A/N:Written for the "Mother's Day Contest", created by owluvr on the HPFC forums. The rules were to choose a mother and write about her and her son. I chose Narcissa Malfoy. Thank you owluvr for such a wonderful inspiration! I really enjoyed writing about Narcissa.

Summary: Narcissa Malfoy reflects about her life and son on the way to Harry's dead body. A short story about why she decided to save Harry.

Disclaimer: HP and all of its characters belong to JK Rowling.

Thank you so much for reading!

~ Julie

Narcissa's choice

Three steps that felt like miles, and I saw my life flash before my eyes. Forty-three years condensed in three long, slow steps. I was scared, but I held my head up high because I was, after all, a Black.

One.

And I remembered Hogwarts, where it all started. We were foolish back then; naïve and inexperienced. We thought we owned the world and that we had the winning card. It was simple to scare the mudbloods and blood traitors; all we had to do was to merely show our Slytherin badges. It was simple to praise the Lord because we were young and reckless, and he was so powerful and admirable. Every word he said and everything he did encouraged us to make it real, the ideal world of wizards ruling mudbloods and muggles. We thought that he would defend us – his loyal, obedient and youthful servants – forever.

And there we were again. The castle's towers were visible from the Forest, and I could see the remaining bits of the broken protective spells being gently caressed away by the wind. The smell of ashes and fire came to my nostrils and I finally realised that the castle was destroyed. Had we really done that? Had we really destroyed Hogwarts? Suddenly, I was again in the silver and green common room and all those late-night talks with Bellatrix, the amusement with friends and the fooling around with Lucius came back to me, along with that careless and light-hearted feeling of being young. It didn't seem real that it was all gone, a long time ago. We weren't the next generation anymore, Draco was, and we had just destroyed his childhood.

Two.

And I saw Lucius, out of the corner of my eye. He tried to come to me, out of impulse I'm sure, but the Dark Lord had commanded me the task. I ignored him and kept walking towards the dead body, so he retreated and left me on my own. For an instant, I travelled back in time and we were seventeen again, dreaming about living happily ever after. The bliss that I felt when I finally became a Malfoy… I loved my husband with all my heart, but we were sore now. A part of me still resented him for being sent to Azkaban and putting Draco in such a dangerous situation. My boy was only sixteen when he got the Mark, when he was commanded to kill Dumbledore. How did all of this happen? How did we go from a happy family to a torn and shattered bunch of strangers? My sister was insane, my husband publicly humiliated, my cousins dead and my son… my poor son was trapped in the enemy's boundaries. Our family was destroyed. But I was being unfair, Lucius was not to blame; he was just as desperate and hopeless as I was. He and I were victims; victims of our own crime and our son…he was paying the price.

Three.

And I finally reached the dead body; finally visualized, touched and sensed the real cost of the war. This was greater than our initial desire of pureblood supremacy. There were greater things at jeopardy. The boy in front of me was dead. Dead. And, suddenly, I pictured my boy. Because it could be him, it could be Draco, the one lying motionless and lifeless on some cold, stony floor, completely alone and uncared for. Desperation won me over and my pureblood pride was gone. There was no Voldemort, no blood status, no Potter, nothing – just Draco. I had to go back to the castle and find him; I had to put and end to our misery and mend us.

I kneeled down, touched the boy's face, opened one of his eyelids and heard his heart…beating. He was alive. For the second time in his life, the boy had survived to the Dark Lord's curse. He was alive…

And so, I doubted myself. Could we have been wrong from the beginning? How could this boy survive to the most powerful curse, from the most powerful wizard? Were we in the wrong side? But it didn't matter anymore; the decision was made.

So I leaned down, purposely covering his head with my hair.

"Is Draco alive? Is he in the castle?" I whispered.

"Yes," he breathed back.

And suddenly, Lily Potter and I were one.

"He's dead," I said.