InsaneJournal

Current mood:	hot
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Entry tags:	fic, ficlet, lucius, lucius/snape, snape

Fic: A Form of Persuasion, Lucius/Severus preslash, Adult-ish
Title: A Form of Persuasion
Author: diabolica / celta_diabolica
Pairing Lucius/Severus, preslash
Rating: Adult-ish? Nothing very graphic happens, but it’s not a bedtime story for littl’uns either.
Warnings: I think I must have used about 57 cliches here. Also, teenage!Snape is an angstwhore drama queen. And Lucius is a cradle-snatcher.
Word Count: 840 (It's teeny. No, really.)
Disclaimer: Jo would never approve of the uses I put these boys to. But they sure seem to like it.
Author's Notes: For luciusmistress, who gave me the following prompt: "Come here; I think you're beautiful", Lucius convinces/tries to convince/makes him feel that there's something unique about Severus. This may not be what you had in mind. It’s more angsty than fluffy, and Lucius is a right bastard who refuses to utter the word beautiful, but still, there’s something about Severus ... Hope you like it, hon!



‘I’m not ready,’ Severus blurted out, which was decidedly not what he had come here to say. He could have guessed what Lucius wanted, bringing him here, right under Dumbledore's nose. It wasn't difficult for someone with Severus's gifts to divine the other man's intentions; he need only make eye contact. But Severus had his own reasons for avoiding Lucius's eye.

‘You’re of age,’ said Lucius. ‘You came of age three months ago.’

The acknowledgement of his birthday, which had passed without so much as an owl from Lucius, almost made Severus look up. But he would not fall into that trap again. Instead he made a show of looking out the window, and in his mind he lined up his doubts like gobstones on the windowsill, examining the swirl of consternation and desire trapped under glass. He fought them down; emotion, as he well knew, was a dangerous thing.

‘Why would he want to meet me?’ Severus asked, as if the answer made no difference to him.

Lucius's response surprised him. ‘Because you are extraordinary. You know that, don't you?’

That did make Severus turn his head. Sitting there on a Saturday afternoon in the best room that Hogsmeade had to offer, with his legs too long for his trousers and a whippet-thin body he’d not yet got used to, the last thing Severus felt was extraordinary. He wondered if Lucius could guess the reason for his refusal to respond.

Lucius leaned forward in his seat. ‘You possess more innate knowledge and skill than almost any wizard I know. In the right company, with the right training, you would be unstoppable. Wizards like you are our best hope for the future.’

What happened to blood will out? Severus wanted to ask. But he remained silent and gave the barest of nods to indicate that he was listening.

‘All I am suggesting is a meeting,’ Lucius continued. ‘A meeting like this.’ He gestured with one hand to indicate the two of them, his wedding band gleaming dully in the sinuous spring light. ‘Surely that's not such a dreadful prospect.’

‘I’m not sure,’ said Severus, again surprised at himself. Mulciber and Avery, waiting for him in the Hog’s Head, would have unthinkingly handed their grandmothers over to a pack of ravening Dementors if only Lucius would say those words to them. Severus had wanted such a meeting for at least a year, had begged Lucius to arrange it. But that was before Lucius had disappeared without a word, and now that this chance was being offered to him, Severus was ready to throw it back in Lucius’s face.

‘Is this about—?’ Lucius let out an exasperated breath and stood, pacing over to the window, where he remained with his back to Severus. After a moment he said, ‘This is your way of punishing me, is it?’

‘What makes you say that?’

‘Because I know you, Severus. I know how quick you are to take offence, even when none is intended. Did I not explain to you—’

‘How is your wife?’

Lucius looked hard at him for a moment and did not answer. ‘It was a simple question,’ Severus remarked.

‘It was no such thing.’

Severus, who recognised the truth of this, merely inclined his head in a way he knew Lucius could read as What am I supposed to say?

‘Severus, if you cannot see past your own petty jealousy to the prize I am offering you, then perhaps I have misjudged you after all.’

Severus stood, defiant. ‘Shall I go then?’

When Lucius did not immediately respond, he turned and stepped towards the door, forgetting the kind of magic—deft, undeniable—that Lucius possessed. On the third step, Lucius was beside him. Severus stopped short before he could take a fourth.

‘Have I misjudged you?’ Lucius asked in his ear. ‘Did I believe you more circumspect than a mere teenager has any right to be?’

‘You weren't always so concerned about my age.’

‘No. I concerned myself with you. Only you. Was I wrong?’ Severus meditated on a knot in the wooden floor to avoid acknowledging the effect that Lucius's breath on his neck was having. Lucius asked, ‘Are you simply an ordinary wizard?’

No, Severus wanted to say. You were wrong about me and you were wrong to deny me and I want what is rightfully mine.

‘You know I am not,’ Severus said eventually.

Lucius stepped back. ‘You're right.’ Again he turned his back on Severus, who, out of the corner of his eye, noted that Lucius was shrugging off his outer robes to reveal a button-down shirt and wool trousers. By the time Severus had resolved not to leave, Lucius had undone his cufflinks and laid them on the bedside table. He looked back to Severus, who finally met his eye.

‘Come here,’ Lucius said, his voice low and controlled, and Severus remembered how it came to be that Lucius had such an impressive command of a certain Unforgiveable: it was simply in his nature to be obeyed.