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He thought, once, that he would never survive to see peace. And for a while, he had had it after so long. It had been hard won, and he had lost almost everything, but in the end, he knew what it was to be able to sleep without fear, and without the crushing weight of his past actions.
Lucius Malfoy finally had something like peace. But like everything in his life, it was fleeting.
On the day the Dark Lord fell, he had finally doffed the heavy mantle of playing the second to a madman, and went to his family, to protect them. He had been so beaten down, almost crushed under it all, but love, it had been love, saved him. Even that had not lasted. When it was over, truly over, his wife left and then died rather suddenly, and his son, at the departure of his mother, anxious to be free of the past, left. For the first time in his life, Lucius Malfoy was truly alone.
The loss of Narcissa had nearly ended him, and his son’s marriage to Astoria Greengrass, which should have been a happy occasion, was something that had to be told to him by a mutual acquaintance. Draco and his wife were in France, never letting him know where or how they made a living. Narcissa would have been aghast, but Lucius tried not to imagine his wife’s thoughts or moods after a year of their son’s marriage and her death.
Lucius lived alone in the family manor in Wiltshire, only the elves attending him, though he rarely asked it of them. He felt so much guilt that he could not stand even the eyes of the elves upon him. Instead, he busied himself with learning to do everything, as much as possible, on his own. Cooking, cleaning, washing, all of it, as if he had years to make up for. He went as far as tending to the gardens and to the Granians in the stables. He did it all as a type of penance, hoping that if he somehow were able to prove himself a capable man, Draco might return.
Six years after the Last Battle, he was still alone. Only by the seventh did he have a letter from Astoria, telling him to stop trying to seek them out. Lucius had been trying to send money, gifts, anything, through Gringotts or by owl. After twelve years, Lucius stopped trying, and by then, he had other things to consider.
Though he had not been to London in years, he received several summons to the Ministry, all ignored. And then Aurors were in the foyer of the Manor, demanding from the elves that Lord Malfoy come down and show his face. Lucius had almost hidden from them, seeing their red cloaks, their generic faces, obscured with glamors to keep them mostly anonymous. One face shined through, however, and Lucius sighed at the top of the stairs, and started down.
“Lord Malfoy, by order of the Ministry, you are hereby summoned to attend a meeting on July 1st with the Minister for Magic and Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot concerning the new law enacted on March 1st. Failure to attend will result in the seizure of assets, and possible detention in the Ministry jail or Azkaban. This is your notice, sir.”
Harry Potter looked annoyed, that was the only way to put it to Lucius. He had only seen the boy’s face in The Prophet from time to time when he did look at it and knew he was slated to be the new Head of Magical Law Enforcement in short order. Lucius stared at the boy, no, man, and sighed.
“New law?” he drawled, straightening. He knew he looked ridiculous with his bare feet, his old pair of brown corduroy trousers, and his worn gray and collarless Edwardian shirt that kept him cool while he worked in the house and gardens.
Potter cleared his throat. “They are calling it the Pureblood Marriage Law, sir. Surely, you have read about it?”
Lucius dipped his chin and clenched his fists. So, he thought, it had passed.
Potter lifted a glove hand with a roll of parchment toward him and Lucius sighed, smoothed his hair from his shoulder to fall down his back, and stepped forward. He noted that the Foyer needed dusting, looking at the footprints on the dark parquet floor. Lucius rarely entered the main part of the house, and certainly not the front rooms.
The parchment was heavy as he took it and he shoved it into the back pants pocket. He could feel the other Aurors watching him, four besides Potter.
“That gives you your appointment time and the law in its entirety. You may want to review it with a solicitor.”
Potter nodded at his last spoken word and turned on his heel, the front doors opening automatically to a bright summer day beyond. When the doors shut, Lucius sighed, pulled his wand from next to the parchment, and began cleaning. It would not be until later, sitting in his study, the French doors open to the terrace and back garden, that he pulled the parchment, unrolled it, and read.
The appointment was the next morning. Short notice, he grumbled internally.
It was a consequence of low birth rates, of Shacklebolt’s belief that Pureblood superiority should be absolutely eliminated, and the fact that there were a few other ex-Death Eaters like himself that needed reigning in. It was ludicrous, but not unprecedented. After the last wave of the Black Death had swept through in the 17th Century, the Ministry, before the Statute of Secrecy, had instituted a similar law, pairing many bachelors and widowers with half-blood or Muggleborn witches. His own great, great grandfather Malfoy had been subject to the law and married a half-blood witch of no means. The witch had been a Selwyn, distantly, and in Lucius’ eyes, maintained the Malfoy bloodline by imbuing considerable magic. Since then, however, the Malfoys had only ever married a Pureblood witch.
The time had come again, it seemed, and though he had an heir who had married a Pureblood witch, Lucius was required to take another wife. The law did not demand a child, but there were incentives if he produced a legitimate, half-blood child. In his case, he would have his full assets returned, stripped from him by the Ministry in lieu of a sentence in Azkaban and a pardon. He would have his seat on the Wizengamot returned, and the governor’s seat at Hogwarts again. Lucius sniffed at that. After so long, it did not really matter to him. As far as he was concerned, he was happily a hermit, unmolested by society. But, there was a part of him that would love nothing more than to rub the fact that he had outlived the Dark Lord in some faces.
As he stared out the French door, smelling the flowers he tended and the fragrant trees, he felt a bit of pity at whatever witch was under the purview of the law. From what he read, the witch would also be given incentives to wed, money, for certain, but more than that. Access to the vast wealth of the Pureblood wizard, the influence of title and land.
“Rather backward,” he whispered to himself. Witches, last he knew, had all the same freedoms of class, title, wealth, and advantage as wizards. Unless…unless in his decision to ignore the outside world, something had changed. Rising, he moved to the stack of old copies of The Daily Prophet he was hoarding for some unknown reason next to the door into the corridor. Lifting half the chest-high stack, he looked at the top and a paper from three years before.
Last Death Eater Executed!
He sighed. That had been Rabastan, and technically he had been the last convicted Death Eater executed via Dementor’s Kiss.
Dropping the pile on the rug, he began flipping back, tossing papers behind him.
Shacklebolt Proposes Marriage Law!
Ah, yes, he thought. Over three years ago, some of the details of the proposed legislation were introduced to the populace. He scanned the page, ignoring the photograph of the Minister for Magic. There were objections from every side, but the Wizengamot was stacked with Pro-Shacklebolt proponents. The main objection was the implied stripping of the rights of witches, in the guise of constructing a society where blood status was no longer applicable. Bodily autonomy, voting rights, property rights, it went on and on. And as Lucius went back to the newer papers on the rug behind him, he found more and more.
By the time the Marriage Law passed, many small moves had been enacted, beginning with the banning of all abortions, the brewing of abortifacient potions, and even contraceptives.
‘Our society is on the verge of collapse. More of us are dying than are being born,’ Shacklebolt had been quoted.
In a more recent article, Lucius scowled at the seizure of vaults and property from several widows, all under the age of sixty. Single women were either marrying right away or leaving Britain altogether. In the pages of The Prophet were dozens of engagement announcements, most of them of younger couples, but only a few notices of actual weddings occurring. As for births, it was rare. There were over a dozen death notices to one birth or wedding announcement.
There were editorials, so many editorials, and it did not surprise him at all that most were written by the same three witches. The first was Milicent Bulstrode for the Pureblood contingent. The second was Luna Lovegood-Scamander, who admitted that she felt it better to put her writing talents to something to do with creatures rather than the rights of women, but she was put upon as a half-blood witch to speak out. And the last, predictably, was Hermione Granger, who seemed to not have married into the Weasleys and was haunting the Ministry halls to try to lobby for a saner, fairer government.
‘We are a civilized society, or so I was led to believe. We have not fought an entire War against a madman to fall victim to some of his more extreme ideas now. Voldemort was a half-blood megalomaniac who would have had all believe that blood purity meant power. I had hoped that we had gotten past this blatant falsehood. For the Ministry, the Minister, and Wizengamot to enact such a law and all its restrictions against witches, is beyond backward. It is damning . The world is watching us, knowing that nothing good can come from this legislation, and they will laugh. How backward, how uncivilized we have become!’
“Hear, hear,” he whispered.
The truth of it, Lucius thought, was that Shacklebolt was probably trying to keep the Pureblood families in line. The Ministry was bankrupt after the Dark Lord, fell apart under his impossible rule. The Dark Lord was many things, but statesman, he was not.
Sitting tailor-style on the floor, he went through the papers and found that after a few months, leading into that year, the editorials were gone. There was no mention from any of those women who refuted the Ministry’s new law, but there were letters from some of the newly wedded.
‘I have more freedom and ability now than I ever could have if I had remained unmarried. I can now feel confident in the assured future of our nation…’
‘Happy? Oh yes, very happy. I have a wonderful home, a loving husband…’
It was utter rubbish. Propaganda. And Lucius’ expression darkened as he read on and on. What was happening in London?
He supposed he would be finding out soon enough.
The elves had laid out his best suit in charcoal, a lovely Edwardian three-piece suit with fine black dragonhide shoes, and his old cane. In summer, he did not wear a hat but managed to remember the Charms to style his hair and shave. He had been keeping a rather austere beard that was slightly darker blonde than his hair. The silver was hard to find, but he knew it was there.
When he looked at himself in the wardrobe mirror, he could almost believe he had never witnessed the second rise of the Dark Lord. The years had been almost kind to him after the Last Battle, and the old leanness was gone. He looked like his father when the man was more a father to him rather than a competitor. If he had kept the beard, or trimmed it back to a goatee, he would be his father’s doppelganger. The only difference was the scar of the Dark Mark on his left forearm and the other scars that simply would not fade away from his tortures in Azkaban and in his own home…toward the end. He had been able to remove the tattoo of his prison number from his neck before Narcissa had died.
Lucius sighed. He considered calling for an elf, maybe Maizy or Pip but did not want to bother them with having to meet his gaze. He knew they had been the ones to lay out the clothing, shine his shoes, and, as always, make sure some things were cleaned and food was available. He made his own breakfast in an empty kitchen, but the elves always did the dishes if he was particularly bothered by something. And he was bothered, having to go to London.
The appointment was in a room near the Minister’s offices, promptly at ten, and when he stepped out of the Floo in the Ministry Atrium, he had his haughty expression firmly affixed. Lucius had not let his face form that expression in a very long time, but it was like riding a broom, it came easily.
People stared, and he let his blue-gray eyes move over them, coolly. Even as he checked his wand, another heirloom after his original wand was confiscated or destroyed, he did not know which. The twelve-and-a-half-inch elm and phoenix feather had been the one his great grandfather Malfoy, husband of the half-blood witch, had carried until his death. It was a suitable wand, but almost seemed to thrum in his hand a little too much when he used it. He hated he had to part from it, his haughty expression turning into a scowl as he made his way to the lifts, his cane tapping the marble floor.
No one spoke to him or would meet his eye. That suited him.
Even as he walked down the corridor to the office he was supposed to be in, even the Minister’s staff only averted their eyes. Inside the office, more like a conference room, all eyes were upon him, and Lucius steeled his resolve as the door shut behind him and privacy Charms went up.
Minister Shacklebolt was sitting at the head of the table, a secretary just behind him near the wall. Sitting to Shacklebolt’s right was Arthur Weasley, and to his left, a woman he did not know.
“Mr. Malfoy, thank you for coming,” Shacklebolt said, rising. The imposing darker man was in a set of very fine red robes, and as Lucius studied him, his dark eyes flashed in the lamps hanging over the room and in the enchanted windows to his left overlooking the Thames. “Please, have a seat.”
Lucius eyed the chair nearest him, at the other end of the table. He stepped toward it but did not sit, instead, he opted to stand behind it, placing his pale hand atop the back.
“We’ll not waste time, Malfoy,” Arthur Weasley gruffed, turning toward him. “As you seem to think that your previous summons were a request…”
Arthur Weasley looked old . They were nearly the same age, but Arthur was a few years older. There was something about the man that looked worn down, something not quite well about him. Lucius was no Legilimens, but he knew that something was wrong with Arthur.
“Why am I here, Arthur? Surely not to poke at me, an old man, who had kept to himself all this time?”
Arthur inhaled. “The law applies to you, Malfoy, though you have tried to ignore it.”
“Ah, yes, this Pureblood Marriage Law…barbaric.”
Shacklebolt was listening all the while, his secretary, an unremarkable witch with unruly curls taking notes behind him. Shacklebolt was glancing between the two of them, amused.
“I am a widower, Weasley, and I have no desire to wed again.”
Weasley snorted. “Not even to regain your wealth? Come, Malfoy…”
Lucius sighed. “I just want to be left alone, at this point. Coming here was a courtesy, nothing more. And unless you want to verbally jab at me, Weasley, Minister, I’d find you would be jabbing at a man who could care less.”
Weasley blinked at that, glanced at the woman across the table, and then to Shacklebolt.
“You’re not interested in regaining your seat?” Shacklebolt said then, his hands folded on the table.
“To what end? My interest in most of it ended on that day in May, the rest the day my wife died, Minister. Now, please…speak your peace and let me return to my home.”
It was all true. He did not give two fucks about any of it. He had what he needed, the rest of the Malfoy assets were in Draco’s name. The directorship of Malfoy Apothecaries was just waiting for Draco to make up his mind. Lucius had more gold than most goblins, and he had no desire to insert himself into the government again. He had learned his damned lesson.
“You are not exempt from the law, Lord Malfoy. No Pureblood male of-age is. You can either hand over your lands in this country, leave, or you can follow the law.”
Lucius inhaled and lifted his chin. “My family lands have been in my line since before either one of your ancestors thought to come up with a surname,” he growled.
“That may be, Lord Malfoy, but it is also a part of your obeisance to the law of the land. And considering your history, your allegiances, it should come as no surprise that you will be expected to comply, no matter the longevity of your family line.”
Lucius pursed his lips and glared at Shacklebolt.
“You expect me to take a wife, most likely an unwilling woman, and do what ? Bed her? That could be constituted as rape, sir.”
“Something you know all too well about,” Weasley murmured and Lucius tapped his cane roughly into the floor.
“Careful, Weasley. I may have done many horrible things, but I have never, never hurt a woman. I would think forcing your wife to bear so many children would be considered far more cruel.”
Weasley moved to stand, but as neither of them had wands, Lucius was sure, after so many years, he could easily knock the older man flat on his back and out of consciousness for some time.
“Gentlemen…perhaps Mrs. Davies can perhaps answer your questions in a better manner. Madam, if you would?”
The woman at Shacklebolt’s side looked at him then, her dark brown eyes rather narrowed, flat. The woman was young, perhaps Draco’s age, a pretty Asian woman with long black hair that fell over her left shoulder. Mrs. Davies looked somewhat familiar and if he had known her maiden name, he might be able to come up with a proper thought about who she was.
“Yes, Minister… Lord Malfoy, as you may know, birthrates are the lowest since the mid-17th century, putting our nation in a rather precarious situa--”
“Yes, yes, I’ve read the propaganda , Mrs…Davies. What is it you think you’ll get from me?”
Mrs. Davies blinked slowly at the interruption.
“A strong heir, who will remain in the country, and perhaps propagate a line of magical people who will ensure our future without the threat of another Dark witch or wizard capitalizing on the differences of blood.”
And there it was, simply.
“And those who have married before, Pureblood families?”
“We are not dissolving those Noble and Ancient Houses if that is what you fear, Lord Malfoy,” Mrs. Davies almost purred. “Those wedding vows are sacred, but those who are not married will be required to do so. Fruit of those vows would be prized highly.”
Silence fell, but a pen was scratching from the secretary, and Lucius sighed. “I will remarry, or I will lose my home. Sounds incredibly stupid. I have other homes.”
“Those are a part of the whole, Mr. Malfoy.”
Lucius was afraid of that. His solicitor, Ms. Turpin was still reviewing it all after he sent an owl the night before, but he knew that the Ministry was probably very aware of his assets, having frozen most of them after his first imprisonment. This meant, possibly, the house in the Loire Valley where Draco and Astoria probably lived, would also be taken, and that would not do.
“And I assume I have no choice in who I wed if this barbarity holds?”
“In your case, no ,” Weasley gruffed and looked at the secretary who was pouring over her notepad, writing almost frenetically. “We have paired you with someone who will suit your aptitudes and demonstrated ability.”
“It isn’t a punishment, Malfoy.”
“Like hell, it isn’t. Kicking an old man while he’s down, wanting nothing more to strip me of my home, empty my vaults, and possibly parade me around as the ex-Death Eater who somehow escaped Azkaban and the Kiss? It seems like you’ve been planning this for some time. Pray tell, if my son were still in Britain, would you have tried to divorce him from his wife to use him as well?”
Shacklebolt cleared his throat and sat back. “And this isn’t personal, Lucius,” the Minister whispered, accenting his name.
Lucius and Kingsley Shacklebolt had had a rapport, once. That had been a lifetime ago, and the way the other man said his name was galling.
“Then who is it? Bring me the witch. If she will ‘suit’ me as you said, maybe she and I can figure out a way to have this law overturned. And woe to the rest of you greedy, vindictive bastards!”
His hand grasping the back of the chair made the wood whine at this, and everyone, even the secretary looked up as his magic flared through the room. He took a deep breath and tried to still his growing ire. It would do no good to explode in the heart of the Ministry, before the very Minister for Magic himself. Another stint in Azkaban would break him. Another deep breath and the light in the room seemed to brighten and Shacklebolt could only smirk at him.
“You need to sign first, Mr. Malfoy, that this union will take place…”
Lucius blinked. “So you intend to spring an unknown witch on me, and have no objections?”
“It’s done , Malfoy,” Weasley sneered. “That or Azkaban.”
Kingsley frowned. “It will be done today.”
“What?”
Kingsley stood then, Weasley and Mrs. Davies followed his lead. “Mrs. Davies will speak with you after the handfasting, but I’ll leave you to speak with your intended for a few moments. The rite will be performed in my office.”
And then he was left alone. No, not alone, the secretary was still sitting against the wall, and Lucius frowned.
A handfasting in the Magical world was a binding contract, but in no way permanent. Every family, Pureblood to Muggleborn, had their own ways. Handfasting was like ‘marriage lite’, but even he knew that it could be conditional. The Malfoy wedding rites involved blood, most Pureblood families used blood to bind. The only way to break it was death, and Narcissa had done just that.
Thinking of her, he felt his jaw tighten. She had left him, gone off, and then gotten herself killed in the most mundane way. It had been so wrong, but the prospect of marrying again seemed more so. He would never bind himself through blood again and wondered if Draco had done so with his wife. Surely, it had been done that way, and the old pain of being excluded came into his chest again.
He had been a rubbish husband and father.
The sound of pages being shuffled and then a chair shifting caught his attention and he lifted his blue-gray eyes to the secretary. When she moved to stand by the head of the table, the pad of paper slapping down onto the service, a Muggle biro clattering slightly, he winced.
“Is this woman supposed to appear, or do I just wait and make guesses until she comes through the door?” he drawled.
The woman sighed and lifted her face to him. She was young, maybe like Mrs. Davies, nearer to Draco’s age. Her hair was a barely controlled mass of dark auburn curls about a pretty face of golden brown. Her eyes were a light brown, almost golden in the lamps, and as he studied her face, he had a spark of recognition.
This woman was attractive in her dark green blazer, black ruffled shirt, slim waist with a thin black belt, and form-fitting green A-line skirt. He could not see her legs but imagined they were as shapely as the rest of her. But it was her lips that drew his eyes, perfectly heart-shaped, full and painted a dark violet shade. When she crossed her arms under her ample bosom, he had a sinking feeling.
“Hermione Granger,” he purred. “Hermione Granger is a secretary.”
Her eyes glinted at that, and those lips curled slightly.
“And your ‘intended’.”
He stared, almost letting his jaw unclench and fall open.
The girl he recalled being tortured on the front parlor floor was long gone. Time might change things, his brain admitted, but this woman was not that girl. That girl had been thin, wan, pathetic, and her cries had been so cutting that he remembered wishing that Bellatrix would have killed her and been done with it.
No, the woman across the long table was someone else. She glowed with health, and in the very air, he could feel her presence, as if she had purposely obscured it before.
“And I intend to bring this Ministry down, Lord Malfoy. Would you like to help me?”
His lips parted, and he almost reached up to close his jaw manually. Lucius could only stare at her for a long moment before his brain started moving again.
“I would have thought that you would have done it by now, Miss Granger. I do recall that they called you the ‘brightest witch of the age’, and you’re…a secretary? Do you intend to bring this sham of a government down as a junior employee?”
She lifted her chin and Lucius swallowed. Something was flowing out of the witch, something that he had not felt from anyone in a very long time. Indignation.
“With your vast wealth, your influence, your name, I intend to start a revolution. You can either help me, or you can go to Azkaban, I thought the choice would be simple.”
At that, he barked a laugh and immediately cut his eyes to the conference room door. He shifted, tapped his cane, and moved his other hand from the chair to shove it into the pocket of his trousers, crossing his right leg over the left foot, resting against his cane.
“You had no say in this?”
Granger sighed. “If I had, I would have run off to the Americas by now. No…I stayed to fight the good fight, but when your name was put forward, I thought there might be a chance…”
“Chance?”
“To bring it all down.”
He arched his brow. “And you say this, in this place?”
Granger’s hands moved to grasp the back of the chair before her. “They think I’m toothless, Lord Malfoy. They think they’ve stripped it out of me, demoting me from my post as a senior advisor, taking my own path to the Minister’s office away with this new law. They think that by taking away my rights, I have no power to move…and then they put you in front of me.
We can either come to a mutual understanding, or you can go to Azkaban, and I can marry someone like Mundungus Fletcher. Personally, if I must , it would be you, sir.”
Lucius scowled. He had not kept up with who was a bachelor, or, like himself, a widower. If all Pureblood wizards, and surely, as he understood it, witches, must marry, there were not many left to pair up. Maybe they had saved him for last.
“What are the conditions of this handfasting, Miss Granger? Surely they want you impregnated?”
Granger scoffed, “Ideally, but considering that I was unable to get pregnant with my ex-husband, that might be off the table.”
Lucius cocked his head, but Granger waved away the questions forming on his lips.
“I’m not asking anything more from you than some cooperation. I doubt it would get us thrown into Azkaban if I fail, but at the very least, I want to make the Ministry’s lives a living hell.”
Somehow he liked the sound of it. Lucius knew that if he had more time to ponder it, he would come up with some strategy of his own. Turpin was a good solicitor, and as far as he knew, had no stake in maintaining a barbaric marriage law. The woman was married to a Squib MP for Bath.
“Money? My title?”
Granger sighed. “It would help. I take it that through marriage I would be titled, but also by suo jure with my Order of Merlin, First Class…something that was not stripped from me when the Law came into effect, surely an oversight.
That said, I am not completely without means, Lord Malfoy, but the name, the title, it would give me leverage. And, if you reclaim your seat on the Wizengamot, the mood might shift.”
“How long have you known that I was to be bound to you, Miss Granger?”
She smirked. “Since late March.”
And she had not reached out, covertly? He appraised her again. Draco had been so jealous of her most of his schooldays. She beat him in grades every time. She had even broken his nose at one point. As a child, she had been dangerous, but as a grown woman, she was something more.
“I realize that this seems to be sprung on you, sir, but I’ve had almost three years to plan. Nothing came into effect until the passage of the Law, and believe me, I’ve been fighting every step. Me, and many, many others.”
Oh? Who, he wondered. Surely the two other women in the editorials, but ‘many, many’ was an interesting prospect.
“What will Mrs. Davies have to impart, Miss Granger?”
Granger shifted, her countenance darkening. “She’s a puppet, Lord Malfoy, but she will impart that you will be tethered to me, and I am supposed to keep you in check. They don’t trust you, or the fact that you have been minding your own business all these years. Anyone with means is suspect, and they want your power, your money. As far as I can tell, they want to make this country a model to others, forcing a change rather than let the younger generation, the ones who lost the most, make their own way.”
Lucius nodded. Yes, he had thought that. Shacklebolt, Weasley, many others, even himself, were of the older generation, and it seems, had not learned their lessons from history. Rather than let the younger generation make their own way, their elders were going to blaze a path forward without the consent of the future. There was no room for deviation or improvisation, all in the self-righteous notion that by somehow eradicating the notion of blood purity, it would prevent something or someone else from shaking their world to pieces. It was short-sighted, ill-born, and dangerous.
“You’ve put it succinctly, Miss Granger, what you want, but what is your goal, ultimately ?”
Granger frowned and licked her smudgeless lips. “A modern world. Tradition does not mean better or safer. I want a fair government, though it seems too much to ask, even now,” she sighed.
Lucius could not really care if he were honest. He just wanted to be left alone, as he had said. Of course, considering his many crimes, that was just too much to ask for.
As if skimming his thoughts: “I do not think I’m asking for much, Lord Malfoy. I am not asking to be friends, lovers, or even roommates. I just ask for shelter, at this point, because truthfully, there are others who have actively sought my hand, so much so that I would rather just kill myself than continue living in this madness.”
“I am your last resort?” he purred, amused, wanting to know who had sought her hand.
“Truthfully, you are my only hope, sir.”
Those words were a cut and a strange caress, and he tried not to betray his surprise. And then there was a knock on the door, and the real madness began.
Hermione Granger, he learned later from reading the file that was sent to him by Mrs. Davies was a Potions master. She had wed Ronald Weasley just after the War, and the marriage was annulled two years later. Nothing was said to the reason, let alone anything about a failure to conceive.
It was like reading a Granian’s pedigree, to the point that he found the whole file rather distasteful. Granger had magical ancestors on both sides of her family, but not for six or more generations before. A grandfather on her mother’s side was a famous Potioneer who taught at Uagadou, and a grandmother on her father’s side was descended from an extinct family line that was related to the Fawleys, all Slytherins. Granger had been the first magical child in centuries.
There were all her scores, OWLs, NEWTs taken after the War, and even facsimiles of letters of recommendation from all she studied under to obtain her Mastery. It was all there, the testament to a remarkable witch who should have overtaken Shacklebolt, but had been deterred by new laws and old ideas. Patents, manuscripts, editorials, and memos referring that more research be done on the effects of the 17th-century Marriage law, all rejected by apothecaries, The Daily Prophet, and various members of the Wizengamot, it was all in her file.
Then there was the woman herself. She was slightly older than Draco, and even in her file, it was noted that she was added an additional eight months to that by use of a Time-Turner in her Third Year. Lucius was aghast that a child had been allowed the use of something so powerful. Again, a testament to the witch.
Hermione Granger, standing in Shacklebolt’s office, was barely holding in some sort of emotion. The woman could be read, Lucius supposed, but he could not decide if his own indignation was obscuring a proper evaluation. Even as her hand clasped his and Shacklebolt, Davies, and Weasley witnessed, Granger was clear-eyed, determined, perhaps. The rite was simple, at least, on its face.
Do you promise to support this woman, provide a safe home, basic needs, etc.? Do you promise to keep her safe from harm, internally and externally? Do you promise to conduct yourself properly, keeping true? It went on and on, and it was rather dull compared to the vows he had made with Narcissa. In that rite, he vowed to endeavor to keep her happy, and satiated, mind, body, and soul. Of course, he had failed in some of those respects. He had no intention to promise something like that to Hermione Granger.
What he did decide was to tear the Ministry down.
When the tendrils of magic wove over their hands, up their wrists, under their clothing to their hearts, he stared into her pretty eyes and made a silent vow: to burn it all down, one last, maybe fatal, hurrah. Why the hell not? It was not as if he had much else to lose, and if he had to lose, it might as well be everything all at once.
The magic was powerful, akin to the Unbreakable Vow, but even that was a misnomer. Knowing Granger, as little as he did, but only suspected, she knew ways around it.
There was no epiphany, no sudden swell of emotion toward the woman. He was curious, but nothing more. Hermione Granger was attractive. She was shorter by more than a head, and she smelled nice and clean, like some distant place he never thought to go. Her hand was small but strong, and parts of her were very slim, while others were thicker, stronger, more feminine than anything he had ever known. Hermione Granger was a counterpoint to Narcissa, dark where Narcissa was pale, strong where Narcissa was too thin. And her magic, when he stilled himself and allowed it to wash over him, was almost overwhelming. There was no sign of pollution or dilution in the woman’s blood.
“All that needs to be done is some signatures, and then…” Davies said, taking several rolls of parchment from Shacklebolt’s desk. And then Lucius and Granger were reading, making the other three in the room impatient.
“The conception and birth of a child will fetch only ten thousand Galleons?” Granger whispered, more to herself than to Lucius who sat next to her at a small table in Shacklebolt’s large office. “ Only ten thousand?” she snorted.
“All that a half-blood child is worth?” Lucius purred, looking up at Shacklebolt.
The Minister for Magic cleared his throat. “It is an incentive, Malfoy. It may seem to be a paltry amount to a man like yourself but to others…”
Granger rolled her eyes, lifted a proffered quill, and signed, her signature small, cramped.
“The Healers declared me barren, Minister, so…” Granger grumbled.
Lucius narrowed his eyes at this. Not that it mattered, he had no intention of sticking his prick into the woman, no matter how attractive she was, but as he glanced up to Arthur Weasley, he knew that it mattered somehow, elsewhere.
The formalities were nearly over, and a part of him cursed that he should have let Turpin read everything before he signed. He never signed anything without consulting with a solicitor first, but he was schooled well enough in legalese. The only point of pause was a clause that the Ministry had the right to do ‘welfare checks’ with Granger. The language was vague as to what that entailed, and he had a sneaking suspicion that the Ministry wanted confirmation that the marriage was consummated.
A handfasting was a civil matter until the arrangement was consummated. Typically, if there was no consummation after a certain period of time, the arrangement could be dissolved without dispute. In the language, he figured that they had two years. He had gone longer celibate.
“Well then, with that out of the way, you are free to take your wife home, Mr. Malfoy,” Davies said dispassionately.
Lucius sighed. The Manor was not ready, the elves were not alerted, and he was not even sure where he could put her, a long-term guest. Her thoughts on all of it, the logistics, were unknown.
“Shall I come to the Manor gates this evening, sir?” Granger asked then, standing, dusting her fingers off in almost a symbolic gesture. Lucius stood, grasped his cane, and pressed his lips, nodding.
“Very well, let me prepare.”
And then he was striding toward the lifts, frowning. Was he married? Was he really ? Surely, wherever Narcissa was, she was laughing to the point of tears. The announcement would be perfunctory, he was told as he left, Davies walking with him part of the way to the lifts. There would be no fuss, he was assured, but it did not matter to him, not really. It was not as if Draco would suddenly appear, aghast, and demand Granger not touch his mother’s things. If Lucius was lucky, Draco might send an owl to convey his disgust. Then again, he had no idea what Draco thought of Hermione Granger at all.
“You can kiss my arse, Arthur Weasley!” a voice bit out, coming down the corridor from the door of a small office near the Minister’s. “You pushed this on me, and now you’re complaining about who was selected for me?”
Granger’s voice was icy, hard, and it gave him pause. The lifts dinged, several people gawking at him from inside, but Lucius ignored them, turning his face to look up the corridor. He could only see Weasley outside a door, and it seemed Granger did not care who heard her words.
“Between you and Molly, you orchestrated my divorce, going so far as to force invasive gynecological exams to prove that it was my fault, and not your son’s that I could not carry a litter of your grandchildren. And I would have, once, considered it, but you and your Pureblood bullshit have convinced Ronald that I cannot carry when it is probably him!”
Lucius blinked at this. He knew very well how medieval women’s health matters were in the Magical world. They had tried for years to conceive, gone to Healers, private ones on the Continent. Both were healthy, and both could have children, but it needed help, they would learn, and they defaulted to old magicks. Draco was not a miracle, though it seemed like it after so long. Whereas the Weasley woman had to sneeze and she was pregnant… No, Lucius knew that gynecological knowledge in the current world was just as it probably had been five hundred years before…some mystery.
“We know it isn’t him, he’s had two already…with…”
“Do not speak another word, Arthur Weasley. We are no longer connected, the divorce was final, and no matter how fatherly you may feel toward me, you are not my father, you are not my friend, and now I suppose, I am Hermione Granger-Malfoy, and I am exerting that now. You will call me by my title, Lady Malfoy, or more aptly Marchioness Malfoy, Lady of Sarum, Marquise de Malfois et Beaugency. Now, kindly, fuck off, Arthur.”
Lucius snorted as the lift moved away, and he cut his eyes away as Arthur Weasley began to slink toward him.
“Happy, Malfoy?” Arthur growled, punching at the button for the lift. “You have my former daughter-in-law to use and abus--”
“If it annoys you, then yes , Arthur, I’m happy.”
The lift returned, and Lucius strode into the car, people parting for him, smirking at Weasley. It was almost a good day just to see the other man’s face fold, and his shoulders in his ragged old coat, slump.
The file came by owl to the Manor an hour later, and with it, Lucius decided. He and his foisted wife were going to overthrow the government.
Maizy and Pip had been his father’s personal elves. Why Abraxas needed two valets was still a mystery, but Lucius had inherited them. They had been faithful valets through his childhood and into his marriage. Only his taking of the Dark Mark and all the horrors that followed severed any connection he felt he had to the creatures. Since the Dark Lord had horribly sullied the Manor, Lucius felt too much guilt to ask anything from any of the elves who lived in the house or tended the lands.
Yet, after reading Granger’s file, and changing into his usual house clothing, he called their names for the first time in years. Maizy and Pip immediately appeared in his study, standing just before his desk, eyes watery.
“Master,” they said in unison. The elves were brother and sister, he had been told once, twins. If it were not for their decidedly gendered clothing, albeit only a satin pillowcase versus a piece of velvet drape remnant, Lucius could barely tell them apart. Maizy wore the satin and had a slightly higher voice and Pip the velvet with a rougher voice.
“I have remarried.”
The elves nearly swooned at those three words, and Lucius cleared his throat as the siblings grasped hands in excitement.
“My new wife will be arriving this evening.”
“...clean the rooms…redo them?”
“But Mistress’ things? What shall we do?”
“Creams and golds? Maybe change the painting over the fireplace?”
“Oh, poor Mistress…she was so…”
“And supper, what about supper, we need something special…”
Lucius cleared his throat more dramatically. “While I am very pleased you both are delighted and ready to start preparing, there are several things you need to know.”
The siblings blinked their bulbous green eyes and nodded in unison.
“Lady Malfoy is a Muggleborn witch.”
The elves cut their eyes to each other but said nothing.
“She is younger than me.”
They did not move, but blinked, confused…as if that did not matter at all.
“And if I remember correctly, she believes elves should be freed.”
“Guh!” Pip gasped.
“Who is this woman, Master?” Maizy asked, not bothering to hide her suspicions.
“Hermione Granger.”
The elves did swoon then, but not for the reason Lucius initially thought. When they were able to stand, their eyes were gleaming and their faces were twisted into a strange smile.
“A War hero, Master. Yes, yes, we know who she is.”
“Do you ?” he purred, leaning to rest his elbows on his blotter, folding his hands under his chin.
The twins nodded. “Dobby favored her, and we favored Dobby. He was our youngest brother, sir, if you recall.”
He did not. Dobby was part of the reason he did not want to do much with the elves. Dobby was part of his guilt.
“The new Lady Malfoy had tried so hard to advocate for us in the Ministry, sir, and though it was ill-informed to start, she tried… We…” Pip trailed, glancing at Maizy. A silent conversation occurred before his eyes and he sighed.
“Out with it, Pip, I’m not going to box your ears.”
Maizy’s eyes widened at that. Abraxas had been the sort to promote self-flagellation among the elves, and Lucius did little to stop it. Another point of guilt.
“When Young Master was at home, before…he took us to interview with the new Lady Malfoy, years ago…”
“Oh?” he hummed and figured his expression betrayed something as both elves took a tentative step back.
“About how we felt being Malfoy elves, sir. If we desired a brand of freedom,” Pip continued, and then Maizy sighed, annoyed.
“She wanted to know if we wanted to be paid and given clothes, sir. And we were honest, sir. Since the Dark times, things have improved for us here. Except…not being allowed to tend to you, sir. That has been hard.”
Lucius frowned. “Do you want to be free?”
It was ludicrous, a part of him hissed. House elves…by their very nature, were meant to serve, and then he remembered the Mark on his arm. He had had a choice, they did not. But what did a choice matter to a creature who never had to make one, the part of him hissed again. It did matter, he decided.
“We are as free as we know to be, sir,” Pip whispered. “And we would like to be able to serve the new Lady Malfoy, if she allows it, but sir…we will not take clothes, no matter if she insists.”
Lucius smirked at that and sat back in his chair. “Thank you for your frankness. I…If Lady Malfoy presses the matter, at any point, come to me.
In the meantime, prepare the rooms in the north wing. Leave Cissy’s rooms as they are, and seal them, if you must. I think it would be inappropriate to put the new Mistress there.”
And profane. He had left the rooms as they were, even though everything Narcissa ever owned had been stripped out and taken with her to Monaco to her preferred, but short life. There were still traces of her there that he sometimes liked to visit if he were feeling particularly maudlin, or drunk.
“But Master…the north wing is where the Dark Lord…”
“Then gut it, and put her in my room until it is redone,” he bit out and immediately apologized. The elves nodded, glancing at each other again. Lucius used to find the silent, perhaps telepathic, twinspeak amusing, but something was beginning to wear in his soul. He was tired.
“Lady Malfoy might have preferences in style, Pip, Maizy, and when she arrives, please conference with her. I believe she will be amenable to such a conversation. Make her comfortable, within reason. Lady Malfoy seems to be quite set on her preferences on certain matters.”
“Yes, Master,” they chirped. “Shall we have Hurd prepare a full supper?”
Lucius sighed. Hurd, the head cook, he thought, had died when Lucius started cooking for himself.
“Three courses, something with fruits for dessert, appropriate wines. Nothing too ornate, please tell Hurd. I know I’ve not been allowing him to do his duty, but I would rather not kill the woman with too rich or over-the-top dishes.”
The elves nodded. “We will await her arrival.”
“At the gates, yes, one of you please escort her until I can prepare myself… And make sure the foyer is cleaner than it was yesterday, please. Fresh flowers, no Floo soot.”
More nodding, and Lucius dismissed the pair, feeling ill at ease.
He felt as though he was being ambushed. No, not that exactly, but certainly put upon. Only a day before, he was Lucius Malfoy, the hermit. Suddenly, he was Lucius Malfoy, twice married. He looked down at the file on Granger again.
Lucius did not know this woman at all. Besides the reputation and the images he had of her during the War, as a child, he had no idea what she was really like. She might be an alcoholic, a hoarder, she might dogear books…
The fates had aligned and put some plan in place, surely. Overthrowing the Ministry, it could not just be that, although the idea of chaos in those hallowed halls was a fantasy of his. No, it was something more than his idea of instating some anarchistic form of government that challenged the Statute of Secrecy. This was something on a more personal level.
He stared down at his right hand where only hours before the golden tendrils of magic had bound him to a virtual stranger. Lucius could still feel the magic under his pale skin. Her hand had been so small, the color of it so different from his own. It had been a long while since he had even clasped hands with a woman. The last had been Andromeda at Narcissa’s memorial her sister had arranged in London. Draco and Astoria had not come. Only a few old classmates who still had anything to do with Cissy had come. Andy had only invited him because she wanted to keep an avenue open to him, for some reason. Andy had not been in contact since.
Lucius was not asexual. He missed women, well, Narcissa. She had been his first, but not his only . Before their wedding, he had his dalliances, mostly with Bellatrix and Corban Yaxley’s exotic wife Athena. Odd, he thought, all those women were dead, and dispatched in rather violent and tragic ways. There had been encounters at school, but never, not once, did he participate in some of his compatriot’s games of a sexual and usually murderous nature. He had been true, and for the most part, Narcissa had been accommodating. Of course, in the end, Narcissa had been the one to be untrue, and though it hurt him, he could not completely blame her. For a few years after the War, he had felt asexual.
That was over though, and he had reacquainted himself with his hand.
At that thought, he snorted. He had a new wife, and she might be completely frigid, and may not even like men if she had been married to a Weasley. But no, he would not entertain anything remotely sexual about the chit. That would forever bind him to her, perhaps.
As the sun began to set on July 1st, he went to his rooms, finding everything tidied, freshened, and the bed turned down for two. Presumptuous little shits, he thought. But hanging on his wardrobe was a fine suit, similar to what he had worn to the Ministry, but in a lighter shade and lighter weight fabrics. Summer supper clothing, he supposed. Lucius had stopped considering fashion before the War was over.
He bathed, and combed out his hair, letting it fall damp over his back as he applied a light cologne and brushed his teeth. In the lavatory mirror, only in a pair of white boxer briefs, he considered himself. A young wife might not find him terrible. The scars on his chest, and his ribs, were not so bad after so long. Turning to push his hair away from his back, he found those looked worse. The guards at Azkaban had been rather brutal when they remembered he was there. Maybe getting his seat back in the Wizengamot would afford him to find a way to punish those disgusting shits. Oh, he remembered their names, and the Ministry claimed that Azkaban only needed Dementors…
He was fit for his age, more so as he worked on the Manor and the grounds. His skin was not so pale, his complexion healthier than even in his youth. The line of muscle and bone was firm, and his hair was not thinning like he had seen Draco start to do the last time he had seen him. The thinness must have come from the Black side. He put on some moisturizer, the only bit of beauty product he wore when he was clean-shaven. Did Granger like beards? What did it matter? He had only shaved to not look so wild going into the Ministry. He could cultivate a full beard in a few weeks time, naturally.
“Master, Lady Malfoy is here. Should we have her wait in the Foyer?” Pip said as Lucius slipped into his shoes, scowling at how stiff they felt. He preferred to go barefoot after so many years.
“Show her the room, I’m sleeping in Draco’s room tonight,” he murmured, bending down to adjust his sock. “Oh, her things?”
Pip grunted. “Only a trunk, sir.”
Odd, he thought. “Bring it here then, see if she needs to unpack anything, and explain that the rooms are not ready yet. I’ll meet her in the dining room.”
Pip cleared his throat. “Sir, we set up on the terrace overlooking the western gardens, the dining room needs…redone.”
Lucius sighed. Yes, yes, it did. Most of the more formal rooms had been left alone since after the War. Like the rooms in the north wing, the Dark Lord’s lingering taint was there too.
“ Fine . I’ll be there momentarily, just give me time to slip out and compose myself, Pip.”
The elf nodded, smiling.
He took the door to the passage down to his study on the first floor, a secret passage that no one but he and Narcissa knew. Narcissa’s private rooms were next to his, and there was a secret door between the two, but toward the end, she had blocked it. There were passages all through the house, some he used daily, some he had not been in since he was a boy. Only the Malfoys knew them and used them often in the old days to spy on guests or hide things from the Ministry.
In his study, he eyed his sideboard, considering.
Lucius was nervous. He felt like he had been nervous for almost twenty years, and when it became too much, he’d drink. He had not had more than a snort of whiskey or half a bottle of Superior Red in a long while. As much as he worked, cleaned, cooked, or read, he went to bed every night with little need for liquid lubrication for sleep. Lucius had planned it that way for a reason.
Standing by the French door, he knew that further down his bride was probably waiting. He hoped that Hurd had not overdone it with supper.
Then the gravity of it all began to press his shoulders down. He was wed, in a manner of speaking. And for the foreseeable future, he would have to deal with a potential insurrectionist living under his roof. Better than a megalomaniac Dark wizard, his brain hissed, and he snorted, leaning into the door, shoving his hands into his trouser pockets.
Surely, Granger had a plan, one he might go along with.
The sun was set, but the sky over the garden reflected reds and orange on high clouds, casting the terrace in warmth. Lucius watched her, standing at the balustrade overlooking the ornate labyrinth hedges with the fruit trees interspersed. He had spent years working to restore his mother’s treasured labyrinth and still had work to do. Narcissa hated it, and maybe it was a way of getting back at her for tearing a lot of it out. Narcissa had been afraid Draco would lose his way, impossible, he tried telling her once. A labyrinth was not a maze, and at the center was a traditional Japanese garden, something his mother remembered from her girlhood travels, complete with a tea house, pond, and cherry trees. The tea house was in ruins, and he knew it was next to do.
He sighed, watching the wind blow her curls. Curls were novel, his own hair so straight that anything else was alien. In the light, her hair looked like dried blood. She had changed into a linen duster in pale blue over a long linen dress in black with flowing skirts. Lucius frowned, realizing she was barefoot, her brown feet small, standing on the stone of the terrace.
“It isn’t at all like I recall,” she said, turning to look over her right shoulder, her eyes glowing in the red clouds overhead. “Then again, I was dragged here, under duress on a very cold March day.”
Lucius pursed his lips and stepped onto the terrace, eyeing the small bistro table with candles behind glass globes to keep the wind from blowing them out. Two settings, close together, under silver lids and crystal for water and wine, ready for them.
“I remember peacocks, I didn’t see them when I came from the gate.”
“I got rid of them. A holdover from my father, nasty beasts, shit on the doorstep all the time…”
Granger smirked, turning. Under the long duster, she had on a dress with no discernable straps, just a bodice that clung to her slim waist, flaring over her breasts and over her perfect decolletage. With her curls falling over her shoulders, and the same dark violet lipstick, she looked almost refined, pretty.
“Welcome home, I suppose I should say, Marchioness Malfoy, Lady of Sarum, Marquise de Malfois et Beaugency,” he said, moving nearer, extending his hand.
“Heard that, did you?” she snorted, and took his hand. Slowly he bowed to her and drew her hand to his right arm to lead her to the table.
“I did.”
“And the rest, before that?”
“That too,” he sighed, pulling out her chair. Civilities, manners, etiquette, he knew he should demonstrate it all. As far as he knew, the chit had only ever seen him be the opposite.
Lucius sat at her left and watched as the water and wine glasses filled before them.
“Aren’t you going to ask? I know that the dossier on me probably only had the hard statistics.”
“Yes, dossier, a much better word for it,” he muttered as he pulled the dome lid off from his food, satisfied that it was a small green salad with fresh fruit and cheese on top. He took his napkin and placed it on his lap, and reached for his salad fork, not hesitating.
He realized Granger was watching him, amused.
“I have not had a guest in years, Miss Granger…”
“Lady Malfoy,” she sighed, taking her ornately folded napkin and putting it on her lap, shifting closer to the table, so close her knee bumped into his. “But Granger will suffice.”
He bit the inside of his cheek. “As I said, I’m afraid my manners can be lacking. I feel as though I have spoken more today than I have in a very long time.”
Granger removed the cover and set it aside, next to his, on the rather cramped table. She eyed the salad, expressionless, and took her salad fork and stabbed into a juicy piece of summer strawberry. Lucius watched her take the first bite, her mouth opening just slightly, and ate. It had also been a long time since he had seen another person eat, let alone a woman.
Lucius blinked at the thought and began to eat as well. When he finished, trying not to scarf it all down as fast as possible, he sat back with his wine and considered her again. He could not tell if she was trying to be polite or if she just ate daintily. Narcissa rarely ate in front of him, it was something that always bothered him. His wife, first wife, was borderline anorexic, or maybe full-blown anorexic, if there was such a thing. Granger was the opposite, and when she drank her wine, it was deep.
“You could not conceive a child, is that why you divorced?”
Granger’s eyes swiveled to him over her glass, and slowly, carefully, she sat it down.
“How did your wife die, Malfoy? And was that the reason why your son won’t speak to you?”
How dare she! He dropped his napkin in his lap, grasped his wine, and threw it back. They glared at each other for several moments and then Granger sighed, dabbed her mouth with her napkin, and sat back. The plates popped away, and after a moment, the second course of cheeses and fruit came. The wine glasses were refilled with a white, and Granger took the wine first.
“If you haven’t noticed, having children is the first imperative of the Weasley family, at least the more recent generations.”
Lucius huffed. “Surely to have their own private army.”
Granger said nothing, drank and grabbed a piece of cheese. Lucius did not like cheese so much and opted for a piece of pear. He chewed, watching her out of the corner of his eye.
“Ron and I…we were not trying, I thought we were too young. I was right, but Arthur and Molly did not think the same. And in the end, convinced my lovable idiot of an ex-husband that he was better sowing his seed with more fertile soil.”
Lucius smirked. “Who was that, then?”
“Doesn’t matter. He’s got two now, and has a good position consulting with the Ministry, a home in Devon, and seems quite happy.”
“But you’re not infertile.”
Granger laughed. “No. Just very good at contraceptive Charms and timing my cycle. Have you heard of the phrase ‘baby trap’?”
He had not, but the words themselves had enough implication.
“When all this bullshit with a Marriage Law really started years ago, the Weasleys were all for it, all but Ginny, of course. Ron fell into it, and even though I raised my objections, he thought a baby would answer every problem, soothe everything, and I realized he had never really grown up at all…just another insecure man.”
Lucius lifted another slice of pear to his mouth and nodded, thinking of saying something about the fact that every Weasley had varying degrees of masculine insecurity, at least everyone he had known.
“He’s a good man, just not the right man, and as far as I know, he’s not pining and I’m not either.”
“And now you’re here…in a different type of trap,” he sighed.
Granger chuckled. “One that I hope to escape since you’re trapped just as much as I am, Malfoy.
Weird, calling you that. I only called your son Malfoy.”
“I have no issues with ‘Lucius’, but you might,” he said, reaching for his wine.
She considered this, watching him drink, the sky getting darker overhead, and the lamps on the balustrade lighting. He allowed her survey, those light brown eyes studying how his throat moved as he drank, his hair, his nose, all of it. When she quirked her lips into a half smile, he pulled the glass from his lips.
“Granger will work for me. But your wife…”
He set the glass down a little too roughly, and the plates popped away. Nothing came for a long while. Lucius had a distinct feeling then that the twin elves were watching from some unseen place, possibly keeping Hurd from sending the main dish.
Lucius sighed, sat back, and regarded Granger coolly. “She drowned in the French Riviera, dove into the sea, hit her head, and drowned. Her lover pulled her out, tried to save her life, and failed.”
That was the short and sweet answer, he supposed. There was obviously more to it, context, but he was not about to say anymore, no matter how this woman was bound to him. He was not about to tell Granger that he had never seen Narcissa swim, never knew she could, let alone dive into the sea. He was told that she was in a bikini, and he had a near-impossible time trying to picture that. When Andy told him about it all at the memorial service, she said that Narcissa looked wonderful, tan even. Lucius never saw her body.
“My condolences, Malfoy,” Granger whispered.
He nodded at that. Again, short and sweet. He had to give Granger props for her economy in some regards. So far, she had been honest with him, though they had only spent perhaps an hour in each other’s presence.
The main dish was poulet chasseur, a rustic dish he sometimes fixed for himself. Hurd’s iteration was quite good, but Lucius preferred more butter and mushrooms. Granger picked at the food, eating the vegetables, and took her time, eating the chicken last. He wondered if she was used to such rich food.
“Where were you before?”
Granger blinked. “ Before ? Before this?”
Lucius dabbed at the corner of his mouth and nodded.
“A flat in Diagon Alley.”
He frowned. “There aren’t any suitable places to live…” he trailed.
Granger arched a brow. “I took a massive pay cut, Malfoy, and my application for spousal maintenance was denied. Harry and Ginny put me up for a while, but they are… busy. ”
Lucius hummed, cut a piece of chicken, and gathered a bit of onion, and took a bite. He had not seen Potter for a long time until the day before. In fact, he had not thought about him in years. He had not thought much about anything beyond the Manor.
“I only have one trunk, and I’m wearing my nicest outfit. I Charm my work clothes in different colors on different days, and my familiar died last year. My parents are lost to me, and I have fewer rights as a witch than a Muggle, and I think that sums up my adult life.”
Granger said this very casually, but there was a tightness at the corner of her mouth. Lucius noted this, dabbed his mouth again, and tossed his napkin on the table, done.
“And now you’re Lady Malfoy.”
Granger said nothing, staring at the candles in the globes.
“And you want to overthrow the government.”
She sighed.
“Not some sort of petty revenge then?”
Her eyes swiveled to him and her lips slowly curled. Lucius felt something tighten in his throat at her face.
“I don’t do ‘petty’, sir.”
He believed her. This woman, with the very sly and predatory expression on her face, only did punctilious and godlike vengeance. His lower belly stirred and he cleared his throat and tapped his empty wine glass, indicating he wanted more.
They shared a silence, but Lucius was hoping it would give him time to suffuse his blood with some alcohol and get that tell-tale feeling to pass. When dessert came, he still had non-dessert wine in his glass. A fruit and custard tart, small, and pretty, was next.
“I hope that Pip and Maizy properly introduced themselves?” he said at last.
“Yes. I have met them before.”
Lucius hummed and told her what the siblings had told him, going so far as to mention their concern that she may try to free them. At that, Granger threw back her head and laughed. The gesture afforded him a look at her skin, neck, and chest. In the candlelight, she looked so soft.
“I would never presume, especially now, to do something like that, Malfoy. I hope that Pip and Maizy understand that.”
Lucius used his dessert fork to cut a piece of tart. “And I hope that the room will suit for the time being. The short notice has…” he trailed, frowning. He wondered what sort of room she would prefer. Anything had to be better than the shabby studio flats on Diagon Alley.
“It is fine, though I dislike having to usurp you from your stupidly massive bed.”
Lucius smirked as he chewed. The bed was ‘stupidly massive’ as Granger said, but when Narcissa was in it or had been up until the Dark Lord took up residence, the bed had been quite comfortable. In the years since he had considered changing it many times. The only thing that had changed were the colors in the room, less black and silver, more greens and blues. The room was comfortable, despite the bed, and the en suite was luxurious, even to someone like him.
“I…” she began. “I’m not used to the size, the cleanliness. I’m no slob, but when you live on a fixed income, it is amazing what you can get used to.”
He could not imagine. Azkaban had been the worst of the worst, cold, damp, dark, and filled with odd pests, and Dementors. If Hell was real, it would be Azkaban. Lucius knew he could never abide the sound of the sea from that time.
“Pip said you only had the one trunk, and I suppose you should have some suitable clothing?”
Granger said nothing, chewing the summer fruits, eyes on the distant glow in the west. Lucius studied her, noting that she sat rather rigidly, and chewed rather slowly. She had freckles across her nose and along her hairline. She had a pinchable chin, and the line of her jaw was lost in her curls. He wondered what her measurements were, and felt a pang, remembering all too well what Narcissa’s were. Madam Malkin and he sighed softly, would love to clothe the new Lady Malfoy. The woman would look good in a dark violet, like her lipstick, or in gold and green.
“I would not ask that, Malfoy. I only ask for shelter.”
Lucius rolled his eyes at this, sat back, and dabbed his mouth one last time.
“I assume then, you have a plan to overthrow the Ministry?”
Granger paused in lifting her dessert fork to her mouth and smiled. “Of course. Shall I tell you?”
“By all means, Lady Malfoy, as I would be a co-conspirator by association.”
She lowered her fork and grasped her rosé dessert wine. After she took a long drink, she also sat back, her left arm hugging herself while she held her glass before her with the other.
“As your wife, the law still says I cannot be compelled to testify against you, and vice versa. And by your rather blase acceptance of my hand, I will assume that you have some semblance of trust in me, or at least my reputation?”
It had been blase, hadn’t it? Lucius Malfoy, at least the one of twenty years ago, would have thrown a spectacular fit in the Ministry, spewed a litany of curses and disparagements, and would have come up with some underhanded way to assassinate Shacklebolt and Weasley, maybe even Granger. Instead, he had just laid down and married again.
“I trust that you would rather not see us both in Azkaban.”
Granger nodded, took a drink, and tossed her napkin on the table. “Are you keen on taking your seat back with the Wizengamot?”
If she had asked him the day before, he would have said absolutely not. Of course, the day before, he had no clue how the Ministry would have come for him. Lucius had tried to stay out of sight, out of mind. That was a naive hope, obviously.
By all accounts, he was the richest wizard in Britain, and probably France and most of western Europe. The wealth was mostly generational, but he was no fool when it came to investments. He had put his directorship of Malfoy Apothecaries on pause, allowing a capable interim to run things until Draco decided what to do. The Apothecaries were still making money hand over fist, as the Muggles would say. And no matter what fines and settlements he had had to pay, he was still well in the black. Hell, there were vaults in his family name that he had never seen, but was only vaguely aware of from the ring of keys he kept in his study.
“Will I be your puppet, Lady Malfoy?” he purred then, turning his eyes to her again.
“Absolutely not . I lack the ability to make anyone do what I want, and I am not about to try my hand with the Imperius.”
Lucius narrowed his eyes at her. The woman was sly. He knew he had to be careful, she was well-informed, and she knew how to use the information.
“No, I would prefer to persuade you, if I must, but I have an intuition that our feelings on the matters of this Law align.”
“But no outright objections, no penned bills to be introduced in your cramped little hand?”
Granger grinned. “Not right away. I have some places to start, amendments, objections, and if you’ll permit me some time, I can explain them all.”
Lucius hummed at this. He did like a good debate. “When would you like to start?”
“Soon, if possible, but it will have to wait until all the fuss about what happened today dies down. I anticipate that The Prophet will be agog when Davies releases the record if she hasn’t already.”
“She assured me…”
“Perfunctory announcement?” Granger supplied, brow arching. “ Unlikely . You are the last Death Eater, ex-Death Eater to be paired off. That, and you are who you are, and I am who I am.
If we do go out in public, I’m prepared for flashbulbs, intrusive questions, stares, slack-jawed gapes, something thrown on me, maybe a hex or two. At this point, I am prepared for human excrement to be thrown at me…”
Me too, Lucius mentally conceded. He knew he was hated. He had had some security in the Ministry but in Diagon Alley, in Paris? No one was ready to forget and forgive him, and rightly so, he thought. All the things he did to save his family meant nothing. He had killed, he had aided and abetted, he had lied, and he had been unrepentant.
Hermione Granger, however, was a War hero. An Order of Merlin, First Class was no small thing. It was akin to a knighthood in the Muggle world, and not an honorary title either. Granger had fought, she had strategized, and she had survived. So much of it came out after the Last Battle, and even Lucius was impressed. But the woman who sat at his side was jaded, beautifully so. Somehow he could imagine a Mudblood witch bringing it all down, and it made it all the more impossible to think of her that way…muddy blood. Maybe an old dog could learn new tricks?
“Reporters have never breached the wards here, Granger. If you have concerns.”
She shook her head. “I don’t, but I, you, can’t stay behind the wards forever. As much as I would love to rest on one’s laurels…no offense…I can’t be idle.”
Lucius smirked at the idiom. He assumed she meant their hours-old marriage, and then his smirk faded. He had rested on something, but it was not laurels. Maybe it had been thorns. Maybe Fate had given him just enough time to recoup, and learn to live with himself, all in preparation for that day. A part of him was restless. As much as he felt self-satisfied with some idea of self-sufficiency, he was a born control freak. He was subject to this new barbaric Marriage Law, not just because of his former allegiances, but because of his blood. It could not stand in the modern world. If their race, their country was to disappear from the Earth, it would be so small a concern. The days of the sun never setting on Britain were long gone.
“And I suppose you also have a plan for that? The intervening time?”
“I do. I only hope you’ll indulge me.”
He laughed at that. It was not part of his vows, but somehow, he thought he’d not have any issue with indulging her the longer she spoke so candidly with him. Lucius wondered what she was like when she was truly riled. Frightening, surely.
“You said your family is lost. But you still have Potter, I assume?”
Granger nodded. “And Ginny, who is probably vomiting from something more than morning sickness, if she’s heard. I’m sorry to say, but she despises you, Malfoy.”
Lucius said nothing. The girl had every reason to. If he could, he would have pleaded for forgiveness as a part of his ‘apology tour’ after the War. He truly had no idea the book was what it was, other than something that polluted everything in his study for years. At the time, he had been desperate to get rid of it, incriminate Arthur Weasley after having the Manor raided repeatedly, and to somehow appease Draco by forcing the Muggleborns out…including the woman who was sipping more wine at his side. Gods, he had been so pathetic then. It would get much worse before it got better.
“Harry, he…he’s mellowed. I think your relationship with Snape helped, at least, what he saw and learned after the fact.”
“Ah,” was all Lucius intoned. He did not want to think about Severus, because every time he did, his chest hurt, and he usually ended up drinking too much. If he had ever had a friend, it was ugly, greasy, brilliant, Severus. Lucius could have been a better friend, but he truly did not know how to be one, and at that moment, there was no way he could ever repay his friend for his sacrifices.
“Harry has some idea what I’m up to, but I don’t count him as an ally or asset, not since he has bid for the Head of the MLE.”
Lucius turned his eyes to her again. “Not a part of your plan?”
Granger licked her lips and met his gaze. “Not intentionally. It might work out, but that's several steps ahead yet.”
“And how many steps are there?” he asked in a purr.
“Twelve.”
“And this is?”
“Step one. I can summarize the others if you like.”
Lucius nodded. “I don’t care for surprises.”
Granger smirked and began. As she went on, Lucius signaled for more and more wine. He was rapt by her voice, by the way, her eyes gleamed. The longer he listened, the more he truly believed that this woman, his new wife, was a fucking genius .
“And finally, the Wizengamot is dissolved, a new Minister is installed, the MLE is given a new charter, and Gringotts is forced to give up its records of every former Minister, Wizengamot member, and a new government is established with cooperation with the ICW.”
“Fucking hell.”
Granger’s eyes narrowed, glancing at him. “You think it's madness, don’t you?”
“Absolutely.”
She sighed and crossed her arms.
“The part with Gringotts giving over records, that is insanity. The rest? Doable. But do you give room for improvisation?”
“Naturally. I cannot foresee every move all the pieces will make, only speculate. But all of it hinges on one thing: half-bloods and Muggleborns who are affected by the Law.”
“And not Purebloods? I’m sure you’ll find many would rally behind such a plan.”
Granger shook her head. “Not enough, I’ve polled them.”
Of course, Granger had. If she had constructed such a plan, she surely had done her due diligence and research. If she had been a senior advisor to Shacklebolt, no lowly post, she would have had access to a lot of data. Perhaps that was why she was demoted, but still kept near?
“Then there was me?”
Granger sighed again and nodded. “As terrible as it may seem to you…you surely had an idea the Ministry would come for you, again?”
He had, he just never thought it would be this way. Merlin, had Shacklebolt fucked up by pairing him with Granger. Unless…
“Who really pushed this Law?” he asked then.
She licked her lips, considered. “Arthur did, at first. He had tried pushing through some bills on Muggleborn equality, as you may remember.”
He did, all too well.
“His heart was in the right place, I think, at first. But then he got in league with a few others in the Ministry who wanted something more comprehensive, and I think it snowballed from there.”
The fear of falling back into the Dark times, the blood purity argument that had been drilled into his own head by his father, the same nonsense he nearly drilled into Draco’s. Lucius could only imagine who some of this ‘league’ was. Extremists in the guise of the law, those whose ideas were not so far removed from the Dark Lord’s or even Grindelwald’s. Lucius knew who they were.
“Arthur is not a bad man, but he can be easily misguided. He has this self-righteousness that cannot be shaken, and as they say, in for a penny, in for a pound.”
Lucius snorted at that. He did like idioms.
“Of course, having mostly sons, Pureblood sons, I don’t think Arthur saw the ultimate outcome, and by then, he had convinced too many others to push the Marriage Law through, people with real sway and power.”
Shacklebolt. Lucius closed his eyes and sighed. Shacklebolt had always had an implacable sense of justice, even in school. They had both had much to prove and for the first time in his life, Lucius had lost out politically.
“So, if you want to lay blame, it’s with Arthur, though I think now, after today, his self-righteousness might be shaken.”
“Because of me?” he purred, opening his eyes. Granger was smirking at him. “As you orchestrated it to be?”
Granger lifted her chin and said nothing. “I will vow not to maneuver behind your back, Malfoy, if that is what you will need.”
Slytherin, the very ideal, and yet she was, according to Draco, a Gryffindor princess. Draco had been very, very wrong.
“As long as you will not work against me, that is,” she added.
Lucius gave her a small smile. “As long as you are not working against my interests, Lady Malfoy, and I can impart what those are, we can shake on it.”
Granger cocked her head, and unfolded her arms, offering her right hand. Lucius narrowed his eyes for a moment, almost seeing the faint tendrils of the handfasting still on her golden brown skin. When he took her fingers, he winced, feeling a spark of something flash between their skin. Granger noticed it too and smiled widely.
“Sic infit,” she whispered as he shook her hand firmly, but did not release her fingers immediately.
And the madness continued.
Draco’s old bed was only slightly better than the floor of his cell at Azkaban, and when he haphazardly stripped off his clothing and fell face-first into it, he thought he had broken his nose. The bedroom had been freshened, but there were still so many things left from his son’s childhood, things he had hated at the time, but now found just sad and discarded. With the Quidditch posters, the little things the boy had collected, even child’s books, the room was like a tomb for childhood lost.
Lucius was borderline drunk. How could a day be so long? How could a day be so insane? Oh, he had had worse, but he was simply not used to it after so long.
Laying on his belly on the too-short bed, he stared at nothing, just shapes of potential obstacles in the dark. He lifted his left hand and blinked blearily at it. He was married again, but there was no ring. Lucius supposed he should give Granger one, if only for appearances. Thinking of appearances, he understood the logic of what Granger told him, at least the first part. The prospect of going to London was not savory.
Had the Weasley boy given her a ring? He had not noticed the mark of one or the subtle discoloring of her ring finger. The last ring he had given anyone was to Narcissa, and she had stopped wearing it by the end of the War. The goblin-wrought silver was in one of the vaults, and he had no inclination to get it out again. No, if Granger had to have a ring, he imagined it would not be something like the family heirloom, fraught with darker memories and meaning. A ring with no ostentatious gems or jewels, nothing fancy, but still attractive, perhaps? Somehow Granger struck him as a sensible woman, novel, really.
Then there were her twelve steps, and lying in the dark of a silent room, he realized that much of it depended on him . Lucius refused to think too long about his role, even with her summarization which seemed very detailed. If Granger had not been presented with him, how would her plan have changed?
Lucius sighed, licked his lips, and curled his arms under the pillow of Draco’s bed. When it came to madness, sometimes it was best to ride the wave, keep one’s head above the tide, and hope you came upon the shore of sanity eventually. It was an old and familiar sensation, but a part of him felt a type of excitement to be able to ride that wave again.
He slept deeply, the liquid lubrication helping, and when he woke, stumbling and confused, it took running face-first into the side of an open door to wake him fully. Lucius had forgotten where he was and walked into the ensuite door. Just before dawn, he pissed, sighed at his reflection.
“Looking very ruffled this morning, Lord Malfoy,” the mirror said to him, nearly causing him to punch it in surprise.
“Fuck off,” he muttered, and the enchanted mirror tutted at him as he washed his face and found an old comb to smooth down his hair.
Granger was in his room, and though he knew he could call Pip to fetch him clothing, he did not say a word, scratching his chest in the mirror and checking to see if he smelled of wine and sleep. Lucius found an old dressing gown on the back of the ensuite door and donned it. The dressing gown was too short and barely came to the tops of his knees, but it would have to do. Summoning his wand from his discarded clothing, he left the room with a sigh. He would have to change the bed, clear the floor, and Silence the mirror. Lucius hoped Pip and Maizy would have the rooms redone sooner rather than later.
As he normally did, Lucius would rise before dawn, and take to the kitchen to prepare tea and a light breakfast. He would normally eat in the kitchen, finding the paper or some correspondence waiting in the breakfast nook by a window overlooking the walled herb garden. The paper was usually unread. After he ate, he would wash, dress, and head to the stables to see the Granians, only two after so long. He’d walk the grounds, doing a type of survey of what needed tending, trimming, or replanting. And before lunch, he’d work on the labyrinth, laying Charms, spreading new gravel on the path, pruning the fruit trees. After lunch, he would conduct whatever business needed to be done, send off owls, and work more in the gardens. He’d clean the Manor, dust, freshen, and do any repairs, and by late afternoon, he would read before supper. Supper would be prepared himself, and he would eat in the kitchen again. Another walk, back inside, bathe if needed, read, bed.
Simple.
Except that when he took the steps down into the kitchen from the main corridor on the ground floor, he found the kitchen lit, the kettle on the stove, and Granger speaking to Hurd and Maizy at the breakfast nook, the morning still quite gray outside.
At his arrival, all turned, and Granger’s light brown eyes studied him from head to bare toes. The robe was inappropriate, but it was his house, his kitchen, and he rolled his eyes and went to the stove as the kettle began to whistle, not caring if Granger could see his bare chest, his boxer briefs, or his bare legs. Lucius was not about to change his routine for her, and he wondered if that would somehow upset her.
What did it fucking matter? It was his house, the house he was literally born in, and thought for a time, he might die in.
“Master, was supper suitable?”
Hurd was a burly old elf with yellow eyes and skin, and Lucius frowned as he prepared the teapot next to the stove. He had not heard Hurd’s voice in some time.
“It was.”
“Shall I arrange another supper tonight?”
Lucius Summoned two cups and saucers from a shelf near the scullery and began preparing a tray.
“I suppose, Hurd,” he mumbled as the elf moved to begin preparing toast, setting out marmalade, which he did not usually eat.
Granger was looking out the window to the bed of mint and lemongrass. As he set the tray with tea down on the nook table, he realized that she was probably wearing the same dress as the night before, only Charming it pale blue. It was indeed strapless, and in the dawn light, her skin was still warm and golden. When he sat down across from her, she sighed, and somehow, small talk began.
How had he slept? How had she slept? Fine, fine. Cream or sugar? No, neither one took additions. Questions about morning routines, both really did not sleep well as a rule, and were up early. Granger only had black tea in the morning, sometimes coffee, and usually did not eat until lunch.
“It is a Thursday. Aren’t you expected in London?” he asked with a fragrant cup of black tea hovering before his face as Hurd brought a toast rack and the marmalade he had made himself using summer berries, very good marmalade, he thought.
Granger sipped her tea and when she lowered her cup, she frowned at the toast.
“I have been…let go.”
Lucius blinked at this and paused in reaching for a slice of dry toast.
Granger sighed. “As I am now married, I am not allowed to work for my own income. It was a trade-off, one I anticipated.”
He had not seen mention of it in the paperwork, but he had not expected something so backward. Lucius pressed his lips, snatched a slice, and began reaching for the marmalade, surprising himself at the movement.
“You no longer have an in with the Minister’s office.”
“Yes, as I said , I anticipated it.”
She watched him slather marmalade and take a bite. Her eyes were distant and she took more tea.
“I have some money saved. The Ministry has not moved so far as to strip away my vault, giving it to you by default, but it will happen sooner rather than later. Bulstrode, despite being Pureblood, had her vault transferred to her half-blood husband by the fact she was a woman.”
Lucius chewed thoughtfully.
“Besides, my meager savings will barely be an addition to yours, sir. Still, I do want to go to Gringotts and withdraw what I can, and transfer it to the branch in New York.”
“Oh?”
Granger sighed again and sat back in the nook booth, crossing her arms. “It is a ‘nest egg’ if I should have to flee.”
Lucius swallowed, took his tea, and drank, following her eyes to the window. The morning was still gray, and as he watched, rain began to patter on the window.
“I would like to request an allowance, Lord Malfoy,” she said after a moment, leaning forward, and placing her bare elbows on the table surface.
“An…allowance?” he muttered, lifting a finger to suck at a dollop of marmalade. Granger’s eyes followed the motion, and he froze, realizing how utterly uncouth it might seem to a virtual stranger. Licking off the sweet berry stickiness, he noticed how Granger swallowed and quickly cut her eyes away. “I can…provide that, given I have an idea how it is used?”
Granger nodded. “Mostly for personal things, clothing, potions, ink, parchment, possibly a few books. But, I was told you have an expansive library here?”
Lucius popped his forefinger from his mouth and took his tea. “I do.” He drank, still watching her, noting the way her shoulders were raised as she leaned on the tabletop, the way her collarbones popped, and the deeper valley between her breasts. Yes, a much larger bust than Narcissa… “I can give you a tour of the Manor if you like. It only makes sense you have an idea of where to go.”
“Yes, I suppose so,” she said distantly, but she leaned back, and hugged herself, frowning into her tea. “Maizy told me that some rooms have been disused for years, the formal rooms, she said?”
He hummed. “Yes. I keep putting off having them redone. I have lost the stomach for interior decorating, had left that to Narcissa…” he trailed.
Granger lifted her eyes to him, smirking. She opened her mouth to say something and seemed to think better of it, her mouth closing again. He anticipated that she would say something about preserving the rooms in memoriam to the Dark Lord or some such cutting nonsense. Yes, he was glad she had said nothing.
“I told Pip that I would work with them today to redo the other rooms, but I will really need to rely on their direction. I am not much of an interior decorator myself.”
They drank their tea as the gray rain continued outside. Lucius was a little annoyed with the summer shower as it would hamper his outdoor work. He could still go to the stables. Rain, though, meant he’d not have to water the herb garden, the potions garden, or the fruit trees. Instead, he considered the requested allowance.
“Five hundred Galleons a month, would that suffice?” he said softly.
Granger blinked and turned almost pale. “That is…exorbitant, Lord Malfoy.”
Lucius cocked his head. “I am very ignorant of Ministry wages, Granger…”
“That is four months' wage in my former position. Two months, when I was Senior Advisor.”
“Truly? That’s…” It explained her living in a shabby flat on Diagon Alley and her comment about her clothing. He could easily spend that much in a day or a few hours. Five hundred Galleons a month would barely be noticed from the ledgers. “I’d not allow for less, Lady Malfoy. If we are to…”
The Daily Prophet appeared on the edge of the table as he trailed off. There were several letters atop it, and he frowned at it.
“May I?” Granger asked, motioning to the paper. Lucius nodded but took the letters.
Granger’s face was obscured by the paper, and he noticed that there was a letter from the Ministry, thick and stamped with a seal from the Minister’s Office. When he opened it, he found it was a copy of the marriage register, one he had signed the day before. With it, however, was a typewritten letter.
Welfare check to be conducted by Mrs. Davies, a Healer, and a representative of the MLE on August 1st, 10 AM, at Malfoy Manor. No other details were given.
Lucius set it aside and scanned the other letters. One was from the Apothecaries, the written report on the progress of June, a normal monthly report that he rarely ever read. Another was from Andy, a card, which startled him. ‘Owl me, L. I need to know if the Prophet is correct. Andy.’ The other missives were a bank statement and a notice from a company he had contacted about acquiring koi to replace those that had died decades ago in the Japanese garden.
Granger was scanning the inside of The Prophet when he looked up, and he sighed, seeing the headline.
Malfoy weds Granger!
There were no pictures, however, but as he read, squinting as her hands shook slightly, he thought about snatching the newsprint from her hands.
‘The last surviving Death Eater, Lucius Malfoy weds Order of Merlin, First Class recipient, Hermione Granger. Yesterday, in the Minister’s office, the last vestige of the Dark times was brought to check when the Minister for Magic Kingsley Shacklebolt officiated at a private meeting. This is the true testament of the correctness of the Pureblood Marriage Law, and the rightness of ending any ideas of blood superiority. While this marriage is symbolic, it is also a glimpse into the Minister’s fervent mission to make a world more equal to all who are in it.’
Lucius scoffed. The article went on to include a short biography of them both, but somehow as he tilted his head to read toward the fold, it seemed that his treatment was far more diplomatic than hers. ‘Lady Malfoy was previously married to War hero Ronald Weasley, but the marriage produced no heirs. Ronald Weasley went on to wed…’
Granger closed the paper then folded it and offered it to him. Lucius waved it off but instead passed over the ‘welfare check’ notice. Granger scanned the page and rolled her eyes.
“They want to be sure you are not torturing me in the dungeons.”
“They are wine cellars now and had been before the Dark Lord came. They were never intended to be a ‘dungeon’, Granger,” he grumbled. A door to the former dungeons was by the ovens, and he eyed it disdainfully. It had taken ages to get the cellar cleaned, and there was still so much to do to expunge that time from his home.
“They will lay eyes on me, ask me a few questions, and then you, and go. Other so-called welfare checks have rarely been anything more.”
“So it is not just you needing it?”
Granger shook her head. “A few others, mostly some of your former acquaintances who survived their sentences at Azkaban. Three, Rowle, Travers, and Dolohov,” at Dolohov’s name, Granger shuddered and sighed. “Rowle and Travers seem to have taken their wives with some grace, but Dolohov…”
“Anton hates women,” he put out as a matter of fact.
“Makes sense,” she whispered, pushing the typewritten page back across the table. “Dolohov nearly killed his wife after three days, and was taken to the Ministry jail for a week before vowing not to harm her…threat of the Kiss this time, no prison time. And that was what really moved the Minister’s office to start doing welfare checks.”
Lucius frowned. He had had no contact with any of his former compatriots for obvious reasons. He had not known that those three had ever been married or had been forced to marry. Only Yaxley, Mulciber, Nott, Rodolphus, Crabbe, and Goyle had wed, and he only knew Athena Yaxley as someone’s wife. Bellatrix, he had known most of his life and hated her for most of it. He doubted that even her surviving sister, whose card was under the bank statement, was sad the bitch was gone.
“They’ll ask if I am being fed, clothed, etc. If I am being beaten or mistreated, and most ridiculously if I am happy. At least that was what they asked of the others.”
“Do you know who they are? These wives?”
Granger nodded. “Two I went to school with, but were much younger. Dolohov married Penny Clearwater, half-blood, ahead of me. Most of the Pureblood men are marrying women of my age. The few Pureblood women are marrying men older than you, Lord Malfoy,” she muttered but did not disparage his title with her tone.
He had a fleeting memory of seeing a notice that Bulstrode had married a very old Muggleborn wizard by the name of Pickering. If there were to be children born of such a pairing, it was not something he wanted to think about.
“You can see how this will most likely come down in history as a massive failure?” she asked then, refilling her tea and pulling it nearer.
“I can only imagine,” he muttered, turning The Prophet over to read below the fold, and a short Rita Skeeter blurb on their impromptu marriage. It was scathing.
“I did several personal projects looking into the last Law in the 17th century. It did nothing to increase magical births and ultimately did nothing to dilute bloodlines. If anything, it just made it murky. A lot of records disappeared after the Statute of Secrecy was in effect, so many that my own family tree is incomplete as magical children were only being born sporadically. Only some families kept personal and meticulous records of family lines.”
“Like my own. Yes, I am well aware of the ‘murkiness’, Granger. It lasted into the last century, obviously, with the Dark Lord.”
Granger nodded and drank more tea. They shared silence again, and Lucius watched her out of the corner of his eye. He wondered how ‘murky’ her line truly was. The woman was clearly an amalgam of races and cultures, magic and Muggle, and somehow, she seemed more pure than most of the Purebloods he knew.
Because it was all bullshit, you old fool, his brain hissed.
“Day after tomorrow,” she said at last. “I want to go to London, to Gringotts, and settle my account.”
Lucius inhaled. “I suppose I must go as well, as per the documents I signed yesterday?”
Granger smirked. “Yes. Shall we make a scene, or try to remain unseen?”
His eyes scanned Skeeter’s piece again, and he felt his lips curl. “Make a scene. Of course, we will have to take Pip or Maizy, to have an extra set of eyes in case someone throws shit at us.”
“I suppose so.”
“To Gringotts only?”
Granger considered. “Madam Malkins, if you please. I would like some better clothing. The linen is near its limit…” she sighed, looking down at her dress, already starting to change the color back to what he assumed was the original color of magenta.
“I’m sure five hundred Galleons will be enough?”
Granger blinked. “I am rather thrifty, my Lord. That is something I cannot unlearn.”
Good, he thought. He hoped it lasted.
Pip had brought clothing to Draco’s rooms for him to change into and waited as if to say something after Lucius showered and pulled his hair back into a tie.
“Out with it, Pip,” he grumbled as he shrugged into his normal loose, collarless shirt.
“This arrangement, Master, it is a marriage of…?”
Lucius sighed, pulling his hair out of his shirt, and looking at the lavatory mirror that had been Silenced. He looked back at Pip in the mirror and frowned. “Not of convenience, as they used to say, but one of necessity . Do you have an objection to Lady Malfoy?”
Pip shook his head, eyes wide. “No, Master, none at all. I just wondered how much I should impart to her.”
“Impart? Such as?” he asked, slipping his wand into the back pocket of his corduroys.
“House things, Master, the passages, the portraits, and rooms to avoid?”
“Ah,” he sighed. “Yes, the portraits and rooms, that should be imparted, but I will be giving Lady Malfoy a tour after lunch.”
“And the passages?”
Lucius smirked. He had an idea of what Pip was trying to get at. If Granger was taking the room he had mentioned, there were passages in and out, and places to spy. If he wanted, he could watch her without being able to detect him. No revealing Charms worked on the passages and vantage points, and there was a barrier of silence in the walls.
“You want to watch her, Master?” Pip intoned.
“You little pervert , Pip,” he purred and the elf bristled.
“Master, no …I…”
Lucius chuckled, turning to look down at the elf in the lavatory door. “I am joking, Pip, but…honestly, I would like the option to observe her unnoticed .”
“You don’t trust her?” Pip squeaked, looking around, as if worried things would somehow end up missing.
“I don’t trust anyone, Pip…” he sighed, stepping around him, his bare feet barely making a sound on the soft rug of Draco’s old room. “No humans anyway.”
Pip followed him as he moved through the corridor, glancing down to Narcissa’s room and the sealed doors, past that to his own room. He figured Maizy was with Granger in the north wing.
“My rubbers, Pip…” he said softly, moving down into the Manor, taking passages that led to a mud room off the kitchen. Pip appeared with a clean pair of green wellies and Lucius sighed, reaching for an old Mackintosh and stepping into his boots. The day was getting very oppressive with the steady rain and the humidity. Still, he walked to the stables, beyond the kitchen gardens, through a small orchard of apple and pear trees.
He only nodded to Bently, the stable elf, and tended his two Granian mares. Lucius noted he needed to owl the owner of a stud in Essex, confirming the arrival of the papered stud to breed one or both the mares, Mathilde and Brunehilde. Both were fine Granians, coming from some of the fastest stock that had raced for generations on European circuits. Lucius adored the mares, having raised and trained them after the War. Bently, Pip and Maizy’s older brother helped tend them but left training to Lucius. Besides the gardens, it was all he did.
Would Granger like them, he wondered and shook his head as he smoothed a bent feather in Brunehilde’s wing. What did it matter? As far as he was concerned, he could still do his normal life things…and overthrow the government for fun.