Lost Boy 04

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Lost Boy

Part the Fourth

Harry was stunned.  He could feel his vined ring begin to heat up and, in fear of retribution, he pushed Lucius away and looked down at his hand.

“Nothing happened,” he stupidly said.  He looked up at Lucius.

“Pardon?”

“My ring—it just warmed, but nothing happened.”

“Nothing will happen,” Lucius promised him, approaching as if he were a wounded bird, “if we are true to one another.”

“But you can’t even touch a witch.”

“No,” Lucius agreed, reaching for Harry.

Harry looked at him carefully and let himself be led to his bed.  They sat beside each other, and Lucius took Harry’s left hand and stroked his ring. 

“There’s so much we don’t know about the magic of the rings.  We can’t touch witches, it’s true.  We would have been punished if one of us were a witch.  But if we’re both wizards, we just have to be true to one another.  You can be assured of my fidelity with the ring.”

“How can I be assured of that?” Harry asked, looking into Lucius’s silver eyes.  “The Dark Lord said it himself.  You’re engaged.”

Lucius, to his credit, didn’t look away.  “A political arrangement, nothing more.”

Harry thought about this for a long moment.  “You’ll still marry her, though.”

“I will marry her, though,” Lucius agreed, his silver eyes dipping to catch Harry’s gaze.  “As you will one day marry as the Potter heir.”

Harry’s face broke into a twisted grin.  “Aunt Euphemia is seeing to it so that I don’t have to marry a witch.”

Lucius looked at him oddly.

“She’s a world class potioneer, is she not?” Harry asked a little bitterly, thinking he couldn’t bind Lucius to him.  He looked down at Lucius’s vined ring.  It was gold with diamond leaves and rubies.  It was the height of sophistication and everything that Harry was not.

“Hartwig.”

Harry looked up at the sound of his name.

“You’re so beautiful.”  He ran a hand through Harry’s sleep mussed hair.  “You’re everything I’m not supposed to want.”

“What are you supposed to want?” Harry asked, slightly interested.

“A blonde,” Lucius confessed, “a mother for my heirs.  A lady of society.”

“Not a schoolboy out for his first time Muggle baiting,” Harry derided himself.

“How did you like it?” Lucius asked, leaning down and catching Harry’s eyes.

“How did I—?”

“Muggle baiting?  How did you like it?” Lucius repeated.  His silver gaze was so earnest that Harry found himself almost wanting to give Lucius an honest answer.

“As I was supposed to like it.”

“That’s not an answer.”

Harry looked up sharply.  “I suppose you Muggle bait.”

“That’s not an answer either,” Lucius replied wryly.  He lifted Harry’s chin up with his finger, forcing Harry to look him in the eye.  Lucius’s eyes were so silver, they seemed brighter than the moon.  “Tell me, Hartwig.”

“Maia—” Harry began hesitantly, but Lucius’s gaze seemed so encouraging, he licked his lips and continued.  “Maia and Regulus seemed to enjoy it so much.”

“But you did not.”

“But I did not,” Harry agreed carefully, looking at Lucius warily. 

“Not every Death Eater enjoys Muggle baiting,” Lucius told him firmly.

“I am not a Death Eater.”

Lucius looked surprised.  “You’re not?”

“I’m favored as Maia’s friend, but I’m not a Death Eater.  Regulus and I seem to be exempt.”  Harry’s dark green gaze cut to the side.  “I wasn’t sure what to do.  They were hexing those Muggles and enjoying it so much.  I had to join in or I’d be left out.”

“And it must be horrible to be left out,” Lucius concluded for him.  “To always be looking in and never assured of your place.”  He nodded his head and seemed to decide something.

Harry glanced over at him warily.

“I want to assure you of your place.”

“My place?”

“Yes, your place,” Lucius told him decidedly.  He settled back on the bed so he was leaning against the pillows with his feet firmly on the bedspread, his boots discarded to the side.  Harry looked at him and came to sit beside him.  “You’re young but that does not mean you should be ignorant,” Lucius continued.  “I will marry Narcissa because I must marry Narcissa.  My father expects it.  She will be on my arm at gatherings and at parties, and in society she will be recognized as my wife.  She will be the mother to my children.”  He took Harry’s left hand in his and carefully kissed his vined finger.  “I should very much like to know you, Hartwig.  I should like you to be the companion of my evenings, the one I walk beside through life, and, should we come to love one another, the keeper of my heart.”

Harry’s breath hitched.  “You just saw me for the first time today.”

“I saw what I needed to see.”

“Has,” Harry licked his lips as they were suddenly dry, “has anyone held your heart before this?”

“There was a wizard at Hogwarts.  Friends at my club.  Nothing like what I am offering you.  I know you are young.  I know this is a lot to take in.  I understand if you need time.”

Harry looked at Lucius in profile.  Lucius had a strong face, a decided nose, an elegant jaw.  He was already smitten with Lucius.  That had been apparent since earlier that day.

“Do your worst,” he murmured, hoping that Aunt Euphemia would brew her potion before Lucius took his vows, so there was some hope for a future. 

Lucius turned toward him and gave him a small smile.  “I pray you will not come to regret this.”

Harry prayed for that as well.

Lucius leaned forward and kissed Harry gently, Harry breathing into the kiss in all youthful innocence.  Cupping his cheek, Lucius drew him forward so that Harry was resting against his shoulder, and they hunched down on the bed, curled around each other, Lucius’s fingers combing through Harry’s long hair.

“When’s the wedding?” Harry murmured just when he was on the edge of sleep.

He didn’t hear the answer.

Harry woke all tucked into bed, Lucius gone into the morning light.  He yawned and stretched his arms above his head, wondering if the previous night had been a dream, but there was a second imprint on the pillow, showing Lucius had been there.

He came down to breakfast skipping and Fleamont noticed his good mood.  “What’s this?  What’s this?”

Aunt Euphemia looked up from her tea.

“How far away are we from the Gnascum Potion being operational?” Harry asked, putting some jam on his toast.  He leaned over to look at the front page of the discarded Daily Prophet.  It seemed like there had been Death Eater activity in Cornwall, not too far from them. 

“It’s coming along, don’t you worry,” Aunt Euphemia promised him.

“I do worry,” Harry admitted.  “What if I run out of time?”

Euphemia looked up at him sharply.  “Decided, have we?”

“Yes, I think I have.”

“Best not to hurry these things along,” Uncle Fleamont put in.  “We don’t want to cut corners and end up turning you green and lopping off an ear.  You’ll be uglier than You-Know-Who is rumored to be.”  He looked up at Harry.  “But I suppose you might be knowing all about that.”

“What am I knowing all about?” Harry asked, affecting a tone of innocence.

“Never you mind,” Aunt Euphemia decided for them.  “We decided that as long as Harry is not approached, we won’t pry.  Lady Maia is a school friend.”

Harry went and sifted through his post.  He had a letter from Maia and another from—he wasn’t quite sure.  He turned it over and inspected the seal before cutting it open with a butter knife.  What he opened was an invitation to The Wicked Stepmother in a few days.

He squeaked.

“What was that, Hartwig?”

“Lucius wants to take me to The Wicked Stepmother.”

“And so it begins,” Euphemia declared.  “We’ll have to air out your good robes.”  There was a sparkle in her hazel eyes.  “You’ll have to write back.”

Yes, yes, Harry would. 

He flipped the letter open from Maia and saw that she wanted to go Muggle baiting in London.  Harry tried not to pull a face.  Maybe he could suggest it could be a date between Maia and Regulus. 

At least they were less likely to get caught in London.  They could so easily get lost in the crowd. 

“Oh, this one’s for you.”  Fleamont handed over a letter and Harry’s stomach sank.

It was from Lily Evans.  She may not be his mother but in another lifetime she could have been.

He carefully opened the red seal with an ornate “L” and read what she had to say.  It turned out she had an adoption certificate for “baby girl” that she had found a couple years ago in her attic.  “Baby girl” had been born in January 1960—and Evans’ birthday, it turned out, was January 2, 1960. 

Harry’s birthday, in this timeline, was July 31, 1962.

Harry had to hold in a groan. 

Did Harry think that she should pursue this? she wrote.  She had already written the Office of Public Inquiry.

Quickly picking up his post, Harry grabbed his last bit of toast and went up to his room where he would write his letters.

He wrote to Maia first.  He mentioned Evans’s letter.  He barely brought up Muggle baiting because the idea made him slightly ill. 

He ignored Evans entirely, setting it aside with all of her other letters.  He had them all tied with pink ribbons.  Euphemia had conjured the ribbons once to tie his hair back, and he rather hated them, and thought the color rather fitted the seventh year Head Girl who plagued him. 

Next, he took up Lucius’s letter. 

Harry had had calligraphy lessons after his first year at Hogwarts, and he was proud of his handwriting. He swooped the ‘L’ in Lucius when he put quill to parchment.  He breathed out and then accepted the invitation.  He hadn’t realized that when Lucius had said he wanted Harry to be his companion, he meant that he wanted to be seen with Harry—but Harry supposed this was only the beginning.

Harry meant for it to be more than a beginning if Aunt Euphemia could only finish the Gnascum Potion.

Harry snuck into James’s room after dinner and took in his dad.  He had been dressed in dark blue robes and dragon hide boots.  He still looked an unearthly shade of gray.

“Da,” he greeted, taking a seat at the edge of bed.  “I’m afraid Lily might be your wife after all.”  He quirked a smile.  “I can’t imagine her as a pureblood, but if she’s adopted—” He sighed and looked out the window.  “I wish she didn’t fancy me so much.  I find I can’t respect her.”

James remained silent, but it had been years since Harry expected anything else.

When he slipped back into his room, he found Lucius waiting on his bed.

Harry startled.  “Lucius.”

“Hartwig.”

“I was—I was just speaking to my father.”

“I didn’t know you knew who he was,” Lucius admitted. 

“He can’t hear me,” Harry admitted, coming into the room and shutting the door behind him.  “He’s been ill my entire life.”

Lucius reached out for Harry, and he leaned against Lucius on the bed, tucked into his side like the night before.  “Tell me about your day.”

“I wrote Maia—Maia wrote me first.  More Muggle baiting,” Harry admitted.

Lucius laughed into Harry’s auburn hair.  “We must get you out of that.”

“You never said if you Muggle bait.”

“Yes,” Lucius admitted carefully.  “I Muggle bait with my friends.  I am great friends with Madam Bellatrix Lestrange, though not her dolt of a husband.  We used to go out together and Muggle bait in the village beneath Malfoy Manor.”

“Why didn’t you marry her?” Harry asked, a little curious.

“Well,” Lucius admitted, combing his fingers through Harry’s hair.  “Bella was a good two years older than I was.  It wasn’t acceptable to Father.  She also had black hair.  Father wants to preserve the Malfoy looks.”

“I can understand blood purity,” Harry admitted, looking up and catching Lucius’s silver eyes.  “Uncle Fleamont feels it keenly that he is only third generation.  We’ve now discovered he’s at least fourth generation if not fifth.  He’s so pleased.”

Lucius leaned down and kissed Harry’s lips lingeringly.  “My little pureblood.”

Harry blushed, which he was sure clashed with his hair.

Lucius only looked at him as if he thought it was charming.  His fingers lingered at the corner of Harry’s eye and then trailed down his cheek.  “I’ve been asking about you,” he admitted.

“Have you?”

“Youngest seeker in a century.”  He tapped Harry’s nose.  “Slytherin Prefect.  Slug Club.”

“Oh, you’ve been talking to Ol’ Sluggy,” Harry surmised.  “You only know my accomplishments.”

“I want to know where my Lost Boy came from,” Lucius breathed, cradling Harry’s cheek.  “How did you catch the Dark Lord’s niece’s attention?”

Harry sighed, not liking the subject.  “I know nothing of you.  I know you’re a Death Eater.  I know you’re favored by the Dark Lord.  I know you were in the Slug Club and were Head Boy my first year at Hogwarts.  I remember you playing Quidditch.  You are heir to one of the oldest families in England.  But who is Lucius Malfoy?”

“Well,” Lucius decided, leaning down for another brief kiss, “I am the eldest son, but the second child.  I have an elder sister Madeleine.  She’s married to Kenmore Kingsley.  They have a daughter, Lady Lux.  She’s a couple of years ahead of you but in Ravenclaw.”

“Lux. Lucius,” Harry realized.

“Yes, she was named for me.”

“I have no idea why I was named Hartwig.  Dad’s been ill this entire time and Mother’s—missing.”

“You must know Aloysia, my sister.  She’s a year above you at Hogwarts.”

Harry thought for a moment.  He thought of Maia, with her dishwater blonde hair and ocean blue eyes.  She was often with Apricot Selwyn when she wasn’t with Regulus and Harry.  Then there was another witch with platinum blonde hair and ice blue eyes who was often with another witch with dark skin and pale eyes.  Harry didn’t know her name.  “Yes,” Harry answered carefully.  “I don’t think I’ve ever spoken to her.”

“There’s no reason for you to know her.  She’s not in your year.”  He paused.  “Then there’s Roman.  He’s not at Hogwarts yet.”

“You’re a younger brother and an older brother.”

“Yes.”  He smoothed Harry’s hair away from his smooth forehead.  “Everything’s for duty and position.  I can’t remember when I didn’t have conversations with my father about appropriate brides.”

Harry pondered this.  “I had conversations with Aunt Euphemia last year when she noticed I didn’t fancy other witches.  She wanted to make it easier for me.  She didn’t want to burden me with an unnecessary marriage.  There’s always Uncle Charlus, but he’s never had a son, so we don’t want the line to die out with him.”

“Yes, this potion you mentioned.  It seems rather fantastical.”

“I’m not going to share you—”

“Hartwig.”

“I won’t always share you,” Harry amended.  “You don’t have to understand it.  You just have to accept it.”

Lucius was quiet for a long moment.  “I distrust Muggles.  I can see how they erode our culture.  It was so clear at Hogwarts.  We have Christmas holidays now.”

“Uncle Fleamont says, ‘Christmas holidays.’”

“He’s third generation.  I make my point.”  Lucius looked down at him.  “I want to keep Lux, Aloysia, and Roman safe.  I want to keep my future children safe.—I want to keep you safe.”

“And you Muggle bait with your friend Bella.”

“I should like you to meet her.  She is nothing like a lady of society should be.  I truly admire her.  If I have to marry a witch, I should surely prefer to marry someone like her that I could admire and not wish to shove off into another part of the mansion.  Someone I could talk to even if I must make love to her in order to create heirs.”  His voice had turned sour.  “Surely it would be better.”

Harry looked up at him.

“I am plagued by Lily Evans.”

“The Mudblood?”

“She has an adoption certificate.  She is owling the Office of Public Inquiry to follow up on it.  If she finds out she has wizarding parents, she will plague me even more.”

“It is your bad fortune that you are so beautiful and kind, Hartwig.”

“I am not kind.”

“You have a kind soul,” Lucius told him.  “I am not a kind person.  I indiscriminately torture at the Dark Lord’s bidding and fight for The Takeover.  You cannot even bare to cast a tickling curse on Muggles.”

“Some would call me weak.”

“You’re not weak, Hartwig,” Lucius promised him, running a hand up his spine.  “You’re simply good.  You’re a lamb in wolf’s clothing.”

“A lamb in wolf’s clothing?” Harry sputtered.

“My sweet little lamb,” Lucius cooed, leaning down to kiss him once again.  Harry met the kiss eagerly, reaching up to touch Lucius’s cheek.  They lay there until the sun came up and Lucius slipped off on his broom into the morning sunshine.

It was three days until Harry met Lucius at The Wicked Stepmother.  The day before Maia and Regulus descended on Potter Abbey.

“She has an appointment for tomorrow?” Regulus asked, picking up the letter.

“Yes,” Harry answered, shoulders hunched.  “The Ministry is actually taking her seriously.”

“Who is this man, Tankard?” Regulus asked, looking up from the page.  “Do we know anything about him?”

“I asked Uncle Marvolo,” Maia put in, taking the letter from Regulus.  “He’s a plant.  He’s actually a Death Eater.  They want to find misplaced wizards.  There could be more Lost Boys”—

“—Or Lost Girls,” Regulus put in—

“—like Hartwig.”  They both looked up at Harry, who had the decency to blush.  “Not everyone has his good fortune to be found before Hogwarts.”  Maia passed back the letter.  “Do you want me to try to stop it?”

Harry looked down at the letter.  He was torn.  What if Lily Evans was actually a pureblood?  What if she was actually Stephagenia Black?  Was there actually a way to prove that she was outside of a hereditary potion?  There were only a handful of potioneers in the world who could brew it, and Harry didn’t know any outside of his own grandparents inside of Europe.

“Should we stop it?” Harry asked carefully.

“What are we afraid of?” Regulus asked.

“This!” Harry answered, picking up the three separate piles of letters from Evans.

“I take your point.”

“Have Lucius write a letter of intention,” Maia suggested.  “Aren’t you going to The Wicked Stepmother with him?”

“Wait, what?”  This was Regulus.  He looked between Maia and Harry.  “Maia’s plan actually worked?”

“It would seem so,” Harry answered airily.  “He’s quite taken with me.”

“He’s engaged to my cousin,” Regulus reminded him.

“When’s the wedding?” Harry asked.

“Er—” Regulus scrunched up his face.  “I’ll find out for you.”

“Thanks, mate,” Harry told him sincerely.  He really had a great deal of planning to do.  That potion had to be ready in time to entice Lucius away from a political marriage.  There was also the problem that marriage between wizards wasn’t legal.  Maybe if he could get marriage redefined as between a wizard and a ‘wombed person’—

How was he going to make that happen?

He glanced at Regulus.  He doubted Regulus could put pressure on his father Orion Black, but could the Dark Lord?  He’d have to talk to Maia privately.

Making sure Regulus flooed out first, he grabbed Maia’s wrist.  “I have a favor.  A big favor.”

She looked at him with a question in her ocean blue eyes.  “What is it, Hartwig?”

“I need a law to be changed.”

“A law?”

“I need marriage to be redefined as between a wizard and a witch or a ‘wombed person.’  Can the Dark Lord lean into Mr. Black since Blacks have metamorphical abilities?”  He looked at her hopefully. 

She gazed at him in confusion.

He flicked his eyes to black and then back to green.

She gasped.  “Hartwig—”

“Please.  I wouldn’t ask if it weren’t important to me.”

“Are you saying you can—?”

“Aunt Euphemia is developing a potion,” he admitted quietly, leading her away from the floo toward a side room.  “It’s difficult to tell how close we are to completion.  Nothing like this has been attempted before.  But if I have a chance at happiness—I want to take it.”

“Regulus’s father will actually be going against his niece.”

“But he will be acting on behalf of his great-nephew.”  He looked at her imploringly.  “The Potters don’t have enough political pull in the wizengamot to make this happen.”

“No,” she agreed carefully.  “No, I don’t suppose they do.”  She nodded.  “I’ll judge the time and ask.  You realize Uncle Marvolo might ask you to use this talent—”

Harry had considered this.  “As long as I’m not marked.”

“I’ll make that a condition,” she promised.  She leaned down and kissed his cheek briefly, their vined rings heating up painfully, not enough to burn, but enough to warn.  “Leave this to me.”

“Thank you, Maia.”

She flooed out a few minutes later.

Harry stared at the hereditary parchment that was framed and placed on his bedroom wall.  He traced the line that went up from him, through his mother Stephegenia Black, up through Alphard Black who was Orion Black’s brother-in-law.  Her mother was Elnora Prewett.  She must be a relation of Gideon and Fabian Prewett who had been above him but in Gryffindor.  The hat hadn’t even hesitated before putting Harry in Slytherin, saying he ‘could be great, you know’ and it was ‘all there in his head.’

He put back a Notice Me Not spell on it as he expected Lucius that night.

“Growing up at Malfoy Manor was never lonely,” Lucius told him as they lay in each other’s arms that night.  “Mother and Father were always distant.  We had house elves, but Lux was there and Aloysia, and later there was little Roman.  We got up to such trouble.  Father was the first person to take me Muggle Baiting.  I took Lux and Aloysia.”

“Where did you go?” Harry asked.

“To the village.  Nothing so overt.  It was tame.  Father taught me the Unforgivables later.  He was a harsh teacher.”

“Hmm,” Harry sighed as he traced the lines of Lucius’s face.  “I’ve never cast the Unforgivables.”

“I can’t imagine the Potters are going to teach you,” Lucius noted.

“No,” Harry agreed.

“Would you like me to take you?”  The offer was open but there was no expectation to it.  “My lamb.”

Harry paused and pondered.  “I suppose the Dark Lord will take Maia and Mr. Black will take Regulus.”

“Yes,” Lucius agreed.  “It’s something you should know in Slytherin.”

“The Selwyns will take Apricon.  I wonder who will take Barty.”

“Bartemius Crouch Jr.?” Lucius asked.  “That’s been taken care of.”  He ran a hand through Harry’s auburn curls.  “I can tell the Dark Lord I’m taking care of you.  I’m sure he won’t be displeased.”

“Does he know about us?”

“He has no reason to know about us, but I can tell him, if you should like.”

“I’ll let Maia tell him,” Harry decided.  “She tells him everything eventually.”

“If that’s what you want,” Lucius agreed.  “Let me take you.  We can use prisoners in Muggle prisons, the very scum of the earth.  We won’t insult your sensibilities.”

“We can do that?”

“Oh yes,” Lucius laughed.  “We can choose murderers.  Rapists.  Anyone you want.  You have only to say the word.”  He leaned forward and touched his forehead to Harry’s.  “You can always have anything you like.  You have only to say the word and I will get it for you.”

Harry wondered if that applied to marriage.

Still, he smiled and he closed his eyes and drifted off into sleep.