FIC: The Fall of the House of Sparklypoo, as told by Lucius Malfoy, eyewitness. (PG)
Title: The Fall of the House of Sparklypoo, as told by Lucius Malfoy, eyewitness.
House Category: Sparklypoo
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Lucius, Child. (Pairings hinted at offscreen)
Author: shiv5468
Beta Reader(s): iulia_linnea
Rating: PG, for innuendo
(Highlight to View) Warning(s): None.
Summary: Not everything is recorded in Hogwarts: A History. Some tales are too dark, too tortured, too threaded through with suffering to be told to outsiders. But where two Slytherins are gathered together plotting, whether in dingy back streets or the grandest mansions over fine wines, eventually the tale of Mary Sue of the House of Sparklypoo is mentioned.
"Once upon a time," began Lucius, "not that very far away at all, there was once a beautiful princess."
His son, beloved fruit of his loins, stared up at him and blew a carefully formed bubble of spit.
"Indeed, you may consider that beautiful princesses are ten a penny, and rarely that beautiful, but convention is important, my child, so we will observe the traditional forms."
"Dadda," said the child.
"Indeed," Lucius agreed, and shifted the child against his arm. "I am your Dadda, and you are my son, scion of a proud line, and inheritor of a great responsibility."
The child gummed on his own hand, looking intently at his Dadda.
"This is a tale of House Sparklypoo," Lucius said, "as told by Slytherin to Slytherin across the years. Contrary to Some People's opinions, not everything is recorded in Hogwarts: A History. Some tales are too dark, too tortured, too threaded through with suffering to be told to outsiders. But where two Slytherins are gathered together plotting, whether in dingy back streets or the grandest mansions over fine wines, eventually the tale of Mary Sue of the House of Sparklypoo is mentioned as a warning against hubris, a memento mori if you will. Respice te, hominem te memento.
The child's gaze did not waver, regarding proceedings with a grave and thoughtful mien only slightly undermined by the bursting of the spit bubble.
"I was in my seventh year," Lucius continued. "And had been told that I would be Head Boy, as was only right and proper. We had returned to school full of enthusiasm for a new year, prepared to welcome new pupils into our ranks."
Lucius paused to jiggle his son encouragingly. "You will, of course, be sorted into Slytherin in due course no matter what your mother says. Not that we will mention that to her, will we?
"Unusually for Hogwarts, there was an older child to be sorted. An exchange student, though what we had exchanged her for was never made entirely clear. She was the same age as me, more or less, and had the most striking eyes I have ever seen in a woman. One could only call them violet, though more impressionable members of my year raided the thesaurus in search of other terms. Neither violet nor purple lend themselves easily to poetry. Unlike grey."
Lucius smirked. "Or brown even."
"Bwown," said the child, and was rewarded with a fond smile.
"So there we were, facing the delightful Princess Mary Sue, with violet eyes, and the long dark hair with one elegant blond streak, and curves in all the right places, whatever that might mean. Nevertheless, she had to be sorted, and the Hat pondered long and hard about where to put her. Should she go to the Hufflepuffs, who wanted her for her loyalty, or the Ravenclaws who wanted her for her intelligence, or the Gryffindors who wanted her for .... well who can plumb the mind of a Gryffindor?"
The child gurgled and reached out a hand to tug on his Dadda's hair.
"And then the Hat spoke - she was to be sorted to her own House, Sparklypoo. You can imagine the uproar - there had been nothing like it ever before in all the long years of Hogwarts - and McGonagall was particularly cross. Dumbledore, he sat there smiling, looking as enigmatic as he knew how."
"Spahkeypoo," said the child, and attempted his first sneer.
"A smile that was wiped off his face in the days to come when the story started spreading about her being his long-lost daughter," Lucius said, and smirked. "Any objections to that possibility on the basis of Dumbledore's well known predilection for Dark Wizards was passed off as irrelevant. After all, her mother was a veela, so no man could resist her."
The child giggled.
"I see you share my opinion of that argument." Lucius jiggled the child gently. "A man who could resist Grindlewald could certainly resist a bird-brained seductress."
Lucius shifted a little straighter in his chair, and his voice dropped to a quieter, more confidential tone. "It seems that Princess Mary Sue considered that, as Dumbledore's daughter, part veela, and only member of House Sparklypoo, she was entitled to the position of Head Girl. Never mind that there had only ever been one Head Pupil at a time before, and that there was a perfectly adequate, not to say exemplary, Head Boy. A Head Girl was needed, and if a Head Girl was needed, then there had to be special rooms for the Head Boy and the Head Girl."
"Agoowirble?"
"A good question. Some Slytherins, I am ashamed to say, were taken in by her lovely eyes but she turned her shoulder to us and made it clear that she wanted nothing to do with such an evil and unredeemed collection of people. This did not have quite the effect she hoped for - there's nothing so exciting for a seventeen year old boy as being considered dangerous - and there was no sudden conversion to the Light but rather more wearing black and silver."
The child reached out and batted at one of Lucius' silver buttons.
Lucius coughed gently.
"At least they had good taste and stayed true to the classic look of the Dark Arts practitioner. The Gryffindors started wearing something Muggles called flares, and tank tops, and in such appalling colours. Paisley, I remember a lot of paisley. And then my darling Narcissa...." Lucius paused and shook his head sadly. "Your Aunty Cissa, she decided that the two-tone hair effect was "cool", and she could not be dissuaded. Do you know, it's only in the last few years that she has come to see the error of her ways and returned her hair colour to its natural state."
Lucius paused. "Her original natural state, though that is strictly a matter to be kept in the family, young man."
The child gurgled, head nodding in agreement.
"The rooms were .... You are too young to hear of the whole horror. Suffice it to say that even those who thought loon pants were a stylish choice balked at the combination of colours and patterns she chose to decorate the sitting room. And she was the very devil for bursting in on a chap when he was having a bath, or casually forgetting to lock the door so you would catch her in a state of undress.
"I was not driven into a state of overwhelming attraction for the girl, not least because your Aunt Cissy would have had my guts for garters. I wasn't entirely sure about her blood status either, that story about Dumbledore and the Veela was a little too convenient...." Lucius cast an anxious glance at the doorway. "And I was young and stupid, and that sort of thing mattered then. But not now, obviously."
There was a watchful silence for a moment, and then Lucius continued. "Something had to be done, it was clear. Something had to be done to save Slytherin from its flirtation with disaster, and don't believe a word your Aunty Cissa tells you about this being the revenge of someone envious of another's hair. Indeed, no, as you will see."
Lucius shook his head, recalling the horror of it all. "It fell to me, as Head Boy, to do the right thing by my fellow students, before more people were caught wearing yellow flares."
"Dadda," said the child earnestly.
"It was hard to come up with a suitable plan," Lucius said. "I was young and inexperienced and there were very few allies I could look to, all were held in thrall to the power of Princess Mary Sue Smythe-Cholmondleigh-Dumbledore. Almost all. A fifth year student of uncommon perspicacity, though half-blooded, found her entirely resistible. He preferred red hair, you see, and green eyes. Oh he said something about his half blood status meaning that he had seen the havoc wreaked in the Muggle world by such fashions, and the need to stand firm, but he was trimming his motives to those of his hearer as every good Slytherin should. Though he was always fond of black, and yellow was simply not his colour.
"Is is anyone's? I hear you ask, and the answer to that is rarely."
Lucius leaned closer and whispered into the child's ear, "As you know, his views have changed on the matter of red heads if not black, and he is rather fonder of blonds these days. And brown hair that twists round your fingers like an affectionate cat.
"Impervious to the charms of Mary Sue, young Severus was the perfect recruit to the cause. And when you get a little older, he will tell you his version of what happened, but you will remember what I tell you now is the truth, won't you?"
Lucius winced, and continued with the main matter of his tale.
"He suggested a variation on Veritaserum, not a potion to make people tell the truth, but one to make people see the truth. It took several weeks to brew, and in the meantime Slytherin house had weakened and now followed her round like lost puppies, asking her to weave pretty ribbons in their hair."
Lucius shook his head. "She told Avery he looked good in puce, and he wore nothing else for days. She told Mulciber that he didn't look fat in his flares, which he manifestly did, and she encouraged Nott to wear trousers so tight one could see all that he had, and it wasn't a lot."
Lucius looked at the fruit of his loins and added swiftly, "A small coin pouch, I mean."
"So Severus and I brewed and chopped and sliced for the honour of Slytherin. He was a useful little chap, very helpful, and showed much promise in the area of potions."
Lucius smirked to himself.
"Eventually, the brewing was completed, and the time came for delivery. The house-elves were induced to help, simply by telling them that Princess Mary Sue had formed a society dedicated to obtaining their freedom, and that the potion was a necessary corrective to her evil power. Sometimes, occasionally, I do wonder whether Dumbledore knew what we were doing, but he can't be responsible for every Machiavellian plot hatched since the rise of Grindlewald, can he?"
Lucius pondered the question for a moment, before shaking his head in answer.
"He can't. No matter what Severus says.
"The elves agreed; the potion was inserted into the pumpkin juice, and Severus and I sat back and waited for events to take their course. We didn't have to wait long. Four minutes after breakfast had started, our Slytherin sistren and brethren came to their senses, staring in horror at their clothes. Some changed them to decent black robes straight away, others were searching for ways of recording their confreres for posterity and blackmail, others were keen to make their way to the Library to begin researching memory charms."
The child tilted his head to one side and gurgled.
"Gradually, the potion took effect in the other houses. Its progress could be tracked by the cries of horror as people came to their senses, forming an increasingly hostile crowd centred on Princess Mary Sue.
"She sensed her danger. She raised her head and trained her limpid violet gaze on her fellow pupils and lisped - 'there's something wrong with the juice' - but the die was cast. We could see her, at last, for what she truly was, and there are few who can stand that kind of scrutiny."
Lucius looked into the middle distance, contemplating horrors worse than yellow flares.
"She rose to her feet, clutched her hands to her breast, and took three tottering steps into the centre of the Great Hall. Her hair was fading, becoming a darker blond, until it was mousy. Her eyes changed, losing their lustre and colour, until they were nothing more than common or garden brown. Her skirts grew longer, her breasts less perky, and three spots appeared on the end of her chin.
"In short, she became ordinary. Nothing unusual. Just like the rest of them.
"A golden cloud formed above her, and she reached out for it, trying to pull it to her and stuff it back into herself, but it rose higher, splitting off into different, smaller clouds. Each cloud moved across the hall, as if they were borne on the wind, searching out a different student. A cloud reached Lily Evans, and her eyes turned greener. Another reached Sybill Trelawney, and turned her hair wilder and she threw out her arms and started talking Prophecy. Another came to me, and Severus said it turned my hair even prettier, which I find hard to believe. Every child in that hall received a touch from that cloud, a touch of destiny, if you will."
"Dadda," the child said, and touched his Dadda's hair.
"And when it was all gone, the short, fat, spotty girl that was left behind burst into tears and ran out of the Hall.
"The rest of the students swore a inviolate oath that they would not speak of this to others.
"Only Severus and I were not bound by this compact, because we hadn't made complete Tits of ourselves, pardon my Muggle, and we had to be free to pass on the warnings to our successors so that the House of Slytherin would never again fall prey to the machinations of House Sparklypoo. My child, this destiny now falls to you, and you alone will carry the flame forward to future generations."
The child blinked at his father.
"It was the end of House Sparklypoo, but that was not the end of the tale of Princess Mary Sue. Not at all.
"Oh she disappeared for a day or so, but then she reappeared under a new guise. She denied all knowledge of Princess Mary Sue's whereabouts, alleging that any resemblance between the two was merely familiar - she was Mary Sue's cousin, the Lady Morgana, drawn from a Pureblood family so secret, so rare, that none of us had ever heard of it. Lady Morgana sorted Hufflepuff, where she attracted a certain amount of sympathy for her suffering.
"She dressed all in black, as a proper witch should be, with black lace gloves, looking as if she'd been hit in the face with a plank. And for all I knew, she had been. Slytherins don't take kindly to being made fools of. She seemed poorly, her lips all stained with blue, and there was metal stuck through her ears, her eyebrow and her lip, and a rather tasteless tattoo snaked its way across her ankle. And her hair was dark, with the iridescence of a beetle's carapace that she could never rid herself of, even in later years once she'd dropped the affectation of Lady Morgana and become plain Rita - the bitter enemy of your mother, and of the House of Malfoy."
"Beware the House of Sparklypoo, my son. Beware."
House Category: Sparklypoo
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Lucius, Child. (Pairings hinted at offscreen)
Author: shiv5468
Beta Reader(s): iulia_linnea
Rating: PG, for innuendo
(Highlight to View) Warning(s): None.
Summary: Not everything is recorded in Hogwarts: A History. Some tales are too dark, too tortured, too threaded through with suffering to be told to outsiders. But where two Slytherins are gathered together plotting, whether in dingy back streets or the grandest mansions over fine wines, eventually the tale of Mary Sue of the House of Sparklypoo is mentioned.
"Once upon a time," began Lucius, "not that very far away at all, there was once a beautiful princess."
His son, beloved fruit of his loins, stared up at him and blew a carefully formed bubble of spit.
"Indeed, you may consider that beautiful princesses are ten a penny, and rarely that beautiful, but convention is important, my child, so we will observe the traditional forms."
"Dadda," said the child.
"Indeed," Lucius agreed, and shifted the child against his arm. "I am your Dadda, and you are my son, scion of a proud line, and inheritor of a great responsibility."
The child gummed on his own hand, looking intently at his Dadda.
"This is a tale of House Sparklypoo," Lucius said, "as told by Slytherin to Slytherin across the years. Contrary to Some People's opinions, not everything is recorded in Hogwarts: A History. Some tales are too dark, too tortured, too threaded through with suffering to be told to outsiders. But where two Slytherins are gathered together plotting, whether in dingy back streets or the grandest mansions over fine wines, eventually the tale of Mary Sue of the House of Sparklypoo is mentioned as a warning against hubris, a memento mori if you will. Respice te, hominem te memento.
The child's gaze did not waver, regarding proceedings with a grave and thoughtful mien only slightly undermined by the bursting of the spit bubble.
"I was in my seventh year," Lucius continued. "And had been told that I would be Head Boy, as was only right and proper. We had returned to school full of enthusiasm for a new year, prepared to welcome new pupils into our ranks."
Lucius paused to jiggle his son encouragingly. "You will, of course, be sorted into Slytherin in due course no matter what your mother says. Not that we will mention that to her, will we?
"Unusually for Hogwarts, there was an older child to be sorted. An exchange student, though what we had exchanged her for was never made entirely clear. She was the same age as me, more or less, and had the most striking eyes I have ever seen in a woman. One could only call them violet, though more impressionable members of my year raided the thesaurus in search of other terms. Neither violet nor purple lend themselves easily to poetry. Unlike grey."
Lucius smirked. "Or brown even."
"Bwown," said the child, and was rewarded with a fond smile.
"So there we were, facing the delightful Princess Mary Sue, with violet eyes, and the long dark hair with one elegant blond streak, and curves in all the right places, whatever that might mean. Nevertheless, she had to be sorted, and the Hat pondered long and hard about where to put her. Should she go to the Hufflepuffs, who wanted her for her loyalty, or the Ravenclaws who wanted her for her intelligence, or the Gryffindors who wanted her for .... well who can plumb the mind of a Gryffindor?"
The child gurgled and reached out a hand to tug on his Dadda's hair.
"And then the Hat spoke - she was to be sorted to her own House, Sparklypoo. You can imagine the uproar - there had been nothing like it ever before in all the long years of Hogwarts - and McGonagall was particularly cross. Dumbledore, he sat there smiling, looking as enigmatic as he knew how."
"Spahkeypoo," said the child, and attempted his first sneer.
"A smile that was wiped off his face in the days to come when the story started spreading about her being his long-lost daughter," Lucius said, and smirked. "Any objections to that possibility on the basis of Dumbledore's well known predilection for Dark Wizards was passed off as irrelevant. After all, her mother was a veela, so no man could resist her."
The child giggled.
"I see you share my opinion of that argument." Lucius jiggled the child gently. "A man who could resist Grindlewald could certainly resist a bird-brained seductress."
Lucius shifted a little straighter in his chair, and his voice dropped to a quieter, more confidential tone. "It seems that Princess Mary Sue considered that, as Dumbledore's daughter, part veela, and only member of House Sparklypoo, she was entitled to the position of Head Girl. Never mind that there had only ever been one Head Pupil at a time before, and that there was a perfectly adequate, not to say exemplary, Head Boy. A Head Girl was needed, and if a Head Girl was needed, then there had to be special rooms for the Head Boy and the Head Girl."
"Agoowirble?"
"A good question. Some Slytherins, I am ashamed to say, were taken in by her lovely eyes but she turned her shoulder to us and made it clear that she wanted nothing to do with such an evil and unredeemed collection of people. This did not have quite the effect she hoped for - there's nothing so exciting for a seventeen year old boy as being considered dangerous - and there was no sudden conversion to the Light but rather more wearing black and silver."
The child reached out and batted at one of Lucius' silver buttons.
Lucius coughed gently.
"At least they had good taste and stayed true to the classic look of the Dark Arts practitioner. The Gryffindors started wearing something Muggles called flares, and tank tops, and in such appalling colours. Paisley, I remember a lot of paisley. And then my darling Narcissa...." Lucius paused and shook his head sadly. "Your Aunty Cissa, she decided that the two-tone hair effect was "cool", and she could not be dissuaded. Do you know, it's only in the last few years that she has come to see the error of her ways and returned her hair colour to its natural state."
Lucius paused. "Her original natural state, though that is strictly a matter to be kept in the family, young man."
The child gurgled, head nodding in agreement.
"The rooms were .... You are too young to hear of the whole horror. Suffice it to say that even those who thought loon pants were a stylish choice balked at the combination of colours and patterns she chose to decorate the sitting room. And she was the very devil for bursting in on a chap when he was having a bath, or casually forgetting to lock the door so you would catch her in a state of undress.
"I was not driven into a state of overwhelming attraction for the girl, not least because your Aunt Cissy would have had my guts for garters. I wasn't entirely sure about her blood status either, that story about Dumbledore and the Veela was a little too convenient...." Lucius cast an anxious glance at the doorway. "And I was young and stupid, and that sort of thing mattered then. But not now, obviously."
There was a watchful silence for a moment, and then Lucius continued. "Something had to be done, it was clear. Something had to be done to save Slytherin from its flirtation with disaster, and don't believe a word your Aunty Cissa tells you about this being the revenge of someone envious of another's hair. Indeed, no, as you will see."
Lucius shook his head, recalling the horror of it all. "It fell to me, as Head Boy, to do the right thing by my fellow students, before more people were caught wearing yellow flares."
"Dadda," said the child earnestly.
"It was hard to come up with a suitable plan," Lucius said. "I was young and inexperienced and there were very few allies I could look to, all were held in thrall to the power of Princess Mary Sue Smythe-Cholmondleigh-Dumbledore. Almost all. A fifth year student of uncommon perspicacity, though half-blooded, found her entirely resistible. He preferred red hair, you see, and green eyes. Oh he said something about his half blood status meaning that he had seen the havoc wreaked in the Muggle world by such fashions, and the need to stand firm, but he was trimming his motives to those of his hearer as every good Slytherin should. Though he was always fond of black, and yellow was simply not his colour.
"Is is anyone's? I hear you ask, and the answer to that is rarely."
Lucius leaned closer and whispered into the child's ear, "As you know, his views have changed on the matter of red heads if not black, and he is rather fonder of blonds these days. And brown hair that twists round your fingers like an affectionate cat.
"Impervious to the charms of Mary Sue, young Severus was the perfect recruit to the cause. And when you get a little older, he will tell you his version of what happened, but you will remember what I tell you now is the truth, won't you?"
Lucius winced, and continued with the main matter of his tale.
"He suggested a variation on Veritaserum, not a potion to make people tell the truth, but one to make people see the truth. It took several weeks to brew, and in the meantime Slytherin house had weakened and now followed her round like lost puppies, asking her to weave pretty ribbons in their hair."
Lucius shook his head. "She told Avery he looked good in puce, and he wore nothing else for days. She told Mulciber that he didn't look fat in his flares, which he manifestly did, and she encouraged Nott to wear trousers so tight one could see all that he had, and it wasn't a lot."
Lucius looked at the fruit of his loins and added swiftly, "A small coin pouch, I mean."
"So Severus and I brewed and chopped and sliced for the honour of Slytherin. He was a useful little chap, very helpful, and showed much promise in the area of potions."
Lucius smirked to himself.
"Eventually, the brewing was completed, and the time came for delivery. The house-elves were induced to help, simply by telling them that Princess Mary Sue had formed a society dedicated to obtaining their freedom, and that the potion was a necessary corrective to her evil power. Sometimes, occasionally, I do wonder whether Dumbledore knew what we were doing, but he can't be responsible for every Machiavellian plot hatched since the rise of Grindlewald, can he?"
Lucius pondered the question for a moment, before shaking his head in answer.
"He can't. No matter what Severus says.
"The elves agreed; the potion was inserted into the pumpkin juice, and Severus and I sat back and waited for events to take their course. We didn't have to wait long. Four minutes after breakfast had started, our Slytherin sistren and brethren came to their senses, staring in horror at their clothes. Some changed them to decent black robes straight away, others were searching for ways of recording their confreres for posterity and blackmail, others were keen to make their way to the Library to begin researching memory charms."
The child tilted his head to one side and gurgled.
"Gradually, the potion took effect in the other houses. Its progress could be tracked by the cries of horror as people came to their senses, forming an increasingly hostile crowd centred on Princess Mary Sue.
"She sensed her danger. She raised her head and trained her limpid violet gaze on her fellow pupils and lisped - 'there's something wrong with the juice' - but the die was cast. We could see her, at last, for what she truly was, and there are few who can stand that kind of scrutiny."
Lucius looked into the middle distance, contemplating horrors worse than yellow flares.
"She rose to her feet, clutched her hands to her breast, and took three tottering steps into the centre of the Great Hall. Her hair was fading, becoming a darker blond, until it was mousy. Her eyes changed, losing their lustre and colour, until they were nothing more than common or garden brown. Her skirts grew longer, her breasts less perky, and three spots appeared on the end of her chin.
"In short, she became ordinary. Nothing unusual. Just like the rest of them.
"A golden cloud formed above her, and she reached out for it, trying to pull it to her and stuff it back into herself, but it rose higher, splitting off into different, smaller clouds. Each cloud moved across the hall, as if they were borne on the wind, searching out a different student. A cloud reached Lily Evans, and her eyes turned greener. Another reached Sybill Trelawney, and turned her hair wilder and she threw out her arms and started talking Prophecy. Another came to me, and Severus said it turned my hair even prettier, which I find hard to believe. Every child in that hall received a touch from that cloud, a touch of destiny, if you will."
"Dadda," the child said, and touched his Dadda's hair.
"And when it was all gone, the short, fat, spotty girl that was left behind burst into tears and ran out of the Hall.
"The rest of the students swore a inviolate oath that they would not speak of this to others.
"Only Severus and I were not bound by this compact, because we hadn't made complete Tits of ourselves, pardon my Muggle, and we had to be free to pass on the warnings to our successors so that the House of Slytherin would never again fall prey to the machinations of House Sparklypoo. My child, this destiny now falls to you, and you alone will carry the flame forward to future generations."
The child blinked at his father.
"It was the end of House Sparklypoo, but that was not the end of the tale of Princess Mary Sue. Not at all.
"Oh she disappeared for a day or so, but then she reappeared under a new guise. She denied all knowledge of Princess Mary Sue's whereabouts, alleging that any resemblance between the two was merely familiar - she was Mary Sue's cousin, the Lady Morgana, drawn from a Pureblood family so secret, so rare, that none of us had ever heard of it. Lady Morgana sorted Hufflepuff, where she attracted a certain amount of sympathy for her suffering.
"She dressed all in black, as a proper witch should be, with black lace gloves, looking as if she'd been hit in the face with a plank. And for all I knew, she had been. Slytherins don't take kindly to being made fools of. She seemed poorly, her lips all stained with blue, and there was metal stuck through her ears, her eyebrow and her lip, and a rather tasteless tattoo snaked its way across her ankle. And her hair was dark, with the iridescence of a beetle's carapace that she could never rid herself of, even in later years once she'd dropped the affectation of Lady Morgana and become plain Rita - the bitter enemy of your mother, and of the House of Malfoy."
"Beware the House of Sparklypoo, my son. Beware."