceptive or blissfully ignorant when she gabbed on about the Lestrange brothers.
"He's nearly the Prince of Wales' age and no romantic history whatsoever!" the younger blonde commented. "I mean Rabastan is your brother-in-law, you must know what the Marquess thinks of all this."
"We have… heard the Lord Lestrange's tastes are not of the public consumption," Narcissa smirked, hoping the muggle (?) noble would catch her drift, so to speak.
Her mouth formed a perfect O as her cornflower blue eyes widened in shock. She looked more like a China figurine than Narcissa ever could.
"No wonder we don't see him at any balls!" she exclaimed. "Or you for that matter, will the Blacks be attending any events this Season?"
She had a sly look on her face, as if she was in on the secret. Narcissa began to reconsider her theory that the Lady Di was blissfully ignorant of their world.
"I believe we are going to a polo match this weekend, I believe the Duke wants us to attend more events as it suits the family's financial direction," Narcissa said lightly.
Truthfully, she assumed that Orion and Sirius would eventually figure out balls were one of the best places to make backroom deals, deeming it necessary to suffer through dancing the night away.
"Well then, I must have Daddy be sure to invite you to the Althorp Ball next month, it's my first!" how the girl grabbed her hand was so dreadfully eager, Narcissa found herself instantly agreeing to attend.
FRIDAY, AUGUST 24, 1979
Narcissa Black was nothing like Lily had expected to be out and about in the muggle world, remembering her reputation as an icy bitch of Slytherin House. Most of the party's guests had apparated to the Longbottoms' posh home near Sloane Square, but Sirius, his cousin in tow, had seized the opportunity to take his motorbike out for a spin.
The girl had tumbled off the bike, laughing uproariously, unclipping the helmet smoothly, as her white boot-clad feet hit the pavement. Her riot of curls was a bit mushed from the confinement, but she shook them out, combing through her nearly waist-length hair with practiced ease.
Most pureblood witches, especially sorted as Narcissa was, would not be comfortable wearing the type of muggle clothing that the youngest Black girl wore. Lily would have assumed that the aristocratic witch chose to wear some kind of Sloane Ranger get-up, but it was obvious that Sirius had steered her in another direction as the muggleborn witch observed the Black cousins' elegant dismount of the motorbike from the window.
"THE LADY BLACK ONCE MORE!" Alice Longbottom cried victoriously, stumbling down the steps of her townhome and practically tackling the young Narcissa. She teetered and nearly fell into the rose bush, shrieking with free laughter.
The ladies wore tight pants that would have scandalized half the Wizarding World (and all the pureblood ones), Alice in dark denim, Narcissa in blinding white. Alice had at least pulled her hair up into a ponytail, worn a tight striped top that covered the necessary bit.
The newly-single woman declared her emancipation with a bare midriff and two strips of electric blue jersey knit that made a poor excuse for a top, binding her pert B cups high on her chest. Her ropes of honey framed a set of defined obliques, which flexed to retain her balance.
"Alice, I'm not back from a grave," she laughed, allowing the lady of the house to lead her up the steps. She looked back at Sirius, beckoning him to follow her inside, anxiety at the scene where she recognized so little faces.
He sighed, reluctantly crushed his cigarette under his motorcycle boot, straightened and popped the collar of his leather jacket before trudging after them.
The girls disappeared into the throng of people almost instantly, as Sirius was quickly accosted the Prewett twins and Peter.
"…none of us could see it coming, Uncle Iggy has been exploding about it for weeks now!" Fabian was telling him in a rush as Peter pressed a cup of pungent firewhisky into his hand. Longbottoms could always be counted on for a good bar.
"Says treatment is right indecent, dear god, I've never seen Arty so pleased, the Malfoy-Weasley blood feud runs deep," Gideon added, on behalf of his brother-in-law.
"James and Lil here yet?" Sirius waved off the twins to ask the short nervous young man.
"Over by the window, you know Marlene and Dorcas always want to smoke," Sirius allowed himself to be led through the maze of people where the Class of 1978 Gryffindors had staked out a spot in the parlor of the Longbottom residence, piling into a window seat.
"Ah the Prince has deigned to greet us mere mortals," drawled Dorcas, removing the Gillyweed joint from her mouth.
"It was quite a grand entrance, my liege, tell me is the fair Lady Narcissa still have the same tastes? Seraphina and her…" Marlene sighed, grabbing for the homemade blunt from her girlfriend's hand
"Were Bloody gorgeous, but don't you dare fantasize anyone but me, darling," Dorcas leaned over to place a kiss on Marlene's brunette head.
"You lot would have to consult Alice, she stole my cousin the second we walked in," Sirius said, his gaze trying to catch the attention of Remus, who remained stubbornly staring out the window looking onto the Square. "But I think she could use some friends more than a rebound."
"It was only a joke Pads, can't knock us for trying—you know how wonderful a bit player a Black can be in the bedroom," Marlene waggled her eyebrows at him.
He rolled his eyes good-naturedly and drained the plastic cup of liquor.
The tension of the brooding werewolf was heady as the leather pants clad heir kept his eyes trained on him. James and Peter shared a worried look, while Lily anxiously scanned the crowd for a suitable escape.
"Effing hell, what is Alice doing?" the heads of the occupants of the alcove whipped around, to spy the bubbly Hufflepuff drag the somewhat shy Slytherin behind her, considerably less steady on her feet than when she had entered the party. Shots of Boomsbury Gin work quick.
"Dear god, she'll never be rid of McLaggen if she's polite," Marlene muttered, setting down the remnant of the blunt into a conjured ashtray.
Sirius tore his apologizing eyes away from Remus to go and rescue her from the prick, but Lily and the rest of the girls had already started to cross the room. Lily's emerald eyes met his, silently ordering if to sort out the obvious tension between the Marauders.
James, the magnificently good-natured fool he was, tried to ignore the tension.
"We've barely seen you this week, Pads, why don't we go down to the pub after the Order this week, it will be just like old times with a proper catch-up, just the four of us?" he offered eagerly.
"Can't make Order this week," Sirius said apologetically, reaching for one of the bottles of Dragon Scale Ale that were at his friends' feet.
"Why?" Peter scrunched his face. It was not done to miss Order meetings for flights of fancy; the ailing Mrs. Pettigrew was by far the only excuse that did not meet reproach.
"Reggie is playing his first exhibition match Sunday," he slipped into the family nickname his baby brother, grinning with pride.
"And they play polo in the evenings?" Remus finally joined the conversation, a nasty edge to his voice that was usually only present close to the full moon.
"No, but I've been enlisted to host the after-party at Valentine Park and Cis can't host alone in my house," There were three vacant country estates in the Black Family portfolio: Canis Court, Taurus House, and Valentine Park.
Canis in Hertfordshire was a very English red brick manor house, surrounded by extensive gardens. Last inhabited by his late great-great uncle Arcturus Black (the first), the home was the closest of their family homes to London, lying 20 miles to the north. Sirius had thought that perhaps the Tonks would enjoy it, an opinion he had been yet to voice.
Taurus was really Uncle Cygnus's country home in Derbyshire, although the Hwicce Blacks had preferred to raise their three daughters in London's Star's Hall than in the splendid home that was more glass than wall. Pollux's sister Cassiopeia preferred to stay there, when she was in the UK, rare as it was.
Valentine was the largest of the three empty manors, sitting on some 1,200 acres nestled in the Cotswolds. Narcissa had used the greenhouses and 10 gardens extensively during her two final years at Hogwarts, while Sirius (until his disowning) had adored leading the hunt through the well-maintained forests. Regulus, no lover of the outdoors unless it was on a broom, did enjoy stabling Neptune there, yet he greatly preferred the expansive basement Potions lab to the impressive grounds.
His grandfather's siblings had made the house infamous—a den of debauchery that defined young Pureblooded society for the Roaring 20's. Lycoris had taken over the house upon her graduation from Hogwarts in 1921, soon joined by her brother, Regulus, in '23. The amorous affairs and exploits that had occurred in the country party house were stuff of legends—a reputation Sirius looked forward to living up to.
"What do you mean your house? I thought you had the flat?" Peter never really could get over the flippancy of the Sacred 28 around money. He was a half-blood, from decently well-off Welsh country stock, and hell even James was wealthy, but the generational wealth of families like Sirius's incited jealousy in him.
"The flat was my Uncle's in his own right, the manor is the family house entitled to me through my position," Sirius said airily.
"Well, I hope you'll enjoy your bribe, Valentino," Remus snarled. James's hazel eyes widened in shock at the venom in his friend's voice, looking between them in shock.
"What's going on with you two?" he asked, frowning.
Sirius opened his mouth to try and explain, thinking of all the advice he had been fed to try and demonstrate he was only trying to help, but Remus beat him to the punch.
"Oh, Padfoot didn't tell you?" he feigned politeness. "He tried to buy me out of spying for the Order."
Peter gasped. James's jaw dropped.
"That is a complete misrepresentation of our conversation and you know it Mooney!" Sirius protested.
"What did you say, Padfoot?" James adopted the stance of referee, not remembering tension this bad since the Prank. Remus and Sirius hadn't spoken to each other for four months (mostly due to the summer hols).
"I asked my Grandmother to pull some strings at UCL, the application deadline had passed, but based on his NEWTS alone, the Board was more than willing to extend an invitation for this term to Remus," Sirius had regained some of his composure; he believed he had outlined the problem rather well. "We all knew he would make a ruddy fantastic professor."
"And I told you that I didn't need your charity!" Remus retorted, jumping to his feet.
"Moony, it doesn't sound like Sirius meant ill, we all know you'd be brilliant," James said beseechingly.
"You're so clever at twisting your own words, Sirius, he neglected to mention that he believes Dumbledore raised me for the slaughter and that my work isn't 'necessary,'" he spat out, turning to go.
"He's probably not going to the Order meeting because he believes that there are three sides to this war."
"Sirius, is that true?" Peter asked in a small voice.
Sirius pressed his forefingers to the bridge of his nose.
"I've always had my reservations about Dumbledore, you lot know it," he kept his eyes focused on James. "I only portrayed that my family has been showing me that maybe there is a way to choose your own side in the war."
"Sure, if you're fucking rich enough," Remus swore. "Enjoy society Sirius, after all, it was built for people like you."
The werewolf stalked towards the door, the dark storm clouds over his face allowed him to cut a wide path through the young witches and wizards. Peter hurried behind him, pleading at him to come back.
"Sirius," James Potter said in a quiet tone as the other wizard watched his lover longingly go.
"What Prongs, you going to condemn me too?" Sirius said with a brittle laugh.
"Do you still believe Lily should be loved and accepted by wizarding society? That our marriage is good and pure and legal?" the Potions' scion stared intently at his friend.
Sirius reeled back in offense.
"Of bloody course! Hell, even my family is coming 'round to the idea, we had Ted over for Nymphadora's birthday dinner this week and my grandfather liked him," Sirius stated emphatically. "The Blacks will change, they are changing, look at Cis getting her annulment! I'm going to drag them into the 20th century if I have to."
James' disconcertingly somber face split into a grin.
"That's all I ask mate, bloody good enough for me that you have capitulated to the Dark Side," he clapped his hand on his best friend's back. "Besides, Dad's not too keen on Dumbledore of late, says he would rather I listen to the Ministry Orders than vigilante justice."
"Dear god, has your dad been talking to mine?" Frank Longbottom dropped into the conversation, a bottle of his family's most expensive firewhisky in hand. Sirius reached for it greedily.
"I suspect all of our fathers share the same sentiments, yours more so than mine," Sirius groused.
"Why?" James frowned, wondering why Orion Black, a Slytherin, would be less caring about his son's recklessness than the pair of Gryffindor fathers. Sirius laughed.
"You both are only children, at least my parents have Reg as the spare," Frank's eyebrows lifted.
"That's why they have him on the polo circuit," he snapped his fingers. Auror skills were good for something.
"What do you mean?" James frowned at Frank.
"Someone in the public eye like that, photographed every week, expected to show up to daily practices, isn't the type to have the time to be a Death Eater," Frank narrowed his eyes to watch Sirius's body language, ninety percent sure his hunch was correct.
"And isn't the type to disappear quietly if he refuses," Sirius added. "I'm surprised at you, Frank, I never thought you had a taste for Black intrigue."
"My dad, not me—he got the idea that I'd be far better served doing like you do as proxy in the spotlight rather than just another Auror," Eadric Longbottom was the son of Callidora Black, whose diplomatic savviness was so renowned, that she had represented Britain well in the Grindlewald Peace Talks.
"Speaking of intrigue, it's really my wife who has a taste for it," Frank used the neck of the bottle of Blishen's to gesture towards the make-shift dance floor where Alice had seemed to have thrown Narcissa into the best possible exhibition lighting for this potential match.
Marlene and Dorcas had evidently either taken Sirius's request as gospel or a challenge, leading Narcissa in hip swaying line, their arms in the air as if they were about to snap their fingers. Alice was off to the side, nudging a handsome blonde man towards them from the side of the dance floor, although he seemed to look rather intimidated by the united front of girls.
"He is not Cis's type," Sirius smirked, watching his cousin look the nervous West German margrave up as down and toss her hair in rejecting snatching the twirling redheaded Lily and dragging her to jump to the chorus of the song.
"Oh? He's not titled, nice, and handsome?" Frank laughed, watching his wife make the apologies to their visiting colleague.
"You lot knew her in school, her preference was always more dark-haired Byronic types than golden boys," Sirius drained the bottle and pulled himself to his feet. "Also, Frankie, if you can wrestle the cassette player from your wife—I like Knock on Wood, but not the rest of the disco shit."
He waded into the throng of dancing bodies, beginning to think the leather jacket was a bad idea given the proximity of the hot and sweaty youths.
Frank and James watched with interest as their friend did what most of the wizards (and some witches) had been too scared to do and pushed himself into the closed girls of dancing girls.
"Think he meant like himself?" James asked his fellow Auror, watching as his best friend wedged his lean, athletic, strapping body between his cousin and James's wife to join their exuberant jumping to the music. Marlene and Dorcas didn't seem to mind, stumbling into a corner in an impassioned lip lock.
"He's not wrong about her type: she was with Kings and Seraphina Zabini in school, think she had a flirtation with Violet Greengrass," Frank analyzed, watching them together as Sirius managed to get her to mirror his quick steps side to side, head bobbing, giving her a wink as they turned in unison in time with the music. He caught the hip of her waist in one hand, pulling her back into him in a move not out of place in Saturday Night Fever.
"But, hell, they are Blacks, and didn't I see Remus stalk off?" James only half-heard Frank's words, his eyes locking with his wife's seductive green gaze.
"They're in a bit of a tiff," James answered, wondering if Sirius had been projecting a bit when he said that Narcissa didn't need a rebound as the girl turned and leaned her shoulders back into Sirius's chest, rolling her shoulders in time to the music and running her hands through her mass of curls, arching her back as she did so.
"Managed to save the damsel from McLaggen?" James whispered from behind Lily, before planting a kiss on the skin just below her ear lobe. She gasped and turned, her arms flying around his shoulders.
"She was doing her own rescuing, but I think she appreciate some friends," Lily giggled, swaying a bit on her feet.
"How much liquor did you lot drink? You weren't gone that long," James steadied his wife on her feet, his hands meeting at the ridges of her spine as he wrapped his arms around her.
"Can I tell you a secret Jaime?" his wife looked up with him with almost child-like eyes. James was once again struck by what a lucky son of a bitch he was that this woman had agreed to marry him.
"Of course, my Lily-pad, I believe our vows entitled me to them," he answered, whirling her around.
"Look in Cissy's back pocket," the Potters' eyes turned to the aristocratic pair, who were laughing at some ridiculous disco move Sirius had tried to show her. The silver wrought head of a hound peaked out of the pocket as he attempted to get her to copy the rapid hip gyrations while standing opposite each other.
"He had it brimming with Crystal Dragon Vodka," the red-head whispered conspiratorially.
"He's going to be very disappointed when he finds you lot drank his entire Russian supply—you can't get that shit behind the Iron Curtain anymore," the one absolute good thing, in James' opinion, about the Black family was their expensive tastes… and inability to notice when their errant heir smuggled it to Hogwarts.
Quidditch after-parties may have been supplemented by Madam Rosmerta, but their consummate commentator always provided top-shelf to the team.
"It was Sirius's grandfather's from before the war," Lily informed him, parroting the words that Narcissa had confided when Alice had grabbed the flask in shock.
"Aged over a century, not wonder you are so affectionate, Mrs. Potter," James felt his wife grind against and suppressed a groan, scanning the rest of the crowd. They were no different than any couple at the party: young, wild, and free with their inhibitions.
"James… please tell me Remus and Sirius are just having some friction," Lily's eyes had landed on the cousins, worry pinching her face together. Her husband's best friend was known for his self-destructive tendencies and as he skirted the knife's edge of appropriate dancing with his cousin, she could see the car crash coming in the distance.
He had sought to soothe rejection before at their flat, when Remus and him had first declared the break, clinging to James like a needy child. At school, the string of warm bodies that had paraded from his arms was impressive, when the fallout from the break had iced Padfoot out of the Marauders.
The sting of love lost was always soothed by the love of others, for Sirius, whether it be a deep platonic bond, near familial, with her husband or the carnal kind from the bodies of others. Lily prayed Sirius, in his reckless search for love, wouldn't do something he regretted.
"I'd say it's maybe a stone's throw in severity from the prank," James answered, watching the pair too, less worry etched on his face. Lily took comfort in this, knowing that her husband would be the first to pull his best friend away from the cliff.
"Are we to play referee like when first went to Greyback's?" she sighed. "Or have you chosen a side, like you did with Remus in the whole Sev—Snape situation."
James pretended not to notice her correction.
"As much as I hate that he's back with his family…" he said slowly. "I can't deny that he's trying to change them, they're trying to change."
"What did Sirius do that blew Remus up then?" she inquired, looking at how seamlessly the pureblood heiress was acclimating to the crowd, gleefully copying the drop that fellow muggleborn Mary MacDonald had done in the midst of the dance floor.
Sirius whooped and grabbed her hips again, gleefully pushing her around the dance floor again. It wasn't as though disco couldn't be a bit sexual, all the hip movements and gyrations, but one would think Sirius wouldn't have tried to intrude on that space so unapologetically or that the recently unattached Narcissa would lean into so readily.
"Pulled strings for a spot at UCL," Lily pursed her lips. They had been prefects together, she knew that was probably the most thoughtful thing Sirius had done for Remus—who had always dreamed of teaching, yet hadn't bothered to try due to his condition.
"I'm sure it's hard for Remus to accept that Sirius's circumstances have changed so quickly and so abruptly," she reasoned, trying to look at the side of her fellow bookworm with as much sympathy as she could muster. "We're not going to cut him out, by taking Sirius's side."
James looked appalled at the suggestion.
"Of course not!" he declared. "But I think that we should support him in coming 'round to the idea."
Lily pressed her lips to his with a soft smile fixed on them, dragging James back out onto the dance floor, pressing her hips into his.
"What do you say we get out of here?" her whisper sent a shiver down his spine, leaning down to devour her mouth in the middle of the parlor dance floor, the late hour excusing increasingly public intimacies as inhibitions faded.
They were far from the only couple—Marlene and Dorcas had snuck hands under each other tops, buttoned-up Amelia Bones was seated on the bookshelf, her legs wrapped around her fiancé Fabian Prewett, hell, even their hosts, Alice and Frank, had their hands in each other's back pockets.
Ordinarily, James Potter would not abandon his best friend after a messy fight with his ex-boyfriend. But, a cursory glance at the Blacks assured the Potters that one Sirius Black was not nearly as drunk or irresponsible as they assumed.
He was leading her towards the door, saying something to the Longbottoms, no doubt begging off at the late hour and an early morning en route to the countryside. Narcissa was swaying slightly on her feet, obviously still under the effects of Crystal Dragon, clutching Sirius's leather jacket about her shoulders.
They, of course, hadn't thought to ask if the Longbottom's little soiree was press-free, forgetting that their egalitarian invitations to most of the young people in the Wizarding World including cub reporters and amateur photographers.
Narcissa had the sense to smile at the flash of light as Zippy Smith held up her camera, flexing her abs for the photograph.
"Zippy darling, W! won't want to run that alone," she said, an oddly kind voice for someone who was about to be in the Monday edition of the tabloid magazine.
"Sorry Narcissa, I have to—you look bloody fabulous though," the former Hufflepuff offered suspiciously.
"Valentine Park, Sunday night," Sirius smirked, swinging one leg onto his motorcycle. "I assume you would prefer a proper picture of the next generation of the House of Black."
She wasn't the magazine's photographer, or even trained as one, but she knew she had a cover shot.
The Viscount Westerna was straddling the black motorbike, his black waves framing his sharp aristocratically angular features elegantly, while the Lady Narcissa had been captured in the process of putting on her helmet.
Held high above her head, her back was arched and head tilted back, making her hair one golden waterfall of curls. Small-breasted, full-hipped, with athletic legs encased in tight white fabric, the image captured a figure evocative of Farah Fawcett. The yellow light of the street lap made her tan glow, highlighting every bit of her dance-toned body.
She didn't look at the camera, but Sirius did.
Eat your heart out was the plain expression on his handsome smirking face.
(Zipporah assumed he was directing it to Malfoy, but Sirius, framing the photograph in his head, was plainly telling Remus Fine, make me your villain)
SUNDAY, AUGUST 26, 1979
Regulus Black had often felt overlooked by the family. It was why he had chosen Slytherin, praying that there was be an iota of praise, attention, his turn to get a shred of spotlight.
However, he had just met expectations, his achievements never greeted with as much fanfare as the successes and failure of his elder brother.
His parents in particular had never told him he was a particularly brilliant flier, only acted that his superior athleticism was his birthright rather than a gift.
Perhaps it had been his brush with death, perhaps it had been his retrieval of the Horcrux from under the Dark Lord's nose, either way, the Family found it difficult to overlook him now or at least act as though everything he did was expected.
Nothing exemplified the defrosting stiff upper lip of the public perception of the Blacks than the family's attendance to Cirenchester Park that fine Sunday.
"TIDY SHOT REGULUS!" Walburga Black had always had a harpy-like screech in her, although she usually only deployed it in scolding her eldest son.
Regulus hid his smirk as he rounded the goal, egging his steed on. It wasn't Neptune as the aerial match had been played earlier than morning. As was tradition, the muggle and magical aristocrats would almost always rather hone their skills on each other than have to face non-Brits.
"Black! Be sure to call me if you ever want a different spot!" the opposing captain had called to him as the conclusion of the match. "I'd bump Wales for you!"
"Oi, check my rank!" the Prince called out, from where he was already swinging off his horse into the waiting adoration of Society It Girl, Sabrina Guinness.
"Better watch out for treason Kent!" Fabian Prewett gleefully crowed. As was tradition, since a polo team required four players, the Board selected one player from each of the four Hogwarts houses to represent Britain internationally and in domestic matches such as these.
However, equality pretty much stopped at that—polo was an expensive sport, only played by aristocrats and similar men of leisure, ensuring that only purebloods were selected.
It was rare anyone was selected outside of the Sacred 28 and this team was no exception. Replacing Garland Greengrass was Regulus, for the Slytherin spot, while Fabian Prewett was the representative from Gryffindor. Captain John Macmillan hailed from Hufflepuff, while Hamza Shafiq played for the house of the Ravens.
"Holy hell, Reg, that was a bloody brilliant cut shot!" his brother ran up to him, dressing surprisingly appropriately for the match in nice blazer and slacks.
Even though the Blacks were seated, as always, in the VIP tent, it seems like his brother had refused to completely bow to custom, as his white linen shirt was unbuttoned several inches down rather that to the throat with a neat tie in a Windsor knot.
"Glad to know I'm as good on land as I am in the air," Regulus smiled at his elder brother, soaking in Sirius's prideful beam. "Where's Cis gone off to?"
"You know it was Bella's birthday week, I suspect she's trying to pretend to be a nice sister and stay back with her to avoid the rabble," Sirius said that last part in a high tone, to emphasis that he was repeating a likely repeated complaint from throughout the match.
"Isn't that what Great Aunt Cassie is for? She is Bella's godmother after all," their grandfather's sister, the Lady Cassiopeia Black, had returned from her American sojourn the previous day, heading straight out to Gloucestershire to watch the match.
"You know her, swore she saw one of her friends and practically bolted into the muggle throng," even at 64 years old, the scholarly old woman could still move incredibly fast.
The pair of brothers noticed the Black sisters approaching then, a long-suffering look on the blonde's face while the dark haired one looked haughty and sour at the same time.
"Just a warning—she's in a foul mood, Rodolphus didn't even come she's so peeved at something," Sirius warned Regulus as they approached them.
"Regulus, you were amazing!" Narcissa chirped, obvious in her attempt to spin the situation and steer her sister away from the nasty comments that were no doubt brewing. "I mean you were fantastic on Neptune, but on a normal stead, goodness, you're such a good horseman. Isn't he, Trixie?"
She prodded her sister, who managed a poisonous smile at the sweat covered polo player.
"You played well, Reggie, but that's to be expected against a bunch of dirty muggles," she sneered. "You should have cursed them, or maybe used them for ten-pin bowling. That's all they're good for."
"Bellatrix you will behave yourself," the cold stern voice of Pollux Black came from behind the girls. Their grandfather and grandmother had seemed to have hunted down their runaway Great Aunt, who wore an identical disapproving thin line on her lips.
Sirius could see his grandfather making his apologies to some muggle Lord over in the corner, stalking towards them to hopefully contain the impending scene, as Orion and Walburga remained trapped in conversation with Ignatius and Lucretia Prewett and Cygnus and Druella were ensnared in discussion with Rosier relations.
It was fortunate that Arcturus Black thought to erect a privacy charm, just as Sirius had employed a silent Muffliato behind his back as Bellatrix's Black temper made itself known.
"I don't know what has gotten into this family, are we all of sudden blood traitors? We've never mixed with them before!" she shouted, her pale skin flushing with anger. It was boiling, even for England in August, yet she still had worn long sleeves, in her signature black silk.
"Oh, the Duke has been skipping votes in the House of Lords for a quarter century?" Cassiopeia asked her goddaughter in an amused tone, as she had done when the children asked stupid question when she had given them lessons before Hogwarts.
"No, but we've never debased ourselves socially!" Bellatrix stamped her foot, the absence of cold rage bringing some relief to Narcissa. Calculating Bellatrix, now that was a dangerous woman. Right now, she resembled a small girl who had been told the world didn't work as she thought.
"I thought you were more Slytherin than that," Arcturus commented mildly, joining the conversation.
"What do you mean?" she was taken aback at the patriarch's cool tone, his lizard-like eyes watching her like a fly.
"You've never thought how much gold it takes to keep up our lifestyle? How small our world is?" Pollux Black demanded of her, as if she hadn't been raised to be a good daughter who was told nothing, worried naught, and just produced heirs for her husband.
She suspected it had been those expectations that had driven her to find her true purpose with the Dark Lord. He valued her for her skills, for her mind, (yes for her blood), but not for her womb.
"We've dabbled quietly in this world for centuries to keep the family afloat, it was high time that we started to blend in more," the Duke of Mercia hissed.
"But why?" Bellatrix hadn't been the child to ask that question, that honor had been Sirius's. Yet, she looked lost when she said it, as if she was looking back from a way down a path and asking her pursuer why she shouldn't continue.
"Because power is power my dear, we've been forced to evolve before, we shall do so again," Arcturus's eyes burned. "I won't have our illustrious line fade into obscurity and destitution like the Gaunts."
Sirius caught himself before he could make an inbreeding joke. He knew the difference between extinct lines like the Gaunts and his—rape and coercion, no matter the blood relation, always twisted, corrupted, marred magical bloodlines.
The scions of Slytherin had been obsessed with their snake charming gifts, so much so that they forbade marriage from outsiders. Over the centuries, Sirius's line would fall for each other, not as a requirement, but often in spite of pre-ordained contracts. The Gaunt offspring were encouraged towards each other, and if that didn't fail… well, everyone could see the half-wizard Marvolo Gaunt was. The Black offspring were watched closely, encouraged to trust only the family, that love was ambition and ambition was love—it was a wonder they could still make marital alliance, as without fail, a Black each generation would rip up their contract and draw a line in the sand with their love.
(A very stupid pair of Black brothers had christened their children George and Anne, in honor of Hanoverian succession, in the 18th century. The story went… well you know the rest, didn't I say Black names had power?)
"But, the Dark Lord says that we should rule over the muggles…" Bellatrix was grasping at straws now.
"What exactly is that man's title, dear?" Irma Crabbe Black tried to ask kindly, but anyone could see that she was teeing up a vicious cut.
"I don't, I don't," Bellatrix stammered under the imperious gaze of her grandmother. "It's disrespectful to call the Dark Lord by his…"
"I wasn't aware that Voldemort was a seat, Pollux, you did check to make sure it wasn't some airs that French fool of an emperor put on," no one had ever doubted that Irma had gall, but her utter nerve made Sirius wonder if he and Regulus hadn't been the only family members considered for Gryffindor.
"Not even Napoleon would be so stupid to name a title 'flight of death.'" Cassiopeia Black answered for her sister-in-law with a haughty sniff.
"So tell me Bellatrix, as a daughter of House Black, the purest, most noble magical duchy in the land, please tell me why you are calling a peerless man my lord," Pollux Black wasn't the head of the family, but the gravitas with which he spoke reminded everyone just who was the consigliere beside Arcturus's iron-fisted ducal regime.
Bellatrix couldn't answer. Truthfully, she herself didn't know herself why he demanded all the members of the Inner Circle, many of who were noble peers, call him my lord.
(It's about power, that corner of her mind told her, the only that had screamed for her to stop as she inked over the constellations of her kin with the mark of her master).
"I fear if you cannot properly conduct yourself, I must bid Sirius to bar you from attending the party this evening at Valentine Park," the Duke of Mercia declared.
"Oh she couldn't have come anyways Grandfather," Sirius was more deferential than Bellatrix had ever heard him, her curtain of black hair flying as she whirled to look at him. His eyes had an eerie platinum cast to them, chilling her to the bone.
She knew he had the capacity to be cruel, but had never thought she would see if for herself. He wasn't Dumbledore's reckless little soldier anymore; no, this was the Sword of the Morning returned to the seat of the Father to wage holy war.
"I've made a few adjustments to the wards—anyone with the Dark Mark that attempts to darken my threshold will get, what did you say you constructed Cis?" Bellatrix looked as Sirius directed, towards her sister.
"It activates a rather lovely spell that has kept my new thicket of Lucifer's Snare at bay," her sister had shook her head at Narcissa's hobbies: gardening, stargazing, dancing, all frivolous ladylike habits.
Bellatrix hadn't realized she had been picking her poisons, read the signs, and sharpen her graces like stiletto daggers.
"Oh darling, I was so worried it wasn't going to take, what is it's nature?" Irma beamed at her granddaughter.
"It's American, so it's quite uncouth—none of that sensitivity to the light and cuts down on the strangling time by half!" Narcissa was not given an odd look, not a trace of fear was on any of their faces not even Regulus's. Bellatrix eyed each of the faces of her family, nervousness rising in her throat like bile.
It was in that moment Bellatrix had made a serious miscalculation. The world only saw Narcissa's beauty and had failed to divine the iron underneath. She had a keen understanding of the working of power, with an inexhaustible patience that allowed her to bend to circumstances, but never be defeated by them, turning events to her advantage when she saw fit.
Bellatrix had never doubted Sirius may kill her, fighting for the Order of the Phoenix.
But, based on the cold crystal in Narcissa's grey eyes, Bellatrix Black feared her own sister would pronounce the sentence and Sirius swing the sword.
Notes:
I apologize for the Wolfstar angst… ok, not really because I think Sirius and Remus needed to have an adult discussion in canon/fanon of how their relationship could work in the long-term, Remus does seem committed to spying for the Order throughout the sixth book in canon (implying he did so throughout Oct. 31, 1981 during the first war), which has always made me think how his relationship could have possibly worked with Sirius when they were doing long-distance, especially with this version of Sirius who thinks Remus is being used as canon fodder.
Again, maybe its just me being the author, but I think that that scene (which a lovely reviewer actually gave me the fantastic idea for!) was SO important to character development of them and a fantastic exploration for Sirius.
Also, yes I've always thought formal robes looked like priest regalia. So yes have I watched too many period dramas with hot cardinals and decided that a version of Sirius Black in them would give anyone a priest kink? Also yes. Plus dear god did I litter the overt historical symbols in there, I doubt anyone will be able to guess all the family symbols ;)
RE: James supporting Sirius wrt to Dumbledore. I will never get the HC out of my head that Potions genius Fleamont Potter already knew six of the 'real' uses for Dragon's Blood and doesn't like the credit a *Transfiguration Professor* gets for the "discovery."
The trope I'm really playing fast and loose with is the familial, romantic, platonic love and boundaries surrounding it within the Big Screwed Up Family Trope. The third person perspective is helpful to drive the point home around how there's a physicality there that is really edging the line, but it's just how they *are,* generous deployment of Frank in that context.
Machiavelli, Smith, and Mill are attributed to the quotes in the Sirius mental monologue as he tried to figure out what he did wrong. I didn't choose then for any porto-capitalist reasons, I chose them because Mill and Machiavelli are consequentialists (a philosophy canon Sirius would wholly subscribe to) and Smith's theories are definitely something Sirius would have read growing up.
If anyone has seen the Crown or has seen any kind of Diana film… it's not inconceivable in a fictional world she would have been running around the same corner of London as a pureblood aristocrat. It's the Emma Corrin version, who yes was a dance teacher and nanny in 1979 :).
The Polo match is actually one that did occur, I'm relying on my own experience attending matches and historical research for this fic which has essentially become a love letter to 1979 and old prep.
In an early comment on this work, someone commented that they wished they saw Bellatrix come back into fold, which put a bug in my ear that has grown to an essential plot line in the story now. I may have been overt in my foreshadowing, but I *promise* that there is going to be some action soon. I'm upping the rating to M starting in Chapter 6—there are certain fixed events in a timeline, as in Regulus always goes to the cave, children are always born, and well… there is always a chance that Orion Black dies in 1979.
Thank you all for all the comments, kudos, and bookmarks! Your insights and ideas from comments have literally birthed new scene and directions in this story, I cannot thank you all enough!