Remus watched him for a moment, then sighed. Albus had a sensation he hadn't felt in a long time, that of being an unruly student sitting at a wise professor's feet. He didn't care for it at all.
"Does it really matter what his motivation is, if it brings him over to our side and makes Harry happy?" Remus asked softly. "I know that you're worried about Harry, but also worried about the war. It seems to me that you don't need to be concerned about either."
"If Lucius Malfoy cut off his arm so that he could pretend to be on our side, and we trust him, and he hands Harry over to Voldemort at an opportune moment—or, worse, encourages Harry to compromise with Voldemort—then we will lose the war."
"How likely do you think that is?"
"You have met Lucius, Remus. You tell me."
"I knew him in the war," Remus acknowledged. "And I knew him in the first few years after the war. I didn't think he would change then, no. I do think he has changed since Harry came back into his life." He rocked his chair back on two legs. "I think that I won't be part of this anymore, Albus. And I wish you luck in believing that Harry is in danger when I know what I smelled."
"What did you smell, Remus?"
"Love. Devotion."
Albus jolted, and then tried to shake his head and get his thoughts back on track. "Well, yes, I would say that Harry does love his adopted family. It doesn't mean that they have his best interests at heart."
"Not love and devotion on him, Albus. On Draco Malfoy." Remus tilted his head at Albus with his eyes glimmering like amber lit from behind. "I think they probably did perform some magical ceremony, because it's almost unnaturally strong. That will probably fade as time goes on. But I know what I smelled."
"And because of that, you're changing sides?"
"I would never join Voldemort," Remus snapped, a growl on the edges of his voice which reminded Albus that the full moon was tomorrow. "I'll fight with the Order. But if you think that someone who believes in the Malfoys' love for Harry is suspect, then I think you won't have that many allies."
He stood and left before Albus could work out what to say. He sat back in the seat behind his desk and blinked for a moment.
Fawkes gave a soft croon and flew across the room to land on his shoulder. Albus stroked his companion's neck, and Fawkes tilted his head back and gave a trill of song that lifted into the air and fell on the floor like molten gold.
"You think I should give the Malfoys a chance?"
Fawkes leaned so near his face that Albus could hardly focus on his bright black eyes, and warbled emphatically. Then he took off and soared around the office, before landing on his perch and holding out a wing.
Albus squinted, then realized that Fawkes was tugging hard enough on one feather to make it stand out from the rest. "I was aware that one of your feathers is in young Harry's wand, yes."
Fawkes trilled at him again.
"Even those with a phoenix core wand can make mistakes. Even those with a wand core of thestral hair, come to that."
Fawkes flapped his wings and nearly flipped himself off his perch with the force of it. Then he ruffled all his feathers, sleeked them, and began to preen with the dedication that he used when he planned to be busy for the next several hours.
Albus sighed. "All right. I will wait."
In truth, he didn't have any better plans right now. Getting Sirius close to Harry hadn't worked, and the boy didn't have much reason to miss his godfather. Remus was either right or seriously fooled; in either case, he wouldn't be amenable to working with Albus again for a while.
Perhaps Albus could do much worse than wait, observe the Malfoys, and see what happened next.
Narcissa listened in rigid silence as Lucius explained the idea that he'd planned to talk to her about the day she got the letter stating that Regulus was still alive. She stared into the fire the whole time and didn't look at him.
When he was done, she asked only one question. "Why would you want to do such a mad thing?"
"Because the Dark Lord is not revealing himself," Lucius said. "You know that we both expected attacks, more widespread ones than the simple one that Crouch launched at King's Cross. We expected Henry to have more nightmares. We expected him to call the Death Eaters. Instead, he's done nothing."
"Perhaps because he does not have enough followers left to launch such attacks."
Lucius would have liked to believe that himself, but he did not dare, especially since the Dark Lord had managed to work Crouch into the position of the Defense professor last year, and had managed to regain a body with only one servant. "We do not dare leave it like that."
Narcissa turned to him with her eyes bright and hard. "And so you propose to go and—what? How will you lure Crouch out in the first place?"
"By destroying things that matter to him," Lucius said calmly. "I thought I would start with his mother's grave."
Narcissa stared at him.
"Next, the trophies that he collected when he was a Death Eater in the war. He took pieces of his victims' bodies and preserved them, or their possessions if their bodies were too completely destroyed. He told me about his caches. Even if he doesn't still visit them, it will drive him into the open to know that I'm visiting them, let alone destroying them."
"And once you have him?"
"I will take him alive."
"Lucius!"
"I am skilled enough with Imperius to make it less dangerous than it might be, Narcissa. We must find out where the Dark Lord is hiding and what his plans are. Leaving aside what nightmares Henry might eventually have—if he has any, now that the Horcrux is gone—we have no other source of information."
Narcissa's lips pinched shut, and she stared into the fire this time for so long that Lucius felt a tingle of anxiety run down his spine. But in the end, she turned back to him, shaking her head, her face resigned.
"If you will swear to me that you will take every precaution to keep yourself safe, Lucius. And if you will swear to me that you will kill Crouch if there is any chance that he might break your Imperius or you can't take him alive."
Lucius smiled and leaned over to pick up her hand and press a kiss to the back of it. "I never intended to do anything else, darling. Life with you and Henry and Draco is too precious to give up."
Narcissa leaned towards him and kissed him, frantic, desperate, devouring. Lucius leaned closer still and let the devotion of the woman he loved so much more than he'd ever expected to carry him away.
....
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