A/N: Crossposting this from Ao3 since stats are back up here now and it feel less like impending site doom is upon us. It's tentatively 15 chapters and just a fun idea that wouldn't leave me alone until I wrote it. And yes, the ship is Lucius/Hermione. It wouldn't work otherwise, as you shall soon see. 😘


Lucius Malfoy. Widower. Dubiously penitent former Death Eater. Charismatic lobbyist. Somehow recent Wizengamot seat holder despite aforementioned Death Eateryness. Opposition force to meaningful reforms for magical creature legislation. Perpetual thorn in the side of one Hermione Granger.

"Luscious Malfoy."

Those were the words that bypassed her brain and tumbled out of her mouth.

Luscious. That is: Lush. Us. Meaning attractive. Richly satisfying to the senses. Luxurious.

One hundred percent not his name.

Hermione cringed. Viscerally. Visibly.

This was worse, exponentially worse, than the time she'd introduced Luna as Loony back in her fifth year. That had been a nervous slip. But this?

How. Why. Where had that errant mangling of his given name even come from? Was it just because he was not completely objectionable to look at? Was it because his hair was so impossibly perfect that it made her want to scream?

It might have been a reasonable slurring of letters comprising his name had she run into him after imbibing something at the pub after working hours. Though she rather suspected men of his ilk rarely patronized the same sorts of pubs common witches and wizards did. Were there wizarding gentlemen's clubs? She'd never thought to look into it.

Regardless, the inane thought was immaterial because Hermione most certainly was not drunk. Had she somehow been confunded? It was the middle of the workday, and she'd merely intended to introduce him to her new assistant because it was the polite thing to do, even if she despised Malfoy and ninety-seven percent of what he stood for.

There was truly no excuse as to why 'luscious' should ever cross her lips with regard to Lucius Malfoy, in his and half her department's presence no less, other than she'd gone barmy or been cursed or had been reduced to a mere imperiused puppet on the strings of a cruel, embarrassment-minded mistress. But no, Hermione was of sound mind, completely sober, and based on her crushing embarrassment and acute desire to disappear into the ether, not operating under magically induced compulsion.

Lucius's brows raised, his lips parting ever so slightly in the ghost of a smile.

His eyes glittered.

The minuscule hope she'd held that he hadn't noticed her slip, or would have been chivalrous enough to pretend not to notice her slip, was swiftly crushed.

"Lucius Malfoy," he corrected, extending his hand to a mildly nonplussed Sebastian Mangle, "A pleasure. I simply wanted to congratulate your department head on her new project. We'll be seeing much of each other, this upcoming legislative session."

"Oh?" Hermione asked. This was certainly news to her. If ever she saw a hint of the man outside the Wizengamot chambers, it was too soon.

Like now.

It was bad enough having to see him weekly across those dimly lit chambers, as nearly every time he opened his mouth Hermione felt the compulsion to throttle him.

Thankfully, being a creature that enjoyed nothing more than to hear himself speak, he took her questioning intonation as bait without making her voice her inquiry properly. Which was lucky because Hermione was not certain that she presently held the restraint not to pitch an absolutely childish fit while doing so.

"Yes, as part of a special committee appointment, I shall be acting as liaison between your office and the Wizengamot as a whole in these early stages, especially. The last thing any of us want is to waste precious departmental resources on bills that would be dead on arrival," Lucius said silkily, as though this were a completely reasonable imposition. The only evidence to the contrary was a smug, though deniable, upturn to the corners of his mouth.

It was in that moment Hermione realized from where, precisely, Draco had inherited his highly punchable face. Lucius's face was easily five times more punchable. He was simply fortunate that she was both sober and a mature, responsible adult capable of withstanding the increasingly tempting lure of schoolyard violence.

But on the whole, more obstruction from the Wizengamot was hardly surprising. Even after the war, the old boys' club masquerading as a governmental body clung to obsolete and often infuriatingly unfair laws. The fact that it was ensconced within the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and generally was self governing with regard to which legislation was even proposed to be voted on had not been lost on her.

It had taken her years to get to this point: the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures had just now finally been granted leeway to propose departmentally relevant legislation that could be brought to a vote by the Wizengamot as a whole. Hermione, of course, was the driving force behind this change, having been with the woefully under-funded and poorly established DRCMC for eight years total, and now two months as the youngest department head in the past two hundred years.

If Hermione had it her way, the entire Wizengamot, really the entire system of wizarding governance, would be dismantled and thoughtfully restructured from the ground up, and they knew it. This was likely why she faced so much opposition to what ought to be common sense reforms for beast and being rights to begin with.

But for all that was myth and magical, why did they have to choose to send him as their liaison? He was the epitome of everything wrong with wizarding society! Privileged since birth, and a fine example of why there had been not one but two wizarding wars within the past thirty years.

The fact that he was both not incarcerated for his part in Voldemort's last rise to power and now was a permanent member of the wizarding body that would determine what laws she was even able to submit for consideration rankled.

Hermione reined in her growing temper. She'd already made possibly the most embarrassing verbal slip imaginable; there was no sense in making this encounter worse by giving the infuriating man in front of her more ammunition to obliterate her hard-won efforts before she, they, even started.

Unfortunately, Hermione was not naturally a spectacular actress. Her jaw clenched, and she could feel the pinched expression taking up residence on her face. She also was aware that he knew he was getting under her skin with mortifyingly minimal effort on his part.

"Thank you for informing me, Mr. Malfoy. I look forward to your no doubt illuminating insights. Now if you'll excuse us, we need to strategize how we're going to use those precious departmental resources you're so worried about," she replied, somehow managing to sound mostly calm and reasonable, even though she was still mentally contemplating his figurative and literal evisceration.

If she were to have to work with him for any period of time, perhaps she could in fact find something damaging on him- some way to guarantee his compliance with her aims.

And now he had her considering the highly slippery slope toward blackmail. Ugh. Just his presence was a terrible influence.

"Of course," Malfoy senior inclined his head magnanimously. "Mangle. As always, a pleasure, Her- moan -ie."

Hermione froze, mouth agog, staring wide-eyed at Lucius Malfoy's perfectly tailored, swiftly retreating back, his cane clacking jauntily with his departure.

It was several more seconds before she remembered to breathe.

Had he just-?

He had.

Her-moan-ie.

What did he even mean by that? Aside from the obvious. Why would he escalate her purely accidental word-vomit to something so- so blatantly, inappropriately, intentional?

There were plenty of ways he could have embarrassed her without saying her name like that. Why had everyone gone back to their business like nothing happened? Had they not heard? How had they not heard? Why was her heart thudding in her chest like she'd run a marathon?

"Er, Miss Granger, is there anyone else I need to be introduced to or-" Sebastian asked, drawing her if not out of her thoughts, at least away from them enough to get her new personal assistant set up with everything and every contact he should need for his first day.

Then, once she finally escaped to her office and was allowed several more private moments of perturbation and over-analysis of his motives, Hermione realized the obvious: as a Malfoy, Lucius simply had to have the last word. That was all.

It was most certainly not really insinuation one way or another, nor was their strange exchange the instant that would mark a bizarre turning point in her life.

It was simply a childish parting jibe. Nothing more.

Everything would be forgotten and back to normal the next time she had the misfortune to suffer Lucius Malfoy's presence, Hermione was certain of it.

And if not? Well, maybe, just maybe, she had found her ammunition.


Hermione Granger. Obstreperous shrew. Abrasive and brash, though not completely objectionable to the eyes, muggleborn upstart. Somehow recent Head of the DRCMC despite aforementioned abrasiveness. Possess-ee of a surprisingly entertaining vindictive streak alongside a highly exploitable craving for praise. Keen to end wizarding society as it was known with disastrous propositions for magical creature legislation as well as her likely aspirations for the seat of Minister for Magic. Perpetual thorn in the side of one Lucius Malfoy.

Finally restored to his rightful place in the ministry, presently as a member of the Wizengamot capable of further influencing the future of the wizarding world, Lucius recently found himself at a crossroads.

Voldemort's hellish second rise to power had very nearly broken him.

He'd spent the eight years since the war rebuilding the Malfoy name, and perhaps skirting justice by the virtue of his Gringotts vault. He abjectly refused to be submitted to Azkaban for a second term, if there were any way at all to avoid it. Luckily, the court of public opinion had a short attention span and shorter memory further diminished by shiny gold in the form of reparations and charitable donations. The fact that Lucius both lacked his wand for the duration of the Dark Lord's uninvited stay at his manor and that his wife had a large part in saving Harry Potter in that last battle had certainly not hurt matters, either.

Once he was free to do so, Lucius had thrown his efforts into reestablishing himself. In the beginning, it had been a blur: the house arrest, the subsequent probation, endless dotted i's and crossed t's and greased palms. Narcissa's acute ailment, rapid decline, and subsequent passing occurred in the midst of those early years of chaos, followed shortly by Draco's marriage and relocation to the summerhouse.

None of it had been pleasant.

Now, though, he was back on top; Lucius had everything he wanted. Well, nearly everything. The hole Narcissa had left in his life was not terribly appreciated, but these days, the ache had lessened to bearable levels. Draco was also coming around to the idea of permanently moving back into the Manor while taking over more of the family accounts and responsibilities once Scorpius was out of nappies. Though that was likely another two years away.

Regardless, despite having nearly everything, Lucius was bored. Painfully so. The witches and wizards governing the Wizengamot were a largely conservative lot; swaying them was no challenge at all. He was a wizard at the prime of his life, nearing the height of his power, and he needed something to work toward: a new goal to conquer.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, Lucius discovered that Hermione Granger was not boring.

Since the proposal to moderate potential legislation from the DRCMC was passed, it became Lucius's primary aspiration to obstruct anything that he deemed detrimental to wizarding society. The status quo stood for a reason, after all.

But now, after the most diverting encounter in recent memory, he wondered. He weighed what he knew of her. Her scandalized irritation roused him in a way he had not encountered in years.

She was a challenge, in more ways than one.

He could work against Granger to satisfy the overall goals of his post, but Lucius considered the amusement he could gain by working to help her aims. At least some of them. The minor ones that would have no significant impact but would allow him to gain her trust, while continuing to obstruct her most odious of aspirations. With the new regime, their association could even be viewed and construed as fashionable.

Useful .

A Malfoy was nothing, if not adaptable.

Nettling her, evoking that pretty flush of ire and pique, would simply be an added bonus.

And with her rather telling slip, Lucius thought he might engage her in a game of sorts.

If he played just right, he- they, really- might get much more out of this committee arrangement than he had previously endeavored to consider.

The opening move was his, and he knew just the thing.