Harry's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean?"
"The Weasleys are blood traitors, but they're still a pureblooded family, do you really think that they didn't know that you should be Lord Potter? Foolish they may be, yes, but even I can't believe they're that ignorant."
"So, Mister Weasley has a seat too?" Harry asked his mind was already running around too much information to take anything else in.
Lucius Malfoy let out a small, short, sarcastic laugh. "Of course not, they're blood traitors, Potter. When they renounced their blood, they renounced the lordship of their family too."
"Why don't you like the Weasleys?" Harry asked in a flash of courage. "It can't just be that they're blood traitors." Lucius gave him a look and sighed. "Catch up, Potter. I have no wish to shout my business up and down the street for all the shoppers on Diagon Alley to hear."
Harry jogged a bit to catch up and stood by Lucius Malfoy's side, matching him stride for stride as best as he could given that the Malfoy lord had seriously long, slender legs. In fact, everything about him was long, slender, and elegant.
"You doubtlessly know that all pureblood families are interrelated." Harry nodded, giving his full attention to Lucius Malfoy as he listened intently.
He'd always been so curious to know why the Malfoys hated the Weasleys and he hadn't felt comfortable asking Mr Weasley and asking Ron only garnered him a furious tirade about 'those evil Slytherin bastards' which left Ron red-faced and him still not understanding the situation. "My great-grandmother Amorette Malfoy married Lord Bilius Weasley, back when they were still a respectable family, if you can imagine such a thing."
"What happened?" Harry asked as he sensed how…sad the man next to him seemed.
"He dragged her down and into the mud and he utterly humiliated and disgraced her. Malfoys…we're not known for our fertility, Potter. Most of us struggle to get two children, why do you think that Narcissa and I only have Draco?"
"I thought that maybe you only wanted the one. Believe me, Draco's more than enough for any parent to handle."
Lucius shook his head. "No, we are infamous for our lone child pregnancies, male or female, it doesn't matter, we are…cursed almost, with low fertility, but Bilius Weasley wanted more children. More than the two that Amorette could give him. The two smart, beautiful children that she almost died to give him. He blamed her for their lack of children, quite rightly, but it was not her fault alone, he knew that Malfoys struggle to conceive, everyone in the pureblood circles knew, but he was enamoured by her beauty and overlooked all of the important qualities."
Harry nodded to show that he was listening and following the story thus far when Lucius looked at him to check.
"Lord Bilius had a secret affair with a muggle woman, completely disgracing Amorette and the Malfoy family; he had four further children with the muggle. Amorette was broken-hearted and she died not long after she finally found out about her husband's affair nearly twelve years later. He had named both his eldest son by Amorette and by the muggle Septimus, almost as if he were replacing Amorette's son with a new one. This disrespect was too much for Amorette to bear and she died from the grief, at which point Bilius Weasley finalised his complete and utter disgrace of her and the Malfoy family by marrying the muggle who had given him four additional children, naming the eldest boy, the second Septimus, his heir and bastardising the two children he'd had with Amorette, leaving them with no family name. They were both quickly taken back into the Malfoy family and given their mother's last name, and they were raised by their lord uncle, Brutus, who named them as his own heirs instead. I am the grandson of the first Septimus and the Malfoy lordship passed down to me."
Lucius actually sighed after telling his story, after telling Harry that he was related to the Weasley family through his grandfather, who despite being named Malfoy had actually been born a Weasley and would have stayed a Weasley if not for Bilius' cruel actions. It was a much closer tie than Harry had ever imagined between the two feuding families. "To carry on our earlier lesson of the politics involved between related houses, so that you might understand it better, the Black family, out of respect for the Malfoy family, actually disowned a daughter when she married a younger Septimus Weasley, the son of the second Septimus born of Bilius. She claimed to love him despite what his grandfather, Bilius, had done to my own family and she refused to give up her husband, choosing him over them. She was disowned and disinherited from the Black family as a result."
Harry scowled. "That's a terrible story. I can understand wanting children, but if you love someone, you deal with it. You don't just go out and have an affair just to have more children and you certainly don't get rid of the older children you've had. That's despicable!"
"I am pleased that you see things from my ancestors' side. But after that, the Malfoy family swore a feud with the Weasley family until such a time that they disowned Bilius Weasley from their family for what he'd done to our family; they have thus far refused to do so, so the feud carries on to this day."
Harry went silent, thinking fast and hard. He was only just realising that things weren't always what he'd thought they were. He'd thought that the Malfoys were just snobby, stuck up pricks who bullied Mr Weasley merely for his lack of money and ambition; he'd had no idea of the story behind what had actually started their feud. He was ignorant and he was beginning to think that maybe Hermione had the right idea; books contained all sorts of information and, as Mr Malfoy led the way into Flourish and Blotts, Harry promised himself that before he went back to Hogwarts, he would do his best to read every single book he bought here today, even if there were twenty of them.
Last Time Harry went silent, thinking fast and hard. He was only just realising that things weren't always what he'd thought they were. He'd thought that the Malfoys were just snobby, stuck up pricks who bullied Mr Weasley merely for his lack of money and ambition; he'd had no idea of the story behind what had actually started their feud. He was ignorant and he was beginning to think that maybe Hermione had the right idea; books contained all sorts of information and, as Mr Malfoy led the way into Flourish and Blotts, Harry promised himself that before he went back to Hogwarts, he would do his best to read every single book he bought here today, even if there were twenty of them.