Protect the family.

There was little else of command from your father; all else was subsumed into a disapproving glare or the raised brow of blessing. But in your childhood where little was denied you, the idea of putting your desires above your name was absolutely never permitted. The name was older than you, and would live beyond you, and boy you would be dammed by all your ancestors if you let it fall into the filth.

Filth was a word you knew, and you were never allowed to forget those who fit the description. Worthless, flat creatures with no magic in their fingerbones, or wizards too much in love with peasants and animals to keep their hands clean. Other families, older than yours, had thought to lower themselves to the level of those lesser life forms, saying we are all humans, declaring them the same as you. None of them improved their situation.

No son of mine will ever claim to be the same as a mudblooded whelp. Will he, boy?

What were you born, Lucius?

What will you die?

Bright lad.

So back to his parchment he would go, and reassured of your Father's confidence, you would be free to leave the room.

But never to leave the name.

There were many lessons of those days in your father's study, in summer between terms with the buzz of cicadas loud from the open window. Always stay in control. Morals are subjective. You did not disagree. Your ancestors watched you carefully with haunted narrowed eyes from their high oil paintings, and their pale sharp faces were made like yours, neither forgiving nor kind. The Malfoys were always beautiful, but you all came out of the womb with the look of having seen too much. The family had not lived as long as it had by having too many humanitarian scruples, and it had not left you unmarked as a breed.

You won't let me down, will you, Lucius? You won't let this name bear shame, you won't let your children forget who they are?

And what is the best way to insure that?

How?

And if there is one more powerful than you?

Why do you do this?

And you were protected, all through your school years, not a hair harmed on your head, not a desire ungranted as long as you kept the name of Malfoy high on its pedestal. Good boy, Lucius. Good man, Lucius. I leave it in your capable hands, Lucius.

You had no desire to associate with those who would sully your name. Disgusting Gryffindors, laughing raucously in the halls, flaunting their morals and honor. Little good for them, when trouble came and they fell back on their trusted alliances, only to have their own throats slit and their children impaled, victim of their parents' gullibility and faith in the myth of inherent goodness. But you did not run groveling to the other side, hoping to stay alive by selling your soul right out of the gate. You had learned to watch the race a little before placing bets, and even then, to bet only on yourself.

You did not live in fear, even in those days when the world itself was ending. Your wife would not see her husband cower as the others did; no male Malfoy yet bred would permit his wife and children to see him as anything but impenetrable: the epitome of the Malfoy name. When you were certain of your own survival, you made your choice, and you did not make it on your knees.

But you admit, in the darkness of your own soul, as the burning tip of a wand traces with horrible slowness over the tender flesh inside your arm, that it is not only for your name that you did this. When the slender body you pressed beneath you at night began to swell with the promise of a hundred generations of all that you were born and all that you would die, you finally realized what it meant to protect the family.

Your family. Your son.

That your father loved you, you never doubted. In return you never disappointed him. You will not start now.

Yes, father.

Blood is warm between your fingers; the mark weeping, newly cut, as you lower your head. You will not neglect your name, you have always waited to see. For now, it will keep your family safe. But only until you are stronger.

"Yes, My Lord."