Chapter Three
Draco awoke to Hermanito pawing at his face. Turning over and looking at the clock on the bedside table, he understood why; the cat was normally fed at around 7:30 in the morning, and it was now well past 9 am. He groaned and sat up, swiping a hand over his face. Looking around, he took in the sight of his bedroom in the morning light. It had been nearly seven years, and yet the room still looked exactly the same as the day he had left – four poster bed centered on the wall opposite the fireplace, large picture windows at one end of the rectangular room along with the door to his lavatory, his dressing area and armoire at the other end. Despite the room's large size, it felt rather cozy and relaxing (which probably had something to do with the light blue hue that Narcissa had insisted on painting the walls).
The Malfoy heir climbed out of bed and set about getting dressed. Fifteen minutes later he exited the room, pausing momentarily to feed the cat as he did so. He made his way downstairs, and found both Narcissa and Lucius in the drawing room. The boy was perched at the side table - drawing once again – and Draco was pleased to see that the child was at least using paper this time. Narcissa was seated in one of the armchairs, flipping through a catalog for witches' robes. She looked up as Draco entered the room.
"Good morning, Darling. Did you sleep well?"
He responded with a single nod. "Yes, Mother. I take it the two of you have already eaten?" Breakfast had always been served at 8 am sharp in the Malfoy household – at least it had when he had been growing up.
The woman smiled. "Oh yes. And I'm happy to say that Lucius ate quite well."
Draco raised an eyebrow at that statement but refrained from commenting. He distinctly remembered his mother saying something similar to his father on several occasions when Draco had eaten little more than sugar for a meal.
He made his way over to the side table and sat down, tapping the table once so that his own breakfast appeared. Glancing over at the boy's picture, he was somewhat taken aback by the fact that the paper was mostly covered in black ink.
"What are you drawing?" The man asked, puzzled at what the picture could possibly be.
Lucius looked up, "It's Draco."
"What?!"
The boy bit his lip in thought. "Conslation," he said after a moment.
Ah, the Constellation. Draco thought in relief. He didn't want to imagine what a mostly black sheet of paper might mean if the child had actually been trying to draw him. He unconsciously ran his fingers over his left forearm, where the Dark Mark still resided under his sleeve. Shaking his head to rid himself of any troubling thoughts, he picked up his fork and began eating.
The Malfoy heir ate his breakfast, and the three members of the family spent the rest of the morning in relative peace.
In fact, Draco was rather shocked at how well Lucius was behaving, especially considering his mother's report the day before. He had expected to be dealing with a spoiled little terror; instead, Lucius had been the model of good behavior all morning.
When Draco quietly asked his mother about this at morning tea (while Lucius was preoccupied with painting on a giant piece of parchment on the drawing room floor), she had merely shrugged.
"I believe he's a bit intimidated, with you being master of the house and all. Don't worry. I doubt it will be long before he tests you."
And true to her word, that testing came exactly 37 minutes later.
Narcissa had stepped out to deal with a crisis of one of the other pureblood wives (the caterer for the woman's daughter's birthday had backed out last minute). Draco was still relaxing in the drawing room, perusing some articles for work and occasionally casting his eye on Lucius, who was still painting. The boy had pulled out nearly every vial of paint in the side cupboard, and was currently completing a detailed picture of a magical forest landscape.
Draco had to wonder why he had never seen his father paint or draw before. The boy certainly had a talent for it. Perhaps Abraxas had not approved, and had sought to squash the tendency before it developed into a full-blown hobby.
Lucius finished the leaves on a tree, and then hopped up and dashed over to the cabinet, presumably in search of a different paint color. From the back of the cabinet, though, he pulled out a medium-sized wooden box. He set it down on the floor, and lifted the lid, revealing hundreds of puzzle pieces. The boy began to pull out pieces and sort them, only to pause when Draco spoke up from across the room.
"If you're going to play with that, then you need to put away your paints please."
The younger Malfoy didn't look up from his task with the puzzle box. "Make the house-elves do it." He muttered.
Draco nearly growled in irritation at the boy's words. While it was true that the house-elves could have easily cleaned up the mess, he also knew that children who had everything done for them with magic often grew up lazy and ill-prepared to handle situations where they would not have servants to wait on them (such as when they attended Hogwarts). In addition, it behooved parents to teach their children to take proper care of their things, since magical items were not always easily repaired. Draco distinctly remembered having a songbird figurine as a child that he had broken accidentally (if by "accidentally" one meant "threw against the wall in a fit of temper"). His mother had repaired it immediately, but from that point forward it had always sung slightly out of tune.
The man closed the journal in his hand and laid it on the side table. "Look at me." He commanded, leaning forward and placing his elbows on his knees. He waited until a pair of young steel-grey eyes met his before continuing. "Who is the master of this house?"
"You." The boy said, dropping his eyes back to the box as he ran his hand through the pieces.
"Then do as I have asked."
Lucius made a sour face at the command. He didn't want to put away the paints. He wanted to put the puzzle together. His irritation taking over, he upended the puzzle box in one swift motion, sending the pieces flying all over the floor. "No," he said, his voice slightly raised. "I don't want to, and I shouldn't have to." He crossed his arms over his chest as he sat on the floor, pouting.
Draco was on his feet instantly. He crossed the room in seconds and pulled the child up, steering him straight into the nearest corner of the room. "I think you need some time to calm down."
"I am calm!" Lucius yelled, as he pushed past the man and started to move away. "And I'm not standing in the corner!"
He was quickly caught by his guardian, who promptly returned him to the corner with a smarting smack to his backside.
"Oh, yes, you are." Draco said as he leaned down and spoke into the boy's ear. "I'm not going to tolerate any misbehavior out of you. Now stand here and get control of yourself."
The boy sniffled. That smack had hurt! "How long do I have to stay here?" he asked after a moment, his voice coming out as a whine.
"Until you are ready to mind me." Draco replied, returning to his seat, and picking up his journal again.
It was only a few minutes later when Lucius exited the corner and began slowly picking up the paint vials. Once he had gathered a handful, he glanced up at his guardian.
The man nodded toward the cupboard. "Put them away." He would have preferred if Lucius had waited until he was dismissed from the corner, but he supposed he couldn't fault the child for following his words to the letter. He watched patiently as the boy put away all of the paints – all the while occasionally glancing up at his guardian - and then moved on to collecting all of the wayward puzzle pieces.
The child then settled on the floor and began piecing together the puzzle, while Draco resumed his quiet reading. The two lapsed into a peaceful silence once more.
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Later that afternoon, Draco was in the study, reviewing potential candidates to tutor Lucius. If this situation turned out to be permanent - and he suspected it might - then he wanted the child to at least be educated. He had narrowed the list down to two potential choices, but wanted to get his mother's opinion on the matter before making a final decision. To that end, the Malfoy heir summoned Twitzle, who appeared instantly in the office.
"Where is your mistress?" He demanded of the elf.
Twitzle's voice took on a nervous tremor. "Mistress is in her chambers. Mistress is being very upset."
"Why is Mother upset?" Draco asked, puzzled.
"Little Master Lucius is yelling at Mistress, is making her cry."
Draco scowled. That child needs to learn some respect.
"That will be all, Twitzle," The Malfoy heir said as he stood and immediately made his way out of the room and toward the stairs.
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He found Narcissa in her bedroom, seated at her vanity and drying her eyes with a handkerchief. Upon spotting her son, she quickly handed the small square of fabric to her house-elf, Nelly. "Draco, darling, is something the matter?" She asked in a feigned nonchalant tone.
"Mother," He approached and leaned against the vanity. "Why have you been crying?"
The Malfoy Matriarch waved a hand dismissing his question, as if her son's concern was silly. 'It's nothing, dear. Just a bit of sensitivity on my part."
Draco crossed his arms, gazing down at his mother skeptically. "I was told that Lucius yelled at you. Is that true?"
Narcissa sighed. "It started out so well. He came in to show me one of his drawings. We were talking about it, and he was so very proud of himself. Then he went silent and just suddenly became so angry. So, so angry. I have no idea why. He started yelling the most horrible things at me. And then his accidental magic went off, shattering my hand mirror." The woman gestured to the mirror on the vanity, "I repaired it immediately, but he had already fled. I don't know where he went. This all happened a few moments ago."
"Nelly," Draco turned to the house-elf, "Find Lucius"
"Yes, Master Draco." The elf said, vanishing with a *pop*. Thirty seconds later, she reappeared. "Master Lucius is in the library, sir."
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Down in the library, Lucius lay sprawled on one of the lush couches, a worn copy of The Tales of Merlin spread before him. This was his favorite book, although he didn't remember it being quite so ragged the last time he had read it. That said, he wasn't particularly focused on the text anyway. His mind kept drifting to the shattered mirror upstairs.
A crisp *pop* announced the appearance of Nelly, and Lucius glanced up at her. She had been such a little elf when he last knew her; now she was older, middle-aged at least.
The two locked eyes for a moment, and then Nelly vanished with another *pop*.
Mere seconds later, she had returned. "Master Lucius' presence is required upstairs."
Lucius raised a small hand to rub his eye. He had no desire to go anywhere. "I'm busy," he said. At the house elf's hesitation, he spat "Go away, elf."
Nelly disappeared a second time, only to reappear a moment later. "Master Draco is telling Nelly to inform Little Master that he is to report to Mistress' chambers now."
"Tell them to leave me alone!" Lucius said, raising his voice as he threw his book at the smaller creature. She vanished with a *pop* right before the text reached her.
Satisfied, the boy hopped down off the sofa and went to retrieve his book. He returned to his seat, propping the text open on his lap, and was reaching the end of the first paragraph of a new tale when the library door opened.
Glancing up, Lucius took only one look at the foreboding expression on Draco's face before he slid off the sofa and scrambled for the library's side entrance.
He almost made it, but Draco was faster.
The older Malfoy grabbed Lucius' wrist and turned him, wrapping an arm around his waist while bringing his free hand down in a stinging swat on the seat of the boy's trousers.
"Ow!" Lucius cried as the swat sent him up on his toes.
He tried to wriggle free, but Draco just tightened his grip and delivered four more equally hard smacks before loosening his hold. Grasping the child by the wrist, he led them over to a nearby armchair and, sitting down, pulled the boy between his knees. Lucius just stood there, crying softly.
To be honest, the boy's tears surprised Draco. He could not remember ever seeing his father cry real tears. He quickly reminded himself, though, that the figure that stood before him was a six-year-old version of his father, not a grown man.
He lifted the small quivering chin, so that he could look directly into the child's tear-filled eyes.
"I told you earlier today that I was not going to tolerate misbehavior from you," the Malfoy heir began. "You were told twice to come upstairs, and you refused both times - rather rudely from the account I received."
"Didn't want to." The boy said, wiping at his eyes with one hand.
Draco raised an eyebrow. "When I tell you to do something, I expect you to do it, whether you want to or not."
Lucius took a shuddering breath, and then nodded. "Y-yes, sir."
At the response, Draco reached up and used his thumb to wipe a stray tear from the child's face. "I heard you became quite upset a little while ago. Do you want to tell me why?"
The boy shrugged and looked down at his feet. "You'll be cross." He muttered.
"Why? Because you yelled at Mother? Or because you broke the mirror?"
"Both" came the sniffled reply.
Draco pulled the boy a few inches closer. "Look at me, please." When the child complied, he continued, "You are right. I am not particularly thrilled with the fact that you yelled at Mother. Such rudeness toward the mistress of this manor absolutely must stop. She is a Malfoy - " The young man silenced the child's impending interruption with a look. "- by choice, yes, but still a Malfoy. You will grant her the respect she deserves, or else my hand will be having a much more detailed conversation with your backside about why you should do so. Am I clear?
Lucius grimaced, but nodded dutifully. "Yes, Draco."
"As for the mirror," The older Malfoy began as Lucius' gaze started to drift downward, "I am not going to be angry with you over a bit of accidental magic. Besides, Mother already repaired it."
The small platinum blond head shot up, locking eyes with his guardian. "She did?"
"Yes, but apparently you had already fled the room." Draco tucked a lock of hair behind the child's ear. "What I would like to know is what set off your accidental magic in the first place. What upset you so?"
Lucius tucked his chin to his chest as his gaze once more drifted to the floor. "It's not hers." He muttered softly.
Draco leaned down in an attempt to see the child's face. "What isn't hers? the mirror?" He asked, puzzled. His mother had owned that mirror his entire life, he was sure of it.
"It's Mummy's" The boy said, stressing the final word as he looked up.
The Malfoy heir raised his eyebrows at the statement and fought against the smirk that threatened to take over his lips. He had never heard his father refer to his grandmother in such an infantile way. "It was your mother's mirror?" He asked.
The child nodded. "Yes. Why does she have it?" She obviously meant Narcissa.
"It was a gift," came the answer from the doorway before Draco could even open his mouth to respond. The two Malfoy males looked over to find Narcissa gliding toward them. She knelt next to the chair, so that she was facing Lucius.
"Your mother gave me that mirror on my wedding day, to welcome me to the family. I have used it with pride ever since."
Draco glanced sideways at his mother while Lucius eyed her skeptically. "Mummy gave it to you?" The younger one asked.
Narcissa gave a soft smile. "Yes, she did" she said, her tone warm and comforting. "I do apologize for upsetting you earlier. I would really like for us to be friends, you know."
Lucius looked from her to Draco. The older Malfoy raised an eyebrow, as if willing the child to remember their discussion just moments before about respect. The boy turned back to the Malfoy matriarch, giving her a single, determined nod. "Alright."
"That's settled then." Narcissa said, standing upright. "Why don't you go play, Love? We'll call you for dinner."
After Lucius departed, Draco stood and turned to his mother, giving her a knowing look. "Grandmother hated you."
Narcissa's smile turned quickly into a smirk. "Yes, I know. She would have gone to her grave with that mirror rather than let me have it."
The two of them turned and walked toward the main library entrance.
"Then how did you get it?" Draco asked as he held the door open for his mother.
"Your father stole it for me." Narcissa said over her shoulder as she exited the room. "Because he knew how much I liked it."