Faith

Faith by Lady Apocalymon

Summary: Narcissa has no faith in the dirty, dark world, as her sisters abandon her and outshine her. Only when she sees a spark of light in the world does she begin to find faith in her existence. Oneshot, 4,505 Words.

Why You Should Care: Lady Apocalymon takes a couple of villains and nearly turns them into protagonists with this fic. Lucius and Narcissa seem well within their canon characterisations — their high-brow snobbery and nobility oozes throughout the words in dialogue and action — yet there seems to be a new kind of affection breathed into their relationship. They are courtly, but as unable to restrain their attraction to each other — physical and intellectual — as any other fevered couple in Harry Potter canon. R-rated because of a sex scene near the end.

Why You Might Not Care: To be honest, the sex scene — for me — was the weakest part of the fic. Now, to be fair, there are probably quite a few people who would consider this the best part of the fic; it’s one of those highly subjective things. I prefer a little less throbbing-burning-pounding cliche, personally, but not for nothing is Harlequin a popular form of female erotica. I’ll let y’all decide for yourselves whether it gets the thumbs-up or thumbs-down.

Two Lights Above the Sea

Two Lights Above the Sea by V.M. Bell

Summary: Narcissa Black’s wedding day is filled with doubt. Oneshot, 1,540 Words.

Why You Should Care: Lucius Malfoy has picked his side in the war, and Narcissa Black calculates the risk of becoming a widow too soon after she becomes a wife.  She is tempted — and reasonably so — to abandon the life and love she has chosen with Lucius in favour of something safer, something not so precariously balanced on the edge of a knife.  Bell does fairly well getting into Narcissa’s head in this time and place, and of honouring her character and the relationship between Narcissa and Lucius, and when she does so with a poetic twist of phrase is where this fic really shines.

Why You Might Not Care: The dialogue between Narcissa and Lucius is a little flat, to be honest.  I would have preferred a little more of the character we see in the narrative injected into the dialogue for a little more “show, don’t tell”, but what’s there does do the job.  There are also a couple of places where the sentence structure could have been made less awkward with the use of some higher level punctuation.  Over all, I get the sense that the author of this fic is pushing at her limits a little bit, but trying to be better at something you love should never be considered a bad thing.

Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow

Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Lilith Morgana

Summary: Last time, things were different. Oneshot, 2,700 Words.

Why You Should Care: Even Lord Voldemort’s highest ranking lieutenants experience the war, and this is a portrait of the Malfoy family and their fall from grace during the second war as told through Narcissa’s POV. It is too easy to forget sometimes that even the villains have something to lose, and sometimes are that much closer to losing it. There is still love amongst the lowest of us, and while the likes of Voldemort — and maybe even Bellatrix — are beyond it, the Malfoys are not. Dark moments in the life of a dark family as the Malfoys do what they do best — survive and escape.

Why You Might Not Care: This will be best for people who like the darker characters, and who don’t eternally hate the Malfoys for weaseling their way out of trouble again. Let’s face it folks, if Lucius Malfoy tortured puppies in front of five-year-olds twirling an old-fashioned villain’s moustache, he’d somehow find a way to buy himself out of it. Again.

Awards: 2008 Hourglass Award, Best Drama — Second Place