Altered for the Altar

It wasn’t cold like I’d pictured it to be; instead, warmth was spreading through the whole room from a fire that was crackling in the hearth of the grey stoned fireplace. However, there was a certain iciness about the three people who were standing formally in front of me.

The clear leader of the entire family demonstrated perfect posture as he stood in front and the expression that covered his pale face radiated hate and clear, unhidden displeasure in the fact that we were in his presence. The woman was just as frigid, if not more so. Her head was held high and she stood just as straight as the man, but she was sort of leaning towards the other member of the group. The boy, or young man, rather, had his hands shoved into the pockets of his black dress pants, a slight sneer on his pink lips, and an angry, depressed look on his strangely beautiful face.

The woman appeared as if she wanted to reach over and wrap the young man in a strong embrace, but was refraining from doing so simply because we were standing in their company. I frowned at this, wondering just how badly appearance meant to these people, and glanced away from them, down to my twisting hands.

A truly horrible reason was the result of us all residing in this cool colored room together and it was one that I had been trying to fully grasp since being informed. The detail’s being something I have seemingly banished from ever taken the liberty of traipsing through my mind again, I unwillingly have complied. I was practically left with no choice and wanted to have a bit of dignity left over after I escaped from my father’s study that day.

At the thought, I felt tears pricking the corners of my eyes and quickly snapped them shut, willing myself to push them back for just another hour or two. Crying now, in front of everyone, would do nothing but humiliate me; none of these people, not even my parents, cared as to my feelings on the whole situation. Trying to suppress the horrid drops of emotion, I tightened my hands around each other.

I felt a quick bump from my mother, who was sitting to the left me on the couch, and opened my eyes as I glanced over to her. I expected a consoling glance from her sapphire blue eyes to be directed at me, but the stare I got was anything but trying to comfort me. Her jewel colored eyes were hard and her mouth was tightened in to a very thin line. She gave a quick shake of her head and then turned her attention back to the Malfoy’s.

Instead of allowing the slight shock I felt running through me to take control, I did as she had silently asked and halted the waves of self-pity that had been the cause of the tears. My hands, however, only constricted tighter around each other as I looked back over at the family of pale, blonde people.

“Well, Lucius,” began my father. "Is everything good on your end?”

“Quite,” said the man. “In fact, news has spread so fast that everyone’s demanded a party for the two.”

He seemed relatively smug as he said it, like he thought it was going to impress any of us in great magnitude. I felt a small smile bubble up at that and almost let it float across my face-almost.

If he thought that something as a mere coming-out party was going to do anything in the way of awe my father, then he seriously had no idea who he was doing business with.

My father didn’t care in the least what other’s thought; his one sole belief was that anyone has the ability to reach great heights in their lives, and those that don’t are fools for letting anything get in their way. Trying to get the Malfoy’s community to accept me wasn’t in his blueprint for this, I knew. He wanted the mass numbers and support that this all would bring when he decided a war of our own was necessary. No, he cared nothing about the thoughts that rambled around in everyone’s minds when they saw him, me, or my mother walking down the street. Thus, none of us would be here.

“Fantastic,” my father sarcastically muttered.

This seemed to ruffle the man a bit and he let only a brief slip of surprise swipe over his face before he quickly recovered.

“Yes, well, is your end all tied up? We can’t have any of those American’s running around blabbering about this, even if they are on another continent. News travels fast, you know.”

“I am aware how quick you Brit’s get wind of everyone else’s business, Lucius. They are no holes in my company, so there is no threat of a leak.”

“Very well,” Mr. Malfoy quickly muttered.

There was a pause in which the boy shifted from one foot to another and the movement from anyone on that side caused my eyes to redirect their focal point on to him. His face seemed to have hardened since the talking began and I’d caught the quick, uncertain look he’d sent his father just before he’d looked over at me.

Was he surprised that someone was speaking to his father in such a way? Clearly his father was a respected wizard here and I figured the boy had never seen anyone address him in such a way.

The morphing of his clear, steely grey eyes paused the thoughts running through my mind and it caused me to stare harder. They seemed to have softened a bit, but still held the same anger and sadness that I’d previously seen. His eyebrows drew down, but not to convey the anger; instead, they were showing me the sadness.

I could do nothing in response, as I knew not what he was sad for. Was he sad that I was the person he was forced in to marrying? Or was this whole situation as overwhelming as it was for me?

I was being silly, I concluded. It was irrational of me to assume that those were the feelings that were coursing through him and completely irrelevant to question the meaning behind anything that had to do with him. He was a stranger to me, his name being something I only learned minutes before entering this manor. I didn’t know him, just like he didn’t know me, therefore any speculation or pretending that I knew him better than I really did was just me being the true, foolish young girl I really was.

“As you know, time is not something that is on our side now,” my father begin again.

“I am aware,” stated Lucius. “Preparations will begin as soon as she is in our household.”

My eyes moved from the son over to the father at hearing a slight mention of myself, but he wasn’t looking at me; he was staring, still, over at my father.

“That’s fine. We’re to begin at the end of the week, and I think the small meeting then can decide what’s to happen next.”

“Yes, that sounds reasonable,” Mr. Malfoy ended.

My family stood then, with me straggling behind just a bit as I had still been starring at the boy’s father, and curtly we each began to make our exit.

None of them had even bothered to question either one of us on the decision’s that were being made, even though the majority of them would have to be carried out by him and I. Obviously the thought was simply that we were going to do as we were told, with absolutely no fuss and hassle. As ashamed as I was to admit, that’s just what I was going to do.

I had never pretended to be a brave person; that was something left back in the remains of my childhood, when I would pretend to be superman and save my dolly from my cat. Now I was the young woman who did as she was told, no matter what it was she was being demanded to do. I knew better than to question such a person as my father; that was a past mistake that had forever ripped up any leftover will from my previous days as a girl.

I would marry this Draco Malfoy and I would do it with the smallest of smiles on my face.