Work Text:
Amazing cover art by arcturus-night-star, who organized this fest!
“The potion’s finished brewing, my darling,” Lucius said, patting the sweat off of Narcissa’s brow. “Are you ready to try it?”
Narcissa coughed, blood and sputum mixing together on her silk handkerchief. Her body ached. Her lungs hurt with each inhale and exhale. Her heart labored to continue pumping blood through her veins. She shook her head violently from side to side, and Lucius wondered if she was saying no to the potion or if it was an unintentional spasm of the flesh.
“Please, Narcissa. We have to try the potion.” He summoned the potion from the slowly bubbling cauldron on the other side of the room, the vial scraping the bottom of the vessel to get every last drop of liquid.
The Seer had told him that all that was needed was a singular drop of Moonbeam Elixir. The potion was iridescent and effervescent, gently fizzing in the small vial that floating across the room to where Narcissa lay.
The potion had been exceedingly difficult to brew. Their son, Draco, had needed to travel half the world over to collect the ingredients, which could only be harvested under the light of the full moon. It had taken months to get started, and then the potion had taken near constant monitoring and adjustments for three full moons to create the few drops that were brewed in the end.
But it was the only thing that could save his wife, his world.
“I’m scared, Lucius,” her voice was hoarse from the ravages of the curse, which tore at the soft cells inside her body. “What if it doesn’t work?”
He cupped her cheek in his hand. Her skin burned his palm as he did. “It will. The seer said that all was needed was one drop.”
Her eyes, half-lidded, shifted to view the small vial in her husband’s hand. The Moonbeam Elixir. It was said to end the effects of any curse, and she knew how hard her husband and son had worked to brew the almost impossible liquid.
But in the year since the curse had collided with her small frame, she’d felt nothing but pain. It made it hard to remember that there was a time before she knew this suffering. The curse ran through her body, bursting her cells one by one. It moved at a rate slow enough not to kill her immediately but fast enough to be excruciating.
She didn’t regret lying to the Dark Lord that Harry Potter lived. Her son had organized for the Daily Prophet to do a full issue on her bravery, highlighting how one witch had changed the course of history by standing up to the Dark Lord. She knew it had been the right thing to do. She knew that it made her son proud of her and that that should be enough.
But she sometimes, secretly, wished she had told the truth and avoided the effects of this curse that ravaged her body repeatedly. Her body was clever, constantly healing—though the curse was cleverer, moving just a little faster than the rate of replacement to ensure there were always new cells for the curse to destroy.
The curse would kill her, but only after years of agony.
“What did the Seer say again?” It was difficult to speak, but she longed for her husband’s reassurance again.
Lucius smiled wanly. He’d repeated these words to his wife many times. “Under the full moon, a single drop of moonlight will cure your wife of all pain.”
It felt like a forbidden promise, something the Gods’ would offer to their Vestal Virgins as a thanks for great sacrifice and long years of service. She wasn’t sure she deserved such a gift, having sacrificed little and served only her own interests.
But she trusted Lucius, and she’d suffered for so long.
“Should we wait for Draco?” She asked before erupting into another coughing fit. The shaking of her body caused a bloody nose and a new ache in her chest.
“You have to take the potion under the full moon, my love.” He bent over and kissed his wife’s forehead, his lips cool on her skin, as he wiped the blood from her nostril. “If he’s not here in time, we’ll have to wait another month.”
The thought of another month of agony scared her more than trying the potion without her son.
“Ok, let’s do it.” She took a deep breath and tried her hardest to swallow her fear. “Lucius, thank you for trying everything.”
“I would go to the end of the world for you, my love.” He smiled because he knew that soon, everything would be better. When the curse was ended, he’d have his wife back.
“I love you,” she whispered. The words burned as they fell from her lips. She wasn’t sure if it was her passion for her husband or the curse that made everything feel more intense at that moment.
“I love you, too,” he replied, genuinely.
“Can you help me with the potion? I’m too weak to lift my head.” She hoped it would be the last thing he’d have to do for her. If this potion worked… she couldn’t wait to do things on her own again.
Lucius complied. He gently slipped his hand under his wife’s head and tilted it towards the lip of the potion. With a precise flick of his wand, he ensured that a single pearlescent drop entered her slightly open mouth.
He felt the muscles in her neck contract as she swallowed the drop.
And he felt her exhale one last time, in a way that was so sudden that he thought she must not have any breath left.
Panic gripped his chest as he noticed that the rise and fall of her chest had ceased.
“Narcissa?” His voice was frantic, crazed. He shook the witch, and nothing happened. Her skin pale and luminescent in the glow of moonlight from the window. “Narcissa wake up!”
He cast every spell he could think of. All at once. The room filled with magical light from his sparking wand. Blues and greens and reds flooding the space in a quick succession.
Nothing worked.
Narcissa was gone.
Cured of all her pain by a single drop.
Lucius’ howl shook the walls of the Manor when he realized what he had done.