Happy Christmas, Family Malfoy

Happy Christmas, Family Malfoy

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Chapter 1

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The happy laughter of many children echoed through the halls and chambers of the Malfoy Manor. The tall blond man walking through the corridor didn't bat an eyelid as he saw two children running past him, laughing madly. As they didn't seem to be up to no good, there was no reason to stop them. Neither did he try to stop the even smaller child hurrying after the two boys on her two little feet, giggling as she fell over. Not pouring a tear over her fall, she pushed herself back to her feet and trotted off, although not without giving him an adorable smile that still lacked teeth, and a delighted call of, "Fathew!"

The next child he came across, however, would not be ignored that easily. The little boy wrapped his short arms around the man's legs, hugging him tightly. "Father!" he exclaimed. "When will Mariah come home? And when will it be Christmas? I want them both already, now!"

"Patience, Marius," chuckled the tall wizard as he picked up his middle son. "Mariah will come home from Hogwarts eventually, and after that, it'll also be Christmas. You still have to wait over a month, though." Placing a gentle kiss on top of the boy's darkhaired head, he then asked, "Do you know where Dad is?"

"Dad left just a while ago," said another boy, who just had come to sight around the corner. "He said he had some business to attend to in the castle of Hogwarts, and that he will be back by dinner."

Lucius smirked slightly at his eldest son's manner of speech. Janus had always been that way. Even when he'd been just a little baby, he'd always said, "Dad," right away, never "Da" or "Dada" like their other children. Other than his "fun talk," like little Sirius called it, Janus was also showing signs of being even worse a bookworm than his carrier, whom he was a spitting image of.

As soon as he thought more about Janus's words, however, Lucius frowned. "Did he say what kind of business he has there?" he asked. For anything he knew, his husband should have had nothing to do at the school. However, he could indeed think of a possible reason -- and if it was true, he was in for it.

"No, he didn't," Janus replied. "Maybe he's sick, though. I recall him talking about Madam Pomfrey."

Now, Lucius sighed. There was only one occasion in which Severus would go to see Poppy Pomfrey. And, if his doubts were confirmed this time, too, he might actually fulfill his threat and castrate Lucius. After all, if the result was positive, it would be the ninth time one of them got pregnant. Considering that Lucius had been pregnant only once, and even then he'd had almost no complications at all, nor had he experienced any of the other problems that always bothered Severus during his own pregnancies, it was not a miracle if the darkhaired wizard was quite fed up with it all.

"Thank you, Janus," he said, sighing a bit as he put Marius back down to the floor. "Now, run along, you two. I have to check that Juliah is being properly cared for." The two boys both nodded, then ran off -- well, Janus only walked with a book tucked under his arm, but then again, he'd never been as wild as the majority of his sisters and brothers. Really, they were worse than a hurricane at times.

Lucius sighed and shook his head. It wasn't that he didn't love each and every one of his children, no, he wouldn't have exchanged them for anything. However, he did think that ten kids were quite enough -- two of their eight pregnancies had produced a set of twins. Well, they had originally thought that three would be quite enough, but their efforts had been for naught when they'd tried to stop more children from coming. Finally, when everything else had failed, they'd resigned to the fact that their family was bigger than even the Weasleys'. At least they could support their huge family with no problems at all.

However, even though all their children were certainly wanted and heartily welcomed, it didn't mean that they had all been originally wished for. In fact, it had been rather the opposite. When Severus had fallen pregnant for the fourth time despite the contraception charms they'd used, Lucius had secretly hoped that he would just miscarry the child. It wasn't like he had hoped for his child's death, no. During his third pregnancy, however, Severus'd had a lot of complications. True, carrying Mariah and Hannah hadn't been easy on him, either, but with Janus, it had been many times worse. Lucius had simply considered losing an unborn child less grave than losing both the child and his beloved husband. When all had been over and Draconah and Lucius, their first set of twins, had been born safely and without further complications, Lucius had been relieved. That was, until Severus had fallen pregnant again.

True enough, wizards could get pregnant just as well as witches. Nothing wrong with that. However, Severus's body was somehow different from that of most wizards, and was unfitted for pregnancy. Unfortunately, Severus was also especially fertile. Like they'd noticed, nothing short of sterilization could stop him from becoming pregnant, and Lucius wasn't sure if even that would work, knowing his husband.

It was really unfair, though. Malfoys, who had certainly enough children, got more and more of them despite their attempts to the opposite. Meanwhile, Lupins only had young Keith, even though they certainly wouldn't have minded many more. Now, when Mariah and Keith had started Hogwarts, Lucius and Severus had still nine other children to look after, but Remus and Sirius were left with a painfully empty house. Sure, there was no way Lucius could have given up any of his dear children, but at times he couldn't help thinking that it might have been better if their friends had got some of the kids instead of them. Those children would have been welcomed with even more love and care than theirs, if possible.

But that wasn't the case. In reality, the Lupins were destined to have only one child, while the Malfoys could do nothing to stop their already enormous herd from growing even further.

Well, that couldn't be helped. Thus, it was no use to spend all his time thinking about it.

No, he had to concentrate on thinking about how he could stay alive if Severus indeed was pregnant.

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