Chapter 41

It was those dratted dreams of hers. They told her. Somehow, she'd found out what I was going to do.

Was that why she hadn't been getting enough sleep? Because of me? Because she knew I was going to kill somebody?

No, no, no—I didn't want this to have anything to do with Lily. At all. Lily was one thing I did not want to contaminate with myself—you notice I'm the one doing the contaminating, and not her. She might have been a muggleborn, and therefore someone with considerably dirty blood, while I was pureblooded, and, supposedly clean.

But my soul was as black as the Gates of Hell. And hers? Purer than an angel's, no doubt.

What could I do, to keep her mind at ease? Being a typical Gryffindor, she would, no doubt, worry herself senseless about the "anonymous sacrifice's" demise. I would need an alibi, of course. I could always get some Polyjuice Potion from Father's cabinet—it would take too long to brew some for myself. But who could I possibly get to impersonate me? It had to be someone I trusted greatly.

There weren't many of those around, unfortunately.

Crabbe? Goyle? No—they were both too stupid to be me.

Peter? No—he'd always been one to do what he wanted to do instead of follow orders—it wouldn't have been below him to try and molest Lily in my guise.

The mere thought of that caused my fists to clench in anger.

No.

I had to be rational right now.

Think think think. Who could I use?

Severus.

Yes. He could do it—given the right incentive. Why hadn't I thought of him before? Of course, it would take a great amount of force, if not bribery, to get him to do this. He'd never been one to deceive people on purpose.

But then again, he was a Slytherin—who knew what he did? Narcissa had been right—Severus was too withdrawn-- even I, his sometimes-roommate, knew next to nothing about him, or his family. He stayed at Hogwarts for the Holidays, that I was sure of. 

But what else was I sure of?

For all I knew, he could've been an axe-murderer, waiting for his chance to murder Lily.

Or not.

As much as I'd like to go on talking about this mysterious hex-maker, this is my story, so naturally, I'll talk more about myself.

Now, where was I?

Yes, I remember. My plan to keep everything a secret from Lily.

Well, naturally, I'd have to tell Severus about it. 

I rummaged through my desk and managed to find a spare piece of parchment paper. I scratched a quick note on it with my quill ('Slytherin Common Room Fire Eleven Tonight') and sent it on its way via Juno (one of the many family owls—I believe we'd had more than Hogwarts, at that point).

Leaning back on the chair, I must admit, I felt rather smug with my cleverness. That affair was dealt with, at least.

I hoped Lily would be a bit more gullible, uncharacteristic though it was of her. Again, possibly to appease my waking conscience, I reminded myself that what I was doing was all for her.

Seriously.

I'd even made a list. 

Number One:

Joining Voldemort—despite all the added privileges this gave me, it would save her in the long run (or at least I thought so). 

Number Two:

Spying on Her—again, I did seem to get much more out of this than she did, but at least it put my suspicions to rest, and therefore saved her from the wrath of my jealousy.

Number Three:

Lying to Her—this, of course, did nothing at all to help me. It was just to keep her a) in the dark, and b) at ease. Didn't want her to know she was consorting with a murderer cum mudblood-hating-deatheater, did I?

. . .

Right. After. . . further consideration, I will concede to the fact that Lying to Her gave me, once again, a fringe benefit or two—asides from all stated above, it gave me the added advantage of Lily herself. Not lying to her would have meant the immediate extermination of our relationship. 

And they call me cynical? I did everything for her (almost).

Some people could be so nauseatingly blind.

My watch told me it was still half-past ten.

What could I do to kill time? Kill house-elves? I snickered mentally at the joke.

What can I say? I was immensely bored. There was absolutely no chance in Hell I was going to go back down to the party. If I did, I would probably be ensnared yet again by my would-be-fiancée, Miss Narcissa Black. 

A knock sounded from my door.

"Lucius?" A feminine voice inquired tentatively, a barely recognizable hint of arrogance and snootiness beneath the veil of meekness.

Well, well. Speak of the devil.

"Come in." I said, after I'd hidden all the incriminating evidence.

"I hope you don't think me too forward, barging into your room like this"—here, she gave a small giggle which told me exactly how forward she thought it was—"but I just had to see you. Andromeda's being such a bore about Thomas or Teddie, and Bellatrix is just awful. I was feeling so lonely over there, especially after you left me all alone."

Had I been anybody else but myself, I would have shown irritation at her remark. But I was Lucius, and therefore I had the amazing ability to mask my emotions.

"Well, Narcissa, I had—something to attend to. Lucky you came here when I'd just finished." 

"It's a beautiful room," she murmured, touching the hangings of my bed.

"Indeed. Elves have taste, don't they. But this isn't really my room—I've never had a room here. Father doesn't want me to get too attached to anything, see. Because of that, I've been changing rooms about every half year. Only suites, of course—that's the third floor. Fourth floor's the guestrooms, first floor's the ballrooms and living rooms." I knew I was babbling quite a bit, but I had to say something.

"What about the second floor then? Isn't that--"

"Now, now, Narcissa, we all have those floors. Father likes to call it his. . . Grimoire."

Have I confused you? Obviously a grimoire is a book of dark magic. Well, our second floor was hidden—one tended to go straight to the third unless he was given clearance. Why is it hidden? I'm sure you know that the Malfoys, of the past, present, and the future, are great believers of the Dark Arts. And. . . Some of the things we have in the second floor appear in the Ministry's Dark Artifacts List. Ha.  As if they'd be smart enough to see something right in front of them. So anyway, to end this little diatribe, Father calls the second floor his grimoire, as it is, literally, stuffed with Dark books (dating since before Merlin) and Dark Artifacts.

The Malfoys are not the only pure blood family to have this—I am quite certain the Blacks have one as well, though not as extensive as ours, of course.

Wait. . .Let me rephrase that—they must have had one, before that fool Sirius Black turned his back on his family, and they lost themselves an heir.

I will return to the story, as this chapter seems to be taking quite long in the making.

"I see," Narcissa said delicately, as if she believed matters such as this were for men only.

"Yes." I looked around my room conspiciously, letting the silence hang a bit.

Did she have no inkling whatsoever of my obvious discomfort?

I WANTED TO BE ALONE, DAMN IT.

WONDERFULLY ALONE.

"Oh dear, my necklace is growing warm. Mother's looking for me. Sorry for keeping you so long. Ta, Lucius dear." She leaned forward to kiss my cheek, and as she did so, I caught an unfortunate whiff of her rather artificial smell. 

"Wonderful to meet you, Narcissa." I nodded, bowed down, and kissed the proffered hand like the expert that I was.

Proud as I was (and still am) of my ability to keep my emotions at bay, I am sorry to say I slammed the door a little louder than usual as she left.

Oh well.

Served the girl right, intruding into my personal space.

Now, I wouldn't have time to kill any more house elves.

Damn it.

In fact, I hadn't even thought of what I was going to say to Severus.

Just my luck I was a perfect orator. And that wasn't arrogance talking, either.

I took my seat in my floo fireplace (not a regular fireplace where you could just floo—you didn't honestly think I would kneel down on the floor, did you? I bowed to no one [except maybe Lord Voldemort, but that part hasn't come yet]), cast down a generous pinch of floo powder, and said 'Slytherin Common Room Fire Place Three'.

Then, it was just the usual—the spinning sensation, the dust, etcetera. Nothing new.

"Lucius. What did you want to speak to me about?"

Severus was being extremely grumpy today. I would have to handle him a bit carefully.

"Well, I was just wondering if I could ask a favor."

"A favor." One dark eyebrow rose insolently. A small part of me wondered what had gotten him in such a bad mood, but I dismissed it.

"Yes—do your ears need cleaning? If they do, I know just the spell," I drawled sarcastically. When Severus was in a bad mood, you matched it—you didn't cower. I never did, anyway.

"No, Lucius, they do not. Now what is it you plan to ask of me?" He snapped.

"Well. Gotten to the point, have we? I need protection."

"Protection."

"Will you stop echoing every bloody thing I say? Yes, I said protection. No, not for me. Lily." I paused, to catch his reaction. He looked mildly surprised, but he'd hidden that emotion quickly.

"Why would she need protection? From whom?" I drew a deep breath.

"Me, possibly. No, I'm not a werewolf. I'm just. . . look. Lily is a mud—muggleborn, and you know who she might need protection from."

"I'm a pureblood wizard like yourself, with the same prejudices. What makes you think I wouldn't hurt her? And would she want me to protect her? I'm Severus Snape," he said the last two words sneeringly.

"And if you are? That's the point—I want you, not Parkinson, or, Merlin forbid, Crabbe or Goyle. They haven't got half your talent-- you're almost as good at the dark arts as I am—you would be able to protect her. And as for looks—you could always take the polyjuice potion and be me for a bit."

"Be someone else for a bit. . . sounds nice. But I won't do this until I know what you're planning to do. Tell me the truth, Lucius."

"Lord Voldemort." I said curtly. "You've heard of him?"

"Heard of him? He's all over the news--"

"With his anti-muggle, anti-mudblood act. Yes, well, the ministry is hardly rallying to his cause, but just about every pureblood is."

"And you're one of them?"

"I am. I. . . have an initiation ceremony to undergo soon, once school starts."

"I presume the initiation has something to do with murdering a mudblood." He seemed to be catching on quickly.

"Of course it does. And. . . I need you to make sure that mudblood isn't Lily."

"And at the same time make sure Lily doesn't know you're hurting anybody."

"Yes." I'd always admired his ability to latch onto my train of thought. "So you will do it?" I had the right combination of boredom and anxiousness. If I sounded too bored, he would think I had somebody else lined up for the job, and refuse. If I sounded too anxious, he might try to profit from the deal, which, though not too hard with all my financial resources at hand, could be bothersome. 

"How long did you say your initiation ceremony would be?" He was considering it—the tell-tale gleam from his eyes told it all.

"Possibly all night."

"Fine. I'll do it then."

"Good." I nodded, and popped out of his fireplace.

Excellent. My plan was working out perfectly.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

A/N:

Hello everybody, and no, I didn't fall off a cliff. How long did it take me to make this? Er. . . well, sorry I couldn't update sooner :D This, I fear, may be the last update of this year.

certain hot blonde apparates into the room

"Rhyming, now, are we?"

author, pretending to be annoyed, instead looks like she is hyperventilating

"Rhyming? Of course not. That was just a—a--*sigh* Lucius, where have you been?"

evil Death Eater smirks mysteriously, waving a leather clad hand

"My Lord's business, what did you think, muggle?"

said muggle turns a shade of red and turns back to the computer

"Excuse me, but I happen to be typing the replies of the reviews to your story."

pale blonde eyebrow rises

"Reviews? Indeed? Let me."

As you know, with wizards like Lucius, you don't really have a choice. And so, I am kicked off my computer—

Ah, hello little muggles. You've missed me? I'm too important to type reviews—I'll leave that to the author. I just wanted to—how do you say this—pop in. Remind you I'm still alive and hexing [a/n: I believe that was the wizard version of alive and kicking]. Yes well, dark mark burns my Lord calls. Farewell, muggles. Enjoy your pathetic little lives while you can. disapparates

How nice of him.

Can you believe, for once, that I have something to say right now? About the chapter? Yes, Severus. He is, obviously, being picked on by the 'jerks of the year'—or, the marauders. Which is why he isn't exactly keen on being Severus Snape—and that sort of explains why he practically jumped at the opportunity. Okay, maybe he didn't jump, but he was being quite optimistic, for a Slytherin, anyway. 

Okay, THANK YOU's:

Dilligas--*sigh* I don't want Lucius to turn into a murderer either. But he did *sigh*. Maybe I really should make some sort of AU story and split this into two. . . you know, where Lucius doesn't do anything terrible and he ends up with Lily and they live happily ever after? *sob* but, I fear *Trelawney voice* that it cannot be. *sob*

Black Snow—hey!!! *huggles* you're back! Thanks for reviewing! :D

LaurenK—I'm glad you like the story, and I'm glad you think the 'quality' of fanfiction has gotten better :D Thanks for reviewing!

Briana—I just read the last Flower Twins chapter—you know, the new one? It's great :D Sirius and Petunia's first fight, teehee. I'm just such a lazy freak for not reviewing, so I'll tell you here how great it was! :D The Lily thing, telling Lucius not to do it, was more on the 'don't murder whoever it is' than don't spy on me :D Although I must admit I think she'd be pretty peeved if she ever knew Lucius was spying on her :D  I'm glad you like the way I write—I'm practicing what it's like to get into character and stuff, since, being the abnormal freak I am, I have nothing better to do :D Thanks for the wonderfully LONG review! :D

Kingsdork—thank you! I'm glad you like my story that much :D I hope this chapter was longer than the other one—I think it took me a great deal longer, anyway :D