The Unwanted Malfoy Heiress

Two: The Assignment

Eleazar Fig

Two Days Before Start Of Term...

The letter from Matilda Weasley sat there on a cluttered desk he had no time to clean like the rest of his office. Miriam had been the cleaner of their long marriage together, and she had often bemoaned the sad state of affairs of being bonded to such a pack rat. In the letter, Matilda expressed her regret in requesting that Eleazar had to be the one to play the mentor role to the new transfer student. She also mentioned that they were both recently bereaved at this time and so would perhaps work together with this shared commonality between them.

Eleazar tried to insist that Aesop Sharp would be a better fit since he had been an auror of some note before an injury forced him into teaching instead. Matilda had personally agreed but wrote that orders were orders and the Headmaster would make their lives more difficult than they already would be if the transfer student did not receive the treatment due to her now privileged status of being the Malfoy heiress. Hence, he reluctantly agreed to take on this thankless task despite wishing to disappear into his travels.

Eleazar stood outside the posh French flat that was the Rosier residence in Paris. He read over Anastasia Malfoy's school transfer files: Her first two school years had been spent in Ilvermorny in America, and these last two in Beauxbatons Academy. Her grades had been exemplary, save for her reckless streak in that she loved sneaking into places she wasn't supposed to go at night after curfew. There were no sports on her transfer papers, but her professors either admired her fierce drive to succeed or found her over preparedness tiring in that she tended to have a know it all attitude at times.

He personally could not see why her very family did not want to keep their own daughter close, especially since they just lost their son. But perhaps he only felt that because Miriam and him tried years for children, only to be told by the mediwitches at St. Mungos that Miriam was unable to have them just before she reached menopause.

He paused on the landing and had a brief cowardly thought to turn around and find the nearest alley to apparate to Hogsmeade. He scowled and chided himself for that and rang the doorbell. To his surprise, it was an elderly muggle Butler who answered the door, not a house elf. He had salt and pepper hair, colorless gray eyes, and seemed to be thin to the point of being gaunt.

The muggle scrutinized him and found his appearance lacking in some way. "Good morning, Mr?"

"Fig, Eleazar Fig. I am the professor charged with escorting Miss Malfoy to Hogwarts."

Eleazar produced his calling card. He found it to be a ridiculous custom, but these were very high society people, and he had to curb his manners as Miriam would have chided. Not for the first time, he wished that his wife had been the one to collect the witch, not him.

The Butler escorted him into the foyer, where he went upstairs to where Miss Rosier apparently was located. He returned five minutes later and announced, "Madame Rosier will see you for morning tea with Miss Malfoy. This way, please."

He followed the muggle to a more open air room, a solarium, and it gave the otherwise stuffy feminine flat a much more airy ambiance. Marietta Rosier was precisely how Matilda Weasley described her: tall, slender, dark brown hair often tied to submission into tight buns, with a rather charming but austere face. She had been quite beautiful when she was younger but was now aging gracefully.

The girl seated beside her was dressed in a simple coat and long skirt, not a wrinkle in place, nor the lack of poise in most teenage magical children. She had wavy light blonde hair typical of a Malfoy, but with blue gray eyes that missed very little in what she observed. She eyed him with interest but did not greet him at first, as per her etiquette training.

Her aunt spoke to her in French, and the Malfoy girl smiled and laughed before composing herself. Eleazar sat down at the farthest end of the table, and the serving maids began serving them.

"My Niece asked if Hogwarts was much different in how students are sorted," Miss Rosier informed him. "I said that you Brits never do things by halves."

Eleazar buttered his crumpet, grinning, "Ah, the sorting. Yes, well, you might find it a crude bit of business, Miss Malfoy, compared to your previous schools."

"Obviously," the girl commented in English for the first time. "In Beauxbatons, you are sorted upon first year academic merit, not personality. Ilvermorny was quite...dramatic, as a statue carved of each House animal chooses you based on the Legilimency abilities it is enchanted with. If you possess attributes of multiple Houses, you are given a first and only choice to be sorted into where you feel you belong. All rather gauche and American, but there it is. I am intrigued as to how Hogwarts does it. My Aunt was not forthcoming with the details as if it were some carefully guarded secret."

He understood the joke now and chuckled, "Ah, yes, well, students are sorted the first night they arrive in the castle and a hat enchanted with Legilimency is placed upon the student's head. The hat takes the student's choice into consideration, but in the end, the hat decides where the student shall reside for the whole of their educational career."

Miss Malfoy nodded. "I see. And what if in a year or two, the student no longer fits in with their school House?"

Eleazar winced at that. "I suppose that is something the student has to live with until graduation."

"Did you know my brother?"
"Not well, I'm afraid."
"Hmm. What do you teach?"
"Ancient Runes and Symbology."
"Ah. I prefer Charms and Dark Arts."

Miss Rosier gasped, "Ana, please! It is impolite to speak of the Dark Arts so familiarly."

She sighed, "I meant the intellectual applications of said spells, Aunt Mar. Of course, only training dummies get tortured or blasted with the Reductor Curse, for example."

"You speak out of turn, young lady."

"Was I? I thought it was an intellectual discussion on magic itself."

Eleazar cleared his throat. "If I may be so bold, Madam, but there is nothing wrong with debating things civilly."

Miss Rosier glared at him a bit before composing herself. "Yes, of course, Monsieur. Now then, let us continue our tea service, and you two can be on your way to London."

"That is agreeable to me as well."

The tea service continued on until it was time to leave. Eleazar watched Miss Malfoy and her aunt exchange a tender hug and some words before his charge turned to him.

"Shall we go, professor?"
"Yes, I think it is time."

Just as Miss Rosier went inside the flat, and before they entered their thestral drawn stage coach, his best friend from the Ministry of Magic George Osric apparated right into their midst....