A/N: This is entry #1 for the We Got Locked Down! (but we'll get out again) drabbles contest in QLFC's Prophet Issue #6.
Title: The Next Day, Their Lives Began Again
Words: 595
It was 7:22 in the morning of November 1, 1981—a date no one in the Wizarding world would soon forget—when Narcissa Malfoy walked through the front door of Malfoy Manor and was practically accosted by her husband.
"Where have you been? You were gone when I woke." Lucius boomed so loudly she was sure he'd wake their seventeen-month-old son, Draco.
"Nowhere!" She lied.
"You can't leave the estate right now." His voice lowered. "You've heard what's happened?"
"Of course I've heard, Lucius. I went to check on my sister."
"Bellatrix was here. So, let's try that again," he said harshly, his eyes unforgiving.
Narcissa glanced around for her eldest sister, the only one she was supposed to speak to. It appeared she had already come and gone. She cast Severus' clever Muffliato charm just in case.
"Andy," she hissed. "I checked on Andy. She refused to see me, but that's all I needed. Confirmation she was alive."
Lucius trembled before her and she couldn't decide if it was from anger or fear. She placed a comforting hand on his forearm, and he let out a ragged breath.
"Bellatrix thinks it's a false alarm. She is certain the Dark Lord is simply in hiding as he tends to his wounds."
"Why would she come here? She doesn't…does she?" Narcissa left the words suspect us unspoken to be safe.
"She thought we were harboring Him. Narcissa, she's unhinged." His eyes widened and she leaned closer to him, suddenly feeling more connected to him than she had since they conceived their son two years ago. Lucius continued in a whisper, "She's wrong. He's gone. Look at my mark."
He pulled up the black sleeve of his robe up to reveal his pale left arm. She could just make out the faint scar-like discoloration where his Dark Mark typically shone ink black.
"So it's true then?" She breathed. "That baby, Harry Potter, stopped the Dark Lord?"
"Don't say such treason aloud!"
"Lucius, don't you see what this means? We can finally live again."
Her husband stood in silence, but his eyes flickered, his mind fast at work.
"Well," he began in a businesslike voice. "We certainly must clean up our reputation. Bend your ear for any fiscal opportunities to promote the good Malfoy name in society. The others will be lying low for a time, but we must rise up and show ourselves. The Wizarding world must see us celebrate alongside them."
"Won't that be dangerous? It seems very unlike us to celebrate such a thing. What will the other pureblood families say?"
"If they have any sense at all, they will be doing the same. The Ministry will begin to crack down on any suspected followers. Do you want me going to Azkaban?"
Narcissa shook her head and Lucius took her hands in his. Her heart beat faster at his touch.
"I love you, Narcissa. We will come out of this on top. Malfoys always do."
"I believe you," she whispered.
He bent down to kiss her and something unshackled inside her. They were free of the Dark Lord. They had escaped him.
When Lucius next murmured, "Let's go back to bed," she happily agreed.
She felt lighter than she had in over a decade, since before the death of Minister Leach, before the war began, before her sister left their family. She felt like she was floating on air and she let it carry her up the stairs, her hand clutching excitedly to her husband's, as if nothing could ever stand in their way again.