Chapter 4: Deal

"Thank you for joining me. The house-elf just brought the scones an-"

"When, Mother?"

"Excuse me?"

"When?"

"Oh."

Pause.

"As soon as she’s capable of standing without collapsing on the floor, I suppose."

"But...why her?"

"She’s pureblood, and our options are quickly growing thin."

* * *

Lucius stared at the door for several minutes after Draco left. Gwynne wished more than anything she could disappear, or at least become invisible. Finally, the tall blond turned his attention back to the bed. The redhead immediately felt squeamish.

"I suppose you have many, many questions." He looked at her with haughty disdain. "You always were the meddling type."

She always was? How could he know her unless...

"Where is my family," she asked, her voice no louder than a whisper. Lucius glanced out the window before redirecting his stare towards her.

"Dead." The word hit her like a Bludger to the face. Dead? "You are the only survivor of the Wallace line. That’s where you were found, the Wallace Manor’s basement."

Dead. Her family was dead, and the only person able to tell her anything about herself was this snake of a man before her. Gwynne’s stomach twisted at the thought.

"How is it that I can’t remember any of this?"

"The combination of traumatic stress and a single nasty spell can do wonders to a person’s memory. I suspect that you passed out from some attack, and the intruders never knew the wiser." His smirk grew slightly. "Lucky for both of us they didn’t stop to check."

Gwynne eyed him suspiciously. She still remembered his words: I thought I told you to take care of her. Perhaps he meant those words in concern? No. The tone of his voice had been very clear. He had wanted her dead too. The question gathered on her lips before she could stop herself.

"Who did this?" Lucius grinned at her almost maliciously.

"My poor Gwynne," he began. "The murderers of all our families have been one and the same: The Order of the Phoenix."

* * *

The Order of the Phoenix. Gwynne spent the next few days recovering in bed while her mind whirled around the name of her family’s murderers. The Order of the Phoenix. Draco came to visit her some, but his conversation was short and his expression mysterious. She felt that with every visit he studied her like some trinket. The Order of the Phoenix. Why did that name sound familiar? Perhaps her mother told her warnings of a rogue group called by that name, or maybe there were ghost stories of them from when she was younger. The Order of the Phoenix. She was sick of being stuck in this room.

A knock at the door startled her thoughts, and Draco entered.

"Oh, it’s you."

"Yes it’s me, you invalid." He carried with him a silver try piled with food. "Mother insisted I personally bring you supper, although I haven’t a clue why." He set the tray down on the bedside table and mumbled, "We have house-elves for a reason."

Gwynne ignored his bickering and reached for the bowl of soup. Draco often grumbled about meaningless tasks. He must have been a spoiled child. The griping, however, was far more enjoyable than Lucius’s sinister visits.

In between gulps of soup, she watched him.

"What are you looking at, Wea-...Wallace?" She smirked at the pout on his face.

"Where have we met before?"

"We, er..." he stammered. Unusual. "We went to school together." Gwynne took another sip.

"Is that why you dislike me so?"

Draco sighed. "Do you always ask so many questions, woman?" She raised her eyebrows over the rim of her bowl. "It wasn’t entirely you. Your brother and his friends were...despicable." The spoon dropped in her soup.

"I had a brother?" He didn’t meet her eyes. "Tell me about him, please...though...minus all the insults."

"But they were insulting to me," he griped.

"Okay, minus the major insults." She fished her spoon out and continued eating. Draco slouched gracefully in the chair.

"I might be able to manage that. His friend was really the worst. He had an ego bigger than a Hungarian Horntail, and everyone loved him. Your brother...he was just an oaf of a sidekick." Gwynne threw him a warning look. "Well he was! I’ve never seen someone so clumsy." Draco glared back at her indignantly. She sighed at him, and a funny little half-smile crept onto his lips. "You know," he taunted, "he was easy to torment with feet that big..."

"Draco!" The blond smirked, and in retaliation, Gwynne threw her spoon across the bed right at his face. He grasped his injured nose in utter shock. The redhead burst into giggles.

Unfortunately, the senior Malfoy had chosen that inconvenient moment to walk in. At the sight of him, Gwynne quieted immediately, and Draco stopped grasping his nose. Lucius sneered at the scene.

"This is no way for either of you to behave." The elder Malfoy glared at his son. "Leave us. Now."

With no other choice, Draco quietly exited the room. Gwynne watched him go reluctantly. As the door shut, she turned an unpleasant face towards Lucius.

"I’m sorry; we were just having a dispute. It was really nothing an-"

"Silence." She stopped immediately. "I hope that this behavior between you two ceases. I don’t need you picking fights with Draco, or vise versa." Lucius examined her with his cold eyes.

"Well, why does it matter if I get along with him or not?" Gwynne could have kicked herself in the arse for that impudent question. She was dead, she knew it. Why couldn’t she ever just keep her stupid mouth shut? Lucius, on the other hand, simply raised his head in disdain.

"Because you," he spoke with a sinister smirk, "are to marry my son."

Author notes: Chapter Update: 03/24/07

To Be Continued.
Foreveress is the author of 1 other stories.
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