Shoutout goes to:

MissesE: *evil laugh* Hahahaahaa I most certainly made you jumped off your seat with the last chapter huh? XD well you will be doing a lot more jumping later on. I'm glad you enjoyed the little scene with Claire and Lucius on the previous chapter ;) Enjoy this one as well!

Chapter 18 : Unexpected Return

"NARCISSA."

Lucius coughed and cleared his voice, after an eternal long silence. He was still deeply in shocked with the appearance of his supposedly dead wife. Beside him, Draco hadn't lowered his wand, though his hand was obviously shaken.

Narcissa stared at the wand pointed at her from the corner of her eyes, with arms crossed on her chest.

"Now, Draco. Is that really a way to greet your Mother after months of not seeing her?"

Draco snapped out of his thoughts. "My mother's dead. Who are you?"

Narcissa was crestfallen by her son's answer. Though, she understood why. After all, nobody had expected her to be alive. Even Narcissa herself didn't expect to still be breathing today had it wasn't for...

"It's true that the Dark Lord had used Avada Kedavraon me when he'd found out I'd lied to him about Harry Potter's supposedly death in the Forbidden Forest before his death. I shouldn't still be alive. Had it wasn't for my kind older sister who had saved me, Andromeda. You remember her don't you, Lucius dear?"

Lucius blinked his eyes from his far away thoughts. He looked up at his wife, still not believing that she was standing before him. While his mind was busily wandered to his wife, Lucius had forgotten all about Claire who stood awkwardly behind Severus Snape with Willy Wonka.

"Yes. I..I remembered her."

Narcissa nodded. "She had been the one who found me dying and bought me back to the Tonks' Family household and had also been the one who treated my wound. While I was there, I had a lot of things to think about..."

Narcissa spoke forlornly with a soft and quiet voice.

"I thought of my family members, most of the time. How wrongful they were about the importance of blood purity and the family's wealth, the guilts and griefs I felt over the deaths of so many people; including my own eldest sister, Bella and also, Dromeda's only daughter and son-in-law. In addition to that, I had a very hard time accepting the fact that Bella, my own sister had killed our cousin, Sirius Black."

Narcissa looked away from the polished floor to her husband and son.

"I didn't mean to deceive any of you about my death. Honest. I needed some time for myself to re-evaluate everything that had happened to our lives before and after the war. I'm very sorry, Draco."

Draco looked at her with red watery eyes. He was clearly torn between wanting to hug her or stayed mad at her for deceiving him.

Meanwhile, Severus Snape who had also been in a great shock earlier, cleared his throat before addressing a question. All the while, trying to grasp the situation on hands.

"What made you decided to come forward now, Narcissa? Why now and not sooner?"

Narcissa took out a parchment from her skirt's pocket. Using wordless magic, she tossed it over to Severus who caught it perfectly.

"I received that threatening letter a while ago."

Severus read it aloud:

"'Blood traitors who dared to betray the Dark Lord shall suffer fate that's even worse than death itself.' It's written in blood."

"I came back to warn you and to protect my family from whoever the idiot who dared to threaten the Malfoy's family with petty words."

"I need to report this to Shacklebolt immediately. We've been trailing down the mysterious schemer who had been sending us threats for months without any successful outcomes. Does anyone else beside your sister knows about your current situation?"

"Yes. Shacklebolt and Harry Potter."

"He knew you alive?! That half-blood scum!" Draco's voice rose aloud with rage. Even Lucius who had been quiet had abruptly looked up.

Narcissa raised her hand before Draco could spat more curses to Potter.

Calmly she said, "It had been my decision to let him know, Draco. Shacklebolt knew I'm still alive through Dromeda, and I chose to tell Potter in regards for all the mean words I had said and acted toward him for the past years. We've made an agreement that he would not tell anyone about it. Not even to you, Draco, until I am ready to reveal to you myself."

While Draco still fumed over his arch-rival, Severus chose to take his leave to deliver the important news to Shacklebolt. Leaving only the five of them.

A moment after he had calmed himself down, Draco approached his mother and wrapped his arms around her in a tight embrace. Lucius followed closely behind him and kissed his wife's cheek before embracing his family in a tight hug.

it was supposed to be a tender moment.

It should be a happy and tender moment for a family who had previously thought falling apart when one of them had died, and by miracle, was back together again as one.

Thus, she shouldn't be sad about this, right?

Claire Rollins tried to argue her heart with logical thinking. Biting her lower trembling lips from sobbing out. She told and reminded herself over and over again that this was as far as her relationship with Lucius goes.

You're the light I'm the shadow on the wall when you sleep
Everything that I need is right here with me

She had to do the right thing now.

She had to let him go, back to his wife and son. To his family.

Her fairy tale dream end here and now.

Beside her, Willy Wonka looked gloomily at her. It didn't take a genius to figure out what she had in mind judging from the look on her face. Willy knew what came in next. Though he could not predict his God-daughter's future, he could however, predict the Malfoy's future － they would lived happily and together again as one.

There was no room for her whatsoever.

Little time not a moment wasted with you
I realized to stay
We had to break away

Lucius opened his eyes widely when he suddenly realized something. He pulled back from hugging his family and turned around to look at the front door.

"Claire?"

She was no where in sight.

"Claire?" Lucius' wandered eyes wildly searched for her outside.

"Claire!"

"My dear Lucius, who is it you're calling to?" Narcissa looked at her husband before turning to her son who chose to look down and kept silence.

To her utter surprise, there was a hint of sadness in her son's eyes.

"Claire!" Lucius continuously called her name when suddenly, his left shoe stepped onto something breakable caught his attention.

Lucius knelled down to take a good look what it was he had stepped on when his heart stopped for a beat.

It was the gift he had given to Claire, the love-shaped charm locket with a red Salvia flower, now broken in halves.

Forever Mine.

His eyes widened.

Memories of last night's intimacy flashed in his mind as he stared at the broken locket.

No.

Lucius felt as if someone had just dumped a bucket of icy water on him.

His blood ran cold.

"CLAIRE!" He barked loudly.

"Good Merlin, Lucius!" Narcissa scolded.

Now she was getting worried and utterly confused. In all of her twenty-one years of marriage to the man, never before had she seen him in such great distressed over something like he was now.

Goodbye
Good Goodbye

No.

No.

NO!

Lucius tried to keep himself calm. He took a long deep breath, holding the now half-broken charm pendant in his hand.

Before Narcissa could say anything else, Lucius had apparate to Merlin knows where.

Lucius appeared in the Muggle World in a silence 'pop', at the front of the Claire's Apartment whom she shared with Severus.

Lucius entered the apartment in a rush and made his way to their unit. Once arrived, instead of using the key to unlock the door, Lucius cast a spell to forcefully opened it.

His mouth was agape with shock at the half empty apartment. Lucius quickly moved to Claire's private chamber and found out that all her stuff were gone and left with only an empty forsaken room.

There was a letter on the floor, written especially to him.

"Dear Lucius,

I wish you all the happiness to you and your family.

Please don't look for me . What we had is something that I will always cherish for the rest of my life.

Be a good husband to Narcissa, Lucius. She deserves you after all you both been through.

Yours Truly,

Claire Rollins."

Lucius's shaky hand dropped the letter as he curled up on the floor like an infant. He felt his own lungs deflate. Something was literally breaking inside of him. He could feel it.

His heart.

That was when no matter how hard Lucius tried to stop the fluids from flowing out of his eyes, he couldn't. The stinging sensation was too much for him to take.

SEVERUS Snape slammed the front door of his Apartment rather loudly and damped all his school beg somewhere on the floor before heading toward the kitchen to fetch himself a cold bottle of Firewhiskey that he kept in the fridge.

He then proceed to the living room and seated on his comfortable sofa in front of the Muggle's television, with his legs crossed as he watched the news.

Severus had been in a gloomy mood as lately.

Today had been a terrible day for him at school. He had lose his temper to almost all his insufferable students who were either not completing their assignments or not paying attention in the classroom at all.

Drinking the Firewhiskey straight from the bottle, Severus pondered in the silence of his apartment. He looked at the big calendar hanging on the wall.

The date was now 3rd March 1999.

Two and a half months had passed since the sudden disappearance of Claire Rollins a day after last Christmas and the unexpected return of Narcissa Malfoy.

On that same day, after Severus had given into his reports to Shacklebolts and returned home for a nice hot shower and a change of cloth, he too had been in shock to see the apartment was half-empty.

"What the Devil is going on here?" Severus shouted.

Just as he had passed by the living room, once again, he had been caught off guarded by Lucius' presence in Claire's room, sitting on the floor, looking at nothingness.

"Lucius?" Severus had carefully asked as he observed the otherwise empty room.

"She's gone."

"I can see that, Lucius. It appears she decided to take everything along with her as well." Severus gotten on his knee and picked up a piece of letter laying on the floor.

After reading the letter for a minute, he had sighed.

"While I'm very much inclined to say this to you Lucius, I think you should heed her words on this one."

Lucius turned to glare at his old friend.

"The very reason why you had come to the Muggle world in the first place was because you were grieving for the so called death of your wife," Severus said it as gently as he could. "Now that Narcissa is back safe and sound, I think it is wise if you put your family first. After all, you owed them so much during the war. And as for Miss Rollins." Severus folded the letter carefully.

"It's best if we all forget about her. That way, she would be kept safe from whatever harms and threats that are aiming at us."

Severus had said that, but even he did not know where Miss Rollins had gone off to. After he had let his old friend to have a private grieving for a moment, he had sent the man back to his family with a few private words with Draco to keep a close watch on Lucius.

Something told Severus that his old friend would up to no good if he was being left alone at the moment.

Severus reached out a hand for a letter on the coffee table beside him.

he read the letter silently before pitching the bridge of his nose and let out a loud curse.

Getting up to his feet, Severus switched off the television and walked to his own private chamber to get ready to go for a short travel.

The city of Sheffield, was the third largest English district by population. The metropolitan population of Sheffield is 1,569,000.

It was also here where a carnival was being held.

"Get your delicious ice-cream here over here! It's only £1!" A familiar female voice was shouting at the large crowd.

One by one the crowd who heard her began to walk to her ice-cream truck and placed their ordes.

The young woman at the booth was busily serving her customers.

Who would have thought the Willy Wonka's 'chocolate turned to ice-cream' idea would be such a great hit to the people?

As she was busily serving the customers, the back door of the truck shut loudly, and Willy Wonka himself appeared, carrying a heavy box of ice cream in his arms before putting them beside her.

"How's the business going, love?" He asked while helping her serving the customers.

"Excellent. If we keep this up we'll earned £20,000 today and £40,000 by tomorrow!" Claire Rollins said excitedly.

Willy could only smiled.

It had been long. Too long that he didn't see her smiled like that.

He remember what happened last year when Narcissa Malfoy showed up.

Claire had decided to cut all ties that she had with one Lucius Malfoy without even giving the man to chance to chose.

Claire went as far as moved out of her rented Apartment; leaving enough money for the January rent and letter in Severus's room, and moved all the way here to Sheffield.

It was a mean and unfair move not only to Lucius, but to Severus and all of her other friends as well.

Willy had even told her so, and asked her why.

"Because I refused to become his Mistress." Claire had replied after crying her heart out during the day, on that night.

She looked straight into his eyes with red and puffed eyes filled with stubborn determination.

"I refused to become a homewrecker. What Lucius and I had was something magical and couldn't be forgotten. It was like a fairy tales came true... But even I know fairy tales didn't exist and full of craps. Nobody lives happily ever after."

"You could have if you had just stayed and wait a bit longer!" Willy argued. "Malfoy would have figured something out. He would not let you go simply like that!"

"And what do you want me to do then? Wait for him to leave his wife and be with me instead?! I am not selfish enough to do that! For the record, I know about the Wizard's marriage and the holy unbroken bind every married couple has. Wizarding couple could not get divorced. They would remained to be married until death tears them apart."

Claire took a long deep breath to calm herself down after leashing out at her Godfather.

She felt bad for snapping at her dear Godfather that night. After all, he had been the one who persistedly asked her not to leave.

When Claire had stubbornly made up her mind, Willy had joined her. Stated he would still be loyal and go to the end of the world with her no matter what.

Willy hadn't said anyhing else that night. Because right after she had leashed those words at her, Claire had failed to calm herself down and broke down to tears.

"Hey, pretty lady." An male customer who had paid for the ice cream and was waiting for his order began to flirt with her.

Claire smiled politely at him as she worked on his ice cream but didn't say anything.

The man unshamingly making his advances even though there was another man whom he easily presumed was the owner, looking at him with stern eyes.

"How about after work we go to the bar down the street and you serve my ice cream then?"

"How about if you kindly stepped away from her before I break each and every bones in your bloody body, you insufferable half-wit?" A familiar baritone voice spoke behind him.

Before the lad could turned his head around to look at the man who had just clearly insulted him, he felt himself being forcefully pulled away from the counter.

Severus Snape, dressed in a simple clothes for the summer, stared challengingly at the man with his arms crossed on his chest.

It was a sight that all of his students in Hogwart both feared wheneven they got into trouble while he had temporarily become the Headmaster.

The young lad trembled in fright, and fled away, forgotten his already paid ice cream.

Meanwhile, Severus' sharp and deep glare continued to grow as he looked down at the paled and shock filled face belonged to Claire Rollins.

"Se..verus.."Claire whispered softly after a long pause.

"Miss Rollins." Severus' hissed lowly.

They both stared at each other for a long while before being disrupted by the sound of Willy's cheerful voice.

Ah, ! You look well. What are you doing here at the carnival?" Willy asked cheerfully like the latter's sudden presence wasn't causing a high tension between his goddaughter and the said man.

"A little annoying owl kept dropping off this ice-cream pamphlets at my doorstep despite how many times I told it that I'm not interested of eating the ice-cream. When that doesn't work, it kept on tapping my windows with more of these pamphlets. Sufficiently to say, I was forced to come here, least I want my apartment to be filled with more of these pamphlets." Severus kept his sharp gaze on her the whole time he said those words. Never once did he blinked away nor did he looked away at the other man.

"Oh dear. That's truly unfortunated. I wonder who was the irresponsible owner of the owl? He should be informed." Willy grinned as he turned to reload the ice-cream.

"Well do be seated, Mr. Snape." He pointed at the available chairs and table that suddenly appeared beside the truck. "Since there seems to be no customers around at the moment, perhaps you would like to take a short break, my dear?"

"W-what?" Claire blinked her eyes several times. She looked at her Godfather then to Severus.

"Oh, go off then!" Willy pushed her out from behind the counter. "I'll bring something for you to eat for lunch. Off you go then!"

And best of luck. He whispered the last sentences silently.

Okay, okay I know some of you are feeling a bit angry at Claire for leaving Lucius behind.. Claire is still young at the age of 24, so she tends to act reckless at times.

P/S: The song in the chapter was by a Japanese Rock band called One Ok Rock. It is called Good Goodbye. I do not owned the song whatsoever. Only borrowing it to fit the mood of this chapter.