A/N: This can be considered either a character study of Lucius before he ultimately becomes a Death Eater in canon or a more AU version of Lucius where he's actually a decent person.
Narcissa Black didn't want trouble. She didn't want to get caught by Flich for wandering around at night. She didn't want detention or letters sent to her parents. And yet, she moved through Hogwarts corridors at midnight, to meet Lucius Malfoy in the astronomy tower.
Narcissa Black didn't want trouble. Except that she did.
She pulled her cloak closer to her body, knowing the chill that would hit her once she stepped outside. She pushed the door open tentatively, and there he was. Lucius Malfoy, somehow even more handsome in the moonlight, hair tucked into a loose ponytail. He was tall, and he always looked out at the world like he was challenging it and expected it to turn and run.
"Hi," she said simply, approaching him as he stared up at the sky.
He turned and regarded her. "You're too good for me, still, you always come."
"You're too cool for me, but you always ask me to."
He looked out at the sky again. "Congrats on your potion. The one Slughorn liked."
"Thanks." She hadn't known he'd noticed.
They stared out at the sky together.
"Your mother write you today?"
"Yeah." He sighed.
"What'd she say?"
"The usual. That I disgrace the family, that I don't deserve to be a Malfoy…" He swallowed. "That I can't escape becoming what I have to…"
"She's wrong," said Narcissa angrily. "You're never going to treat Muggles like rubbish, like they do."
"Damn right, Narcissa." He grinned, a fire igniting in his cobalt eyes. "I'll never be that kind of person, never! All people have value, how do they not see it? I'll never, never join those elitists who think they're better than everyone somehow."
Such conviction, such bitterness. It would make him a great man someday, if it didn't break him first.
"I wish I was like you," she told him quietly. "I wish I could stand up to my parents."
"Don't wish you were like me. You stand up in your way. A better way. Your parents don't know, but you're kind to everyone. You're good to Muggleborns. Loving is its own kind of rebellion, you know?"
He pensively took out a cigarette, lit it, and put it between his lips. She promptly snatched it away and crushed it under her heel.
"Those things can't be good for you, Lucius, they reek! Are you crazy?"
He offered her a crooked grin. "That's how it's always gonna be, eh, Narcissa? You keep me safe, I keep you sane."
"What do you mean?"
"I would never have let someone take my cigarette away if it wasn't you. Just like I know you wouldn't go running around Hogwarts in the middle of the night if it wasn't me. You keep me from slipping off the edge of crazy, from dooming myself in my attempts to break free. And I keep you from going mad, from never taking a risk in your life."
"You're right." She took a breath as she concluded, "You're right. I have a feeling we'll either rise together…or crash together."