Chapter Twenty-One

Lucius began to move cautiously into the room, as though any sudden movement might frighten her. Lucretia followed him with her eyes, as if she were fascinated by him, and then looked across to where Black and I still stood in the doorway.

'Have I to entertain these men, Lucius?' she asked. 'Only I had hoped now that my father was dead that men would no longer come here.'

I watched Lucius freeze as the implication of her words struck him like a blow in the chest.

'Is my father truly dead?' she asked when he failed to answer. 'Tell me it is truly so.'

'Yes ... yes,' Lucius replied, his voice choked with rage. 'He is dead.'

'And these men?' she asked, looking again to Black and me. 'Sirius Black and the other one?'

'They are my friends, Lucretia. They mean you no harm.' Lucius had sat down on the settee opposite the chaise longue on which Lucretia sat, his face pale with fury. He turned for a moment to where Sirius stood with me, unable to hide his dark suspicion. 'How do you know of Sirius Black?' he asked, as Black shook his head in a mixture of denial and dumb mystification.

'I watched when my father and two men brought him here. He was with another man. I thought they were dead at first,' she said, 'and wondered why I had been locked away with dead men. But then that man with the dark hair came to them,' she said, nodding to me, 'and he gave them something. He called him, Black, and then, Sirius, and I guessed it was his name,' she said doubtfully. 'And they disappeared ... not long after, less than a day after ... right in front of my eyes.'

'You were here when Sirius and the other man were here?' Lucius asked, shooting another meaningful look at Black.

'Not in this room, Lucius,' she replied. 'I had managed to get to the room next to this, and peep through the spy hole to see why I had been shut away ... But my father came later, and when I asked him who the men were, he beat me and locked me away.' She nodded vaguely towards the back of the room, to where a bookcase had been drawn aside to reveal a door, and I wondered just how many rooms were hidden under Malfoy Manor, and what dark secrets they held.

Lucius said nothing, and I could tell he had no clue as to how to proceed.

'I have not to entertain these men, Lucius?' she asked again.

'No,' he said softly.

'You then? Do I have to entertain you? You are my brother after all, and perhaps that is fitting.'

'Fuck,' Sirius muttered under his breath. 'Make him change direction here, Severus.'

'No ... no, that is not fitting,' Lucius said quietly, and I could see he was struggling.

I began to move cautiously into the room, much the way Lucius had, and found Black beside me. He sat at the far side of the settee on which Lucius sat, and I found I was left to either stand or sit beside Lucretia.

'May I sit?' I asked, first to her, and then to Lucius.

'Of course,' Lucius replied, appearing glad of something to break the intensity of the surreal conversation.

'Would you like to go upstairs, Lucretia?' I asked.

'Oh, I don't think so,' she replied. 'I am not permitted to leave these rooms. Father would not approve.'

'Father is dead,' Lucius said. 'So if you care to leave here, there is no one to stop you.'

That seemed to frighten her, and I thought I could understand that, that that room, and whatever others lay hidden there, had been all she had ever known. 'You must try to understand now, Lucretia, that Lucius will care for you, and that you have nothing to fear by leaving here,' I said. 'But also that you may come and go, or even stay here, if that is what pleases you.'

'I see,' she said.

I had begun to probe gently into her mind, and found it confused and frightened, but not in terror. There was one thing I did not find, and that was any hint of the dark waves of madness. I wondered what devil had possessed Abraxas Malfoy to imprison her there for what must have been almost thirty years.

'Do you have other rooms here?' Lucius asked.

'Why, of course I do, Lucius,' she replied. 'I have a room to bathe, and one in which to sleep, and one in which to play music and read, and this one. I like this one best; I have never entertained my father and his men here.'

'I think Lucius and Severus are trying to tell you that you need never entertain men again,' Black said, breaking his silence for the first time since he had sat down, and I had an idea that he too was finding her references to Abraxas and his friends to be almost more that he could bear. 'That life will change for you now, Lucretia. You now have the freedom to make your own choices, and no one will ever again force you to anything you do not want to do.'

'Severus? A weighty name,' she said, darting a glance at me, and then looking back to her brother. 'Is this all because my father is dead?'

'Yes,' Lucius replied. 'I never knew you were here, Lucretia. He never told me. I would have come for you before, long ago.'

'I wish you had, Lucius,' she said, and began to cry.

*****

Lucretia couldn't be coaxed out of her rooms, and we settled for sleeping in her living room, Lucius on the chaise and me on the settee, and Black on the floor; he was a dog after all, and changed into one for what was left of his night's sleep, once Lucretia retired to her own bedroom.

In the morning Lucretia's attitude had changed somewhat, she became relaxed and seemed happy, and I wondered if that were because no one had attempted to harm her, or have her entertain them, as she put it. An elf arrived with her breakfast, on a tea tray decorated with a small posy of fresh roses; the elf was quickly followed by three more, bringing breakfast for us. Once we had eaten, she became animated, declaring that she would like to explore a little, and perhaps Lucius could take her to see what the world looked like.

Black and I left him to it. We had both already warned him not to probe her too much about Abraxas and his friends, and to let her come to terms with herself, and understand things bit by bit. He came to see us a couple of hours later to say that Lucretia had gone back to her rooms, expressing a desire to be alone for a little, and saying that she would like to go outside the next day. He had arranged for an elf to stand outside her door at all times, so that she could let him know whenever she wanted for company or anything else, and he seemed at a loss as to what else to do.

'I suspect what you have already done is enough for the time being,' I said. 'You can't rush this, Lucius.'

He nodded, but I could see he was a lot more relaxed about the whole thing, and I suspected much of that was due to the fact that it did, on the surface at least, appear as though Lucretia was as sane as any of us.

*****

There was an endless stream of visitors to the manor that afternoon: the great, the good, and the thoroughly evil, and it got so busy that I suggested to Lucius that he give his elves instructions that each visitor be given a strict ten minute time slot, so that he could get through them. I could tell that he was becoming bored anyway, listening to meaningless platitudes from those who had been short-sighted enough to have crossed him earlier in his life, and insincere condolences from those who knew neither him nor his recently dead father. Even when the Lestrange brothers and Walden Macnair called, Lucius didn't seem much interested in them, and when Walden suggested a night out at the fleshpots of Knockturn Alley, Lucius had just looked at him as though he had been speaking some tongue he didn't understand.

He had left it up to Black and me to make the actual funeral arrangements, after suggesting that we sever Abraxas's head, put a silver stake through his heart for luck, and bury him upside down, ten feet deep in a ditch somewhere. We had willingly passed the business onto the head elf instead, a capable enough seeming creature, who brought the various arrangements to us for checking every now and again.

We got rid of the callers by about half past four, and even managed to get down to the cellar to take tea with Lucretia, and we had just come back upstairs when the first of two interesting sets of late visitors arrived. The first two were Albus Dumbledore and Minerva McGonagall.

'I confess I am surprised to see you,' Lucius said, hauling himself to his feet as they came into the drawing room, and for the first time that day calling for refreshments for his visitors.

'Were I not to offer my respects, it would be more unusual, Lucius,' Dumbledore replied. 'Your father was, after all, a governor and a great benefactor of Hogwarts.'

'Of course,' Lucius replied, nodding to the elf that had reappeared, to pour the tea and pass round whatever fancies it had brought on the plates.

'Is it ... safe to speak here?' Dumbledore asked, looking around the room, then rather pointedly to where Black and I sat under the Concealment Charm we had sat under for a fair part of the day.

'Of course,' Lucius repeated. 'The only people in the room are us ... and of course Black and Severus.'

McGonagall pinched her nostrils and gave us a long look as we dropped our charm, very much like the one she had drawn me often, and I suspect Black, when we had been at school. 'I thought the cat in me smelt dog,' she said.

Sirius flashed her his grin; it was one I supposed he had tried on her many times, and she seemed to be as unmoved as she probably had been in times past.

Dumbledore seemed satisfied with our presence. 'Firstly, Severus,' he said, poking a lemon tart into his mouth, and chewing it thoughtfully, before swallowing it and beaming in pleasure, as we all sat waiting for what he was going to say, 'I am pleased to find you here, as it saves me a trip to Spinner's End to tell you that I have moved Andromeda.'

'Where?' I asked, before he had a chance to go any further.

The old man glanced to Lucius, and once again appeared to satisfy himself. 'Nicolas and Perenelle have taken both her and Ted in,' he said.

I nodded; that was a good choice, and I wondered why we had not thought of the Flamels earlier. 'And she can stay there until it is safe?' I asked, wondering if Ethel had told him that Andromeda's unborn child was a girl; then again, I reminded myself that that assertion of mine had not curbed Tom Riddle's interest in her whereabouts.

'Indeed,' he concurred. 'For as long as it takes.'

'Have you decided to remain here now, Lucius?' Minerva asked.

If Malfoy were surprised at her question, he didn't show it, but then, although there was no one who could deliver a dismissal in quite the way Lucius could, his manners were impeccable when he felt the occasion demanded. 'In the meantime, yes,' he replied. 'Black is going to stay here, and I suspect Severus will return to Spinner's End, although he hasn't said as much. I doubt that we can talk him out of that,' he said. 'May I enquire why you ask?'

She favoured him with a twist of her thin lips. 'No reason really, other than nosiness,' she replied. 'However, you must know that the race to secure your hand in marriage will be heating up, and no holds will be barred.'

'Am I to understand that you are offering me your own suit, Minerva?' Lucius replied, and I wasn't quite sure if he was joking or not, as Black snorted unhelpfully into his teacup in that way he had.

She blushed and smiled in a grotesque version coquetry, until they both laughed, breaking down more barriers with that little exchange than any long monologues could have done, and I added another aspect to Malfoy's long list of character traits. But Minerva was right, Lucius was going to have to pick a bride at some time, and I suspected it would be fairly soon.

Dumbledore had demolished about a half of the lemon tarts when he sat back. 'Has anyone from the Ministry been to see you, Lucius?' he asked.

'Not in an official capacity,' Malfoy replied. 'Should they have?'

'I would expect a call, if I were you,' the old man murmured, twisting his beard. 'I have heard through my own sources that there may well be an enquiry into Abraxas's death ... in fact, my source was surprised that that had not happened immediately.'

It was something I was half expecting; in fact, save for Riddle's declaration of a seizure, we had no details at all of how Abraxas had died, and I suppose it was really only the other events of the past day that had stopped me thinking more about it.

'Was there a problem with the report from the mediwizards?' Lucius asked.

'Not so much the report,' Dumbledore replied, 'as the actual mediwizards themselves.'

'What are you trying to say?' I asked, feeling an uncomfortable prickle of alarm creep down my back.

'No one seems to know just who they were.'

'And?' Lucius asked, to where Dumbledore had picked up his teacup again.

'And, I believe the Sudden Death Inquiry Squad are about to request that you postpone your funeral arrangements until they examine Abraxas's body for themselves.'

'So I just leave him rotting in the family crypt?' Lucius asked, his nose wrinkling in distaste. 'He's already been dead for almost two days.'

Dumbledore nodded. 'Indeed. It is all taking rather a long time, and I am not quite sure why that is. Normally those types of things are dealt with very hastily indeed.' He lifted yet another lemon tart to his lips, then seemed to change his mind, and turned to Sirius instead. 'If I were a gambling man though, I would be willing to wager that the fact that your father is on the advisory committee for the Sudden Death Squad might have something to do with the hold-up, Sirius,' he said, popping the next tart into his mouth.

'Like if he had anything to hide, he wouldn't care for those he bullied about at work to poke their noses where he didn't think they belonged?' Black asked. 'Just in case they found something?'

'Not the way I would have put it,' Dumbledore murmured, 'but I see you've caught my drift.'

They didn't stay much longer, just time for Dumbledore to drain his third cup of tea and munch his way through the remaining few tarts. Lucius took the step of accompanying them to the front door himself, something he had not done for any of his other visitors, and I had to remind myself that just because he was a charmer, did not mean he was to be trusted in full.

*****

The last visitor of the day was no less of a surprise.

'Is it wise for you to be here without a chaperone, Miss Black?' Lucius asked, his eyebrow rising in surprise. 'And so late in the day.'

'Miss Black?' Narcissa queried, letting her own eyebrow rise; she seemed to have forgotten her curtsey. 'Have you forgotten my name, Lucius ... or do I call you Mr Malfoy now that you are the lord of the manor?'

'Perhaps you should not call me at all,' Lucius replied. 'Anyway, what can I do for you? I'm sure you can't have forgotten that I have already endured the mass Black condolences.'

'I haven't come to offer false condolences,' she replied, sitting down without invitation. 'I have come with a proposal.' She held up her hand as Lucius began to interrupt. 'Hear me out, Lucius. I may only be eighteen, but I am not an idiot, and despite your best efforts to present yourself as one, neither, I suspect, are you.'

Lucius sat back, clearly as intrigued as Black and I were, once again hidden beneath the charm. 'I permitted you entry to this room, Miss ... Narcissa,' Lucius said, 'so that observation might be in question.' He seemed to relax somewhat though, and I felt Black draw me an anxious look. 'But please proceed.'

It was difficult to believe that she was only eighteen, so assured and eloquent was she, and I had to admit even to myself, extremely comely. Her hair, as white-blonde as Lucius's own, was loose, tied up only by a green ribbon on one side, so that the mass tumbled over the opposite shoulder, and she had forsaken her black mourning clothes for a low cut, dark green velvet dress, which showed little enough cleavage to remain modest, but managed at the same time to hint of things worthy of the exploration of any man.

'Surely you know, Lucius, that you are about to be inundated by offers from the highest echelons of wizarding society for your hand in marriage. The daughters of the rich and important men of the world are about to descend upon you ... warts, fat thighs, huge dowries and all.'

It was the second time Lucius had been told the same thing in as many hours, and I suspected he was becoming a little nervous.

'Narcissa,' he said, rather more kindly than I had expected, 'I know that your father and mine concocted a plan between them, mapping out our futures, even going as far as to announce them to the world at large. I, for one, had no say in that, and now find I am free to make my own choices. I do not want to be unkind, but I do not intend to be railroaded by Cygnus Black, or by you. Go back and tell him that his clever ploy has failed.'

'You think my father sent me?' she asked. 'What do you take me for, Lucius?'

'A very clever girl actually,' he said, 'and an extremely pretty one. I am sure that the queue at your own door will easily rival the queue at mine.'

She snorted her derision at that. 'I'd have to get shot of Bellatrix first,' she said. She leaned forward in her seat, her eyes sparking in something that looked vaguely like mischief, and I began to wonder whether I had underestimated Narcissa Black or overestimated her. 'You couldn't talk Severus into taking her, Lucius, could you?'

Lucius eyes shot involuntarily to where he knew I was sitting. 'I doubt that,' he said. 'He is a bachelor at heart.'

'Yet, you Lucius, are not,' she said, cleverly taking the conversation in her own direction. 'Now would it not be better for you to settle for the devil you know, than the devil you don't?

'I was rather hoping to do better than a devil,' he replied, and I had an ominous feeling then that he was about to lose the most important battle of his life, and perhaps that would not be such a bad thing after all. 'But I most certainly am not about to give Cygnus Black any more victories, real or imagined, over me.'

'I understand that,' she replied, leaning forward again. 'I would make you a good wife, Lucius. I would not curb whatever ... social excesses ... in which you like to indulge. We could lead separate lives, untrammelled by the tedious problems of love gone sour. We could present ourselves as a fitting couple to head the country's most important family, without the burdens that attach themselves normally to such a union.'

'You are asking me to marry you, whilst stating to me that you have no interest in actually being any sort of real wife to me?'

'No, Lucius. I am begging you to marry me to save me from the man next in my father's list of prospective grooms.'

'Who is next in line?' he asked, and I knew then that he was lost.

'Anatoly Karkaroff,' she said, bowing her head, and for a moment she disappointed me; I thought she was going to feign tears, but she didn't. 'I would sooner cut my throat than live in their cold wasteland of a country, with nothing but wild boars and snow and ice for company,' she said, raising her head again. 'That apart, Lucius...' But it was her turn to be silenced, as Lucius interrupted her.

'Why not palm Karkaroff onto Bellatrix then?' he asked, raising his eyebrow in a way that made me think he was enjoying the cut and thrust of her conversation as much as she had probably hoped. 'That way you get rid of them both.'

'I'm afraid that even Anatoly's skinny body and pimply face aren't that desperate,' she said.

'And you think Severus more desperate than Anatoly Karkaroff?' Lucius scoffed. 'I rather think not.'

'Of course not. I had just hoped that his straitened circumstances might make him settle for Bellatrix, where he seemed not to be interested in Andromeda,' she said, twisting what felt like a dagger into my heart. 'Anyway, Lucius, I have rather set my heart on being the lady of Malfoy Manor, and I think it's just a matter of time before you come to realise that, at least with me, you get what you pay for. Surely better me than some money-grubbing heiress of dubious bloodlines and uncertain fortune?'

'I shall not back down to Cygnus Black,' Lucius declared, his tone hardening, 'not ever.'

'I understand that,' she said, looking away from him in a way that made me think that Cygnus had regaled his family at some time with humiliations he had heaped on Lucius, and I wondered if she had made a mistake, and suddenly found that I was actually rooting for her. 'There is a way though,' she said. 'A way to get what is perhaps the best that life has to offer such ones as we are, not only without backing down to Cygnus, but by cocking a snook at him too.'

'How?' Lucius asked.

'I am a virgin, Lucius, unspoiled but for a few kisses and chaste embraces,' she said, without a trace of self-consciousness. 'There are no skeletons to fall out of my closet to disgrace you. You could, however, embarrass Cygnus deeply.'

'How?' Lucius repeated, and I felt Sirius slump in defeat at my side, as he finally accepted too that the battle was lost, and yet perhaps the war had just begun.

'If I were to become pregnant with your child,' she replied, 'of course, before marriage, in fact before anyone was even aware of any relationship between us. Remember,' she said, hurrying on, 'Andromeda may be unmarried as yet, and with child, but she was not under Cygnus's protection at the time. She had already flown the Black nest to make her own way in life, and Cygnus had already disowned her. I would have gone with her, you know,' she said reflectively, 'had I been just a little older. I would have escaped that way.' She sat back, her case presented, waiting for the verdict I felt sure she had anticipated would be in her favour. 'It could be a secret, Lucius, our secret,' she said, as though prompting the man opposite her to some sort of reaction.

'But it is not a secret.' Lucius sighed theatrically. 'I am very afraid, Narcissa, that we have not been the only ones party to this conversation,' he said, turning to where Black and my jaws dropped as one, and releasing the charm around us.

She spun round, eyes glittering. 'Thank you very much, Lucius,' she snarled. 'Did you have to let me get to virgin bit?'

'As you inferred, Narcissa,' Black replied for him, 'you wouldn't want him to unwrap any nasty shocks.'

'You keep out of it, Sirius,' she replied, and I could see that she wasn't really angry at all, in fact, if anything, she seemed rather amused. Then she turned to me, and I just knew what was coming. 'Severus, you would take Bella, wouldn't you? I'm sure you could handle her.' She seemed to take in my stony silence and think it indicted that I might want a little more persuasion. 'Oh, I know Andromeda always fancied you, but you didn't seem to want her ... but Bella's younger ... and she can have my dowry; I'm sure I shan't need it. It's just that it may be some time before I get through to Lucius,' she said, as though he weren't sitting opposite, with his eyebrow rising, the way it did. 'And if I have to keep slipping out to the manor to ... achieve our aims, it would be easier if she weren't around.'

'You will not find me as easy to soft soap as your fiancé,' I replied, acknowledging her victory over Lucius as my own defeat washed over me again. 'That apart, let me assure you that anyone considered as suitable for Anatoly Karkaroff, would not be any choice of mine, let alone anyone he would not even consider ... Bellatrix in particular.'

'I can't say I blame you actually,' she replied. 'In fact, I think I would have been very disappointed in you had you not refused her ... thrice now, is it not?' she asked, her mouth twitching in amusement.

'At least,' I replied. 'May I ask you something, Narcissa? Just where, I find myself wondering, does your father think so eligible a virgin has disappeared to ... on her own?'

She dipped into her décolletage, and for just a moment the three of us exchanged uneasy looks, but when she withdrew her tiny white hand she had it grasped around a fine gold chain. A little egg timer shaped charm dangled from the end, one that seemed to spin of its own accord.

'I see,' I remarked as she slipped the Time-Turner back to nestle between her breasts, and I resigned myself to the fact that Lucius had acquired a sister and a bride in the space of what was not much more than a few hours: not bad work, even for a Malfoy.

Narcissa stood up; she curtseyed deeply, first to Lucius, and then to Sirius and me, so we had to share one between us, and threw us all what looked like a smile of victory. 'I must go now,' she said. 'I am sure you three have a lot to talk about amongst yourselves, whatever my list of failings is, not least of all.' Then she turned again to Lucius. 'I shall get away from the Blacks, Lucius, one way or another, and it is to Malfoy Manor that I shall come.'

She was casting an elaborate charm about herself, an intricate feminine one, when Lucius spoke again. 'Of course, Narcissa, there is one way in which I can deeply embarrass your father and have my own wicked pleasures, one that I think you have not thought through,' he said.

'You're wrong there, Lucius,' she said. 'Of course I thought of you leaving me in the lurch, holding the baby, so to speak, but I happen to think you're a better man than that.' Then she turned to me. 'Watch out for my father, Severus. He and his friends deeply resent your position of favour with Tom Riddle. Don't underestimate the type of men they are.' She gave me a long searching look, and I wondered if she were really trying to work out what type of man I was, and whether whatever she had been led to believe about me was true. She finished her charm and left the room, with us gawping after her.

'Well,' Sirius remarked eventually, seemingly having not much else to say.

'She's certainly a Black,' Lucius replied, giving Sirius a look as though to say that it was all his fault.

But I was thinking about another Black, and the fact that Lucius had been present when Dumbledore had told me that he had taken Andromeda to Nicolas Flamel, and whilst he seemed to have satisfied himself about Lucius for some reason, he had not done so about Narcissa. I was thinking, too, about the Narcissa Black who had been at the party, and her spiteful smiles and obvious confidences with Bellatrix, and even her anxiety to distance herself from Andromeda, and I was wondering just who the real Narcissa Black was. I stood up and made my way to the door; suddenly the amusement had seeped from me, and I felt all my doubts and troubled thoughts wash over me.

'Where are you going, Severus?' Sirius asked.

'To Spinner's End, I suspect,' Lucius replied for me, and I could tell he knew what worried me. 'You either trust me, Severus, or you don't,' he said. 'But I am finding it very difficult to work out which it is ... and very difficult to confide in you deeply because of that.'

I could understand that, but I didn't really have anything to say just then. I wanted to speak to Ethel, and I wanted to speak to Dumbledore, and I wanted to get rat-arsed drunk on my own because Lucius Malfoy was going to get his Black sister, and I wasn't going to get mine.

'I need you to do one more thing for me, Severus,' Lucius went on, and I rather thought I had done quite enough for Lucius Malfoy over the last few days.

'What?' I asked, trying to push my resentment back to where it belonged; after all, it was hardly Lucius's fault that I had made such a mess of my own personal life.

'I want you to take Lucretia back to Spinner's End with you,' he said. I was about to voice my protest, ask why I had to be the one to care for stray Malfoys, when Lucius raised his hand to stave off whatever objection I had. 'I want you to take her to Ethel, Severus. I want to know what has happened to her, and why, and how we go about giving her a normal life, and Ethel is the only person I can think of to help me there.'

I knew what he really meant; I knew he meant that Ethel was the only person he thought he could trust to find the real Lucretia Malfoy below whatever had been heaped upon her, and I thought he was right.

*****