A Thief to Catch a Thief; a Death Eater to Catch a

A Thief to Catch a Thief; a Death Eater to Catch a Death Eater.

If I owned the Harry Potter Universe, Lucius Malfoy would be permanently naked, wearing a little leather collar with ‘Property of Utopia’ on the tag, and his lead would be attached to a hook on my headboard.

Now, seeing as that never happened, we can safely assume that I do not own the Harry Potter Universe – and unfortunately, I don’t own Lucius either. *sulks*. The original characters are mine, but I don’t want to chain them up and have my wicked way with them.

***

Lucius Malfoy was summoned to the office of the latest Minister of Magic at half past eight on the first Monday after the final battle. Bacchus Montague was young for a Minister, at twenty-six, but the voters had decided that they needed someone younger running the country.

Lucius was delighted, the young man was a Slytherin, and pureblood – perhaps he had a chance to wriggle his way out of the mess he’d got his family into.

“Mr. Malfoy, please take a seat.” Said the young man from behind the desk. The day had barely started, and he looked tired, a large list of things to do that day sat to his left, a few lined crossed off, but so many more pending. He had a soft, almost effeminate face and smiling brown eyes that shone with power. He was no push-over, and bribing him would take some doing. His tie wasn’t tied, and lay limp around his neck; his top two shirt buttons were open, the collar lying over his shoulders.

“Minister.” Lucius said in short reply.

“I’ll keep this simple, Mr. Malfoy…” began the Minister.

“Please call me Lucius.”

“Mr. Malfoy, you are quite frankly a dangerous man; you are a powerful wizard with great knowledge of the Dark Arts; you are influential in society; and you are one of the easiest problems to deal with on my to-do list at this time of the morning.” Said Montague, reaching for a steaming cup of black coffee.

“Shall I take that as a compliment, Minister?” Lucius sneered.

“That depends on your answer to my next question… as does your future.” Said the younger man, reaching behind his desk for two garment bags before laying them over the ‘clutter’ on his wide desk. “You have two options: Firstly, open the bag on your left hand side…”

Lucius did, carefully unzipping the black canvas to find the unmistakeable sight of the Azkaban prison uniform.

“You could go to Azkaban for your crimes, you may have changed sides at the end of the war – but you committed multiple crimes before that point, including escaping from Azkaban and the use of unforgivables… open the second bag…”

Lucius did, opening the other garment bad to find some sort of grey leather jacket. He looked at the Minister with a puzzled expression.

“That is the new uniform of the aurors, they’ve been requesting something like this for years, and the previous Ministers thought it too expensive or ‘unneeded’ and told them to make do with what they already had. It is made to their collective design and moulds to the body after the first fitting. Everything is skin-tight so clothing doesn’t get caught up in a duel or moving through rough terrain; the leather vest and gloves have multiple protective charms on them and they are basically armour against some curses; the undershirt is nice soft cotton and has both a cooling and comfort charm woven in; the boots are practical as well as protective; the arm holster for a wand is for ease of access; and a set of grey over-robes to cover it all up when working or out for lunch, but they come off quickly if there is an emergency… they’ve obviously put a lot of thought into this uniform, and the aurors that survived were overjoyed when I signed the cheque that subsidised the cost – the Ministry just doesn’t have the money to pay in full for them – yet.”

Lucius looked utterly lost at this point, though he had to agree that the uniform design was sensible – he himself had grabbed an auror by their cloak as she ran from a situation where she was greatly outnumbered… but what did that have to do with him?

“Your second option, is to join with the aurors – the muggles have a saying: ‘Use a thief to catch a thief’. Or in this case, use a Death Eater to catch other Death Eaters. As I said, you are greatly knowledgeable in dark arts, and, seeing as the aurors have never caught you, you must also have a fair knowledge of defence against dark arts also…” The Minister looked at Lucius with a sly, Slytherinesque grin,

“Whatever your choice, the fine you’ll be paying will cover the cost of the uniforms – and at two-hundred-and-fifty-three galleons each, with currently seventeen aurors, each requiring two uniforms, it’s a pretty penny for you to pay... actually, it is eight-thousand-six-hundred-and-two galleons for the basic set up; but include the extra undershirts and spare pairs of trousers, and the ten sets ready for training aurors, and it comes to a grand total of fourteen-thousand-eight-hundred-and-seventy-seven galleons… shall we make it twenty thousand to give us a nice round number?”

“So, I have the choice of Azkaban or auror training?” Lucius clarified, twenty thousand galleons didn’t make much of a dent in his gringots vault; and it wasn’t unusual for his money to be spent on clothing, but it was usually Narcissa’s clothing he paid for – not aurors.

“Put simply, yes. Though, I think you’d be able to go in at the last year of four that they require – I don’t think you need the ‘basic’ training. But either way, you’d be doing either for forty-five years, you would be freed from Azkaban, or offered redundancy from the aurors on your hundredth birthday. You’re likely to live until one-hundred-and-seventy anyway.” Another Slythin grin crossed the minister’s face, “Oh, and you will be expected to pay for any other uniforms required during your time in either Azkaban or as an Auror.”

“So… black and white stripes and a cold, damp cell; or grey risking my life against megalomaniacs and pushing paperwork… for forty-five years?” Lucius said, not sure which was the lesser of two evils.

“Oh, and the dementors are once again back under ministry control, and they aren’t happy about that – but their hunger for happiness will soon be sated as we round up criminals.” Said Montague casually, his tone of voice could be discussing the weather or the price of potions; not emotional torture.

“Did you say that the auror uniform moulds to the body after the first fitting?” Lucius commented, signing the withdrawal slip for the fine as he sealed his fate until his century.


A/N: Sorry for the rubbish start, I needed to set the scene and add some background to all this.