Harry Potter Fic
This story is about the Lestranges.
I started writing this peice a long time ago, nearly two months now. I will get it done someday, but I felt terrible letting it just lounge around on my hard drive when I could have it posted somewhere for people to see.
Miss AshJay was my beta. She is an amazing girl who gave more constructive feedback and caught more stupid errors then I thought humanly possible. I love her oh-so-much. You should love her as much as I do. Seriously. (A few other people helped me as well: addictedkitten and jrivka were also incredible. You should love them too!)
Right then, to the story...
Title: House of Cards
Author: Chloe
Rating: Strong R, for sex and violence
Pairing: Lucius/OC, among many others
Feedback: I cannot express how much feedback would mean to me. Posting this first chapter is like placing a piece of myself on public display. So... have at it!
Before you begin, this is a strange story thus far. I was heavily influenced by Donna Tartt's The Secret History when writing it. Basically, the focus is on the the Lestranges (that mysterious Death Eater couple of GoF fame) and their induction into the Voldemort's inner-circle. This is not a finished story, but I wanted to put out what I have now before all of the canon I have built for myself is destroyed with OotP. Please enjoy!
Patrice and Evelyn Lestrange were both slight brunettes with pale eyes and a shy way about them. Some had murmered that they were cousins; but they weren’t
Certainly there were quiet things about them that whispered of a distant relation, like the constant economy of movement they both unfalteringly had and the seemingly innocuous
manner they affected when in tense situations, but even the casual observer should have been able to see their different bloodlines written plainly across their skin.
Evelyn was fair cream, like an English country morning, except when she was ailing (and she often was), then she became pallid, but no less beautiful. Patrice had olive skin and his hair curled around his ears in delightful ringlets (“Isn’t he lovely?” Lucius breathed upon their first meeting). He wasn’t dark, but he obviously wasn’t British. “My family has Greek roots,” he told Evelyn’s parents in his lilting French accent when they were introduced.
The Lestranges were young and beautiful and Patrice decided that they needed a way to remain safe.
“It doesn’t mean a thing that I’m a half-blood,” she cried.
“Yes it does!” His dark eyebrows knitted in consternation. “What if they find out? What if I lose you?”
“Merlin, Patrice, if you’re so terrified, let’s run away. We could go to Paris and from there-”
“We cannot flee,” he told her. “We’ve not nearly enough reachable money and neither one of has an inheritance yet.”
Evelyn opened her mouth to say something.
“And while we could Apparate, what will we do once we’ve reached some unknown clime?” He finished.
“We could make do, I know we could.”
“Evelyn, you were raised by governesses and have never done real day’s work in your life. What skills have you?”
“Magic, we have magic-”
“Magic means nothing in this case.” Patrice shook his head. “Magic works against us here.”
This was the battle that had consumed them for weeks. Every night, near morning’s first light, they sat in the gilded atrium of Patrice’s parents home and tried to plan, tried to discuss. It inevitably dissolved into fighting and tears. Tonight was no different. She was just so convinced that they’d survive in perfect condition-that they were immortal.
Patrice was becoming increasingly agitated with his wife. In a fit of desperation he said-
“Why don’t we just join?”
There was a long silence.
Evelyn looked up, her eyes glassy. She rubbed the back of her neck and Patrice heard her nails run over the skin.
“Okay,” she said.
The Lestranges became Death Eaters.
Lord Voldemort asked for a child in the early fall after their initiation. It seemed a bizarre request after their rites, which had involved the almost perfunctory slaughter of a boy-child in the most ritualistic sense of the word. Patrice, looking back on it, was still in complete disbelief that he hadn’t run screaming with Evelyn in tow.
Their arms were both branded now, and Patrice had no idea where they were going. But somehow, the two of them-so young, and such newcomers-had managed to end up in their Lord’s inner-circle.
“It’s because you’re so beautiful,” he told Evelyn after a bout of discreet Muggle torture in the country. She looked paler than normal and in their bedroom with her hair falling over her eyes; Patrice thought she might be ivory. “How can anyone resist someone so lovely and so dangerous?”
“Does it thrill you?” Evelyn turned the slightest bit and looked at him.
“The tormenting?”
‘The murdering. Do you take pleasure in it?”
It hadn't even occurred to him to think about it like that. He didn't feel like he was killing people. While he was there watching, while he was raising his own wand and crying Unforgivables with abandon it didn’t feel like murder. It felt godly. He may have been timid at first, plagued by stronger morals than he harbored now, but now….now he was committing acts of wonder.
“Yes,” he said. “I suppose I do.”
She had rolled over, the spine of her back elegantly curved beneath her skin and exposed by the deep cut of her nightdress. Her shoulders, delicate and sharp, curled inward and Patrice knew she had crossed her arms over her chest.
“You don’t,” he said.
“Not yet,” Evelyn sighed. “But maybe soon.”
Patrice kissed the back of her neck.
A child, Voldemort told his closest followers, would ensure his legacy and provide him with someone he could train as he saw fit. A child, he said, would mean another heir.
On the dark Lord’s right, and only five paces away, Lucius Malfoy leaned over and put his lips close to Patrice’s neck. “Bunch of melodramatic nattering on, if you ask me,” he whispered in an amused tone, his voice breathy.
“Oh,” Patrice said and shifted his weight. Lucius’ breath smelled like whiskey, but that was normal for Lucius.
Voldemort was saying something about the qualities he wanted in the mother of his child. Patrice silently thanked Merlin that Evelyn had been unable to attend this abruptly called meeting.
“Where’s your pretty little wife?” Lucius asked and he’d moved closer, his hand was resting on the small of Patrice’s back.
“She’s ill.”
Lucius raised one blond eyebrow into a stylish arch and his aristocratic little mouth made a comical pink “o”. He regarded Patrice coolly but his eyes looked dangerously keen in the dimly lit room (meetings were generally held in the study at Malfoy Manor).
“Does our Lord know?”
“Yes. Evelyn owled before I Apparated here.”
“Ah…”
“What?”
“Our Lord likes your wife. He says she’s very talented, that she’ll be here with us until the end.”
Patrice's face must have given away some sort of emotion, because Lucius smiled at him and said-
“You too, of course. After all, what’s one Lestrange without the other?”
“Right….” Patrice said uncertainly.
Lucius started humming jauntily under his breath and Patrice realized that the other man must have been drunker than he'd thought
“When this is really over,” Lucius stopped to say, and Patrice noticed that Voldemort had finished speaking and was now conversing with a tall dark-haired witch who was apparently a Diviner. “When this is over will you stay a while? I want to show you something.”
“I ought to go home. Evelyn will-”
“Phssh.”
Lucius turned and looked at him, moving his hand from Patrice's back to his shoulder. In the most indiscreet manner and place, Patrice was being backed into a corner.
“You’ll stay for a bit,” he said. It wasn’t a question. Patrice was learning that it generally wasn’t with Lucius.
The meetings weren’t like the rituals. The rituals were always unique, sometimes elaborate and sometimes crude. Sometimes they were told to wear their best dress robes. Once Voldemort instructed them to wear Muggle formal wear- looking ridiculous in top hats and tails, they had murdered a British lord and his family at their ancestral home. If Patrice were to be honest with himself, he would have to admit that he liked the rituals much better. There was a strange air of both familiarly and barely concealed jealously that prevailed at the meetings and he often felt like an outsider.
Tonight the meeting had ended at around 1:00am. The Dark Lord liked the quiet of nighttime and he enjoyed the early hours of the morning. Often they were called just before daybreak so his ranks could be with him at sunrise. Patrice surmised that it was a good idea not to question his Lord’s eccentricities.
Soon nearly everyone had Disapparated and Lucius had left the room, abandoning Patrice in a leather chair with what looked suspiciously like nail scratches on the seat. Patrice began to feel slightly anxious. It wasn’t, per se, that Lucius was a threatening person, nor was he so naïve not to know what Lucius wanted from him. That was perfectly clear. But somehow Lucius managed to make him acutely uneasy.
Evan and Augustus had stayed as well, and that too made Patrice nervous. They were engaged in a sleepy game of half-drunken chess (“No fool, that’s my pawn.”). Patrice suspected that they had been at the Manor before the meeting was called. All three of them-Malfoy, Rosier, and Rookwood- were old school chums; they had been in Slytherin together. They were older than he.
Patrice was one of the only Death Eaters who hadn't gone to Hogwarts, and also one of the youngest. He wondered sullenly if it mattered. A terribly long time ago Lucius had disappeared to fetch them scotch.
“Do you think he needs help?” Patrice asked. Evan and Augustus looked up from their game and stopped bickering.
“Oh, not Lucius,” Evan shrugged. “Lucie doesn’t ever ask for help.”
Patrice had never heard anyone call Lucius Malfoy “Lucie.”
“Don’t they have house elves?” He ventured.
“Of course they have house elves,” Augustus said scornfully.
“It’s just, the house elves don’t really like Lucius very much,” Evan added, elegantly slurring his words.
“Oh.”
“It’s because Lucius offed his-” Evan cut off abruptly and rubbed peevishly at his shin.
“Lucius what?” Patrice picked up.
“King to d-3,” said Augustus pointedly.
“Why don’t the house elves like him?” Patrice tried again when nobody answered him.
“The house elves,” Augustus said slowly, eyeing Evan reproachfully, “were very loyal to Lucius’ father.”
“Are you implying Lucius killed his father?” Patrice asked, not at all skeptical. There were far too many rumors that had circulated after Lucius had come into his inheritance. An inheritance which included, besides Malfoy Manor, a position on the Hogwart's Board of Governors.
Evan nodded. Augustus aimed another sharp kick at his shin.
“Will you bloody quit that?” Evan said. “It’s not some grand secret. Lucius boasts about it all the time.”
Augustus sneered at him.
“Well, he does!”
“It’s a very classical concept, patricide,” Augustus said by way of explanation. “Lucius likes classical things.”
Patrice watched them with rapt attention. Lucius had never said any such thing to him. Most of the things Lucius said to him were either embarrassingly lustful compliments or snide comments about Evelyn.
“Does the Dark Lord know?”
“Of course our Lord knows,” Augustus said. “It was a part of Lucius’ initiation.”
“Oh Merlin.” Patrice rubbed at his forehead. The grandfather clock near the door was marking the time at 1:45. Lucius had been gone nearly an hour.
“It’s not really something you should worry about.” Augustus looked back down the chessboard. “The ministry knows all about it, but no one is going to do anything. They tend not to when it comes to the Malfoys.”
Evan giggled and took another sip of his scotch. It was around his fourth. He was the one who’d sent Lucius for more.
“Auggie here works for the Ministry, you know,” he said, pointing at the considerably more sober Augustus. “Auggie…Auggie, how long have I been calling you Auggie?”
Of course he knew that, Patrice thought impatiently. Everyone knew that Voldemort considered Rookwood a great asset because of his position in the Department of Mysteries.
“You’ve been calling me Auggie since before I knew enough to hit you for it. Now please shut up and play.”
“Wait, why did Lucius-”
“Why did Lucius what?” A cold voice asked from the doorway.
“Why did… why did... why didn’t you call one of us to come and help you?” Patrice recovered as quickly as he could and smiled sheepishly. His right hand, out of Lucius’ line of sight, gripped the chair arm painfully.
Lucius had changed. He was wearing simply cut, cobalt robes of some thick fabric that Patrice couldn't identify from so far away. There was a tray of tea and biscuits floating gracefully by Lucius' side, controlled by his wand, and his other hand carried a full bottle of toffee-colored
scotch
“I generally don’t need help,” Lucius said.
“Hi Lucie,” Evan said, with a sweetly inebriated smile. “I’m drunk, you know.”
“Yes Evan, I can see that,” Lucius answered him, his tone one that people usually reserved for children and the mentally ill.
“Why don’t you keep the scotch in here?” Evan continued. “It would be so much simpler to get to; it even matches these pretty moldings of yours.” He looked happily at the walls.
Lucius came and set the tray down on the table between Patrice’s chair and another one like it. “I hope these two rogues were sweet to you,” he said with a slight curl of his upper lip.
“Oh yes, perfectly cordial,” Patrice said. He glanced up at the clock on the wall; it was 2:00. “I should owl Evelyn; she’ll be worried.”
“I thought you might ask to do so,” Lucius answered smoothly. “I took the liberty of sending her an owl while I was down in the kitchens.”
Patrice didn’t have time to school his features and Lucius said-
“I’ve told her you’re to spend the night,” he paused artfully. “I hope you don’t mind.”
“No,” Patrice said slowly. “No not at all.” He motioned toward the scotch. “May I?”
“Certainly,” Lucius said and his eyes were positively gleaming. He set a glass tumbler engraved with a swooping “M” on the table and poured out some liquor for Patrice.
Scotch was something of a special occasion drink in his father’s household. So, intending to just take a sip, Patrice took the tumbler in hand, but before he could stop himself he had thrown back the entire contents in one desperate gulp. The liquid burned his throat and settled warm in his stomach. To his surprise, Lucius let out a low chortle.
“Good man,” he said and Patrice felt his cheeks flush.
At the other table, chess game neglected, Evan was trying to explain the finer points of the house elf trade--his family legacy--to Augustus.
“You just find them,” he was saying. “You find them and they go with you. They don’t even ask questions. And bam,” he thumped the table with his fist, “you sell them for a profit.” He smiled. “It’s the perfect business, really.”
Augustus looked as though he didn’t agree. “Why haven’t you passed out yet?” He muttered aloud.
Evan looked momentarily affronted but kept talking. Subtly, Augustus pointed his wand square at his chest and quietly said “Somnus."
Evan slumped over and began snoring.
Lucius and Patrice looked up from their conversation. Lucius raised an eyebrow and Patrice took another sip of his glass of scotch. The tea sat untouched.
“He fell asleep,” Augustus said.
“I’m sure he did,” Lucius smirked.
“You should… you should walk him upstairs. He looks very uncomfortable,” Patrice said, nodded resolutely. This was a nice room, he decided. He liked the tapestries. His parents were overly fond of austerity. Everything in Malfoy Manor was ornate and older than most of the Malfoys who’d ever lived in it. He liked the dusty grace of it all, the centuries engraved into the walls.
“That’s a very good idea,” Lucius smiled and he had no laugh lines. “Why don’t you take him up to bed, Augustus?”
Augustus scowled at him. “What do you plan to do, Lucius? Take him on that chair like you took poor drunken Evan here?”
It was such a sudden change in mood that Patrice didn’t know how to react. He looked down at the chair he was sitting in. The scratches on the seat, he thought, dear God. Next to him, Lucius seemed entirely unfazed.
Perhaps," Lucius hissed, standing up. "Or I could take him in the solarium. It's very private this late at night."
Augustus’s eyes widened
“What, surprised?” Lucius asked after a pause. “Do you not think I know who’s fucking my precious wife? Do you not think I keep an eye on her always?” His voice had slipped into a low, throaty whisper that made Patrice shiver.
“Lucius, I-”
“Shut up, Rookwood. Take your friend and sleep in the guest room on the ground level. And if you find yourself with such insatiable urges, fuck him.” He smiled a hideously cold smile.
‘Thank you, Lucius,” Augustus said and for the first time Patrice caught traces of a nervous stutter that must have been bred out of him by tutors as a child.
Augustus stood and nervously pulled his wand from his robe sleeve. He pointed it at the unconscious Rosier and mumbled “Mobilicorpus.” Evan sat up, his head lolling peculiarly on his neck, black hair flopping back off his forehead. Augustus pulled him into a standing position and with a hand on his waist led him toward the door.
“And Augustus,” Lucius said just as the other man reached for the door handle. “If I catch you near my bedchambers-” he inclined his head slightly. “I’ll kill you.”
Patrice didn’t doubt that he would.
There was a long moment of silence.
“Goodnight, Patrice,” Augustus said courteously.
He left then, Evan moving strangely beside him.
“My get-togethers are rarely boring,” Lucius said, as he sat back down. “It’s a true gift.”
“Ah,” Patrice nodded dumbly. He felt the scotch in his stomach, felt it wrapping his brain in a lovely sort of velvet-at once too hot, but soft and lovely too-and it was just the right way to feel. It wasn’t exactly scandalizing to find out that Narcissa Malfoy slept around, but that she had slept with Augustus seemed somehow out-of-place.
Lucius rolled the liquid around in his tumbler. It was his second and he’d hardly touched it. It had to be nearly 4:30, but the room had gradually become darker and Patrice could no longer make out the clock.
“You mustn’t let anything you’ve heard upset you,” Lucius said. “We really like having you with us and soon you’ll get used to the way things are.” He looked fondly at Patrice.
Patrice gulped. He finished his scotch.
“While things may seem odd at first, it’s not all the terrible that Augustus is sleeping with my wife. When she’s pregnant with my heir it will be, but not now. I don’t actually intend to kill him.”
Patrice let out a relieved sigh and Lucius laughed again. Low, like his angry whisper before.
“As for Evan, Augustus is just jealous. They were lovers at school.” Lucius pursed his lips. “Nothing can be done for it; Evan is just a whore.”
There were shadows on the wall near a grand piano that Patrice hadn’t noticed before. And the walls, lined with old books, were falling deeper into the dim. It was almost as if morning had held off for some unknown reason, like Lucius’ whims had stalled the rising sun.
“You don’t mind my using that word, do you? Whore is such an apt word sometimes. But people are so sensitive now.” He was rambling, talking Patrice into a subdued daze. “I tried being sensitive once….”
Patrice had sunk down into his chair, enjoying the soft seat, his warm, hazy body.
“You have such lovely curls, you know that, Patrice?” Lucius absently reached out to touch one and slip a long finger through the center of a ringlet. “They’re so soft and perfect. Your mother must have dressed you in such finery as a child.” He kept stroking Patrice’s hair, running his hands through it, down to the nape of his neck, and under the collar of his robes.
“Mmmm,” Patrice said, “Mother used to say I looked like a cherub.”
“Yes, a cherub,” Lucius said softly and leaned over to place a kiss below Patrice’s ear. “You could certainly be a cherub.”
He pressed his face into Patrice’s hair. “You smell like cinnamon. Like something spicy,” he murmured.
Patrice didn’t answer. His eyes had fallen shut. The tumbler had dropped to the floor.
“It’s inevitable,” Lucius whispered right into Patrice's ear, letting his tongue rest just for a moment against the lobe. “There’s really no point in fighting it, not that you could…” His mouth moved lower and he nipped at Patrice’s neck. “You should just let me do what I want.”
“Lucius, perhaps this isn’t…” Patrice started when there was unexpectedly a hand on his leg and Lucius was no longer in his chair but sitting on the ground in front of him.
“No, no,” Lucius said soothingly. “We’re doing what I want, remember? That way no one gets hurt and everything,” his hand slid up Patrice’s leg to his groin, “and everything is perfect.”
Patrice’s breath hitched and his mouth fell open. Oh, Evelyn…. He thought suddenly and moved to shove Lucius’ hand away, but by the time his brain had relayed the message to his body, Lucius had already had undone his robes.
“See? Isn’t this nice… I promise you, it’ll be very nice.” Lucius had somehow moved from sitting on the floor to perching on Patrice’s knees without taking his hand from his trousers. He bent and took a small dark nipple into his mouth.
Patrice gasped and his hips spasmed upward. From his chest, Lucius laughed softly.
“I told you. This is very normal for the lot of us. Soon, soon.... ” He trailed off and sat up to undo the fastenings on his robes, which turned out to be just two small ties-one near his waist and one near his neck. Lucius pulled off his robe and his skin was like actual light, radiant and pale. He wore only black briefs. Patrice felt very dressed and very disoriented.
He tried to shimmy out of his pants and Lucius helped, pulling them off and throwing them over the other chair.
“I’m going to fuck you now,” Lucius said.
Patrice bit his lower lip hard enough to draw blood and Lucius kissed him there for the first time. Slow, deliberate and decidedly greedy, he slipped his tongue into Patrice’s mouth and lapped at the coppery taste. His hands curled into Patrice’s hair and held his head still.
He was terribly hard and whimpered into Lucius’ mouth. Lucius rewarded him by settling his groin heavily down upon his own. Lucius was taller than Patrice, but lighter than him. Light like a bird-but Lucius. Lucius was hardly a small fluttering bird; he was more like a poised, dangerous hawk.
Patrice wrapped his arms around Lucius’ neck. Let himself be kissed again and again, Lucius’ tongue in his mouth, heavy and textured and wonderful. And Lucius grinding his hips in tune with his own. The two of them, writhing together on the small chair.
“Get down on the floor,” Lucius said after some time of this, and stood. Both of them were breathing heavily, and Patrice could make out two pink spots of color high on Lucius’ cheeks.
Governed only by lust, Patrice complied and flopped inelegantly to the ground. He was nearly naked now-his robe left rumpled in the chair, his shirt undone to the navel and his knickers damp with sweat and pre-cum-Lucius was already nude.
“Turn over.” Lucius said and his voice lacked its usual timbre, replaced instead with a husky sort of drawl that made Patrice’s skin both crawl and break out into goose bumps.
Patrice turned over onto his stomach. The Oriental rug felt rough and irritating against his sensitive nipples-aching where Lucius had worried them with his teeth. Lucius went to fetch something from the desk and when he returned Patrice saw that he carried a small glass jar.
Lucius smiled, his hair twisted into long, wild cowlicks from their earlier deeds. In the dark he looked like a caricature of an angel, with his white skin and long torso, his legs sinewy and toned.
“Lucius,” Patrice said, and the man knelt on the rug beside him.
Patrice felt a warm hand run down his back and to his ass. Lucius leant over and kissed him just between his shoulder blades. The hand slipped into his knickers and while Lucius continued kissing a slow trail down Patrice’s body, his other hand joined it. Patrice obligingly lifted his thighs to have his last undergarment pulled off.
After discarding Patrice’s briefs, Lucius moved to straddle him low on his legs.
Patrice whimpered when Lucius parted his buttocks and prodded none too gently at his asshole. A pointed nail scratched just over the puckered entrance.
“Shhhh….” Lucius pressed a hand on Patrice’s upper back to hold him in place and continued to work his finger into Patrice’s body.
“So lovely,” Lucius was saying in between Patrice’s incoherent keening noises. “You’re so very lovely… I thought so from the moment I saw you.” He stroked again and again into Patrice’s ass. “Like a cherub… a debauched cherub.”
Oh God, Patrice thought wildly, Lucius’ Lucius' mellifluous words dripping over his consciousness. His mind was completely overwhelmed with wanton emotions and the all-consuming feeling of just Lucius-beautiful and far eviler than his sweet Evelyn. Oh God, Evelyn….
“Ahhh!” Patrice cried into the rug when Lucius added another finger. Now both were brushing against his prostate. He though desperately of the most comforting thing he could recall: summers in Greece when he was a boy, his Grand-mère’s villa in Kalami. How sunlight would dapple the white walls in the morning and a house elf would bring him watered wine from the vineyard. After lunch, his beloved Grand-mère would attempt to teach him the language, the harsh Greek words enrobed in her French inflection.
Patrice tried not to cry.
Lucius bent over Patrice’s back so that he could speak into his ear. The hand which had been holding him in place moved to grasp the back of his neck. “See?” Lucius whispered, wet breath on his ear. “This is what I’ve wanted to give you all along.” Lucius’ hand on his neck tightened to an almost painful clutch. Patrice couldn’t help but squirm, jarring the fingers in his ass.
“You’re hurting me-” He tried to say.
“No, I’m not,” Lucius stopped him. “You like this. You like the thrill of it.” He took his fingers from Patrice’s body and brought them to his own cock, waiting hard against Patrice’s thighs.
“Aren’t I dangerous enough for you, Patrice?” He whispered, and just before he slid his slick cock into Patrice, he bit sharply at his shoulder, drawing blood.
Patrice dug his hands into the horrid carpet.
Patrice woke to sunlight. Sunlight pouring in through the open velvet drapes of the study and bathing him in relentless bright morning light. The sun was already high and he was, it seemed, fully dressed and slumped back in his chair from the night before. His head ached something awful.
He closed his eyes and rubbed at his temples, circular motions, and deep breaths. From his toes to his neck his body hurt. Patrice hadn’t known that so many different kinds of pain existed, or let alone were possible at once before he became a Death Eater. Now he was aware of it on a far more personal level.
“Oh God,” he said aloud and looked about the room.
During the earlier morning it had been tidied. House elves, presumably, had rearranged the chairs where Evan and Augustus had been sitting. Their empty scotch glasses were gone, their chess set put away. It looked like they’d never been there at all and that was disconcerting. So easy it was to hide away the past.
Patrice’s trousers were rumpled beyond repair but his robe sat pristine and folded on the chair next to him. He hadn’t even thought to check for his wand, and hurriedly patted at the fabric of his robe, to find it nestled in the pocket in which it was left.
Patrice sighed heavily and shoved the wand into the pocket of his trousers.
On the table next to him, there was a new tray. Cold pumpkin juice and tea, charmed to stay at the right temperature and a plate of fresh croissants. Also, Patrice saw, a short note written in what could have only been Lucius’ hand. He took the glass of juice and read over the letter…
Patrice-
I’ve gone to London on family business. If you run into Augustus or
Evan wandering the halls, I’m certain they’ll both be more than
pleasant to you. Inform me if they are not.
Needn’t worry, I expect we’ll be seeing much more of each other…
we wouldn’t want anyone to tell Evelyn anything unsavory about you, now
would we? I imagine it may take quite a bit of…effort…on your part to
buy the silence you so desperately require. We'll be seeing one another
quite frequently from now on.
Disaspparate when you will.
I’ll be in touch-
L.M.
Patrice quickly folded the letter and put it away to dispose of later. The night before was less of a blur than he would have liked it to be. Evan and Augustus, silly and arguing over useless things until Lucius ordered the latter from the room who took Evan with him. Lucius just talking and talking…. and more scotch than he’d ever had before. And oh…
Patrice trembled in remembrance. Lucius had taken him on the rug, a hand gripping his neck and another holding his thigh for leverage. Dear God, the sheer carnality of it all! It was animalistic on a level Patrice had never reached: killingly blissful and more guilt laden than the murders he had committed with his own wand. Lucius was so incredibly vicious. This man (who Patrice knew would kill him if asked) ripping into him and whispering crude endearments. It was wrong. It was too much.
He had to go home; he had to get out of the Manor because its very walls seemed to sing the merits of deviancy. And what of Evelyn… he wondered silently. Evelyn would disown him, Evelyn would cry, beautiful Evelyn with her small hands and delicate neck. Evelyn: pale and soft in his clearest recollection of her. Lucius was dreadfully right, Evelyn could never know.
Patrice Disapparated home.
In the months that followed, their lives changed in ways that neither he nor Evelyn had anticipated. They moved from carriage house at Patrice’s family home to the country estate of Evelyn’s recently deceased Muggle aunt. There, far removed from most of civilization, they learned what it meant to be the elite of a society. And that is what they were.
It is said that one choice-one moment-can change the course of a man’s whole lifetime, but Patrice had never believed in such nonsense before. At present though, it had an undeniable ring of truth. Before his night with Lucius Malfoy, Patrice had thought that they were, indeed, close to the Dark Lord and his circle of followers. But now it seemed that night had actually been his true initiation and Evelyn’s as well. For he was being summoned to far more meetings than he’d known were occurring before and Evelyn had been called on by Narcissa Malfoy, Lucius’ beautiful and notoriously cold wife. She had even Apparated to Astera Mcnair’s house for an afternoon of tea and euchre, and much to Patrice’s discontent, was asked after by the Dark Lord himself during one of their early morning meetings.
In her journal, Evelyn affectionately termed the weeks after this turn of events “the Death Eater days.” Those were the days when their new circle of acquaintances seemed to open its arms and embrace them as more than just equals, but as friends.
Patrice watched Evelyn in the evenings, cream nightgown hanging on her lovely slim frame, as she sat at desk in their bedroom and transcribed that day’s events by quill. How could they have known then that these very entries would help to condemn them? That Evelyn’s meticulous remembrance of detail would read like a list of criminal charges?
TBC
I started writing this peice a long time ago, nearly two months now. I will get it done someday, but I felt terrible letting it just lounge around on my hard drive when I could have it posted somewhere for people to see.
Miss AshJay was my beta. She is an amazing girl who gave more constructive feedback and caught more stupid errors then I thought humanly possible. I love her oh-so-much. You should love her as much as I do. Seriously. (A few other people helped me as well: addictedkitten and jrivka were also incredible. You should love them too!)
Right then, to the story...
Title: House of Cards
Author: Chloe
Rating: Strong R, for sex and violence
Pairing: Lucius/OC, among many others
Feedback: I cannot express how much feedback would mean to me. Posting this first chapter is like placing a piece of myself on public display. So... have at it!
Before you begin, this is a strange story thus far. I was heavily influenced by Donna Tartt's The Secret History when writing it. Basically, the focus is on the the Lestranges (that mysterious Death Eater couple of GoF fame) and their induction into the Voldemort's inner-circle. This is not a finished story, but I wanted to put out what I have now before all of the canon I have built for myself is destroyed with OotP. Please enjoy!
Patrice and Evelyn Lestrange were both slight brunettes with pale eyes and a shy way about them. Some had murmered that they were cousins; but they weren’t
Certainly there were quiet things about them that whispered of a distant relation, like the constant economy of movement they both unfalteringly had and the seemingly innocuous
manner they affected when in tense situations, but even the casual observer should have been able to see their different bloodlines written plainly across their skin.
Evelyn was fair cream, like an English country morning, except when she was ailing (and she often was), then she became pallid, but no less beautiful. Patrice had olive skin and his hair curled around his ears in delightful ringlets (“Isn’t he lovely?” Lucius breathed upon their first meeting). He wasn’t dark, but he obviously wasn’t British. “My family has Greek roots,” he told Evelyn’s parents in his lilting French accent when they were introduced.
The Lestranges were young and beautiful and Patrice decided that they needed a way to remain safe.
“It doesn’t mean a thing that I’m a half-blood,” she cried.
“Yes it does!” His dark eyebrows knitted in consternation. “What if they find out? What if I lose you?”
“Merlin, Patrice, if you’re so terrified, let’s run away. We could go to Paris and from there-”
“We cannot flee,” he told her. “We’ve not nearly enough reachable money and neither one of has an inheritance yet.”
Evelyn opened her mouth to say something.
“And while we could Apparate, what will we do once we’ve reached some unknown clime?” He finished.
“We could make do, I know we could.”
“Evelyn, you were raised by governesses and have never done real day’s work in your life. What skills have you?”
“Magic, we have magic-”
“Magic means nothing in this case.” Patrice shook his head. “Magic works against us here.”
This was the battle that had consumed them for weeks. Every night, near morning’s first light, they sat in the gilded atrium of Patrice’s parents home and tried to plan, tried to discuss. It inevitably dissolved into fighting and tears. Tonight was no different. She was just so convinced that they’d survive in perfect condition-that they were immortal.
Patrice was becoming increasingly agitated with his wife. In a fit of desperation he said-
“Why don’t we just join?”
There was a long silence.
Evelyn looked up, her eyes glassy. She rubbed the back of her neck and Patrice heard her nails run over the skin.
“Okay,” she said.
The Lestranges became Death Eaters.
Lord Voldemort asked for a child in the early fall after their initiation. It seemed a bizarre request after their rites, which had involved the almost perfunctory slaughter of a boy-child in the most ritualistic sense of the word. Patrice, looking back on it, was still in complete disbelief that he hadn’t run screaming with Evelyn in tow.
Their arms were both branded now, and Patrice had no idea where they were going. But somehow, the two of them-so young, and such newcomers-had managed to end up in their Lord’s inner-circle.
“It’s because you’re so beautiful,” he told Evelyn after a bout of discreet Muggle torture in the country. She looked paler than normal and in their bedroom with her hair falling over her eyes; Patrice thought she might be ivory. “How can anyone resist someone so lovely and so dangerous?”
“Does it thrill you?” Evelyn turned the slightest bit and looked at him.
“The tormenting?”
‘The murdering. Do you take pleasure in it?”
It hadn't even occurred to him to think about it like that. He didn't feel like he was killing people. While he was there watching, while he was raising his own wand and crying Unforgivables with abandon it didn’t feel like murder. It felt godly. He may have been timid at first, plagued by stronger morals than he harbored now, but now….now he was committing acts of wonder.
“Yes,” he said. “I suppose I do.”
She had rolled over, the spine of her back elegantly curved beneath her skin and exposed by the deep cut of her nightdress. Her shoulders, delicate and sharp, curled inward and Patrice knew she had crossed her arms over her chest.
“You don’t,” he said.
“Not yet,” Evelyn sighed. “But maybe soon.”
Patrice kissed the back of her neck.
A child, Voldemort told his closest followers, would ensure his legacy and provide him with someone he could train as he saw fit. A child, he said, would mean another heir.
On the dark Lord’s right, and only five paces away, Lucius Malfoy leaned over and put his lips close to Patrice’s neck. “Bunch of melodramatic nattering on, if you ask me,” he whispered in an amused tone, his voice breathy.
“Oh,” Patrice said and shifted his weight. Lucius’ breath smelled like whiskey, but that was normal for Lucius.
Voldemort was saying something about the qualities he wanted in the mother of his child. Patrice silently thanked Merlin that Evelyn had been unable to attend this abruptly called meeting.
“Where’s your pretty little wife?” Lucius asked and he’d moved closer, his hand was resting on the small of Patrice’s back.
“She’s ill.”
Lucius raised one blond eyebrow into a stylish arch and his aristocratic little mouth made a comical pink “o”. He regarded Patrice coolly but his eyes looked dangerously keen in the dimly lit room (meetings were generally held in the study at Malfoy Manor).
“Does our Lord know?”
“Yes. Evelyn owled before I Apparated here.”
“Ah…”
“What?”
“Our Lord likes your wife. He says she’s very talented, that she’ll be here with us until the end.”
Patrice's face must have given away some sort of emotion, because Lucius smiled at him and said-
“You too, of course. After all, what’s one Lestrange without the other?”
“Right….” Patrice said uncertainly.
Lucius started humming jauntily under his breath and Patrice realized that the other man must have been drunker than he'd thought
“When this is really over,” Lucius stopped to say, and Patrice noticed that Voldemort had finished speaking and was now conversing with a tall dark-haired witch who was apparently a Diviner. “When this is over will you stay a while? I want to show you something.”
“I ought to go home. Evelyn will-”
“Phssh.”
Lucius turned and looked at him, moving his hand from Patrice's back to his shoulder. In the most indiscreet manner and place, Patrice was being backed into a corner.
“You’ll stay for a bit,” he said. It wasn’t a question. Patrice was learning that it generally wasn’t with Lucius.
The meetings weren’t like the rituals. The rituals were always unique, sometimes elaborate and sometimes crude. Sometimes they were told to wear their best dress robes. Once Voldemort instructed them to wear Muggle formal wear- looking ridiculous in top hats and tails, they had murdered a British lord and his family at their ancestral home. If Patrice were to be honest with himself, he would have to admit that he liked the rituals much better. There was a strange air of both familiarly and barely concealed jealously that prevailed at the meetings and he often felt like an outsider.
Tonight the meeting had ended at around 1:00am. The Dark Lord liked the quiet of nighttime and he enjoyed the early hours of the morning. Often they were called just before daybreak so his ranks could be with him at sunrise. Patrice surmised that it was a good idea not to question his Lord’s eccentricities.
Soon nearly everyone had Disapparated and Lucius had left the room, abandoning Patrice in a leather chair with what looked suspiciously like nail scratches on the seat. Patrice began to feel slightly anxious. It wasn’t, per se, that Lucius was a threatening person, nor was he so naïve not to know what Lucius wanted from him. That was perfectly clear. But somehow Lucius managed to make him acutely uneasy.
Evan and Augustus had stayed as well, and that too made Patrice nervous. They were engaged in a sleepy game of half-drunken chess (“No fool, that’s my pawn.”). Patrice suspected that they had been at the Manor before the meeting was called. All three of them-Malfoy, Rosier, and Rookwood- were old school chums; they had been in Slytherin together. They were older than he.
Patrice was one of the only Death Eaters who hadn't gone to Hogwarts, and also one of the youngest. He wondered sullenly if it mattered. A terribly long time ago Lucius had disappeared to fetch them scotch.
“Do you think he needs help?” Patrice asked. Evan and Augustus looked up from their game and stopped bickering.
“Oh, not Lucius,” Evan shrugged. “Lucie doesn’t ever ask for help.”
Patrice had never heard anyone call Lucius Malfoy “Lucie.”
“Don’t they have house elves?” He ventured.
“Of course they have house elves,” Augustus said scornfully.
“It’s just, the house elves don’t really like Lucius very much,” Evan added, elegantly slurring his words.
“Oh.”
“It’s because Lucius offed his-” Evan cut off abruptly and rubbed peevishly at his shin.
“Lucius what?” Patrice picked up.
“King to d-3,” said Augustus pointedly.
“Why don’t the house elves like him?” Patrice tried again when nobody answered him.
“The house elves,” Augustus said slowly, eyeing Evan reproachfully, “were very loyal to Lucius’ father.”
“Are you implying Lucius killed his father?” Patrice asked, not at all skeptical. There were far too many rumors that had circulated after Lucius had come into his inheritance. An inheritance which included, besides Malfoy Manor, a position on the Hogwart's Board of Governors.
Evan nodded. Augustus aimed another sharp kick at his shin.
“Will you bloody quit that?” Evan said. “It’s not some grand secret. Lucius boasts about it all the time.”
Augustus sneered at him.
“Well, he does!”
“It’s a very classical concept, patricide,” Augustus said by way of explanation. “Lucius likes classical things.”
Patrice watched them with rapt attention. Lucius had never said any such thing to him. Most of the things Lucius said to him were either embarrassingly lustful compliments or snide comments about Evelyn.
“Does the Dark Lord know?”
“Of course our Lord knows,” Augustus said. “It was a part of Lucius’ initiation.”
“Oh Merlin.” Patrice rubbed at his forehead. The grandfather clock near the door was marking the time at 1:45. Lucius had been gone nearly an hour.
“It’s not really something you should worry about.” Augustus looked back down the chessboard. “The ministry knows all about it, but no one is going to do anything. They tend not to when it comes to the Malfoys.”
Evan giggled and took another sip of his scotch. It was around his fourth. He was the one who’d sent Lucius for more.
“Auggie here works for the Ministry, you know,” he said, pointing at the considerably more sober Augustus. “Auggie…Auggie, how long have I been calling you Auggie?”
Of course he knew that, Patrice thought impatiently. Everyone knew that Voldemort considered Rookwood a great asset because of his position in the Department of Mysteries.
“You’ve been calling me Auggie since before I knew enough to hit you for it. Now please shut up and play.”
“Wait, why did Lucius-”
“Why did Lucius what?” A cold voice asked from the doorway.
“Why did… why did... why didn’t you call one of us to come and help you?” Patrice recovered as quickly as he could and smiled sheepishly. His right hand, out of Lucius’ line of sight, gripped the chair arm painfully.
Lucius had changed. He was wearing simply cut, cobalt robes of some thick fabric that Patrice couldn't identify from so far away. There was a tray of tea and biscuits floating gracefully by Lucius' side, controlled by his wand, and his other hand carried a full bottle of toffee-colored
scotch
“I generally don’t need help,” Lucius said.
“Hi Lucie,” Evan said, with a sweetly inebriated smile. “I’m drunk, you know.”
“Yes Evan, I can see that,” Lucius answered him, his tone one that people usually reserved for children and the mentally ill.
“Why don’t you keep the scotch in here?” Evan continued. “It would be so much simpler to get to; it even matches these pretty moldings of yours.” He looked happily at the walls.
Lucius came and set the tray down on the table between Patrice’s chair and another one like it. “I hope these two rogues were sweet to you,” he said with a slight curl of his upper lip.
“Oh yes, perfectly cordial,” Patrice said. He glanced up at the clock on the wall; it was 2:00. “I should owl Evelyn; she’ll be worried.”
“I thought you might ask to do so,” Lucius answered smoothly. “I took the liberty of sending her an owl while I was down in the kitchens.”
Patrice didn’t have time to school his features and Lucius said-
“I’ve told her you’re to spend the night,” he paused artfully. “I hope you don’t mind.”
“No,” Patrice said slowly. “No not at all.” He motioned toward the scotch. “May I?”
“Certainly,” Lucius said and his eyes were positively gleaming. He set a glass tumbler engraved with a swooping “M” on the table and poured out some liquor for Patrice.
Scotch was something of a special occasion drink in his father’s household. So, intending to just take a sip, Patrice took the tumbler in hand, but before he could stop himself he had thrown back the entire contents in one desperate gulp. The liquid burned his throat and settled warm in his stomach. To his surprise, Lucius let out a low chortle.
“Good man,” he said and Patrice felt his cheeks flush.
At the other table, chess game neglected, Evan was trying to explain the finer points of the house elf trade--his family legacy--to Augustus.
“You just find them,” he was saying. “You find them and they go with you. They don’t even ask questions. And bam,” he thumped the table with his fist, “you sell them for a profit.” He smiled. “It’s the perfect business, really.”
Augustus looked as though he didn’t agree. “Why haven’t you passed out yet?” He muttered aloud.
Evan looked momentarily affronted but kept talking. Subtly, Augustus pointed his wand square at his chest and quietly said “Somnus."
Evan slumped over and began snoring.
Lucius and Patrice looked up from their conversation. Lucius raised an eyebrow and Patrice took another sip of his glass of scotch. The tea sat untouched.
“He fell asleep,” Augustus said.
“I’m sure he did,” Lucius smirked.
“You should… you should walk him upstairs. He looks very uncomfortable,” Patrice said, nodded resolutely. This was a nice room, he decided. He liked the tapestries. His parents were overly fond of austerity. Everything in Malfoy Manor was ornate and older than most of the Malfoys who’d ever lived in it. He liked the dusty grace of it all, the centuries engraved into the walls.
“That’s a very good idea,” Lucius smiled and he had no laugh lines. “Why don’t you take him up to bed, Augustus?”
Augustus scowled at him. “What do you plan to do, Lucius? Take him on that chair like you took poor drunken Evan here?”
It was such a sudden change in mood that Patrice didn’t know how to react. He looked down at the chair he was sitting in. The scratches on the seat, he thought, dear God. Next to him, Lucius seemed entirely unfazed.
Perhaps," Lucius hissed, standing up. "Or I could take him in the solarium. It's very private this late at night."
Augustus’s eyes widened
“What, surprised?” Lucius asked after a pause. “Do you not think I know who’s fucking my precious wife? Do you not think I keep an eye on her always?” His voice had slipped into a low, throaty whisper that made Patrice shiver.
“Lucius, I-”
“Shut up, Rookwood. Take your friend and sleep in the guest room on the ground level. And if you find yourself with such insatiable urges, fuck him.” He smiled a hideously cold smile.
‘Thank you, Lucius,” Augustus said and for the first time Patrice caught traces of a nervous stutter that must have been bred out of him by tutors as a child.
Augustus stood and nervously pulled his wand from his robe sleeve. He pointed it at the unconscious Rosier and mumbled “Mobilicorpus.” Evan sat up, his head lolling peculiarly on his neck, black hair flopping back off his forehead. Augustus pulled him into a standing position and with a hand on his waist led him toward the door.
“And Augustus,” Lucius said just as the other man reached for the door handle. “If I catch you near my bedchambers-” he inclined his head slightly. “I’ll kill you.”
Patrice didn’t doubt that he would.
There was a long moment of silence.
“Goodnight, Patrice,” Augustus said courteously.
He left then, Evan moving strangely beside him.
“My get-togethers are rarely boring,” Lucius said, as he sat back down. “It’s a true gift.”
“Ah,” Patrice nodded dumbly. He felt the scotch in his stomach, felt it wrapping his brain in a lovely sort of velvet-at once too hot, but soft and lovely too-and it was just the right way to feel. It wasn’t exactly scandalizing to find out that Narcissa Malfoy slept around, but that she had slept with Augustus seemed somehow out-of-place.
Lucius rolled the liquid around in his tumbler. It was his second and he’d hardly touched it. It had to be nearly 4:30, but the room had gradually become darker and Patrice could no longer make out the clock.
“You mustn’t let anything you’ve heard upset you,” Lucius said. “We really like having you with us and soon you’ll get used to the way things are.” He looked fondly at Patrice.
Patrice gulped. He finished his scotch.
“While things may seem odd at first, it’s not all the terrible that Augustus is sleeping with my wife. When she’s pregnant with my heir it will be, but not now. I don’t actually intend to kill him.”
Patrice let out a relieved sigh and Lucius laughed again. Low, like his angry whisper before.
“As for Evan, Augustus is just jealous. They were lovers at school.” Lucius pursed his lips. “Nothing can be done for it; Evan is just a whore.”
There were shadows on the wall near a grand piano that Patrice hadn’t noticed before. And the walls, lined with old books, were falling deeper into the dim. It was almost as if morning had held off for some unknown reason, like Lucius’ whims had stalled the rising sun.
“You don’t mind my using that word, do you? Whore is such an apt word sometimes. But people are so sensitive now.” He was rambling, talking Patrice into a subdued daze. “I tried being sensitive once….”
Patrice had sunk down into his chair, enjoying the soft seat, his warm, hazy body.
“You have such lovely curls, you know that, Patrice?” Lucius absently reached out to touch one and slip a long finger through the center of a ringlet. “They’re so soft and perfect. Your mother must have dressed you in such finery as a child.” He kept stroking Patrice’s hair, running his hands through it, down to the nape of his neck, and under the collar of his robes.
“Mmmm,” Patrice said, “Mother used to say I looked like a cherub.”
“Yes, a cherub,” Lucius said softly and leaned over to place a kiss below Patrice’s ear. “You could certainly be a cherub.”
He pressed his face into Patrice’s hair. “You smell like cinnamon. Like something spicy,” he murmured.
Patrice didn’t answer. His eyes had fallen shut. The tumbler had dropped to the floor.
“It’s inevitable,” Lucius whispered right into Patrice's ear, letting his tongue rest just for a moment against the lobe. “There’s really no point in fighting it, not that you could…” His mouth moved lower and he nipped at Patrice’s neck. “You should just let me do what I want.”
“Lucius, perhaps this isn’t…” Patrice started when there was unexpectedly a hand on his leg and Lucius was no longer in his chair but sitting on the ground in front of him.
“No, no,” Lucius said soothingly. “We’re doing what I want, remember? That way no one gets hurt and everything,” his hand slid up Patrice’s leg to his groin, “and everything is perfect.”
Patrice’s breath hitched and his mouth fell open. Oh, Evelyn…. He thought suddenly and moved to shove Lucius’ hand away, but by the time his brain had relayed the message to his body, Lucius had already had undone his robes.
“See? Isn’t this nice… I promise you, it’ll be very nice.” Lucius had somehow moved from sitting on the floor to perching on Patrice’s knees without taking his hand from his trousers. He bent and took a small dark nipple into his mouth.
Patrice gasped and his hips spasmed upward. From his chest, Lucius laughed softly.
“I told you. This is very normal for the lot of us. Soon, soon.... ” He trailed off and sat up to undo the fastenings on his robes, which turned out to be just two small ties-one near his waist and one near his neck. Lucius pulled off his robe and his skin was like actual light, radiant and pale. He wore only black briefs. Patrice felt very dressed and very disoriented.
He tried to shimmy out of his pants and Lucius helped, pulling them off and throwing them over the other chair.
“I’m going to fuck you now,” Lucius said.
Patrice bit his lower lip hard enough to draw blood and Lucius kissed him there for the first time. Slow, deliberate and decidedly greedy, he slipped his tongue into Patrice’s mouth and lapped at the coppery taste. His hands curled into Patrice’s hair and held his head still.
He was terribly hard and whimpered into Lucius’ mouth. Lucius rewarded him by settling his groin heavily down upon his own. Lucius was taller than Patrice, but lighter than him. Light like a bird-but Lucius. Lucius was hardly a small fluttering bird; he was more like a poised, dangerous hawk.
Patrice wrapped his arms around Lucius’ neck. Let himself be kissed again and again, Lucius’ tongue in his mouth, heavy and textured and wonderful. And Lucius grinding his hips in tune with his own. The two of them, writhing together on the small chair.
“Get down on the floor,” Lucius said after some time of this, and stood. Both of them were breathing heavily, and Patrice could make out two pink spots of color high on Lucius’ cheeks.
Governed only by lust, Patrice complied and flopped inelegantly to the ground. He was nearly naked now-his robe left rumpled in the chair, his shirt undone to the navel and his knickers damp with sweat and pre-cum-Lucius was already nude.
“Turn over.” Lucius said and his voice lacked its usual timbre, replaced instead with a husky sort of drawl that made Patrice’s skin both crawl and break out into goose bumps.
Patrice turned over onto his stomach. The Oriental rug felt rough and irritating against his sensitive nipples-aching where Lucius had worried them with his teeth. Lucius went to fetch something from the desk and when he returned Patrice saw that he carried a small glass jar.
Lucius smiled, his hair twisted into long, wild cowlicks from their earlier deeds. In the dark he looked like a caricature of an angel, with his white skin and long torso, his legs sinewy and toned.
“Lucius,” Patrice said, and the man knelt on the rug beside him.
Patrice felt a warm hand run down his back and to his ass. Lucius leant over and kissed him just between his shoulder blades. The hand slipped into his knickers and while Lucius continued kissing a slow trail down Patrice’s body, his other hand joined it. Patrice obligingly lifted his thighs to have his last undergarment pulled off.
After discarding Patrice’s briefs, Lucius moved to straddle him low on his legs.
Patrice whimpered when Lucius parted his buttocks and prodded none too gently at his asshole. A pointed nail scratched just over the puckered entrance.
“Shhhh….” Lucius pressed a hand on Patrice’s upper back to hold him in place and continued to work his finger into Patrice’s body.
“So lovely,” Lucius was saying in between Patrice’s incoherent keening noises. “You’re so very lovely… I thought so from the moment I saw you.” He stroked again and again into Patrice’s ass. “Like a cherub… a debauched cherub.”
Oh God, Patrice thought wildly, Lucius’ Lucius' mellifluous words dripping over his consciousness. His mind was completely overwhelmed with wanton emotions and the all-consuming feeling of just Lucius-beautiful and far eviler than his sweet Evelyn. Oh God, Evelyn….
“Ahhh!” Patrice cried into the rug when Lucius added another finger. Now both were brushing against his prostate. He though desperately of the most comforting thing he could recall: summers in Greece when he was a boy, his Grand-mère’s villa in Kalami. How sunlight would dapple the white walls in the morning and a house elf would bring him watered wine from the vineyard. After lunch, his beloved Grand-mère would attempt to teach him the language, the harsh Greek words enrobed in her French inflection.
Patrice tried not to cry.
Lucius bent over Patrice’s back so that he could speak into his ear. The hand which had been holding him in place moved to grasp the back of his neck. “See?” Lucius whispered, wet breath on his ear. “This is what I’ve wanted to give you all along.” Lucius’ hand on his neck tightened to an almost painful clutch. Patrice couldn’t help but squirm, jarring the fingers in his ass.
“You’re hurting me-” He tried to say.
“No, I’m not,” Lucius stopped him. “You like this. You like the thrill of it.” He took his fingers from Patrice’s body and brought them to his own cock, waiting hard against Patrice’s thighs.
“Aren’t I dangerous enough for you, Patrice?” He whispered, and just before he slid his slick cock into Patrice, he bit sharply at his shoulder, drawing blood.
Patrice dug his hands into the horrid carpet.
Patrice woke to sunlight. Sunlight pouring in through the open velvet drapes of the study and bathing him in relentless bright morning light. The sun was already high and he was, it seemed, fully dressed and slumped back in his chair from the night before. His head ached something awful.
He closed his eyes and rubbed at his temples, circular motions, and deep breaths. From his toes to his neck his body hurt. Patrice hadn’t known that so many different kinds of pain existed, or let alone were possible at once before he became a Death Eater. Now he was aware of it on a far more personal level.
“Oh God,” he said aloud and looked about the room.
During the earlier morning it had been tidied. House elves, presumably, had rearranged the chairs where Evan and Augustus had been sitting. Their empty scotch glasses were gone, their chess set put away. It looked like they’d never been there at all and that was disconcerting. So easy it was to hide away the past.
Patrice’s trousers were rumpled beyond repair but his robe sat pristine and folded on the chair next to him. He hadn’t even thought to check for his wand, and hurriedly patted at the fabric of his robe, to find it nestled in the pocket in which it was left.
Patrice sighed heavily and shoved the wand into the pocket of his trousers.
On the table next to him, there was a new tray. Cold pumpkin juice and tea, charmed to stay at the right temperature and a plate of fresh croissants. Also, Patrice saw, a short note written in what could have only been Lucius’ hand. He took the glass of juice and read over the letter…
Patrice-
I’ve gone to London on family business. If you run into Augustus or
Evan wandering the halls, I’m certain they’ll both be more than
pleasant to you. Inform me if they are not.
Needn’t worry, I expect we’ll be seeing much more of each other…
we wouldn’t want anyone to tell Evelyn anything unsavory about you, now
would we? I imagine it may take quite a bit of…effort…on your part to
buy the silence you so desperately require. We'll be seeing one another
quite frequently from now on.
Disaspparate when you will.
I’ll be in touch-
L.M.
Patrice quickly folded the letter and put it away to dispose of later. The night before was less of a blur than he would have liked it to be. Evan and Augustus, silly and arguing over useless things until Lucius ordered the latter from the room who took Evan with him. Lucius just talking and talking…. and more scotch than he’d ever had before. And oh…
Patrice trembled in remembrance. Lucius had taken him on the rug, a hand gripping his neck and another holding his thigh for leverage. Dear God, the sheer carnality of it all! It was animalistic on a level Patrice had never reached: killingly blissful and more guilt laden than the murders he had committed with his own wand. Lucius was so incredibly vicious. This man (who Patrice knew would kill him if asked) ripping into him and whispering crude endearments. It was wrong. It was too much.
He had to go home; he had to get out of the Manor because its very walls seemed to sing the merits of deviancy. And what of Evelyn… he wondered silently. Evelyn would disown him, Evelyn would cry, beautiful Evelyn with her small hands and delicate neck. Evelyn: pale and soft in his clearest recollection of her. Lucius was dreadfully right, Evelyn could never know.
Patrice Disapparated home.
In the months that followed, their lives changed in ways that neither he nor Evelyn had anticipated. They moved from carriage house at Patrice’s family home to the country estate of Evelyn’s recently deceased Muggle aunt. There, far removed from most of civilization, they learned what it meant to be the elite of a society. And that is what they were.
It is said that one choice-one moment-can change the course of a man’s whole lifetime, but Patrice had never believed in such nonsense before. At present though, it had an undeniable ring of truth. Before his night with Lucius Malfoy, Patrice had thought that they were, indeed, close to the Dark Lord and his circle of followers. But now it seemed that night had actually been his true initiation and Evelyn’s as well. For he was being summoned to far more meetings than he’d known were occurring before and Evelyn had been called on by Narcissa Malfoy, Lucius’ beautiful and notoriously cold wife. She had even Apparated to Astera Mcnair’s house for an afternoon of tea and euchre, and much to Patrice’s discontent, was asked after by the Dark Lord himself during one of their early morning meetings.
In her journal, Evelyn affectionately termed the weeks after this turn of events “the Death Eater days.” Those were the days when their new circle of acquaintances seemed to open its arms and embrace them as more than just equals, but as friends.
Patrice watched Evelyn in the evenings, cream nightgown hanging on her lovely slim frame, as she sat at desk in their bedroom and transcribed that day’s events by quill. How could they have known then that these very entries would help to condemn them? That Evelyn’s meticulous remembrance of detail would read like a list of criminal charges?
TBC