Chapter 19

"Dear and esteemed father.

Our new DADA teacher is of the same opinion as yourself, that dark wizards are losers. He made several cogent arguments as to why, and now I understand what you meant. Your howler to me earlier this year is now making more sense to me, as I was listening to the wrong sorts of people. I do not have to use dark magic to be one up, since I am a Malfoy and therefore inherently superior to any other wizard alive in the world.

I had half considered permitting Rabastan Lestrange to introduce me to his Dark Lord, but I am going to eschew that dubious pleasure.

I am glad I am not going to be associated in marriage with the Black family; they are all insane. Bellatrix more obviously than her sisters, but Andromeda and Narcissa appear to be mudblood lovers. However, perhaps we should pretend more tolerance, in order to be able to work beside the bleeding heart liberals in the overthrow of the contumelious upstart, Voldemort. Mr. Prince did not come out and say that Voldemort is also insane but the inference was clear enough to me. He has also convinced me why it is a very bad idea to dabble in demonology. You may want to speak with him, however, and offer him the Malfoy library to visit, since I have gained some clue that Voldemort dabbles in necromancy, and may have made himself into some species of minded undead. Rabastan boasted once that his body may be defeated but he can never die, which sounds rather like a spirit binding of some sort to me.

I have been sentenced to a week in Gryffindor House for shooting off my mouth – and yes, I am very sorry about it – but amazingly they have been largely civil to me, apart from one of the numerous brats of the fecund Weasel clan and what shamed me was hearing his class mates tell him that he was like me. I did not appreciate that. I will attempt to curb my temper. Oh yes, and apparently Mr. Prince has managed to cure old Filch of being a squib; I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw him casting cleaning spells! Father, if you want to consider standing for office, it might be as well to invest money in this cure, and have squibs, and families who have them, left in your gratitude. It might also be worth tracing the descendants of squibs of former times and seeing if it works on them too.

You see, I am considering politics and the good of the family,

Your dutiful son,

Lucius,

Scion of Family Malfoy."

"My dear son,

I am pleased that you have taken your head out of your arse to contemplate the realities of life. You are correct; one does not have to like mudbloods or half-bloods to make use of them. Plenty of old families, even those claiming to be lighter than light, are chary of upstarts, but if you ask me, controlling the upstarts is better than banning them from school, when they might band together and cause trouble. It is quite apparent that even as a physical familial trait may show itself in the peasantry, where droit de seignior has been exercised even generations before, so too may magic show up in the muggle peasantry from the heritance of naughty boys who use muggles rather than sully a witch of good standing with their intemperate youthful urges. I am sure you have done something similar in your own youth. A wise man, however, knows what offspring he may have and keeps an eye on them. But keeping track of such matters may prove more difficult over time; I have had the greatest of difficulty tracking down all the products of your great grandfather's profligate youth. I am pleased that you accept that there is merit in using these, and as you are now ready to listen, I propose to start to build a power base beginning with our own blood. I have often despaired of making you understand some pragmatism but I am delighted that Professor Prince has encouraged this. You should attempt to make an ally of his grandson, who is only a half-blood and may have difficulty forging alliances because of it.

Your proud father,

Abraxus,

Head of the House of Malfoy."

"My dear father,

I regret that the chance to forge an alliance with Severus Prince may have passed me by. It is he who leads the gang who stopped my former friends and me from having some sport with the squib, Filch, and I have not come out well from encounters with the brats. As one of them is the scion of House Black, Sirius Black, and another the scion of House Potter, James Potter, I fear he already has pure blood allies. Two of his other gang members are pureblood, albeit of lowborn families, and he is on friendly terms with the scion of House Longbottom. The only pureblood in his house he does not get on well with is the Weasel.

It does not sit well with me to pretend that my time in Gryffindor Tower has altered my way of thinking, nor would it be believable. I am thinking perhaps I should be 'suitably chastened' and behave with courtesy towards the wretched boy, and even his mudblood friends. I cannot like this much, but I bow to your suggestion to try, for the greater good of House Malfoy.

Your obedient son,

Lucius,

Scion of the Family Malfoy."

"My dear son,

You are correct that a sudden change of heart will not be believable. I think your suggested approach will work as well as any. I will attempt to get to know Tiberius Prince better during the next holidays.

Stay out of trouble and work hard, and keep away from the Lestranges. Like the Fates who had only one eye and one tooth between them, I think they have only one brain cell and have to pass it back and forth.

Your loving father,

Abraxus Malfoy

Head of House Malfoy."

"Malfoy's being polite, should we be worrying?" asked Remus.

"He might have learned his lesson," Peter suggested.

"You're too optimistic," Severus opined. "If you ask me, he's got the sense to sit out his sentence and get over heavy ground lightly."

"That I more readily believe, agreed Sirius. "At least he's falling back on the usages of etiquette and it makes it easier for us and for him."

Tiberius glanced up as his fire flared green.

"To what do I owe the pleasure of this call, Abraxus?" he asked. Like all private quarters save the headmaster's office his fireplace would send and receive floo calls but could only allow people to pass through it with the use of a password to take down the wards.

"I wanted to thank you, Tiberius, for persuading my son not to be an idiot and run headlong into the snares of that snotty half-blood Vol…"

"Do not speak his name," said Tiberius, sharply. "Never heard of egophonic magic?"

"Buggered if I have but I can figure out what it is. He can do that?"

"Let's say I'd rather not risk Tom Riddle being able to do so," said Tiberius. "I don't think he uses his real name with it."

"Tom Riddle? One time head boy, darling of the Slug Club and beloved of everyone except Albus and Minerva?"

"You knew him?"

"He was three years ahead of me. I always suspected him of having opened the Chamber of Secrets and dropping the blame for that girl who died on Rubeus Hagrid. Hagrid should never had been in school in my opinion, but the matter was never properly investigated if you ask me."

"Abraxus, we need to talk."

"Meet me in the Hog's Head then at seven. I believe we may be of use to each other."

xxx

"So. You know about egophonic magic. I know Tom Riddle personally. He was a good prefect, able to charm the most recalcitrant enemies into working together. He was a model student and I thought he was hiding a fuck load of stuff about himself."

Tiberius nodded.

"Nobody ever suggested you aren't shrewd, Abraxus. I think it's the fae blood in your family."

"I can smell when things aren't true. My cousin, Xenophilus Lovegood does it too, only more so. I'm glad I don't have it as strongly as he does, half the time he's talking about things nobody else can see, and he gets treated like a lunatic, because he uses codewords of his own to refer to the … well, the auras he can see."

"Ravenclaw, isn't he? Fourth year. Doesn't say a lot."

"He's much bullied by his own House, and Lucius won't talk to him, little idiot, because for one thing he's in a different House, and for another, Lucius does not have the fae talent even in the minor way and I don't think he believes in it. He thinks Xenophilus is mad."

"Unfortunate."

"My son is a bit of an idiot at times but at least he's had the sense to listen to you."

"I am glad that he has, I had hoped he would do so. I have no liking for him as he has tried to cause trouble for my grandson, but as a teacher of his, I have a responsibility towards him to keep him safe if I can. I don't agree with a lot of his and your views, Abraxus, but we are agreed, I think, that Riddle has to be brought down."

"Yes, we are agreed on that. And I suppose that also makes Dumbledore an ally."

"And a most uncomfortable bedfellow that manipulative old coot is," said Tiberius. "I don't trust him further than I could kick a troll, not over his ideals and beliefs, but over the way he does things. He was busy setting up a student to be so isolated he would be the kid's only friend to use him as a spy in Riddle's organisation."

"Not Lucius?" Abraxus was alarmed.

"No, an even younger child."

"Getting a spy in the creep's organisation would be useful, but I can't do it, Riddle knows I never liked him."

"No, that's why someone else has to do it."

"You, Tiberius?"

"You realised I legilimensed you before I was prepared to admit it?"

"You did, did you? I never felt a thing. Well I'll support you as much as I can. Does your grandson have a godfather in case …."

"He has his mother, and his inheritance. He'll be fine. He's also got potentially powerful friends."

"Yes, Lucius told me. Lucius also told me that you implied that Riddle was insane."

"He probably is, which may help, but if he isn't, it's a risk I have to take. I need to know who is in his organisation and who is not, because I wager we might be surprised."

"You mean Gryffindors?"

Tiberius shrugged.

"It wouldn't surprise me. Some pure bloods of supposed 'light' families have views that make you a liberal."

"That surprises me."

"Yes, but then, I'm sure there are Gryffindors who would be surprised to find you ready to oppose the self-styled dark lord."

"Fair point. I can actually see where their opinion that all Slytherin who were at school with him might follow him; he was charismatic."

"But then, his identity is not widely known."

"I hadn't bothered to think about it, but it's not hard to put together though."

"But then, Abraxus, you actually use what you have between the ears."

xxx

Lucius was glad to return to Slytherin's rooms under the lake, where he found that many of his supposed friends were less courteous to him, traditionalist or no, than the majority of the Gryffindors had been. Having the boys of his dormitory holding their noses and asking if the smell was the smell of rancid lion was not amusing.

Lucius had a bit of an epiphany. The ruddy mudbloods in Gryffindor had been more polite to him than those in his own house. This necessitated a serious number of jinxes to put the contumelious ones back in their places. He noted that Greengrasse and his gang, even the hapless Avery, who had no cause to like him, treated him the same as before, and he went over to Greengrasse in the common room.

"Mr. Greengrasse, well met," he said.

"Well met, Mr. Malfoy," said David Greengrasse.

"I am pleased that you and your friends have the manners of gentlemen, not the manners of apes, as mar some of those in our house," Lucius said. "I will not forget this. You are all under the protection of House Malfoy," and he nodded to each of David's friends including Edmund Avery. He hesitated. "Mr. Avery, I apologise for mistreating you earlier this year. I never found any of the information I sent you to discover, even living in Gryffindor Tower. I was unreasonable to expect more of you. Now you lot stay out of the way of the Lestrange boys and Mulciber; they consort with Death Eaters."

"Crumbs, Mr. Malfoy, I thought you were a Death Eater," said Avery.

"I don't consort with losers," said Lucius, haughtily.