Never meant to be

Malfoy manor reeks. The stench is there, and his nostrils tremble in a very animalistic way which is a joke in itself. Isn’t it the smell of an animal, a very special and dangerous animal, that makes him angry? But who can really tell now? The anger, dangerously balancing on the verge of turning into rage, has been his constant companion for… for how long? No answer for that, at least, no answer yet. There wasn’t a calendar in Azkaban, and he had lost the count of the days early on. It was another level of torture, the one that was not inflicted by the terrible guards who could still enjoy the results. Not knowing how long you had been there. Not being sure you had suffered enough for Him. Malfoy manor reeks, and Rodolphus knows that smell too well. It’s the stench of a werewolf who has only recently turned back, and there is only one living werewolf he knows about who can turn whenever he wants to. Greyback. Who could have imagined that Fenrir Greyback, the savage werewolf, would one day walk the proud halls of the manor Rodolphus had once used to dance his waltzes in, drink his ridiculously expensive wines in, and discuss politics? He used to be a frequent guest here, like most notable purebloods. The wallpapers changed. The decorations changed. The manor looks more modern, it looks more… well-kept. Narcissa has always wanted to play house, and she got what she wanted. The whole Malfoy estate to play with. It’s just… Greyback leaves through the backdoor, and Rodolphus thinks that it doesn’t matter anymore. Even if Abraxas Malfoy is probably rolling in his grave, it doesn’t feel like much of a punishment. Just a small jab in the ribs of the Malfoys’ dignity, the beginning of a joke he would never have a chance to share with his old boys: so, a werewolf walks into the Malfoy manor… His old boys are either dead, or insane, at least, for now. Or traitors. Azkaban didn’t break him, but it almost destroyed his brother and turned his wife utterly insane. Bella had had her fits even before but that was nothing a good fuck or some patience couldn’t cure. Rodolphus used to think his wife was very spicy, the way some sorts of peppers are not for everyone’s palate. Now he is fully and completely disillusioned, Azkaban does this thing to people, and he knows that she is insane. She could probably get better in time, but Rodolphus doesn’t believe in time anymore. His time and all the clocks stopped in Azkaban. Bellatrix was almost unconscious and so fragile in his arms when Rodolphus carried her out of the prison! It felt like he was holding a bird, broken by the storm, a mix of trembling feathers and crushed bones. He didn’t want to let go of her, not after all those years, when he heard her screaming and whispering but couldn’t touch her, hold her, lull her to sleep… Rodolphus had to let the man he worshipped take the woman he loved from him, because he had Rabastan to get out of Azkaban, walk him out of that place, and Rodolphus knew well that while the Dark Lord would take care of Bella, he would not do the same for Rabastan. The younger of the Lestrange brothers was loyal enough to be remembered but not important enough to be taken care of by the Lord Almighty. So, Rodolphus had to do the thing no Azkaban prisoner would do willingly, he had to walk back, through the crumbled wall, to get his little brother out. These memories come and go, just like the waves come and go during the high tide, and Rodolphus wonders for a moment what it looks like for others. Maybe his eyes get all hollow and expressionless, all dulled by pain and past. Maybe this is the real reason no one seems to be able to hold his gaze now. People rush to turn away from anything that reminds them of illness, and Azkaban is an illness that took deep roots inside. “I am very happy to welcome you…” Lucius starts and fails. He clears his throat, tries again and gives up under Lestrange’s stare. The intensity of it has always been a thing that even the Dark Lord joked about in the past. “Rodolphus never stares, he glares,” the Dark Lord had once mused, and that settled it. Lucius can’t hold his glare. He lowers eyes in defeat, and for a small moment Rodolphus is contemplating killing this man right there, on the spot. It is nothing personal, just the facts. Lucius was living his life while Bella was rotting in Azkaban. It is unfair. Whatever happened to Bella was her own choice and his fault, but it is very difficult to be fair at this very moment. Rodolphus isn’t holding Bella in his arms anymore but he can still feel her trembling, and he will always feel that, he knows. Lucius had chosen wisely back then because he had a newborn child and a wife he fell in love with after little Draco was born. The Malfoys have always been good at smelling the opportunities and good deals, and Lucious probably thought that he had bought himself a chance for a new life. He was wrong, of course. He had borrowed some time but he borrowed it from the Dark Lord, the last person you should ever become in debt of. If I kill him now, I will be doing him a favor in a way. A hand sets heavily on his shoulder, and Rodolphus knows whose hand this is just from the way it feels. But even if it wasn’t for that, Lucius is a great tell, because he turns almost white, ready to compete with those white peacocks still parading in the gardens outside. The Malfoys took care of the birds while Bella, Narcissa’s sister, was rotting alive in Azkaban. “She is resting,” the cold voice says, and fingers dig into the muscles of his shoulder, sharp and unforgiving, just the way Rodolphus feels. And then Voldemort adds, “Let us see your brother now, Rodolphus.” Lestrange nods and follows Voldemort who doesn’t pay Lucius any attention, not even acknowledging his existence. Maybe, Malfoy truly doesn’t exist for the Dark Lord anymore.

***

Time comes back to him, but now, when Rodolphus finally gets it back, he doesn’t have enough. Everything has to be done swiftly. Their Lord had been waiting for so many years! No wonder he is impatient now. And extremely paranoid. Rodolphus gets into the bathtub, and when hot water swallows his body, he can’t help it but lets out a sigh in which pain and pleasure are mixed. He didn’t know how much he craved the hot bath until this very moment. Fifteen years in prison meant fifteen years without the luxury of hot water. His consciousness starts drifting, and for a moment the blasphemous thought gently touches his mind. The possibility of drowning in the hot water and ending everything right here and now. Rodolphus has never been a suicidal person, though his recklessness and passion for dueling might have been signs that deep down he was seeking self-destruction. But the idea that everything can end right here is tempting, to say the least. They did it. They waited for Him, they survived for Him, and now the waiting was over but it left Rodolphus so tired… His wife and his brother were free, they escaped Azkaban, and now time was as good as any to finish it all and for once. The Malfoy manor is enormous, and it can easily accommodate all of them, with its beautiful and spacious guest rooms, bathrooms decorated with marble and, for some reason, tapestries. He never truly realised how big this house was in his youth. Abraxas Malfoy, now dead, the lucky one, was so good with investing his gold that there was a rumour, the nasty one, he had leprechauns in his bloodline. It was so obviously not true that this gossip stayed and bloomed into something utterly bizarre. Leprechaun gold. Leprechaun luck. Rodolphus drifts in and out of consciousness, and water stays hot all the time. He looks at his limbs through half-shut eyes and they disgust him. So thin and pale, and he was making an effort to exercise in his cell! He used to be a big man, all muscles and broad shoulders, and people used to call him a brute behind his back and never to his face. Now he doesn’t feel big, he feels bitter and dangerous. He feels unstable. His sanity is held together by an intricate combination of his will and arrogance because he is a Lestrange, for Merlin’s sake, he will endure. And yet… It is tempting to pull the pin from the fabric of his mind away and let it unfold into the ugliest stream of violence and self-hatred ever known to mankind. Shaving is easy if it’s done with magic. Rodolphus hates shaving with magic, he misses his razor but it would be a mistake because his hands might tremble… he might flinch. He cuts his long hair and beard with magic, and it feels unsatisfying. It feels like cheating, he would rather bleed, if necessary… Let the bad blood out, his father would say when he was drunk. Let it pour. When he is done, Rodolphus feels clean and tired. But there is no rest for the wicked.

***

He still remembers Narcissa as a girl who enjoyed playing a princess. She was the one to be kidnapped by a wizard, or a dragon, or whatever monster was suicidal enough to mess with a Black. Usually the role of the monster was masterfully executed by Rodolphus. He had a knack for playing dark wizards. This new Narcissa he does not recognize because he didn’t have time to get to know her. She is a Malfoy now, and she is a mother, too. Rodolphus has that deep respect for motherhood, it’s half subconscious, half instilled by the values that run deep in pure-blooded families. A mother is sacred, at least, a pure-blood mother who gave birth to an heir. Their kind is scarce, carefully selected and controlled inbreeding for the purpose of purity, and those women who give birth to an heir… they are above others. Narcissa is not the little girl he used to know, but she still enjoys playing house. Her house, the Malfoy manor, is not hers anymore, not really, but she pretends it is. She is playing a graceful hostess with people who forgot not only that they are supposed to behave as guests, but that they are people. She brings him scotch, neat. It’s perfect, it evokes the memories of other times, better times, when he was younger, bigger, and still knew how to laugh. Those times are not real anymore, because the whole concept of time is not real, Rodolphus learned it the hard way. Narcissa stays with him in one of the rooms that is meant to be used for receiving close friends, and Rodolphus glares at her when he makes another sip of his drink. Scotch tastes like ashes. Everything tastes like ashes for him now. “What do you want, Cissi?” he finally asks when the shadows change. Narcissa was silent this whole time, just sitting there quietly, gracefully. A princess without a castle. Rodolphus asks because he knows courage when he sees it, and it takes a lot of courage to share space with him now. “You are His right hand,” Narcissa says, and Rodolphus shakes his head. “Bullshit.” “Language, Rod,” she tries to look indignant and fails, she tries to make it sound like a joke, a reference to their past, and fails again. Rodolphus notices dark circles under her eyes, the ones that makeup didn’t manage to hide. “He does not need one anymore. People betray.” “You did not,” Narcissa is quick to say, pointing out the obvious that is looking at Rodolphus from the mirror every day. “You did not betray Him.” Unlike your husband, he thinks but does not bother to say that aloud. Some things do not need to be voiced, they sound very distinct even if they were never pronounced. Instead, he says: “I am still people.” Narcissa lets out a small sound, a nervous laughter that she would have never allowed herself before, because that would have been unfitting for a Black. “Rod, my son is a child. He is the heir for the Malfoys…” “And?” “And for the Blacks,” she says stubbornly, ignoring his contempt. “You don’t have any heirs… you and Bella.” “We don’t,” he agrees and finishes his scotch. Narcissa pours some more, graceful, fragrant like a flower. “He is the only hope for both of the families. You respect the blood, don’t you, Rod?” Rodolphus doesn’t answer. He is suddenly exhausted by dancing around the subject. He used to be good at it, but now he is just tired. “Are you trying to whore yourself to my husband for your pathetic excuse of a son, Cissi?” Bella enters the room, and she looks terrible, gaunt and insane, her dark hair long and loose, the best decoration she ever needed. Diamonds, pearls, and coral… all of that were attributes of femininity her sisters used. Bella could have walked into a room stark-naked, and still be dressed better than others in her long raven hair. He can now see many silver threads in them. “Trying to make good old Rody feel sorry for little Draco, aren’t we?” “Your tongue should be forked,” Narcissa stands up, cold and collected, but Bella laughs in her face. She isn’t impressed even the slightest. “You will allow your own nephew, your blood, to die in vain, Bella. Just to prove some point.” Bella looks at him, demanding: “What do you have to say?” “Nobody needs to die in vain to prove anything,” his gaze is slowly following the gentle curve of Narcissa’s lips. Her skin is so smooth. He can imagine the way it could taste. Then he thinks about his Lord, left alone, destroyed, hurting… Rodolphus got into Azkaban, and yet he still had his body, his knuckles to crash at the walls, his fingers to bite, his hair to pull. What did his Lord have? He thinks about that cold hand on his shoulder, those unforgiving fingers sinking into the flesh of his muscles… he says, “You can send him to Azkaban. They say the guards there know their job well.” A shadow passes over Bella’s face. Narcissa rushes out of the room, and then there is that terrible sound he grew to hate. Bella is laughing. “Aren’t you a sadistic piece of pure-blood trash, Rod? She is a mother, after all. And my sister.” “Does that mean that only you are allowed to pour poison in her ears?” “Yes.” “I will try to remember that.”

***

The Dark Lord is sitting near the fire that doesn’t make him warm. He is terrifying, truly. The grotesque mask that has become his new face shows no emotion, and Rodolphus is there with him. “That Wormtail didn’t deserve such an honour,” he finally says. The shadows feel alive and hungry around them. The Dark Lord has stopped talking several minutes — or hours — ago, and Lestrange is trying to find something to say, anything, in response to that horrible sincerity the man in the chair had shown him. The tale of the Dark Lord that will never be told again. “Flesh of the servant, willingly given… It should have been me. I would have killed for that honour.” “I know,” the voice is cold and calm, “I would have chosen you as well.” There is no higher praise Rodolphus could imagine, and for a moment he doesn’t want to say or hear anything ever again. Then the moment is over, because the Dark Lord continues: “I don’t enjoy staying here. It’s a pity the Lestrange manor is in ruins… it was never meant to be this way, Rodolphus.” The Dark Lord leaves the room, the words still linger. Rodolphus looks at the flames, but doesn’t see the fire dancing.