Birthright

In the locker room, Draco hung his sweat-drenched silk shirt on a peg and flexed luxuriously. Lucius chuckled and started unbuttoning his vest. Draco sat and unlaced his boots. Lord Malfoy had removed his vest and cravat; his shirt had more classical lines to it, with rounded shoulders and laces at the throat. He was untying them dexterously and Draco found himself watching in appreciation.

Lucius was definitely one of the last of the old guard. Draco was a child of a different era, and as much as he loved the ceremony and elegance of the old ways it was impractical to live that way anymore. The snakehead cane and the intricate clasps on Lucius’ robes were charmingly anachronistic. Lucius left his shirt open at the front, still tucked into his tight riding breeches, and sat down to remove his boots as well. Draco continued disrobing, but watched his father’s careful movements. Everything with Lucius was graceful—even the awkward removal of riding pants. Draco found himself looking away quickly as Lucius walked past to the showers.

Draco had long harbored shameful feelings about his father. Most boys felt camaraderie with their fathers and love for their mothers; Narcissa had oscillated between cold and frustratingly overprotective. She was, at best, competition for his father’s attention. Now that his mother was out of the picture, there was no competition for his Lucius’ affections, and the feelings of desire would fade. Sometimes if Draco told himself something enough times it became true.

And he had every right to find Lucius attractive. The man was not classically beautiful like Narcissa, but he was extremely handsome and had a powerfully alluring presence. If Lucius had been anyone but his father, Draco would have begun the subtle social dance that was necessary to determine someone’s interest—or lack thereof. But of course the unavoidable truth of the matter was that Lucius was his father. Draco shook his head and peeled off his boxer-briefs, one of the few Muggle inventions for which he was constantly thankful. They were quite good at preventing the need to adjust oneself whilst chasing the Snitch—a few seconds’ delay to resettle the family jewels could result in a loss. This particular pair was Slytherin House colors, and he tossed them into his locker casually.
ius ius hadn’t chosen to go to one of the secluded shower cubicles, and Draco averted his eyes. He felt a slight blush tinge the tips of his ears. Damn it, I’m past that, he thought to himself. Shame in the locker room had gone away after puberty. Or so he thought. Apparently it didn’t matter, because he was struggling with being casually naked with his father. He chose the shower head a few down from Lucius and turned it as hot as it would go. Draco’s eyes snaked over to the older man against his will. Lucius had his head tipped back and his eyes closed, allowing the steaming water to run in streams down his body. He had taken his hair out of the thick horse braid and it hung heavy and wet down his back. When it was wet it appeared almost yellow, like damp straw. Draco dragged his eyes away to pick up the soap but they migrated back.

His father had very broad shoulders, and the muscles beneath them shifted mightily as he took a deep, shuddering breath. Lucius ducked his face into the spray and rubbed at it with his hands. Draco could see the droplets of water trapped in his long eyelashes. Lucius opened his eyes and Draco looked away quickly. Out of the corner of his eye he watched his father lather the soap and wash his face, then rub it in wide arcs over his chest, reaching overhead to cleanse the backs of his shoulders. His hands moved briskly over his back and back around to his stomach. Draco turned the temperature of the water down a little and again tried to drag his attention to his own bathing.

Lucius’ stomach was flat and hard, and when he flexed one could see a strong hint of chiseled abs. His flanks were lean, and his hipbones lacked any pad of fat over them. Don’t look, Draco. Don’t look. The litany ran through his mind until he heard himself mutter it.

“Something the matter?” Lucius asked, looking right at him.

Draco shook his head. “Just thinking about something, that’s all. Don’t mind me…I’ve picked up the bad habit of talking to myself.”

Lucius chuckled.

“You know, Draco, that they consider that a sign of madness.”

He returned to the spray, this time turning his attention to what Draco dreaded most. There was nothing sexual in his motions, and he lingered only a moment over his cock. Lucius was cut, alleviating the need for any particular effort in cleanliness. He reached under to lather his balls and moved then to the sides of his legs. Lucius soaped his muscular huartuarters and thighs, bending to wash his lower legs and giving each foot a good pass with the soap. He stepped fully under the spray to rinse and his eyes drifted closed again at the pleasure of the hot water. Draco turned his own shower all the way to cold and lathered himself very quickly, fighting the temptation to jack off right there.

He was rinsing when Lucius spoke again. “You wouldn’t happen to have brought any shampoo, would you? I seem to have forgotten mine.” Draco poured out enough for himself and tossed the bottle to his father, who caught it neatly out of the air. “Thank you. I’ll try not to use it all.” He flashed Draco a quick smile that made Draco feel like he had fireworms crawling around his stomach.

Draco longed to grow his hair to Lucius’ heroic length, sweeping past the bottom of the shoulder blades. When he was a very young child Lucius would let him brush it sometimes. Lucius would sit back in an armchair with his hair trailing off the back, and Draco would gently and carefully brush through it, letting it run through his fingers as he did. He knew it was impossibly soft to the touch and very heavy. He longed to touch it again, but brushing someone’s hair was a girlie thing. Draco lathered his own hair and felt the tips of it, which went slightly past the tops of his shoulders. Dormitory life was not conducive to such quantities of hair—even the girls chose to cut theirs shorter, except for those who felt comfortable with drying spells. If they were done improperly, one could wind up dealing with scorched hair. Far worse than dampness, in Draco’s opinion.

Lucius rinsed the last of the suds out of his hair and wrung it out. The sheer quantity of water it had held made Draco wonder for a brief moment how his father could stand up with that much weight hanging from the back of his head. Then Lucius turned off the water and put a hand out toward his towel. So practiced was he atrievrieval spells that Draco didn’t even hear him say the key. The towel found his hand and he roughly dried his hair before moving down his body. When he finished he wrapped it securely around his waist and padded out of the shower area. Draco watched the last of the soap swirl down the drain, turned off his shower head, and went to pick up his towel.

His father was working the knots out of his hair with a wide-toothed comb. Draco’s fingers itched to touch it. Once, when Draco was very young, he had stroked the platinum waterfall when Lucius was asleep. It was like silk beneath his fingers, and ever since he had longed to touch it again. Now that longing had transformed into a fantasy; Draco grasping his father’s hair, letting the silky strands slide through his fingers as his tongue explored the soft, hot depths of the other man’s mouth. How shameful. Draco turned away and he could feel the heat in his cheeks.

Lucius threw his towel into the hamper and walked to his locker. Draco caught himself before his gaze could fall fully on his father. Put on your clothes, before I do something stupid, he thought fervently. Fortunately Lucius dressed efficiently, shrugging on his waistcoat only moments later. He closed his locker; the country club’s house elves would clean their silks and have them delivered back to the mansion.

“Should we take lunch here, or go home?” Lucius was re-braiding his hair. In the complex dance of Malfoy home life, this was a clear signal that Lucius would not be leaving the sanctit the the club and the estate. He never went out like that. Besides, he had chosen a very simple set of robes. Draco finished buttoning his black shirt and put on the accompanying black jacket. He looked at the silver necktie and chewed his lip slightly. Then he tossed it with his silks and unbuttoned the top of his collar. It was to be a casual afternoon, he suspected. He shrugged on his black outer robe, the one with the deep scarlet lining that he favored when he was away from school.

“I haven’t eaten in the club for quite some time.”

Lucius murmured assent and then looked at Draco. His eyes were piercing. Draco shivered. “You should wear your collar open more often, dragon. It suits you.”

What the hell?

When they arrived back at the manor, Draco realized what his father reminded him of since his return to Lignum; a beaten hound, still carrying the pride and nobility of its birth, now unpredictable and ultimately dangerous. Lucius was hand-shy in a way, reacting with violence to innocent approaches. Conversely he was letting his inner desire for gentleness take over at the wrong moments. His body language had even changed; whenever he wasn’t focused, he curled in on himself, as if to protect his body from some unseen attack. Draco felt disgust at the weakness his father was displaying. He was a Malfoy, by God!

Draco closed his eyes briefly and looked up at his father. Sympathy was not normally in his repertoire of emotions, but he forced himself to find some. He watched his father mount the stairs, and as he reached the landing Draco spoke. Lucius stopped and his son caught up.

“You deserved better, Father.”

Lucius looked at him and a hard glint entered his eye. “It is not a matter of my personal feelings. Narcissa betrayed an ancient code by walking out that door. She shall not find it easy to return.” But then the floodwall broke. “Who am I kidding, Draco?” he asked softly, touching his son’s shoulder. “I am a pathetic fool.”

The younger Malfoy pulled his father into a fierce embrace. “You are Lord Malfoy. You are the greatest man I know. Snap out of it, Father.” His father said nothingaco aco drew back. “We are better off without her.”

His father turned to the foyer and gripped the rail. “I hope you are right, dragon. But this is a terrible blow to the family’s honor.”

Draco sneered. “She called me ‘baby’ before she left.”

“I don’t doubt that, in her own way, your mother cares for you.”

“Fuck her ‘own way.’ Don’t stand up for the bitch, Father. She has unmanned you and embarrassed our family!”

He wasn’t entirely sure how it happened, or which one of them did it, but he found himself standing with his chest against Lucius’, the collar of his father’s vest caught in his fists, lips locked in a desperate kiss. Lucius’ knuckles were stark white, curled in Draco’s shirt. Neither was standing where he’d started. Draco felt dizzy. Lucius’ mouth was hot and so impossibly soft inside…save for the questing tongue and shteetteeth.

They parted as violently as they had come together, both breathing hard. Draco wiped his lips with the back of his sleeve and looked at his father intently, hand pausing before his face. Lucius’ eyes were wide and dark. The two Malfoys stared at each other silently for a long moment.

“What was that?” Lucius finally asked.

“I don’t know,” Draco said softly.

“How inappropriate.”

“Terribly bad form.”

They were kissing again somehow, and Luciuand and moved up and through Draco’s hair, clutching it almost painfully. Finally Draco braced his hands on Lucius’ chest and pushed him gently away. “Father, you don’t want this,” he said huskily. “I’m going to my room.”