note: this story deals with some dark themes, the rape of a minor foremost among them. While never explicitly stated, it's glaringly obvious what the characters are discussing, and if this is a trigger, I strongly encourage readers to find a different story. On a more trivial note, this is going to *eventually* be a Draco/Hermione, Luna/Harry story, though romance won't be the focus, and (true to life) I fully intend to give some secondary characters a variety of different sexual orientations. Please, please don't leave a review telling me how wrong any of that is. Just close the tab and read something else.
"What on Earth?"
A trainee healer dropped her armful of parchment, scattering scrolls everywhere as she stared. Shocked, hissing whispers followed the two men down the corridor. Was the world ending? Was the elder under some dark spell? Was the younger blackmailing him?
Neither slowed from their frantic pace, nor turned to glare the whisperers into silence. There was only one thing on their minds, and, perhaps for the first time in their lives, they were in perfect accord.
The Welcome Witch behind the Inquiries desk gaped up at them unattractively when they finally came to a stop in front of her. "How can I assist you?" she asked hesitantly.
And Lucius Malfoy, white-blond hair in disarray, soot clinging to his expensive robes, and a look in his pale gray eyes that warned of pain for all who crossed him, said coldly, "You can tell me where my niece is."
"Luna Lovegood," Arthur Weasley supplied. "My wife brought her in a few hours ago."
It was almost amusing to Lucius the way the witch turned to Weasley to get out from under his glare. But he, too, was hard and unyielding, and the witch sunk down in her seat and looked back at Lucius. "This floor, past the Dai Llewellyn Ward, all the way to the back. That's where the Dorcas Wellbeloved Ward for Imperiled Witches and Young Children is."
An icy hand wrapped around his heart and squeezed. Oh, Salazar, it was true.
"Steady, Malfoy," Weasley said calmly.
"If ever a man deserved to rot in Azkaban," Lucius snarled, and grudgingly subsided. He nodded sharply to the Welcome Witch and started off again, past the Inquiries desk and down another corridor, Weasley easily matching his long stride.
His sister-in-law met them at the entrance to the ward. "Lucius," Andromeda Tonks greeted him.
"Andromeda." He took some small measure of comfort from her professional mien. He might disapprove of her choice of husband, but all throughout school they'd had a solid friendship as fellow Slytherins, and later as fellow prefects, and her presence was preferable to a stranger's. He only wished she'd married better. Her safety during the war had caused Narcissa endless worry.
"You're the Healer-In-Charge?" Weasley asked.
"I did the necessary training in mind healing and emotional trauma," Andromeda said. "I'm one of the few who's kept up with the research since the war ended. And when the hospital administrators discovered that I'm sister-in-law to the wizard who donated an absurd amount of money to fund this ward, I received an early promotion."
Weasley made a face. "Galleons talk."
"How is she?" Lucius asked, dismissing Weasley's comment.
"She's very quiet," Andromeda said. "She's withdrawn, frightened – very emotionally fragile. I haven't seen any sign of tears. They may come later, they may not – she likely did quite a bit of crying early on, when all this started. But for all that, she's quite lucid, and if you wish to go in and speak with her, you may."
"She will not react badly to a strange man entering her private space?" Lucius pressed. "She is my blood, but the first and last time I laid eyes on her was at Aurélie's funeral. With all that's happened since, I'd be shocked if she remembered me at all."
"She knows you're coming," Andromeda reassured him. "She also knows what you look like. I would just make one suggestion, however."
"Tell me."
"Your hair." Andromeda gestured to her own light brown plait, hanging smooth and sleek to the center of her back. "At the moment, it looks remarkably like his. Pull it away from your face. If you intend to keep her –"
"I do."
"Then you should consider a haircut," she said.
"For my sister's daughter, under circumstances such as these, I would shave myself bald," Lucius said. Weasley smiled faintly at the idea.
"What, like Shacklebolt, the Auror? You haven't the head for it."
"But wouldn't it be a sight?" Lucius asked with the ghost of a smile. He drew his wand – his late father's wand, only two months ago – and silently conjured a black silk ribbon. "Not a word, Weasley," he said forbiddingly as he flicked his wand at his hair, then at the ribbon, which flew from his fingertips to pull his hair back in a tidy, low ponytail.
"That will do," Andromeda told him. "Remember, she's in a very fragile state. Moderate your volume, mind your tone, and no matter how angry you are – and I'm sure you're as furious as I am – keep it off your face and out of your body language. She may misinterpret it as anger toward her."
"I know," Lucius said. "Believe me, I know." He took a moment to tamp his anger down and gestured for her to precede him.
All noises of the hospital cut off abruptly as soon as they entered the ward. Soothing ambient sounds of nature filled the air instead: faint birdsong, the gentle rippling of a brook, a breeze rustling the leaves of phantom trees. The quality of light was different as well; it was softer, warmer, more natural. The whole effect was clearly designed to put patients entirely at ease, and considering the sort of patients who ended up in this particular hospital ward, it was entirely necessary.
"It's good to see my money hasn't been wasted," Lucius observed quietly.
"It was a thoroughly ludicrous amount of money, Lucius," Andromeda replied, equally quiet. "I think at some point the hospital accountant just started making up things to do to upgrade the ward."
"Better that it be used here than that it line some ineffectual politician's pockets," he said.
She shook her head at him, but didn't disagree. "She's just behind this curtain," she murmured. "If you'll allow me…"
He let her banish the soot from his clothes with a precise flick of her wand. "My thanks."
"Luna?" Andromeda called out softly. "Luna, it's Healer Tonks. Your Uncle Lucius is here to see you. May we come around?"
For a few seconds, there was no answer. Then, quietly, a girl's voice answered. "You may."
The first thought Lucius had when he saw his niece sitting there, so small and still in the hospital bed, was that his younger sister must have had a childhood accident with a Time Turner and neglected to tell him. They looked that much alike. The thought fled, however, when he saw the look on her face. When Aurélie was ten, she had never looked that frightened, that ill – she'd never looked like she had no innocence left. Deep, bruise-purple smudges beneath her gray eyes attested to lack of sleep; hollow cheeks spoke of a lack of either appetite or food. She was drawn and pale, with such a wary, watchful look in her eyes that it was hard to believe that this was the same girl he'd seen not even six and a half months ago at the funeral.
"You look different than I thought you would," Luna said. "You look older than the pictures Mummy had of you."
Her little fingers worried at the blanket spread across her lap, pulling off little pilled bits of wool and casting them aside as she watched him slowly cross to take the seat by her bed, close enough to hear a whisper, but far enough away to let her feel secure.
"The passage of time does that to everyone, I'm afraid," he said. "We saw each other several months ago, though, didn't we? Do you remember?"
"You laid a posy of harebells and marigolds on Mummy's grave," Luna recalled. "For grief." She looked at him with slightly less suspicion and added, "I liked them best. All the rest were white."
"I'm pleased to hear it," Lucius said.
She gave a stray pill a hard yank and asked, "Am I supposed to live with you now?"
"When Healer Tonks clears you to leave," Lucius said. The wary look returned to her eyes. "My wife, your Aunt Narcissa, is quite eager to meet you. As is your cousin, Draco. He's only a year older than you – he'll be attending Hogwarts this autumn."
He hadn't even realized how tense she was until she relaxed at his indirect assurance that she wouldn't be stuck, once again, alone and at the mercy of a grown wizard. "And…and you won't…."
"No!" he said vehemently. She drew back slightly, huddling into her pillows, and he took a deep, calming breath before continuing more evenly, "No, Luna. Never. You need never fear that I, or anyone else, will ever interfere with you in such a way ever again."
"That's what he would say, every morning," Luna said. "Then he drowned his guilt in Firewhisky, and by sunset he'd forgotten all about his promises."
Lucius exchanged a swift glance with Andromeda. That miserable, pathetic, wretched excuse of a wizard had known what he was doing.
"Well, I am no Gryffindor, and my sense of honor will not be injured if you demand a binding oath from me before I take you home," Lucius said. "Healer Tonks can help you come up with one, if you like."
"Thank you," Luna said quietly. "I'd like that."
"Is there anything you'd like to discuss?" he asked. "Perhaps there's something you'd like to have brought to the manor to make it feel more familiar."
Luna contemplated the pile of woolly pills on her lap for a while, and looked hesitantly up at Lucius. "My books – Mummy left me her poetry books. She told me they were a part of my legacy. May I have them?"
He gave her a genuine smile. "Of course. After all, what is a Malfoy without poetry?"
"At a loss for words," Luna said, the barest of smiles crossing her face for just a moment as she completed the exchange. Lucius had a feeling that it was one that she and Aurélie had had quite a lot while his sister had been alive.
Her smile fled faster than it had appeared, and she looked back down at her blanket, twisting her fingers in its folds and pressing her lips together in a thin, bloodless line. Lucius waited for a minute in silence, then spoke up carefully, making certain not to startle her.
"Luna, I'm going to let you rest now. I'll be back tomorrow – I'll bring your Aunt Narcissa." He stopped for her nod of acknowledgment, and continued. "I'm going to stand up slowly and walk around the foot of the bed to the other side of the curtain, alright? Healer Tonks will accompany me." Another nod. "Try to sleep, Luna. I'll see you soon."
He followed his words to the letter, keeping himself in her line of sight the entire time. It was only when he reached the curtain that she spoke up again.
"Thank you," she whispered. "For coming."
He met her eyes and finally saw what he'd feared was lost forever: hope. "You are my blood," he told her seriously. "I will always come for you. I only wish we had known sooner."
Luna shrugged, and added cautiously, "If you could – please thank the Weasleys for me as well."
"I will," Lucius said. It was more than an empty promise. The Weasleys saving his blood relative had set in motion something that would require a great deal more than simply conveying her thanks.
Andromeda joined him on the other side of the curtain, and he shook his head at her and drew her farther away when she made to speak. "Muffliato," he muttered, waving his wand in Luna's direction when he deemed them a safe distance away.
"That's not one I've seen before," she observed.
"One of Severus's inventions," Lucius said. "It's a mid-level charm against eavesdropping. I didn't want her to inadvertently hear what you had to tell me and become distressed."
"When you said you knew how to behave around a child who'd been…traumatized…in such a fashion, I didn't realize you were speaking from a place of experience," Andromeda said, her words measured and carefully neutral.
Lucius glared at her. "If you have an accusation to make, Andromeda, then say it, and stop tiptoeing around it."
"No, not you," she said, frowning thoughtfully. "If you had done something like what Lovegood did to that poor girl, my sister would've either killed or castrated you."
His lips twitched in an involuntary smile. "Very true."
"I imagine you must have seen terrible things during the war," Andromeda said. Her voice took on a hint of disgust. "I'm surprised you remember any of it, Lucius, having been lost in the fog of the Imperius Curse for so long."
"Stop," Lucius said, holding up his hand. "Just stop. We both know that's a lie, but the truth is far more complex, and isn't something I can simply tell you without a guarantee of privacy. Let's just move on. I brought the emergency order of protection from the Wizengamot Administration Services. It makes me her official legal guardian until all parental and custodial rights are stripped from him at his trial, whenever that may be. I don't – for Salazar's sake, don't show me the photographs you had to take for evidence. Just show me the parchments, tell me what I need to know, and tell me what I need to authorize."
"The order first," she said. He produced it from within his pocket and handed it over, and she waved her wand over Amelia Bones' signature. It glowed a soft white under her detection spell, and she handed it back, satisfied. "Very well."
She, in turn, took a tightly-rolled length of parchment from her robes and gave it to him. "These are the results of the medical scans I took when she was admitted," she said as he untied the lime green ribbon holding the scroll closed.
Lovegood, Luna Erato, it read along the top. Admitted to St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries on 27 April, 1991. Date of Birth 24 April, 1981. Female.
His eyes dropped to the second line, and the world went gray. Dear Salazar, no.
He read slowly, as if in a fog, the words swimming before his eyes as bile, thick and sour, crept up his throat. As a student, and later when he started to work at the Ministry, he'd been admired for his exceptional ability to remember everything he read. Rarely had it seemed such a curse. He'd never forget these words.
Eventually, he realized Andromeda was speaking. Her voice sounded far away and muffled to his ears. "–Potions regimen to clear any traces of him from her system will help stabilize her juvenile magic. There's a borderline dark spell that needs parental approval that we can do, that can restore her physically –"
"You have my approval," he said distantly, unable to tear his eyes from the damning parchment in his hand. "But only if she wishes it done."
"And I've started the paperwork to get her a license to learn Occlumency," Andromeda continued. "It's my professional opinion that she will benefit more from Occlumency and mind healing than from anything we do to help her physically."
"Narcissa is licensed with the Ministry," Lucius said. "She can teach her."
"Not you?"
"The last thing that child needs is another man forcing himself somewhere he's not welcome," he said. He thrust the parchment back into Andromeda's hands and stepped back. "Andromeda. Thank you for everything. I'll see you again tomorrow."
He tried and failed to smile, and pushed his way out the door and back into the hospital proper before she could tender her own farewell. Weasley halted his worried pacing as Lucius brushed past him, rushing back up the corridor to let himself in through a door marked with a brass plaque that read "Wizards". He flung open the nearest stall door, fell to his knees, and vomited.
He wasn't sure how long he knelt there, violently ill and shuddering under the weight of unwanted knowledge and horrific memories. It seemed like an age passed before his stomach had nothing left to give.
A warm hand rubbed his back, and he slid his gaze sideways to see Arthur Weasley crammed into the stall beside him, holding back the hair that had escaped from its conjured ribbon.
"That bad, was it?" Weasley asked quietly.
Lucius Vanished the contents of the toilet and sat carelessly on the cold floor, leaning heavily on the far wall of the stall. "What sort of father – fuck." His voice was hoarse. He didn't bother to pull himself together. Weasley had already seen him at his lowest. There was no further he could fall in dignity today, and after what the man had done for his family, he was willing to extend a bit of trust.
"I'll get you some water," Weasley said, climbing to his feet.
"Lock the door while you're up," Lucius said. "Please."
Weasley didn't acknowledge his instruction, but a muffled "Colloportus!" and a slight squelching sound let him know he'd been obeyed. He returned with a plain clay goblet filled to the brim with water, and handed it carefully over to Lucius before taking a seat on the opposite side of the small stall. Lucius washed his mouth out with the first mouthful, drank the rest, and sighed deeply.
"Hell," he said, with great feeling. Weasley raised his eyebrows at him, and Lucius snorted humorlessly. "You know, Arthur, Narcissa found me like this more than once in the early years of our marriage."
"What, in the toilet? Puking?" Weasley asked skeptically.
"I can't even begin to imagine what it must have been like for her," Lucius said. "Eighteen years old, just married, and she comes upstairs to find her brand new husband covered in filth and someone else's blood, half out of his mind with guilt and quite literally sick to his stomach with what he'd just seen." He toasted Weasley mockingly with the empty goblet. "Here's to Absalom Travers, a shining example of a pure-blood. May he die in Azkaban, the sick bastard."
Weasley's hand crept toward his pocket, where Lucius assumed he kept his wand. "There's no statute of limitations on war crimes, Malfoy, so if I were you, I'd take advantage of the fact that I've obviously taken leave of my senses and stop telling me things that could be considered a confession. I do work for the DMLE, if you recall."
"Ah, but I've already been tried and found not guilty by reason of the Imperius Curse, and by reason of ostentatiously large donations to certain politicians' campaign coffers," Lucius said. "And you're making the assumption that this isn't already known by a select few people within the DMLE and on the Wizengamot."
In his later years, Abraxas Malfoy had always claimed that the Weasleys were a bunch of dullards, and that they always had been, a line of imbeciles stretching back to even before their ancestors had started feuding three centuries ago. Lucius saw no evidence of this in Weasley's furrowed brow as he was studied with narrowed, thoughtful eyes.
"Dear Merlin," Weasley whispered, eyes widening. "You turned on him. You."
"This room is not nearly secure enough for such conversation," Lucius said, straightening abruptly.
Weasley nodded in comprehension. "Where would you like to continue it?" he asked. "Because we are going to finish this talk."
"We have more to discuss than that," Lucius said. His words were heavy with the weight of an old feud and an even older alliance.
"We do," Weasley agreed, "But what we decide to do about it will depend on what you have to say."
"To the manor, then, if you trust that I won't kill you," Lucius said, standing. He extended a hand to Weasley and helped him up. "I think we could both use a drink for this particular conversation."