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Disclaimer: I do not own, nor do I wish to possess, Voldemort’s eerie appendages. Nor do I claim Lucius’ thoughts, such as they are.

Lucius Malfoy did not excel at Occlumency. This had not bothered him for most of his life. He had other talents in a smattering of the subjects taught at Hogwarts and in a few that were seldom mentioned within those ancient walls. Above all, he was good at scheming, bargaining, and reasoning.

But the schemes were not his here; the only bargain that would interest the Dark Lord involved that which Lucius could not bear to part with, and… reasoning only works in the presence of reason.

It was, unfortunately, quite late in the game to realize this.

So, as Lucius knelt with the rest—in scarcely less mortal peril than a Muggleborn would be should one have the misfortune to be brought to this meeting—he kept to the here and now. He tried not to think, per se; instead, he focused his eyes on the ice-white, dead-looking hands that lay in ghastly contrast against the inky robes of his Master.

Said Master loved to flex and grip the air with those hands, gesticulating as if he were actually proud of the crabbed, knobby joints and slithering tendons in their shroud of improvised flesh. The left hand took center stage, splayed to emphasize some point or another, the thumb jutting awkwardly above it. It was a grotesque parody of a digit: so narrow-waisted as to seem connected to the hand by a mere ligament, widening abruptly at the knuckle, only to taper again into a pointed claw of a nail. Like its owner, it was less human than thing—a mushroom wobbling on its pale substrate, an oddity ripped from the pages of 1,000 Magical Herbs and Fungi.

Lucius blanked his mind as best he could when the red eyes turned on him again. At least the gist of Lucius’ musings would serve him well, should any remnant be visible in his thoughts.

The Dark Lord liked it when his servants were aware of whose thumb they were under.

FIN

Note: The term ‘sinister’ as used in the title is a term from Heraldry. It refers to the left side of a shield (the left of the presumed bearer, not the viewer). Through negative associations with the left hand, ‘sinister’ eventually took on its modern meaning of ‘evil.’