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What If.....?	By : valkyrie136 Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Lucius/Hermione Views: 4465 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I Do not own the rights to Pillow Book or to Harry Potter or anything in that universe nor do I not make any profits from it. J.K. Rowling does. Please support the author by reading her books.

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The Office of Muggle Protection
The Ministry of Magic was always a busy place, but it had never seen this amount of activity. In addition to investigating the many leads on death eaters, collecting whatever information was available on the movements of both the Dark Lord and Tom Riddle, which some thought a rather odd distinction since they were one and the same, an enigma that made no sense to the general public but when they all reflected that magic often made no sense, they decided to simply accept it. In the weeks after the wedding of Bill Weasley and Fleur Delacour, now Fleur Weasley, business went on as usual.
There were many places one did not want to be—one was under interrogation by the Office of Aurors because it was essentially run by Lucius Malfoy, former death eater though some were still not entirely sure of his allegiances—and the other was before the office of Muggle Protection.
To understand the Office of Muggle Protection, one needed to know one thing: it was the result of a new law introduced by ministers firmly in the pocket of Lucius Malfoy. It purported to protect the muggleborn witches and wizards who were most vulnerable—Hogwarts was not safe since the death of Albus Dumbledore the year earlier and it was often subject to random acts of violence by dark wizards and witches.
When a boy was killed, the wizarding community knew they needed to address this issue but short of refusing to allow muggleborns’ attend school, none knew what to do. The ministers who pushed the law argued that muggle born’s be separated, and taught privately, by various half blood and pureblood families. They would be anonymously placed, and receive their education. It was welcomed as an ingenious solution, until problems began to arise. First, many of these students did not have access to qualified teachers, and second, many families did not want to participate even with incentives like money but families with well known reputations for hating muggle borns, well they were all to eager to participate.
The results was that a vast majority of children simply elected to live a life outside of the magical world. This saw an increase in Obscuras, which only delighted the others, or they failed their exams for lack of proper preparation, lending credence to the argument that muggle born’s were indeed not meant to be in this world. This law all came to pass during Hermione Granger’s two year absence, and ever since her return, she became one of the biggest headaches for the ministry as she campaigned to have the law repealed. The office was temporary and so had no real office; headed by Edmund Beach’s. it set up office wherever and whenever space was available.
This is how Lucius Malfoy would, in his mind, come to remember the circumstances under which he first had an impression of Hermione Granger. Up until this meeting, he could not receall having ever met her; he knew stories of her, mainly through his son, but he had never actually met her. Even at the wedding, she stood a few feet from him but not once could he remember paying any attention; Lucius in his years of living rarely noticed anything not worth noticing, so he had essentially no memory of the encounter, or her warm voice.
Many people would have taken pity on Edmund Beach. He was not known for much and received this promotion only because no one else wanted the responsibility. Today he was in a nervous sweat because his assigned office was in the vacant third floor, it was a busy time for aurors and they did not often have time to stop by the Ministry. This meant that Beach had the extreme misfortune of crossing Lucius Malfoy’s path on any given day of the week.
Today Lucius Malfoy sat far off to the side, and might have gone unnoticed if not for his incredibly fair hair. Lord Malfoy reclined comfortably in his corner, reviewing letters and reports, and did not look up at all. To make matters worse, Hermione Granger was scheduled to come in and so Beach wanted to speed things up quickly and even instructed his associates to do their best to delay her from coming inside. He wasn’t happy with these tactics but he did not want have to be put in the uncomfortable position of respecting two famous and recognizable people who were complete polar opposites in every way you could imagine. Lucius Malfoy was unaware that she was coming; he merely took immense pleasure in making Beach uncomfortable. It was a heady sensation and he something he could do openly, making it all the more nice.
As the meetings wore on he eventually became bored because Beach was an extremely boring and predictable individual. He finished his reading and rose to leave. It was at this very moment that Beach began to think he would escape today unscathed, and it was at this very moment that Hermione Granger barged in.
Because Lucius Malfoy was sitting in the corner by the door, there was no way she could have seen him. She wore muggle clothes—jeans and a bone colored sleeveless blouse. Her hair was bound atop her head, and in it she had several flower pins. Lucius could only see her side profile and he found her complexion was somewhat tanned from the sun, she had somewhat big, brown eyes that made her seem rather innocent, and otherwise delicate features. Curious, he decided to sit back down and made himself comfortable. He decided that she must be very young, yet seemed to possess the confidence of someone far older—or maybe it was the arrogance of youth because she seemed entirely unconcerned with the consequences.
‘M-Ms. Granger,’ Beach’s voice came out in a stammering squeak, ‘I t-thought you were already placed in our program’
Ms. Granger reached into her back pocket and took her time to unfold a piece of parchment before carefully setting down in front of Edmund Beach, who looked rather green. It seemed he was not unsurprised by her act, but then he had seen her do this countless times before.
‘I am appealing. I was told I would receive a quality education on par with what I would receive if I attended Hogwarts but as you can see, the family I was placed with is not qualified and the person who is supposed to teach Advanced Transfiguration never even took the course.’ She paused for breath, ‘I filed the necessary paperwork but since no one was responding I decided to exercise my rights and meet you directly. Strangely, it was very difficult to locate you Mr. Beach.’
She said this last part with unhidden sarcasm, and Beach glanced from her to Lucius, who merely watched this show with mild interest. Beach was silent and Ms. Granger’s blood began to boil. She waved her hand in his face rudely to get his attention, ‘Excuse me Sir but I think the best solution to all of this is to re-examine the purpose of this law because time and again I have given evidence that it is not helpful in fact it hurts the muggle borns like myself.’
Beach’s tittered, ‘But the law is very well researched and even supported by extremely capable people, like Lord Malfoy for instance.’
There was a pause, and Hermione said with some degree of frustration, ‘……He’s kind of crazy.’ Shaking her head she continued on her tirade, ‘Do you know that almost every student enrolled in this program has failed their O.W.L.’s?’ She absolutely felt that the minister before her was either completely uncaring or somehow misinformed. When faced with the facts, shouldn’t the laws be changed? She continued to criticize the law, blissfully unaware of the fact that the law’s creator sat not far behind her, ‘I think anyone with half a mind could see that it’s goal is to perpetuate, not end, discrimination and perhaps even rob muggle borns of their dignity and rights; it’s a huge disgrace.’
She crossed her arms, and silently applauded herself for delivering such a scathing criticism. Well done Hermione. She could not ignore things like this; it simply was not in her nature. She wouldn’t be able to hold her head up, but still, even she felt the blood slowly drain from her face at what happened next.
Beach choked on his words, and after a lengthy silence while Hermione watched him and waited for him to reply, a quiet, cold voice interrupted her tirade, sending chills down her spine and making her freeze,
‘Ms. Granger—
Hermione’s immediate reaction was to panic. Her heat began to pound wildly and she found it difficult to keep her breathing calm. This was the first time seeing him in a long time. It felt like a lifetime had passed, and even if he seemed to not know who she was, her memories were perfectly defined inside of her; every moment with him seared inside, leaving a burn that could never go away, or for that matter, heal completely. She became scared. This was new to her, she didn’t know how to really act with him.
Lucius said nothing after that, and in the silence he merely watched her as she turned to face him, made note of how tense she now appeared, and felt the smile she summoned was incredibly forced, and her words insincere, ‘Lord Malfoy, how wonderful it is to see you again. I’m Hemrione Granger, it is a pleasure to finally meet you.’
She waited for him to say something, expecting his words to be cutting or rude. But he merely regarded her with that icy stare.
The only thing worse than dislike was indifference, and Hermione again reminded herself that she should focus on treating him the same. They were nothing more than casual aquaintances at best.
'Were you that surprised to see me?' He finally said.
Hermione remembered then that this was the floor where he spent his time the most at the Ministry of Magic; of course it made sense that he should be here. She wondered if maybe their paths had crossed before, and so she carefully calculated her reply, 'I can hardly begin to express my joy at seeing you, but you seem to be inconvenienced by me being here. I will conclude this matter with Mr. Beach on another day and apologize for any rudeness on part.'
Lucius regarded this well-worded pack of lies with a simple arch of his brow. She professed joy but appeared to be anything but joyful. He indicated to Beach that he would like to sit with a simple wave of his hand, and settled himself in the nervous man's seat. The room was so quiet you might hear a pin drop, and all eyes were fixed on the two of them. Lucius waited for her to continue.
Hermione stared at him in awkward silence for a few minutes. He seemed perfectly at ease with the discomfort he was causing her. She struggled to find the right way to exit without offending him further. But her mind was blank. So she coughed into her hand once and turned to face Beach's, 'I submitted my appeal. I don't want to inconvenience anyone any further so I will go ahead and leave.'
Lucius picked up the piece pf parchment and strared at it for a moment then wordlessly crumpled it into a ball and tossed it into the nearby fire. Hermione stared at him in shock, her mouth opening and closing multiple times.
He was not known to be a talkative person, but when he did speak his words cut sharp like a sword, and when he did act, it was sometimes likened to a sharp cutting you deep. In short, Lucius was someone others made an effort to avoid.
After encountering so many troubles over the years, it seemed rather laughable that they should meet under such casual circumstances. In the past year not once had she thought of him. He didn't seem to recognize her, and that wasn't exactly a bad thing in her eyes. While her running into him seemed odd, it didn't matter. They had what she might call a cursed fate.
Feeling more than a little pressure to do something, she finally blurted out, 'Why are you making things deliberately difficult for me?'
Lucius casually replied, 'It's fun.'
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