Prologue
There were only three people left to ask who would definitively say that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named hadn't won. Of course, they had their little handful of supporters – any resistance group always did – but they were easy to ignore. Easier, still, was getting rid of them. They were just like little dominoes. One push… and they all toppled.
For all technical purposes, though, the Dark Lord had won the war. His Death Eaters had infiltrated the Ministry, taken over the Daily Prophet, and made themselves in charge of the rest of the Wizarding World. With Lucius Malfoy as the minister of Magic, very few people dared to try to fight back.
Of course, there was the exception of those three – the ones who had evaded, blocked, and irritated the Dark Lord at every turn. Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley, and Hermione Granger. But there were only three of them. Three against the masses. And none of the rest of the Wizarding World was willing to help them. Fear kept them pinned down too strongly.
Three of them against the many. And Lucius Malfoy knew exactly how to destroy them.
For all their grandeur, the Dark Lord's chambers were dark and cold. Lucius knelt at the foot of a tall, marble chair that someone more foolish might call a throne. Black robes swept down from the top of the high white seat, pooling on the floor. A lesser man than Lucius might have wanted to kneel on them, avoid having to kneel on the hard stone floor. But Lucius knelt without flinching. From the very top, piercing red eyes looked down on him, glinting in an expressionless white face. A pale hand rose.
"At ease, Lucius," said a voice, the cold, high voice that so matched the room, and that so matched the man.
Lucius raised his head to look up into the face of his master. "My Lord."
"I do hope that it's something worthwhile this time, Lucius," Voldemort sighed, waving his hand airily at the girl who stood in the corner. She stepped forward, trembling, and fell to her knees before him. "Drink," he said sharply.
"Yes, My Lord," she said, so quietly that Lucius could barely hear her. She stumbled to her feet, and under her tangled hair and dirty clothes, he thought he recognized her face.
"Penelope Clearwater?" he said, once she had stumbled away.
"Mudblood," the Dark Lord hissed dismissively.
Lucius frowned a little at her condition. He preferred his own slaves clean and well-dressed, so that they were easier on the eye. But he was in no place to criticize his master.
"Something wrong?"
"No, My Lord. Not at all."
A sigh. It was just a hiss of air, like a deflating balloon. "Why are you here, Lucius?"
"The Order, My Lord. I believe I have found the solution."
"The Order of the Phoenix is dead!" Voldemort screeched, so loudly and so suddenly that Penelope Clearwater who had just come back in, dropped the tray she was holding with a clatter. A golden goblet fell to the floor and bounced, clanging. Dark red wine moved across the parquet floor in waves, pouring out like blood. It stained the edges of Lucius' robes, but he did not flinch. He was not allowed to show weakness here.
"I know that, My Lord," he said hastily, his smooth voice covering the pounding of his heart. "All except for –"
Voldemort stood, his already impressive height added to the altitude of the chair he sat upon making him tower over Lucius, as his face quivered with rage. "I have asked you, have I not? You are never to say that name again. There will be no mention of him in my presence lest I begin the conversation. You, of all people, should know this."
"My Lord –" Lucius scrambled to his feet, knowing that he was unofficially allowed to do this in the case of a shouting match. "My Lord, please. It has nothing to do with the boy. It is about the Mudblood."
Voldemort stopped screeching and looked down at him with a skeptically raised eyebrow. "Go on," he said boredly, sitting back down.
Lord Malfoy remained standing, albeit shakily. "My Lord, Hermione Granger is everything to that group. While He-Who-Is-Not-To-Be-Named is the brawn, and the Weasley brat is the one with sheer dumb luck, Hermione Granger is the brains behind their resistance. I've seen the way they operate. Everything they do is a plan of hers. Without her, they would be lost."
"Go on."
"If we could separate her from the group, we would have a better chance of quashing their resistance. It would not be difficult – there are few protecting her, now."
"And what," Voldemort said, almost amused, "would you propose doing with the Mudblood, once you had her?"
Lucius' pale skin flushed a deep red over his aristocratic cheekbones. The Dark Lord came close to smiling, though it was a frightening thing to behold.
"Nothing more than I expected from you, my slippery friend."
"My Lord," he stammered feebly. "It would only be putting her into her place. The Mudbloods belong below us, under us. We must rule them in any way we can."
"I would think that you would have been taught a lesson when I killed Narcissa," Voldemort said, not threateningly. "You cannot be controlled around women, can you Lucius?"
More red, staining that smooth, white skin.
"And you would prefer this to killing her, to eradicating the scum?"
"She has unparalleled skills. It would be a pity to lose her."
The Master laughed, and the sound sent shivers down the Servant's spine. "Oh, Lucius. You do think of everything, every way to get around me."
"Thank you."
"Very well. We will try this plan of yours. And if it should not work?"
Lucius swallowed hard. "If it does not work to stop the resistance, as I am sure that it will, we can target the next person closest to the boy. The Weasley spawn. Without him, I am sure that the boy will be completely lost."
"And whose whore would the blood traitor become?" Voldemort asked, amused.
"My Lord knows that such plans are only for him to make," he said humbly, bowing his head again. "Although, I know that Bellatrix Lestrange is feeling restless now that you have Rodolphus incapacitated. She would love to have a new toy, and if I may be so bold to suggest this, I do believe that she deserves it after her behavior at Grimmauld Place."
"Very well." A high, cold laugh, although it was not an unpleasant one. "You are dismissed, Lucius. I assume that you would prefer to be there in the procuring of the girl?"
"My Lord always knows best."
"I will call you when you are needed."
"Yes, Master."
"Dismissed." Voldemort snapped his fingers for the Clearwater bitch to come back, and Lucius rose to his feet, his body aching from kneeling for so long. He bowed quickly, and left the room as fast as he could without making it seem like he was running.
"Well?" Bellatrix Lestrange stood at the door, waiting for him, her eyes glinting with anticipation.
"The Dark Lord will think over the matter," Lucius said shortly, holding out his arm for his sister-in-law to take. He had no choice to house her with him, now that her husband was gone and his wife was dead. The Malfoy family had fallen far down, as had the House of Black. It was only expected that they group together, although he loathed her company.
"Ah! Lucius. You will yet do our family honor." She cackled as they climbed the steep steps that led back up into natural light. "The Dark Lord will be proud of you, yet. And did you ask about the blood traitor's spawn?"
Why she would want anyone red-headed with freckles was beyond him. He personally found the Weasley family disgusting. "He said he would consider it, Bella," he said gently, pushing the door open.
"The Dark Lord is indebted to us, Lucius," Bellatrix breathed, her airy words floating across his neck as she leaned in to him. "He cannot forget all that we have done for him in the past. He owes us this much."
"It is not our place to expect anything at all from him," Lucius snapped, pushing her away from him but keeping a firm grip on her arm. "We have betrayed his confidence more than once, Bella, and he does well to punish us for what we have done."
She pouted at him. "You would know, Lucius. You who did not dare to go to prison for him. You who made yourself the lapdog of Cornelius Fudge, and who ate out of Albus Dumbledore's hands!"
He kept his face in a smooth mask. "Let us go home, Bellatrix, and speak of this no more. Our Master will call us when we are needed, and we can expect no more of him than that."
The city of London had changed since Voldemort's takeover. The skies were cold and grey. Chilly, putrid air leaked out of the dark alleys where the Dementors stood, waiting for the next blood traitor victim to walk by. People rarely went into the streets now, too afraid of what waited for them outside their doors.
Across the town from where Lucius and Bellatrix stood, their robes whipping in the wind, three people scurried about 12 Grimmauld Place, the lights in the windows glowing, and piles of parchment covering every flat surface. Plans, plans. Always plans.
Plans were made to be broken.
