Path of the serpent

Title: Path of the serpent
Author: ejab
Pairing: SS/LM with a little SS/RL and SS/DM on the side
Rating: story is slash and NC-17
Feedback: a true gift.
Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling owns them. Alas.
WARNING: severe beating
Category: all over the place
Summary: Draco pays the price for listening to his hormones.
A/N: Look at the 'warning' and the 'summary' and combine those two. Guess who gets the beating…
Beta was underlucius. All remaining mistakes are mine and mine alone.

24/?

The insufferable part was that Dumbledore had been right. The potions master had indeed gained more insight in the whole transformation process and felt his confidence growing as he proceeded with several new adjustments. Although he couldn't stop wondering about the price he would surely have to pay. He just knew Lucius too well - the ease he had lifted the curse on Lupin with without even asking questions only indicated the man had motives. He was a Slytherin after all and they would NEVER do such a thing without expecting something in return. Well, there was nothing that could be done about that know. He would just have to wait and see. In the meantime, just to be sure, he avoiding any contact to the DADA teacher. He told himself that he only did that to avoid the curse being activated again. The fact that Lupin turned out to be in love with him had absolutely nothing to do with that, of course. The fact that that knowledge started to make him feel disturbingly horny also had nothing to do with that. He simply put the revival of his hormones to better use by making Draco VERY happy and bugger the boy senseless on several occasions that following week.

Draco never questioned his Head of House sudden lack of reservations and was only too happy to oblige. The pleasure and knowlegde he gained from the eperiences were, as far as he could see, priceless and absolutely worth every second. They even had sex the night before he went home for the Easter holidays.

It created memories he could cherish and make the time at home more bearable. And he surely needed that because somehow the atmosphere at home had changed - his father was absent even more than usual and his mother hid in her rooms and cried a lot. Which she denied when he asked her about her red eyes. Something was going on but he couldn't quite figure out what. And he knew his parents well enough to know that questioning would do him no good. He simply had to deal with it. So he went his own ways and dreamed a lot about a certain potions master. It was remarkable how soon the week past.

Tomorrow was Monday. And that meant being back at Hogwarts. And that meant… more sex! With a broad grin Draco stared at the walls of his room and sighed happily. Sex…he could eat and drink and breathe only the pleasures of the flesh and still live, he mused. Espescially now that he had the good fortune of having such a very experienced sexpartner…

“Master Draco better hurry! Master Draco’s parents are waiting for breakfast!” A very agitated house elf came running into his bedroom and started to lay out clothes, with a beseeching look at his young Master.

“Damn!” Startled Draco jumped out of bed, dashed into the bathroom and took a short shower. A scant ten minutes later he walked into the dining room, greeted his parents politely and took his place at the table.

“Draco? What is that under your shirt?” Lucius stared with an appraising look at the edge of the shirt his son wore.

“Wha – oh, nothing, father. Nothing.” A glance downwards and Draco felt his heart skip a beat. With as much nonchalance as he could muster, he pulled his shirt straight and back up to cover the purple indentation of a bite-mark that had been exposed, smiling as innocently as he could. His father kept staring at him though, as if trying to read his mind.

“To my study.” Lucius put down his fork and abruptly stood up from the table. “Now.”

One look at his evidently FURIOUS father and Draco obeyed without a word.

“Take off your shirt.” Lucius slammed the door behind them and walked to stand in front of his frightened son.

“But father, it’s n – “

“I am not in the habit of repeating myself, Draco, and believe me, you don’t WANT me to have to repeat myself.” Lucius gave his son a warning look.

“Yes, father.” Draco knew when he was in the danger zone and estimated himself to be rapidly nearing its centre. Reluctantly, he took off his shirt and remained standing perfectly still while his father slowly walked around him. He was in trouble. One discreet glance at his fathers face confirmed that; his tightly pressed lips, narrowed and piercing eyes, the faint blush high on the cheekbone, the flared nostrils – they all screamed danger. Draco swallowed.

“Undress yourself completely.” His fathers voice sliced through the air. Draco managed to suppress a whimper. With shaking hands and staring fixedly at the carpet before his feet, he did as he had been told. His father silently circled him again. Draco suddenly felt a strong desire to be invisible – the bite marks and suck marks he had worn with so much pride now would become his downfall, as his father seemed to recognize them. Oh fuck, what had he been thinking? Why had he acted like a normal and stupid teenager with raging hormones, like a dog in heat?

“Who has been… touching you, Draco?” Lucius’ tone was lethally casual. That did nothing to put Draco at his ease. He carefully switched his weight from one foot to the other, deciding on what to say.

“A Slytherin,” he finally mumbled.

“I may certainly hope so,” Lucius drawled. “Anyone I know, perhaps?”

All kinds of names raced through Draco’s head as he searched for someone to put the blame on.

“Answer me, boy!” One moment his father suddenly held his favourite cane in his hand, the next instant it came smashing down on Draco’s back with full force. He fell to the floor, screaming in pain.

“Don’t be so pathetic.” Lucius looked down on his son with utter contempt. “Stand up and answer me. Who. Touched. You?”

Draco scrambled to his feet as fast as he could, trying desperately to ignore the stinging pain, fear written all over his face now. Oh Merlin, he was SO in trouble. Fuck fuck fuck. And fuck.

He managed to swallow another scream of pain as the cane slammed down on his back a second time. But only just. A third blow changed all that and he found himself lying on the floor, swallowing his tears with his panic, shivering and gasping.

“Why do you have the marks of MY lover all over YOUR body? Mmm?” Lucius roughly pulled his son into a kneeling position, and Draco forced down the rising bile by sheer willpower.

“I…we slept together.” He felt so unbelievably afraid. There was no way out of this alive and Draco knew it. So he whispered his confession, wondering how much time he had left to live. There was a long pause, loud with the father’s harsh breathing and the son’s whimpers.

“I see.” Lucius’ voice could cut steel by now. “Did he kiss you?”

“…yes, father.” Draco braced himself in anticipation for the next blow he knew would come and when it came he smothered the scream by biting his underlip, hard.

“Did he take your cock in his mouth?”

“Yes, father.” CRACK – a blow on his left shoulder. He whimpered.

“Did he make you come?”

“Y-yes, father .” WHOOSH – a blow on his right shoulder. Oh Merlin, that sounded broken.

“Did he rim you?”

“No, father.”

“No? Are you sure? Did he not lick, kiss or suck your anus?”

“No, father.” Draco felt sick of the pain, but couldn’t help thinking that he definitely would have remembered THAT.

“Did he put his fingers in your arse?”

“Yes, father.” WHAM – the head of the cane landed on his own head and something warm started to slowly glide down his temple. Nausea swept over him but he did not dare to move.

“Did he fuck you?”

“Yes, father.” Another blow to his head and now Draco collapsed into a mess of limbs and broken skin on the floor.

“Did you touch HIM?” His father had no intention of showing any mercy. He wasn’t like that.

“Yes, father.” The cane came crashing down on his stomach.

“Did you give HIM a blow job?” Well, he had sucked him. He had NOT sucked him off.

“N-no, father.”

“Did you fuck HIM?”

“No, father.”

“Who made the first move?”

“He did…p-professor Snape did.” Draco lay perfectly still.

“THAT, my son, may have just saved your life.” His father smiled coldly at him, straightened up and walked towards one of the windows. There he just stood and stared outside a while. Draco still did not dare to move.

After several minutes Lucius broke the silence, still with his back at his son. “You do understand that you have crossed a line here, don’t you?”

“Yes, father.” Draco felt another wave of pure panic wash over him.

“And you also understand that I will have to punish you for that, don’t you?” Still no movement.

Oh, gods, please, no more! “Yes, father.”

From three rooms down the hall Narcissa could hear her son cry and scream in agonizing pain and begging for his father to ‘please stop!’. She immediately stopped eating her breakfast and shospaispairing, pointless glances in the direction the sounds came from. She knew that there was nothing she could do for her son but that didn’t prevent her from wincing at each sound as though it were she who took the blows. It was almost too much to bare.
Then there was silence. Deafening silence. That too was almost too much to bare. No, not ‘almost’.

Scared and worried she jumped up and ran out of the dining room, in search of her only son.

“No magic is to be used.” Lucius came out of his study just as his wife reached the door and she heard the warning explicit in his voice. So the beating itself wasn’t enough, was it?

Narcissa nodded curtly, outwardly impassive. Inwardly she was extremely furious and fuming but it would do her no good to express those feelings. She already learned that lesson years ago. Ignoring her now retreating husband she ran into the room and gasped for air. Her son! That bleeding heap of raw flesh on the floor was her son? Gods, no! How was she to cure him before the start of school without magic?

She said his name, and he laboriously turned his head to look at her. He met her eyes and she wished he hadn’t.

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Orphelia Malfoy - Lucius is not bad ALL the time, you know. He does care about his lover and really thinks he deserves the acknowledgement as a Grandmaster of Potions.
Having said that - it also puts Severus in his debt. The potions master now owns him one. Which
can be very convenient for Lucius… you really didn't think he would lift the curse without
expecting anything in return, now did you? And what that will be? Time will tell. Patience…
(Already hating me? You off all people KNOW I can say nothing more…)

Dummydore - your e-mail address keeps rejecting my mail, so I will answer your question here.
No, I do not plan on taking this story that far. I have set the limit at 30 chapters - no more. Have
to draw the line somewhere… okay the the way, thanks for your extended review! Loved it!