HP ficlet: "Leviathan," Lucius, gen, PG

[ishafel]

He is his father's, and then he is the Dark Lord's, and when he is forty-four he is his own, and free. Lucius is not in the habit of thinking for himself, but because no one in the world will talk to him but his son and his wife, he has no choice.

He reads a great deal the first year. Books are a luxury to a man who has served time in Azkaban: the right to choose for himself is a luxury to a Death Eater, to a son of Abraxas Malfoy. He is not such a fool that he does not realize the power of words, the lure of ideas.

But he finds books seductive all the same. The ability to change the world, using only ink on parchment—this is something the Dark Lord never thought of, or never chose to use. He has inherited Snape's library as well as his father's, and through their books he comes to love both men again.

Abraxas' books are pristine, with only the cut pages to show they have ever been read, bound in matching leather and imprinted with gilt. Severus's are secondhand, or older, with cracked spines and dogeared corners and notes on the margins of every page. Lucius shelves them all together, in an order that seems logical, and sometimes he runs his fingers across the backs and remembers when the world made sense.

Time goes by and takes the world with it, and Lucius watches from Malfoy Manor. There is no place for him in what they are building. It is barely possible that there will be a place for his son. And he has books enough he can spend the next hundred years in his library, and never turn the same page twice.

He starts to write: fragments, at first, on the end-papers of books worth more than the Manor, on the blotter of his desk, on scraps of parchment, in an empty ledgerbook of his father's. He has a photograph of Severus, in a silver frame on his desk. Sometimes he talks to it. It gives him no more advice, and no better, than any paper. Eventually he stops asking.

It takes him three years to produce something that might reasonably be considered a book. When he thinks it is finished he wraps it in waxed paper and sends it by Owl to an man his father knew, who sometimes handled such things. He does not expect anything to come of it, or at least he tells himself he does not.

They Owl him back by return post, offering to publish his work. In three months he has it in his hands: a book with his name printed beneath the title, his words, his thoughts, his version of the future set on paper. This is a more subtle magic than that he once practiced: spells printed in ink and not spoken. It is no less powerful, for all that.

A week after that they come to offer him the Ministry.

He turns them down. They are fools, these nameless men in their hooded robes. They are in love with a shadow, a dream, a past that could never have been. He knows them, though he cannot see their faces. He was one of them once.

The Ministry is no sane man's route to power. He wants it; he wants, more, to live. He has read the papers. The country is at war again. What they need is not another politician, not a general or a prophet, a dictator or a Fool.

What they need is a revolution. The second group that comes offers him that. They are young; they do not hide their faces. They believe. Always they believe. But what they wish for will never come to pass. All the idealism in the world cannot change nature, cannot make men equals when they are not born so.

He sends them away. He is done with war. He is done with promises and done with hope. And so he stays in his library, with his books and his papers. He waits. It is easier now, because now he knows that it is working.

The third time they come, there are so many of them that the will not fit in his house. The third time, they bring him a crown. It is a lovely thing, victory. This time, what they want he can give them.

He turns Severus's picture face down before he places their crown on his head, and he says goodbye to the books that line the shelves. They will have to be burned. They are dangerous, books, and they have served their purpose. He turns his back on them, and he goes to rule the world.

Comments

[postingwhore.livejournal.com]

Interesting ficlet! I love your Malfoy stuff ♥

[ishafel.livejournal.com]

You can never have too much Lucius!

[pushdragon.livejournal.com]

This whole fic is composed of gorgeous little details. I love Lucius's impression of freedom, the little pleasures of it.

There's a detached kind of air to it, it reads like a fable or a fairy tale. Which is suppose it is, a fairy tale about the magic of books.

The opening is so typical of your Lucius - the slightly empty aristocrat who is such an intersting and credible take on canon. And the ending, the lack of sentiment in his decision to abandon the books that had helped him to power, that's just pure Malfoy too.

Always nice to have some more quality Lucius fic in the world - thank you!

[ishafel.livejournal.com]

Yay, that's exactly what I was going for. I'm glad that it worked.

[amanuensis1.livejournal.com]

The third time, they bring him a crown.

*shivers*

[ishafel.livejournal.com]

Thank you :) That's my preferred reaction.

[pingrid.livejournal.com]

He has inherited Snape's library as well as his father's, and through their books he comes to love both men again.

That combined with this bit:

He turns Severus's picture face down before he places their crown on his head, and he says goodbye to the books that line the shelves. They will have to be burned.

It paints your Lucius' character in such rich detail with so few words. I have goosebumps!

[ishafel.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much!

I love your icon, although it's disturbing to picture Snape as Lady Bracknell.

[pingrid.livejournal.com]

Thanks! Imagine them both in matching vulture-topped hats and it does sort of fit though, doesn't it? ;)