Just Around the Riverbend

You guys know I usually respond to your reviews....but it's three in the morning and I haven't gone to sleep yet, and I have school in a few hours, so I'm just going to give props to those who did review, and hope I don't fall asleep in the morning. So thanks to:

Avanell
Meankitty69
Sampdoria
Sureves Epans (**I do have a tiny little note for you. To 'go native' basically means to go wild or crazy. So to go native on someone would be to kick their ass. Basically.)
ginnylovesharry07
slytheringriffendor21
margaritama
Heidi191976
RavenBlackWing
Alina
angelnomiko

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Hermione was incensed. Absolutely furious. How dare he?!?

She stared at the parchment in her hands in disbelief. Daisy had just sent back her reply telling Hermione how her third session with Jacques had gone. She had been strapped! Corporal punishment! And her cousin had given permission? Oh no. Oh hell no.

She quickly threw on an outfit, and slipped into some comfortable trainers. She pulled her curly hair back into a ponytail, and grabbed her wand, tucking it away in her sleeve. She then Apparated right to the gates of Malfoy Manor.

She tried to push open the wrought iron gates, angered that they wouldn’t budge. She really hadn’t expected them to…but she was pissed anyway, so…

~~

Lucius sat at his desk, listening as Jacques preached on and on about what a horrible student Daisy was. He’d been a bit surprised that Jacques had already strapped Daisy. He’d thought that with such a mild-mannered child that it would have taken longer.

“She has no respect! None of her people do! Rebels, the lot of them!” Jacques seethed.

A small ‘pop’ signaled the arrival of a house elf.

“Master Malfoy.” The elf was old, its voice deep and gravelly. Lucius looked over at the elf, named Axis, and sighed.

“Yes, Axis?” he asked, a bit annoyed when Jacques continued ranting. The bastard was going to give him a headache.

“There be an irate Mudblood at the gates. She is demanding to see you. She is speaking of the hexing of balls, sir. Does Master want Ax to send away the Mudblood?” Axis said, the last part giving him a bit of a maniacal look.

“No, Ax. Let her in. I daresay my little cousin has been penning away to Miss Granger, because that’s the only Mudblood with enough balls to come to my gates directly.” Lucius said. Axis bowed low, and disappeared again. “Jacques, shut up!” Lucius hissed. Jacques finally stopped his tirade, and looked at Lucius.

“What is ze matter?” he asked.

“It seems Daisy has an angry friend coming to her rescue. Hermione Granger has the most annoying habit of ‘Championing the Downtrodden.’" Lucius said. Jacques sneered.

“Hermione Granger? The Mudblood from the Golden Trio?” Jacques asked. Lucius’ left eye twitched.

“The very same.” He said softly. He suppressed an annoyed groan when he could already hear the little banshee screeching. “Nix!” he called out. An elf appeared, rather tall and gangly for its kind, and bowed low in front of Lucius.

“Master has called Nix?”

“Go fetch Miss Daisy. I have a feeling our ‘guest’ is going to want to make sure the girl is in one piece.” He said. The elf disappeared with a pop, and several seconds later appeared with a sleepy-looking Daisy.

“Holy crap! Can’t anybody take a fucking nap in this place?” she asked.

“It is ze middle of the day!” Jacques said incredulously. Daisy whirled around towards the sound of his voice, and nearly stumbled over Nix in an attempt to get away. She was behind Lucius in a flash, using her larger cousin as a shield between her and the Frenchman.

It was at that moment that Hermione appeared in the doorway, looking thunderous. She spotted Jacques standing near Lucius, and advanced on him immediately, her eyes fairly glowing with rage.

“You sick-minded, perverted, chauvinistic, archaic, abusive bastard!” she hissed. Jacques narrowed his eyes at her.

“Ah….the embodiment of all things filthy. The Mudblood.” He said snarkily. Hermione’s eyes widened a bit.

Even Lucius was fairly shocked at Jacques’ audacity. No one used the word ‘Mudblood’ to a Muggleborn's face anymore. Behind their backs, sure…

*SMACK*

Daisy peeked out from behind her cousin to see Jacques rubbing the side of his face. But then he struck back. He back-handed Hermione as hard as he could, sending her stumbling a few feet. Daisy, outraged that he would strike her friend, stepped out from behind Lucius.

“Hey, you French Fuck! You can’t hit women like that!” she snapped. Jacques turned to her, and she squeaked softly. But he gave a surprised yell when Hermione jumped on his back, wrapping her legs around his waist and beating the crap out of his head.

“How does this feel?” Hermione hissed, digging her fingers into his hair and jerking as hard as he could. Lucius rolled his eyes skyward at the two.

“Immature idiots.” He murmured. Daisy looked at him, and at the two. Jacques was trying to get a good hold on Hermione to pull her off.

Daisy grabbed Lucius’ arm desperately.

“Please, cousin! Please help Hermione!” she begged. Lucius looked at the two fighting in his study, and then at his little cousin. She looked terribly frightened, and Lucius felt something stir within him. It wasn’t very noticeable, or even very large….actually…it wasn’t even enough to make him risk stepping foot near the two flailing idiots, but he felt it nonetheless.

“Let the adults sort out their differences, Miss Melfy.” He said. Daisy looked at him blankly, before turning back to where Hermione was now jerking on Jacques’ ears. Daisy shot forward before Lucius could grab her, and kicked Jacques hard in the back of his knee. He stumbled forward, his legs bent awkwardly beneath the force of her blow and the weight on his back. Daisy went in for another kick just as Jacques swung around to stop her. His bent elbow connected with her face with a terrible crunch, and Daisy was knocked backwards.

Her hands flew up to her face as she hit the ground hard. She was quiet for a few seconds before she rolled to her knees, face still covered, and screamed. Hermione dropped off of Jacques’ back, and the Frenchman took several steps away. Lucius and Hermione both acted as one, and knelt down beside the screeching girl. Lucius tried to gently coax Daisy into letting him survey the damage.

“Let me see, Daisy. How bad is it?” he asked. Hermione’s eyes widened when blood began to drip from between Daisy’s fingers, and onto the carpet in the study. Lucius gently put his hand on Daisy’s shoulder, and the other hand gently wrapped around one of her wrists. “Come on now, Daisy. We have to see how bad it is before we can help you.” He said.

Hermione’s eyes darted up, and she saw the line of worry on Lucius’ forehead. Did he realize what he had just said? He’d said ‘we.’ She assumed he meant her….but she wasn’t sure.

Daisy relaxed a bit and let Lucius pull her hand away, whimpering softly when she saw the blood smeared across her palm. Tears were streaming down her face, mingling with the blood that was pouring from her nose. Her nose looked slightly tilted to the side. Lucius grimaced slightly.

“It looks broken.” He said. Daisy began to sob again, her shoulders shaking. Lucius reached into his robe pocket, and pulled out a pristine handkerchief. This he pressed into Hermione’s hands. She looked up at him. “Try to help the bleeding. I’m going to contact a healer.” He said. Hermione nodded silently, and Lucius gingerly pulled away from Daisy and stood. There were a few smudges of blood on his fingers. As he walked towards the door, he grabbed Jacques by the back of his robes, and hauled him with him. “We need to speak.” He hissed, using his long legs to basically drag the shorter man along.

Hermione gently pulled Daisy close, and put the handkerchief in her hand.

“Put it to your nose to catch the blood.” She said softly. Daisy pressed the white cloth just below her nostrils, and winced at the slight pressure.

“I don’t feel good, Hermione.” Daisy sobbed. Hermione wrapped her arms around Daisy, and the trembling girl laid her head against Hermione. She was trembling and shivering with sobs, and she felt so small in Hermione’s arms that Hermione wanted to get up and go after Jacques again. Hermione and Daisy didn’t have that large of an age difference. Hermione was nineteen in the Muggle world, but twenty in the wizarding world, where her year with the time turner had sped up her age.

“It’ll all be okay, Daisy. You cousin went to fetch a Healer, and you’ll get patched up, and everything will be all right…” Hermione said soothingly.

“I feel dizzy…” Daisy whispered softly, before she went completely limp in Hermione’s arms. Hermione quickly reached up to check her breathing, and sighed softly when she only realized that Daisy had passed out.

Lucius returned several moments later, a white-robes Healer on his heels. The Healer knelt in front of Hermione, and immediately began to check Daisy, pointing the tip of his wand at her face.

“It’s not broken, but she got a pretty good conk. You might want to get her to wherever she’s going to rest, because when I give her some potions for the pain and swelling, she’s not going to want to go anywhere…” the Healer said softly. Lucius knelt to the floor beside Hermione, and gently transferred Daisy’s weight from Hermione to himself. He picked her up, and walked from the room. Hermione and the Healer followed behind.

Once in her room, Lucius settled Daisy down on her soft bed. She was still out cold, though blood was still dripping from her nostrils. A wave of his wand stopped the blood from flowing, and another twitch cleaned the blood from her face. The Healer produced a small black bag from his pocket, and set it on the table. From the bag he produced a small phial of little white pills, and a larger phial of thick green liquid.

“Give her one of these pills every few hours for the pain. This green stuff can be given every two hours for the swelling, which will probably last anywhere from a few days to a few weeks. Don’t let her do any strenuous activity. The best thing to do is rest. And try not to let her face get struck again. I know that accidents happen….I’m not stupid….but even though her nose wasn’t broken this time, it’s going to be very tender for a little while. So just be careful.” The Healer said, and pressed the two phials into Lucius’ hands. Then, with a swish of his white robe, he walked out of the door.

Hermione looked over at Lucius, who was looking at the phials in his hand. He then looked at Daisy, and swallowed hard. He looked….upset.

“Well…I guess I should be going.” Hermione said softly. Lucius looked up, and his icy blue eyes met Hermione’s brown ones.

“Thank you for taking care of her until I got the Healer.” He said softly, a slightly pained expression on his face. If it wasn’t such a serious situation Hermione would have laughed at his awkwardness. She frowned slightly.

“Where did French Toast go?” she asked. Lucius seemed to gain a bit of his composure back, and smirked.

“I think he mentioned something about an extended stay in Russia…I didn’t quite catch the details as he rushed out.” He said. Hermione was about to bring up the spanking incident again when Daisy whimpered. Lucius strode to her bedside, and she opened her eyes blearily, and looked up at him.

In her weakened, half-awake state, she looked up at his blurry face.

“Daddy?” she whimpered softly. Hermione felt a large lump in her throat for an inexplicable reason, and took that awkward moment to take her leave. Unbeknownst to her, Lucius felt a very similar lump.

“No, Daisy. It’s your cousin, Lucius.” He said softly. Daisy seemed to deflate a little with disappointment.

“Oh. Okay.” She said. “Will…will you stay with me anyway?” she asked. Lucius gave her a small smile.

“Only here a couple of weeks and you’ve already got me wrapped around your little fingers….” He said. Daisy gave a weak smirk.

“Of course…that’s just how I roll.” She said.

It was at that moment a small house elf appeared, a bit of green blood smeared across its face.

“Master Lucius….Master Draco is being home, and he is angry!” the little creature squeaked, trembling violently. Lucius frowned.

The little shit must have read the Prophet.

This is not how he wanted him to find out about Daisy. He had meant to write him a letter.

Damn.
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Oooh...cousin Draco doesn't appear to be too happy about a visit from little Daisy. I wonder how this will turn out.

Poor Daisy can't win for losing right now, eh?

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