Snakes and Ladders (Fem!HPxLM) (DISCONTINUED)

Mettle

Narcissa watched Hyacinth dutifully brush her hair from her vantage point high in her frame. She noticed how quickly her hair had been growing, and it now reached her knees. Soon she would need help with brushing it, but that would come later when she would have to pick a chosen, a trusted male to brush her hair every morning and night. 

She wore a dark red dress with a black mesh overlay, causing the dress to look even darker. There was a dramatic split in the dress that caused the fabric at the apex of the split to crease attractively. 

She had paired the dress with the Christian Louboutin heels that put four more inches on her height, making her stand at 5'11 and much taller and closer to Fred and George's heights of 6'3. 

Hyacinth hummed a nameless tune as she began styling and pulling up her hair, securing it with a beautiful headpiece of enamel leaves and flowers. 

"You look beautiful dear", Narcissa called from her portrait, and Hyacinth whipped around in shock as she hadn't realised she had been there. 

She blushed at the purebloods words, turning back to face her vanity mirror. 

"Really?" she asked, sounding unsure. Never in her life had she felt pretty, let alone beautiful. She had always thought herself too plain looking in the past, brought on by the Dursley's constantly putting her down.

"Darling, you are stunning. Why do you doubt that?" Narcissa said, exaggerating the word stunning to get her point across. Hyacinth shrugged with one shoulder, hooking a pearl earring into her ear. 

"I don't know. Don't get me wrong, the clothes and stuff I find exceptionally beautiful but never felt that that beauty extended to me," she explained quietly, carefully brushing mascara onto her long lashes and dabbing on some perfume. 

Narcissa sighed and sat in her painted armchair. "I understand. Probably more than most," she said, causing Hyacinth to pause. 

"What do you mean?" she asked, facing the woman again.

Narcissa shrugged, looking defeated in her frame. "A lot of the time, I felt very much the same as you do now. Malfoy's are famous for wearing their masks in public, so I was trained to do the same. But beneath the emotionless mask I wore in public, I was very much insecure in my looks. Growing up, I was the plain one; Andromeda was the pretty one, classic beauty; Bellatrix was a wild beauty; despite the lessons, she never once kept her hair up, and in a sense, she gained a lot of respect for it. I was just the plain mousey one. It wasn't until I married Lucius that I started to feel even marginally good in myself, but the insecurity never fully went away. I died before I could ever fully gain confidence in myself," Narcissa explained, looking small in a way Hyacinth had never seen her before. 

"I don't mean to pry," she said softly, "but how did you die? You don't have to tell me if you're not comfortable," she asked, locking eyes with the portrait of the once feared pureblood. 

Narcissa smiled slightly. "I don't mind telling you, sweetheart. It was cancer. Breast cancer, actually. By the time we discovered it, it was too late to treat it, and I went quickly after the diagnosis." She explained, somewhat aloofly.

Hyacinth wiped a stay tear. "I'm sorry", she whispered, and Narcissa smiled. 

"It's ok, little one. I feel as though my life is bathed in golden sunlight. And the wonderful thing is that I know it. I lived a good life."

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I had to find a way to honour Helen McCrory somehow and this is how I chose to do it. The quote "I feel as though my life is bathed in golden sunlight. And the really wonderful thing is that I know it." is one of Helen's and I thought it very apt to use it in this chapter