A Snake Named Voldemort

Untitled Part 15

"That's..."

Lucius nodded. "Yes," he said simply, because there was no reason to waste unneeded words. Draco, knowing exactly what could be at stake, simply bid his father good luck and rather quickly fled the vicinity. Lucius idly wondered not for the first time if he had sheltered his heir too much.

Flooing to the Ministry was, as expected, easy, though as Draco had said, it was New Year's Eve, which served to make Lucius' situation both easier and more difficult. Despite Lucius' careful preplanning for such an event as now to get people accustomed to his all-hours business, there was no one around to bat any sort of eye at him, questioning or disinterested alike. Because of the holiday, he was currently both unobtrusive and conspicuous.

"Let's just get this over with, shall we?" he said to no one in particular, though it could have been the snake he was talking to, but of course she couldn't understand him.

Lucius had to laugh to himself while he reminisced on the Ministry's competence, or lack thereof. While it was true security had been upped significantly—though how well that really worked considering he was still employed—there was a severe lapse in judgment concerning how safe the changes were. Using his particular mission as an example, there were serious flaws in how the security was maintained.

Lucius entered a lift and directed it to the ninth floor.

It had been rather fortunate for him to escape both the Order and the Aurors a year ago from the very place he was headed now. For one, it kept him out of Azkaban, and it allowed him to fulfill the Dark Lord's wishes now relatively painlessly. Unfortunately, the Department of Mysteries had been one of the places he was relatively impressed by the changes in security for it. They had better preventative measures to prevent theft. It seemed the Ministry was capable of "learning their lesson" and barricaded the DoM from any unauthorized admittance. Indeed, no unauthorized wizard or Muggle, nor creatures of intelligence such as House Elves or Centaurs, would be able to enter through the main entrance to the Department.

Too bad Lucius was authorized, and too bad snakes hadn't been deemed intelligent or magical enough to register in the wards...indeed, they were probably one of the animals used in experiments down there anyway. Nagini's last escapade to the DoM had largely been ignored, as the imprudent Order members involved couldn't make it clear what their purpose was for being there in the first place. Perhaps it was also because that particular incident had been swept under a rug, due to Fudge's deniability of the time, and thus was not widely known during the security upgrades, having been lost in the paperwork.

...Or maybe that paperwork had been accidentally shredded as Lucius was cleaning out his office one day.

Harry sat down heavily in his chair. Had he been a wizard of weaker constitution, he might have never made it there and instead collapsed on the floor. He thought he knew what emotional turmoil was before, but it seems he may have been mistaken.

While Snape was here, he hadn't allowed himself to fully react to their interaction. But now...now he could fully appreciate just how jumbled and ridiculous his life could be. He wished he had someone to talk to, but since he was alone in the house—save for well-meaning but terrible-as-therapists House Elves—he settled for talking to the empty chair across from him. There was a wrinkle left in the back of it from when Snape sat there that vaguely looked like a crooked face.

It would do.

"So," Harry told it, "Dumbledore, suspecting something of Horcruxes and my being one, came up with this grand plan to remove it and make Voldemort mortal. And then after, I could kill him, as per the Prophesy."

Harry propped his chin up with his hand and eyed the chair contemplatively.

"He got Snape in on the action, only Snape didn't like his plan. I guess—what?—he thought I would lose and get killed instead like? Did he really care?" Harry snorted dismissively.