A Second Channe Through Time

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Page count: 14

Ministry of Magic - Tuesday 26th January 1982

Hermione and Sirius stepped out of the lift and made their way toward the Minister's office, their footsteps soft but purposeful against the polished floors. When the door opened, they were greeted not only by Minister Bagnold and Kingsley but by Lucius Malfoy himself.

Hermione blinked.

He looked nothing like the collapsed, half-starved shell she'd found chained to a chair in Azkaban.

He stood tall. Proud. Composed. His pale hair was clean and tied back neatly. His skin—though still a touch gaunt—looked alive rather than ghost-grey. His posture was straight, shoulders squared, eyes steady and sharp. He wore immaculate tailored robes of deep emerald and black, the Malfoy crest stitched subtly but unmistakably at the collar.

He looked like a man reclaiming his identity.

Lucius inclined his head politely.

"Miss Granger. Lord Black."

"Lord Malfoy," Hermione greeted, her lips twitching into a warm smile. "It's good to see you looking more like yourself."

Lucius dipped his head slightly. "I owe that in part to you."

Sirius snorted. "She does that to all of us."

Hermione elbowed him lightly when he slotted his arm around her shoulders, and Minister Bagnold cleared her throat with pointed amusement.

Pleasantries exchanged, papers signed, wands returned, and freedom officially granted—the group moved out of the Minister's office.

Behind them, Kingsley and two Aurors formed a subtle protective formation. Not because Lucius needed guarding—but because the Ministry knew better than to risk a public misunderstanding on the day they were releasing a high-profile prisoner.

They stepped into the lift, descending toward the atrium. The closer they got, the more Hermione felt tension prickle in the air.

People always gawked. But this? This was going to be chaos.

The lift doors slid open.

Hermione was proven immediately, spectacularly right.

The entire atrium froze.

Hundreds of witches and wizards—in robes, in suits, in groups—stopped mid-step, mid-conversation, mid-spellwork. Quills dropped. A memo-bird flew into a pillar. A clerk gasped so sharply he swallowed his quill.

Every eye locked onto their group.

More specifically—

Lucius Malfoy, cleaned, restored, and walking out of the Minister's office beside Sirius Black.

The silence was suffocating.

Hermione kept her face perfectly neutral. Sirius raised an unimpressed brow. Kingsley's expression was carved from stone.

Lucius? He walked with the poise of a man who knew very well half the room expected him to be a monster—and the other half couldn't fathom why he wasn't still rotting in Azkaban.

But he kept his chin up, shoulders squared, and his steps light and even.

They didn't speak. None of them broke formation. They simply walked.

Past the fountain. Past the rows of shocked employees. Past the whispering groups who didn't even try to appear subtle. Hermione could hear everything with her sharpened senses: