Draco had not wanted to come at the beginning.
He had said so, clearly and at volume, standing in the entrance hall of Malfoy Manor with his arms crossed and his chin set in an expression that Narcissa privately thought looked alarmingly like Lucius when he was preparing to be immovable.
He didn't want to leave his toys. He didn't want to leave his room. He didn't want to leave the peacocks.
His father had looked at him for a long moment and then said, quietly, "That is enough, Draco. A Malfoy does not carry on like this. Compose yourself."
It was not a threat. It was worse than a threat. It was a standard being stated as a fact, and Draco, who was five and understood more than people gave him credit for, had understood it. He had composed himself. He had gotten into the Floo with his jaw still set and said nothing else about it.
That had been seven days ago.
Draco now loved Blacktide.
He hadn't told anyone. He didn't really know how to say it. But his bedroom here had a huge window that went almost from the floor to the ceiling. In the morning, the light poured in and made everything look like gold. It felt like the whole room was filled with something warm. His bedroom at the Manor was big and fancy and had all his toys in it, but the light there always felt cold and hiding, like it wasn't really supposed to be inside. Here, the golden light just came right in, big and happy, and stayed on the floor like it lived there.
He liked the sounds, too. The Manor was quiet. Blacktide was never quiet. If he listened attentively, he could hear the steady rhythm of the sea, the wind rushing off the cliffs, and the distant, strange calls of animals in the deep forest. He had not chased any peacocks in days, but he was finding, somewhat to his own surprise, that he did not especially miss them.
But today was a quiet day. Father hadn't visited, and Aunt Esme was with Grandpère. Mother was resting on her lounge, a book open in her lap, and the castle felt very still around them.
"Are you excited to be a big brother, Draco?" Mother asked, without looking up from her book.
Draco looked up, entirely confused. "A big brother?"
"Yes. You will have a little sibling. The way Rigel has Corvus, Alphard, and Lyra."
"I don't know," Draco said, squeezing his dragon until it emitted a soft ring of lavender smoke. "What does a big brother do?"
"Honestly? I'm not entirely sure," Mother said, and something unusual in her voice made Draco look at her properly for the first time.
She was still looking down, but she wasn't reading. Her hand rested lightly over her stomach in the way it sometimes did without her seeming to notice.
Draco looked back down at his dragon.
A big brother.
He turned the words over in his mind the way he turned the toy in his hands, examining them from different angles. Rigel was a big brother. Rigel was quiet and watchful, and he always seemed to know exactly where everyone else was in the room. Corvus was a big brother too, the kind who explained things patiently and made room for you on the cushions without even being asked.
Draco wasn't sure which kind he would be.
He wasn't sure he knew how to be either kind yet.
*****
Blacktide was large enough that exploring it felt like a genuine undertaking.
Draco had not yet seen all of it. The corridors went in directions that didn't quite make sense, and the staircases sometimes felt like they were in slightly different places than he remembered, and there were doors he hadn't tried yet and windows that looked out onto parts of the castle he hadn't found his way to from the inside.
He was looking for Alphard first, because Alphard was easy. Alphard did not require anything complicated from him. But one of the house elves told him, very politely, that the young master was sleeping.
He thought about looking for Rigel. But Rigel is hard to find. Usually, it's Rigel who finds Draco. He was hoping to find him first this time. But where is he anyway?
Draco turned and found Uncle Sirius.
He had not expected to find Uncle Sirius moving quietly up the corridor with Lyra draped over one shoulder, sleeping.
Sirius saw him and raised a finger to his lips. Then, apparently deciding that Draco deserved more than that, he mouthed, hello.
"Hello," Draco whispered. Then, because he genuinely wanted to know, "What's wrong with her?"
"Bad night," Sirius said, very quietly. "Didn't sleep well. She's making up for it now."
Draco looked at Lyra. She looked entirely different asleep. Less like someone who called people ugly and more like, a small person, just sleeping, with her fist curled under her chin.
"Oh," he said.
Sirius adjusted his hold on her with the ease of someone who had done these many times.
"Uncle Sirius?" Draco asked.
Sirius stopped and looked at him with the unhurried attention of someone who was not in a hurry despite carrying a sleeping child. "Yes?"
"Are you a big brother?"
Something moved across Sirius's face. It was there and gone quickly, the way expressions sometimes were on adults when a child asked something that landed somewhere unexpected. He was quiet for just a moment — not a long moment, not long enough for Draco to feel he had said something wrong.
"Yes," Sirius said. "I am."
Draco tilted his head. "What does a big brother do?"
"A big brother do?" Sirius repeated, as though hearing the question properly for the first time.
"Mother said I will be a big brother soon. But I don't know what it means."
"Well," Sirius said slowly, "it means you will have a little brother or a little sister."
Draco already knew this part. He waited.
Sirius looked at him for a moment, then looked at Lyra, still deeply asleep against his shoulder, her fist curled under her chin. When he looked back at Draco his expression had settled into something quieter.
"You also look out for them," Sirius said, his voice low. "You make sure they're not alone. You're the one who knows where they are, who notices when something's wrong before anyone else does." He paused, adjusting Lyra's weight on his shoulder. "And you make mistakes. You don't always get it right." Another pause, quieter. "But you show up. Even when it's hard."
Draco considered this seriously, the way he considered most things.
"Did you always show up?" he asked.
Sirius looked at him. For a moment he looked very much like an adult who had been asked something by a five-year-old that he did not know how to answer, which in Draco's experience was unusual. Adults always had answers. They just didn't always give them.
"No," Sirius said finally. "I wasn't a very good big brother."
He said it simply, without making it into something larger than it was, but the words felt heavy in the quiet corridor.
Draco stared up at him, his small jaw dropping just a fraction. He didn't know what to do with that information. In Draco's experience, adults did not confess to being bad at things. His father was always right. His mother was always perfect. The world was built on a foundation of absolute certainty, and flaws were things to be hidden away behind closed doors.
But Uncle Sirius was looking right at him, admitting to a mistake with a calm, quiet honesty that didn't feel like a defeat. It just felt... true.
"Oh," Draco whispered. He looked down at his own polished boots, suddenly feeling the immense weight of the future sibling his mother had promised. If a grand, powerful adult like Uncle Sirius could fail at being a big brother, then it must be a terrifyingly difficult thing to do.
Sirius gave him a small, reassuring nod, adjusted Lyra's weight one last time, and continued down the corridor, his footsteps making no sound on the heavy rugs.
Draco stood there for a long moment after he had gone, his mind spinning.
I wasn't a very good big brother. But you show up. Even when it's hard.
He turned the words again, trying to fit them into the rigid puzzle of how he was supposed to behave. He wasn't sure he fully understood it yet. But it felt like the kind of answer that would mean more later than it did now.
With Alphard asleep, Rigel missing, and Lyra tucked against Uncle Sirius's shoulder, Draco was left to his own devices. He didn't want to go back to his room, and he didn't want to disturb his mother. The quiet of the castle felt heavy now, filled with questions he didn't know how to answer.
Seeking the warmth of the golden light he loved so much, Draco wandered down a sunlit corridor that led toward the central courtyard.
Draco pushed the heavy door open and stepped out into the crisp air.
Then, he froze.
In the center of the stone courtyard, sitting in the full spill of the midday sun, was Corvus.
But he wasn't sitting on a bench, or on the grass. He was sitting in a chair made of polished dark wood and silver metal, with two massive, intricately spoked wheels on either side. It looked like a cross between a throne and a carriage, and it sat entirely still.
Draco's breath caught in his throat. He had never seen a chair like that before. He didn't even know such a thing existed. In the Malfoy world, people walked, or they flew, or they used the Floo. Nobody sat in a chair with wheels.
But what made Draco's jaw drop completely was the space around his cousin.
Corvus was surrounded. At the base of the heavy wheels, three fat, brown rabbits were huddled together, their noses twitching as they sat perfectly content on the cold stone. A massive barn owl was perched calmly on the left handle of the chair, its great dark eyes fixed on Draco. Across Corvus's lap, a small red squirrel was stretching itself out, yawning with luxurious ease as if it owned the space. And just a few feet away, curled into a tight, orange ball on a patch of sun-warmed stone, a fox lay napping, its tail twitching occasionally in its sleep.
Corvus didn't look like he was in danger. He looked like the center of a strange, quiet kingdom. He was gently stroking the squirrel's back with one finger, his face completely peaceful.
Draco took a clumsy step forward, his boots scraping loudly against the stone.
The owl's head snapped toward him. The rabbits shifted slightly, but they didn't run.
Corvus looked up. When he saw Draco, his face instantly brightened into that easy, uncomplicated warmth Draco had noticed in the playroom.
"Draco!" Corvus called out softly, mindful of the animals. "You're out. Come look, the wood-mice left, but the squirrel stayed."
Draco didn't move. He couldn't. His eyes were glued to the large silver wheels, then to Corvus's legs, which were covered by a thick, dark green blanket despite the midday warmth. The stark reality of it clashed violently with the image Draco had formed in his mind just minutes ago—the capable, patient older brother who made room on the cushions.
"What..." Draco's voice was barely a whisper. He swallowed, trying to find the proper, dignified words his father always demanded, but he was five, and his composure was entirely gone. "What is that?"
Corvus looked down at his chair, then back up at Draco. His expression didn't change; there was no shame in it, no sadness. It was just a fact of his life, stated as simply as the weather.
"It's my wheelchair," Corvus said pleasantly. "My legs don't work right today. So, the chair helps me move around."
Draco stared. His legs don't work right. The words didn't make sense in Draco's head. Everything at Malfoy Manor was perfect. If something was broken, it was mended. If someone was sick, they took a potion and were fixed by morning.
"Can't... can't it be fixed?" Draco asked, his voice trembling slightly as he took a tentative step closer, his eyes darting from the sleeping fox to the heavy silver spokes of the wheel. "Doesn't it go away?"
"Sometimes it's better, sometimes it's worse," Corvus explained patiently, not taking offense at Draco's bluntness. He gently nudged the squirrel, which let out a tiny chitter and scampered up his arm to sit securely on his shoulder, right next to his ear.
Draco who was focused on the wheelchair got distracted by the movement and looked around the animals.
"The animals don't seem afraid of you," Draco commented.
Corvus smiled. "Yeah. They are always nice to me."
"We only have white peacocks at home," Draco said.
"White peacocks?" That caught the attention of Corvus. "What's that?"
"Well," Draco said, his chest puffing out just a fraction as he found himself on familiar ground. "They're like regular birds, but much grander. They don't have colors like the ones in the books. They're completely white, like snow, and they have these long, beautiful feathers that trail behind them when they walk."
Corvus listened, his eyes wide and shining with genuine wonder. The squirrel on his shoulder mirrored his attention, tilting its small head toward Draco. "Do they fly?"
"Not high," Draco explained, waving a hand toward the high castle walls to demonstrate. "They mostly walk around the gardens. And when they get angry, or if they want you to look at them, they fan their tails out into a massive, giant circle. It looks like lace. Father says they are very rare and very noble."
"Wow," Corvus breathed, his imagination clearly ignited. "Do they let you pet them?"
Draco's proud expression faltered slightly, a look of mild grievance crossing his face. "No. They bite if you get too close. And they make a horrible shrieking noise when it rains. But they look very pretty in the hedges."
Corvus let out a soft laugh, and the sound seemed to break whatever lingering tension was left in the courtyard air. The fox on the stone floor cracked an eye open, gave a lazy yawn, and went back to sleep.
"They sound like magical guards," Corvus said cheerfully.
"I guess they do," Draco said thoughtfully.
A quiet settled over the courtyard. It wasn't the cold, heavy silence of Malfoy Manor, but a soft, living stillness punctuated only by the distant murmur of the sea and the tiny, rhythmic twitches of the rabbits' ears at their feet. Draco stood a step away from the silver-spoked wheel, his hands resting loosely at his sides, still trying to reconcile the impressive boy from the playroom with the chair he sat in now.
"What do you want to do?" Corvus asked, breaking the silence with that same easy, unbothered tone. "I can't do much today, but I can watch."
"Oh." Draco paused, looking down at his own polished leather boots. He hadn't really thought about a game. "Nothing really. I was just wondering what it means to be a big brother."
"Why?" Corvus asked.
"My mother said I'll be a big brother soon and asked if I was excited," Draco said, his voice dropping into a smaller, quieter register. "I don't know what that means."
Corvus was quiet for a moment, stroking the squirrel's back thoughtfully.
"I think," Corvus said slowly, "it means you have to be the one who looks around a lot. Like Rigel. If Lyra starts to cry, Rigel is already sitting right next to her before she even finishes. He doesn't even ask what's wrong. He just gives her his hand to hold."
He tilted his head, his dark hair shifting.
"And when Alphard falls down in the garden, Rigel always runs the fastest. He gets there way before the house-elves or papa, every single time. I watch him do it so I can learn how." Corvus looked back at Draco, his smile returning, simple and warm. "Because I am a big brother to Lyra and Alphard. But Rigel is my big brother."
The sound of footsteps on stone made them both look up.
Rigel stood in the doorway of the courtyard, his dark hair catching the light. His blue-green eyes moved from Corvus to Draco, then to the fox, the owl, and the rabbits in the unhurried way he had of taking stock of a room before entering it.
Rigel looked at Draco. Then at the wheelchair. Then back at Draco, with the quiet assessing attention that Draco was beginning to recognize as simply the way Rigel looked at things. Not unkind, not distant, just thorough.
"Did you find what you were looking for?" Rigel asked.
Draco blinked. "What?"
"You were wandering the castle," Rigel said.
Draco opened his mouth to deny this and then didn't, because he suspected Rigel would simply wait until the denial ran out, and he didn't want to find out how long that would take.
"I was thinking," Draco said instead, which was true enough.
"About what?" Rigel asked.
"About being a big brother," he said. "Mother told me today. That I'll have a sibling." He paused. "I asked Uncle Sirius what it meant, and he said you show up even when it's hard. And Corvus said you notice things before anyone else does — that you just pay attention, all the time, even when you don't mean to." He turned the stuffed dragon over in his hands. "But I still don't really understand it."
Rigel looked at the stuffed dragon in Draco's hands, then stepped fully into the courtyard. The barn owl on the wheelchair handle tracked his movement, but none of the animals ran. They knew his step.
Rigel walked over to the napping fox, sank down onto his heels right on the sun-warmed stone, and lightly scratched the wild animal behind its ears.
"They're making it sound too hard," Rigel said flatly, his blue-green eyes steady on Draco.
Draco blinked, shifting his feet. "It is hard. I don't know how to do it."
"You don't have to do anything yet," Rigel said simply. "The baby isn't even here. When they arrive, they'll be very small, and they won't know how things work. You'll just have to show them how."
Draco frowned, turning that over. "That's all?"
"Mostly," Rigel said, a tiny hint of a smile touching the corner of his mouth. "And you have to make sure they don't eat your blocks. Alphard tries to eat them if you don't watch him."
Corvus let out a cheerful laugh from his chair, and the red squirrel on his shoulder chittered in agreement.
The heavy, confusing knot in Draco's five-year-old chest completely unraveled. This made sense. It wasn't a massive, invisible standard he had to live up to—it was just practical.
"I have very good blocks," Draco said, his shoulders dropping out of their stiff, anxious pose as he stepped a little closer to Corvus's wheelchair. "They're made of real snakewood. I won't let the baby eat them."
"Good," Rigel said, nodding once as he stood up from the fox. "Then you'll be fine."
The three of them got quiet.
"Do you think you'll have a baby brother or a baby sister?" Corvus broke the silence.
*****
"Mother! Mother!"
Narcissa looked up from her book, startled out of her quiet.
"Draco? What is it? Did you have fun today?"
Draco ignored the question. "Mother! Will I have a baby brother or a baby sister?"
"Well." Narcissa set her book down slowly, the corner of her mouth curving. "I don't know yet, darling. We won't know until the baby is born." She tilted her head. "Do you want a baby brother or a baby sister?"
"A brother," Draco said, with the absolute certainty of someone who had just made up his mind.
"Why?"
Draco's expression settled into something very certain. "Because sisters are mean. And terrifying."
Narcissa looked at him for a long moment. Outside, somewhere below the cliffs, the sea moved against the rocks with its usual unhurried indifference.
"Lyra is not that terrifying."
"Yes she is!"
The corner of Narcissa's mouth moved — just slightly. She pressed it flat before it could become anything more.
"And what," she said carefully, "if you have a little sister?"
Draco's face fell into an expression of acute despair, his small shoulders bunching up toward his ears as if the imaginary little sister were already in the room, getting ready to call him names or knock over his snakewood blocks.
Narcissa let out a soft, melodic laugh, the sound entirely filling the quiet room. She was deeply amused, but beneath that amusement, a quiet, tender warmth blossomed in her chest.
For years, the silence of Malfoy Manor had been a heavy thing. After Draco—their difficult, miraculous boy—there had been only empty rooms, hushed conversations with healers, and the quiet grief of pregnancies that ended before they could truly begin. She had spent a long time believing her family was finished, wrapping all her fierce, protective love around her only son. To be holding life in her hands again felt like standing in the sun after a lifetime in the dark. She wanted this child, so desperately, and though a tiny, fragile part of her still trembled with the fear that something might go wrong. Hearing Draco talk about the baby as a solid, inevitable reality made it feel real. It made it feel safe.
She reached out, her fingers gentle as she caught Draco by his small hand and pulled him just a bit closer to the edge of her lounge.
"If you have a little sister, Draco," Narcissa said, her voice dropping into that smooth, comforting tone that always made the world feel entirely secure, "she won't be mean. Do you know why?"
Draco blinked, his grey eyes locked onto hers, completely attentive. "Why?"
"Because she will have you, darling."
"Me?"
"Yes, you. You will be the one who teaches her how to play, and how to behave, and how to be a little sister."
Draco's chin lifted a fraction. The despair on his face faded, replaced by a look of intense, serious calculation.
"And," Narcissa continued, leaning in slightly as if sharing a grand secret, "if she ever tries to be mean or terrifying, we can show her the proper way."
Draco straightened his shoulders, his mind flashing back to the conversation in the courtyard. "I have very good blocks," he announced, his voice regaining its usual noble weight. "Rigel says I just have to make sure the baby doesn't eat any of them. I can teach her not to do that."
"I am certain you will be excellent at it," Narcissa smiled, her hand resting lightly, protectively over her stomach, the lingering shadow of her old worries finally melting away into the quiet room. "Go wash your hands for supper, darling."