Title Photographs
Author Sionnain
Rating Hard R for violence/sex
Challenge Lucius/Narcissa on their honeymoon for
HP_FQFSummary In Venice, the Malfoys enjoy their honeymoon in a very decadent manner.
Warnings Violence, murder, sex. A typical Malfoy offering.
AN: Written for the Lucius/Narcissa on their honeymoon challenge. And yes, I *did* borrow a phrase from Percy Bysshe Shelley.
Photographs
Soon as midnight brought on the dusky hour
Friendliest to sleep and silence.
~John Milton, Paradise Lost
Narcissa Malfoy never bothers much with mementos from the past.
There are exceptions to this rule, of course, and mainly they are photographs.
There are boxes of pictures that are kept in the attics of Malfoy Manor, locked away and forgotten. There are many people in these snapshots-Lucius’ father, long forgotten and dead in Italy, her sister who is Not Spoken Of, and the other, mad sister locked away in Azkaban…beautiful dark eyes staring forever at the top of a box as her real-life counterpart stares at the iron bars of her cell.
Sometimes, however, he finds her seated in the chair in front of the fire in their bedroom, smiling at a group of pictures she keeps wrapped in a long black satin ribbon beneath their bed. He stands above her and smiles his cold smile, the cheeriest expression he has left after years of service to the Dark Lord.
It has never bothered her, this smile. She tilts her head and smiles up at him, the darkness only he has ever seen within her is sparkling in her eyes-the exact color of the sky before it loses its light and darkens to black.
“Reminiscing?” he says, leaning casually against the chair, quirking a blond brow at her. He no longer smirks as he did in his youth-this affectation has passed to their son, but Lucius’ youthful smirk has become a sneer, and that is a look he never gives to his wife.
He looks at the pictures with her, and they inevitably end up before the fire, limbs entwined, staring at each other as they fuck on the floor. Narcissa does not make love with her husband-their actions have always been too primal, too dark. Their love was forged in darkness, and thus it will remain.
****
In the pictures, they are in Venice for their honeymoon. They are youthful versions of themselves; Lucius does not have the lines around his mouth and eyes, and Narcissa looks much the same as she always has, but there is an indescribable something she has lost since those early days of their youthful romance.
The first photograph shows Narcissa, standing on the Bridge of Sighs. She is dressed in simple blue robes, and her neck is unadorned. Her skin is very white and her blonde hair is shining in the sunlight that sparkles off the water below the bridge.
The night before, they had stayed in their suite at Il Palazzo, a sign on the door and their attention focused only on each other. Lucius did not speak words of love to his wife; but he worshipped her in his rough caresses, in his decadent whispers and fervent commands.
In the second photograph, Narcissa smiles at the camera, waving coyly from underneath a parasol. Around her throat is a necklace of pure white diamonds. Her left hand is resting lightly on her skin, her index finger barely touching one of the unspoiled white stones. Never does the youthful figure of Narcissa Malfoy remove her hand from that pose in the picture, and it is because of what rests underneath.
A single drop of red mars the pristine perfection of her diamonds. What the observer cannot see is that she is not hiding the mark; rather, she strokes it lightly, reverently.
They are there for their honeymoon, but that is not the only reason. He has business for them, as well-business Lucius had planned to conduct at night while she slept, but he should have known she would not be so easily fooled, so easily left behind. When Lucius leaves, she follows him amid his protests. She too is hooded and wrapped in black to hide the gleam of her golden hair-he is cloaked and masked for other reasons.
That night, she hid in the shadows as he kiled. The man begged for his life, but it did not stop Lucius. He killed with a cold, implacable efficiency she found alluring. When he was finished, they Apparated back to the room. He gave her the diamonds and she wore them while he fucked her, against the door that leads out to the balcony. The lights of Venice were spread out before her; all she saw was his reflection in the glass, eyes as cold and hard as the stones that adorn her neck. He grasped her throat-there was blood on his hands, and it left a stain when he pulled away.
Narcissa still has the necklace, but no longer is the small red stain there but she pretends sometimes that she can still see it. She wore it to his trial, smiling as she stroked the same stone that had been marked with the blood of his victim. When they had returned to Malfoy Manor after his release, he had taken her against the door, the diamonds around her neck, as he had in Venice.
In the next picture, she is wearing sapphires, and they are standing on the Academia Bridge. He is impeccably dressed; hair tied back, unsmiling, with a hand resting lightly on her waist. She is turned toward him, fingers resting lightly on his chest. It is the most intimate picture they have ever taken. A careful observer will see his slate eyes flicker down towards the necklace of cool blue stones around her elegant neck.
The night before the picture was taken, she watched with bated breath as he first tortured the man, asking in a chilling tone for the information their Lord sought. Lucius did not break a sweat, standing still and pointing his wand at his victim, a sneer of cold command on his face. When the light hit the mask, he looked like an angel of death-and that was what he was. When the man lay dead, Narcissa’s heart beat like a Carnivale drum, and Lucius stared down at the corpse. When he raised his head, she saw his eyes gleaming in the white holes of his mask, and she lifted her hand to him in supplication.
He took her against the railing of the bridge, fast and furious, his body pounding into hers, and his voice dark in her ear. He left his mask on, although she tore at his hood to entwine her elegant fingers in the long strands of his white blond hair, and gloryied in his moan as she pulled sharply. When they were finished, they tossed the body in the dark waters of the canal, and the next day he bought her the sapphires, and they shared an intimate smile at the jewelers, tinged with darkness and death. Lucius smiled at her as he handed the Galleons to the man behind the counter.
In the next picture, they are in front of Campo San Giacomo, and she is idly playing with a strand of rubies fastened around her neck. There are pigeons that she scowls at every now and then, and he is looking away from her into the sky above them, a sky as grey as his eyes with clouds that hang low, delete and heavy with rain. He looks concerned. They do not touch each other in the picture.
He was so effortlessly beautiful in those moments, and it was like a dance. The way he circled them, the way his voice deepened and cooled, the way humanity slipped away and left him an empty, soulless killer. She found she was aroused by him in those moments, when his eyes would slip to her and she would shiver under his icy gaze. He had killed for her before-she would see her engagement ring and remember how he had killed the Muggle woman for it because she had desired it.
When the flames licked at the house, started to hide the body, she tore at him eagerly, hands searching. He spun her around and pushed her against a tree in the side yard, and she braced her hands on the rough bark of the tree while he took her from behind. The smoke licked at them from the burning building, while the flames rose in the air.
It could not touch them, that fire that consumed their victims, because they were made of ice.
The next day, his cold eyes gleamed as he gave her the black velvet box, wrapped in a bow. In it was a strand of rubies. The flames of the fire echoed in the depths of the red stones.
At the Piazza San Marco she is laughing, because she is young and in love, and they are on their honeymoon. He is not in the picture. She holds her hands on her head as the wind blows and tries to carry her hat away. She is laughing, blue eyes sparkling, and years later, her son will resemble her in his rare moments of unfettered good humor.
Around her neck is a strand of emeralds, deep and green.
They have gone out of the city, into the countryside, and here Lucius has cruelly cut down a young couple who have moved into the country to escape the violence of the city. They were worried death would come for them in the guise of some nameless vigilante. Instead, it was a terrorizing man in a white mask in a black cloak, speaking words the woman does not understand. The man tried vainly to stop him, but his attempts couldn’t halt his murder’s relentless pursuit.
That night, she trembled in excitement as he wrapped his arms around her, and used her wand to cast the Dark Mark in the sky above the house. Afterwards, she led him to the bedroom and rode him hard, and they both stared out the window where the sinister green mark shone brightly, illuminating them and casting a slight pallor over their icy paleness.
The next day, she was gifted with emeralds.
They have one day left in the city, and there are many pictures of her in the gondola, of Lucius standing before some Wizarding monument with a tight expression in his grey eyes. In the very last picture, she is wearing a necklace of pure onyx, and the look in her eyes is as dark as the stones.
This is his favorite picture of her-for she smiles in front of a lighthouse, the wind having caught her hair and tossing it about the perfection of her pale face. She is dressed in the black cloak she wore on their secret missions, and he likes the way it contrasts with the fairness of her skin and hair.
The night before, he had whispered to her of pain and darkness, on the balcony overlooking the city. She had straddled him, taking him deep within the fire of her body, and she had raked her nails down his back with a smile that he had never seen before. It was reminiscent of her sister; perhaps she was not the only Black whose smile could cut like a dagger through the heart. He liked when she moved on him, eyes half-closed, body swaying into his as he taunted her with promises of sinister depravity he knew she craved.
“I will not allow you to do this ever again,” he said to her, as she fell against him, replete. His face was flushed, and his hands trembled slightly against her soft back as he lazily stroked her skin. His hair was unkempt and fell around his face; his eyes were serious. He spoke not of their passion, but of her assistance in his duties on behalf of the Dark Lord.
“I know,” she said, tracing the Dark Mark on his arm. She had always been fascinated with that, from the moment she first saw it against his skin in the moonlight, on their wedding night.
“I wish I could feel it burn,” she said wistfully, tracing it. He watched her, his eyes sparking as she moves her sharp nail over his skin. “Does it hurt, when he calls?” Her cornflower eyes looked into his, the darkness in her gaze almost weakens him.
“Yes,” he said, voice slightly unsteady. “It hurts.”
“Mmm,” she murmured, leaning down to trace it with her tongue. He hissed, his cock stirring and pressing against her. She looked up at him with a smirk he found all too familiar.
She was a Malfoy now, after all.
“I want to feel it, Lucius,” she said with a moan, and he eased her onto him, guiding her with his fingers digging into her smooth skin.
“I will not allow you to take the Mark, Narcissa,” he replied, their eyes clashing. They never closed their eyes-he liked to watch her black pupils swallow the blue. It brought him some sadistic joy to watch darkness fill her eyes.
“I want a Mark, Lucius, I’ve earned it,” she gasped out, moving on him, faster now, head thrown back in her ecstasy.
“I shall give you my mark,” he snarled, “not his.”
She cried out in her pleasure, and he pulled her to him. “Mine,” he growled, pulling her hair, and she reciprocated. “Mine,” she said, and he laughed.
The next day, he gave her the onyx necklace wrapped in a black ribbon. “These are the darkest stones they have,” he said in his coolly polite tone, but when he met her eyes he knew she understood.