Lucius\' Bookshelves

A/N: This is my first attempt at a Hermione/Lucius pairing. Lucius falls a bit more out of character as it goes on, but I am not sure if I want to do anything about it. Because I sort of like my Lucius. I appreciate constructive/positive feedback on this – thanks! Oh, and there are hints of Harry/Draco slash - nothing graphic, but don\'t say you weren\'t warned.

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Lucius’ Bookshelves

By Lizski
gretaski@hotmail.com

Disclaimer: Not my people, not making money, yada, yada, yada.

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He surveyed himself in the mirror. Long blonde hair, broad shoulders, well-muscled chest, waist slightly thicker (but not much!) than when he was 18, the trail of white blonde hair snaking down from his belly-button to his genitals, lean muscles defining the arms and legs, and graceful, tapered digits. Not bad, he thought, for a man in his late 40’s. A few more lines around the eyes, but he guessed that was to be expected. No, the only element marring the alabaster perfection was a still-red scar on his abdomen, a holdover from the Final Battle. Not bad at all, considering the outcome.

Lucius Malfoy couldn’t help but smile at the reflection in the mirror. The Final Battle had been a bloodbath, with high numbers of casualties on both sides. Certainly, the wrong side had won, but he was happy that he had been able to add significantly to the high body count. ‘Psychopath’ was the term he had heard Severus bandy about on past occasions. But that made the underlying assumption that he was an out-of-control madman. And nothing could be farther from the truth. Inflicting pain, raping, killing – these were all activities based on pragmatism, and aimed to achieve a specific outcome. Could he help it if he enjoyed it, too?

He dressed carefully. The representative from the Ministry of Magic would be arriving this afternoon. As part of the agreement that kept him out of Azkaban after the war, he would have to allow a member of the ministry to catalogue and confiscate any Dark Arts items that may still be in his possession. Despite the fall of Voldemort, the Ministry was still had its weaknesses; their coffers were empty after the war, and they were happy to make some concessions to Lucius in exchange for some of his money.

He smirked. They were such fools at the Ministry. Did he still have any Dark Arts items? Of course. Were they going to confiscate them? Well, some of them. He had spent the last week sorting through some of his more prized objects. The important ones had been locked in a magically sealed Undetectable vault. The Ministry would never see any of those items. The more insignificant items had been scattered throughout the manor, in various degrees of disguise.

That, he thought, had been one of his better plans; if he just turned everything (well, everything the Ministry was going to see) over to them immediately, they would assume that he was hiding other things, and they would search the place until they found more. So, by deliberately hiding things that the representative from the Ministry could then ‘find’, the moron would likely stop looking there, and wouldn’t look for anything beyond the easy ‘discoveries’.

And, it would be fun toying with the Ministry’s representative, he mused. No doubt they would send a simpleton like Weasley. Someone who would need to be reminded that they were a guest in one of the finest manor houses in the wizarding world. Certainly, he would have to maintain a certain level of respect, so that his professed loyalty to the Ministry was not questioned too closely, but it wouldn’t hurt to remind the representative of the respect that should be paid to the old aristocratic wizarding families, regardless of any former affiliation with the Dark Lord.

He slipped into a pair of black wool pants, a deep burgundy silk shirt, and a black wool vest. He surveyed the results; formal, but in a casual way. Perfect. Just enough to remind the Ministry lackey who he was, without over doing it.

After a final glance in the mirror, he left the wing of the manor that housed his bedroom, and went to oversee the preparations of the rooms the Ministry representative would be staying in. The Ministry had insisted that their representative be given some private space for the duration of the investigation. Momentarily put off by the idea, Lucius had eventually decided that that would actually be the best solution for everyone; he would be able to better monitor the representative, and, he would have the opportunity to display his ‘reformed’ ways. Simpletons. The lot of them.

Walking down the gloomy hallway to the rooms that the house elves were preparing, Lucius walked by the door to Draco’s old bedroom. Draco. The boy was so much less than he could have been. He should have been a carbon copy of his father, and yet he had turned out to be a far from perfect replica. He had taken up with Harry Potter while at school, and in a misguided emotion that Draco had taken for love, he had sworn allegiance to Dumbledore, denying his father, and the powers of the Dark Lord in the process.

Gods. He was going to have to reconcile with Draco. It wasn’t a direct order from the Ministry, but they had hinted that they would feel “much more comfortable” with Lucius’ professed commitment to the Ministry if he were to make peace with Draco.

It wasn’t that Draco had chosen to have a boyfriend. Lucius had always recognized the lures of both sexes, and he could appreciate the charms of bending a boy over a table and thrusting repeated into him as easily as he could appreciate a willing woman. It wasn’t even that the boyfriend was Harry Potter, although that did rankle him a bit. No, it was the fact that Draco was living with his boyfriend openly – and was actively refusing to continue the Malfoy name. Damn it! He had raised the boy to know what was expected of him when it came to preserving the family lineage. And yet the boy was throwing it all away with Potter. Didn’t he even realize that he could have Potter, and still keep the family name alive?

Well, finding a way to lure Draco and his whore back to Malfoy Manor would take some thought. He filed that in the back of his mind; he’d think about it later. There was plenty of time. And plenty of ways to carry on the family name.

Heading down stone stairs lit by flickering sconces on the walls, Lucius arrived at the rooms being prepared. The house elves scurried away when they saw him coming; years of abuse at Lucius’ hands had taught them that it was better to be summoned, than to be waiting in his presence. The rooms consisted of a small suite including a sitting area, a bedroom and a bathroom. The small sitting area was a poorly-lit room furnished with a desk supplied with plenty of tapers, parchment and quills, an unattractive couch, a shabby wing chair that cast dark shadows across the floor, and a fireplace. An oriental carpet covered the floor. The bedroom was no better lit than the sitting room. The large four poster bed dominated the room, leaving a little room for a nightstand, and an scarred armoire.

Before examining the bathroom, Lucius noted that the elves had taken the liberty of using a bedspread with the Malfoy crest on it. Good. Let the Ministry operative remember where he was. And he was certain that the Ministry would send a ‘he’. They’d be idiots to send a woman to him; the temptation would be too much to handle. But it would be fun. For him at least. And he was in serious need of some fun – it had been a while since he’d had a woman, and it hadn’t been under the most comfortable circumstances – she’d been held down by two other Death Eaters as he’d raped her, and then, when they were done, he’d slit her throat. Enjoyable, certainly, but there was definitely something to being able to take a little more time. And it really had been a while. Maybe even if they sent a good-looking boy. Lucius sighed happily.

He liked the look of the bedspread so much that he poked his head in the bathroom, to see if the towels all had the Malfoy crest on them, as well. Sometimes, he mused, the house elves knew him better than he knew himself. The bathroom was probably the best of the three rooms with a marble tub, marble sink, and marble lined shower. The floor was a porous stone, comfortable, and not entirely cold to the touch. Lucius nodded as he swept out of the suite of rooms – this was likely better than anything the representative from the Ministry had ever seen before. And yet it was positively meager by Malfoy standards. His lips fell into their typical malevolent smirk.

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The house elf had been instructed to let Lucius know when the representative had arrived. He had been in the library, having a brandy and making sure that the last of the ‘hidden’ Dark Arts texts were readily locatable. When the elf entered the library hesitantly, Lucius discarded any pretense of working; everything that was not supposed to be found had been secreted away, and the rest of it had been in various stages of concealment for the last several days. Pulling on a black jacket, Lucius headed down the stairs to the front hall.

Oh gods. They actually had sent him a woman. Fools. Utter fools. Oh. Wait. She looked familiar somehow.

“Hello, Mr. Malfoy. I am Hermione Granger, the representative from the Ministry.”