Harry Potter 1. Chapter 1

Narcissa's First Meeting.

I walk up to the door, arm in arm with my mother. I don't know why I agreed to this party, as I'm sure it will be as boring as the other ones. It's in Malfoy Manor. It's owned by the Malfoys. I know nothing about them, except they have two sons, Lucius and Angelo. I don't want to meet them, they sound like twin satans. My sister is on my mothers other arm, trembling with nervous excitement. I can see nothing worth getting excited about, this looks like a boring house.

A house elf opens the door. I don't know if it was the sight of the thing or the fact that the Malfoys had one that made me step back. He looked at me oddly, then ushered us inside to the crowded hall. Its Angelo's birthday, that's why we're here.

I can see how we are going to pass our night. Mother will find some excuse to leave me alone with one of the sons to 'Get Us Acquainted', and the rest of the time, people will make a fuss over me and Bella.

"Bella!" mother hisses as, for a moment my fixed smile slips. Composing myself, mother then loosens her grip and lets us go and saunter round the rest of the party. My dress is too hot. I told mother I should have worn a thinner one. She insisted I look my best though, so here I am in green satin with puffy sleeves and a low neckline. I even have jade beads.

It is attracting many stares, one from one of the brothers. I have not seen them before, but you could tell it was them, for their fair hair was blonder than my own.

"So you are Narcissa." His voice is so silky; you could make a dress out of it. "You look very pretty, I am Lucius." I feel a blush mounting on my cheeks. I feel especially drawn to this young man.

"Would you like to go for a walk?" I find him very polite, but one look in those silver-greys eyes tells me that I am not allowed to refuse his offer.

"Of course." I say demurely, lowering my eyes to the floor. I swear that I am falling gin love. He is so perfect. Love at first sight is real _it exists!_ My eyes never leaving the floor, he leads me out of the hustle and bustle and out, into the cool night's air. In all my fifteen years of age, I have never seen anyone as beautiful as Lucius Malfoy. I never will.

We talk about innocent subjects. His eyes never leave my face and I look into his as often as I dare.

We walk around and around the garden, never looking anywhere but each other.i know that it is getting very late and mother will be wondering where I am. I cannot rip myself away from this fantastic night, the fantastic company.

"I must go soon." I admit, wishing I didn't have to say it, but knowing that I had to go back.

"Alright." Says Lucius, his eyes catching mine, making me hold my breath." Maybe we could see each other again some time." He bent down swiftly, brushing his lips on my cheek, holding my hand. My heart dives in my chest, making me hold my breath for another time. "Goodbye Miss Black."

Slowly we mad our way back to the Manor, not uttering another word. Who knows that silence can do so much? An infinite number of emotions were bundled up inside my chest and I longed to tell his all of them. I shook the improper thoughts out my head and departed with mother and Bella.

"Where were you all evening?" Bella sneered as soon as we had got into the house, "Who were you with?"

Mother told her off, though she was anxious to know herself. "Where did you go Cissa? Bella and I were getting quite worried about you." By the look on Bella's face I could tell that_ she _wasn't worried at all, probably hoping that I had been mugged.

Summoning up the first trueful-ish sort of story I could manage I said "I went for a walk in the gardens, I wanted to be alone."

"Was Mr.Malfoy denying you of that?" Bella asked sweetly before bursting into raucous laughter.

"He wanted to come a swell." was my only defence.

I wonder if Lucius is thinking of me. I wonder if we shall ever meet again.


	2. Star Signs

Star Signs

I didn't see Lucius for months after, however much I wanted to. He surfaced many times on my mind, whenever I thought I had forgotten him. I kept thinking about the night in the gardens, his sweet face, his silky voice. He wrote once to say he wanted to see me again, I don't know how he got my address.

Then it was Bella's birthday. I didn't know it was coming until the day before, when she hinted she wanted to know what I had bought her. I was falling over my self with excitement. I could invite him. And that was the second time that I saw him.

I'm waiting in our hall. There aren't so many people there, which is good. There's only one person I want to be with.

That was Lucius.

The invitation was sent this morning by owl, he must have got it. And then he's there walking through the door in the robes of utmost green, sliding between the guests to get to the drinks table.

Then all of a sudden, he's standing next to me, handing me a glass of very pungent sherry suggesting that we tale a walk.

It's funny, how you meet someone and talk to them for hours, how there's still so much to say, and how half of it goes unsaid.

We sit on the lawn, feeling the wet grass seep into our clothing.

"Look," he says pointing upwards, "There's the consolation, Draco." It all seems so familiar like I went outside every night and looked at Draco, the twinkling specks of light forming a rough dragon shape.

"There's Bellatrix," I murmured, pointing up like him at the specks of light, "My sister's named after it."

There was a pause.

"Lady Bellatrix Malfoy, of course," he mused as if a very important fact had slipped his mind. "She's very nice, your sister."

Holding back the unladylike I was about to utter I come out with, "She has her days."

At this he laughs, rocking forwards his hair rippling like the moon on water, his laugh just as smooth.

He takes my hand and admits, blushing a blush that people have when they are not used to confiding their feelings to somebody else, that he had seldom met such an interesting person. Looking back now, I should have dropped his hand, shoved him in the pond and walked away without looking back at him, with his hair fanning out above the water, like spilt milk.

Instead I smile and blush back, and pluck at a piece of grass that happens to earn my attention.

The party's over. Everyone's going home, trickling out the door after visiting Bella to wish her good luck in her 20's. she was twenty today. It seems so old, as if your life has half gone already. I don't know how she can be in a good mood, knowing she's old.

I said goodbye to Lucius at the gate, Bella glaring through the window. I think that she has a crush on Lucius. Whenever she sees him she flirts and twists her long black hair around in the most irritating way possible.

"How come you always get the cute ones?" she bursts out halfway through cleaning up the sherry glasses.

"'Cos I'm blonde." I reply stubbornly, enjoying the look on her face as she gazes wistfully at my hair. That's the one advantage of Bella. She's gullible. If I told her her name meant 'muggle' she'd believe me. She doesn't know anything about star signs.

Lucius is mine. I'm not giving him away without a fight.

Middle of January,

Party's on,

All I want to,

Do is run,

Suddenly you're,

There, I forget,

You're coming,

Suddenly it's over,

The hatred,

And the shunning.


	3. Announcing

Announcing

I spent most of my time thinking about Lucius and the little time that I had spent with him. It seemed so cruel that we could meet, barely twice a year regarding how much I felt for him and (I'm sure) how much he felt for me. We wrote letters, oh yes. He sent beautiful letters, fantasies of us meeting again, us talking.

Never once did he mention anything about the relationship I was so longing to have with him. Not once did he mention that he liked me more than he should and what was proper, but somehow, it seemed to go unsaid.

Bella wasn't having any of it. She now had confessed that she fancied Lucius and (rather meanly) kept on saying when I objected that there was no relationship with Lucius that she would just have to take him for herself.

"If you're not interested…" she would say, laughing when I objected, saying in innocent tones, something like, "Oh but Cissa! I thought you weren't interested!"

I can't say that it didn't infuriate me a little. In some ways I was more mature than her, the big sister. In some ways she was so wise of the world, acting like only she new best. When she was in a Lucius mood she was different.

When she was in a Lucius mood, she didn't act like herself at all. It was like a whole new person was talking about this man. _My_ man! To tell you the truth, it angered me. It shouldn't have. I should have gone to Bella's room and yelled at her that she could have him, if only I had known what he was like.

Lucius changed me. I don't know if it was his letters or the rare times that I saw him that made me change. I just did. It was so sudden; I didn't even know what had happened, until mother pointed it out to me. I was subdued; I didn't talk as much as I had. I locked myself in my room every night to write letters.

It must have been the fourth or fifth time that I saw him that made things really changed. I was seventeen by then, come of age, leaving Hogwarts.

I walk into the Rosier's hall, feeling all the eyes on me as I usually did. This night seems no different, nothing special, but this is the night the truth comes out. This is the night it all changes. We talked it through; it's all planned, to the finest of details. Nothing can go wrong.

That's what they all say. It's bad luck but part of me doesn't _want_ to go through with it.

I saw him immediately, situated by the stairs, watching. _For me_, I think. Now I just have to get to him, but, "Narcissa dear," someone says close to my ear, spinning me around "Oh he_llo, _lovely, come and talk to me!" Mrs Rosier towed me off to the heart, leaving a pretty put-off Lucius by the stairs. Mrs Rosier is a gossiper. After I had been put through ten minutes of 'that Mrs Dolohov', it was time to talk about the Malfoys.

"Do you know them dear", What are they like", "I saw young Master Malfoy staring at you, you flirt you!" the usual tosh. When I was at last let go, I made my round of the room, looking casual, but straining to find Lucius. Did the Rosier's have a garden, could he be there?

I slipped out, just as I saw Mrs Rosier coming towards me with a delighted look upon her face, like she was cornering a juicy fly.

It was very dark outside. I couldn't see a thing. The light from the party streamed out a certain distance, before petering out a few yards into the grass. I walked along for a bit, not having the slightest clue where I was going before a familiar voice rang out into the darkness a few yard in front.

"Not lost Lady Malfoy?" it asked silkily.

What happened then, I don't want to think about. It was most un-honourable. I should have pushed away and spat on him in the dark, before walking dignified off. But no, I was young and foolish. Definitely foolish

All I can say is, an hour later we went back inside, me flushing and wearing a rather creased dress and him supporting a very smug expression.

We went up the stairs and Lucius, (calling down from the balcony) announced our engagement. It was strange night. I still wonder if it really did happen or if I dreamt it all and am still dreaming a dream that started when I lay asleep in Lucius' arms in the Rosier's garden.

I wish the dream would end and I would awake up to my young self in the garden. I don't want this nightmare to continue.


	4. Family

Family

So we were married. It seemed so quick, for we had known each other little over two years. I sometimes wondered if it had been a bit too hasty, as if we hadn't thought it over enough. There was only Lucius in my eyes though and I didn't want to lose him to anyone else.

I was afraid that if I didn't say yes then someone else would before it was too late. So I went along with it, convincing myself that this was the right thing to do. I was lying to myself of course. It was the worst thing I had ever done or would ever do.

I did love him of course. He was wonderful, perfect. Bella was very disappointed, to say the least. She went on about it for days after we had announced it, whining and whinging that it wasn't fair. I think that must be the reason that she doesn't like me now even after these few years.

It was brought up again by the birth on my baby. We needn't have bothered. Aquarius died within two weeks of being born, leaving me thunderstruck and resentful towards everyone. I never wanted to have a child again, know the pain it would cause me if I lost it again, and the chunk that it would rip from my heart.

I got through it, yes, but barely. I didn't eat, causing me many sleepless nights and a bad case of anorexia.

Lucius didn't care. I thought he did at the time, but oh, how wrong I was. I didn't know things were going to get a lot worse as our second baby was conceived.

I sit here, holding my baby. When I was pregnant, I never wanted him. I even tried to get rid of him, overdosing alcohol, hitting myself, nothing worked. Now I look at him now and I regret it. I smell the horrible hospital smell reeking from the wall, the silent patients, everything.

"Your husband has arrived." A kindly nurse informs me, not really needing to as I see Lucius sweep through the doors, making all the patients look at him in awe. I know what they mean. I saw the same in him once. Everyone did, but he's changed.

For the worse. I have spent more and more sleepless nights, waiting for him to return to the house after work. He came back reeking of drink, cigarettes, perfume.

As I see him sweep towards me I wonder I what I did wrong to make him turn out this way.

It has to be my fault, as he was never like this before I met him. He was sweet, kind. The face I see before me now, looking at our son is anything but kind.

"Draconus." He said after examining the baby hard. "It has a certain ring to it fit for a Malfoy." I bite my lip. After hours of researching name, careful planning, cancelling out the bad ones, I had chosen three names. Now he had chosen to ignore them and use his own, carefully invented of the spot.

"Wasn't it going to be something else, "I carefully coaxed, weeping inside. "Wasn't it going to be,"

"No. "Said Lucius shortly, giving the impression that he was thinking very hard, "No, Draconus. It is much more suitable." I fix my attention carefully on the bed covers, grimy things. By that time he's halfway across the ward.

"Honey!" I'm calling, but it is as if he had never come to visit me in the first place.

I don't know why I bother. He won't stay; he never does, even at home, if there's something important to do elsewhere. Or even if he feels like it. Either way he never turns around when I call. Something tells me he never will.

Somehow I'm happy. I now have a family, something I have never properly, happily been for a long time. I have a son, a husband. What more do I need. I sniff.

"Need a tissue, love?" the kind lady in the next bed asks, passing over a box of Kleenex wipes.

"No, no, I'm fine." I say. What a liar I am. I suppose I'll always say I'm fine, though I never will be.

Last night Lucius didn't come home until five in the morning. He woke me up, singing and jostling. I had been in labour for half an hour and he didn't notice, not until I pinched him, hard.

He'll never remember me, not in a million years.


End file.

Harry Potter, Romance, Tragedy