Title: The Ramblings of a Very Old Lady
Pairing/Character: Narcissa Black and Lucius Malfoy
Rating: G
Wordcount: 2,349
Summary: There was a lot of supposition behind the marraige of Narcissa and Lucius Malfoy. Apart from the couple themselves only one person knew the whole story!
Author's Notes: I actually wrote the first paragraphs of this nearly a year ago when a community somewhere suggested a 'Through the Portrait' type of weekly challenge and the idea appealled to me. Something went awry and for whatever reason, long forgotten, so was this piece until yesterday when climbing the stairs I heard on the British radio station, Classic fm, the story of how Gabriel Faure selected his bride, and got kickstarted into finishing it off.

Many thanks to the linguistically reliable manynames for her duties on overseeing my grammatical correctness.



The Ramblings of a Very Old Lady

As a student at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry during the mid sixteenth century, Musidora Barkwith had been aware of the close knit community of portraits around the building. It was impossible, she’d realised, to try and keep any sort of secret to herself. It seemed that each time Musidora attempted to make her way through one of the many doors requiring a password the keeper of the portrait would say something to bring a flush to her cheeks.

Cheating at charms brought a childish sneer from Felix Summerbee, fairly recently deceased and proud to guard his former classroom and to protect the ideals he’d upheld for so many years of teaching. Sneaking into the Ravenclaws’ common room to spend some time with Roderick Bonham, the most handsome wizard in the school, brought sneering jibes from Cyprian Youdle who really couldn’t understand why Roderick drew the attentions of so many young witches.

It was when she found herself standing in front of a portrait of Salazar Slytherin receiving a stern lecture, complete with no small amount of finger waggling, about upholding the pureblood virtues of his house - which surely shouldn’t be extended to Ravenclaw students - that Musidora herself decided that one day she’d like to feature at Hogwarts. Not teaching like Summerbee, or starting out as a Quidditch star like Bonham. It was far too late to have a house named after her as Salazar Slytherin and the other founders had, but there had to be a way and that ideal way, she eventually decided, was to live here as a portrait.

The portraits within Hogwarts had a perfect life, Musidora considered. They had the freedom to move from corridor to corridor between the magical network of picture frames. They had power. She couldn’t think of another word for it, power to oversee, to mould, to control students. Power was something that she wasn’t sure she should be striving for, but power was what she wanted. The Sorting Hat had mumbled to her as a puzzled young student about ambition way back in her first September and now, perhaps for the first time, Musidora was able to see that ambition within her. Whenever anyone asked her what she intended to do on leaving Hogwarts she covered up her real plans. To say that she intended to be a portrait would have found her taken forcibly away and left to think about changing her mind in the cells at the top of the school, a charge of madness held against her. Instead when put on the spot one day by an annoying inhabitant of one of the portraits in the Slytherin corridor who constantly niggled at her about her future plans she announced exactly what they were to be.

“I’m going to write music. Follow my name, I’ll be famous.” With a haughty look over her shoulder the sixteen year old had called out while walking away. “You’ll see.”

It was because of her successful one-shot composition, actually unfinished, that Musidora happened many centuries later to have succeeded in her ambition and to inhabit her own portrait along one of the lesser corridors at Hogwarts. The years had been kind to her, although Felix Summerbee had never forgiven her for her cheating pursuits in his lessons, and Cyprian Youdle had never understood why she hadn’t found him the most handsome member of the opposite sex in the castle. There was always something interesting to see. She’d witnessed that Tom Riddle walking the corridors after dark, ignoring the curfew and seen Minerva McGonagall’s initial attempts at advanced transfiguration. It had been quite hard not to laugh when instead of finding her eventual animagus form the young woman had transformed herself into a strange creature, basically herself though slightly demonic in appearance with a long tail that curled over her shoulder complete with hairy chest and talons that better suited the lions which insisted on accompanying Godric Gryffindor to his arguments with her own house founder in that big portrait, now long removed, at the bottom of the Slytherin corridor.

In more recent years Musidora had watched the young Severus Snape as he cursed and hexed his way through the students his age and eventually in his later years at school, the younger ones too, apparently attempting to gain popularity but instead isolating himself. As funny as they were, she’d hesitated at openly laughing at Sirius Black and James Potter when they carried out numerous pranks. Flooding the lower areas of the school lost its charm when you’d already seen it two or sometimes three times a century. To then go on and witness the event at least twice a term, she had told them unsympathetically, was frankly boring.

Of everything Musidora had witnessed in the centuries since her portrait had been hung with a small ceremony that, sadly, hadn’t made the columns of The Daily Prophet, the story that she really wished she could tell the world was the one surrounding the marriage of Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy.

Whenever Musidora mentioned the couple to one of the other portraits she was met with a disdainful rebuttal. Apparently just everybody knew that if it weren’t for a business arrangement they would never have been together. The word on the street, or in this case the word in the frame, was that Narcissa’s father had sold his youngest daughter’s hand in a business deal that sealed the fate of the pair. Lucius, of course, would never have married Narcissa without the vault full of galleons her father offered in exchange for a wedding date set not too far in the future from the date of Narcissa leaving school.

What no-one else knew, except Lucius, Narcissa and of course Musidora herself, was that the galleons and carefully choreographed courtship was unnecessary. During Lucius’s last year at Hogwarts the pair had fallen in love. Hushed conversations in the corridors had informed Musidora that the pair had cleverly planned their own betrothal, complete with dowry of galleons that wouldn’t have been theirs had they openly followed the path of courtship, engagement and marriage her sisters had taken.

The next few years where Narcissa was still a student, and Lucius at work within the Ministry hadn’t proved too much of a hindrance to them. Musidora had moved into the coffee shop in Hogsmeade, or the bar of the Three Broomsticks on a number of occasions just to check that they still seemed as happy as she’d known they would be.

She’d even managed to be in the extremely elite Jewellers’ shop in Diagon Alley the morning that Lucius had placed his order for a rather nice and extremely expensive engagement ring. And then later that week followed that through by dining within a delicate golden frame opposite Glower Hipworth while they planned the final stage of their betrothal, Narcissa wearing the ring for the whole evening just, as she’d exclaimed, to make sure it suited.

One of the benefits of being a portrait elder was that Musidora, like the others, was able to arrange short holidays from Hogwarts. A holiday wasn’t something that had appealed to her before now, there was far more of interest here in the Castle to observe than she could even begin to imagine took place outside. However, having followed the romantic saga from its very beginnings Musidora began to think that a holiday might be in order. And, what better place to holiday than the exact same place as the honeymoon couple? Not that she’d be watching them, of course, not at times like those anyway. Watching had never been her thing. It would be nice to just oversee the conclusion, to just make sure they were happy, and then she’d go back to Hogwarts and find another couple to see on the happy path of courtship, marriage, and hopefully one day parenthood.

It had proved impossible to secure an invitation to the actual ceremony, or even more infuriatingly, to the reception afterwards. The portraits within Malfoy Manor, the bride’s venue of choice, were adamant in their refusal to comply this time. It was entirely unnecessary; Musidora had expressed, to be quite so snooty in their decline of her presence. The other guests were just as she, deceased beings who had offered their services to the wizarding world. Their circumstance of birth, she thought, shouldn’t even be a consideration. Did no-one realise the important part she had played in securing this marriage? Even the offer of an exchange visit to Hogwarts didn’t stir them one little bit from the firm stance that Malfoy Manor was the place to be. And so, it was a long long day as Musidora waited in a rather opulent suite in a small but exquisite hotel in the more fashionable wizarding area of Santa Croce, Venice, ideally placed for wandering through elegant squares to delight in superb restaurants. Yes, she had schooled them well.

Having made an early start herself, not wanting to get held up in a logjam of so-called celebrities from all over Great Britain as well as other wizarding communities abroad on their way to Wiltshire, Musidora welcomed a sojourn in a delightful Brasserie on the South Bank in Paris where she filled in Inigo Imago on the detail of the bride’s couture before making her way, as guest of honour in the sumptuous surroundings offered by Jacinta Pilliwinkle, alone while her husband Justis attended the Manor itself.

Tired as she was on arrival, Musidora was very careful to give the politically correct version of events leading up to the day’s nuptials and not the version she knew was actually correct.

That Lucius had wined and dined three potential suitors from a list presented by his father was common knowledge amongst wizards and portraits alike. Narcissa herself had assisted him in selecting the other two, each handpicked for quite defining reasons.

Although quite academically brilliant and not unattractive, Alexandria Gibbon, had been selected for her voluptuous figure and shortness of stature, quite the opposite to Lucius’s preference for willowy svelteness. In years to come, they’d sniggered together once the hopeful maiden’s name had appeared on the list. Miss Gibbon would be quite frumpy and matronly, certainly not the picture of aristocratic elegance the Malfoys liked to see in their own family portraits.

The third name to join Narcissa’s own with Miss Gibbon had been rather harder to choose. They had, in a classy wine bar in the snootier end of Diagon Alley, one summer’s evening talked long and hard about this choice. In the end the name of Diana Yaxley had been selected, solely because of the colour of her hair. For Lucius to openly prefer such a girl as this would be sure to encourage drastic measures by the elder Malfoys in Narcissa’s direction.

As luck would have it, Musidora managed to secure herself a rather nice position in the Wizard’s Club in Clarges Street where she posed behind the head of a prize Beagle the night Lucius and his father dined alone, the only item on the agenda that of selecting the next Mrs Malfoy. Quite a collection of other subjects had found their way to the dining room by the time the port and cheese was delivered to the corner table in the hope of hearing the decision of just who the lucky girl was to be.

It had been almost impossible for Musidora not the display her obvious glee at the way Lucius controlled the situation, manipulating his father’s decision by not even mentioning Narcissa but apparently favouring the third girl on the list, the one Mr Malfoy had reassured his wife would never bear the Malfoy name. Musidora did let herself down a little with an audible squeal of delight when Mr Malfoy, the elder, announced the best and only way to choose was an impartial way – that of allowing Lucius to pluck the name of his future wife from a silver goblet produced by the head waiter especially for the task.

It had been of no surprise to Musidora when Lucius graciously excused himself from the table for a necessary visit to the gentlemen’s room where he, at exactly the same time as his father, clearly enunciated the words which would change the name on all three pieces of expensive deckle edged parchment bearing the Malfoy crest to one and the same name.

Sitting back, Musidora watched as Lucius dipped his hand into the silver goblet and with a flourish produced the parchment bearing the name of Narcissa Black. Each man managed to force a look of disappointment when they first saw exactly who was to join their family, the words ‘It was the only way to choose’, and ‘Hard lines, old boy but a deal is a deal’, being thrown in for good measure along with a well practised shrug of displeasure.

That was how come Musidora now witnessed the light hearted giggling of the newlyweds’ arrival at their honeymoon suite, desperately and wholly in love as she could tell just by watching for the briefest time.

It would be wrong to outstay her welcome. With a polite thank you to her host shortly after breakfast the next morning and the satisfaction of a job well done, Musidora started her return journey to Hogwarts. Soon was to be the start of another term, and during that term it would be vital to select a new couple whose futures should be secured in a similar way to these lucky two.

Musidora wasn’t quite in agreement about the undesirability of the red-headed girl, who Mr Malfoy had snorted looked just like a Weasley, and come to think of it there was a rather nice red-headed girl at Hogwarts just now – about to enter her final year. Perhaps it was time that James Potter raised his game and stopped boring her and her colleagues with his pranks. Yes, Musidora had a new couple in mind. She was quite sure another wedding would be on the cards, if only she could find a way to bring them together.