Chapter 13

Lucius tossed and turned in his sleep. In his mind, he was down in the cellar. He was surrounded by people in masks, and further away, he could hear screaming and crying. Shaking, he made his way down the corridor, only to stop when a hooded figure appeared before him.

"You will pay for everything your kind has done." The figure said, raising a cane over his head. Lucius ducked, only to hear moans of agony next to him. He turned to find Narcissa limp on the floor, and Draco next to her, his face covered in blood as it seeped down from his head. Lucius watched as his guardian looked up at the figure, who then removed his hood and revealed himself. The man turned to the young boy. "Let's see how you like being alone forever." He said to the child with a vicious smile, before raising the brutal instrument over Draco's head again. He brought the cane down –

And Lucius awoke with a strangled yell. He grasped the covers with both hands as tears fell down his cheeks. A moment later, his door opened, and Draco was there.

"Another nightmare?" The man inquired, coming to sit on the side of the bed. The light from the hallway illuminated his face.

Lucius looked up at him with wide eyes. "How did you know?" The boy asked as his guardian reached out and pushed a strand of hair out of his face.

"I was going to bed myself, and I heard you." Draco held his arms out to the child, who readily crawled into the embrace. The man gave the small blond a squeeze. "Do you want to tell me about it?"

When the boy shook his head, the Malfoy heir paused, then posed a different question. "Do you want me to stay with you?"

Lucius nodded.

"Alright then," Draco kissed his charge on the top of the head, "Move over."

The child made room in the bed, and the elder Malfoy climbed in next to him. Lucius snuggled against him, and Draco moved a hand in calming circles on the boy's back.

"Go to sleep." The older Slytherin whispered.

But even with his guardian there, Lucius did not sleep well. He kept dozing off only to startle awake and check that Draco was alright. It was a long, fitful night.

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Lucius awoke the next morning, exhausted. He was irritable during his morning lessons – so much so that his tutor had to scold him several times – and he was extremely disagreeable at lunch.

"Do you need a nap?" Draco asked after a particularly cheeky comment from his charge.

The boy petulantly crossed his arms over his chest. "No!"

"Hm." The man hummed, but he didn't say anything more.

After lunch, the Manor was a bustle of activity as Narcissa prepared to host one of her social engagements for afternoon tea. While Draco made himself scarce in the study (he had seen more than enough of such events in his lifetime), Lucius watched in fascination as the house elves set up the refreshments. There was a plethora of delightful treats to catch the eye, but in the center of the long table stood a three-tier chocolate cake, and that, more than anything, captivated the child's attention.

"Can I have some cake, Cissa?" he asked, crossing to where she stood supervising on the side of the room.

"May I," the witch corrected. "And yes, you may, darling. But not until the meeting is over and the refreshments are formally served."

Lucius nodded his head in understanding. He could wait, just a little while. He still had enough patience for that.

Unfortunately, the meeting ended up testing his patience to the limits. The women in Narcissa's social group apparently liked to drone on and on about the most boring topics possible. After an hour-long discussion about the newest laws concerning house elves, Lucius was beyond ready for his slice of cake.

Taking advantage of the fact that everyone's attention was on the woman in a feathered hat who was currently speaking, he slid off of his chair and made his way stealthily over to the refreshment table. He had just reached up to serve himself a slice of chocolaty goodness when he heard someone hissing his name.

"Lucius!"

He looked over to find Narcissa scowling at him from her seat beside one of the windows.

"What?" He asked a little too loudly, drawing some of the ladies' attention away from the feathery-hatted woman.

"You know very well what," The Malfoy matriarch whispered just loud enough for him to hear. "I told you that you would have to wait."

He turned toward her, the cake server held tightly in his small hand. From his point of view, he had waited long enough. "No! I'm done waiting" The boy all but yelled.

"Lucius, put that utensil down. You are not having cake right now!" Narcissa snapped, her own voice rising slightly.

A huge scowl took over the boy's face. "I want cake now!" He screamed, throwing down the cake server with a clang and then throwing himself down beside it. He screwed his eyes shut and drummed his hands and feet on the ground, crying out "Cake now! I want cake now!" in a loud voice.

"Stop that at once." Narcissa said with a hiss, and Lucius opened his eyes to find she had risen from her chair and the room had gone quiet – all attention was on them.

The Malfoy child, though, was too tired and emotional to listen to reason. Instead of stopping as Narcissa had insisted, he took a deep breath and proceeded to scream and wail at the top of his lungs, picking up from where he had left off a moment before.

He was so involved in his tantrum that he was taken by surprise when someone abruptly lifted him and placed him over their shoulder. He opened his eyes to see that he was being carried away from Narcissa's stern expression and the headshaking, tsking women of her social group.

"No, no, no. Put me down!" He yelled. A moment later, the women disappeared entirely as he was taken through the door and into the hallway.

"Let me go! Let me go!" He tried again, drumming his fists on the back of the person carrying him.

"No, Lucius. Now stop." Came the reply, and the boy stilled slightly when he realized that he was slumped over Draco's shoulder.

Uh oh. He was in trouble. He wondered how the man had appeared so quickly. Had he decided to attend Narcissa's meeting after all? Or had Lucius really been screaming that loudly that he had drawn the elder Malfoy from his study?

They started up the stairs, and the child began to struggle in his guardian's arms again.

"Settle down." The man commanded.

"I don't want to settle down. I want cake!" Lucius yelled.

Draco's only response was to tighten his hold on his charge's legs and to continue moving.

After what seemed like mere seconds to Lucius and an eternity to his guardian, they arrived at the boy's room. The elder Malfoy stepped inside and closed the door firmly behind him before placing Lucius on the ground.

The child immediately moved forward and tried to turn the doorknob, only to have Draco place his hand on the door itself, holding the piece of polished wood shut.

"Let me out!" Lucius screamed, bouncing slightly as both hands grasped the knob and pulled.

"Absolutely not." His guardian said, holding fast to the door and looking down at the boy with narrowed eyes.

The younger Malfoy released the knob and backed away a few steps. "I want to go back downstairs." He whined, wrapping his arms around himself. "Open the door."

Draco just shook his head, though. "No. You threw a fit while down there and a rather bad one at that, so you have now lost the privilege of attending Mother's soiree. If you want to have a tantrum so badly, you can do so up here."

The boy looked at him with wide eyes, unsure of what to make of this development.

"Go on." The man insisted. "I won't punish you for it. I'd honestly rather you get it out of your system."

Both of the child's eyebrows raised to his hairline. Draco was giving him permission to throw a tantrum?

"I want to eat cake!" The boy whined, jumping up and down a couple of times.

His guardian crossed his arms and leaned back against the doorframe. "Oh no, you can do better than that. I want to see the entire routine. Go ahead. Lie down on the floor. Kick. Scream. The whole gambit."

Lucius made a face. Suddenly throwing a tantrum didn't seem so appealing. "I don't want to do that." He said.

Draco raised an eyebrow. "You certainly seemed keen on doing so downstairs." When his charge just bit his lip in response, the man continued. "So, no tantrum then?"

The boy shook his head, and then watched as his guardian took several steps toward the bed. He was worried that the man would sit down and call him over for a smacking, but what Draco actually did was arguably just as bad.

"Alright," The elder Malfoy said, pulling back the covers. "Into the bed. You are in desperate need of a nap."

"No!" The child raised his voice again, which prompted the man to turn toward him with stern eyes.

"If you would like to throw a tantrum before your nap, you may do so. However, yes, you are absolutely taking a nap."

Lucius stomped his foot on the ground. "I don't need a nap!"

He watched as Draco crossed his arms again and leaned back against the bed. "Really? I suppose I've been imagining your terrible attitude all day, then?"

"I don't want to sleep." The boy whined, though there was a bit of panicked pleading in his tone that caught his guardian's ear.

The man immediately knelt down to Lucius' level. "Come here, Love."

The child came, spurred forward by the familiar appellation - albeit while regarding the elder Malfoy with wary eyes. Once he was in reach, the man took both of Lucius' hands in his own.

"You need to rest," Draco said, and then, before the boy could protest, he added, "I still want you to lie down, but you don't have to sleep."

When his charge still appeared unsure, the man reached up and brushed the child's hair out of his eyes. "I could stay with you - read to you, perhaps?"

The boy's eyebrows raised in disbelief. He could scarce believe his luck. He had just thrown one of the worst tantrums of his life downstairs and, in truth, should have been facing a major smacking. And yet, instead of handing down punishment, Draco was now offering to read to him.

"Would you like that?" The man asked when Lucius failed to speak after a moment.

The boy took a shaky breath. "Yes sir."

Draco gave the child a half smile. "Good boy." He said somberly before lifting the child up and placing him on the bed. A moment later he had climbed in next to him and picked up the book of children's wizarding tales that had been resting on the night table.

The boy snuggled up next to him, and he began to read the bookmarked story. "It was the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month, and the troll's stomach rumbled . . . "

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Less than an hour later, Narcissa was seeing one of her guests out the door when Draco came down the staircase.

The witch turned to her son and wordlessly raised an eyebrow, her question clear: Did you smack him?

Draco shook his head.

"That's . . . surprising." She said as the young man approached.

"Astoria's been imploring me to be more patient with him." The Malfoy heir said with a shrug. "Plus, this is at least partially my fault. If I hadn't hired Collins then Lucius wouldn't be having nightmares in the first place."

Narcissa sighed. "Darling, you cannot keep blaming yourself for that. There's no way you could have known or suspected."

"Yes, well, consider it a lesson learned." Draco said. "Now, I have a question for you."

His mother raised an eyebrow. "Oh? And what would that be"

He smirked. "Is there any leftover cake?"