Written for a challenge on xoxLewrahxox's forum.
Prompt: Bella's childhood love story
Enjoy!
Sisterly Love
Somewhere in the great house, a clock struck noon.
"Dromeda, come on! Mother's going to –oh, shoot, hide! No, not there, out here!" Bellatrix roughly pulled her sister out from behind a rich green tapestry and through the magnificent double doors that guarded the entrance to the Black family estate, just as Druella Black's footsteps echoed down the hard stone steps. Outside, a wild laugh escaped Bella as she dashed across the immaculately cut lawn. Even Andromeda chirped a small, sharp giggle.
"Bella, where are we going?"
"Anywhere! We're free! Free!" Bella shouted, as though daring someone to find them, to try and force them back into the stuffy living room to endure another lecture or suffer through etiquette lessons.
"But – but won't Mother be angry?"
"She might be." Bellatrix's eyes glittered mischievously, and she looked absolutely delighted at the possibility. "But, really, what can that hag do? We're almost adults. I mean, I will be starting at Hogwarts next year, for Merlin's sake!"
Andromeda looked thoroughly disheartened at this fact.
"Oh yeah – I had forgotten…"
"Never mind that," Bella said quickly, foreseeing a temper-tantrum in the near future. "I want to show you this clearing that I found last week. I think it's this way."
She broke into an easy gait towards the edge of the woods that bordered the estate. Andromeda, now laughing again, sprinted to keep up, disappearing beyond the tree line just as her mother poked her head out the door. But by that time, the two girls were almost a hundred feet into the foliage, and her efforts to reclaim her children from their reckless natures having been thwarted, Druella Black slammed the ornate wooden doors and resigned herself to terrorizing the rest of the household.
"Bella, are you sure this is the right way? I think we passed this tree already."
"No, don't be stupid, that was a different tree."
"No, look, I remember those pretty yellow flowers. We're lost!"
"We are not lost!" Bellatrix snarled. "I know how to get there, ok? Maybe if you did a little less whining, we would get there faster!"
A branch snapped on the girls' immediate right. With the reflexes of one who regularly prepares for an attack, Bellatrix clamped a hand over her sister's mouth and dragged her behind a tree. As Bellatrix carefully removed her hand, she mouthed, "Climb!"
Immediately, she launched herself into the tree, quickly scrambling away from the voices below that seemed to be getting closer.
"I swear, over here, I saw two little girls!"
"Come off it! Who would let their kids wander this far into the woods?"
The voices were almost directly underneath Bellatrix's nimble hands and feet. She glanced back down to check Andromeda's progress. To her horror, she saw Andromeda struggling to boost herself onto the first few branches. Desperately, she shinnied down the trunk towards her sister, but too late. Two men came into view, both in their mid-30s. One had a scar marring the entire left side of his face. The other seemed nervous, falling back behind the sauntering step of the first. Bellatrix quickly hid herself among the leaves and fingered the small black dagger that was her constant companion. She still remembered the day her father had given it to her. She had been eight at the time. One of the house-elves had delivered the message that her father wanted to speak to her in his study. Nervously, she had slunk up the stairs and cracked open the heavy door. She had thought he was going to yell at her for the previous day's adventures in the attic. But instead, he handed her the dagger, waving down her apologies with one of his enormous hands and a booming laugh.
"No, no, don't apologize. I was the same way when I was a boy. Exploring everything. Right nuisance I made of myself, too. But one day, you'll get yourself into a bad situation that you'll need to get out of. This is to be used only to protect yourself or your sisters, understand?" She had nodded solemnly, holding the knife reverently.
She thought that this situation would qualify as "bad".
The voices of the men broke her train of thought. Furious at missing part of the conversation, she returned to watching the scene that was unfolding below her.
"—got to be at least 500 Galleons. I bet she lives at that fancy manor a couple of miles from here," the man with the scar was saying.
Both men looked greedily at Andromeda.
"But she is a pretty young thing, seems a waste…." Scarface said slowly. Then, abruptly, he commanded, "Go over and get our bags."
"But I can just Summon them," the second man said, confused.
"I said go!" the other replied harshly, and his partner left, a grim look of comprehension on his face.
As soon as his accomplice was out of sight, the first man grabbed Andromeda roughly, leering.
"Don't worry, girlie, you won't remember any –" But the rest of his words were lost as a rock exploded with the force of Bellatrix's anger, searing his feet and legs and sending Andromeda flying backwards.
"Andy, run!" Bella screamed, and threw herself out of the tree, landing directly on top of the man. They both tumbled to the ground, and Bellatrix felt a sharp pain in her ankle. With a strangled cry, he tried to push Bellatrix off, but she was faster. Fumbling in her pocket, her desperate fingers found what they were searching for.
Two hours later, a search party found the girls, Andromeda supporting her sister, who was limping heavily. A team had already found Henry Durpish, a petty thief on the run from the Ministry, sprawled out on the forest floor a mile away, his glassy eyes staring, unseeing, into the thick canopy of leaves. The red smile that had been carved across his throat mirrored Bellatrix's own as she walked the last steps toward safety, with the support of her best friend.