Fic: Choices (15/2)

[my_thestral]

Author's note: See the one posted from Choices 15/1 about half an hour ago, not much has changed since then :)
Pairing: Ron/Draco
Word count: 2525, this part
Rating: R, I suppose, overall (not this chapter)
Disclaimer: I'm a self-confessed character-kidnapper, but I want no ransom for them ;)

“I demand an explanation! I’ve been stuck in this abominable hole for hours and I will have you answer for it, you miserable excuse for a wizard! When I’m done with you, you’re going to wish you were born a Muggle!!!”

Lucius Malfoy was magnificent in his wrath and Arjen Debonheur wasn’t the most self-confident of young men to begin with. And it didn’t help in the least that this was the father of that gorgeous creature he had the worst crush on and looked every bit like the older version of him. And to top it all, his news was anything but pleasant… Arjen Debonheur indeed wished he could be any place but here tonight. Still - it needed to be done and he intended to be as professional about it as he could muster. He tried to recall how his mentor, Senior Auror Weasley would have handled it, but he just didn’t have the tall man’s overwhelming presence and confidence that came with it. But he tried.

“I would very much like you to calm down, Sir,” he said quietly and Lucius had to shut up if he hoped to hear anything he had to say. “There’s been… a development and I’m afraid, not the best one could hope for. Your grandson… Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy has gone missing. We brought in Madame Malfoy in for questioning – but it seems she hasn’t got a clue who could have been implicated. Still, this is somewhat fortunate for you – you have been in custody all this time and you cannot be blamed for his disappearance.”

Some time during his speech Lucius Malfoy had turned ashen white.

“My son!” he said hastily. “Have you spoken to my son? He could have taken him! He’s got access, he’s…”

“Scorpius Malfoy disappeared while I was still in the Manor with your wife, Mr. Malfoy. No one else was present, I can confirm that. And it seems as if your son has an alibi. He was at The Silver Spoon for the night, as I’m informed, with witnesses a-plenty. He cannot be to blame. We already checked his alibi, the old waiter present says he can remember Mr. Draco Malfoy arriving there with Mr. Weasley – erm, that would be Senior Auror Ronald Weasley, your son’s… partner, I suppose – and he cannot recall Mr. Malfoy leaving."

Lucius Malfoy looked as if he was bursting to say something, but couldn’t and he merely opted to bark out instead: “That man is not my son’s partner! My son’s married and that blood-traitor of Arthur Weasley’s son better keep his sick perverted intentions to himself! He ought to be ashamed of himself, parading his corrupted character in public like that, trying to drag my son with him into the mud! A shame to the purebloods, that’s what he is!”

“Now, you listen…” started Arjen Debonheur in a shaky voice, clearly shocked and intimidated by the old pureblood’s viciousness and malice.

“Is this the thanks I get for finding your grandson, Malfoy?” asked a cold voice from the door and Junior Auror Debonheur positively jumped, ready to hug his mentor fiercely. Ron Weasley could not have come to his rescue at a more appropriate time.

“Where is he?!” the older man asked greedily. “You know now this is all a mountain of nonsense and that I was not implicated; neither in harming Potter and least of all in my grandson’s disappearance - there is some third party at work here. Release me now and let me see my grandson. Idemand it!”

“Not so fast, Malfoy,” said Ron Weasley with a small smile at the corner of his mouth. “I’m afraid it’s quite impossible for you to see your grandson at this moment. He is safe and sleeping soundly in the company of the one person who has his best interest at heart: his father.”

And if Lucius Malfoy could have gotten to his wand at that moment, there would have been murder on the spot. His eyes positive shone with putrid impotent wrath, but Ron merely smiled sweetly and ordered matter-of-factly: “Debonheur – please be so kind and fetch Lady Malfoy, I want to be the one to give her the good news. After all – I need to get into her good grace; I expect to be seeing a lot more of her in the future.”

As soon as the door clicked behind the unwelcome witness, Lucius let his mask drop:

“You!!! You filthy abominable creature! How dare you!? I don’t know how you and that idiot son of mine had done it, but I will get to the bottom of it, if it’s the last thing that I do! I know you’re behind all this, I know it! I don’t know what you did to Potter and how, but how dare you kidnap my grandson from me!?”

“I’m sure I have no idea what you’re on about, Malfoy,” said the redhead calmly, the devilish spark in his brilliant blue eyes the only testimony to how much fun he was having. “But I will say this…” – and with these words he leaned forward, the mountain of a man that he was, deeply invading the personal space of the haughty aristocrat and spoke clearly word for word, as if he was talking to a less than bright child:

“Watch your fucking mouth tonight, Malfoy! I have enough to have you charged with aiding in kidnapping of a Senior Auror on active duty, as well as blackmailing a rightful heir into giving up his heirloom! Both offences are extremely grave and I’d like to see you try proving them wrong, your past record in tow! You’re Draco’s father and I will not actively seek to harm you – but you push me and I will bust your elegant old arse so fast you won’t have time to spell Azkaban! So it is in your best interest to shut-the-fuck-up and listen,” he hissed and the echo of his voice barely died when the door flew open and in floated one very agitated Narcissa Malfoy with Arjen Debonheur following closely at her heels.

“My grandson, have you found him?!” she asked hastily and her face showed nothing but the sincerest concern. Yep, Voldemort had definitely picked the wrong one of the Black sisters for his aid, Ron thought with silent admiration, this one would have won him the war single-handedly!She reached out to her husband elegantly, ignoring the awkward circumstances completely, kissed him on the cheek almost absent-mindedly, and crossed her arms gracefully on her chest, a perfect picture of good breeding and mastery. Then she bore her icy blue eyes into Ron’s and asked haughtily:

“Well, Auror Weasley!? I expect you must have some answers for me by now – after all, your reputation precedes you! I was told you are the best Senior Auror under Harry Potter’s lead – and with the Saviour himself currently unavailable, you are effectively the best this Ministry’s got. You must have something! This… the whole intolerable affair – it is perfectly unacceptable!”

“Calm down, Madame, if you please,” said Ron courteously and pointed to a chair, which she took with a flawless grace. “We’ve found your grandson and I assure you, he’s perfectly safe, resting with his father.”

The look Narcissa shot towards her husband was full of anxiety, but her words reflected none of the emotion: “Merlin be praised, so he is! Oh, what an impossible night! But do tell me – how could this unfortunate affair have happened!? Is it clear yet?! Have you found the culprit?”

“Well… I’m afraid it is a bit more complicated than that…” shrugged Ron. “We found out who did it, the whole shebang - stunning Head Auror Potter and taking your grandson – but I wouldn’t exactly call him a culprit. It seems as if it had all been a great misunderstanding, as the… personwho did it stepped forward to confess to his actions immediately and when your grandson was taken, he was delivered almost directly to his father. I’m sure when Harry wakes up, he will agree with me – for all the uproar it caused, hardly any crime had been committed tonight.”

“But who, who, Weasley, was the wretched man behind this calamity?!” barked Lucius Malfoy and Ron could almost see his fists contracting in a deadly grip. As sorry as he was to do this, he had no choice.

“It was your house-elf, I believe he’s called Wheezy,” he said as calmly as he could and saw Lucius Malfoy literally collapse backwards into his chair with his noble mouth gawping in disbelief resembling that of a fish out of water.

“My house-elf?” he asked dumbly, because there was no way this was ever going to make sense in a million years and a million universes away.

“Your house-elf,” confirmed Ron adamantly and saw Narcissa’s elegant hand fly to cover her mouth. That woman…

“You see – I was just about to tell Draco the unfortunate news about his son’s disappearance, of which I was dutifully informed by Junior Auror Debonheur here, when your house elf apparated right next to us with a sleeping body of your grandson in his arms and spared us all a lot of grief. He was squealing and sobbing so hard for a while it was quite impossible to make out what on Merlin’s bloody earth – pardon my language, Madam – he was saying, but eventually we managed to make heads and tails of his story and this is what he told us.

Apparently Harry Potter had apparated into your household unexpectedly very late in the evening - his motives as of now are still unknown – “ he looked at Lucius sharply, daring him to say a word, but as much as the silver-haired wizard was seething, he kept his mouth wisely shut. “In any event - it seems as if Wheezy was taken a little by surprise by a sudden appearance of an unannounced stranger in your home and he let his impulses to protect his family take over: he stunned Mr. Potter with one of his particular defensive charms and when he saw who it was that he attacked – because that how it would look like – he completely lost his presence of mind. You see, that particular charm is quite impossible to counter and it takes a while to wear out, he told us, so once it was cast there was precious little he could do.

I don’t know how you treat your house-elves, Malfoy, but this one is dead frightened of you. He was absolutely certain he would be immediately given clothes if he confessed to what he had done, so he hoped that the calamity would simply come to pass in the morning, because by that time Potter should have already come to his senses. But suddenly the house was swarming with Aurors and the poor house-elf no longer knew left from right. He heard people shouting downstairs and you shouting back, then my lovely colleague here stormed in, howling something about strangers running around the house and stunning people – so he did the one thing he thought best until the terrible mess cleared up: he protected the heir of the Malfoy family and took him where he knew the child was going to be safe – to his father. Inadvertently causing more panic, of course. But he did it to protect what you should value most, Malfoy, so – can you truly blame him?”

“Oh… that terrible stupid stupid creature!” shrieked Narcissa in a distressed voice. “He should have been given clothes years ago, really, just as dumb as his wretched father, this one! To cause us all this trouble! I don’t want him to set another foot in our household, Lucius, not another foot! I absolutely refuse to have such a failure for a servant! What a commotion! What misery! – and because of a house-elf! We will be the laughing stock of the wizarding community if this comes out! Gentlemen,” she turned towards the two Aurors and looked at them sternly. “I must ask for your complete confidence. I don’t want a word of what happened at the Manor tonight to see the light of day. Do your reports, write what you must, but I would very much appreciate it if no one outside this room – save for your superiors – found out about the unfortunate turn of events. I would take it as a personal favour if you did my bidding.”

“You need not fear, Madame,” said Ron courteously. “I will personally mark the file as a confidential. I have no interest in humiliating you and I think as upsetting as this affair was, it best be forgotten.”

“I… thank you, Mr. Weasley,” Narcissa Malfoy nodded gracefully and proceeded to look at the younger man in the room as well. “And thank you, Mr. ... Debonheur, was it? Your behaviour was most exemplary tonight, and I will make sure this goes on the record. Darling,” she turned to her husband without further ado, “I can’t fathom why should our presence still be mandatory at this wretched place, so if Aurors Weasley and Debonheur agree – shall we?” she looked at her husband with a raised eyebrow, clearly indicating “say no more, we shall speak of it in the privacy of our home”.

And for once Lucius Malfoy didn’t object. When it was clear the Aurors weren’t going to stop them and Ron merely asked for them to remain available for any additional questioning, he took his wife’s arm under his and all but dragged her outside. But he had a last minute stop by the door and hissed at Ron:

“This isn’t over yet, Weasley. I want my son and my grandson back and I will not stop until it is done!”

But Ron merely smirked and asked with a bit of rogue in his voice:

“So which one is it going to be, Malfoy? Threats or bribery? Because I hope you realize there’s nothing you can do to me that wouldn’t come back to haunt you tenfold. And as to the bribery…” He approached the haughty wizard in two long strides and looked him directly in the eye: “You might be the richest wizard in Britain, but you don’t have enough, Malfoy. There is only one way to buy my heart, old man, and your son has found it: a heart for a heart. A pureblood like yourself should know better than to try and break a bond so sacred and so magical.”

“Darling, I believe we’re quite done here,” said Narcissa Malfoy and dragged her flabbergasted husband along with an adamantly tug at his sleeve. “Good day, Mr. Weasley… Mr. Debonheur – adieu!”

And if Ron didn’t know where to look he might have missed a tiny shadow of a smug smile that flashed in the corner of her lips.

He watch her go and once the door clicked he had a rather unusual thought: The curtain has fallen and the primadona left the building.

If only the night - well, almost morning now - was done for him… He still had to deal with the hardest part.

Harry.

~ End of Part 15/2

Next: ( Choices 16/1 )
See also:
( Choices, Part 1 )
( Choices, Part 2 )
( Choices, Part 3 )
( Choices, Part 4 )
( Choices, Part 5/1 )
( Choices, Part 5/2 )
( Choices, Part 6 )
( Choices, Part 7 )
( Choices, Part 8/1 )
( Choices, Part 8/2 )
( Choices, Part 9 )
( Choices, Part 10/1 )
( Choices, Part 10/2 )
( Choices, Part 11/1 )
( Choices, Part 11/2 )
( Choices, Part 12 )
( Choices, Part 13 )
( Choices, Part 14 )
( Choices, Part 15/1 )