"Green Water," Bellatrix/Narcissa, NC-17 Title: Green Water Author:green_amber Pairings: Narcissa/Bellatrix, Narcissa/Lucius, implied Bellatrix/Andromeda Rating: NC-17 Warnings: incest, underage (15 and 17 at the time of the smut) Word count: ~2600 Summary: Narcissa and Bellatrix have always been close, but when jealousy rears its head, Narcissa learns that Bellatrix wants to be...even closer. A/N: Written for thisaestus at reversathon 2007. Thanks to sionnain and stephanometra for the beta and the hand-holding. ♥
Departure
Narcissa was not ready.
Her bags were packed, stuffed to bursting with everything she'd been instructed to bring plus a new wardrobe suitable for a young daughter of the House of Black. Narcissa had run her hands over the new things the night before, feeling a rush of anticipation that she tried to summon back now. Her shoes had been polished to a mirror sheen. In a luxuriously padded carrier, her cat slept peacefully, curled into a snowy circle.
Still, she was not ready.
Bellatrix and Andromeda, near-identical but for the green ribbon in Bella's hair and the blue one in Andie's, for once were in agreement about something: Narcissa was holding them up. "Come on, Cissy; we don't want it to leave without us," said Bella.
"What if I don't like it there? I won't know anyone. I won't have any friends…" Narcissa hated the way her voice sounded in her own ears, like a little girl's.
"Don’t worry. I'll take care of you. We can have all our meals together and--"
"What makes you so sure she'll be a Slytherin?" Andie's hands were balled into fists at her hips, and her eyes seemed to flash fire. They were arguing again. The world righted itself.
"Oh, I'm sure all right. Cissy's the most Slytherin of all of us."
Before she could ask Bella what she meant, Mother seized Narcissa for one last hug. She was crying, and her hands clutched her tight. "My baby," she sobbed.
Pressed close to Mother, engulfed in her heady floral perfume, Narcissa had a sudden moment of clarity. She could stay behind, of course, but it would mean never growing up, never learning to get on without Mother. She'd be a child all her life. She disentangled herself from her mother and followed the bobbing green and blue ribbons into the crowd.
"I'll write all the time," she called back over her shoulder.
Sanctuary
Narcissa closed the lavatory door behind her and started back down the corridor to the first year girls' dormitory. The dank air seemed to press in around her like a living thing. The Slytherin dungeons were built under the lake, taking their sinuous twists from a network of natural caves that had once been there. Bellatrix had told Narcissa all about their history at dinner. It had all sounded grandly romantic in the brightly lit Great Hall; in the middle of the night, however, it was another matter altogether.
People had been tortured down here, and murdered, back when Hogwarts was a Muggle castle. How Bella had lingered over the grisly details! Torches flickered at intervals against the damp walls, birthing shades that danced at the corner of her eye.
And then Narcissa saw him.
The man's silvery form hovered a few inches from the ground, and his colorless eyes fixed her with a gorgon's glare. She gasped as she saw that he was covered in hideous wounds; every one seeped translucent blood. He was absolutely silent.
Narcissa screamed and ran. She didn't run for her own room; it was unfamiliar. She sought something known, something true, and so her feet led her inexorably to the third-year dormitory instead. It was unlocked. Inside was safety.
She could find her sister even in this stygian dark. She knew the sound of her breathing anywhere, and the scent of her hair potion. Narcissa crawled in with Bellatrix and pulled her long hair over her face like a blanket. She must have fallen asleep in moments; she knew nothing more until morning.
It was the sunlight that woke Narcissa, slanting into the room through all the windows but one.
Each of the dormitory windows in Slytherin House has two spells cast upon it. The first strengthens the glass, enabling it to hold back the pressure of the surrounding water. The second provides a false image of the sky and grounds, so that one sees the view as it would appear from a ground-floor room rather than from a window that fronts upon the depths of the lake. Each of them but Bella's. She'd left the first spell in place, but removed the second, so that her window showed a roiling expanse of murky green. It made Narcissa's stomach do flip-flops, and she wished Bella would put the illusion back.
"Cissy?" Bella uncurled herself from her pillows and rubbed her eyes. "What are you doing here?"
I'll take care of you.
"The Bloody Baron," Narcissa said, knowing it sounded stupid. She'd seen him at dinner the night before and kept her wits about her, it was just seeing him in the dungeons like that, in the middle of the night… "He scared me," she said, again wishing she didn't sound so much like a child. She heard two of Bella's roommates titter quietly.
Bella smiled. Narcissa was certain Bella, too, would join in the laughter, but her face seemed to show sympathy rather than mockery. "I suppose that's my fault, then. With all my nasty little stories. Go get dressed, and we'll have breakfast." The other girls fell silent at Bella's defense of Narcissa. Narcissa thanked her sister with a glance.
From that day the two were inseparable, just as they were at home; for four years no chum, no boyfriend, could come between them. They were more than sisters; they were the best of friends.
Revelation
Lucius Malfoy first kissed Narcissa when she was in her fifth year and he in his sixth. It was in February, just when the days were growing visibly longer. They were meant to be studying at the time. Transfiguration had never been Narcissa's strong suit, and as Lucius had earned an Outstanding O.W.L. in Transfiguration the year before, he was the logical choice.
Narcissa found it hard to concentrate, with the illusory sunset slanting through the common-room window and bathing the walls and floor in gold. She stole glances at Lucius from time to time, oddly fascinated by the way the light limned his blond hair, the way his face grew animated when he explained something. She felt, suddenly, that she didn't quite fit in her skin. It was something altogether new, and it confused her.
Then he looked back. His gray eyes were silver in this light, and he was staring at her as if he'd never seen her before, as if she weren't just little Cissy Black who'd passed him the salt at lunch that afternoon. The room was so quiet she could hear him breathing.
There was a moment's pause to feel her heart lurch, and then his lips were on hers, soft yet eager, and she opened her lips to him. It seemed the most natural thing in the world to reach up, to entwine her arms around his neck and run fingers through the silk of his hair. His hands roamed, running up and down her sides, brushing against her breasts hesitantly at first, more surely when her ragged breath fanned the flames of his courage.
The creak of a door. Narcissa gasped, and she and Lucius jumped apart instinctively. Bella stood on the threshold, smiling. "Why, good evening, Cissy, Lucius," she said, lingering over the sibilances, putting Narcissa in mind of a gleaming, venomous snake.
"Bella," Narcissa said, forcing her breath to some semblance of evenness.
"We were just studying Transfiguration. O.W.L.s, you know..." Lucius babbled, giving away what they'd been up to even more surely than their guilty blushes had done.
"Of course," said Bella. "I owe you my gratitude; Cissy's marks are so important to me. But would you mind...I would like to speak to my sister alone."
Narcissa knew Lucius would never have her to Bella's tender mercies if he'd known how angry she was, but he didn't know her well enough to taste the poison that dripped from her tongue. We Blacks have always been good at presenting a unified front for outsiders. He kissed her hand, which gave her a girlish thrill, and left, trailing pleasantries behind him.
"My room. Now," said Bella through gritted teeth. Dread churned in Narcissa's stomach.
Possession
The seventh-year girls' dormitory was empty but for the two sisters. Narcissa watched the dark water through Bella’s window, the grasping tendrils of fern and the faint silver flashes of fish. Bellatrix had carried on the macabre little tradition from one year to the next, so that one window in the dungeons always showed the truth. "I don't like pretty lies," Bella had said once when Narcissa asked her why.
Bella's shoes clicked on the stone floor as she paced. “Slut,” she hissed.
Narcissa whirled to face her. “Hypocrite.” She threw herself into Bella’s path, daring her to pass. “As if you’re not fucking Evan, and Lestrange, and half the school for all I know…”
Bella slapped Narcissa's cheek. It enraged Narcissa more than it hurt, the sting of the slap like an infusion of venom, and besides, she knew that Bella's resorting to physical violence meant Narcissa was right. She grabbed Bella by the shoulders to shove her away. Bella grappled with her arms, throwing Narcissa off balance and tumbling her to the bed. Laughing, Bella leapt on top of her sister, crouching triumphantly above her. Her hair fell down around them like a dark, heavy curtain.
Narcissa seized two thick handfuls of hair, twisting and pulling hard, and when Bella shrieked, she took advantage of the break in her concentration. She pushed Bella's body up off her and slipped out from under her.
They were eye to eye now, both on their knees, and in Narcissa's fury she was an heartbeat faster, pushing Bella so she fell back onto the pillows. Narcissa straddled her, one thigh to either side of her waist.
“Bitch,” Narcissa said. “What do you want? You want Lucius, is that it? Is big sissy jealous?”
Bella’s nails raked down Narcissa's nylons, leaving laddered ruin behind. Her hands were slow, deliberate, and she laughed again. “Maybe I am jealous,” she said, licking her lips. “But not of you.”
Narcissa didn’t get it, and she was sick to death of Bella just lying there laughing and ruining her stockings, casual as you please. “Then what are we fighting about? I’m leaving.”
Bellatrix put her hands on Narcissa's rag-clad thighs to keep her from going. “I said I’m not jealous of you. I’m jealous of him.”
“What, you don’t want me to go with boys? Want to keep me a little girl forever, is that it?”
“Au contraire,” Bella said. “I think I like you better all grown up.”
And then Bella’s hand was at Narcissa's breast, circling, nails flicking like a snake’s tongue over flesh already sensitive from Lucius’s explorations, and Narcissa gasped, willing her muscles to lift her out of this, to propel her to the door and back to her own room, but instead she found herself leaning into the touch.
“Nice and hard,” said Bellatrix. “What a little whore you are.” She twined her other hand into Narcissa's hair and pulled her down until their faces nearly touched.
Narcissa could feel Bella’s breath hot on her face; the scent of her skin was almost cloying, too familiar, too caught up in memories of innocence. “What do you want?” she repeated, her voice coming out in a hoarse whisper.
Bellatrix rose up to close the space between their faces and kissed Narcissa, not a sister’s kiss but a real one, with tongues. Her hand was inside Narcissa's blouse now, so good with the buttons Narcissa hadn’t even noticed them being undone, and her nails scraped over the lace cups beneath. Her fingers were hot where they brushed bare skin. Narcissa bit Bella’s lip to keep from crying out. The iron taste of blood rushed over Narcissa's tongue.
She broke away, gasping, and Narcissa thought this is it, I’ve hurt her, she’ll push me off now and maybe we can forget this insanity, just go back to normal, and--
But Bella was smiling again. “I knew you were mine,” she said, low and husky. She reached between Narcissa's thighs, nodding in silent satisfaction when she found her panties soaked through.
We’re not supposed to be doing this, some sliver of Narcissa's brain protested, but the only thing she was listening to anymore was the satin slide of Bella’s fingers over her clit, and when she pressed harder and took Narcissa's nipple into her mouth, it was all over.
Narcissa shattered, dissolved, whimpering in a voice that couldn’t be hers. The tarn in its endless green torpor was the only witness to the transgression, watching through its one glass eye.
Departure
The following year, Narcissa and Andromeda boarded the train without their sister, who had finished school. It was pouring as they pulled out of King’s Cross, great sheets of rain that made the car seem a drowned world. The two girls said little.
Andromeda stared at the window, though there was nothing to see but the rain, and Narcissa saw her trace the path of one fat drop as it was swept across the glass to be reunited with the torrent. It made Narcissa think of Bella, and the dormitory window that surely now was re-enchanted to show a more pleasant view, and she wondered.
But Bella and Andie don’t even get along...
Narcissa remembered, then, how it had been between her and Bella, the way it had been born of jealousy, nourished by hostility, and there was something hollow, something empty in Andromeda’s eyes.
They did. They must have done.
She wasn’t sure if she was jealous or if she wanted to confess all to Andromeda. Throw herself into her arms, maybe, let us be lost together, share in being cast adrift from her, muse with her about what our lives without Bella will be. But it wasn't exactly the sort of thing one can bring up in polite conversation, and Narcissa and Andromeda had maintained a wary distance for years. Polite conversation was the only sort they had left.
I shouldn't have listened to Bella, all that rot about traitors and Ravenclaw and all that, she's my sister, I should have...
The moment was lost almost as soon as Narcissa realized there was a moment. She always wondered, in later years, if things might have been different if she'd said something, bridged the abyss.
“Mind if I sit here?” The voice was soft, uncertain, but Narcissa knew its drawling accent well. She looked up and saw Lucius, his smile the brightest thing in the gray morning.
“Not at all,” Narcissa said. The train emerged from the storm then, into a perfect blue morning, and she chose to interpret it as a sign.