Chapter Six: The Malfoy Equation:
Lucius Arbaxas Malfoy was a very wealthy pureblood wizard who had everything he could ever want and more, he was powerful, part of one of the most powerful families in England. Yet his family was still considered new in England, the Malfoy family had been French at one time but the last remaining heir had fled France in the fifteen hundreds after the French king had declared war on several of the noble families, magical and non-magical alike. The Malfoys had from that time resided in Wiltshire, building a fine manor house and building up their wealth. They had since the late 1600s been involved in the ministry affairs off and on for the next hundred years. Then they had dropped from the political scene preferring to grow their wealth and raise their families marrying into several of the older houses who had faded to a single witch as the only heir.
This had changed at the end of the 19th century when Brutus Malfoy II had aligned himself with the Black family completely, this included their radical politics setting in place what happened after this. Brutus had two sons, one was Hyperion Lucius Malfoy, the other Arbaxas Brutus Malfoy. Both had gone to Hogwarts and Hyperion was the elder son and was slated to become the head of the Malfoy family. Yet his refusal to do as his father asked and try to distance himself from Brutus and refusal to join Grindelwald got him killed in a riding "accident". This left his much younger and weaker minded brother Arbaxas the new heir apparent of the Malfoy clan.
With the fall of Grindelwald it looked as of Arbaxas would be able to avoid serving a dark lord himself. He married Ava Rosier and his father made sure he had but one son, Lucius Arbaxas Malfoy. Once that was done Brutus made sure that his daughter in law would never have another child. Unknown to both Arbaxas and Ava he slipped a potion that would insure she never got pregnant again. When Lucius was four his father was pressured by his own father to join the up and rising Lord Voldemort and Lucius was groomed by his grandfather to become part of the army of Voldemort. Neither Lucius or his father's feelings were taken into account and anyway Arbaxas was too terrified of his father to stand up to him, his brother's death made sure of that.
The years passed and Lucius excelled at Hogwarts, he met a young Severus Snape and on instruction of his grandfather he had groomed the young man to servitude with Voldemort. After all half-bloods were only good for one thing, service and they either served or died as they were little better than the muggleborn scum who should have been kept as slaves. Yet Lucius did not see Severus as a servant but friend and his father knew this and kept this from Brutus as best he could. Lucius took the dark mark just after he left Hogwarts, shortly after that he got married. Once Severus Snape graduated he took the dark mark, got his potions mastery in record time and became the dark lord's personal potions master.
It looked as if Lucius would have to endure a lifetime of service to a dark lord he secretly hated, doing his best to turn the anger of the dark lord from killing too many people at one time. He was a master at this, many people, the lowly muggle born and the muggle swarms owed him thanks for staying his master's temper. Yet one night all that changed and a young mother with a pure sacrifice had ended the reign of Voldemort. Everyone said that it was the babe, a young boy who ended Voldemort but Lucius and his father knew different. It was around this same time Brutus died and Arbaxas received several wounds that he stated he got from escaping Voldemort.
With the death of Brutus the Malfoy family shifted from the more radical politics of the brutal Malfoy patriarch to a more mainstream view. Yet the evil that had represented Brutus had extended to Narcissa, Lucius's beautiful brilliant wife. With her long wavy locks of blond hair, clear gray eyes and shapely figure she was the envy of much of the magical world. After she had Draco Lucius Malfoy the new heir apparent after Lucius she had never been able to conceive again. It was a devastating blow as Narcissa and Lucius would have loved to have given Draco a sister or two to grow up with. Brutus had put a stop to that before he had died. Yet with Brutus gone Lucius was able to raise his son with love and much to the annoyance of Narcissa spoiled him quite a bit. She was the disciplinarian of the family but it was clear she loved her son as much as Lucius did. If Voldemort came back the future that Lucius planned for his son, one free of slavery and servitude to a dark lord would not come about.
That was why now Lucius sat in his manor house the new head of the family looking at the fire before him. Last year around Christmas his father had died, officially it was dragon pox but the healers had stated it was an old and deadly curse. They had been surprised that Arbaxas had survived so long in fact and now Lucius had to carry on without his father. He was everything a lord should be, tall handsome and he had long silvery blond hair that went well with his pale noble features and cold gray eyes. Those eyes were troubled and he knew something was very wrong. Someone was killing off death eaters and he knew that as one he was probably a marked man himself.
"Lucius what is wrong?" Narcissa said coming in and sitting in the chair across from her husband.
"Thinking on mistakes I made in my past." Lucius said wincing slightly in pain as he thought on how he had been wrong to join Voldemort. "Joining the dark lord for one."
"Lucius?" Narcissa said as Lucius winced in pain, "what is wrong?"
"Nothing, just a bit of a headache." Lucius said managing to smile, "I do need to go to Hogwarts, I do have a meeting with Dumbledore."
"Be careful Lucius." Narcissa said.
"As always my dear." Lucius said getting up.
Sighing he got up and knew who he had to go to for help, though this was going to be hard to do. He had to swallow his pride and get this over with, now. He smoothed down his fine black robes, took up his ebony cane with a silver snake head topping it and walked out grabbing his cloak as he did so. He walked down the path of his manor house between high tall hedges and out the gate and Apparated to Hogwarts. He had to speak to the headmaster now that much he knew. He entered Hogwarts and walked up the stairs grateful it was the weekend and the students were studying or outside. His head was pounding now as he fought some sort of curse inside his own head. He tried to focus on his task at hand, that of speaking to Albus Dumbledore but the pain became too much and he fell to the floor and blacked out.
x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x
Dumbledore looked worried as he sat in his office, he had so much to worry about now as he saw the signs that Voldemort was not as dead as he had hoped. One of his worries was of course the ancient house of Slytherin, he of course knew the history of the house and knew that two hundred years ago it had been a very different house. It was less hung up on blood purity and had been more of a house for those wanting to get into politics not for raising dark lords. That had changed, well if he was honest with himself there was too much darkness in the school now as it was. He wondered how much of that was his fault and what he could do to change that, yet how was he do to that with Voldemort on the rise? He looked up as his newest defense professor came into his office.
"What can I do for you my boy?" Dumbledore asked kindly.
"I came across Lucius Malfoy coming to your office." Remus said, "He was on the floor muttering about Voldemort and a curse, I think he is mad."
"What did you do with him?" Dumbledore asked getting up.
"I took him to the hospital wing." Remus replied.
"I will need to see him." Dumbledore said.
"Of course, I don't think he will be too happy with what I did to him though." Remus said, "He is dangerous and I did not see another way to contain him."
"Take me to him, I will speak to Lucius." Dumbledore said getting up.
Dumbledore thought to when he first realized that Lucius was going to join the dark lord. He wanted to help the young man but the young Slytherin did not trust him and even now he was surprised the boy had come to see him. He was sure that Lucius had something to tell him and somehow on the way to see him, not to hurt him as he knew Remus thought but to speak to him. For years he had dealt with Lucius sparing with him as Governor of the school, Lucius trying to get him fired and Dumbledore trying to turn him from Voldemort. Maybe he could get the pureblood wizard to give up his death eater ways, he could only hope that was why Lucius was here now.
Dumbledore followed Remus down to the hospital wing and saw Poppy scowl at Remus. Remus smiled apologetically at her and went to the back of the wing and with a wave of his wand unlocked the door. He stepped through as did the headmaster and Dumbledore could see why Poppy would not be happy. Lucius had been stripped to his pale green silk boxers and was bound to a chair. He was out cold right now but when he woke he would not be very happy. Sweat stood out on his strong pale skin and he looked ill. Dumbledore walked up to Lucius and used his wand to wake the man up. Lucius looked up at him and strained to get out of his bonds but was unable to, he tried to speak but the words he wanted to say would not come.
"Remus seems to believe you have gone mad." Dumbledore said sitting down across from Lucius, "I do not, you have times you want to say something but find you cannot?"
"I came to speak to you, not harm you." Lucius said gasping in pain as he tried to speak, to think on what was forbidden to him. "I can't…"
"May I see in your mind please?" Dumbledore asked, Lucius blinked, Dumbledore could have just gone into his mind and taken what he wanted, why didn't he? "I don't do what Voldemort does, I am not a rapist like he is."
"You may look." Lucius said quietly. "Please help me sir."
"I will do what I can my child," Dumbledore said softly.
Dumbledore cast the spell quietly and entered Lucius's mind. Lucius was surprised this did not hurt and he let Dumbledore explore his mindscape. Dumbledore was impressed at how well ordered Lucius kept his mind, he was clearly a master Occulumens as his shields were strong and would have held him out for a time if he was not allowed in. He went through Lucius's mind and found some things that made him sad. He knew Brutus Malfoy was an evil man but he had delighted in torturing his own son and grandson it seemed. The worst he found was a curse to keep Lucius from thinking on rebelling from joining Voldemort and later from doing as he ordered. The fact that he had even been able to come here to the school at all with such a curse on him showed he was a strong man. Dumbledore worked the curse out of Lucius mind carefully and once free he put the dark near black curse into a small shatter proof jar and sealed it.
"Better Lucius?" Dumbledore asked.
"Yes, the diary, it was all me, I am sorry." Lucius said, "I wanted to tell you all last year but I could not."
"I believe you, I am glad to know you are not heartless to allow a dangerous creature into the school with your son in the school." Dumbledore said, "now I have to find out who did this to you."
"My grandfather, he put it on me when I was eleven, when I started to show signs of questioning him and the dark lord. After, well after you saw what I did, what I became, I am sorry sir."
"I know but not all was the curse in what you did, you will have to atone for that." Dumbledore said, "I will help you with that."
"What happened to your grandfather?" Remus asked.
"My father killed him, told me this as he lay dying last year." Lucius replied. "He had to, I hated my grandfather and I hate the Black family as well as they turned to the dark lord. Though I don't hate Narcissa, she is pure and good not like the rest of her family. I thought Sirius might have turned out alright even if he ended up in the lion's den but even he is evil."
Remus looked unhappy at that remark but Lucius had no reason to believe Sirius was innocent, not until he could get his hands on the rat. Remus was thinking it might be a good idea to work with Severus on that as he did not want to have an enemy in Severus anymore. Not that they really were, Severus only threatened him once or twice a day with death or dismemberment so that was not too bad on that count. Lucius had been quiet for a few minutes then he realized his state of dress, or undress and he looked up at Remus in barely concealed rage. He was understandably upset to be bound to a chair in nothing but his boxers as he was.
"Where are my clothes?" Lucius demanded.
"Well I thought you might be a danger to others and took the precautions." Remus said, "I am after all the defense professor here."
"Well now I am not, give me my clothing back now!" Lucius snarled.
"Ah well I was thinking of charging admission at the door and letting the young ladies get a look at the great Lucius Malfoy." Remus said watching as Lucius turned an interesting shade of pink, "I have to make money some way you know."
"Werewolf you will unbind me at once and give me my clothing or I will kill you slowly myself!" Lucius hissed (yes Lucius knew what Remus was, he had since they were in school), "you will scream for mercy but no-one will come to your aid!"
"Very well, but you are a lovely looking man, better looking than Severus even." Remus said, unfortunately Lucius was unbound at this time and it took the headmaster stepping between them before Remus got seriously cursed.
"Remus you are not inclined that way stop annoying Lucius." Dumbledore warned Remus.
"But headmaster he is cute…"
Remus realized he had gone too far as Lucius had finished dressing. He was only teasing the pureblood wizard and really was not inclined towards Lucius or any other man at all. However Lucius did not seem to have a since of humor that way and so Hogwarts was treated to the sight of the defense professor getting chased and hexed, cursed and jinxed by one very irate Malfoy. By the time Malfoy had finished with Remus the poor werewolf did need to spend a few hours in the hospital wing to heal up as Lucius was really ticked off with him. One thing was for sure Remus would not tease Lucius in that manner again, maybe send him some canary creams, yes that is just what he would do. After he healed up and stopped sprouting fur all over that is.
x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x
No this will not be slash, I never write slash and never will. Remus was just teasing Lucius and did get what he deserved. I wanted to show Lucius's father as a good man but still show there was some bad in the Malfoy family. I think Lucius was forced to join Voldemort, notice how he did not go to bring back his lord and master right away when he probably knew a way to do so. If Pettigrew could bring him back why would not Lucius know how to? Still he is prejudiced and did raise his son that way too as Draco is a bit of a spoiled racist brat!
Oh and do review please!