[Wednesday one-shots]: Narcissa Triumphant, Lucius/Narcissa, H/D, PG-13, 7.9/7
Chapter Eight.
Part One.
Title: Narcissa Triumphant (9/13)
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Pairing: Harry/Draco, Lucius/Narcissa
Content Notes: Angst, violence, minor character deaths, gore, torture, crack AU (Narcissa is an assassin)
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Narcissa has a war on two fronts to fight, with Voldemort and with the Ministry. But when winning such wars is necessary to avenge her family and keep them safe, her enemies are the ones who will regret their actions.
Author’s Notes: Welcome to the seventh and final fic in the Narcissa series, the AU of DH. This really won’t make any sense at all if you haven’t read the other fics in the series, so do that first.
Thank you again for all the reviews!
Chapter Nine-Triumph and Tragedy
“There have to be some commonalities among the Horcruxes that would make them easier to search for.”
Narcissa caressed the welt on the corner of Lucius’s shoulder and sighed a little. “Yes, well, that might have been easier before they were moved from their original places. The diadem was in Hogwarts, and that was probably where it always was. But we don’t know where the cup rested before he gave it to Bellatrix, and Nagini was living and could accompany him…”
“We know that it’s probably a Founder’s artifact.”
Narcissa shook her head. “Everything I can find is either destroyed, clean, or accounted for.”
“Then perhaps it is something widely thought to be lost, the way Ravenclaw’s diadem was?”
Narcissa lay back, letting her hair coil around her husband’s throat. Lucius shook in remembered pleasure. Narcissa smiled, but directed her smile at the ceiling more than him. “I still have no idea what it could be. Hundreds of authors have speculated on what the Founders left behind and have much power those objects have, but all of them concentrate on the same small group of them. And I don’t think books exist on the Founders’ artifacts that I haven’t read.”
“Hmm.” Lucius was silent for a moment. “What about artifacts that have a connection to his past?”
“That is a thought,” Narcissa said. “Of course, most of them, like the diadem, don’t, but the diary did. Thank you, husband. You have given me something to look into.” She rolled over and met his eyes. “And you can ask anything you want from me as a reward.”
“Please,” Lucius whispered.
Narcissa smiled and stood from the bed, beckoning him to kneel at her feet.
*
Narcissa nodded to the Wizengamot members who turned to look at her as she strode into the courtroom. She had learned to look natural in all kinds of settings, even ones like this, where she wore rich purple robes and had her hair gleaming almost white as it fell around her ears in artificial locks and ringlets. She took a seat in the small polished wooden gallery for visitors and waited.
Scrimgeour gave her a sour grimace before he stood up in front of the assembled Wizengamot members. Narcissa would have shaken her head if that was in the plans. The man just made himself look weaker and weaker, as if it was Narcissa’s idea and not his that she was here.
Which it was, but he shouldn’t advertise it. Truly, the man was too honest to survive as Minister.
“Thank you for assembling at the last minute, honored Wizengamot.” Unlike most of the Ministers Narcissa had watched, Scrimgeour wanted to stand on his own two legs on the floor instead of sitting in the gallery himself and drawing attention that way. “We are investigating the arrests made by former Auror Alaster Moody-”
“I still don’t understand why,” interrupted an older witch in acid-green robes with a curled ear trumpet that reminded Narcissa of a sick unicorn’s horn. That trumpet was effective in identifying her: Hebe Jackson, one of the few half-blood members. “What did he ever do that was so wrong?”
“Used Dark magic within Hogwarts,” said Griselda Marchbanks, with a wave of a hand that had iron rings on it. “I understand that perfectly. But do we have to revise all the arrests he made, Rufus?”
Scrimgeour gave another too-honest grimace again. “I’m afraid so. It seems that he took the license to use Dark Arts granted to Aurors during the war with You-Know-Who far more liberally than I ever thought he did.”
“But how?” Marchbanks was rocking back and forth in her seat, her foot tapping. Narcissa listened to the tapping and shook her head. From the sound, Marchbanks was wearing slippers. How standards had declined in the Wizengamot since Cousin Orion’s day. “How did he use it?”
“He used a Dark magic artifact to imprison a fellow professor of Hogwarts. It might have trapped her forever if she hadn’t known how to fight her way out of it.”
“This is the incident with the Malfoy woman?” Jackson waited until Scrimgeour nodded. “Well, maybe we would be better off if she’d remained trapped.”
Narcissa sighed. She hoped that she wouldn’t be forced to remind them she was here. She would prefer to startle them with that later, when the collapse of the Ministry was progressing.
“How can you say that, Hebe?” cried out Holland Bulstrode, who had hired Narcissa years ago to get rid of an inconvenient secret. It remained the only half-Kneazle assassination Narcissa had ever performed. “Mrs. Malfoy didn’t deserve to be trapped like that!”
And they were off, wrangling back and forth over old grudges, mostly. Narcissa shook her head again. No wonder wizarding Britain’s government was so inefficient. They couldn’t keep their minds on a topic from one moment to the next.
Scrimgeour was the one who brought back some sense of decorum, casting the Firework Charm that made a harmless gout of noise and light rise from the floor. Narcissa had used that charm when Draco was three and not yet ready for the real thing. “If you could concentrate, ladies and gentlemen,” Scrimgeour said grimly as the Wizengamot members retook their seats and gave him stares of baffled offense. “We are here to talk about Auror Moody.”
“Former Auror Moody. I can’t believe that he’s even the Ministry’s problem anymore!”
Narcissa smiled. She had been waiting for something like that, and the small brooch hanging on her necklace would finally have good material for the Recording Charm.
It was even better material than Narcissa had expected, and she departed the Wizengamot session with a bright smile on her face. Strike two would come tomorrow.
*
Narcissa leaned back in her seat and nodded slowly. It seemed that “Marvolo” was the key that would unlock what she was looking for. That had been the diary spirit’s middle name, and it was not as common a wizarding name as Narcissa had first feared it might be. In fact, the only pure-bloods who had used it in recent history were the Gaunts, who had a habit of naming their children things that began with M.
And she only had to investigate more thoroughly where the Gaunts had lived. It seemed that they had lost their manor centuries ago, about the time they began practicing incest and all the other pure-blood families had stopped speaking to them. (Even the Blacks, somewhat to Narcissa’s surprise, but then she had learned that the Gaunts had practiced sibling marriage. That was a line too far. The Blacks considered cousin marriage the height of good taste in public. You should only fuck your brother or sister under the sheets at night, with the lights off).
“Mother! Mother!”
Narcissa flowed smoothly to her feet, wand in her hand and various weapons she had installed in the corners of her quarters vibrated in violence. They would be needed when one of her children burst in shouting in that tone.
But then she realized it was Harry, and there was laughter behind his voice, and he had no weapons drawn. Narcissa sat down and smiled back at him. “What is it?”
“Did you do this?” Harry asked, and handed her what looked like an absurdly thick sheaf of paper. When she took it, Narcissa realized that the Daily Prophet had published a special edition, the biggest one she had ever seen.
Well, of course, they needed extra paper to hold all that news, she thought half-complacently, and turned to the front page.
RUFUS SCRIMGEOUR: PROPONENT OF THREESOMES?
Narcissa sniffed. They had chosen to lead with the least interesting blackmail she’d dug up or bought about each Wizengamot member and high Ministry official and decided to release today. Personally, she’d thought the Burkes’ penchant for bestiality would have drawn more eyes.
“But how did you get it all coordinated at once?” Harry was grinning at her again, looking as if he would hop from foot to foot in a moment. She had once thought she would have to train that childish exuberance out of him, but was glad it had not been necessary. He never let it interfere with his work. “How did you convince them to print it?”
Narcissa smiled. “I found the people who had it to sell, or who did not realize what they had and needed money. And where pressure can be brought to bear in one direction, it can be brought to bear in another.”
Harry sighed and flopped back on the couch behind him, with one of those lightning-fast changes of mood that had bewildered Lucius so much when Draco was younger. “I don’t think I’ll ever be as good as you.”
“You are much younger than me and you received a kinder upbringing than I did once you were eleven. Give yourself time, Harry.”
“Did they?”
“Did who what?”
“Did-your parents abuse you?” Harry was asking with his eyes fixed on the fire, his foot tapping nervously in front of him. Narcissa could understand why. There would be many reasons he would be uncomfortable asking that question.
“Ah.” Narcissa considered that, her fingers drumming for a moment on the table. “I did not have the happiest childhood, Harry, but nothing like what you endured with the Dursleys.”
“That’s not an answer.”
Narcissa smiled a little. I only have myself to blame if he’s turning the training he received back on me. “You’re right, it’s not,” she agreed gently. “But I was given a choice to embrace the discipline. Would you say that I have abused you because I trained you?”
“No. of course not! But they wanted you to do something else first, didn’t they?”
“Yes, they wanted me to be quiet and biddable.”
Harry gawked at her for a second, as if he literally could not imagine that. Narcissa reached out and gently closed his mouth.
Harry managed to recover long enough to whisper, “Did you?”
“No, of course not. But it took several years for my parents to realize that I would never fulfill their dreams for me.”
“That isn’t really an answer, either.”
“I know, but those are memories that I do not wish to share with you. They are not happy, but they need cast no tarnish on our victory this day, or on the training that you embraced of your own free will-or on your feeling for Sirius. He did not know, and my family did not live in Grimmauld Place.”
From the way Harry started, she had caught onto exactly why Harry was worried about this. He shook his head and gave her a faint, exasperated smile. “You’re far too good at guessing what’s underneath my questions. I’m worried for you, too, you know.”
“I know that.” And Narcissa could acknowledge that if she did not want her sons’ worry, she should not have cut her own throat while facing a werewolf army. She bent down to kiss his forehead. “This is still a day of triumph for us. Go out and show your classmates that.”
Harry grinned at her again, touched her wrist with fingers that Narcissa knew wanted to grip harder than he let them, and shot out the door like a comet. Narcissa turned back to the paper.
At least they had put the bestiality story on page two.
*
“But why?”
Minerva’s voice was taut and strained in the way that the tail of a mouse caught under her claws might be. Narcissa tilted her head a little as she considered the woman. “You have no proof that it was me. The Prophet sometimes prints salacious stories, you know.”
“But not ones that target every single member of the Wizengamot except for Malfoy allies!” Minerva swung around. “I know it was you!”
“Certainty is a rare and dangerous thing,” Narcissa said mildly. “And I assure you, there are stories that mention embarrassing things about the Goyles, the Burkes, and others who have long been our friends.”
Minerva sat down, hard, in the chair behind her desk, and closed her eyes. “I wish I know what you were doing,” she whispered.
“You thought you knew, a moment ago.”
Minerva ignored her interjection, and kept her eyes closed. “I’m charged with the protection of the school and the students, and that means keeping an eye on politics. And I can’t tell what you’re doing. I can’t even tell if it’s something I should be moving to counter.”
Narcissa nodded. “I can see why that would be confusing.”
“You will still not tell me.”
“But we have an excellent understanding. I have already taken actions that would jeopardize that excellent understanding. Why do so again?”
Minerva opened her eyes with a slow, despairing grimace. “Then that means that you did cause this, and you’re plotting-what? The destruction of the Wizengamot? Deposing another Minister, even though this one has done nothing wrong but be reluctant to investigate Alastor Moody? Getting some kind of obscure revenge for Dark families?”
That last one startled Narcissa into laughing. “Of course not. I’ve defended my family against Dark wizards as well as Light ones.”
Minerva sighed and buried her head in her hands. “But what am I to do?”
“Reassure students if they come to you in a panic. Take care of Hogwarts. Lead. Nothing should change here.”
Minerva stared at her with narrowed eyes. “Should is not will.”
“Of course not, but it’s as much certainty as we get in this world,” Narcissa said, and stood. “More certainty than some members of the Wizengamot have right now. And I think I hear someone knocking on the gargoyle’s head. You should probably let them in.”
Minerva’s glance changed. It was deep and wary and unimpressed now. “Probably a student from one of the families who will be affected by this. Did you think about that at all before you arranged for the publication of these articles?”
It seemed that Minerva wouldn’t be put off by Narcissa’s refusal to confirm. She spread her hands. “Did their mothers, fathers, cousins, and aunts think about their crimes and sexual indiscretions before they committed them?” she asked. “More to the point, did they think about keeping them from people?”
“Sometimes you disgust me,” Minerva whispered.
Narcissa sighed and left the office, since she already knew that nothing would change there. She wished she could tell Minerva that this was the nature of the political game. Many of the families in the Wizengamot had played well for a long time, but that was part of the problem: they had let themselves get overconfident, had thought that because they had been on top for the last few generations, they would always be there.
Were you abused?
Narcissa’s mind returned to Harry’s question as she let the Tower’s moving steps carry her down. No, she hadn’t been. It had been a hard childhood in some ways, yes. But that was a gift of strength to her. She had never thought that the Blacks would remain on top forever, because she had seen how they were thrown down.
That had been one of the several reasons that she had been willing to accept the name Malfoy when she married Lucius. Let her leave behind the legacy of a family that had always been overconfident and reckless, and embrace the glory of a rising one, one that she could keep shining.
It was a pity that Minerva did not understand that.
*
Narcissa surveyed the paralyzed Aurors caught in her office by her traps the next morning, and slowly shook her head. Honestly, Scrimgeour.
They had obviously been sent to arrest her, and had thought they would come into her office and ambush her; they had as obviously not known where her quarters actually were. Narcissa sighed. She had caught Scrimgeour in the net of blackmail because it was politics, but now the deeper wisdom of her decision had emerged. He could not be a good ally for her in the long term when he did something this self-destructive.
Narcissa spent a long moment searching the Aurors’ robes for the Portkeys that they would have, and then another moment casting the necessary charms. She tossed the Portkeys back at the Aurors, and watched as they vanished.
Scrimgeour would find them later in his office, covered in silver and green wrapping paper and with a bow occupying each mouth. Narcissa hoped he would be able to read the message, and grasp the not-excellent state of the understanding between them.
Otherwise, she would have to question her own past decision to think he was a good ally in the short term, either.
Chapter Ten.
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