in the bleak midwinter, frosty winds made moan

[malificence]

Who: Lucius Malfoy and Bellatrix Black
Where: Castle Malfoy, Orkney Islands
When: December 6, 1980
What: Midwinter holidays away from the suspicious eyes of the deviant populace the line of fire their very demanding jobs at the Ministry.

He'd quietly hatched this plan a month before, when Rodolphus had decided to mark his birthday with the end of his engagement to Bellatrix - because, as faux as the relationship had been, it had offered a shield. For Rodolphus and Bella, a shield from parents who were determined to see their lines continued through their children. For Lucius, and really few would have even thought of the Black-Lestrange union offering anything to a young man outside that relationship, it had made it easy to explain away any closeness to either Rodolphus or Bellatrix as merely friendship. They were engaged, after all. Druella Black had been planning the wedding for a full decade, and no doubt had her eyes on Lucius for Andromeda, before she'd run off with the Mudblood.

With the engagement over, however, there was a pretense at distance required, and while neither he nor Bella would admit as much, that was a bit more...difficult than one would expect. He likes to blame it on the ritual they'd performed Samhain night, the one he'd picked to get his unruly visions in line, and it was true it had involved the sacrifice of three Mudblood girls and complex and intense magics. But truthfully, he and Bella are very close and have been since he'd returned from his little European tour. It's not only magic that has them wanting some time with each other. But they can pretend it is.

His expression is dry as he pins an elaborate malachite and silver pin to the inside of Bella's robe after she's locked the doors of her official house behind her. "Keeps the maledictions at bay," he tells her. "My grandmother was most fond of magical jewelry of this sort." And his grandfather had been secretive and reclusive in his latter years, after his Irish pureblooded witch had passed - hence the use of his late wife's jewelry as the keys to the castle, so to speak.

"Cornelius Clagg affirmed I am, apparently, no longer a suspect. I assume Elektra did the same with you, darling?" The whole thing was...well. Less ridiculous than it seemed, even if Clagg had thought his senior and Lucius' former classmate had been punishing him for something by making him interview Lucius, Amycus Carrow, and - and this was probably the worst of it - Rabastan Lestrange.

Comments

[scinlac]

"She has." And no harm to it, really. There had hardly been a need to lie, even: this had not been her assignment, and as such, she had been nowhere near the scene of the 'crime'. "I must confess, our mysterious accuser has me a little curious."

Better discuss this than comment favourably on family jewelry, because what better to ignore than one of the things that provides the most damning, physical evidence of their changing relationship? When she had needed to acquire a ring to cement her false engagement, he hadn't opened a vault at Malfoy Manor, but taken her to a jeweller instead. It's the way they are, all of them, with their precious heirlooms, even if they're practically drowning in them, even if they're passing them around in circles anyway. Of course, that line of thought is convenient now that she, uncharacteristically for a workaholic like herself, agreed on a vacation to Castle Malfoy. It's all just curiosity about this lesser known, no doubt impressive, preciously magical property of his family. She can pretend. She can pretend she would have said no to the suggestion if it had been the manor in Cornwall.

She takes the arm he offers her –– yet another thing largely unthinkable coming from Bellatrix Black and her preference for physical distance. They could use floo powder. She could demand, and certainly has done so with others, enough information about the castle to apparate there by herself. She could, if she wanted to, limit the physical to only whatever leads to release.

She doesn't, though. Can't quite manage it, as their attempts at a more distanced public appearance in the past few weeks has shown. Or perhaps she could, and she is just very, very unwilling to.

[malificence]

To Mudblood eyes, the Castle is, of course, a ruin. One of many medieval castles built to defend the Orkneys from the Vikings in the north or the Scots in the south - depending on the year and the politics. It appears built on precarious rocks near the raging North Sea, which keeps all but the most enterprising tourists away with their cameras. If one happens to be a witch or wizard wearing just the right piece of silver and stone, an entirely different place appears, one much more in line with what one would expect of the Malfoys. Lucius does not reply until they've apparated to the cobblestoned front steps of the old keep, and then he glances down. "I am as well. Theo would have all those names, of course, but Theo is hardly likely to throw them at his mother." Theo and Bella weren't particularly close yet - Bella being a recently unengaged lady with entirely reasonable distrust when it came to deviants - but if nothing else, he'd shown he was more than happy to keep his nose extremely clean. Not likely to throw them under the bus, not when Lucius was the one who'd prevented him from going down an utterly stupid path.

"That Weasley, maybe - you know the one. I'm still sure that he's the ginger I talked to at Rosier's." The doors swing open as he speaks and they step into an opulently dark front hall, and a glance backwards has the doors swinging shut again. Lucius idly brushes a few melting flakes of snow off Bella's shoulder, and it's exactly the sort of gesture they've avoided since November. "I imagine there are those in the Ministry who will be a bit...irritated, about the anonymous nature of the tip." If the Minister hadn't used his skills with Legimency on Elektra yet, it was only a matter of time. Of course, Lucius wasn't convinced that the auror wasn't telling the truth about it.

[scinlac]

Bellatrix, having been raised in the lap of luxury, is difficult to impress. Castles are a bit of a rarity – there is Hogwarts, of course, but purely magical castles are... uncommon. It's in part the association with Muggles and their ways, something that, in the Malfoys' case, is overshadowed by the implications. Lucius Malfoy the First did come terribly close to the hand of the Muggle Queen Elizabeth, meaning his family came awfully close to ruling. ... This is of course, entirely ignorant of the politics of that time, but neither general magical society, nor its pureblood equivalent, nor, really, most of the muggle population, would be all that privy to the ifs and buts of days gone by. What remains is a wonderfully impressive Castle, guarded by choice magic, and lording an innate power over even the rest of the Sacred Twenty-Eight.

So yes, when Bella's eyes flicker across the high ceiling of the entrance hall, there is something like awe here.

And it's enough to keep her from voicing, yet again, her list of doubts regarding Theo. In time, they will become fewer, and the sheer degree of trust she has been putting in Lucius for a considerable time now is certainly preventing said list from becoming terribly long in the first place –– but Bella is a person who counts those she trusts on less than one hand. "It could be the Weasley." And, still a little distracted by her first steps into the castle, and she isn't pulling him along by the hand, that would be –– oh, no, she is doing just that, because they are in private and isn't this the purpose? "Of course, it could be a spy within our own ranks."

[malificence]

Lucius is well aware of his family history. They publicly pretend otherwise, of course, but they know just how close they came to the seat of Muggle power and just how close they were always to that seat. Why do they have a castle in the northernmost reaches of the kingdom? Because before the statute, before the tides changed, a Malfoy had arrived on English shores as William of Normandy's best knight-wizard. Because when another English King had made his move on Scotland, another Malfoy had been part of the vanguard north. And thus, you have a palace in the most northernpart of Scotland.

It's not been a sign of Malfoy power for generations; beyond the Sacred Twenty-Eight, most don't even recall that they own it; the Manor has been their social center for a few hundred years.

His hand links with hers as they walk through the castle. There are, of course, elves in the depths of the palace, elves who know well enough to stay out of sight until called upon. "I've considered that." It's a disturbing thought, because a betrayer among their ranks? They all have positions of such power....in the Ministry, at Hogwarts. "There are a few I might suspect of playing both sides." Igor for his own purpose, young Barty Crouch because of his thirst for an actual battle. Both are names he's shared with their lord, and it's always hard to tell what Riddle might choose to do with a supposition like that.

[scinlac]

"Another possibility is someone who was passed over. The likelihood of one of the accused having something to hide is awfully high." For one, because the lot of them do. "Elektra ordered no searches, but among this much old blood she could have found plenty of highly illegal heirlooms." Of course, Elektra Burke, being old blood herself, knows very well that this is beyond likely, least of all because her family owns the shop through which most of these possessions have wandered at least once. She also knows that it would open a whole new barrel of flobberworms.

She is headed upwards – the general thought being a glance at the storm-ridden sea from the highest vantage point, but he could likely have guessed that. In fact, he very definitely knew this was going to happen. Where reasonable people have a fear of heights, Bella has a pathological need to climb up and look down, and he has spent enough time around her to have discovered that. "The sheer accuracy of the list has me thinking it unlikely, though. All the names I know of are names of people who have the Mark."

And yes, she keeps talking about work even as she traces the stone carvings by the stairwell. She can pretend that this isn't a more intimate occasion than a work lunch.

[malificence]

"There are a few who haven't proven themselves worthy." His cultivation of Peter Pettigrew hasn't gotten far enough to identify Lucius' other particular friends as members of a particular cohort - and the little party he'd thrown had hardly been attended by all the people who had been interviewed. Still, he thinks, if Pettigrew was smarter than he appeared and started having second thoughts, he might be able to come up with such a list. He might have even passed it along to one of his more rash friends.

They could have anonymously passed it to the auror who might be of blood both ancient and pure, but who has a rather unfortunate sense of justice.

But there's still the fact that there's no way Peter would have been able to construct a list of that razor sharp accuracy. It would either need to be a betrayer or someone with foreknowledge. A traitor or a deviant. He prefers, for obvious reasons, a deviant.

When they reach the top of the tallest turret and Bella goes straight for the window, Lucius wraps his arms around her waist and brushes his lips against her temple as they look down at the sea, dark gray and roiling beneath them. "Bellatrix," he murmurs.