If you don't understand how a woman could both love her sister dearly and want to wring her neck at the same time, then you were probably an only child.
Linda Sunshine.
Narcissa hadn't spoken to her sister –
-her remaining sister, her only sister, a constant and not very pleasant reminder when she had come eye to eye with the woman who resembled Bellatrix so much, in appearance if not in character –
-for more than two decades. She had hardly even seen her since the day she had walked out of the Black household, carrying her suitcases and ignoring her mother's screams, while she herself had restrained Bellatrix from hexing Andromeda on the spot. When the second of the Black daughters had chosen to marry the Muggleborn, Ted Tonks, her youngest sibling had simply taken it for granted that her sister was as good as dead, to herself and to her family.
It had made it far easier.
Nevertheless, Andromeda had looked very lively indeed for a dead person when she had opened the door at Narcissa's first knock, probably expecting her ever since she had agreed to the visit that the younger woman had requested, not very hopefully, of her. Her soft brown hair hadn't thinned with the years and still looked as beautiful as ever, despite the faint streaks of grey in it, and despite the time that had inevitably passed her figure and face didn't look that much different from the young woman who had turned her back on her family and walked away from them without a thought.
Only her eyes have really changed, she had thought, as the two had stared at each other, one on the doorstep of the house, the other quiet in the doorway. The 'Black eyes', as the other students had always used to joke at Hogwarts –
-Merlin, that seemed so long ago and far away now-
- the characteristic wide eyes that had made the girls so admired; once Andromeda's had been warm, perhaps even laughing, if such descriptions could truly be ascribed to the orbs with which a person saw, but they were different now. They were not manic, as Bellatrix's dark ones had grown with time, or rabid as her own had been on occasion when she had forced herself to look in a mirror. They were simply lined, and tired. They had blinked and stared, and blinked again, and still blinked now as she poured the tea.
They were an old woman's eyes, not the eyes of the sister that she remembered, the sister that had died.
She had had to work hard to keep her face straight at hearing Andromeda's voice again, after so long, so very long. It was only a little changed with the years, the voice of the sister she had run to when she had been upset or afraid or curious, the sister whom she had loved more than Bella, more than anyone; the sister who had betrayed them and left them.
She hadn't imagined that it would be like this at all. She had imagined that Andromeda, despite her agreement to the letter that had begged a visit, might scream, spit, shout, pull out her wand and start throwing well justified curses at her. It was what Bellatrix certainly would have done, and what she probably would have done as well, now she thought about it. But then, Andromeda had always been different from her two sisters, in more than one way. Where they would have shrieked and bellowed and harmed, she chose instead, against all rationality, to welcome and make at home. She chose to usher her guest into the lamp-lit sitting room and fetch tea herself with milk and two sugars for each of them-
-in mugs, of all things-
- leaving her plenty of time to stare at her surroundings.
Narcissa shook her head at the strangeness of it all, with the disbelief of a woman who had gone mad and had cured her insanity simply through her sheer bloody will and desire to save her loved ones, as her eyes focused again on the items on the mantelpiece.
Most of them were framed photographs. It occurred to her that she had hardly ever even seen a picture of Ted Tonks, or himself in person, yet by some chance she was easily able to recognise him in many of the pictures that moved within the frames.
A grinning fair-haired man, waltzing around a small room with a younger version of Andromeda.
The same man, slightly older and now bearded.
And another photograph of him somewhere in-between those ages, holding the arms of a blue-haired toddler and helping her to walk, laughing all the while…
There were pictures, too, of that toddler as she had grown older. Nymphadora Tonks, the niece Narcissa had never truly acknowledged that she had, smiled from most of the frames in her mother's lonely living room as she rode her first broomstick, as she left for a Weird Sisters concert, as she was officially made an Auror, as she beamed alongside the creature –
-the man-
-that had been her husband; her pretty face grinning and her hair constantly changing colour, never staying the same shade for more than a few seconds in any of the pictures. It was dizzying to watch, as if they were making up for the permanent absence of the original they were copied from.
Narcissa looked at the evidence of a family that should never have been, and tried not to avert her eyes. She had not come here to cringe, she…
She didn't even know why she had come here.
What madness that remained in her brain had prevailed upon her to enter the home of her disowned sister, and sit and be confronted by all that she had lost? Why should she, the one who had survived and come through this whole terrible business with her family more or less intact and alive, presume to intrude upon Andromeda's still raw grief? For the first time since Andromeda had turned away, she began to be aware of her feelings, and understood how very hypocritical she herself was.
"So."
She started and nearly spilled tea on her hands in a very ungraceful manner at the sound, once more, of Andromeda's voice. She looked around to where she sat in a worn arm chair, apparently lost in contemplation of her own mug, but when he voice came again it was as sharp as ever.
The first conversation the two had had since they had rejected each other went something like this.
"Why have you come here, Narcissa? It can't simply be to catch up on over twenty years of lost gossip."
A mug faltered at pale lips.
""I came because I couldn't keep away any longer."
An eyebrow slowly, gracefully raised.
"Really? You did quite a good job of it in the time since I left."
A slightly wry, slightly harsh smile.
A smile not returned.
"I know you think that I'm a weak fool. Perhaps I am. You don't need to keep reminding me of it yet again. You were in the right, I was in the wrong. Are you satisfied?"
A close stare over the rim of a mug.
"That sort of thing could never satisfy me. You're aware of that, I'm sure of it."
A pause in conversation, in accusation.
A sip of tea.
"I hope you're proud of what you and your husband did to Draco, you know."
"I beg your pardon?"
Another sip of tea.
"You know perfectly well what I am speaking of. If you were proud of what he and Lucius had done and become, that at least would give you an excuse: you were prejudiced, scathing, you didn't know any better. But if you were ashamed of the fact that you were turning your son into a murderer and yet did nothing to try and stop those around you, then that would be far, far worse. So I hoped that you were proud, because it was better for me to think that you were brainwashed by the family dogma rather than you were too cowardly to do anything else."
Trembling, outraged hands spill tea over fingers.
"You…you don't understand what it was like! You don't understand what it was like at all!"
Lips parted, lips pursed.
"No. No, perhaps I didn't. I thought that I did when I left the family, but I didn't truly understand until it was too late. Now, I'm simply glad that I got out when I did."
Eyes lowered, looking away from a brown, nailing gaze.
"I - I did want it to stop. For them. I wanted to keep them safe. You can't truly imagine what it was like; I know that you can't possibly. You lived in fear that your husband and daughter might die, each day. I lived in the certainty that my husband and son would dieif they didn't do what he wanted. Every day, every single damn day, death stared me in the face – not my own, I could have bourn that willingly. But the death of Lucius, of Draco…"
A muffled sob quickly cut off.
"You would have given your own life for Ted, for Nymphadora, wouldn't you?"
A grunt of assent.
"Well, I would have done the same for them, and more than that."
A pause.
A noise, something between a sigh and a groan.
"And I know that you would have. And I know why, as well. Knowing that, it's harder to blame you. It's always been hard to blame you and hate you."
Silence, broken only by the drinking of tea.
A change in tone.
"So. How is Lucius, now?"
Both gratefulness and awkwardness.
"The charge has been lightened. He will escape severe punishment."
Silence.
A sip from a still fairly full mug of tea.
"And your son?"
The thankfulness is palpable, unavoidable.
"Draco has been cleared of all charges."
Rawness, like fresh meat cut from a still warm carcass.
"Ah."
Silence, broken only by more drinking of tea and a silent, unspoken accusation.
Why the hell is your husband free, when mine was hunted down and murdered?
Why is it that your son is still alive, when my daughter is dead?
The bitterness of injustice is choked down along with the tea, on both sides.
"What will you do now, then?"
"I…don't know yet. The mansion has been taken from us, but we still have some money left. We will survive. We have each other; that is what is important."
A chilly look from the woman who now has nobody.
A pause.
"That is good to know."
A clink as a mug is set down upon a wooden surface.
"Andromeda, I am so very-"
"No."
Another clink, as a second mug is set aside.
"I'm afraid that I cannot let you talk like that, Narcissa."
"But-"
"I cannot allow it. It isn't your right to speak as if you care, when both of us know that you wouldn't have shed a tear if it had been Lucius or Draco that killed Ted and Nymphadora. It was simply sheer luck on her part that our dear sister-"
The pain, the still sharp bitterness as she falters.
How much worse than to lose a husband, a soul mate, the love of your life, is to lose a child, the child that grew from within you and is part of you as nothing else can be, the life that grows with your love? And how much worse to know that it was your sister, however estranged, another who shared that watery world inside your own mother, who should have loved you and her niece but instead hated you both, hated you enough to kill one and rip out the heart of the other without ever touching them?
A gathering of strength as she continues.
"-managed to get to my daughter and her husband first. She would have spat on my own cold corpse rather than apologise for what she had done, so why gives you the right to be any different from her, little sister?"
The scrape of a chair across a carpet, being pushed back as someone stands up quickly.
"I don't know! Andromeda, I don't know. A good deal has happened to me these past few years. I went mad, and I came out at the other side. I hardly know what I am any more. But I know that the two people I love most in the world still did many very terrible things, and yet they are alive, while your loved ones are dead. And I know that there is nothing in this world that I can do to…to…"
A silence.
"To atone?"
"Yes."
Shame.
Sorrow.
"Narcissa, come with me. I want you to meet someone very special."
Andromeda really didn't know why she had led her sister up to the second floor of her echoing house, filled with ghosts she couldn't see but could still feel, but perhaps it was the madness that Narcissa had mentioned. Fear was contagious; perhaps madness was too.
She had feared, more than once, that she herself would descend down the same route of madness that first one and then another of her sisters, however set apart from her, had taken. Narcissa had had something to pull her back from the brink, or at least haul her back up quickly.
Bellatrix…hadn't.
Was she any different? Would she be any different? She had something to hold her back, certainly, but would it be enough? The gaping hole in her own heart was like an abyss, and there were days when she peered over the edge, wondering if it would be a release to fall.
The weight of her dead son-in-law and dead husband and dead, dead daughter weighed down on her, threatening to tip hher over once and for all.
And then they crossed the doorway of the room, the special room, the treasured room, and she took her sister, the sister who had never truly died in her heart, by the hand and led her to the cradle, and they looked down.
She reached forward and stroked his head, his golden head that quickly turned brown and then black and then blue as he burbled in his slumber. And she knew that this was enough. Yes, this was enough. This would always be enough. Enough to keep her sane, enough to help her to live.
"This is Teddy, Narcissa. My grandson. Your grand-nephew. Teddy Lupin. Teddy Remus Lupin. Named for his grandfather and father, you know. His parents were both half-bloods and his father was a werewolf, and I suppose that makes Teddy…well, how would you say it, Narcissa? I would just say he's a baby, not a category, but you should know better than anyone how things are…"
"What do you want of me, Andromeda?" her sister who had never died muttered, without taking her eyes off Teddy's hair, changing slowly from ultramarine to emerald green as he slept on peacefully.
"Not an apology or any offer of friendship, since I know you won't be able to give either completely sincerely, Narcissa, and the last thing I want is to force you."
She straightened, her fingers leaving Teddy' soft skin with regret.
"I only want these things from you. These things, and no more. Nothing else for you to do."
"What things?"
"I want you to promise that, even if you never speak Teddy's name again after you've left this house, or even mention him, you will remember him."
That was what kept a person alive, even if they were still alive – being remembered. Sirius, even when he had been thrown into Azkaban, had kept her, his favourite cousin, alive in his heart, and she had kept him alive in hers. And now she would keep those she loved alive in more than just photographs that moved – they would live, through Teddy and through her.
"I want you to promise that you will remember that he is alive, when my husband and my daughter and her husband are dead."
The memory of all those who did not survive: a sobering reflection. She counted the list each day, each long day. My son-in-law. My husband. My sweet, beautiful daughter. That was what kept people sad, and also what kept them going. The ones who had died so that others could go on, and live.
"I want you to remember that he will never know his parents or his grandfather, that they died before he could know them. I want you to remember why they died, and remember that Teddy will be proud of them, and proud that he is their son and my husband's grandson, and proud that they all helped to make a world without fear for him to live in. Can you do that, do you think?"
She was satisfied to see Narcissa nod obediently, never looking away from the crib and its little occupant, and went on, speaking more gently than she had before.
"Go back to your husband and son, Cissy. They need you more than I do. And Teddy needs me more than you do. We have to go on. That's our job – to go on. You've survived without me for a score of years and more, you can do without me for more than that."
Narcissa suddenly looked up, her eyes bright with tears. "It's always this way, isn't it? Parents would die to save their children. Children would die to save their children. That is love, isn't it? That is always love."
And then the ice cold, troubled, fragile youngest Black girl opened her arms and threw them around the mellow, tranquil, lost second Black girl, and tears seeped from both their Black eyes.
Andromeda waited until Narcissa had calmed down a little, and then quietly released her. She did not kiss her on the head as she had done when they were little; the time for such things had been lost, forgotten, long ago.
"Go away now, Cissy. Make sure that Draco learns to be tolerant. Make sure that Lucius learns to be merciful. Do a better job teaching them to live again than you did bringing them up. And teach them both understanding. I'll teach Teddy forgiveness and hope in return. Is that a deal?"
"Yes."
"Good. I trust you can let yourself out."
Narcissa stared at her for a few heartbeats. Then, slowly, she smiled. A happy smile, not the smile of someone crazed or wicked. The smile her little sister had had, even when she was being poisoned by prejudiced lies and falsehoods, force-fed hatred and persecution. Now the poison was – not gone, but swiftly being diluted and purged.
Perhaps there truly was hope for little Cissy.
"Thank you, Dromeda," she whispered, saying the pet name her lips had not tasted for eons. She turned and walked out of the room. Andromeda heard her walking down the stairs, and heard the front door close behind her.
When Narcissa began to walk down the stone steps outside the door, preparing to Apparate, the two of them were already at the window, looking down at her, Teddy held close in Andromeda's arms ever since she had scooped him carefully up out of his crib and carried him across the floor to see her go. Her grandson blinked sleepily at the golden haired woman who turned back for one last look at the house, before nodding, twirling on the spot and disappearing.
Andromeda Tonks watched Narcissa Malfoy move away from her once more with only one look back, and oddly, she felt – as her grandson grabbed a piece of her brown hair to chew on, just as Nymphadora had done when she was a baby, and she laughed at his actions just as Ted had always done, and her grandson's hair changed at that to the colour that his father's had been – that she had rarely felt more pleased and proud.