Chapter Five

It was only when he noticed that Arthur had not returned after the New Year break, and some sort of coldness seemed to have once again developed between Narcissa and Molly, that Severus remembered how concerned he had been about Lucius's threats to bring Arthur Weasley down. Lucius said nothing though, and Severus didn't ask. Malfoy had become remote and cold, in a way that Severus knew was nothing to do with him, and despite the fact that he had not seen fit to correct anyone who assumed that he was in a relationship with Narcissa Black, Lucius never mentioned her. Severus never them saw them share anything but formality, and he began to notice that, apart from stopping at Narcissa at the breakfast table to give her the type of cool kiss on the cheek a long married couple would give one another, he didn't display any affection towards her at all. It was as though he had marked her as his property, and felt he had no need to further validate that claim.

Severus realised that he seemed to be the only person Lucius even spoke to, and as Lucius's final year drew to a close, with him failing his N.E.W.T.s in rather spectacular fashion, Snape began to become truly worried about him.

'Are you unwell, Lucius?' he asked one day, just before the end of term, a couple of weeks after Arthur had returned to school to sit his own exams privately.

'Why do you ask that?' Lucius said, instead of answering him.

'You've changed, Lucius,' Snape replied, his concern growing as he wondered why he had let things go for so long; it wasn't as though he had exams of his own as an excuse.

'No, I haven't changed... I have just become what I was always going to be.'

'You took the Dark Mark?' Severus asked, berating himself for it coming out as an accusation instead of a question.

Lucius smiled somewhat cynically. 'Yes, Severus, I took the Dark Mark... but that wasn't really what I meant.' He seemed at a loss for words, struggling with his emotions in way that Severus had never seen before. 'I can't undo what I've done,' he said at last.

'Has this got something to do with Narcissa?' Snape asked, somehow knowing it wasn't, not really.

Lucius frowned, as though the question made no sense. 'Why should it have anything to do with Narcissa?'

'Has this got something to do with Arthur Weasley then?' Snape asked the question he had already guessed the answer to.

'It has everything to do with Arthur Weasley.'

'And are you going to tell me what it is?'

'No,' Lucius replied. 'I am going to ask you...' He trailed off, as though he didn't really know what he had been going to ask.

But Severus knew. 'My friendship is unconditional, Lucius,' he said at last, hoping they were the words the other boy needed to hear. 'I thought you knew that.'

Lucius nodded once and turned away, and Severus fancied he was more troubled than he had been. He had his own choices to face though, his own shelter to pick from the storm clouds that were gathering on the horizon of the world he knew.

*****

Ten years later.

The Dark Lord had fallen, and the years had passed, kinder to some than others, and to celebrate the Malfoys threw a spectacular party, inviting everyone who was anyone, and a few who weren't.

Lucius Malfoy looked across the wood-panelled entrance hall of Malfoy Manor to where the last of the guests were handing their cloaks to the elves. Something clutched in his chest as he saw the disdainful way in which his elves bowed much more deeply than they had to the rest of his guests. Lucius hadn't thought they would come, that she would come, and it took him all of his considerable Malfoy dignity not to cross the hall and scatter the offending elves like so many ninepins, for daring to sneer at their betters. Instead he looked away, not trusting himself to meet the eyes of the man he had wronged or the woman he had loved, still loved, after all these years.

She was fat now, rounded and plump, and her hair was like rusty springs poking out of an old mattress. She was dressed in what he saw were cheap evening clothes, all glitter and no gloss, what she would see as her finery, but to Lucius she would always be the same Molly Prewett. His thoughts drifted to long ago, to a night under an almost full moon when he had been but a boy, when he had believed he could have anything he desired, simply because he was Lucius Malfoy, anything but the thing he wanted most in life.

He hadn't understood; when he had embarked on his campaign of hate, and had ruined Arthur Weasley's family, and Molly's too, he hadn't understood. When Arthur had come to him some months after Abraxas had called in his family's loans, Lucius had thought at first that he wanted money, and for a brief time exalted in the thought of his own redemption. Weasley turned it to ashes though, by shaking Lucius's hand and telling him he hoped that he didn't feel awkward about the situation between their families, and that his father had told him that the sins of the fathers did not belong to the sons. But Lucius knew that wasn't quite true, not in his case anyway. And when Lucius had gone to Molly to offer salvation, to re-lend what he had persuaded his father to call in, and then even offered to gift it all back from his own money, if she went to him, he had finally understood that there were some things money simply could not buy: Molly's Prewett's love... and Arthur Weasley's respect.

Narcissa Malfoy looked across the entrance hall to where the last of the guests were handing their cloaks to the elves. She hadn't thought they'd come, hadn't thought they'd have the nerve to join her moneyed guests in their fine silks and velvets, braying their wine-soaked laughs at nothing, but they had, their shabby cloaks and too-tight evening clothes a somehow startling counterpoint to those around them. Molly had put on weight, her body ravaged by the succession of pregnancies, and... yes, she seemed to be pregnant again, as though even now she were showing Narcissa Malfoy that anything she could have, Molly could have more of, anything worth having anyway. Narcissa thought of Draco, her one child, the one on whom she pinned her last hopes for future happiness; he would be asleep in his nursery, already well on the way to indoctrination into the way of life he would accept as his due, his right for being born as Lucius Malfoy's son.

'For the love of Merlin,' Bellatrix sneered from Narcissa's side. 'Look at what the dogs have dragged in. One would have thought she might have had her hair dressed at least... or hired a dress that fitted her... as for him...'

'Yes, yes,' Narcissa replied, 'one would have thought so.' But her thoughts were far away, to a night under the stars when she had been but a girl, a spoilt girl, blinded by delusions of what she should expect in life, when she had considered herself above those who were in reality, in all the ways that mattered, her betters. As Arthur turned to wave across the hallowed hallway of Malfoy Manor, Narcissa fancied she caught sight of the youthful redheaded boy he had been, coming out from the shadows of the Forrest, clutching a bouquet of enchanted roses he had spent everything he had on... for her. She touched the emerald studded locket at her throat, the one Lucius had given her on her wedding day, the one that held a rose petal, still red, still enchanted, still holding the one thing that Molly Weasley had that Narcissa Malfoy wanted... Arthur Weasley's love.

Severus Snape looked across the entrance hall to where the last of the guests were handing their cloaks to the elves. He was surprised that the Weasleys had come, surprised that they had lowered themselves, although he doubted others would see it that way. He knew he didn't imagine that Lucius stiffened at his side as he caught sight of them too. So it was true, what he had always thought, but never mentioned, was true, he mused to himself; after all this time Lucius still loved Molly. Severus glanced across to where Narcissa and Bellatrix stood talking together, unsurprised to see Narcissa just nodding absently to what would be her sister's sneering. Severus could see Narcissa's thoughts were elsewhere too, and he wondered what the wizarding world would think if they ever knew their golden couple, the glittering Lord and Lady of Malfoy Manor, who wanted for nothing, could so envy the lowly Arthur and Molly Weasley.

*****