Words : 1351

Warning: swearing, mentions of cutting

"As I was saying," continued Voldemort, looking again at the tense faces of his followers, "I understand better now. I shall need, for instance, to borrow a wand from one of you before I go to kill Potter."

The faces around his displayed nothing but shock; he might have announced that he wanted to borrow one of their arms.

"No volunteers?" said Voldemort. "Let's see . . . Lucius, I see no reason for you to have a wand anymore."

Lucius Malfoy looked up. His skin appeared yellowish and waxy in the firelight, and his eyes were sunken and shadowed. When he spoke, his voice was hoarse.

"My Lord?" "Your wand, Lucius. I require your wand." "I . . . " Malfoy glanced sideways at his wife. She was staring straight ahead, quite as pale as he was, her long blonde hair hanging down her back, but beneath the table her slim fingers closed briefly on his wrist. At her touch, Malfoy put his hand into his robes, withdrew a wand, and passed it along to Voldemort, who held it up in from of his red eyes, examining it closely.

"What is it?" "Elm, my Lord," whispered Malfoy" "And the core?" "Dragon—dragon heartstring." "Good," said Voldemort. He drew out his own wand and compared the lengths. Lucius Malfoy made an involuntary movement; for a fraction of a second, it seemed he expected to receive Voldemort's want in exchange for his own. The gesture was not missed by Voldemort, whose eyes widened maliciously.

"Give you my wand, Lucius? My wand?" Some of the throng sniggered. "I have given you your liberty, Lucius, is that not enough for you? But I have noticed that you and your family seem less than happy of late . . . What is it about my presence in your home that displeases you, Lucius?"

"Nothing—nothing, my Lord!" "Such lies, Lucius . . . " The soft voice seems to hiss on even after the cruel mouth had stopped moving. One or two of the wizards barely repressed a shudder as the hissing grew louder; something heavy could be heard sliding across the floor beneath the table. The huge snake emerged to climb slowly up Voldemort's chair.

It rose, seemingly endlessly, and came to rest across Voldemort's shoulders; its neck the thickness of a man's thigh; its eyes, with their vertical slits for pupils, unblinking. Voldemort stroked the creature absently with long thin fingers, still looking at Lucius Malfoy.

"Why do the Malfoys look so unhappy with their lot? Is my return, my rise to power, not the very thing they professed to desire for so many years?"

"Of course, my Lord," said Lucius Malfoy. His hand shook as he wiped sweat from his upper lip. "We did desire it—we do."

To Malfoy's left, his wife made an odd, stiff nod, her eyes averted from Voldemort and the snake. To his right, his son, Draco, who had been gazing up at the inert body overhead, glanced quickly at Voldemort and away again, terrified to make eye contact.

o.O

Narcissa followed Lucius into their bedroom after the rest of the Death Eaters had left the manor.

"You okay?" she whispered as he sat down on the bed.

"No! I'm not okay. He knows that we are unhappy with having headquarters here. It's been getting worse and worse the meetings started here. He thinks that Draco isn't good enough. And he's taking things out on Draco because of things that I have done. He's going to find out about you too! I can't do this anymore!" Lucius shouted at her.

She moved next to him and started lightly running his hand over his back. "It's going to be okay. No matter how this all ends it's almost over. We'll be fine. We'll make it through this." She put her hard inside of her robe and grabbed her wand. "Here, you can have mine for now."

"No!" he snapped at her. He moved his hand forcefully, knocking her wand to the ground. "I don't want your wand! I want my wand! I just want to be able to go to work and come home and function in this house like a fucking family!"

"Lucius…" she started.

"I don't want to talk to you anymore. Go away." he said quickly.

"I'm going to take a shower," she said softly, "if you want my company stay in here. I won't force you to talk. If you don't want to be with me for a while, go cool down, and I'll be in here when you're ready to see me." Narcissa turned around and eyed her wand on the floor. She debated picking it up, but she decided that she didn't want to use it to cut, and that she needed to show Lucius that she meant the offer that she made.

Narcissa got in the shower thinking about the past couple of weeks. She didn't like having headquarters in the drawing room but she knew that she couldn't do anything about it; however, knowing what was happening with all of the missions helped her. She knew who was doing what and how long they should be gone for. When Lucius and Draco were sent out, she knew exactly who was with them and what they were supposed to do. Narcissa felt bad for Lucius. The stress was getting to him worse than anyone. Lucius' behavior kind of threw her off earlier. She knew that he was bound to be upset from the way the Dark Lord had acted earlier; however, she didn't expect him to reject her so forcefully.

Narcissa stood under the hot stream of water until the mirror was all foggy and the rest of the room was steamy. Shutting off the water, she grabbed a towel and slowly started drying her body off. She grabbed her nightgown and pulled it over her head before running a comb through her hair.

Lucius was lying on their bed, still fully clothed, facing away from the bathroom door. Her wand was on their nightstand. "I'm sorry I told you to go away and I'm sorry for throwing your wand. I didn't mean it. I just felt like taking my anger out on you, and I knew I didn't want to." he whispered as Narcissa walked toward him.

She sat down on the bed and placed her hand lightly on her back, carefully judging his body movement. "It's okay, Lucius. I could have taken it."

He rolled over to face her. "No, you couldn't have. I haven't been that angry in a really long time. I didn't want to hurt you, and if I would have started I don't know when I would've stopped. And you shouldn't have to take it either."

"Lucius, I'm stronger than you think." she said. Narcissa always felt like if someone was going to take their anger out, it should be on her instead of someone else, especially Draco.

"Narcissa, I should never want to hurt you. Hurting you to get out my anger should never even cross my mind. It's fucked up. Are you sure you want me to have your wand?" he replied to her.

"Yes. I can borrow it or even Draco's if I need to do work around the house. Although, the Dark Lord has been making others do everything that needs done around here. And it's not so much of a temptation if I don't have it. I'm trying to do better Lucius. I haven't cut myself in a week."

"Really?" Lucius asked seriously as she nodded. "Ciss." He pulled her into a hug. "I'm so proud of you. I'm sorry that I haven't been paying attention to that. I feel like I should have noticed."

"No, you shouldn't have. It's not good that I do that. I don't need rewarded because I'm not doing it anymore. Ever since that night it was different, I decided I really don't want to do it anymore. I'll need your support when I get upset, but not on good days.

"Ciss, we can get through this together.

A/N: Hope someone is still waiting for this update. I think there's going to be one more chapter of this story. And I have a lovely little plot bunny in my head for a new story. Let me know what you think!