the "narcissa and lurthur and bellucius" anon here (maybe i'll just start calling myself 🤍anon so that i can recognize my own asks later) , your answer has just made me even more invested in the whole idea. so narcissa had a relationship with alice/lily. the most obvious timeline is it happened in hogwarts, before her marriage. then they all graduate and immediately get married, all three of them. at which point between those two events does narcissa break it off? or is her partner the one to end it? narcissa chooses bellatrix, she refuses to do what andromeda did, she refuses to leave her sister alone. bellatrix becomes her priority, alice/lily gets left. it isn't a surprise to anyone involved because they have been fighting about politics for some time already - alice/lily is incredibly involved in the order, has strong opinions and despises voldemort, while narcissa is absolutely disinterested in the war, her focus is on her personal relationships, her family. the relationship ends, narcissa marries lucius and she never looks back because she has bellatrix and then later draco.
but how does pansy factor into all of this? she's supposed to marry draco, she spends a lot of time at the malfoy manor. what is pansy's relationship with her parents? are they neglectful, is that why it's so easy for her to fall into closeness with narcissa? pansy yearns for care and affection and she'll take it from any sources she has. is narcissa just a source or is she actually important to pansy as a person? then to narcissa pansy is kind of like the younger sister she never had, kind of like a daughter, someone to project onto. she can put pansy in her own position and see what it felt like for druella to have an obedient daughter, a doll. the relationship is a bit similar to sugar mommy - sugar baby thing, narcissa buys pansy expensive clothes, jewelry, teaches her how to do makeup, gives pansy clothes that once belonged to her or her sisters. she invites pansy over, they are alone in the malfoy manor, drinking in the living room and then they somehow end up in narcissa's bedroom, laying in silk bedding, pansy's just in her lingerie and narcissa's touching her (non-sexually, more just like... mapping her body), talking about how she used to be beautiful like that too and how pansy is similar to her sisters
oh, also! do narcissa and lucy have separate bedrooms? i feel like they would
🤍
you're back!!!! hello!!! 🤍🤍🤍
it's making me so so happy that you want to yap about this au with me.. mwah thank you 🤍
(again, she/her for lucius even if she's in the closet)
so!!! narcissa's relationship with either alice or lily can be very different. with alice i always imagine that they were involved in a romantic relationship at hogwarts, and yes in secret. narcissa considers alice the love of her life and the one who got away. if it's a lily/narcissa au then they never properly get together and it's more that they're drawn to each other during their years at hogwarts. they're a little obsessed with each other and neither of them have the vocabulary to comprehend that it's a crush. in this au they're both deeply closeted and smothered by comp-het. i've written a short little one-shot about them before here <3
^ this is the extent of lilycissas relationship, but lily haunts narcissa for the rest of her life
lily isn't the love of narcissa's life, but she could've been. might've been. she represents a life not lived and a love that never was but at least that not-love is narcissa's and narcissa's alone. so depending on the relationship her storyline in the lurthur to bellucius timeline can differ slightly
if it's nobleflower, then i tend to think it's alice who finally breaks it off. but alice is also the one pleading with narcissa to give them a chance. narcissa always knew how it would end but sort of closed her eyes to it. not necessarily in denial, but because she's a hopeless romantic who wanted to ride it out for as long as she could. she'd probably get upset with alice and try to change the subject whenever alice tries to broach the 'what about after hogwarts' subject. and i think alice kind of lets her because they're young teenagers and it's their first love. while you're still full of what-ifs and fantastical hope. there's marriage talk between lucius and narcissa while they're still at school, and narcissa tries to keep this from alice for as long as she can. the news breaks out as soon as narcissa turns 17, which is the catalyst for the nobleflower breakup, andy leaving and narcissa sticking with bellatrix and finall committing to the role assigned to her. she was doomed from the start and now it's here !!!!! her and lucy get married almost immeiately after graduation :/
and yes, bellatrix does become narcissa's top priority !!!! andy leaves for love and narcissa stays for love. cant bear the very idea of leaving bella on her own. bella got married shortly before narcissa, bella has protected them all their lives, and narcissa looks up to her, admires her. bella was both a mother and an oldest sister. narcissa feels indebted to her, i think. indebted in a way andy, the middle-child, never did. here's how i see the black sisters <3 narcissa never dreamed of leaving, she just dreamt of a window in the wall of her cell..... like i said in the previous ask. makes me sick...
AND YES !! EVERYTHING YOU SAID ABOUT THE ARGUMENTS ABOUT THE WAR AND AND NARCISSA BEING DISINTERESTED IN THE WAR BECAUSE IT JUST DOESN'T REALLY PERSONALLY AFFECT HER AND SHE NEVER FULLY UNLEARNS PREJUDICE.... she's just so. sheltered, priveliged, isolated and she never really dreams of getting out and so she never really changes. her point of view only extends so far. until she has draco ...
pansy/narcissa
this is something me and kara have talked about a lot.... and kara is the one who brought up how she usually tend to hc that there was marriage talk between draco and pansy.. but then they have to call it off after the war obviously because the malfoy image is ruined and pansy is the one who sold out harry potter to voldemort. pansy is shunned by the entire wizarding world, deemed a traitor
i always assumed that there's pureblood courting rituals when it comes to potential engagements, and this is how narcissa and pansy get close. i imagine that pansy starts spending more and more time at the malfoy manner, and maybe often even stays the night in the guest room. narcissa sort of takes on the responsibility to prepare pansy for what it means to be a pureblood wife, and that's when they start crossing the line in their relationship because narcissa teaches her how to please a man, how to be submissive, how to be obedient, etc
and yes, this au is also dependant on pansy having a bad relationship with her own parents. i think most pureblood children do, and i think it's even worse if you're a girl in that sense that you're already a disappointment because you're not a son. kara also has a hc that pansy grew up with a lot of brothers and she's the daughter her parents neither wanted or need, so she's just more of less forgotten. she wasn't ever really brought up as a pureblood daughter either because her parents already had sons and several heirs to spare. so they dont really raise her at all. so she's neither a son or a daughter, really.
so pansy never really had a mother, and narcissa doesn't really have sisters anymore. she loves draco, but her girlhood is lost to the past and here comes pansy who reminds her so much of her sister. and here comes narcissa, who's a mother that pansy never had.
there's a whole 'i never had a daughter' and 'it feels like it did with my sisters' and 'i never had a mother' but there's also this. other tension to their relationship. there's this growing intimacy getting mixed up and tangled and wires are crossing. they're both so touch-starved and yearning for what they could be for each other and it's just never enough. it just grows and grows and grows. i don't personally think they ever sleep together, but i do see them sharing a bed and falling asleep together. they're meeting up in secret, late at night. narcissa is bathing and washing pansy. teaching pansy beauty etiquette but there's just this sensual element to the whole thing. narcissa will shave her legs for her, paint her nails, do her hair, etc. and yes, projection is a big part of it. like you said, narcissa being able to put pansy in the same position she has been in, to see what it feels like to be her mother, how it feels to have a daughter- and narcissa absolutely has twisted fantasies about being able to keep pansy. she'll have pansy laid out on the bed like you said, in lingerie, and map her her body with her her delicate fingers, and she'll have twisted fantasies about preserving pansy and keep her just like this for narcissa to play with and do with as she pleases
AND YES !! it absolutely does turn into a sugar mommy / sugar baby type relationship. that's 100% it. narcissa does all these things for pansy, and she spoils her, and buys her things, etc. oh they make me sick ....
pansy does care very deeply for narcissa, but i also do believe that narcissa could've been anyone. pansy is in a very vulnerable position and that's something that narcissa, knowingly or unknowingly, takes advantage of. and i think anyone could've taken advantage of pansy like that with the right instrument. this entire relationship is honestly just a gigantic character study of repressed lesbianism that they (mostly pansy) don't fully comprehend and the cycle of abuse. and i also like this au because it doesn't redeem narcissa. she's a victim and an abuser, she really did have good intentions as a sister and mother and a wife and as a role model to pansy and she just failed at all of it. sometimes good intentions aren't enough and some people will never forgive you
and YES, i absolutely do believe narcissa and lucy have separate bedrooms !!!!!
in addition to this, there's a continuation of this au where rita and pansy strike up an unlikely friendship where rita gives her an internship at the daily prophet after the entire wizarding world her shunned and turned their backs on pansy. this relationship would genuinely be entirely platonic and extremely healthy for both of them. sort of like a aunt/niece type relationship where they just become this out of nowhere-family <3
this took me well over 1h to answer...... i love yapping....
