Author's Note: Well, this chapter came out of the blue, but Malfoy does still
die in it, even though he does take a very long time to get there. I love it
when intolerance destroys itself.
Disclaimer: Don't own Harry Potter, or Lucius, or Dobby, or Malfoy or Narcissa
or the manor they lived in.
Chapter 4: Fire and Brimstone
The doorbell rang, a loud and monotonous sound that reverberated
throughout the house. "Dobby!" Lucius Malfoy shouted once it had rang three
times, "The door!" That's when he remembered that he no longer had an house-elf,
thanks to meddling, I-vanquished-the-Dark-Lord Harry Potter. He snarled and got
up from his chair where he had been plotting more clever ways to get rid of
Dumbledore, Harry Potter and a whole slew of other people he didn't like.
"What?" He snarled at the two people, one male, the other female, both of them
wearing formal muggle attire, standing outside his door. This completely failed
to make them frightened, something that only irritated him even more. The male
spoke first.
"Hello! We're sorry to disturb you, but my colleague," the female smiled
graciously, "and I were just in the neighborhood spreading the word of our
Lord."
Now the female stepped forward, waving a small black book in front of Malfoy's
face. "Have you accepted the Lord into your heart?"
Whatever Malfoy had been expecting this wasn't it. "The Lord?" he
stammered, momentarily forgetting his irritation, "Which Lord do you mean?" He
stood there in surprise as the muggles trampled over each other's words to
describe their Lord.
"Why, THE Lord of course."
"The All-knowing!"
"The All-powerful!"
"The one who will was cursed by all but came back to life from death-"
"Promising to set forth a new order of glory for the righteous and
deserving-"
"His chosen people!"
"On this Earth!"
They finished together: "The Lord!"
They finished their tirade and looked at Malfoy expectantly while he tried
to figure out exactly where they'd found out about the Lord. "You know about the
Lord?"
The missionaries seemed surprised. "Why of course we know about the Lord,"
the woman replied. "He is for all to have who read his book." She waved the
black book at Malfoy again and he stared at it. "What!? You have one of those
too? But I thought I was the one with whom he entrusted his story."
They looked shocked. "Why, no, of course not. Anyone can have the good
book."
"Oh," that made sense, Malfoy thought. Lord Voldemort was much too clever
to entrust the only copy of his diary to one single person. "Excellent, now I
can try to give another copy of it to unsuspecting people in order to aide the
Lord's return."
The missionaries looked pleased. "Would you like a copy?"
"Certainly, my copy was ruined by some brat." He took the copy of it and
could almost not contain his excitement.
"Ah," the man nodded wisely. "The heathens." Malfoy looked at him in
surprise. Blood-traitors, mugggle-lovers and mudbloods were all known terms to
him but he had yet to hear this one. "Heathens, you call them?"
"Yes," the man continued. "Those who have not accepted the Lord into his
heart and submitted their lives to his service in hopes that one day he might
reign in our world."
"Yes, I know exactly the type you are talking about." Lucius forgot that
these were muggles he was talking to. "They think that they're so great because
they accept all, regardless of their origins. But you know what it's really
doing? It's bringing down the standards and soon we'll all be on their-" he
searched for the right word. "-Heathanistic level!"
"Exactly!" The woman was positively glistening with excitement. Lucius
could only imagine that they hadn't had a very receptive audience thus far. "It
is our mission, as Believers, to bring the truth to these people or else they
will burn for ever in eternal torment!"
Lucius was intrigued. "Really? Burn in eternal torment? I hadn't heard of
that curse. Is it similar to the cruciatus curse?"
The missionaries looked at Lucius in confusion. "Er, curse? Well..." the
man looked at the woman and she answered, "It is, in a way, like a curse. I
mean, it can't be a blessing!"
The three of them laughed. "Well, I would love to stay here a bit longer and
discuss ways of tormenting the-heathen, you called them?" The missionaries
nodded. "But I've got to go talk to the Lord and ask him why he changed our
modus operandi without telling me first. I am, you see, one of his most trusted
servants." He smiled at them warmly, patting his wrist and they just looked at
him, all smiles. "Do stop by again, we'll have some tea, and you can tell me all
about the curses you've developed to use against blood-traitors and mud bloods."
"Oh yes! Certainly!" The missionaries waved good-bye and Lucius shut the
door, feeling the sort of satisfaction he usually felt only after hatching a
good plan to torment muggles. MUGGLES! The word exploded in his head like a bomb
and he glanced down at the book he was holding. It certainly looked like
Voldemort's diary. He rushed into his study, grabbed a quill and some ink and
opened it up. As his eyes fell upon the page he felt a rush of surprise. There
was already writing in it! And not just writing! Print! About Love! And Faith!
And souls being saved and how much the Lord, God, Jesus Christ loved everyone!
They weren't new Death Eaters!
Suddenly Lucius felt very unclean. He had just commiserated with MUGGLES
about the problems of untrue wizards and mudbloods!
****
The missionaries left the manor feeling very pleased with themselves. It
wasn't easy being a missionary in Britain and they had been completely prepared
to spend a whole day without finding a single person willing to listen to them,
much less agree with them. Floating on the wings of success they decided to call
it a day when a thought occurred to the woman. "What do you suppose he meant by
mudbloods and curses? That was really metaphorical speech for 'heathens' and
'damnation', wasn't it?"
"Of course it was," the man answered without hesitation. At that moment,
both of them turned to look back at the manor, just in time to see an owl fly
out of a window. They also noted suddenly that the high fence around the manor
consisted of images of serpents and a Latin inscription. The woman gasped.
"Serpents! The devil's creature! And Latin!" She looked at her colleague
worriedly. "You don't suppose he's catholic, do you?"
The man laughed. "Catholic? Absolutely not. England did away with the
Catholics long ago and he definitely wasn't Irish. Besides, that Latin
inscription means 'Power to the Dark Lord and may he bring supremacy to Wizards
of pureblood.'" This took a moment to sink in but when it did, the missionaries
stared at each other in shock. "That," the woman said slowly, "is much worse
than Catholic."
The man nodded. "Indeed. There is only one thing we can do: get rid of
this male-witch! We need torches! Stakes! And Pitchforks!" The missionaries
rushed off.
****
Hours later, Malfoy was sitting in the dining room eating the dinner
Narcissa had grudgingly conjured up when, for the second time that day, the
doorbell rang. Lucius threw down his napkin and strode up to the window next to
the front door. It was, as he had expected, the missionaries. Only this time
they weren't alone. They had brought with them a whole host of other similarly
dressed muggles, all clutching either pitchforks, torches, or bibles. Lucius
thought he could make out a battering ram. "Oh, no." Apparently he wasn't the
only one who had realized he wasn't dealing with who he thought he was. Grabbing
his wand, opened the front door, just as the missionaries with the battering ram
were swinging it back in order to knock down the door and it hit him square in
the chest, knocking both his wand from him and the air out of him. "Get him!"
The missionaries cried. Lucius strained for his wand and touched it with the
tips of his fingers when a missionary tripped on his arm and landed on him,
dropping the torch on the very old and expensive rug the Malfoy's had on the
entry hall floor. Combined with the dust and sweat of a thousand years, it
immediately caught fire. Screams erupted and Malfoy could feel the heat spread
around him and, in desperation, he reached for his wand again so he could get
rid of the fire when he saw that the stupid muggle had knocked it away. His
sense of self-preservation kicked in and Lucius jumped up and made for the door,
but the fire and already spread to his long robes and, besides that, the
missionaries, in their haste to abandon their mission to rid the world of evil,
had completely stampeded and blocked the doorway. The fire spread to the long
curtains, then the oil lamps on the walls and soon, the entire manor was
consumed in fire.
****
"And tonight on the six o'clock news: The railroad strike has reached epic
proportions in some parts of the country, leaving thousands of travelers
stranded," the news reporter said in a cheery look-I'm-on-TV voice. Someone off-
screen handed him a piece of paper. "Oh, this just in: A fire has consumed a
historical manor early this evening, killing at least thirty people, including
the owners. Investigators have yet to find the exact cause of the fire, but
local townspeople said that they'd heard rumors that a witch hunt was on for the
evening." The man chuckled. "Witch hunt, indeed. Well, let's go to Jim Jenson
for the weather..."
die in it, even though he does take a very long time to get there. I love it
when intolerance destroys itself.
Disclaimer: Don't own Harry Potter, or Lucius, or Dobby, or Malfoy or Narcissa
or the manor they lived in.
Chapter 4: Fire and Brimstone
The doorbell rang, a loud and monotonous sound that reverberated
throughout the house. "Dobby!" Lucius Malfoy shouted once it had rang three
times, "The door!" That's when he remembered that he no longer had an house-elf,
thanks to meddling, I-vanquished-the-Dark-Lord Harry Potter. He snarled and got
up from his chair where he had been plotting more clever ways to get rid of
Dumbledore, Harry Potter and a whole slew of other people he didn't like.
"What?" He snarled at the two people, one male, the other female, both of them
wearing formal muggle attire, standing outside his door. This completely failed
to make them frightened, something that only irritated him even more. The male
spoke first.
"Hello! We're sorry to disturb you, but my colleague," the female smiled
graciously, "and I were just in the neighborhood spreading the word of our
Lord."
Now the female stepped forward, waving a small black book in front of Malfoy's
face. "Have you accepted the Lord into your heart?"
Whatever Malfoy had been expecting this wasn't it. "The Lord?" he
stammered, momentarily forgetting his irritation, "Which Lord do you mean?" He
stood there in surprise as the muggles trampled over each other's words to
describe their Lord.
"Why, THE Lord of course."
"The All-knowing!"
"The All-powerful!"
"The one who will was cursed by all but came back to life from death-"
"Promising to set forth a new order of glory for the righteous and
deserving-"
"His chosen people!"
"On this Earth!"
They finished together: "The Lord!"
They finished their tirade and looked at Malfoy expectantly while he tried
to figure out exactly where they'd found out about the Lord. "You know about the
Lord?"
The missionaries seemed surprised. "Why of course we know about the Lord,"
the woman replied. "He is for all to have who read his book." She waved the
black book at Malfoy again and he stared at it. "What!? You have one of those
too? But I thought I was the one with whom he entrusted his story."
They looked shocked. "Why, no, of course not. Anyone can have the good
book."
"Oh," that made sense, Malfoy thought. Lord Voldemort was much too clever
to entrust the only copy of his diary to one single person. "Excellent, now I
can try to give another copy of it to unsuspecting people in order to aide the
Lord's return."
The missionaries looked pleased. "Would you like a copy?"
"Certainly, my copy was ruined by some brat." He took the copy of it and
could almost not contain his excitement.
"Ah," the man nodded wisely. "The heathens." Malfoy looked at him in
surprise. Blood-traitors, mugggle-lovers and mudbloods were all known terms to
him but he had yet to hear this one. "Heathens, you call them?"
"Yes," the man continued. "Those who have not accepted the Lord into his
heart and submitted their lives to his service in hopes that one day he might
reign in our world."
"Yes, I know exactly the type you are talking about." Lucius forgot that
these were muggles he was talking to. "They think that they're so great because
they accept all, regardless of their origins. But you know what it's really
doing? It's bringing down the standards and soon we'll all be on their-" he
searched for the right word. "-Heathanistic level!"
"Exactly!" The woman was positively glistening with excitement. Lucius
could only imagine that they hadn't had a very receptive audience thus far. "It
is our mission, as Believers, to bring the truth to these people or else they
will burn for ever in eternal torment!"
Lucius was intrigued. "Really? Burn in eternal torment? I hadn't heard of
that curse. Is it similar to the cruciatus curse?"
The missionaries looked at Lucius in confusion. "Er, curse? Well..." the
man looked at the woman and she answered, "It is, in a way, like a curse. I
mean, it can't be a blessing!"
The three of them laughed. "Well, I would love to stay here a bit longer and
discuss ways of tormenting the-heathen, you called them?" The missionaries
nodded. "But I've got to go talk to the Lord and ask him why he changed our
modus operandi without telling me first. I am, you see, one of his most trusted
servants." He smiled at them warmly, patting his wrist and they just looked at
him, all smiles. "Do stop by again, we'll have some tea, and you can tell me all
about the curses you've developed to use against blood-traitors and mud bloods."
"Oh yes! Certainly!" The missionaries waved good-bye and Lucius shut the
door, feeling the sort of satisfaction he usually felt only after hatching a
good plan to torment muggles. MUGGLES! The word exploded in his head like a bomb
and he glanced down at the book he was holding. It certainly looked like
Voldemort's diary. He rushed into his study, grabbed a quill and some ink and
opened it up. As his eyes fell upon the page he felt a rush of surprise. There
was already writing in it! And not just writing! Print! About Love! And Faith!
And souls being saved and how much the Lord, God, Jesus Christ loved everyone!
They weren't new Death Eaters!
Suddenly Lucius felt very unclean. He had just commiserated with MUGGLES
about the problems of untrue wizards and mudbloods!
****
The missionaries left the manor feeling very pleased with themselves. It
wasn't easy being a missionary in Britain and they had been completely prepared
to spend a whole day without finding a single person willing to listen to them,
much less agree with them. Floating on the wings of success they decided to call
it a day when a thought occurred to the woman. "What do you suppose he meant by
mudbloods and curses? That was really metaphorical speech for 'heathens' and
'damnation', wasn't it?"
"Of course it was," the man answered without hesitation. At that moment,
both of them turned to look back at the manor, just in time to see an owl fly
out of a window. They also noted suddenly that the high fence around the manor
consisted of images of serpents and a Latin inscription. The woman gasped.
"Serpents! The devil's creature! And Latin!" She looked at her colleague
worriedly. "You don't suppose he's catholic, do you?"
The man laughed. "Catholic? Absolutely not. England did away with the
Catholics long ago and he definitely wasn't Irish. Besides, that Latin
inscription means 'Power to the Dark Lord and may he bring supremacy to Wizards
of pureblood.'" This took a moment to sink in but when it did, the missionaries
stared at each other in shock. "That," the woman said slowly, "is much worse
than Catholic."
The man nodded. "Indeed. There is only one thing we can do: get rid of
this male-witch! We need torches! Stakes! And Pitchforks!" The missionaries
rushed off.
****
Hours later, Malfoy was sitting in the dining room eating the dinner
Narcissa had grudgingly conjured up when, for the second time that day, the
doorbell rang. Lucius threw down his napkin and strode up to the window next to
the front door. It was, as he had expected, the missionaries. Only this time
they weren't alone. They had brought with them a whole host of other similarly
dressed muggles, all clutching either pitchforks, torches, or bibles. Lucius
thought he could make out a battering ram. "Oh, no." Apparently he wasn't the
only one who had realized he wasn't dealing with who he thought he was. Grabbing
his wand, opened the front door, just as the missionaries with the battering ram
were swinging it back in order to knock down the door and it hit him square in
the chest, knocking both his wand from him and the air out of him. "Get him!"
The missionaries cried. Lucius strained for his wand and touched it with the
tips of his fingers when a missionary tripped on his arm and landed on him,
dropping the torch on the very old and expensive rug the Malfoy's had on the
entry hall floor. Combined with the dust and sweat of a thousand years, it
immediately caught fire. Screams erupted and Malfoy could feel the heat spread
around him and, in desperation, he reached for his wand again so he could get
rid of the fire when he saw that the stupid muggle had knocked it away. His
sense of self-preservation kicked in and Lucius jumped up and made for the door,
but the fire and already spread to his long robes and, besides that, the
missionaries, in their haste to abandon their mission to rid the world of evil,
had completely stampeded and blocked the doorway. The fire spread to the long
curtains, then the oil lamps on the walls and soon, the entire manor was
consumed in fire.
****
"And tonight on the six o'clock news: The railroad strike has reached epic
proportions in some parts of the country, leaving thousands of travelers
stranded," the news reporter said in a cheery look-I'm-on-TV voice. Someone off-
screen handed him a piece of paper. "Oh, this just in: A fire has consumed a
historical manor early this evening, killing at least thirty people, including
the owners. Investigators have yet to find the exact cause of the fire, but
local townspeople said that they'd heard rumors that a witch hunt was on for the
evening." The man chuckled. "Witch hunt, indeed. Well, let's go to Jim Jenson
for the weather..."
