Work Text:
THE LAWS OF LUXURY - PART 1
Look But Don’t Touch
Touch But Don’t Use
Use But Don’t Enjoy
Enjoy But Don’t Show It
~~•~~
“Narcissa, where is our son this morning?” Lucius asked, stirring milk into his coffee slowly in order to avoid the repulsive clinking sound of metal against glass. He looked up for an answer, but his wife merely shrugged in response as she sipped out of her own cup.
“Well does he plan on skipping breakfast?” he pressed.
Narcissa, sitting at the head of the table to his left, cast him a side glance. She lowered her cup and replaced it on the saucer. “He’s already eaten,” she informed him, “He was up quite early this morning on account of hidden treasure.”
Lucius sniffed in amusement. “Ah,” he acknowledged, lowering his face and taking the spoon out of his cup. He ran it over the rim twice before setting it aside. “So where might this treasure be?” he questioned, raising the cup to his lips. Only one side of his smile could be seen over the rim.
“He didn’t say,” Narcissa replied, “Only that he found it last night and was eager to return to it in the morning. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen him so excited.”
Lucius hummed into his tea cup. “I suppose I’ll have to go looking for him then,” he said at last.
His wife shook her head. “If he’s been digging around in the dirt and ruining his clothes—”
Lucius held up his palm to placate her. “Come now, Narcissa. Boys will be boys.”
~~•~~
After a quick search of the grounds with no sign of his son, Lucius returned inside and ascended the manor’s old staircase up to Draco’s room. He was a bit worried he hadn’t found the boy by now, but on the bright side, it seemed he wasn’t out soiling his clothes as his mother feared.
“Draco?” he called, tapping at the door with two knuckles. When he received no answer, he let himself in, only to find the room empty and dark. Lucius frowned to himself. “Where is that boy?” he murmured, turning in place amidst the quiet room to leave. But a muted thud from above gave him pause. He turned his head up and raised a perfectly arched brow at the ceiling. After a moment, he heard it again. And again. He gave a long sigh and swiftly started for the third floor. “What am I raising? A wild elephant?” he grumbled to himself as he hurried up the stairs.
The noise, he found, was coming from one of the unused bedrooms, and as he drew closer, a voice joined in with it: “Avast ye, Muggles!” came the childish command, muffled behind the door. Another thud followed the words. “Give me all yer galleons! Do it! Or I’ll run you through!”
Lucius carefully twisted the handle and nudged the door inward just a crack. He expected to be endeared, or at the very least, amused by the scene before him. Unfortunately, the emotions he felt were quite the opposite. Draco’s six-year-old body was drowning in an old leather trench coat. His small hands barely peaked out from beneath the lumpy sleeves to grasp his weapon: a long black cane with a silver tip. He fought an invisible opponent with the makeshift sword, but it too was much too large for him; it kept hitting the floor or the bedpost after each swing, and Lucius identified it as the source of the noise. Draco also had a floral handkerchief tied around his head that he’d cleverly angled to cover one of his eyes. This would have all been fine and well if not for the fact that the coat had belonged to Lucius' father, the cane to grandfather, and the handkerchief to his grandmother. The chest from where all the things had come, now miraculously unlocked, was thrown open at the foot of the bed.
Fuming, Lucius shoved the door open the rest of the way, clearly startling his son, though only for a brief moment. “Father!” he exclaimed cheerfully once the shock had passed, “Look at all this old stuff I’ve found! Did you know it was up here?” The boy grinned expectantly, but the joy in his expression soon withered under his Lucius’ gaze. “Father?” he repeated, more hesitantly this time.
Lucius said nothing as he marched into the room; his every step delivered a menacing rap against the floor that was only magnified in the silence. Slowly and stiffly, he slid the cane out of Draco’s hands. “Take off...those clothes,” he clipped, nose wrinkling up with the final word. Draco did as he was told, slipping off the coat and tugging the kerchief off his head with shame-filled gentleness. Without looking up, he offered both items to Lucius. The latter snatched them away from the boy and draped them over his arm.
“These are not playthings, Draco,” he snapped, “You should have known that. The chest was locked! How did you get into it in the first place?” he demanded.
Draco seemed to contemplate his answer for a very long time. “I thought it was treasure,” he admitted, embarrassed. “It unlocked for me... I thought that meant—”
“And did you wish it unlocked?” Lucius cut in sharply.
“Well...” he trailed off. That was exactly what he’d done.
Lucius huffed and went to return the items to the chest. “I don’t want you coming in here ever again. Am I clear?” Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Draco nod.
The boy watched with tightly sealed lips and a straight back as his father sealed up the trunk again. It was unusual for him to stick around after being scolded. “Do you have something to tell me?” Lucius asked his son, standing to his full height again. He lifted his chin slightly and looked down his nose at the boy.
Draco’s shoulders lifted as he took in a breath. “I found a book too.” The words rushed out of his mouth so quickly that it took Lucius a moment to separate them.
“What...book?” he questioned with a tone like steel. There was only one book in that chest, and Lucius knew it.
Draco seemed to shrink before him. “I-I didn’t know it had words in it already,” he tried, “I thought it was for drawing...”
Lucius’ exhaled audibly through his teeth. “Do you mean to say,” he started, deathly calm, “that you drew pictures...in your great, great, great grandfather’s journal?”
Draco’s eyes widened with every “great,” but he gave no reply, too terrified to do so.
“Get out of here, Draco,” he commanded. “NOW!” Draco flinched at the abrupt anger in his father’s voice, but he didn’t wait around to be ordered twice. He ran from the room as quickly as he could, heart pounding behind his tiny sternum.
Lucius eventually found the diary, tucked over in one corner of the room. He flipped through the pages to assess the damage, and sure enough, his son’s scribbles had completely covered over a dozen previously empty pages. Livid, he threw open the chest and let the journal drop from his hand like rubbish into a waste bin.
“I heard yelling,” a feminine voice announced. Narcissa came into view around the edge of the doorframe, her arms crossed loosely over her chest. “What happened?”
Lucius gave an undignified huff as he tore the journal from the trunk and brandished the ruined pages at her. “ This happened! Your son is too curious for his own good!”
Narcissa simply raised her brows at him.
“These are family heirlooms. Not—not playthings!” Lucius continued. “They’re for looking at, remembering—they aren’t to be touched! I mean look at this, Narcissa!” He put the journal down and picked up the old cane. The silver tip at the end was badly dented, and some of the paint had been scratched off the sides from Draco’s sword fight.
Narcissa strode forward and calmly took her husband by the arm. “You can get it repaired, dear,” she soothed, pulling him toward the door, “It’s like you said: boys will be boys. He is only a child, after all.”
Lucius hummed flatly, tapping the cane against the floor as his wife led him along. “He won’t always be...”