It’s true that this chapter was tricky to write. I was not happy with the dialogue between Snape and Narcissa, even after much struggle… I wanted to address the fate of the Malfoys after the war, though. The defeat of Voldemort was a major crisis for their family and I wanted to demonstrate that it might cause the most stable couple to see things differently and to break up. I stipulated that Narcissa and Snape know each other rather well, because they have moved in the same circles for years, thereof the rather intimate and perhaps a bit out of character nature of their conversation.