Chapter Twelve: Before the Storm
A disaster, there was no other way to state it. And also impossible. Lucius Malfoy, how could it be? The Ministry respected him. The Dark Lord favored him. The commoners feared him. Yet all these factors could not prevent the mortal wound struck by Harry Potter and his crowd. All these factors could not cushion the fall.
But there was never supposed to be one.
The carriage jerked up and down over the rocks in the path, sending uncomfortable jolts through Draco's concentration, if it could be called that. He stared at the sateen wall ahead, back straight, face perfectly still. On the other side of the seat was Laine, similarly poised but less dangerous, more uneasy. He could not blame her, because he understood her and vice versa, but the frigid silence chilled him to the bone on this first day of summer.
It marked the first time a servant had taken them home. Father was somewhat…preoccupied at the moment (he hated the word), and Mother (Narcissa) had never cared enough to leave the Manor for anything but parties. The house elves were incapable of driving a carriage, and he had no idea of how to transport himself. So in the end, everything was perfectly logical, yes, but unsatisfying.
What was illogical was how it had ever happened. The emerald carpeted hills spoke of lush, languid days and charmed nights, when the lords supposedly walked with their ladies fair to gaze across the vastness of their estates. He simply could not force himself to believe; a Malfoy did not believe on pure faith, yet he could put all of his faith in one being, one man, one strong pillar that could never give way. And yet…the one certainty in his life had bowed, bent double. His head pounded with the enormity of the situation, even as cool gray eyes looked on calmly.
And he let logic and reason succumb to the jumble of thoughts threatening to spill forth.
He let the deluge come, he let it crash over him like the incoming tide and batter his tired body into submission. No longer were his eyes seeing the world; they were lost in a world of his own making. At one point, Laine opened her mouth to speak to him and promptly closed it again, either out of fear or maybe respect. She saw more than the figure half slumped in a velvet seat, because she felt almost the same way.
"We've arrived."
They were not the words of his father, who considered the use of unnecessary contractions to be distasteful. Reluctantly, Draco followed Laine out of the carriage and then followed the servant inside. It was a servant whose doddering, graceless frame swept open the double doors and ushered them inside; who commanded the elves to bring the trunks in and called Narcissa downstairs. Even though she'd be preoccupied.
"Draco…" she purred, glancing at him carelessly. "How are you?"
He stiffened in the chair, surveyed the parlor, and only then turned to look at his darling mother. "Fine, and you?" And he made a particular effort to ignore the man whose arm encircled her back.
That was the third one in a week, or maybe even the fourth. After a while, Draco decided to stop the tally, figuring that his mother's lovers were hers, to do with as she pleased. He asked simply that he not come into contact with them, but he still shuddered when he saw, out of the corner of his eye, how Mr. Someone snaked his hand around to trace the sleek lines of her waist.
"Have you met Mr. Flint yet? Lester, this is my son, by the way," added Narcissa, with a hint of contempt. Draco recognized it as such but nodded anyway. Then he looked at the older man's marred face and slouched figure and wondered a few things, just for a moment.
But all he did was uncross his legs and stand up. "Excuse me," he muttered, "I think I'll go outside…to breathe some real air." Before sauntering out, he presented a look of angelic innocence to their turned backs. Doubtless they would enjoy their privacy far more than he enjoyed their obvious affection.
Early the next morning, a common brown owl deposited its letter into the Malfoy's marble mail receptacle. It was strikingly out of place in this cool, ancient land.
Padding through the silent halls, the house-elf carried the pile of mail to the breakfast table, where another elf had already prepared coffee, toast, and slices of sizzling bacon. Turning, it saw a tall figure descend the staircase and darted over.
"Master Malfoy," greeted the house-elf with a bow.
Draco nodded and sat down at the table, riffling through the letters and sorting them by recipient. Most were for his father and would be set aside, a few for Narcissa…
"Laine, you have Ministry mail." He looked across his plate and handed it to her, before starting on the toast. Laine, though, immediately tore open the flimsy paper and finished reading with a somewhat annoyed expression.
She ate half her breakfast in silence and looked up only when Draco's disjointed voice came toward her. "I need a carriage to take me to the Arch today, and from there, I'll be going to the Ministry," she replied, sipping the unsweetened coffee. "They've finally decided to close the investigations on my…late parents." Her brows furrowed as she spoke the words, foreign and rusty in her mouth after five years of disuse.
"The Ministry?" Draco snapped out of his unusual daze and he looked at her with equally unusual intensity. "Hotbed of enemies, bureaucrats, and traitors." Then he shrugged. "Jacques wouldn't mind driving again, he hasn't done so for four years or so."
Everything went like a dream. Yes, everything, despite the maniacal laughter on the Knight Bus, the unease of the few Muggles she had passed, the frequent moods of the weather that threatened to wreak havoc on her chartreuse silken summer robes. With only a little trouble, she found the telephone booth and dialed herself underneath London, into the Ministry Atrium.
What struck her at first was the screaming, crass opulence. The light gleamed off the cherry wood floor, the rows of golden fireplaces, the blue ceiling above, leaving no shadows but creating a sense of weight as if all the gold were dragging down the very walls. Despite the vastness of space, the false splendor cramped whatever redeeming qualities might have shone through. As she walked into the center of the Atrium, Laine narrowed her eyes very slightly, careful to look directly ahead. The overall impression of the Ministry of Magic did not reassure her. It drew a spasm of nausea to her stomach.
She was a slender, straight-backed figure, cool green cutting through a sea of stifling, buttery gold. Alone, she looked smaller, and the clicking of her shoes echoed softly in the emptiness.
Though she had no guardian, she passed through security calmly and descended to Level Two within seconds. A few secretaries flashed her odd looks, but most were too busy to interfere. Laine paused at the end of one carpeted hallway, where a sign flashing, "End of tour," marked the entrance to Auror Headquarters.
There was no door, and she could see deep into the mess of cubicles, desks, and papers that formed wizarding Britain's magical defense force. In one corner, two Aurors were taking an extended lunch break and spending it, along with their gold, on a game of poker. From one of their sleeves, an ace of spades fluttered to the ground, and the other Auror slammed a fist on the table and sent the rest of the cards scattering.
Honestly, she thought with a smirk, I would never have imagined that our law enforcement employs card sharks. Not even real con men.
She looked up as a shadow fell across her, tilting her chin to meet the beefy Auror's eyes. "Your name and purpose?" he growled, training a wand at the center of her forehead.
Utterly unimpressed but nervous, she made a short bow. Only the flickering of her dark eyes betrayed the sense of unease and wariness. So…so what to do now? What would Draco do, if he weren't in the current state of stony despondence?
There was nothing but to follow instructions. "My name," she began slowly, "is―"
"Ah, I've been waiting for you," a young woman cut in. "Follow me." To the other Auror, she added, "No need for security, it's all been arranged."
They left the cubicles and entered a well-furnished office, the door closing after them. A large, polished desk sat in the center of the room, and two leather chairs were situated on either side. There were even the requisite leafy tropical plants in the corner farthest from the exit, though the woman sneezed constantly as soon as she neared them.
The woman ushered her into the chair, but as soon as Laine was about to accept, a back door opened. She watched, increasingly apprehensive, as two more Ministry men filed inside. One caught her attention, particularly the shocks of rough, sandy hair topping his hollow face. But a few moments passed by before she remembered the man's name.
Laurentius Nott.
She felt the sweep of his gaze until it turned to the woman, who offered her a polite smile. "My name is Nymphadora Tonks, and I've been called to close up your parents' last case. The Ministry has a few questions that should be answered, though, and you're in the best position to answer them." Irate, the woman glared at Nott briefly, then forced on the charmingly restrained demeanor again. "I'm afraid it'll be a long afternoon…so would you like a drink before we start?"
Accepting the offer, Laine drank from a crystal glass of water and when somewhat more comfortable, nodded gently. The hard edge on the woman's face faded into an unassuming expression. Just a question and answer session, Laine reminded herself, eyes softening of their own accord. With a trace of a smile, she leaned back in the chair and crossed her legs.
"Just for record-keeping purposes, let's start with the basics," said Nymphadora briskly. "Your name, age, and place of residence?"
Nearly laughing, she marveled at the inanity of the questioning. "My name is Laine Callida Malfoy, age sixteen, and I currently reside in the Malfoy Manor," replied Laine, the words coming forth automatically.
To her right, Nott froze. With much trouble, he leaned forward, then made a few notes in a leather notepad. When Laine noticed him a few seconds later, the brown-haired woman shook her head. "It's nothing, so let's continue." Somehow it made perfect sense, and she made a sound of agreement.
""How did you arrive at…at the Malfoys?"
After that, there was:
"What relation did they have with the Malfoys?"
What were the terms of your parents' will?
What happened immediately after you arrived at the Malfoys?
At the last question, Laine paused and closed her eyes to think. One of her white hands, trembling slightly, ran through locks of dark hair over and over as she racked her mind for the answers. It was evading her, just within reach but still in an impregnable fog. The answer was close and to be found in her own mind. In her own mind. In her own mind…
Finally her lips cracked into a faint smile, before opening to speak. She felt them move to form words but heard nothing, even as her head snapped into the back of the leather chair.
She woke up in the carriage, inhaling the crisp morning air that seeped through the walls and windows. Speeding through the countryside, she surmised that she was already in the Malfoy land again, and not the Ministry offices…
As she walked into the manor, she gathered up the mail and began flipping through it before making it halfway through the main hall. The Daily Prophet caught her eye, and she set the rest to the side. Eyes darting quickly over the cover page, they suddenly stopped on the headline news.
There she was. Smiling vapidly, staring into the face of one Nymphadora Tonks, it was undeniably Laine Callida Malfoy whose soulless calm decorated the front of the wizarding world's premier newspaper, under the brazen title "Lucius Malfoy―the Truth Revealed."
It was brilliant journalism, and journalism was the last thing in her mind.
So she was home, and an awkward homecoming she had received. The sound of the door opening had alerted him, but he could sense every motion of hers either way. A skill that came in handy once in a while.
Upon seeing him, she had been near hysterics, full of apologies and storms and little girl gestures. And Lucius Malfoy, the man with whose name she was helping the Prophet to sell an extra thousand copies, had smiled ever so lightly once she had reverted to her straight, composed bearing again. He had not, however, used his own power to draw her panic away. By now, Laine was more than competent enough to control her state of mind.
Now they were at the same table where she and Draco had taken breakfast for the past few weeks, and Narcissa felt sufficiently cowed to shut herself alone in the master bedroom.
Leaning back, Lucius allowed a ghostly amusement onto his face. "Some would argue that you deserve to die." His voice was soft and probing as it tickled her weaknesses. "Some would never excuse such disloyalty in the face of a little pressure."
In the silence that followed, he watched the flickering suspicion in her very black eyes and saw a hint of Draco, a hint of himself, and a vast part of some quality all her own. Despite the outward calm, she was still very much unsettled like a bowstring drawn to its full extent.
In that silence, he took in every inch of the girl who had ruined any of the remaining chances, a girl who had known the Kin for a fraction of the time the others had been privileged to. Her hands rested in her lap, and they were twisted but restrained. Every so often, a nervous shiver traversed the length of her spine, though her face defied such physical tension.
He decided not to bend her further, not at all interested in destroying her and making her snap.
"You were unprepared, and so these events…" he dragged a finger across the Prophet and said with some difficulty, "they were inevitable." Pleased that no gust of relief rushed through her, Lucius lifted a pair of mirrored silver eyes to bring a halt to time, so that he could finish. "Avoid it in the near future."
Was it a lie? As Laine bowed her head, he did not hold her back from sweeping onto the grounds and disappearing into one of the little clearings in the woods. For a moment, Lucius' gaze traveled with her, soaking in every detail of the land, his land. It had a beauty he had sensed but not seen before…and it was about to fall around his children's feet.
When he had said it was inevitable, he was referring to more than one desperate girl sitting before him.
He turned just as Draco reached the foot of the wide staircase―Draco his child and his heir. With all the distance between them, they stood still and ran two pairs of grey eyes over each other, and only when Draco had ascertained that it was his father did he approach.
Wordlessly they walked outside, basking in the rare glory of the summer day with a fervent emotion that few commoners could hope to understand. It was an emotion borne of life and pride and conquest, and these experiences had fallen into disuse after thousands of years. But here, tradition was sacred. The Malfoy and the Apexis were moving onto greater plans without discarding what they had already achieved.
At the bank of a small stream, Draco stopped. "She…she's a traitor," he breathed harshly, while narrowed grey eyes stared into the far distance. "It should not have been so."
There was a pause.
"It was inevitable…"
The same words he had given to Laine, Lucius now passed to his son. The rise and fall of his chest came in short, abrupt jerks, and Lucius knew―understood, rather―the rampant thoughts in his mind.
How difficult it was to tell Draco that nothing more could have been done, a fact that appeared too much like an excuse for his own sensibilities. While he understood what had happened, that the Prophet had not described, Draco would understand only the old ideas. However, these also dictated that he refrain from any acts threatening to compromise the already delicate situation at hand. Delicate, like the symmetry of clouds in the sky, and every bit as changeable.
"From such a grave mistake, let her grow strong."
Whirling around, Draco lifted a face filled with passion, fury, and confusion, and he shook his head in a great effort. Blond locks fell aside; he was fighting instinct with knowledge; he was struggling not to collapse.
Lucius watched him, waiting implacably until the swell of forbidden emotion had subsided. Ah, youth, only interspersed with cold cynicism, was dangerous, but Draco had not let himself completely loose. If he had…well, he had not yet become the Malfoy Lord, but the magic of the land flowed in every drop of his noble blood.
"Father―I'd never have imagined all this…"
The wind tousled his white-gold hair and made him look all the more compelling, almost reckless. After a moment, he turned away, embarrassed and disquieted.
Ever so gracefully, Lucius placed a hand on his son's shoulder, sending pulses of fierce pride through the fragile physical touch, even though he did not grip any more tightly than if it had been a casual gesture of approval. As he locked onto his father's gaze again, Draco blinked once, then closed his eyes.
"Never imagine events, thinking about them is nearly always sufficient," stated Lucius, a lazy overtone in his voice muffling the incisive words. Then it cooled and became serious, rich with power. "But as long as I am capable of it, I will protect the Kin, the land, and our lives. They will not claim what is not their right to take."
He nodded, and the two of them stood there a while longer to savor the fading taste of beauty and peace. For though the Malfoy were conquerors, they also had a healthy appreciation for life and living, not death and decay. And this place, it was the source of life, to be preserved, loved, and esteemed like none other.
AN: This chapter was incredibly fun to write, once I got started. Hope it was as good to read.