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Framed | ||||||
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Category: Post-DH/AB Characters:None Genres: Action/Adventure, Romance Warnings: Dark Fiction, Death, Extreme Language, Mild Sexual Situations, Negative Alcohol Use, Rape Story is Complete Rating: R Reviews: 193 Summary: After the Battle of Hogwarts, Harry Potter is training to be an Auror, and he is finally back together with Ginny Weasley. But when a young woman dies of poisoning at the Ministry’s Midsummer Ball, Harry is the first suspect, and he can only uncover the true murderer by working with his childhood rival, Draco Malfoy. Hitcount: Story Total: 56261; Chapter Total: 1194 Awards: View Trophy Room |
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Chapter 31: The Portrait July 29, 1998 Greengrass Townhouse, London Astoria woke early on the day that Draco’s painting was to be revealed. She’d had terrible dreams, and she felt certain that all three Malfoys would hate her work. What had she been thinking to paint him in the library? The Malfoys were all about masculine shows of power and she had portrayed their heir as a poet dreamer. At three in the morning, all she could think about was what she should have painted instead. Lucius, who was probably the trickiest customer of the three, would have loved to see Draco on horseback. Or she could have painted Draco as a lone figure on top of a hill with his cloak billowing behind him. Billowing cloaks were a huge hit in pureblood circles. When one walked down the portrait gallery of the London Institute of Wizarding Arts, it was pretty much one big billowing cloak fashion show. At four, she accepted that she wouldn’t fall back asleep. She got up, made herself a cup of tea, and opened and closed the same novel a dozen times. At seven, she bathed and dressed with care. She selected pale green robes, thinking the Malfoys would respond best to Slytherin colors and that the soft shade complimented her coloring. She pondered putting her hair up, but then thought it would be a too obvious attempt at appearing older. Instead, she’s parted it on the side and left it shiny and straight. She reckoned there was a decent chance that they’d hate the portrait, so she prepared to sell them on its merits. She knew from Draco’s chattier moments that there was a literary branch in his family tree. There were two mediocre historians, one prize-winning poet, and several speech writers in the Malfoy family. She’d convince them that the portrait was a nod to these Malfoy achievements. And if her art career came to a fiery end, she always had her dream of becoming a healer. She wouldn’t need Malfoy approval for that. Ten o’ clock came too soon, and Astoria found herself facing the three Malfoys, a magical sheet draped over the canvas. While she couldn’t say she had grown accustomed to Malfoy Manor over the last month and a half, it no longer felt like a storybook setting to her. The manor house was impressive and the grounds were breathtaking, but it was now familiar. She had painted Draco in the library, picnicked by the lake, and swapped stories with Draco in the gazebo. She even suspected that one of the family ghosts had taken a liking to her. The lord and lady of the house, on the other hand, were as imposing as they were in June. Narcissa was unfailingly polite, but never warm. And Lucius was as slippery as the day she had first been introduced to him. Facing them, she felt as shy as she had been as a small child and she summoned up all of her courage. “On the day I met Draco, he told me that this library was his favorite place in all of Malfoy Manor. Over the last month, I’ve learned more about Draco and also about the literary figures of the Malfoy family, and so the setting just seemed more appropriate.” She yanked the sheet off of the portrait. An eighteen-year-old Draco Malfoy was immortalized on the window seat of the Malfoy library. He had an open volume of potion making theory open in his lap, but the painting captured him looking away from the volume and on to the grounds that he was to inherit. On the ground were stacks of books Astoria knew to be Draco’s favorites: travel memoir, adventure novels of the late eighteenth century, and magical theory. In revealing the portrait to the family, Astoria felt like she was seeing it for the first time and what she saw was not the careful depiction of the gardens outside the library or the books she carefully selected to feature, or the rich texture of the silver velvet curtains. What she saw was Draco. A glowing pinkness to his pale skin, bright gray eyes, and silvery hair that looked very touchable. Was it too intimate? Did it look like a portrait painted by a smitten woman? She felt her cheeks pinken, as she wondered how she had never seen it before. Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy were both studying the portrait as if unsure of what they thought. Draco, on the other hand, looked relieved. For the first time, Astoria realized he had been afraid of what he would find, what the painting would reveal about him, ever since the day she had told him about her abilities. He doesn’t trust himself at all, she realized. Astoria knew what it was to distrust her body, having arranged her life to the whims of her medical conditions. She knew that when she woke up feeling weak and feverish, a relapse was on its way, and she’d spend the next week receiving blood replenishment potions. Then whenever she was stressed or worried, she experienced the same symptoms, whether she was actually ill or not, because fear had always been physical to her. But to distrust her own character, that would be terrible. What did Draco fear was inside him? “Thank you,” he whispered. She smiled at him, but she was still cautiously watching the two elder Malfoys. Then Mrs. Malfoy spoke. “It has taken eighteen years, but finally someone has noticed that Draco looks like me.” Astoria blinked in surprise. Draco was so very obviously Lucius’s son from his coloring to his height and build to his pointed chin. But then she saw it. The expression that Draco wore in the portrait was much like Narcissa’s, and there was an emphasis on the long, slender fingered hands that he had inherited from his mother. “Well, of course,” Astoria said, as if no one could have doubted it. Meanwhile, Lucius looked horrified that anyone could think Draco to be anything but his double. Draco and Narcissa both laughed at his expression. Astoria wanted to laugh as well, but she didn’t know which Malfoy would be paying her final invoice. “Come, I need to show you something,” Draco said. “Now?” She looked at his parents, who were both still studying the portrait. “They won’t miss us. Trust me.” To her surprise, Draco dragged her outside through the parlor’s double doors. “Where are we going?” To the best of her knowledge, she had seen the entire Malfoy grounds on her first visit to the manor. “You’ll see.” After a bit of walking, the destination became more clear. “The lake house?” But when they entered the lake house, it wasn’t the floral wallpapered building she remembered with its equally floral upholstered sofas. “It looks like a library in here.” “Do you remember when you said you were going to steal my library and live among the books?” Draco asked. “Yes?” “Well, I may have stolen your idea.” “You stole my stealing mission? How dare you!” She sat on an armchair. “Please explain why you moved your books from the inside of your house to the outside of your house.” “This is my house now.” “You live in the lake house?” “For the time being,” Draco said. “I plan to get a flat once I finish my training at Gringotts, but this seemed like a decent first step. The house has a lot of bad memories attached to it. There are good memories from my childhood, of course, but the last two years were awful. When I was young, this little house was my escape, so for now, it’s my home.” Astoria took a look around. The floral wallpaper had been replaced by a pale green print, at least in the bits of wall that weren’t covered by bookshelves. The red and green floral sofas were replaced by leather couches. And behind a couch, she could see something furry. “Is that a puppy?” “C’mere, Merlin!” Draco called, and a puppy with golden curly fur came running to him. Astoria got off the armchair and sat on her knees on the floor. She stayed very still, hoping the small dog came to her. Sure enough, he approached her and put his front paws on her knees, looking up at her with large brown eyes. “Oh, I love him! When did you get him?” Draco joined her on the ground. “The day after I moved in here. I’ve always wanted a dog, but neither of my parents would permit a dog in their house. They’re a bit less particular about the lake house.” “But how could anyone resist this face?” Astoria asked, scratching Merlin behind the ear. “My parents? Easily. Mother calls him my rat.” “Don’t listen to her,” Astoria assured the puppy. “You’re not a rat.” “Having a dog might make it a little trickier to find a flat, and I’ll definitely have to wait until Merlin’s housebroken for us to move, but he’s worth it.” “He is. And until then, this will be a nice place to live. It’s very peaceful in here,” she said. “That’s what I was going for,” Draco said. “The house is ancestor after ancestor on every wall. I’ve never been able to see who I am apart from them. I may not have gone far, being in the lake house, but it’s enough my own that I can sit with my thoughts and make my own plans.” “I love it, Draco. It really suits you.” * * * * Astoria went back into the house to Floo home. In the corridor, she paused when she heard her name. “I regret hiring Astoria,” Narcissa was saying, “I can’t help but feel something bigger is in motion, and there is no stopping it.” “It’s a canvas and oil,” Lucius was saying. “If you don’t like it, it doesn’t need to go up. It’s not like we’re entertaining these days.” “No, it’s not about the portrait. I like the portrait; it captures our son. But it captured the artist too, and the story it tells is that she loves him. There is so much affection in these brushstrokes. It’s unmistakable.” “I thought that was why you hired her. Pretty pureblood girl from a respectable family.” “No, I picked her because she has abilities beyond her skill with a brush. But she’s poorly suited to Draco. Her sister would be ideal, but Astoria is sickly. A blood disorder, a genetic one.” “And it didn’t occur to you that two teenagers might be attracted to each other?” Lucius sounded angry. “A blood disorder!” “It should have, but Astoria was a pretty little girl, precocious and sweet, the last time I saw her. I’m afraid I didn’t do the maths. If I’d realized she was less than a year from coming of age, I wouldn’t have hired her.” “Five miscarriages before Draco.” “I haven’t forgotten, Lucius.” Narcissa’s voice was the sternest Astoria had ever heard it. “I haven’t forgotten the three miscarriages after he was born either.” “She will not do. We’ll have to forbid it.” “Don’t be absurd! If we forbid it, he’ll marry her! Our son is itching for a rebellion, if you haven’t read the signs. She has two years of schooling left. That’s a considerable length of time for the young. If we leave them alone, the relationship should die naturally.” “And if it doesn’t?” “Then we’ll need to make sure Draco comes to his senses. But he should be given the opportunity to make the right choice on his own.” Astoria weighed her options. She had to walk past the open door to get to the fireplace she traditionally Floo’d in and out of. The old Astoria would have attempted to sneak silently past and hope they didn’t notice. The new Astoria preferred to embarrass them. She backed up silently in the corridor, so they wouldn’t know she had been eavesdropping and then began walking loudly in the direction of the fireplace. As she neared the parlor, she poked in. “I’m so glad that you’re both here. I was worried that I would miss you.” Damn, they were calm. You’d never know they had just been gossiping from their expressions. “Well, I wanted to say thank you for this opportunity. Otherwise, I would have spent my summer, stocking wine bottles in the family store. I hope you love the portrait as much as I do. ‘Bye now!” She walked away before they could respond. She hoped Draco found a flat soon. It had to be terrible living with those people. |
| Reviews 193 |
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