Spoiler Warning: This story is a sixth year fic that follows on from the events of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. As a conseqeunce this story contains *major* spoilers for book 5. You have been warned.
SNAKE HEALER: THE MALFOY MUGGLE LOVER
CHAPTER 8: PARTINGS
Lucius was once again to be found in his office, although this time it appeared from what he could hear that he had the company of a complaining Draco. Lucas may have been there too, but Harry could not see him as the office door was closed.
"But Father he's Harry Potter, the boy-who-lived, the reason you went to Azkaban," Draco was protesting, spitting his enemy's name with venom. He did not need to hear the reply to imagine the strict gaze that Lucius was giving his son.
"Harry was no more the cause of my imprisonment than your Aunt Bella and I don't see you blaming her. It was the dark lord who is ultimately responsible," The Malfoy patriarch replied, his voice clearly confirming Harry's idea of his facial expression.
"How can you say that?" Draco exclaimed, sounding in equal measure horrified and indignant. "You can't blame a failed mission on our master. You were in the right, loyally serving him for a just and noble cause, when you were captured by the enemy. They are the ones to blame, not our own side."
If anything was going to rile Harry's already volatile temper then calling the death eaters a just and noble cause was going to be it. He didn't hesitate to open the door and storm in, ignoring the annoyed look that Lucius had sent his way for interrupting his conversation. Draco looked momentarily shocked, before he covered his surprise up with a mask of defiance. Lucas, Harry noted vaguely, was standing in the corner looking very angry.
"Just and noble!" Harry roared, "There is nothing just and noble about Voldemort. He's a nasty, evil, cold-blooded mass-murderer who killed your own uncle and your mother's cousin. Do you think he actually cares about your stupid prejudices?" He paused for a breath, half expecting a reply from Draco. He was only slightly disappointed when one came.
"Of course he does," Draco drawled defensively, "It's his stated aim to rid the world of mudbloods and muggles." He didn't even notice the expression on his father's face, which clearly said that Draco was repeating what Lucius believed to be lies; both Harry and Lucas did though.
"You really think so?" Harry queried angrily, leaning into Draco so as to intimidate him and some how pulling it off even though he was shorter than his rival, "You really think that Voldemort gives a damn about who he kills. You really think that Voldemort cares for something other than domination and destruction. You really think that Voldemort is something other than a poor abused halfblooded Orphan looking for revenge? Well do you?"
Draco was beginning to look a little flustered as Harry took another step forward before he could reply, disturbing the Malfoy heir's look of cold defiance. Of course part of this lack of composure may have been through the surprise of having Harry actually to intimidate his rival, normally the Gryffindor would have hexed him by now. But then Malfoy never usually said things, which Harry perceived to be so outrageous. Harry wasn't just angry for himself but for all the victims too.
"Yes I do," Draco said slight shakily, defiance clear in his voice, "I think you're lying. I think you're scared, Potter. You're scared because you know the dark lord will win, that he'll kill you and your precious mudblood. You're going to end up just like your worthless mudblood mother and you know it…"
Smack!
"Draco!" Harry had punched the Malfoy heir in retaliation at exactly the same time as Lucius called out his son's name as an angry warning. Neither had taken kindly to the Slytherin insulting Lilly Potter.
"Do not ever insult my mother ever again, Malfoy," Harry hissed, as he followed up his punch with another right hook. He had barely heard Lucius' warning to Draco and had paid even less attention to it. The fact he felt no surprise about ending up in a full body-bind was totally unrelated, he expected Lucius to stand up for his son, especially considering that, in Harry's opinion, Draco had never really provided any evidence that he could stand up for himself without the help of others. What he didn't expect though was to be ignored after being placed in the body-bind and hear Lucius turn his wrath on Draco not Harry.
"I have taught you better than to speak ill of the dead, Draco," Lucius scolded, with a firm slap to his son's cheek.
"But she was a mudblood," Draco protested, sounding as if Lilly Potter's supposed heritage made her subhuman. Whilst that comment would not have led Harry to attack his rival it certainly angered him greatly. Lucius wasn't particularly impressed either.
"Lilly was not a mudblood!" Lucius roared. He seemed to take the insult personally. Harry presumed because this was because he would never have slept with his mother if she had been muggle-born. "She was a loyal, kind and intelligent witch not some common mudblood whore!" From what Harry could see from his position on the floor, Draco had been extremely surprised by the vehemence of his father's response, but then he had probably been unaware of Lilly Potter's true ancestry.
"But Theodore said…" Draco began to protest snobbily. Harry wasn't particularly surprised to see the Malfoy heir arguing with his father; he'd seen it before just before second year, but many of his year mates would be; Draco's idolatry of his father was well known around Hogwarts. What Harry was surprised to hear, however, was for the blond to back up his arguments with something one of his friends had told him. Harry was not alone in thinking that Draco treated everything his father told him as fact without question.
The protest didn't last long as it was cut off by a fierce glare from his father. "Are you saying that you trust the words of the Nott boy more than my own?" Lucius asked forcefully, a slight sneer audible in his icy tone. It also caused Draco to cringe slightly; it seemed his comments had seriously angered his father.
Harry wouldn't be affected though, the same intensity of the glare and the same cold voice were regular features of the way Professor Snape treated Harry both in and out of potions classes. As such he was used to it, but it clearly seemed that Draco wasn't, but then the Malfoy heir normally tried everything within his powers to stay on his father's good side; in Draco's eyes the consequences of failing to do so were not good.
"No father," Draco replied huffily, taking care to appear apologetic enough to appease with his father, without sounding submissive. Whilst he believed his father he almost certainly didn't want to and was in no way repentant in trying to bring Nott's information into the conversation. It was only a small defiance, but it didn't dare push his luck, especially when his father was in such a bad mood.
Fortunately the ruse work and Lucius did not detect the defiance, causing his gaze to soften slightly and make Draco relax and feel more confidant. It also allowed Draco's fierce hatred for Harry to surface and in particular his disgust for Harry's presence at Malfoy Manor. "You can't let him stay here, father," Draco protested petulantly, a hint of anger and hatred evident in his voice, "He's Harry Potter." He spoke Harry's name as if it was a dirty mark on his best robes: annoying but not particularly dangerous. The bratty voice, which he was using, only increased the effect. Not that Harry cared, to his mind Draco sounded remarkably like a cross between Dudley and Aunt Petunia.
"He is my son, your half-brother and a Malfoy," Lucius snapped, his glare hardening. Both Harry and Draco had to fight down a grimace when they were informed of their fraternal relationship and made an unspoken pact to never acknowledge it, even between themselves.
"But father," Draco protested indignantly, "He's Harry Potter, the boy-who-lived, the dark lord's greatest enemy and you call him your son. How could you? He's a Gryffindor, a muggle-lover, the enemy…"
"And my son." Lucius interrupted sternly, turning his full glare upon Draco, "He may be misguided in his beliefs but that does not change his ancestry and his parentage. I have taught you better than to put your petty concerns before your loyalty to the family."
This had the effect of making Draco look positively furious, a sight which Harry found immensely satisfying, if a little worrying. Even though it sounded petty, Harry enjoyed the sight of the unhappy Draco being chastised by the father he so adored and responding with anger and disillusionment rather than with brooding acceptance or small-minded bickering. It seemed that the petty and vindictive brat-prince of Slytherin was finally growing up and starting to think for himself. Unfortunately it also looked apparent that the Malfoy heir was destined to become the impossible - someone who was more radical and more evil than his father. But then Lucius Malfoy was giving the impression that he was nicer than Harry had previously believed him to be. Of course 'nicer' was a relative term with Lucius in the same way that the death eaters were 'nicer' than Voldemort even if both were utterly evil. Whether this new-found pleasantness was an act, the result of his arrest and brief sojourn in Azkaban or an indication that Lucius had an ulterior motive fir Harry was a moot point, but it looked increasingly like it was the latter, after all Draco certainly believed the attitude to be real and he would know his father better than nearly everyone. Harry discounted the second as unlikely, after all twelve years in Azkaban hadn't changed Bellatrix Lestrange and the other escaped death eaters.
"Petty concerns!" Draco spluttered, sounding as livid as he looked. "There is nothing petty about the greatest and most powerful wizard alive and his glorious mission to rid the world of muggle filth."
Harry didn't know whether to be disgusted, angry or amused by the comments of his school rival. Whilst the description of the dark lord's mission engendered the first two emotions, he could only shake his head in resigned amusement and mild disgust at the falsity of Draco's other descriptions of Voldemort. He eventually chose disgust, if only because Lucius Malfoy responded to his son's words with anger and amusement.
"There are greater wizards alive than the dark lord, Draco." Lucius responded, "Severus Snape and I are two of them."
The look on Draco's face that resulted from these words was a picture. Shock, horror, disbelief and anger mingled together to create an expression, which would have had Harry laughing if it weren't for the body-bind Lucius had placed on him. Harry fully expected Draco to respond, except that the blond didn't because he was too shocked to speak
"As for his mission," Lucius continued, paying no attention to his son's expression, "There is nothing glorious about murder."
An indignant fury swept through Harry in a fit of righteous anger, which was directed at Lucius' hypocrisy. This was the man who had tried to kill Harry's friends only a few weeks previously and who had opened the chamber of secrets in Harry's second year with the aim of killing all the muggle-borns in Hogwarts. This fit of anger, however, was redirected to Draco the moment the Slytherin started to yell his reply.
"Snape! You honestly think the traitor is better than the dark lord." Draco yelled furiously. He sounded extremely angry, angrier than Harry had ever seen him before. But among the anger there was a sense of disappointment and betrayal, as if he were the disappointed father scolding his son. He paused as if to wait for a reply, but none come; there was no change to the inscrutable look on Lucius' face. "You have the gall to lecture me on loyalty when you betrayed the greatest wizard alive. And for what? Power? The dark lord can and has given you power beyond your wildest dreams. Money? The one thing you have more than enough of? Reputation? Only loyalty to the dark lord can restore that."
Lucius looked a little taken aback by his son's attitude, especially the sense of betrayal that Draco displayed. It was a role reversal that Draco's father, being a domineering man, did not appreciate. For once it was not someone else's anger that riled Lucius Malfoy, nor a foiling of one of his plans, instead it was loss and disappointment as he was scolded by the son who no longer had an unwavering belief in his father. There were other emotions that fuelled the Malfoy patriarchs as well, but nothing would allow Lucius to admit their existence. Malfoys did not experience desperation and despair when they lost control of their sons to the forked tongue of the current dark lord, nor did they blame this loss on their own mistakes, after all Malfoys did not make mistakes, although they could be controlled and swayed by extremely powerful wizards. Of course the fact that Lucius had admitted to making a mistake in joining Voldemort, thus directly contradicting this second assertion, was neither here nor there in this scenario.
"There are more important things than unwarranted loyalty to a psychotic dark lord and the promises of power, fame and money that he cannot fulfil," explained the Malfoy patriarch, his solemn tone full of weariness. "There is one loyalty that is absolute and unchangeable. One that cannot be overridden, not even by the lies and cowardice that passes for loyalty among the death eaters. Harry is family and the dark lord's greatest enemy. I cannot be loyal to both and duty requires that I chose Harry."
"Lie as you will father, but you don't fool me," Draco sneered in reply, reverting to the tone he normally reserved just for Harry. "Potter is an excuse, you would have betrayed the dark lord anyway."
"That is a possibility," Lucius stated casually. "I may have decided that his ministry deserved my loyalty in spite of the muggle-loving fools who infest it. Cornelius may have his faults, but he is certainly a worthwhile minister. It is a pity that he is constrained by the general ineptitude of our kind." Needless to say Harry found this description of the incompetent minister of magic extremely strange and more than a little funny. Draco seemed to agree with Harry's opinions as he snorted loudly, but was unable to say anything as Lucas, who had been listening quietly in the background, spoke first.
"You only say that because you can manipulate him," Lucas insisted, trying to hold back a snigger. "Virtually everyone else would disagree." Lucius merely responded with a devious smirk, which more than made up for his lack of words. He wasn't going to admit it in case someone would use his words against him, but his nephew's assessment was perfectly correct.
"The minister can change father, but the dark lord does not," Draco snapped, his angry tone disguising the fanatical nature of his words, which were making Harry feel very angry and slightly ill. "His greatness can never be diminished, even in death. He is the dark phoenix destined to cleanse the world of all those unworthy to live on it, able to defeat even death itself…"
"…Who was defeated by a fifteen month old baby and his unremarkable mother," Lucius snapped testily, saying exactly what was running through Harry's head. The Malfoy patriarch did not appreciate hearing his son spouting someone else's propaganda, especially if it was related to one of his enemies, a group which the dark lord been counted in for over twenty years. Even when Lucius had pretended to serve him loyally, he'd still aided the fight in minor ways by briefing Snape and the ministry spies on the dark lords plans and by taking action to save his friends, Lilly included, from being murdered by his supposed master. "A fifteen month old baby who was is and will forever remain my son, my blood and one of my primary loyalties." The forty-one year old continued snidely, with a pointed glare at both Harry and Draco indicating that he wanted his two sons to acknowledge this as well.
"Potter is not one of us! Ask him! Not even he believes that he belongs here." Draco roared in response, taking on the angry denial that Harry had deserted only moments before. Neither Lucius nor Harry were impressed by this reaction for differing reasons. The former disliked the denial, whilst Harry was concerned that he was actually agreeing with something that Draco had said. Not that Lucius liked his son's words much either, as he knew that the second half of the assertion was unfortunately correct, a situation that would have to be remedied.
"Harry's beliefs are irrelevant. He belongs here as much as you or I, even if he is convinced otherwise. His judgement is notoriously poor, as I am sure you can testify." Lucius responded snidely, casting a sidelong glance at Harry. Draco remained unmoved, despite the criticism of his archenemy. His father, just like his lord and his mother, was far more important than the Gryffindor.
"I am sure you know all about Potter's poor judgement, father, as he seems to have passed it on to you," Draco said coldly, glaring harshly at Harry accusation clearly visible in his eyes. Draco's words were serious, he truly believed that Harry had corrupted his father, "But still I will not betray you for your follies or tell of your dalliance with the losing side. If only to prove how much better than you I really am." The blond turned and swept from the room imperiously, attempting to and not really succeeding in intimidating the rest of his family.
Lucius stared after him blankly, letting his son get the final word. He was in a state of shock after having finally lost control of his elder son. Eventually, after he had finished processing what had just transpired, he roused himself from his stupor and turned his attentions towards his other child. Harry glared in response, knowing what Lucius would try to do and determined not to give an inch.
Apologies for taking so long in writing this chapter but I have been incredibly busy over the past few weeks and have had little time to write. This will continue for the next few months, so don't expect quick updates until the end of the summer. I know three weeks is a long time to wait, but the extended writing time has given me space to sort the various ideas peterning to this fic that arose out of book 5. Some of these ideas are clearly visible already in this chapter.
I'm not going to go into detail, but before OotP I was extremely concerned about Draco's status and character in this fic. Many of these concerns were answered by the ideas which sprung out of book five, making him a much more believable, rounded and above all prominnant character in this fic. (which is kind of ironic considering how 2D and non-existant he was in the actual book)
My other reason for changing this to a OotP fic is to with Sirius. I have never had much sentimental attachment to him, so wasn't that affected by his death, even if it did seem a little pointless. However in terms of this fic his fate is a blessing in disguise, as he was severely complicating both the Caranthir and the Lucius/Harry father/son plotlines. His death has removed these complications and replaced them with some rather nice Remus angst, which I allude to briefly in the revised chapter six.
Finally I can't write an OotP fic without commenting on the book itself. You've probably heard all the arguments to death so I'm just going to say that I liked it and thought it was a good albeit flawed book, especially the characterizations which, with a few notable exceptions (Draco and buddies) were brilliant.