Father Christmas

The gray eyes of Lucius Malfoy swept across the snow covered grounds of his manor. Two days ago it had started, at first just a thin dusting that offered no promise of lingering, but then the tiny specks blossomed into large flakes which had fallen steadily until now. A faint smile twitched at the corners of his mouth as he watched the moonlight twinkling off countless ice crystals. Perhaps it was the epitome of arrogance, not that he would argue that he was anything less than, but the snow seemed to have fallen in such a manner for his pleasure alone.



Another smile twitched at his lips as he thought of how that pristinely smooth and white landscape would soon be despoiled if he were still a boy. In the mornings after snowfalls such as this, he would impatiently wolf his breakfast down then burst outside and rocket, shouting with exhilaration, down one of the steep hills surrounding the manor on the Muggle sled that belonged to his Maltese nanny, Francesca Calamatta. Naturally this activity would never be permitted by his pure blooded parents, but since they never saw fit to include their young son on their winter travels, what they didn’t know wouldn’t hurt Cessie.



Francesca was Muggleborn and thus viewed as a mere servant. When Lucius was born, the midwife gently scourgified him, wrapped him in swaddling cloths and presented him to his mother who promptly waved him away and into the care of Francesca. She had done her duty and produced a pure blood heir to the Malfoy name. Beyond breast feedings and the obligatory appearance of doting motherhood at society functions, Lucius’ mother behaved as if the little wriggling, towheaded infant didn’t exist. Once he was weaned, the contact between them lessened even more. During his formative years, Lucius’ entire world was Francesca.



”Loose-sis!” Francesca called, her Maltese accented voice calling as he bounded through the powdery snow. “Not too fast, my angel!” Any further admonishments were lost as Lucius disappeared down the hill, the first of many trips, on a simple Muggle sled.


My angel


Francesca was a woman of the earth; olive skinned, chestnut eyes, and long dark brown wavy hair. In the summer months, she would walk barefoot on the manor grounds with Lucius skipping along after her. They would stop at every flower, splash in the ponds, and chase each other around the trees. In the autumn, Cessie (as Lucius called her) would gather the vibrant fallen foliage with a flick of her wand and the two of them would throw themselves into the pile. They would search for fairy rings and if they were fortuned to find the mushroom circles, Francesca and Lucius would leave offerings of sweets and candies. However it was the winter that Lucius liked the best.


In the evenings while he sat in front of the small fireplace in Francesca’s quarters, she would tell stories of Saint Dimitri who rode his horse across the waters to rescue a young Maltese man from Muslim corsairs. Or she would tell him stories of Avalon and King Arthur and how one day, when people needed him the most, he would return. As Lucius sat and listened, Francesca would knit or sew little poppets while she talked.


“What are you knitting, Cessie?”


“I’m knitting gifts for those who are poor.” Francesca would answer.


”But you’re poor.” Lucius would say with a child’s blunt honesty.


Francesca would smile and look up from her handiwork. ”Ah, but you’re wrong, Loose-sis. I am richer than the richest kings who ever have lived because I have my own angel.”

One year when Lucius was four years old, he discovered in a most wonderful way what all those gifts were for.



&*&*&


“I’m off, darling.”

Narcissa Malfoy appeared in door of Lucius’ study, fastening her fur-lined, richly embroidered wool traveling cloak. Lucius released the heavy drapery of the window and turned around to regard his wife and young son.


“You are a vision, my sweet. How late will you be?”


“Midnight perhaps. Don’t feel you have to wait up for us.”


“Very well. Enjoy yourselves. Draco, I expect you to remember your manners.”


“Of course, Father.”


Lucius returned to gazing out of his study’s window as he listened for his wife and son’s departure. The length of time it would take to enjoy a small snifter of brandy would be the amount needed to ensure Narcissa wouldn’t suddenly return for a forgotten item. Once the last drop was drained from the glass, Lucius moved quickly in preparation for his own night’s activities, feeling lighter in heart than he had all year.


&*&*&

In the winter of Lucius’ fourth year of life, he once again found himself alone during Christmas. His mother and father had departed the Manor earlier that week to travel, first to France to visit some distant, pureblood relatives, then to Africa for a wizarding safari. Lucius didn’t mind, Cessie was with him. The bounty of impersonal gifts left for him under the lavish tree were opened then left where they lay as he busied himself with sledding and snow angels. Francesca excitedly hurried him through his dinner with the explanation that they would be going on their own great adventure.


“Where are we going, Cessie?” he asked as Francesca bundled him up in his woolen cloak.

“You will see, my angel.”

Francesca slung a tattered canvas bag across her shoulders and took his hand. Lucius squeezed his eyes shut as he always did before being disapparated. When they reappeared, they were in an alleyway of a poverty stricken area of wizarding Britain. Immediately, Francesca raised a finger to her lips then moved it to his.


“We must be very quiet and we cannot be seen if we want to spell to work. And we must never tell another soul.” she whispered.

Lucius nodded solemnly at the obviously important magic that was about to take place. Francesca reached into her canvas bag and withdrew some magically shrunk, handmade items. She took his hand and together they tip-toed to the crumbling steps of a ramshackle home. Silently she placed the items on the stoop and enlarged them to their normal size. Lucius peered into a window of the dwelling, straining to see the occupants inside. Before he could spy anyone, Cessie took his hand once again and they tip-toed around the side of the house. With another finger silently placed against his lips, Francesca flicked her wand at the door and gently rattled it. Lucius watched, silent and hidden, as the door opened and a young witch with a baby in her arms and a toddler at her skirts stepped out onto the stoop and bent to pick up a knitted blanket, hats, gloves, scarves, and simple handmade toys.

The young witch’s face lit up and she darted down from the crumbling steps looking for her benefactors. Francesca placed her hands on Lucius’ shoulders to prevent him from stepping out of their hiding place. He looked up at Cessie befuddled when the young witch dabbed at her eyes and reluctantly entered her house and shut the door.


“Why was that lady crying?” he whispered.


“She was happy because an angel visited her.” Cessie said, brushing her fingers against one of Lucius’ cold reddened cheeks.

For hours they secretly left the gifts that Cessie had made. With every gasp of surprise and tears of joy from the recipients, Lucius’ own bliss increased until by the time they were finished, he felt as if he could fly.

“Always remember this night, Loose-sis. It’s the strongest magic one can ever do.” Francesca said as she tucked him into bed and sent him off to the land of Nod.

&*&*&

Lucius emerged from his and Narcissa’s bedroom, dressed in simple clothing worn by common folk and understated togs. He stuffed his long, blonde hair up under a plain woolen cap and wrapped a scarf around his neck and hurried back to his study.

As he opened a hidden compartment behind a large painting of his father, he thought again of the day when he lost his Cessie.

&*&*&

It was the summer of his seventh year of life. He and Cessie had made two other Christmas Eve ‘angel visits’ since their first one together. His father and mother had begun his lessons, training him how to be a proper Lord. Lucius hated it. All the formalities, all the rules of etiquette, tempered of course with techniques of pragmatic ruthlessness. His only respite was in the evenings when they would send him back to Francesca, having tired of his presence.

Lucius always blamed himself for what had happened. After a long lesson which earned him sore and reddened knuckles from cracks by his father’s cane for inattentiveness, his mother rang for Francesca to come and remove Lucius. When she appeared at the door of Abraxas’ study, eyes cast downward as befitting her status; Lucius forgot himself and walked a little too quickly over to Cessie and with a little too much affection on his face.

The chill was felt immediately. At that instant, Lucius could sense that something terrible had happened and that he was responsible for it.

“My Lord, my Lady, the boy is weary, that’s all. He knows not of what he did.” Francesca pleaded.

“Lucius, you will come here immediately.” his mother called, her voice as cold as an arctic wind.

He looked up into the terrified eyes of Francesca and began to sniffle in reaction.

“Boy! You will do as your mother says!” Abraxas’ voice boomed as he walked over to Lucius who was clinging to Francesca with fear. When he reached his confused and frightened son, he roughly yanked Lucius away and sent him sprawling. Lucius began to scream as he saw his father’s cane rise into the air and then descend upon Cessie with vicious blows. His mother pulled him up by his collar and forced him to watch the beating.

“Remember who you are and what she is.” his mother hissed in his ear.

His parents put Francesca out that very hour with only the clothes on her bruised back and whatever meager items she had brought with her at the start of her employment, except for the sled. Lucius watched through the banister of the grand staircase as she limped to the door of the Manor, his eyes red and dampened. Francesca turned to look at him for the last time.

“My angel” she silently mouthed and then was gone.


Weeks later, when Lucius braved a trip to Cessie’s old quarters, he found the sled under the bed. He hid it away lest it be found and destroyed by his father until the day he came of age and nothing could be taken away from him again.


Once Francesca was gone, his days were filled with stifled tutelage and cold, informal interactions with his parents and others of pureblood society. Slowly they formed him into an arrogant and Machiavellian man. The older he grew, the more he consciously pushed memories of Francesca from his mind. Still, especially with the first snowfall, his thoughts would meander to his Cessie.

Once he reached adulthood and came into his inheritance, he quietly made inquiries as to her whereabouts. He planned, if he successfully located her, to secret her out of the country and back to Malta with enough money to comfortably live out her years and without having to lower herself to servitude. Anonymously. It would shame him for Francesca to see the man her angel had become. Despite his efforts, he could never locate her, in Britain or Malta. He only could hope that she had settled somewhere safe.


&*&*&

Lucius removed the large shoulder bag hidden inside his study’s hidden compartment and slung it over his shoulders. Being the current Manor Lord, he could afford more and better quality gifts than simple handmade items, although he knew the value of one of Francesca’s gifts was infinitely more than one of his. With a quick pat of the bag to ensure all the magically shrunk items were present inside, he disapparated to his first stop.

Over the years, Lucius carefully selected his recipients, some of which included Muggles, like the old soldier whose house he now stood in front of. The elderly man had fought not one, but three Muggle versions of the Dark Lord in World War 2 and had lost a leg and the vision in one eye from a mortar blast. Now in the twilight of his life, the soldier was all but forgotten by the country he so bravely fought for. Before Lucius found him, the old man barely had enough money to keep his electricity and gas on and to buy food, but with Lucius’ once yearly visits, the soldier found enough money for all necessities for the coming year, wrapped in parchment, weighted down with a brick, on his doorstep each Christmas Eve and heralded by a rattling of his door.


“Bless you!” the feeble voice rasped into the night. By the time the soldier shut his door, his unseen benefactor was gone.



Lucius found it shameful that any man would desert his family, so the witch with three young children found a Yule log for her holiday barren home, some galleons, and proper wizarding toys.

“Say ‘thank you.’” the witch instructed her children to call into the night but the gift giver had already disappeared before they could sing out the two words.


The lighter Lucius bag grew, so too his soul received a temporary relief from the deeds he committed that weighed it down. It was his one night a year where he could forget himself and who he was and what he was expected to be. Cessie used to tell him stories of the once and future king, and Lucius thought that if ever there was a time for Arthur to return, it was now. If he did, perhaps serving him would provide a way for Lucius to save his soul, as serving his current Lord only damned him more with each passing day.


With something akin to disappointment, Lucius left his last offering of the night and disapparated back to the Manor to resume his identity of Lord Lucius Malfoy, bastard extraordinaire and minion of the Dark Lord.


&*&*&



“Lucius, we’re home.”

Narcissa stepped into the study of her husband and smiled as she walked over to the high-backed, richly upholstered arm chair in which he sat, his pajama and slippered feet propped up on an ottoman in front of the fire. Draco padded off to ogle the gifts waiting for him under the tree.


“Have you been here all this time, reading in front of the fire?” she asked as she bent to place a kiss on the top of his head.


“Did you have an enjoyable evening, my sweet?” Lucius asked, replacing the unanswered question.


“Tiring. Especially in London around all those Muggles. At least they were moneyed and not as vulgar. Look!” Narcissa held out her wrist, on which her expensive new diamond bracelet that she had purchased rested.

“It’s lovely, but not as much as you. My poor dear, surrounded by filth.” he tisked and kissed the top of her braceleted hand.

“Well, I’m off to bed. Goodnight. Don’t spend all night reading. It’s bad for the eyes.”

He listened as Narcissa swept out of his study, instructing their son to go to bed as he cast his gaze into the flames of his ornate fireplace and silently wished Cessie, wherever she was, a happy Christmas.


~Fin~

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A/N: Just one of those feel-good, sappy Christmas stories. The premise is, even Lucius Malfoy didn't start off being the vicious bastard that we all know and love. Hope you enjoy!