~Meet The Blacks~
The Christmas season had arrived as the students of Hogwarts had once again found themselves packing up to head home to their families.
Once aboard the train, Draco and Alyona shuffled through the other students in search of an empty compartment.
As the pair found a vacant cabin, Draco placed his hand on the handle at the precise moment another hand also did.
Draco looked up with a look of inconvenience as his eyes met the thick-framed covered eyes of their Slytherin house mate, Bradley.
"You best take your hand off of our cabin door, Berringer," Draco growled, "Or must I give you another lesson on how to respect your superiors?"
Bradley scowled, but not at Draco. His ill tempered look was directed plainly at Alyona, who did her best to appear unbothered.
Bradley lifted his hand away from the cabin door and stomped off to find another place to occupy.
"That's what I thought," Malfoy remarked as he opened the cabin door and allowed his darling to enter first.
As both students got comfy as they settled in to their seats, Alyona went through her pink backpack to make sure she had her beauty essentials with her.
It wasn't long after sitting down that they heard a tiny knock at the sliding door. Alyona looked over to see Pansy standing just outside of their compartment. Before Draco could stop her, Alyona stood up to slid the door open for her housemate.
"Hey-" Pansy said with a timid expression.
"Uh—hi," Alyona responded.
Pansy glanced around nervously as if she was afraid for people to see her conversing with Alyona in a civil manner.
"Would it be okay if I sat with you guys? No one that I've asked so far wants me to travel with them."
Alyona could see the silent plea for graciousness in Pansy's eyes, something that she hadn't seen before.
Before Alyona could respond, she was harshly cut off by Draco.
"Are you mad?! No we don't want you in here with us! Piss off, Parkinson!"
Alyona shrugged and began to slowly close the door as she said, "Well, that's your answer I guess, sorry."
Alyona took her seat as Pansy sulked and left down the train corridor.
"I'm so excited to be out of this place for a little while," Draco expressed with relief, "Maybe I'll master Occlumency well enough to finally hear you sing."
Alyona gave Draco a positive side smile, she loved when he was optimistic like this.
"I'm hoping for that, too. I also hope your mother has found a match to the signatures she collected."
"Me too, Draco agreed, "Although, I feel like she would have sent us a letter about it by now, if she did find a match."
The two Slytherins sat in silence for a moment until Draco decided to lighten the mood.
Are you excited for Christmas, Darling?" Draco asked, "I can't wait for you to see what I've bought you this time."
"And I can't wait for you to see what I got you. So yes, I am excited," she replied.
Draco sighed heavily as he rolled his eyes.
"How many times have I told you not to buy gifts for me? It's my job to spoil you, it's your job to look pretty for me. That's all I ask."
Alyona chuckled, "So what? I'm just supposed to return all of it?"
"Yes, that's exactly what I'd like you to do," Draco responded seriously, "Just tell me what you got me and I'll buy the items myself if you want me to have them so badly."
"If you say so," Alyona said with a wink.
The pair looked out out of the window as the Express hissed and began to move along the track.
Outside of the train stood Hagrid, who was waving cheerfully at the students as they watched through the windows.
Once Hagrid had passed by their cabin, Draco refused to wave out of contempt and Alyona refrained from waving as to not upset her Slytherin prince.
"I can't wait until that giant oaf gets what's coming to him," Malfoy snarled.
"Has your father settled on what he wants to do about your incident with Buckbeak?"
Draco scoffed, "Incident? I think attack is a much more fitting word. I'll find out what my father wants to do about it when we see him, I hope it's brutal."
Alyona looked unsure of how to feel about the Malfoy's sting hatred of their friendly game-keeper.
"Well…Hagrid is a nice guy. I don't want him to get into to too much trouble."
"Defending him, are you?" Draco asked.
Alyona hated having to feel like she had walk on eggshells when it came to her opinions on certain topics.
"No," she insisted, "he would have trained Buckbeak to be better behaved, but—"
"But what?" You just said it, that half-breed should have trained that bloody chicken to be better behaved," Draco said.
Alyona sighed, "Right, you're right…"
~ooOOOoo~
Once the students had arrived to King's Cross station, everyone flocked to their families, excited to have home cooked meals and to sleep in their own beds.
Draco and Alyona gathered their belongings and began to search for their families.
Unfortunately, Alyona came to realize that her parents were absent once again upon seeing the Malfoys standing alone.
"Ah, there you two are," said Draco's father, "how was your journey? Free of dementors, I hope."
"It was a smooth ride. We just did our best to nap most of the time," Draco responded.
Narcissa flashed the children a lovely smile, as she was excited that her two favorite people, aside from her husband, had returned home.
"You look lovely, Alyona. Have you been enjoying your new wardrobe?"
Alyona looked gleefully at Narcissa, "Oh yes, I love all of it! I feel so posh."
"You certainly look it, as well," Lucius added, "Shall we get going? It's a rather long carriage ride back home."
The Malfoys and their Blossom habitué made their way out of the crowd and to their luxe carriage where Wheezy was waiting to take them on a soaring ride through the nighttime sky over southern England.
~ooOOOoo~
When the family arrived at the manor, the hour was extremely late and unsurprisingly, Draco and Alyona had fallen back asleep once more.
Narcissa had also decided to rest her eyes as she laid on Lucius's shoulder nearly the entire way home.
After a smooth landing, mister Malfoy gently woke up his sleeping bride, doing his best not to startle her.
"Wake up, Love. We've made it."
After a moment, Narcissa's eyes fluttered open as she took in her surroundings.
She eventually caught glimps of of her son, cradling Alyona in his arms as they both slept peacefully
"Awww, look at that," she whispered, "They're adorable."
Lucius smiled as he woke up his son, "Draco, son?"
Draco awoke and without realizing that he had someone sleeping in his lap, began to stand up when his father stopped him.
"Careful, you're holding precious cargo."
Draco looked down at his lap, feeling foolish for forgetting about the blonde witch that was comfortably resting on him.
"Darling? Wake up, we're finally home."
Alyona opened her eyes momentarily before shutting them again and whispering, "I'm still so tired."
Draco quietly chuckled down at her while he stroked her soft tresses.
"Come on, sleeping beauty. Let's go inside and slip into our big, comfy bed, yeah?"
Alyona reluctantly forced herself off of Draco, stretched her limbs and exited the carriage with the Malfoys.
Once everyone was prepped and ready for bed, Alyona and Draco said their goodnights to his parents before heading to bed themselves.
Once encased between the layers upon layers of silk sheets, downy feather blankets and fluffy pillows, Draco pulled Alyona close for her to cuddle up to his chest.
They both fell fast asleep in the comfort of their exorbitant bedding, and each other's arms.
~ooOOOoo~
The next morning as the sun had just finished rising, the family gathered at the long, dark wood dining table for breakfast.
Near the fireplace stood a fifty good Christmas tree, decorated with an assortment of silver ornaments, tinsel, and everlasting icicles.
The rest of the manor he'd been decked out with posh, silver accents and decorative trimmings, courtesy of Wheezy. The little elf had orchestrated a holiday scene that was truly extravagant and magical.
As they four blondes ate their delicious meal, Lucius decided to bestow some information upon the rest of them, knowing that his wife would probably be put into an unsavory mood after hearing what he had to say.
"I spoke with your father a few days ago, 'Cissa," Lucius said, "They'll be spending Christmas with us this year."
Narcissa was about to enjoy another bite of her dish when she dropped the fork she was eating with onto the table and covered her face with her hands.
"Why, Lucius? Why must they visit? You know how estranged my relationship with my mother has been in recent years."
Lucius nodded, "I do. Which is why I feel that it would be beneficial for you to spend some quality time with her, to show her how wonderful of a life you have, and how happy you are."
Narcissa sighed, exhausted at the thought of dealing with her mother's snide comments about her life and the constant begging for her to move back home.
"Lucius, Sweetheart... I don't think you fully understand the level of lunacy my mother is currently operating under."
Lucius gazed smugly at his wife, "But, when I say the same about my father, I'm in the wrong?"
Narcissa glared daggers at her husband.
"You know it's not the same thing."
Draco and Alyona continued to work on their gourmet breakfast as mister and misses Malfoy continued on with their tense conversation.
"Well, all I know is you all might want to make sure you're properly dressed within the next couple of hours. They should be here by noon."
Narcissa sighed heavily as she closed her eyes in frustration, "Oh my god…"
~ooOOOoo~
It was a crisp winter morning as a light snow fall sprinkled the grounds of Malfoy manor.
As the Malfoys and Alyona stood near the entrance to their shadowy manor, Wheezy was ambling slowly past them in order to let their guests inside.
"Is it too late to cancel?" Narcissa asked desperately.
"Oh hush, Darling. Everything will be fine," Lucius insisted.
Wheezy mustered all of his strength to pry open the doors, just like he always had to do.
The large wooden doors opened to reveal the pleasant yet intimidating faces of Narcissa's parents, Cygnus and Druella Black.
While it was clear that Druella had passed down her lovely looks to her daughter, being that she was tall and slim with regal beauty, Cygnus was quite the opposite. He was handsome, sure, but he was stocky with a gruffly appearance due to his dark, slightly messy hair and matching goatee.
"Welcome, welcome," Lucius greeted as the Black couple entered through the threshold, "Wheezy! See to their bags!"
"Right away, master," The little elf chirped.
Cygnus was visibly impressed with how attentive and enthusiastic his son-in-law's elf was to help.
"Wow, I like this one's spirits! Our elf just groans and grumbles all day long. A kill joy, really."
Lucius politely chuckled at Cygnus's humor before responding.
"Would you like to come upstairs? We have tea and an assortment of snacks layers out for you both."
Druella smiled, "That sounds lovely, we'd love t—"
Misses Black abruptly ended her sentence as she looked upon the girl standing next to the Malfoy's son with a look of being awe-stricken.
Druella felt as if time had rewound itself and she was gazing upon her bright and happy little girl again.
"This must be Alyona," Druella said, "I was hoping I'd get to meet her. Has she been staying with you?"
Narcissa nodded and smiled, "Yes, she's been quite the ideal guest. The Blossoms wanted us to look after her, and we couldn't have been happier about it. Draco is certainly over the moon about it, aren't you?"
Draco grinned brightly, "It's amazing having her here. It was quite miserable having to sleep in separate dorms at school."
"They already share a bed?" Cygnus asked.
"They do, "Lucius said with a nod, "No need to worry about anything happening. They're just children."
Druella now was looking at the pair together with a slight grimace present on her face. Seeing Draco and Alyona side by side was a visual representation of Lucius and her darling daughter, and that thought didn't bring her the greatest amount of joy like it probably should have.
"Shall we head upstairs?" Lucius gently reminded the group.
~ooOOOoo~
At the table, the Malfoys and the Blacks engaged in conversation while Alyona just sat their and sipped her tea.
"I have a meeting with some of the other sacred families scheduled for the twenty-seventh," Cygnus said, "I'd like to ask your father if he'd be willing to antend as well."
Lucius looked at his father-in-law with subtle surprise and intrigue as he split a scone in half in order to dip it into his tea.
"I'm sure my father would love to attend. What for is the meeting?"
"It's to hopefully convince the ministry to lift this whole muggle protection act nonsense," Cygnus stated in an unpleased manner, "These bi-annual home inspections are simply ridiculous. It feels like a total invasion of our privacy."
"Absolutely," replied Lucius, "Why is our ministry even going out of their way to protect muggles? We want nothing to do with them. I'm not going to expend my precious energy just to exact malicious doings onto them."
Cygnus then turned to Alyona, who was attentively listening.
"What say you, Alyona? I've heard you've had quite the set of scares at school. Some of it having to do with a Muggleborn."
Alyona timidly put down her cup of tea and batted her mouth with the emerald green napkin before responding.
"Well, I did have one instance with this Slytherin boy at school. His name is Bradley, he's the muggleborn you probably heard about."
Cygnus grew an expression of great insult upon learning that a muggleborn was sorted into Slytherin house.
"A muggleborn…in Slytherin..?"
Narcissa nodded, "I know, I was just as shocked as you are when I found that out."
Cygnus then continued his questioning.
"I'm terribly sorry that you have to deal with one of their kind on a daily basis. I can only imagine how annoying it must be."
"Well, after the whole forbidden forest incident, he was was rather nice," Alyona admitted, "He's very studious and helped me with potions when I needed it."
Cygnus raised a brow, confused as to why a Blossom was talking so highly about a muggleborn.
"I can tell this one was raised to be exceptionally polite, that's very good, "Cygnus commented, "But you need not apply those manners when talking about their kind. They don't deserve your respect, anyone's for that matter."
Alyona nodded hesitantly as she continued on with her story.
"Well, one day, he just…turned on me. I don't know what I did, but he definitely doesn't like me anymore, to say the least."
Cygnus chuckled, "Ah, of course. Leave it to their kind to not know when their in the presence of greatness. Bloody imbeciles, all of them."
"Thankfully, Draco is rather gifted with potions. He's helped me more than Bradley ever could."
Draco displayed great pride as he placed a kiss on his beloved's temple.
"You can come to me whenever you need help with any subject, I like helping you," Draco cooed.
Lucius then excitedly chimed in with what he had planned for the group on this fine winter afternoon.
"Would anyone care for a sleigh ride around the manor's property? I bet the kids would find it entertaining.
Draco and Alyona nodded in unison with smiles of anticipation on their faces.
~ooOOOoo~
As the light dusting of snow continued to fall, the six of them were loaded up into the large, Victorian-esque looking sleigh.
Alyona gasped at the beautiful white abraxan that were connected by reigns to the sleigh.
Wheezy hopped onto the drivers seat, cracked the reigns and off they were.
The cold air nipped at their faces as they traveled quickly over the white ground.
Draco reached over to hike up the scarf Alyona was wearing in order keep ward off the frigid winds.
Narcissa admired her son's chivalry, as it reminded her of how caring and attentive Lucius had always been. Druella however, was not pleased in the slightest.
After taking a lap around the property, it was back inside for some hot chocolate around the warm fire.
~ooOOOoo~
Shortly after stepping back into the toasty warmth of the manor, Wheezy had passed out mugs of hot chocolate as the family settled by the fireplace.
Alyona was dressed in a simple pink fit and flare dress with cream colored tights while Draco was in a dark green t-shirt and black lounging pants as they both sat and giggled to themselves about random nonsense.
While everyone was enjoying their time, locked within their own conversations, the growing sound of foot steps echoed throughout the manor.
Everyone looked over to see Lucius's father, Abraxas Malfoy rounding the corner and making his way over to the group.
"Well, I see we have some visitors," Abaxas said cheerfully.
Cygnus smiled and rose from his seat, "Well well, long time no see."
The two men shared a firm handshake, "yes I suppose it has been quite some time. How have you and Druella been?"
Cygnus hesitated for a moment while he thought of the best response that was both honest and light-hearted.
"We've been busy. I try to attend board meetings at the ministry when I can, I prefer to give input when it comes to magical issues involving muggles."
Abraxas gave a look of disgust upon hearing that word, "Well, be sure to mention how incredibly inconsiderate these idiotic ministry raids are. I don't quite like feeling on edge about what I posses in my own home."
Cygnus nodded, delighted at Abraxas's stance on the issue.
"Well, I suppose you wouldn't mind attending the meeting with me one of these days? Your input would be invaluable, as well as your son's."
Abraxas seemed conflicted at the request, a feeling that his face displayed clearly.
"This is officially ministry business, correct? Not that death eater nonsense that my son took part in?"
Lucius practically jumped out of the comfy chair he was sat in to prevent his father from speaking further.
"Father! Not here, not in front of the children."
The men in the room looked over at the woman and children who tried their hardest to look as if they hadn't overheard anything.
"How about us men go into my office and we can discuss this matter further there, hmm?" Lucius suggested.
As the men left the room, Narcissa's mother took the opportunity to ask her burning question.
"So, sweetheart. Have you…thought anymore about maybe coming home for a little while?"
Draco and Alyona both heard this and glanced over.
"Mother…you must be joking at this point…" Narcissa uttered as she rolled her eyes. Her hope of having a stress free visit from her mother had once again turned out to be too much to ask for."
"You can even bring Draco with you if you're afraid to be without him." Druella offered in the hopes that it would sway her daughter's already made up mind.
Draco unintentionally winced at the thought of stay with his grandparents as he too knew how off the rocker Druella truly was.
"I'm too sober for this—" Narcissa sighed as instead of demanding Wheezy to fetch some peppermint liquor to add to her hot chocolate, she got up and went to the kitchen herself in order to escape her mother."
Draco also so this as a great opportunity to speak with his mother alone.
"I'll be right back, Darling," he said as he ran after Narcissa.
Alyona turned to Druella with the intention of possibly making small talk until the others returned. To her surprise, Narcissa's mother was already staring down at her with an expression that signaled that she was longing for something, which made Alyona feel uncomfortable.
Alyona turned away from Narcissa's glaring mother and stood up to use the bathroom. The young girl walked away from the fireplace as Druella kept her dark eyes fixed on her the entire time. Misses Black sipped on her hot chocolate as she silently began plotting how to carry out her sinister plan.
~ooOOOoo~
As Narcissa rummaged through the alcohol selection, Draco entered the kitchen and approached his mother.
"Oh, Hello Dear," Narcissa said kindly. She could tell by his expression that he wanted something.
Draco took a quick glance around the room, confirming that no one else was present before asking, "Did you find a match?"
Narcissa sighed as she ceased to search for her liquor of choice in order to face her son directly.
"About that—"
Draco knew from his mother's tone of voice that the news she had for him wasn't going to be great.
"I—I went through those signatures with your father's ministry grade equipment countless times and…none of the signatures matched…"
Draco's heart sunk deeply as his eyes widened.
"But…how? Surely the equipment must be faulty. Wasn't every elite family at the Hallowe'en ball this year?"
Narcissa nodded sadly, "Every single one."
"This doesn't make sense," Draco expressed, "Are you sure they all signed it."
Narcissa once again confirmed her son's query with a nod of defeat.
"But…Alyona…What if they get her?! What if they get her before we catch them?!" Draco said frantically.
"We won't let that happen, none of us," Narcissa said, "Your father and I will make sure of it. For now, you mustn't let Alyona know of your fear. It's your job to stay strong for her. Understand?"
"Yes mother," Draco agreed.
Draco began to turn around to head back up the main living room when Narcissa suddenly had another thought come to mind.
"Oh, before you go—"
Draco stopped in his tracks to face his mother once more.
"Those shoes and that belt that Alyona gifted you…Don't wear them anymore."
Draco looked confused as to why his mother would care about such a thing.
"What's wrong with them?" Draco asked.
Narcissa sighed, "Don't tell her I told you this, because I know she had good intentions. However, the items that she gifted you…they're muggle brands."
Draco's jaw dropped, his eyes wide at what his mother had just informed him.
"There…there what!?"
Narcissa could see how negatively this information was affecting her son, and she needed to act fast if she was to ease him.
"Now don't lose your head. That particular designer is popular amongst witches and wizards as well, as a matter of fact, Gabby's Galleria sells their products. However, they also cater to muggle society. So, just refrain from wearing them from now on, and just tell her you out grew them. Only mention it if she asks though. No need to make a fuss about it."
"Okay, mother," Draco said calmly.
Narcissa smiled lovingly at her son, "Speaking of out growing things, I wish you'd stop growing. You're going to surpass my height by next year if you keep sprouting like you have been."
Draco hugged his mother before strutting off to rejoin his beloved for some more holiday fun.
PLEASE REVIEW:)
