Lucius debates the properties of Lord Voldemort's diary in the presence of a servant


- 3.3. -

Small But Powerful


What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight; it's the size of the fight in the dog.

DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER


Thelonius stirred his drink and gazed out of the window, allowing his gaze to wander across the terrific sight. "Don't you think that the peacocks are a little bit too much, junior?"

"Why? Don't you like them?" Lucius stepped forth and accompanied the much older wizard. He grinned complacently. "Narcissa is very fond of birds, these peacocks I gave her for our seventeenth anniversary last summer, and she takes great delight in them."

"You've given your wife poultry for your anniversary? Why, I hadn't figured what an old romantic you are!"

Lucius gave a little chuckle but no reply. Instead, he returned to sit down in his armchair, legs crossed and leisurely flicking through a little booklet. When Thelonius lost interest in the gardens and looked at him, the younger wizard put the book aside with a pensive expression.

"What do you make of Arthur Weasley's latest attempt to disturb the peace of respectable citizens, Thelonius?"

This one sniggered. "Worried, junior?"

"Worried about Arthur Weasley? Oh please! That pompous little idiot. And don't you call me 'junior'. That's my father's job."

Thelonius laughed some more, his wrinkled face appearing much younger suddenly. "I'm thirty years your senior, my good boy. You'll always be Abraxas' little lad, if you like it or not. I assume I'm telling you no news that your father is seriously worried that Malfoy Manor could fall subject to a raid, and certain things might be unearthed that you wouldn't want to be unearthed for your good wife's sake, if nothing else."

"Old, smart Abraxas, yes, he pretends to be concerned with his daughter-in-law's well-being, when all he's really after is his own reputation," Lucius snarled, unable to fully dispel the anger out of his tone.

Thelonius replied very earnestly, "You know that's not true, Lucius. Your father dotes on Narcissa, he really does. And he is right after all. Do you want to compromise your family? Narcissa? Your little Draco?"

"I won't compromise them, what are you talking about!"

"Do you seriously mean to make me belief that you have lately discarded your little collection, Lucius? Whatever happened to the Pantalonian Poison that you were so proud of to have acquired? Where is the cursed armour of Aurelion the Atrocious? Did you get a good prize for the Assyrian severance scourge?"

"Oh, give it a rest, old man!" Lucius emptied his drink and put down the glass a little more forcefully than would have been necessary. "Just for your – and my father's, I suspect! – information: yes, I did see to it that nothing could be found here that could be deemed in any way illegal." He made a wide gesture with his arm. "My father in particular should know that this edifice offers more hiding places than the Ministry buffoons could ever take up with."

"Good for you. Now I suspect you must have had yet another reason for inviting me today. Is it because of Abraxas' ailment?"

"Ailment, you call it? He's got the bloody Dragon Pox, but being his bloody stubborn self, he won't hear a word of it! Narcissa has undertaken to spike his tea with some remedy potions, but he'd need a proper Healer taking a closer look. But being him, he won't have it, of course. I've long stopped preaching, he's old enough to know what he's doing, and if he means to kill himself – oh well, I think Narcissa wouldn't bear it too cheerfully, but otherwise he has my full sympathy!"

"So what do you want from me then? Shall I talk him into it? If you believed I could do that, you'd be sorely mistaken, my dear boy."

"Talk him into it, ph! Narcissa usually got him in the palm of her hand, if she can't persuade him, nobody can, and I'm really sick of the whole thing." He shook his head with an expression that signalled finality, reached out for the little booklet once more and handed it over to his visitor. "You know what this is, Thelonius?"

The old wizard narrowed his eyes for a few seconds, before his expression turned into dumbfounded surprise. "Is this… Is this truly what I believe it is?"

"What do you believe then?"

Thelonius sniggered dryly and opened his mouth for a reply, but in that moment, one of the servants pushed open the door and came in with a huge tray full of assorted fruits. "Dobby," his owner drawled snidely, "if you really, really thought very hard about it – do you think you'd be capable of finding out what fundamental principle of a civilised society you keep on breaching whenever you come through this door?"

The elf did a double-take and stared at his master, the huge eyes bulging. He tried to make a bow and nearly lost hold of the laden tray. One of the pineapples on top had begun to sway dangerously. "Master," he wheezed imploringly, "Dobby didn't – couldn't – Dobby –"

"You know what? I think you're going to do this all over again, and while you're knocking on the door before you enter – use your head as the bumper, bloody hell!"

The house-elf squealed miserably and turned on his heels, the fruits on the tray now curiously lopsided. He marched out, closing the door with his foot behind himself. Lucius could only gape at the idiotic little imbecile. Why on earth hadn't he just let the tray right there where it belonged? Instead, he was going to drop it all over the place, it was as certain as midnight was the blackest hour of night. Indeed, in the next moment, there came a hollow knock and next thing, the elf staggered into the room, his bottom first, he struggled with the tray, his left foot caught the leg of one the side tables, and in the next moment, a nice fruit salad had covered the floor, the sofa, the curtains and the guest.

Lucius groaned and hexed the dimwit impatiently. "Please, Thelonius, beg ignore our latest acquisition. For every dish he washes, he breaks another two!"

"Oh, so this is the 'disgrace to its race' that your father mentioned? Your butler's youngest?"

"The very one. Currently breaking him in." He shot a derisive look at the servant who had started to clean up the mess, just now scraping a bowl of smashed cherries off Narcissa's favourite chair. He snarled spitefully, "However, I like to think of him as the elfish pendant of a Hufflepuff."

"Merrily mediocre?"

"Rather systematically substandard!"

Thelonius had taken out his wand to remove the squashed mangoes and pieces of melon that were sprawled all over his chest and lap, but Lucius held him back, ordering the elf to stop messing with the drapery and attend to their guest at once. The elf gave another squeal and hit his head on the windowsill before teetering over with a slightly demented demeanour.

Thelonius handed the booklet he was still holding back to its owner. "You better clean this one yourself, boy. I don't think you want your clumsy servant anywhere around it."

"You think it's true then? The Chamber?"

"I don't know for sure if it's true, Lucius."

"But you did recognise – you –"

The elf had urged Thelonius to take off his overcoat and hurried out with it to have it washed, and once he had closed the door behind himself while bearing in mind his master's last remark 'And don't forget to bounce your head quite prettily for this!', the lanky visitor recommenced in a grave tone, "You shouldn't have this here to begin with, Lucius! I am not the only one who'd know what this is, and damn you if an Auror found this in your house!"

"So it is true. This little piece of Muggle crap does open the Chamber of Secrets. My, I hadn't –"

"All I can tell you is that the Dark Lord was very fond of this little item when I last saw it. One of his roommates who happened to dare and touch it rather coincidentally, landed himself in the Infirmary with a number of severe injuries, but kept on claiming unwaveringly that the last thing he remembered was tripping over his own feet on top of the Astronomy Tower while looking for his lost binoculars."

"And you follow by that that this booklet has any magical properties of its own?"

Thelonius stiffly shook his balding head. "Trust me on this one, Lucius. Whatever it is, this bloody thing has magical properties, and I don't think you want to have it lying around with your son in its vicinity, if nothing else. Where did you get that from, anyhow?"

Lucius grinned rascally. "He gave it to me, then."

"Did he?!"

"I wonder why though… I have turned it upside down, you see? I cannot find anything, and I tried pretty much every revelation spell I know. If it is supposed to truly open the Chamber of Secrets, one must possibly use it to break a window!"

"You don't want to try making it work, listen very well! I have seen this thing before; I have seen it work… Don't ask me how, but this darned thing can possess you in a way you wouldn't have thought possible for the range of the sixteen-year-old wizard who created it!"

Lucius smirked and gave a little puff. "He was a genius after all."

"He bloody was, but would I want him back? Certainly not, boy."

"You got out of him what you wanted," Lucius muttered, thinking of the service the Dark Lord had once provided old Thelonius, thus securing his everlasting – or not – commitment to the Dark Lord's crusade.

"And you didn't?"

Lucius sniggered. "I remember that back then, I often complained. But looking back… Every darned day when I sit in that office and I can feel my brain crumpling with the utter insipidity of the business, I think that these times had their share of greatness, too. The rush of the adrenaline – the duels – the sheer power of some of the spell work…"

"You're talking to the wrong man, boy. I certainly never felt any rush of adrenaline, but I remember how eager you kids were. You, young Rosier, Yaxley, Bellatrix… Even young Severus –"

The door flew open once more and Dobby raced in, flushed, and waving with the cleaned cloak. "Sir, no stains left, Sir, Dobby –"

"What would it take to knock some sense into your head, cretin?"

"– Snape," Thelonius finished with an irritated glance at the submissive servant who tried to wrap him into his cloak now, getting utterly entangled.

"Snape?" The head of an angelic boy appeared in the open door. "Professor Snape? What about him?"

"Get lost and play, Draco," his father groaned. "Frankly, I can't do with you now!"

"You said we'd practise!"

"Yes, but not now. Come on, leave me alone now, all the sooner we can start with your practise. Now make yourself invisible and go!"

"Okay," the boy grumbled and left with a pout that enhanced the impression of a cherub still.

Lucius watched after him with badly veiled fatherly pride. "And shut the door behind you!"

"As I said," Thelonius began anew, "you kids were pretty much in there. It's weird that one of you is now responsible for my son, in a way."

"I think he's the only teacher in that wretched school worth the name!"

"Yes, one cannot help but think that old Dumbles has lost his marbles in the course of time. Some of his staff –"

"Whom are you telling this? I'm a damned governor; I have to deal with this nutter on a regular basis!"

Thelonius laughed, all the more when the nervous house-elf slipped in a puddle of crushed ice and hurled a handful of already ill-used strawberries across the room in traipsing.

"Oh, Merlin's beard, Dobby! Are you a blistering ghoul or an elf?! You've got the fine motor skills of a two year old giant!"

"Dobby is sorry, master," the elf wheezed and hit himself with the dustpan over the chin, slipping once more.

"Can we come back once more to the Chamber of Secrets, please?" Lucius smiled and helped his guest to more whiskey. "You were there, back then."

"I know as much as you do, boy. He was the true heir of Slytherin and found out how to open the Chamber of Secrets – nobody knows how exactly."

"But what is Slytherin's monster?"

Thelonius shrugged and sipped his drink. "Could be almost anything, if you'll ask me."

"You really don't know?"

"And I really don't care. It's long over, and I rather forget about the past. When you are as old as me, you might feel the same."

"What if… What if this flimsy piece of paper actually is the key to the –"

"And if it is, you should rather not be connected to the whole affair. Lucius, I implore you, be reasonable! It is well possible that we're looking at the most amazing, invaluable artefact, I grant you that. But ask yourself – is it worth clinging to?"

"I cannot bring myself to just throw it away!"

"Bear in mind what's on the stake, Lucius. If I were you, I'd most certainly put as much distance between myself and this thing as possible."

The house-elf scurried away with a stained curtain, and when he opened the door, the young master of the house practically crashed into the room. He looked like someone caught red-handed and comically contrite. "Dobby," he hissed and glared at the servant. "There is a large pool of crap in the hallway. I just slipped in it!"

"Did you, son?" Lucius smirked and shook his head.

"I am sorry to disturb you, Father," the boy muttered ruefully and hurried to get away. "But we'll still practise later on, right?"

"If you're not out of here – and with out I mean out of the house – in less than thirty seconds, Draco, we're not going to practise any flying manoeuvre for a whole week!"

The boy vanished even quicker than he had appeared, and the two wizards continued their conversation. A plan began to take shape in Lucius' mind… Yes, he must get rid of this item, the sooner, the better. But why throw it away into the next fireplace? Why not make the best of this unique magical object, crafted by the undeniably greatest wizard that Lucius had ever come across, or even heard of.

Only after their practise, Draco had finally plucked up enough courage to ask his father about the things he had overheard in the afternoon. "What is it about Professor Snape, Dad?"

"You filthy little sneak," his father sighed fondly and ruffled Draco's hair. "When I tell you to get lost, you get lost. Hear me, sonny?"

"Oh, come on, Dad, you'd have done the same, wouldn't you? But now that I've heard you anyway –"

"Now what!" Lucius sneered and gave a dry chuckle. "Your Head of House is one hell of a talented wizard, is that what you wanted to hear now? Couldn't you tell so much yourself? Oh, I forgot – my son delights not to pay too much attention to his classes!"

"Dad!"

The boy looked perfectly mortified, making his father laugh for real now. "Don't give me that look, that works with your mum only. And also, you know that I am right. If you don't want to do it for yourself, Draco, think of your mum at least, will you? How do you think she feels when you bring home such a record! She has devoted so much time to your education, and this is how you pay her for it?"

"I'm sorry, Father."

"Don't be sorry, do something about it!"

"Will you tell me about the Chamber of Secrets?"

"You prove me you're earnest and study about the goblin feuds in the Middle Ages, and I might tell you what I can about the Chamber." Lucius winked at him in a roguish fashion. "Your mum will examine you though, so you better give it a real try."

"Deal!" Draco beamed.

"One thing, Draco. This isn't the sort of thing your mother likes to be involved with. You trouble her, and this is going to be the last time I was so open with you."

"Yes, Sir!" He was still beaming, clearly eager to prove his reliability. And he did, in less than three days, he had memorised the entire third volume of Leonard Worple's Historic Anthology. Also, he hadn't mentioned a single thing to Narcissa; he never would have betrayed his father's trust. He knew his parents, and particularly he knew his mother's disposition. He knew the list of subjects that, if raised during conversation, would prompt his mum to arch her brows expressively and make his dad fall silent or change the subject at once. Well, Draco hadn't suspected that the infamous Chamber of Secrets could be such a banished topic, but he didn't come to think about it any further.

More intriguing in this respect was the other person that Lucius seemed to find unfit to know. "Don't you mention any of this to Professor Snape, Draco," he said with great emphasis.

"But why? Didn't you say how much he –"

"Professor Snape is one of the most amazing wizards I ever came to know, Draco. But he is also a member of Dumbledore's staff, and I wouldn't want to force him deciding what's more important to him – his job, or an old friendship. Dumbledore has ways and means to unearth what he wants to know – my regard for Severus is too high to deliberately put him into such a predicament."

"So what are you going to do, Dad?"

"Me?" Lucius sniggered and patted his son's back. "I'm not going to do anything, and mind you, neither will you. You and I are going to lean back and watch the Heir of Slytherin do whatever he thinks best."

"But who is the Heir?"

Draco made his best face, but his father merely laughed some more. "It's better if you don't know, Draco. Dumbledore has his ways of knowing what's going on in other people's heads."

"So you know it, right?"

"Yes, I know. And one day I'm going to tell you as well. But not now."

Draco tried to get some more information out of him, but saw that he wasn't getting anywhere, except for annoying his father, so he gave in after all. He was proud enough as it was. He admired his father beyond measure, and that this one would share one of his secrets with him – a secret that not even Narcissa Malfoy or Professor Snape did know about! – Draco could hardly have felt more elated.