This was written in response to Raamelia's "Conflicted Characters" challenge and it incorporated the Slytherin Corner Daily Prompts for March 12th. I'm dedicating it to my good friend,psycho-pink-faery, because I feel terrible about my lack of inspiration for her challenge. As always, credit to Mew and Mor's Weird Pairings.

OoOoO

"For every ending, a new beginning.

And so they say: for everything, a reason."

-Carina Round

OoOoO

It wasn't unusual for Lucius Malfoy to roam the halls of his manor house at night. Sleep wasn't easy to come by, and when he was putting one foot in front of the other, it was easier to put unwanted thoughts from his head than lying beside them in the darkness, the air around him thick and oppressive with their weight. When the Dark Lord had been slain and his surviving followers imprisoned, Lucius had felt as though a curse had been removed from his home. He could scarcely believe that the threat was gone, and so suddenly, too. It was for this reason that he liked to prowl through the corridors – to see for himself that there were no unwelcome guests. No longer did he have to worry that with one wrong move, he would inadvertently cause the death of his wife and his son. No longer did he have to worry about the malice of his sister-in-law, as the fanatical light behind her eyes had been forever extinguished. Even the prisoners were gone.

Although they had made it through the battle relatively unscathed, the Malfoy family had not been undamaged. Whatever tender feelings that had brought Lucius and Narcissa together had been worn away by the harsh reality of living through the worst of a war. There was no place for their plotting, as they were in disgrace, and so there was nothing to hold them together in the future. They had drifted apart, which was why his regrets shared his bed instead of his wife of many years.

As for his son, Lucius knew that Draco despised him for being too weak to protect him. However much he hated his father was nothing in comparison to how much Lucius hated himself.

Even before their lives had been turned upside down, it had always been his mother that Draco had chosen to confide in, and so Lucius had no way of knowing for sure what his motives were in marrying the Greengrass girl. He had always imagined Pansy Parksinson would be the one to lure his son to the alter – she was a capable young woman, pretty in a sharp sort of a way, and her ambition certainly matched Draco's. Then again, if a marriage as strong as his had disintegrated, Lucius doubted that their fledgling romance would have stood much of a change when placed under pressure. Instead, Draco had chosen a wispy little witch whose blonde hair and wide blue eyes created an impression of fragile beauty.

Astoria spoke softly, and it was only when she smiled – which she often did – that people looked twice. There was something very hopeful, a touch naive, about her. A part of Lucius suspected that this was her hold on his son; to him, the girl had not been tainted by the war.

Even if he had wanted to offer his son advice on his love life, Lucius knew that he would never have listened. He had only learned of Draco's romantic involvement with the young lady in question when his son had told him, rather abruptly, that he was engaged to be married. It was such a speedy development that Lucius had been tempted to ask if he could expect any grandchildren however, since he had first met her, Astoria's waistline hadn't changed.

At any rate, if she had fallen pregnant, Narcissa was bound to have alluded to her condition with the smarting subtlety that had once allowed her to become both the greatest and most feared socialite in England. And her opinion, doubtlessly, would have influenced Draco's.

Lucius was uncertain about his son's future and powerless to intervene. He became increasingly restless as he recalled a time when he had been sure of the world around him and had had the influence to achieve the impossible. As a result, he had decided to get up.

Only, his usual routine was disrupted because, with the same suddenness with which the engagement had been sprung upon him, Draco and Astoria had decided to marry. Narcissa suspected that it was she who had pushed the marriage – keen to bind Draco to her before he could lose interest. However, Lucius thought differently; his son was desperate to leave the manor, a place of security warped and turned into the source of his nightmares, and create a home of his own. Either way, the house was now filled with the Greengrass family, and it was buzzing with wedding preparations – an altogether different, less sinister horror than he was used to.

He wasn't the only one who found it distasteful; whenever her mother wasn't asking for her opinions on various fabrics, cake samples, floral arrangements and whatever else it was that, apparently, was necessary for vows to be exchanged, the elder Greengrass girl would slip from the room like only a Slytherin could. It wasn't clear what she did with the time she managed to find for herself, although Lucius had seen her sitting by the fountain, a book in hand, from the windows of his study.

Daphne had only spoken to him once, and that was to request his permission to take books from the library. He had agreed and asked, more out of curiosity than anything else, why she would want to leave the place. Her answer had both astonished and amused him:

"Because it's the first place that mother's going to look for me, isn't it?"

Her sombre demeanour had cracked for just a moment, the secretive woman who all but refused to speak at meal times gone, and a glimmer of mischief had sparkled behind her eyes, a more penetrating shade of blue than her sister's. And then she was gone. The runaway bridesmaid. Her hiding place at the heart of the maze was, it seemed, a success, because he scarcely saw her anywhere else in the week her family had been staying with his.

In that time, he had remained in his rooms, pacing back and forth like a caged tiger until exhaustion forced him into a dreamless sleep. But Lucius was ready to resume his twilight excursions. He knotted his dressing gown tightly and put his wand in the pocket, making his way upstairs, away from the family wing and the guest quarters.

Higher and higher he climbed until he reached the entrance to the roof. He was surprised to find the door ajar – it had been left locked, or so he had thought. Lucius opened the door slowly, his other hand automatically seeking out his wand. At first glance, it looked as though he was alone; there was nobody standing before him. However, upon closer inspection, he realised that wedged in the rectangular gap in the palisade wall with her back to him was none other than Daphne Greengrass.

Knowing that he ought to say something, Lucius tried to speak. The words died in his throat. It was such a peaceful scene before him, one which bespoke a serenity that he hadn't witnessed in a long time. For several moments, Lucius simply watched.

Her brown hair was rippling gently in the breeze, a much darker shade than her sister's, and her head was tilted upwards slightly. It occurred to him gradually that she was looking at the stars above – not the kind of pastime he had imagined her indulging in. Then again, it was a clear night and they were shining brightly. Her position was also rather precarious; one leg was curled underneath her and the other, presumably, was dangled over the wall.

Lucius had almost started to think that she was asleep in this unlikely position until he noticed that her shoulders were shaking. He wondered, at first, if this was due to her feeling cold – although it was June, she was clad in an oversized grey jumper and a pair of cotton pyjama trousers, so her legs would be perishing against the stone – but then he had heard her and realised that Daphne was crying softly.

A surge of alarm passed through him as Lucius realised that she could well mean to propel herself from her perch.

"Stay exactly where you are!" Lucius raised his wand, preparing to summon Daphne as a last resort.

His command clearly startled her, as Daphne flinched at the sound of his voice, turning so sharply that she would have fallen, had not one of her hands found purchase on the wall, her slender fingers curling around the corner. When she saw that he was pointing his wand, her eyes dark with panic. Daphne leant backwards instinctively, as though in a reflexive effort to escape a curse that would never be cast.

Before she could move any farther, Lucius closed the space between them and wrapped both arms around her waist, hoisting Daphne back onto the correct side of the wall and setting her on her feet. Instead of the relief or disappointment he had expected, Lucius was met with anger. She looked up at him as she regained her balance, outraged, a strand of her unruly brown hair plastered to her cheek.

"Mr Malfoy, what the hell is going on here?" Needless to say, he was shocked. Pressing her advantage, Daphne continued, her tone aggressive. "Why did you sneak up on me like that and why were you pointing your bloody wand at me?"

Lucius stared at her in shock, his jaw slack, until he could articulate a response.

"A crying woman was precariously balanced on the top of a very, very high building. Forgive me for reaching the obvious conclusion." Sarcasm dripped from every syllable. As she processed his words, Daphne looked away, horrified.

He watched her reaction closely in an effort to discern whether or not his assumption had been correct.

Daphne's face was the perfect picture of shock, her eyes widening almost comically as they met his once again.

"You thought that I...? No! Oh, Merlin, no. I wouldn't." Distraught, she ran a trembling hand through her hair. "It wasn't like that at all."

"Then what were you doing, you foolish girl? You could have fallen." He shook her slightly, as though in an effort to fill her head with sense.

"I was just... thinking." She shrugged helplessly, the neck of her jumper falling away to reveal the delicate curve of her shoulder

"About?" Intrigued, Lucius frowned.

"Oh, nothing much." She gave a tight smile, folding her arms around herself defensively.

"And why, pray tell, couldn't you have thought about nothing much in the comfort of your own bed? That strikes me as being an altogether more sensible course of action." Lucius raised an eyebrow and watched as she squirmed under his scrutiny. Belatedly, he realised that he was still holding onto her waist. He let go, and she took a small step backwards. "I doubt that your mother or your sister would have bothered you at this time of night."

"Sometimes it's just easier that way – no matter how big the room is, there isn't always enough space for what I'm thinking." She turned from him and rested her elbows on the wall, surreptitiously wiping away the last of her tears. "It sounds ridiculous, I know, and so I'm not going to ask you to pretend to understand."

Since she was no longer facing him, Daphne didn't see the look of astonishment that passed across his face before he could mask it. It was an irrational feeling that he was very familiar with, and Daphne had articulated it rather well.

"You would be surprised, Miss Greengrass." A trace of irony entered his voice. He doubted very much that the girl had any solid understanding of what kept him awake at night. Aside from the odd misgiving about her sister's impending nuptials, Lucius couldn't think of any reason for her to be out of her bed either.

She cast a glance over her shoulder.

"So, you had trouble sleeping too?" The question fell from her lips so casually.

He hesitated before giving his reply.

Lucius had been raised to conceal his thoughts and feelings, a skill he had relied upon throughout his life, and yet when she looked at him with such innocent curiosity, it was a struggle to believe that she couldn't sense the wrongness of what he had done.

"What makes you say that?"

"Because you're awake." The answer was so far from the accusation that he had been expecting, so witty and so juvenile, that Lucius couldn't help but laugh. It was the first time he had done so for quite some time, and it felt good.

"Ah. Your powers of observation are commendable." There was no real sting to his words. A ghost of a smile played around her lips.

"Quite. Tell me, do you wake up like this often?" She yawned quietly, oblivious to his discomfort.

"Miss Greengrass, I doubt very much that this is a suitable line of conversation." Lucius spoke stiffly, almost forcefully, and yet she carried on speaking without paying him the slightest bit of attention.

"Oh. I do it all the time. Only," She paused, tilting her head to the side in a way that caused a curtain of her hair to conceal her facial features, "only, to say that implies that I was asleep in the first place. Really, I never am when I get like this – I only stay in bed until I can't stand it anymore."

"You have your dress fitting tomorrow. You ought to at least go back and try." It was the greatest comfort that he felt qualified to give. Lucius knew that he would be a hypocrite to try and tell her the solution to night time wanderlust.

"You should, too. But people can't always do that – what they should." Her voice became quiet.

Lucius stared at her, uncertain of how to respond. There was truth to what she had said. So much so that he was prepared to bet that Daphne understood what it was to feel remorse, to have her hand forced, even if she had never been party to the same experiences that he had. He knew instinctively that his theory was right – it explained a lot about why she was so quiet and so sullen. It even explained the dark shadows under her eyes, made all the more noticeable by her angular features. He could sense it just by looking at her: the sorrow that she was carrying around, trying to conceal.

Slowly, he draped an arm across her back – a precaution. The wool of her jumper was soft, slightly worn with use.

"You're right."

There was no response from Daphne, other than an unexpected shift closer to him. It was curious, he thought, that she should seek comfort in him; he was her austere, cruel and damaged father-in-law. They remained together in silence, staring at the horizon, each lost in their own respective thoughts, until the sky in the distance turned pink, the sun casting a golden glow over the expanse of the English countryside.

"I'm going to try and rest for a little while." She straightened up, giving an embarrassed smile as she displaced his hand from her waist. Her hair shone in the early morning sunlight, and her skin took on a healthy glow. "Thanks."

Realising that he had been regarding her with a little too much intensity, Lucius tried to look anywhere other than Daphne. She had started to walk away from him and paused in the doorway when he voiced the question that her words had left him with.

"What for?" To the best of his recollection, Lucius knew that he had done nothing more than stand behind her mutely, too bust battling his own demons to make a start on hers.

Daphne turned, smiling.

"For trying to save me, I think, or maybe for staying with me afterwards. It doesn't matter which one, I suppose. Both." She had such a disarming way of addressing him. Not deferential and not irreverent – as though they were conspirators of some scheme of which the nature was unclear. Oblivious to his assessment of her mannerisms, Daphne turned and disappeared down the stairs.

"You're welcome." His words were heard only by the sparrows swooping overhead, twittering to one another as they began a new day.

Aware that he wouldn't sleep, even if he returned to the luxury of the master suite, Lucius took the position so recently vacated by Daphne, the only difference being that he didn't hunch over like she had. He did, however, place a hand against the stone. Whether it had been warmed by the sun's dawning rays as they swept over the horizon, or by Daphne's hand, he could not say. Lucius flexed his fingers and tried not to think of the damage they had done curled around his own wand, how he had been the architect of his own demise.

OoOoO

Thanks for reading. Please review! I'll try and update as soon as I've posted the final chapter of "Once Removed", my other multi-chaptered Lucius/Daphne.