Thank you so much for all the love & support throughout the last year. I just wanted to make a quick note (that will appear on all WIP updates, so everyone has the chance to read it) about how I've organized the updates. Aside from Love Like Blood (which I'd finished & completed posting before moving onto the other updates so the story is complete & out of the way), the updates will be posted in the order of furthest back date of 'last update' to most recent.
I know some of you are really anxious for updates on specific fics & would like to ask for your continued patience as I move through this process. Literally every open fic in my story list has an update ready to go, so whatever story you've been waiting for will have a new chapter in the coming days/weeks.
In Which Lucius Exhibits GROWTH would be the title for this chapter if the chapters of this story had titles XD. Seriously, though, this was supposed to be one of those chapters that bounces from group of characters to group of characters, but the following content kind of took on a life of its own while I was writing it.
Chapter Twenty-Six
For hours, the manor had been blessedly—perhaps unexpectedly, of late—quiet. Lucius considered in an offhanded way that he found it somewhat amusing that for a property which currently housed both werewolves and Death Eaters, the introduction of one little witch from the opposing side would bring yet more chaos.
He had decided it best to use that time to focus on work. Fenrir had sought his aid in hammering out details of afterward …. The reasonable reworking of current Wizarding laws and regulations to include werewolves and of course dismantling of the anti-werewolf rhetoric so thick within Wizarding society, though they were both fully cognizant that would take far more time and effort and patience. Lucius had found himself rather impressed with Fenrir's notions.
No matter how tonight's so-called 'fake out skirmish' went, no matter how the werewolves might prove themselves not savage and barbaric monsters unworthy of equal considerations under the law, there would still be those who would bristle at the very idea of werewolves being treated the same as any other witch or wizard rather than vilified and shunned. If there was anything he'd learned after residing with werewolves for a time, it was that while they weren't always the most commendably behaved of Wizarding Britain's citizens, they weren't running around wreaking havoc without the slightest provocation, either.
Rather … they were no worse than a pack—he cringed at the pun—of rowdy schoolboys in adult bodies. Until the full moon, of course, but if they were contained and monitored ….
Lucius laughed at himself and shook his head. Look at him! Helping to champion the werewolves' cause when merely a month ago, he'd have been content to toss the lot of them into a big pile and set them ablaze … whilst they were still alive.
A knock sounded at the study door and he called out without lifting his gaze from his work. "Enter."
The door creaked open, but whoever it was hesitated at the threshold.
"Would this be a bad time? I thought we should … speak."
Everything in Lucius stilled at the sound of her voice. Narcissa Black Malfoy had never been a nervous creature, but she was reserved, never showing much emotion unless a situation called for it, and just now he thought he heard that catch in her throat—the one that said she was keeping her emotions reined because she did not feel free to express them.
It settled over him strangely in that moment that his own wife did not feel free to express her emotions in her own home.
Or perhaps more precisely did not feel free to express them around him.
His first thought was to simply set down his quill. Or perhaps even set down the scrolls and shuffle them neatly aside.
But no. That would not be clear enough, he thought. And he'd had time to do nothing else but think today.
Looking up from the papers before him, he met her gaze. "No, it's not a bad time." Pushing back his chair, Lucius stood and rounded his desk. "And yes. We should speak. Or … rather I should."
Nodding, Narcissa stepped inside finally and gently shut the door behind her. She recognized the gesture—in truth had been surprised by it—and she would answer in kind, providing Lucius her full, undivided attention.
And after all she was the one who'd appeared to be sneaking about—she could easily enough imagine what her own feelings would be in his stead—it was fair that she let him vent his emotions about that before offering any explanation.
"All right then, Lucius," she said with a nod. "The floor is yours."
"I think you'd be surprised to find how many times I played this conversation over in my head since only this morning." A smirk full of self-derision curved his lips. "A thousand things to point out and shout over, a thousand ways to make … to make our problems somehow not my fault." Visibly, audibly swallowing hard, he shrugged, that smirk fading. "Only to realize they were all my fault."
Narcissa's face fell, his name spilling from her lips in a hushed tone of shock.
Holding up a hand, he gave a minute shake of his head, his lids sweeping downward for a brief moment. "Shh, allow me to finish, please."
Forcing a gulp of her own, she nodded, blinking rapidly a few times to clear her suddenly, mysteriously blurring vision.
He swept an arm backward, gesturing to what he'd been toiling away at when she'd entered. "There was a time you'd have entered this room, needing to speak to me about … about some recent bit of disturbing news, or the elves, or … or even Draco, and I'd have barely looked up. I thought because you told me you understood how important my work was, that it somehow made that … acceptable." Lucius squared his jaw. "I thought there was nothing more important than what I had to do for the Dark Lord, nothing more pressing than maintaining my façade with the Ministry …. Nothing more important than our cause."
Lowering his head, he uttered a low, rough chuckle at himself. "I thought it was all worth the sacrifices I made—as any true purpose of matter should be. It was only as I left our bedroom last night, so angry I could barely see straight, that I began to understand the source of that anger."
Narcissa felt her shoulders tense. Long-learned wifely instinct bid her to go to him, to try to ease his discomfort, but she held herself still. He wanted to speak his side of this, to give words to his emotions, and she would not do him the disservice of interrupting him, no matter how well intended that interruption might be.
His mouth pinching to one side, he met her gaze, his head shaking. "I understood that I was not angry at you, but at myself. I had considered all the things I was putting aside for … for a war we didn't even win—a war in which we nearly lost our son!" The wizard's nostrils flared as he drew in a deep, steadying breath. "I never considered all the things that were not worth putting aside. Our son's life certainly tops the list, but …." He graciously paused for the light, quick laugh she uttered. "But so, too, does our marriage … and you."
Believing him done, she opened her mouth, but he held up his hand once more.
"I am nearly finished, I promise," he said, once more waiting for the laugh she uttered in response to quiet—when was the last time he'd heard her laugh? When was the last time he'd been the cause of such a gentle sound of genuine, heartfelt amusement spilling from her lips? The one to bring a smile to her lips or make her heart feel lighter for just a single, precious moment?
He could not honestly remember if he ever had.
Shaking his head, he went on. "I understand—I know—that for a long while now, we haven't had a marriage. We've had an … arrangement of cohabitation. And the fault for that rests with me. The worst part of all these realizations," he said, his gaze becoming distant and unfocused for a heartbeat before he continued, "is that had I to do it all over again? I don't know I'd do things differently. I'm not even certain I'd know how. And so … if this is the end for us, know that I do not hold you responsible. This is our marriage, but it is my mess. And so if … if someone else can make you happy," though he ground out that last word, unable to conceal how the idea made his stomach roil, "if someone else can give you what I cannot, I will not stand in your way."
"Oh, Lucius," she said with another small, guarded laugh. Sniffling and shaking her head, she walked to the nearby table to snatch up some tissues from the lead crystal box stationed there and pressed them ever so gently to her nose. "Let me begin by saying … there is nothing romantic between Antonin and I."
His brows plucked upward. "Fair to say there's nothing romantic between you and I, either." Once more she smiled, and he felt his heart rending at the sight. How foolish he'd been. How selfish.
"Antonin and I are friends," she explained, nodding. "I … can't say exactly as I understand how that came about, but … we each needed an ear willing to listen and … there we were. Talking, simply talking. The next thing I knew, we saw the sun coming up through the library windows." She gave an elegant shrug. "I didn't think there was any harm in it. Until your reaction last night. After you left, I climbed into bed and I lay awake, thinking about … about everything, about all of it. And I realized that was what was missing between you and I."
Lucius' features pinched in question.
"Friendship, Lucius." She sighed, now shaking her head. For pity's sake, even her brief discussion with Miss Granger had reminded her how much her heart ached for such a small and simple connection. "You and I have been many things to one another over the course of our marriage—lovers, partners, occasionally enemies—but we have never been friends. And I never realized how much I've needed a friend…" she swallowed, her nose stinging and her pale blue eyes watering, "… all this time, and then I finally had one. I never knew how good that would feel. And I'm sorry, but if I have to turn my back on that to make what you and I have work, I won't do it."
Lifting her chin in a haughty look, she recognized the statement she was about to make was weaponizing his own words, but it was called for, she thought, if he had even the slightest notion that his speech meant things could go back to the way they were. "You already sacrificed quite enough of for the both of us, thank you. I shall not follow your example."
Yet he only offered a sad, sympathetic smile—an expression that did not fit quite comfortably at all on Lucius Malfoy's face for how uncommon a look it was for him. "I know. I stand by what I said," he murmured, aware of what she'd thought—that her response, establishing that she fully understood of what she'd been deprived and would now accept no less from her life—and how she assumed it would affect his own feelings.
It did not. He'd thought long and hard on the fact that she would very likely believe his entire bit of soul-baring a ploy so that she might let him simply go on about his own business without concerning himself with her. Just like always.
"I am prepared to give you space ..." His shoulders drooped. "Even if it means losing you."
"Lucius, I already said—"
"That your relationship with Dolohov is not romantic." He nodded, a pensive frown on his lips. "But … is there any chance it could eventually be?"
"Well, I …." Narcissa's voice trailed off, her brow furrowing in confusion. "I don't know."
"That is something you need to figure out. And, in the meantime," he said, shrugging, even as he arched a brow at the incredulity of the idea, "you and I can attempt this … friendship nonsense."
"Oh, Lucius," she said for the second time that discussion, this time crossing the floor to him to slip her arms around him in a hug.
With a chuckle—a warmer sound than she could ever remember hearing from him, not simply recently, but ever, making her wonder if losing the war might've in fact been the best thing to ever happen to them—he returned her embrace.
"Though, as your friend," he said, his cheek pressing lightly to her hair. "You might want to warn Dolohov to steer clear of any rooms he even thinks I might be in for the foreseeable future."
Her face buried against the hollow of his shoulder, she snickered, just barely managing a shake of her head.