Malfoys do not creep. They do not lurk in corners, nor do they skulk in shadows. Nevertheless Lucius was going out of his was to remain unobserved – the hood of his cloak pulled low over his face, he waited for a chattering group of hufflepuff brats to pass before crossing the entrance hall as quickly and discreetly as possible, slipping silently down the corridor to the dungeons. He almost collided with a tiny first year slytherin who was tearing blindly in the opposite direction. Recognising the single lock of golden hair which had fallen forwards out of the hood, she took a step backwards in horror.

"Malfoy! I'm so sorry. I didn't mean…I didn't see, oh, I'm sorry!"

Lucius sneered, then realised she couldn't see his face, so he tutted loudly instead. Grasping her neatly by the ill-knotted green and silver tie (What was the problem with these kids nowadays? Why were they so perpetually unkempt?) he hissed;

"Find Snape. Tell him to come to my room, immediately. Understand?"

"Sssnape?" she squeaked fearfully.

"You know. Black hair, big nose, worrying glint in his eye."

"Yyes, I know who you mean, Malfoy, but…but…"

Lucius rolled his eyes, imagining Snape's reputation with the younger pupils.

"Oh honestly. Tell him I said he's not to hex you for bothering him. Now, go!"

Twenty minutes later there was a knock at the Head Boy's bedroom door. Lucius removed the layers of wards he had hastily thrown up, and Snape slithered in, went straight over to the carved silver box on the mantel and helped himself to a black Sobranie cigarette.

"Well?" he asked, lighting up with the matching antique silver dragon flamer. Malfoy had his back to him, apparently fascinated by something on his bedside table.

"I'm glad you came, Snape. The kid found you in the end?"

"Impertinent brat. I had to hex her for bothering me." Lucius grinned carefully. Well, he had tried.

"I need your expert help."

"Indeed?"

"They say you have a small stock of potions you have either brewed yourself or liberated from Wycan's store room or the infirmary."

"They do, do they?" Merlin, but Snape was a suspicious little bastard. Good for him, mused Malfoy.

"Would you be able to find a healing cream or potion or something which heals cuts without leaving a trace? That's very important. Absolutely no scarring."

Snape drew deeply on the Russian drag, exhaling a billowing white cloud into the still underground air. He was pondering something, Lucius imagined, from the restricted view he had of the younger boy.

"Show me," said Snape.

"What?" asked Malfoy, turning his face further away. "What do you mean?"
"Malfoy, I am not a fool. You have sustained some manner of facial injury. You wish me to heal it secretly without disfiguring your legendary beauty. I will need to assess the wound myself in order to select the best remedy. Show me your face."

Damn him to the deepest pit of Hell. Too clever for his own good, the sarcastic weasel. But he was right, unfortunately. If this was going to be fixed properly the amateur potions expert needed to know exactly what he was dealing with.

Lucius lowered his hood self-consciously, revealing four bloody grazes running diagonally down his cheek, three of them about three inches long, the fourth a little shorter. Snape was smirking again.

"Hell hath no fury," he noted.

"What?" demanded Lucius in the warning tone which commanded instant respect from the whole student body, and some of the staff. This fourth year, however, was currently in a position to ignore it, and did so, gleefully.

"Breaking young witches' hearts again?"

Lucius sighed. He really had no business hexing the only person who could be relied upon to extricate him from his embarrassing predicament. And the brat was a terribly useful ally to cultivate, after all. He came clean.

"Rachel Goldstein, the stuck up little bitch. She started making a fuss when I told her I had no intention of breaking off my childhood betrothal to Narcissa, just because we had shared a bit of fun down by the lake. What's her problem? I mean, she must know that I'm totally out of her league," he scowled, then winced at the movement. Snape examined the scars carefully, grinning all the while.

"Well," asked Malfoy quietly, "What's the prognosis?"

"Not as deep as they look. I do not believe they pose any serious problem. I will mix a quick antiseptic too, just to be on the safe side."

"Be quick about it, will you?"

…….

Running his fingers over his cheek, Lucius frowned.

"I can still feel four lines," he complained, despite his intense relief that there were no visual remnants of the scratch.

"Keep applying the lotion every three hours. They will be gone by tomorrow." Only slightly reassured, Lucius took Severus' hand and rubbed the fingertips against his face.

"Are you certain? Can you feel them?" He knew he was being vain and insecure, but he did not want to have to explain to his mother, Narcissa, or any other female who regularly pecked him on the cheek what had caused the injury. He was jolted from his worries by the feel of Snape's lips on his own. Stroking the mended flesh, the younger boy whispered,

"It feels fine to me."

Lucius returned the kiss, which felt strangely more erotic than going all the way with Rachel had. As a rule his favourite sensation was taking a girl's virginity, but absolutely none of his sexual encounters so far had lit such a pleasurable spark as the simple act of kissing Severus.

He pulled the dark boy down onto the bed, wrapping his arms around him, enjoying the little thrills of delight shooting through his body where the two of them touched. Snape's tongue was moistening Malfoy's bottom lip, so he relaxed his mouth slightly, feeling the warm wetness slide inside, exploring gently. Lucius ran his hand up the inside of Severus' shirt, eliciting a small tremor, and moved across to caress a nipple with his thumb. The little purring sounds the younger boy was now making stabbed straight to Lucius' groin, and bypassing his brain completely, his body had flipped Severus beneath him, pulling off the school shirt and pressing their hips together.

The kisses were deep and passionate, peppered with little groans as the delightful friction between their two erections settled into an urgent rhythm. Lucius felt hands tangle wildly in his hair as Severus shuddered violently beneath him and came with a delicious gasp of air stolen out of his own mouth. The eighteen year old was pushed dizzyingly over the edge, and clutched the other body tightly against himself as waves of pleasure coursed through him, blurring his vision and forcing wanton moans from his throat.

Clinging together with closed eyes, their breathing gradually slowed, and conscious thought began to return to Lucius' brain. Oh dear, he grimaced to himself. That was incredible. The best thing he had done in his romantic life so far. The realisation dawned on him with sobering finality. It was not a huge problem really, more of an inconvenience, and he was certain Narcissa Black was enough of a lady to cope with it. So many pure-blooded women were secretly in the same position. Just as long as his father never found out that his only son, and the heir to the Malfoy estate was…was…was gay. He sighed.

"I don't suppose you have a potion to cure this, do you?" he asked, more to himself than to the boy still lying flushed and sleepy beneath him.

"What? Being a poof? No, I've already looked into it." Lucius looked at him sharply.

"You're fourteen years old. How can you know that you're…"

The darker boy shrugged.

"I just do." He summoned a cigarette and the dragon lighter, alternately taking a drag himself and raising his fingers to Malfoy's lips for him to inhale. "And there is definitely no known cure. You have no choice but to get used to it."

Lucius accepted the advice with a sigh, rolling off Severus so they were side by side on the bed. The sight of those long, elegant fingers holding the thin tube up to his lips was already reawakening the electricity inside. Taking the cigarette from him and crushing it into the ashtray on the bedside table, he began gently removing Severus' trousers.

"You know, Severus," he whispered into a pointed, white ear, "I think I'm already getting used to it."