history × we don't see things as they are, we see them as we are.
The middle of a war is a far from ideal time to try for a baby. It may well be the very worst time to try for a baby, though Narcissa has no other experience to compare it to and less and less desire for any. A baby - no, an heir - is a necessity, an unspoken condition of marriage. She promised to love, honour, obey and for the love of Merlin, get ( Read more... )
Or at least, this was the plan until he hears muffled sobs coming from her room.
Lucius is up and heading for her side before his brain has fully processed what he's doing. At first he's afraid she's hurt, or that something went wrong at her appointment. Injury, illness.
Lucius has steeled himself, as much as a young man can, to the possibility of his own early death. But he would be utterly unprepared to loose Narcissa.
"Love - " He comes in. There's nothing immediately wrong, so he isn't quite sure what to do. "What is it?" He comes to crouch in front of her.
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Narcissa's plan - to take a bath and steady her jangling nerves before she put herself back together to go and find him - is coming apart at the seams before she's even had a chance to implement it, and she blinks wide-eyed at him through her tears for a moment as if she can't quite understand how he came to be in front of her. Actually answering seems thoroughly beyond her and she presses her lips together, her fingers tightening in the flimsy fabric of her bathrobe.
Her eyes well up again as she tries to stop weeping in front of him, trembling with frustration. "I'm all right," she says, in absolute defiance of the obvious.
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She's scaring him. Narcissa never comes apart, and he really isn't at all sure what to do. He wants to fix this. But he keeps calm; years of learning to do just that kick in, and he doesn't let his fear take him over.
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"Nothing is wrong," she says, and it sounds unconvincing to her own ears as she presses her thumbs under her eyes against further tears. "I promise, there isn't anything wrong-"
The way she says it, half-helpless, is a little disconcerting.
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Her insistence that nothing is wrong isn't helping him remain calm, but he's still giving it a valiant effort.
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This is not how she wants to tell him - not at all, he won't understand and how could he when she doesn't either? - but she can't lie to him. The thought briefly crosses her mind of trying to convince him to go away and let her cry in peace, but she'll still have to explain and then he might be vexed with her and-
"We're going to have a baby," she blurts.
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"I... I don't understand, then. What's wrong? Please, talk to me."
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"Lucius-" she sounds exhausted and overwhelmed and, yes, far from pleased or even slightly relieved, "-I don't know, I don't. I do want this, I promise I do-"
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Instead of answering immediately - her fleeting thoughts all seem irrational even in her own mind, an uncertain kind of foolishness that she isn't used to indulging in - Narcissa unclenches her fingers from the crumpled robe and turns into Lucius's side, reaching for him. "It was supposed to be better," she says, finally, her hand pressed to her mouth.
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"What if I hadn't been able to at all? With all of this- I should feel so much better, Lucius, I don't care if it's been hard, I should feel better because it's been hard-"
Her rising voice is taking on a certain edge of anger - Narcissa feels cheated, like she's worked so hard for something only to find it isn't what she thought it was at all.
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"No," she says firmly, pushing at his shoulder to disentangle herself, "no, it is blindingly, unmistakably- all the things I'll have to do-"
It's only something new to worry about when she isn't finished worrying about so many other things. Nothing is fixed by a baby, and it isn't as though their lives were simple and uncomplicated in the first place. She curls her hands into small, tightly balled fists and tries not to cry again, frustrated and furious and unused to this kind of difficulty in expressing it.
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This might be marginally more comforting if he didn't come home bloodied about once a week, but he's trying.
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"I can't have a drink to settle my nerves because the reason my nerves are all so shattered is because I'm pregnant," she says, stiff against him but at least not resisting when he doesn't let her move away. "I can't have the bath water too hot. I'll have to make sure that I eat properly and that I sleep correctly and go to all of these endless tiresome appointments, and then what if I am alone, Lucius? If you could promise me that then it would never have been so urgent!"
The thought of being put aside for a more fertile wife - she thinks briefly and contemptuously of the Weasleys - had crossed her mind more than once, but now they're merely months away from the security of an heir the rising fear of losing Lucius himself rears its ugly head.
Spitefully and slightly irrationally, she hopes for a girl and a half dozen more years of marking her cycle on the calendar.
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