The sheer beauty transfixed me. She seemed created for the sole purpose of exceeding all other life else, rendering it all aesthetically meagre. Magnificent. Glorious. Terrible. I ripped the pages from the tome I had been reading; when I shut the book, the embossed lettering on the cover seemed to glare at me, grudgingly allowing me that which I had torn from its spine. The cover reflected the light: The Dark Arts and its Practitioners.
Clutching the parchment to my breast I stood, and left the library hurrying to where I was certain there would be no-one to ask awkward questions. Not that they often did; just emitted their naive, foolish comments. Gently I lowered myself behind the stairwell, wincing as the bruises sang their polyphonic discordant melody reminding me of their existence; bringing inflammatory pain about my stance it seemed the bruising's awakening gave way to the puncture wounds to release yet more saline, blood. Damn him. He made me base and bestial, enjoying how cruelly he could taunt me and bait me; goad me into begging.
Looking down at the pages I had stolen, I was torn between tears and mirth. She stood, in a warrior's stance despite the heavy shackles that tied her to the walls of her cell. Her expression twisted between agony and ecstasy; her mouth silently forming words, I can't even fathom. But by Slytherin she was exquisite, looking at her was excruciating for they said she was at his right hand. His most prized lieutenant, skilled as if crafted for the art of torture and war. She gazed out of the picture frame now, beneath heavy, darkly lashed, lids. Black eyes. Eyes that screamed for him, that conveyed more than the shrieks. I wept on the pages, for a cause that was not mine to fight.
Bellatrix Lestrange. It didn't sound true, incorrect almost presumptuous of me to say or even think really that someone's name was wrong, but it doesn't roll around on your palate; Lestrange it's a name that is exuded is sneaks about your lips, tumbling, before spat out. The nameplate beneath the photo states Lestrange though; it's unlikely I could investigate her further, from what I've read this woman is not well liked. I however an enamoured with this cruel, torturous creature, from her picture alone.
Reading on, I wince every time the staircase above me shudders, I pull my feet further into the crevice wherein I perversely gaze at the pages; absorbing their words, committing them and her picture to memory. Tendrils of hair creep across those black orbs and perfectly twisted, slender lips; the tip of a tooth can be seen sharp and biting. The gaunt face makes no concession for the state in which she is photographed. Her cheekbones, angular, leave hollows and shadow on her flesh; hidden slightly on the left side by stray curls. Curls and ringlets that gather and explode across her neck leading the gaze towards the prominent collar bones with the pattern of blue veins over the surface; they skitter about her bust and neck, like nervous moths and dragonflies.
Turning to one of the other pages I had torn and taken from the book, I notice an emboldened sentence: Lestrange (ne black) escaped Azkaban in 1996. This would be what I would write about for class, how the aurors investigated this, and attempted to track her. My neck began burning, the small inked rune behind my ear, he was calling me; distress encompassed my being for that moment as Bellatrix lay at the forefront of my mind, my vision, my thoughts. I know that he is an accomplished leglimens, I could not hide my new adoration from him yet still I hurried down the stone steps to the dungeons. Awaiting the fury I knew was soon to come I was shaking as I entered his classroom; my hands clasped together against the mouth I sure would betray my feelings to Snape.
I feel material grazing the nape of my neck, jagged fingernails running across my collarbones before they began to stroke the wavering tendons. He hissed in my, displeased that I had not healed the previous night's marks; promising that I would regret my fool hardiness. He clasped my shoulders in each hand, pulling them, stretching the muscles across my chest, making my shoulder blades rub edge to edge. I leaned my head backwards gazing up at his strong jaw and nose, his unkempt hair grazing my forehead, I leant to press my lips on his as his hands moved down his nails digging deeper into my skin. As our mouths met he threw me down, before sending a convulsion hex at me. I knelt and begged him to stop the hex whilst my muscles twitched painfully.
Snape's mouth curled up at the edges, sneering his words were emitting slowly and very deliberately: "Bellatrix Black, is that more palatable than Lestrange for you?" his speech was broken by my quiet weeping for his fury "pure though your blood is, she's more likely to spill it than cherish it" I stood, tears sliding down my face I begged knowledge of her. His knuckles passed my cheekbone with a crack, the signet ring he wore tore skeins of flesh from my face; his wand passed equally quickly healing the abrasion before he took his hand to me once again. His abuse continued well into the evening, he had no classes to teach it was the Christmas holidays. Nobody interrupted his tirade least of all I. He carried me to the common room, leaving me there among the majestic emerald trappings. I wept for hours, for the loss of my master and guardian; and for still being unable to distance myself from the twisted feelings I had for the death eater Bellatrix.
I awoke to Christmas morning in agony with no scars or wounds to prove it; other than blood flooded eyes, were the whites had been injured. My lips were punctuated with tooth marks and peeling skin; no more tears would come, just long wracking sobbing emanated from that mouth. As my lips parted they met resistance in form of another's I looked through the red haze of my sight and found it was he. I broke away, shamed and distressed; ready to kneel and beg if he might allow it. He did. I grovelled. I made vows and promises to N'er think of her again; all the while I pretended he were she and at the end of this those thin lips would be made swollen and bloody by my bite; in effort to goad her into wounding me so deeply she might never stop and I might become hers, as object, not equal.
Snape allowed me this, I'm sure he knew the perpetual smirk was indicative to this fact. But still I remained unscathed to an extent; maybe it was his concession to the Christmas season... I could only hope, it would exceed by far any of the other wrapped items I'd been sent. The paper gleamed in the flickering fireside light; it had no concept of caution or restraint the deep green glow of the dungeons could not dull these glimmering gifts. Tearing the paper eagerly despite myself I found little other than books and candy, neither on the darker subjects of my interest. The measured script on the cards proved that they were all similar hand, likely to be a house elf or elves judging by the amount that had been wrapped; I was still looking through my gifts and burning the wrapping paper littered about me when the other students entered the common room.
Sniggering, at my Christmas enthusiasm they sat and began to indulge in the same. Hypocrites. I assumed I'd come to the last of mine when the monochrome paper of phoenix sillhuetes was incinerated; I guess they're right when they say not to assume. A small oblong wrapped in what could only be described as a tapestry of ribbon was addressed to me; the script was small and cursive imprinted directly onto the wrappings. It landed in my lap, as I was not the one to have found it but an older student who was very much curious unto who would send such a shabby package to me. She prompted me to open it quickly, her brother joined with this venture though they quickly fell silent when Draco sat next to me. His face was waxy and tired; there was no indignant, arrogant pointed-ness about him unusually; looking at the parcel on my knee he smoke few words though they made me all the more curious: "it seems, you have received an item from my home; the wrappings match those upon those sent to me"
At this I rose from the leather chairs, my joints creaking and the pain from my wounds causing my to limp slightly, in effort to stem the streams of fire coursing through my nervous system; Malfoy too rose, grasping my elbow pulling me to one of the adjoining rooms; his pile of gifts already levitating towards the boys dorm. We sat on the straight backed chairs, I was still holding the ribbon wrapped gift, imbuing it with my curious stare. Malfoy drew his wand and let the tip draw a sigil across the surface of the package; the ribbons fell open almost instantly he sniggered as they did so. "it appears you have drawn the attention of my aunt" Looking at the jewelled box now unwrapped, I perused its innards finding nothing but fragments of lace and ribbon; in a deep quandary I looked up at Draco questioningly. "Well either that or my mother has taken to mailing her sister's possessions to my acquaintances "He closed the box and told me to study the pewter coils on the lid before asking inane questions. I could make out little, among the studded emeralds embedded within the metal patterns; it occurred to me, that the pattern was familiar like I had seen it before quite often.
"Draco, is this a constellation?" I summoned my astronomy textbook whilst the words escaped from my still chapped, bitten lips. The book landed spine facing upwards, it creaked slightly complaining of the brusque treatment, he did not answer me seemed unwilling to release me from my curiosity; just sitting there smirking reminiscent of the potions master he so hated this year. Whilst I was searching my textbook for that pattern, I noticed that the third greatest jewel was emerald with a character inked on it. I had thought nothing of this earlier but from whence I had found the constellation was Orion it irked me. Why was the third greatest unique? Why not the first? Or conversely the last? I re-read the page on Orion whilst Malfoy hummed some March or waltz, something symphonic anyway; it seemed he thought himself above indie, or rock.
"Named stars in Orion:
Betelgeuse- red supergiant
Rigel- blue supergiant
Bellatrix- blue supergiant [AKA Amazon star or warrior star]"
"Draco, your aunt" I paused whilst he made motions of irritancy "is Bellatrix Lestrange?"
"Black as she prefers to be known; Merlin knows why she's sent you of all people one of her bedroom ornaments" he looked puzzled then leaned in closer to my face, and his voice was closer to a snarl "keep this to yourself, the owner at least, whatever you did don't get caught. I can't afford any mistakes in the vicinity of me this year" Malfoy strode away sending a stunner towards a first year that got in his way.
I too made a move, hiding the box in my cloak; I gingerly stood rubbing my shoulders whilst reverentially holding the box within my mantle. I headed towards the fifth floor, making use of the portrait passageways; for once being greatly appreciative of the cynical portrait that reserved right of way for slytherins and no other. These corridors around the 5th floor were mainly unused, no class was held up here; it was merely an in-between sort of place, for playing host to ornaments and the elusive room of requirement. I had never before felt the need for such secrecy and security and was unsure unto how to summon such a place; I remembered from last year when Umbridge had broken into it so I had assumed it would be easy to find. Only blank walls and dusty bird cages were present; infuriated by my inability to succeed I cursed: "Merlin blind me for the room I wish to home me whilst I wonder refuses to appear" Shooting sparks from my wand in effort to make myself at least known to this room, commands left my mouth venomously as if I had somehow been under the impression you could threaten a room.
Things did not disobey me, never they would not dare; even that which I gave mastery over me would not relinquish their initial trepidation and awe; Snape too he would still even now offer me words of pleasure and compliment among the violence we were both so enamoured with. Eventually after much cursing and demanding I hit on the right choice of words, a pair of hardwood doors appeared with engravings or perhaps carved symbols on its surface. Upon entering the room I was struck by how sumptuous it was, but fragile looking also; as if in its ornate beauty resided the flaws which drew you to gaze at it and therefore allowed any manner of vitriol to destroy the tranquil room so easily. I lay on the floor in front of the fire, ignoring the plush chairs and cushions. Placing the box in front of me, I began to weep.
The room swam in front of my eyes, blurred and disfigured by the invading liquids; misty eyed I blinked too quickly, too much; shuddering as the silent though wracking sobs coursed through my spine and neck. Forcing me to flex the muscles and nerves which had been so gloriously abused the previous night; eventually I closed my eyes to the room preferring to remain unseeing of the forlorn state in which I lay. As my lids eventually flickered, I took note of the fire which seemed so much more mesmerizing through a lens of saline water and sporadic vision. It roared and popped as the wood was devoured, the tongues of flame reaching towards me but never quite reaching. Finished with this session of self indulgence, I took yet another longing, lust filled gaze towards the box; treasuring the knowledge, that she had sent me this. Accomplished leglimens as she was; I had never known someone could have known of such adoration saturated feelings towards themselves by its use.
I opened the box, placing its contents in a graduating pattern, making spirals with the lace before running the skeletal lines with the black ribbon. I wasn't sure what else to do other than savour the sensation of these decorative fabrics running over my scarred hands. My left hand twisted among the ribbons, they followed the slight rivulets in the underside of my palm and fingers; they lay above the scar tissue I pulled them tighter about this limb watching the flesh slowly blue as the blood flow was stemmed. Releasing the ends of the ribbons they fell back onto the lace; letting the blood race back towards my fingertips the scars did not recolor; they remained that pallid peach tone marking the maze on my hands that I once believed so important to add to every night. To wear red conflicted with my house's colours but the black it solidified into did not. Spilling pure blood was not an aim of the dark lord's Snape had said; though I was certain blood sacrifice and vows would not go amiss; as usual he would indulge my poor ideals and provide a cabaret of my blood and begging and his words of venom and compliment.
I stained those lace and ribbons with thine own blood; dare I place them, sullied and desecrated as they were back within that black and pewter casket? I doth; and make no sacrifice to their intricate patterns placing them ceremoniously back within, all the while deluding myself that her deep, endless black eyes would be watching, pleased. That her long fingers would tempt her hair down from its careful style; moulding the flicks and curls around her pale, gaunt face. That the fringe would be vibrating ever so slightly as the long lashes upon heavy lids would blink and flicker. The thin lips whispering words of joy and surprise centred on my reverence of the possession she had discarded or given, carelessly or meaningfully. Shutting the lid on the offshoots of garments, I brushed my fingers across the decoration on the lid, hovering for just a second longer on her jewel. On the third brightest star of Orion.
It shuddered under my caressing fingertips, the jewel not the case, just that one engraved emerald. I plucked at it, dangerously close to removing it altogether; it hinged upwards not broken merely open, revealing a small, well I wasn't sure what it was, a globule of something with another something preserved within. The sphere was clear but slightly tarnished and yellow, a tiny key floated in the middle of it. A key to small for anything other than the pseudo keys they put within dollhouses. I shook it out of its cavern and replaced the hinged jewel before taking it in my hands, off the floor. My mind blanked, all I could see and sense was that tiny sphere and key. It engulfed me entirely; runic patterns flew across it, then across my sightline. The arcane was surrounding me and devouring me. It chewed me, bit me, tore at me, digested me till I was nothing more than atoms; still in the presence of this key sphere.
Things felt less solid, less real unsurprisingly I knew generally I had hands and feet and lips and eyes; but at this chaos level they weren't customarily labelled as such. Things were dizzying, as I felt myself floating and dispersing only to come together once more, then again and again; I felt myself traversing much land though thoughtlessly and senselessly. It appeared I was being summoned over the course of this journey I became more together, not solid but together; no longer just atoms, more a phantom than anything. I closed my eyes as the heights became dizzying, and allowed sleep to overcome me; its kind, gentle hands covering me and shielding me and showing me the nocturnal world of fantasy and utopia.
Laugher awoke me, if one could even call it that. It began strained though melodious, before escalating to a glorious chant, echoing against itself, in harmony with itself though still intrinsically discordant. It ripped through my realm of dreams, it was harrowing those deep rich opulent tones; so disfigured and torn. A score of emotion and dread written atonally never intended to please by the norm. I lay still, pressing my eyes closed so that I might listen for much longer. It swam about my sense, more so than sounds could normally saturate, it appeared I was still not solid, still a phantom. Though now thankfully above chaos level. Red wine came to mind, rich and bitter and acidic; yet so deep and smooth and easily swallowed, dizzying and confusing like pain upon pleasure. I prayed that whatever had amused this creature so much would not cease for the laughter became my world.
I could feel things buffeting me, I open my eyes curiously; patches of colour were flinging themselves all around me and the figure who emitted them; I could see neither they nor myself for these colourful things. They were clambering all over me, the room, the furniture; waltzing around her and I uncontrollably. I could see the individual sounds vibrations holding them together: neither I nor the colour was fully solid or totally atomised. As the colour dispersed so did my sense; the laughter had absorbed some of the sentience of my person; worriedly I shook, I couldn't help it, fear of being stuck like this overcame me. Became imbued in my essence. Fear of becoming a shell. Comatose. Soulless. Suddenly dementors seemed the cruellest beings of this plain of existence; the thought of these turned into a though of Bellatrix, how she escaped them; the bravery and faith possessed by her astounding, comforting. The laughing figure turned, I sensed the shift in the air for I could not see or hear.
The particles of the air dispersed and shuddered, racing each other away from my presence and the one slowly stepping towards me. I felt the inhalations and exhalations of their breath, it kissed my cheeks and neck so gently; both were acrid though tainted by age and trauma. I revelled in it. It pleased me so greatly, to feel the contrast in even the smallest most usual of actions. This, space came towards me, without sight I have no other method of description than "space". For all I could sense was rift between the air particles, the schism, a tear. It embraced me, curled around me absorbed me. I enjoyed it, being taken with such disregard; in my utter ecstasy I dropped the sphere, well not so much dropped as exuded from the core of my being for I had no hands with which to handle or hold. With the release of the sphere the figure grew more corporeal, I reclaimed my senses, gradually, gratefully, appreciatively.
Smell:
Musk fills the room, invades every crevice though on occasion seems tainted by burning and herbs. As if candles are melting under intense heat and combustion, slowly liquefying and releasing their chemical, jasmine scents. The oiled wick is shaking causing the flame to flicker; spreading its fragrance about us yet still that dreadful, pleasurable musk overpowers it all.
Taste:
I can taste my blood, my evaporation and solidifying has done little to ease the tears on my lips and inner mouth. Its metallic tang is drowned out by its overriding vanilla menthol tangs. Unusual maybe. But delightful and grotesque like a bleeding wound or a clean puncture in the flesh. Salt invades my nose and mouth, the ripped lips open, part to allow it in; I assume its tears yet again, tempting me to gag or weep further.
Touch:
Things are clutching me, tightly, clawing, viciously. Ecstatic I curl towards the violence; remembering Snape, tearing at my flesh they soak their fingertips in my blood I can feel it silky and probing on my flesh.
Balance:
It escapes me entirely, falling away from them; I land, splayed and vulnerable. Closing my eyes yet again to steady the shimmering, revolving images.
Temperature:
My skin is burning for lust and fear and pain. The three most highly revered things I find, provide chills of ice and death, then the flaming tongues of joyousness and faith.
Hearing:
The laughter has quieted to a mere echo, just the room retelling the most recent of events. Vibrations reach my ears but do not morph into some delightful, amiable melody. I can hear the tear of my skin and the small moist noises as the remnants of Snape's, spell heal and heal once more; the hiss of flowing blood and ragged breathing. I can tell not whether it comes from I or that figure which has now rejected the allure of tearing at me.
Pain:
Runs through me and stops. Again it races then stops. It battles and fights and tears and rips then stops. It is healed so often by the leftovers of a spell I remember dear Serverus applying to me. It breaks eventually allowing this most revered, and feared of things to take me as victim and watch me writhe in its cruel, gentle clutches.
Sight:
It is she. Grand and majestic. Her spine arched into the warrior's proud stance, pale contours of skeletal slenderness contort as she too writhes for reason unknown. The gentle, meek ankles twisting at angles, almost feline, the tendons standing out like those along her wrists which pulse as her hands running against me, ripping and scratching. Thin lips pursed with delight at the new plaything, appeared in front of her; they like mine are bleeding. The heavily lidded eyes flutter long, thick eyelashes which reflect the light making them change colours like petrol and fuel. The hollows of my hip bones, peeking out of the mantle I wrapped around my shirt and skirt like a sarong. The boned corset so tightly cinched around the waist I long to touch and stroke; the ribbons flow out behind her, as does the bustle of netting which is ripping as she indulges in the rampage of harm and laughter.
The shoulders rise and fall as does her cleavage and chest, the corset gives way not, restricting though detracting nothing. The low neckline is decorated with beribboned serpents, the skin, the breasts above are ironically apple white; tempting as tradition dictates. A labyrinth of blue veins transgress the portraits ideal of pure white for theses aquamarine serpentine veins play about all visible flesh. I long to follow their trails with fingertip and to taste the burgundy within yet I cannot move for I am transfixed by every movement of the figure stood in front of my grateful, unworthy self.
Her hair exceeds the laws of gravity, it is everywhere about her, curling around tender ear lobes and collar bone. Lying in great ringlets in the air, floating almost, flying almost, independent almost. It taunts me, the meeker thinner curls, of platinum and ash among ebony, sit at her temple, her forehead and nape of neck. They soften her. They reach as far as any other yet unique in their lighter colour; blessed be they who made it this way like the lace among black ribbons I had received earlier. It trapped ribbons did the mane of hair she wore like a crown, it had captured ribbons, and flowers, they turned about themselves as they fell to the ground when she had rocked her head back and forth, stretching her neck like a wolf being readied for a hunt. Her white throat standing out against the plains of blue veined flesh that seemed translucent rather than coloured.
Like bone her face stared stark and melancholy as she retired from the rage from the writhing and cursing. Laugher returned for no time at all, a note as if to promise more, Charcoal ran down those carved cheekbones, makeup staining skin impossibly black. As it dried leaving slight streaks of grey and ash and black along the flesh I vowed I would cleanse the unnatural trails of discolour. The taint would not reside for long, for I poor as I am, forlorn and pathetic as my form is; would beg its leave and exile those tears and black tracks. I could see her long fingered hands reach for me; clutching my jawbone, forcing me to look into those eyes.
Such black, eyes; impossibly deep, unequivocally full of malice and deviousness; I quailed and trembled, and saw the smirk the snigger she held at my expense. I couldn't blink or weep just stare into those eyes for as long as she would allow me, they held my dreams. Her wand flickered in the corner of my vision, though her mouth made no movement for speech; it occurred to me leglimency. I was being read as I gazed like a caught fox at the metal jaws of the trap; though no will to escape did I retain, only for her to be pleased with what she found in that mind of mine, and to allow me to serve and please.
Gently, she dropped my jaw. My lowered sightline left me looking at her throat. The hollows I longed to touch and know pulsed as she spoke:
"children long for the dark when it is what they are forbidden, silly, itty bitty children that don't know better" her voice was mocking, lisping and sobbing a parody of mine "they find something pwitty and wuvley and want it. They cry if they don't gets what they want" she paused, looking at me; I was still gazing at the pale flesh now shuddering with rage and disconcert. Carrying on her tirade of mocking me "they'll cry if get it too"
I stood up with my head bowed, shaking as I did so; but not weeping or crying or sobbing. No tear slithered down my cheeks leaving stains as those that lay upon hers. I knelt, still bearing my head low:
"might I gaze upon you? Upon the shadows of the cheekbones? The caverns of the neck bearing such tense, pulsing tendons?" she laughed, but made not answer, faltering I stood back up; arching my back, to feel the strain on unbalanced tendons and vertebrae. She slapped me, on my left cheek; it seemed something everybody did, though she drew no blood and left no red mark only a slight white imprint of her ring.
Looking at her, intently studying that which I had requested; still smarting from her deliberate violence so different to the tirade she had earlier released. I dared not to touch her, only to look and imagine. She flinched as if injured then began to smile ecstatically, her pupils dilating and lips quivering, parting to utter small words. "The dark lord" she disapperated leaving me stood, stupidly still looking where she once was. At this I wept, just as she had said; the taunt brought forth the babe within, the abrasive words do still smart most painfully. I let my dampened sight meander about the room; a bedroom, hers perhaps.
I believe I stood there in my dismay, struck dumb by her sudden departure for a great length of time; just staring at the wallpaper its intricate design half faded with age; covered in places by thickly framed mirrors. Before I had the chance to probe further than the dressing table, something a soporific effect, dreadfully so. I saw another box on her table, similar to the one I had received upon opening it a music was released that had such deep effects on the body, the heaviness of one's limbs became so much to bear, the straining to keep one's eyes open whilst they stung and moistened under such heavy lids that brought welcome rest.
The dreams were not my own, more a collection of all those I have had, they swung in front of my visions, disfigured by reminiscence no longer as vibrant and brilliant as they once may have been. Voices hurried about me, I could make out little but the shrill worried calls "don't forget your pet, it must be fed, and exercised. You have to clean and play with it as well" their voice always broke by the end of that sentiment, with mirth or sadness I could not tell in this realm of dreams. The colours begat yet more colour, colour that stemmed from no prism or spectrum. Colour that enhanced and exacerbated, not that which only claimed for itself. My awaking was rude and abrupt. Water had crept towards me, silently, sneakily, treacherously before leaping upon my forlorn form, denying me wondrous sleep.
I awoke, submerged, my bodily heat being conducted away by porcelain and cold water. I could feel the blood pulsing in my outer regions objecting so strongly to the temperature drop, as my skin number the blood pulse became all the more prominent, my fingernails and toe nails seems ungainly like they shouldn't be there. My piercings grew so cold they seemed to burn me as they lay embedded within the flesh of my ear. My hair was saturated and clutching at my neck and face, the water a glistening mask and lens, my lips mouthing aimlessly beneath the water. I could breath easily enough; I didn't wonder how, it seemed true the situation it had undertones and overtones of truth and reality. The harsh lights and cold backed this up. Sitting up, slightly confused at my nakedness, worried about who had caused such and then placed me in a sumptuous but nonetheless unknown bathroom.
The tiled floor was polished to an almost reflective calibre; each water droplet I had spewed in my sitting up was clearly visible. The noise of showering was loud and echoing in this room, its acoustics were haunting. The marble allowed sound vibrations to bounce from wall to wall, ornament to ornament deteriorating by only the slightest of margins. I rose, searching for a towel, or gown or anything really within which I could hide. There was nothing I could use. Opposite me there were two doors, both dark woods with pewter, ornate handles. One door had a key in it, the other had none but I assume its key was the one hanging from the mirror adjacent. I took the hanging key, flinching as it conducted yet more heat away from my blue toned body; I had hopes that since the door's key was in my hand nobody would be in the room and I could think things over, establish what exactly had been happening. The tumblers gave way to the key easily, allowing my entrance to be simple and unopposed. Looking in, it appeared the showering noises had come from in here.
The shower had no curtain for it was basically a shower head on the ceiling of a tiled, hollow cube. Nobody stood within as I had guessed; stepping tentatively into the room I dropped the key, and turned the shower head off. Looking back at the key I saw that despite the low volume clatter it had made after having been dropped it had done great damage, the tile it landed on had shattered; a single flaw in this great, uniform room. Seeing this vandalism I had perpetrated, accidentally or not it could have been avoided yet I did not avoid it. Weeping yet again, I descended to the floor, damp from the shower and now my tears and own bodily moistness as I had not yet dried from the submergence in frigid water.
The shattered tile had spread small fragments across the floor, they seemed magnetised towards my hands, towards the cavernous wastes of scar tissue on my palms and forearms; my fingers searched for these fragments, as if finding them would solve anything. I didn't want to know what had happened today, I wanted to bleed and cry and empty myself, I longed to be held again, to be taken control of and have my mind stolen from me by succubus or incubus. Bellatrix, the warrior star she could; the book said she destroyed everything in her games with the prey she hunted. Slamming my wrists against the fragments they became embedded as did my certainty that I did not need to understand only to serve and allow them to hunt me. I lay there, feeling the hollow space below my body, was the floor became ceiling, then space, then floor again, and again and again and again. All before the cellar could be sense were the chill rose and became cumbersome the more it rose, more clumsy and slovenly searching for an easy target. I could sense the thick smog of cold find me, wrap itself around me, then flee from me as the door was opened then slammed shut. Yet more tiles shattered as stilettos were thrust into them, then discarded and thrown to the ground. Great lengths of silk and lace followed, fraying gloves and bustle.