"You Are Coming With Me Now," Andromeda/Ted, NC-17 Title: You Are Coming With Me Now Author:green_amber Characters/Pairing: Summary: "I can't go back to that...I can't go back to being the girl I'm supposed to be." Rating: NC-17 Warning(s): D/s; inappropriate use of Polyjuice Originally Written: 2/06, 3/06, somewhere in that general time frame Notes: For jadeddiva; beta by Sionn.
It looked like a set piece, a tableau for a painting: three pretty girls side by side in the mirror. Robes: expensive, the best silk money could buy, lightweight for summer. The darkest girl in blood red, the fair girl in pale blue, and Andromeda's own dark brown hair against the pure white gown of a bride. Or a virgin sacrifice.
"Don't look so pale," said Bellatrix, crouching low to pencil Andromeda's eyes. "Lucius will be gentle with you. At least until after you're married." She laughed, a high irritating sound that could cut glass.
Narcissa yanked Andromeda's hair rather brutally at that moment, her scowl distorting the perfect face in the mirror.
"What's got into you?" asked Andromeda.
Narcissa didn't answer, just bit her lip and went back to styling Andromeda's hair. Andromeda closed her eyes, savoring the pleasure of having her hair done, wanting it to go on forever. If it took forever, maybe the hour of the betrothal ball would never come.
Fool, she said to herself. The duty of a Black woman was to marry well and breed more little purebloods. Her ultimate goal in life, to be a sour-faced matron preserved in oils on the wall, a name on the tapestry, a branch on the tree.
And what's supposed to be the fruit? she wondered, as she often did. To what purpose, all this self-denial? We have the brightest, most beautiful, most headstrong women in Britain in our family, and we sell them off as broodmares.
The future, always the future. In what far-off generation would a Black girl finally be allowed to live?
Not this one, for sure. Andromeda had briefly fooled herself into thinking she could be the one to break the chains. That had ended at the Leaving Feast, with Mummy and Daddy Dearest showing up with a cadre of goons, cornering Ted, giving him that little speech about how Andromeda was a lady with a future ahead of her, a future that included Lucius and didn't include filthy Mudblood upstarts, and how if he ever so much as glanced at her again, they would send what was left of him to his filthy Muggle parents in an envelope.
She wondered which of her sisters had spied, had told.
She knew, however, that she needed to put all that behind her. Childish things. A fancy. This was reality, Narcissa twining the golden pins into her hair, Bellatrix dabbing rouge onto her lips, trussing her up like a prize bit of livestock. For Lucius Malfoy.
* ~ * ~ *
Andromeda descended the great curving staircase slowly, careful not to step on the hem of her robes. It felt like sinking into a dream, the ballroom alight with the dancing golden light of a thousand candles, the rising swells of the music, the swirling silk of a hundred regally robed couples. Sweet perfume to mask the rot beneath, said a tiny nagging part of her mind. She tucked it away, forgot it.
Lucius Malfoy waited at the bottom of the stair. His hair gleamed like spun gold; his black robes were impeccable. He took her hand--roughly, possessively--and led her into the throng. He smelled of leather and vetiver. She shivered. Cruelty should not be so beautiful--and he was cruel, she knew, from the tales he'd told at the Slytherin table. Tales of Muggle-born students and dark locked closets and forbidden curses.
How long until I do something that displeases him, and he locks me away in the dungeon of his Manor?
Does his Manor have a dungeon?
He bent so that his lips brushed her ear. "You don't seem happy to see me," he said, in a low near-whisper.
"Nonsense," she said. "I'm always happy to see you, Lucius." She forced her mouth into a semblance of a smile.
"Good," he said. He wrapped his other arm around her waist and whirled her into the dance. He made no small talk, only looked at her so intently that she lowered her eyes and stared at the weave of his robe's shoulder.
"No," he said. "Look at me." He cupped her chin firmly and tilted it up toward him. "You're mine, and you won't forget it, if you know what's good for you." There was a caged fury in his brown eyes.
She shuddered. "Yes, Lucius," she said.
Brown eyes? Hadn't they been a sort of greyish blue?
"You know what, Andromeda? I think I'm tired of dancing." He pulled hard on her arm and dragged her off the dance floor.
"It seems you two lovebirds are having a wonderful time," simpered Mother as they passed her.
"Splendid," said Lucius through gritted teeth. "In fact, I'd like to talk to your daughter alone. Where's a good place?"
"Why, Lucius, that's highly irregular…you're not married yet…"
"Tell me where, or the betrothal is off."
Andromeda watched her mother weigh and calculate: her daughter's virtue against the Malfoy fortune and the restoration of the former glory of the House of Black. She could almost see numbers scrolling across Mother's eyes.
"Very well. There's a parlor at the end of that hall there," she said. "but have her back by midnight; I plan to announce the engagement then, and I want everyone to see the happy couple!" She smiled, a horrible and masklike smile.
This is my future, thought Andromeda. False smiles and protocol and the chance to sell my own daughter into slavery one day.
He pulled her roughly down the hall, opened the parlor door, and pushed her in. He followed, and the door slammed behind him.
She stood stock-still, watching him warily, wondering whether she should hex him when he tried to rape her, or whether that would only make matters worse. Mother would say it wasn't really rape, not when he's my intended.
"Bloody hell, Romy," Lucius swore. "Calm down. I'm not going to hurt you."
"If I'm not mistaken, Lucius, you seem to have dragged me unceremoniously into a secluded place. I doubt you're planning on playing Gobstones."
He stared for a moment, then broke into a laugh. It wasn't the harsh laughter she'd seen when he gloated over his bullying deeds. It was a full-on, tears-in-eyes belly laugh. She was speechless. Was he drunk already?
"For Merlin's sake, Romy, I'm not Lucius!"
"Then who the bloody hell are you?"
He sighed. "I think my hour's about up anyway…yes…"
Lucius changed before her eyes, his features melting into another face entirely, his pale hair darkening to an earthy brown. Suddenly the eyes made sense.
"Ted?" She whispered, wanting to scream but knowing she couldn't risk his name being heard.
"The very same," he said, smiling slightly.
A million questions pummeled her mind, overlapping and competing, and the one that finally fell from her mouth sounded inane even to her. "How did you get Lucius's hair?"
"Accio'd a stray one from his coat at the Leaving Feast."
"How long have you had this planned?"
"Since your lovely parents had that little talk with me."
"Where's the real Lucius?"
"Last I saw him, sneaking out into the alley with your sister Narcissa."
She laughed wryly. No wonder Cissy'd been so bitchy before the ball--she wanted Lucius for herself.
A thought came unbidden to Andromeda's mind then, a thought so treacherous and impossible--let Cissy make the alliance, and I'll run away. I'll run away with Ted, and…
Forget it. Can't lead him into this kind of danger. Get him out of here.
"Go," she said, looking away. "Please. Go home."
"No," said Ted. He stepped toward her and cupped her face in his hand again, just as he'd done as "Lucius", but somehow she didn't mind as much now that she knew who he was. "No. I'm going to have you, unless you swear to me that you don't want me."
"I…"
"You can stop me at any time, but only if you mean it. I'll leave right now, if you can tell me--no, look into my eyes, Romy. If you can tell me you honest to God want me gone."
Andromeda shook her head. "I can't."
He claimed her mouth with a long kiss, crushing her face to his and tangling his hand roughly in her hair. He'd always been so gentle before; what had got into him? She struggled away from him, out of his grasp, and caught a panting breath.
"Ted. We can't do this. We'll get caught."
He flicked his wand at the door. "There. A locking charm and a silencing charm. No one will bother us." He laid his wand down and turned back to her. "Now, where were we?"
"You were leaving."
He smirked.
Since when did Ted Tonks smirk?
"I swear I will leave if you can honestly tell me you don't want me."
"I…I don't…" She wanted to tell him to go away, but her lips still burned where he had kissed them. She saw down the long tunnel of the years ahead, saw herself biting her lip and staring at the ceiling as she did her duty to Lucius, saw herself grow old and grey and never, never feel again the way she felt about Ted.
"So," he said. "If I touched you right now, you'd be dry as a bone."
She closed her eyes, took a deep breath. "Of course."
"Lift up that robe."
"What?"
"You heard me."
She bit her lip, took another deep breath, and pulled the white silk up to her chest. "Happy?"
He looked her up and down, and smiled a feral smile. "Now, let's test my theory, shall we?"
Andromeda knew she was lost. Ted slipped his fingers between her trembling thighs, and slid two of them easily into her wet cunt. "I thought so," he said.
He was moving them in and out of her now, and she let out a moan. "Please…"
"Please what? Please go away, was it?" He pulled his fingers out of her abruptly and moved a step back. "Please leave you here in your stuffy little life?"
"Please take me. Please." Only a last fling, of course, she thought. Let me remember what I'm giving up.
His hands moved to either side of her face; she smelled her own scent on his fingers as he claimed her lips again. His tongue was possessive, hungry. He filled the world. She answered his kiss, pressed her body against his, knowing in some dim corner of her mind that she was wrinkling her white silk robes but not caring. Silk robes, engagement balls--it occurred to her that she'd been sleepwalking these last few months, soulless as an Inferius, mindless as a porcelain doll; all the music and color draining away as Ted walked away from her in the Hall--
--all rushing back, now, a riot, a cacophony, of sensation as he ripped the priceless silk from her in a few rough movements, as he cupped her breasts in his hands, first caressing, then pinching brutally. She moaned as he pushed her gently but firmly against the wall.
He let out a low groan against her neck as his fingers sank again into her wetness; his other hands fumbled with his robes. His cock, freed from the layers of cloth, nudged against her thigh. She writhed, rubbing against him. "Please," she said again.
Ted entered her, familiar and yet made new again, as she had never hoped to have him again in this lifetime. She clung to him, nipping at his neck with her teeth as though to mark him hers for all time, to scrawl Andromeda across his flesh in kisses.
And how am I going to let him go again, having tasted this second chance?
When her orgasm washed over her, it felt like the world shattering, the sky falling, everything she knew broken in pieces at her feet, and as he thrust once, twice more and burst within her, she noticed wetness on her cheeks, on his shoulder, and realized she was crying.
He was tender again after it was all over, helping her back into the tatters of her robes, raining soft kisses on her black-streaked face. "Are you all right?" he asked.
Yes, whispered her body's languor. "No," she said.
"What's wrong, Romy?"
"I can't go back to that...I can't go back to being the girl I'm supposed to be." Not having known you. When you walk away tonight, you'll take the best of me with you.
"Don't worry," he said, an infuriating smirk returning to his lips, all the more arrogant for the satisfied gleam in his dark eyes. "I expressly forbid you to let your mum and dad push you around anymore. I especially forbid you to marry Lucius Malfoy. I won't have it."
"But…"
He pulled a vial of a foul-looking liquid from his pocket, popped the cork, and downed the contents. He grimaced as his features melted again into those of Lucius Malfoy. "This should get us to the gates."
"And then?"
"And then--the world is ours." He grinned, and took her by the arm; led her from the room and out through a back door. The night air was chilly as it whipped through the rents in her thin silk gown.
She didn't quite believe it, couldn’t quite trust that this wasn't some sadistic plan cooked up by Lucius and his friends, not until they were an hour's distance from the house and the man beside her turned again into Ted, the man she loved, the man who had reminded her what it was to be free, to be real.
It felt like a porcelain doll shattered, a tapestry ripped to threads, a priceless portrait where the subject just got up and walked away. The future was unmapped, unknown, a blank slate. It was hers, hers and Ted's, to write.