for the QLFC, Season 6, Round 9 [Beater 2, Tutshill Tornadoes]:
BEATER 2: Bellatrix Lestrange
extra prompts —
(word) rich
(word) harm
WC: 1454
Thank you to Paige, Ca, and Vic who all helped out with this!
A note to the QL mods - as per the rules, it has been 48 hours since we requested a reserve, so therefore we are allowed to write for the position.
. . .
(A/N: I'm really not up to snuff on the stuff that happens at Godric's Hollow, or how the timeline around all of those events lines up. This may not be completely canon-compliant)
.
"I was told that you have a taste for blood."
Bellatrix stares at him — her lord — as her nerves dance beneath her skin. She is a flutter in his presence. His power overwhelms her. She'll do anything for him. She'll drink as much blood as he likes.
Voldemort grins at her, his once beautiful face now dull and sunken, cracked around the edges. But Bellatrix doesn't care about beauty in the traditional sense—she never has and never will. For her, there is still a different kind of beauty in Voldemort, though most can't never recognise it.
She's seen the old pictures of him. She's stared at them for endless hours in feeble candlelight, memorizing every feature, every rise and valley of his face. But nothing has ever entranced her more than his eyes; those piercing, menacing, dark eyes glowing like two burning coals in a field of snow. Despite all that has changed, those eyes are still the same. And now that they're on her, she never wants them to leave.
She's waited for this moment for far too long to turn back now. "Anything for you, my Lord."
And she means it. She'll do anything.
"Show me."
.
This time, the battlefield is a rundown Muggle warehouse on the outskirts of town. All Bellatrix knows is the magic in her veins and the flurries of color bursting around her; all she knows is the harm she intends to cause. The screams of her victims compose a symphony, her wand the conductor. Every body that falls is another domino in her game. Their game. She can already imagine the words of praise her Lord will grace her with, and the thought is enough to make her quiver.
The Aurors outnumber them three to one, but Bellatrix doesn't care. She'll destroy them all. She'll win this battle all on her own if she has to. There is nothing that she will not do for the sake of their cause.
Another faceless Auror runs at her, wand held high, the light at its tip burning almost desperately. Bellatrix whirls away from the curse just as it streaks past, her skirts flaring like a ballerina performing a dance. With barely a thought, she shoots a curse straight back, hitting the Auror in the chest. He collapses on the floor, lifeless and pale. Bellatrix roars with triumphant laughter.
She takes a deep breath and tastes the air around her. It is rich with death—exactly how she likes it.
There is nothing that can stop her. She can feel the adrenaline rushing through her veins, the thrill of battle coursing through her body. She is invincible, unbreakable.
Words fly out of her mouth and light flashes around her. An Auror is bearing down on her, but she takes him out with one lethal strike.
Two down, one to go. She can taste the victory in her mouth, envision her master's gratified face, hear his congratulatory words echoing in her ears.
"You're going down, you —"
Before he finishes his sentence, he's dead. His hatred is still frozen on his face.
Too easy, she thinks smugly. Too easy.
Another battle won. Her Lord will be pleased.
There is something indescribable about Lord Voldemort's touch. His hand is a mere ghost against her arm, but she blooms to life with the feeling of it. The power of the world exists in the tips of his fingers and it ignites her.
It's not love, she knows. Love is far too small a word for the raw emotion that consumes her every time she's in his presence. She wants, craves, needs everything that he is to become a part of her — to meld each atom in their bodies so that they're intertwined for all of eternity.
He looks at her, and she is lost.
"I have something I need you to do," her Lord says. "It's a task that I can trust only you with."
Only you.
Bellatrix smiles. "Anything for you, my Lord."
.
The two people screaming on the floor in front of her are a sad, fragile sight. She can feel them breaking beneath the weight of her Cruciatus curse — their veneers cracking like porcelain dolls. And yet, they won't respond to the one question she needs the answer to.
"Where is your son?" Bellatrix hisses, pouring a stab of power into her curse before she finally releases them.
The man and woman collapse in a puddle of their own blood and vomit. The light in the man's eyes has already started to fade, but the woman looks up at her with clear, piercing hatred. She opens her mouth and blood spills over her bottom lip, dripping down her chin before falling to the soaked ground below.
"We'll never tell you," the woman says.
Bellatrix snarls. She cannot fail her Lord. There are only two children to kill. Two. One for him, and one for her. And he entrusted her with this task. Only her.
She cannot fail.
"You will tell me," Bellatrix says, her voice a cacophony of rage and wild magic. "And if you don't, someone else will. I'll kill everyone you've ever known if I have to!"
The woman laughs. "I'm sure you'll try. You are Voldemort's pet, after all."
Red flashes across Bellatrix's vision like an explosion. Magic roars through the blood in her veins, churning in her stomach before she channels it up her arm and through her wand. "Crucio!"
The man and woman scream, but it's not enough. Bellatrix wants to hear the fabrics of their beings rip apart — she wants to hear the sound of death in their voices.
"Crucio! Crucio! Crucio!"
She pours every ounce of malice and venom she knows into the curses. She'll destroy them if she has to. For him. Always for him. Because she is his sword — she is his instrument of death — just as he is her shield. He protects her. After all of this is over, he'll keep her safe.
The curse continues to flow out of her, fueled by the feeling she has yet to name.
Suddenly, Bellatrix feels something in the earth shift. It hits her so powerfully that she stumbles, and the curse falls. Silence fills the room, broken only by the dull thud of her heartbeat in her ears.
She looks around, instinct driving her into a corner as she searches for an attacker. But no one else is there. The man and the woman have collapsed on the ground, their bodies moving only with their uneven breaths.
But something is wrong...something has changed.
It feels as if the world has tilted upon its axis. Something fundamental has gone missing.
Fear swims to the forefront of Bellatrix's mind as an unthinkable realization dawns. "No," she whispers. "No, it can't be."
In the next moment, she is Apparating. Godric's Hollow, he'd said. She's never been there before, but it doesn't matter. She doesn't need to know the destination when it comes to him. All she needs is that feeling.
She follows it, and lands in a thicket on the edge of a small village.
People are screaming, many of them rushing down the cobbled streets towards the mass of smoke that is hazing the night sky. Bellatrix stares at it, her heart so far up in her throat that it's threatening to choke her.
Wand held tight in her fist, Bellatrix rushes out into the crowd. She runs with them, her feet moving so fast that they're hardly touching the ground. They bring her to a small house...or what used to be a house. The second story is blown clean off, and embers from the Killing Curse are still glowing an angry green.
In the distance, she sees some people emerge from the front door, cradling a crying baby in their arms.
Bellatrix stumbles back and turns away, unable to bear the sight a moment longer. Her heart is beating so fast that she feels it may break free from her chest.
It can't be.
She closes her eyes and reaches out to him — reaches out for the other end of that feeling she's never named. But all that meets her is darkness, cold and still as death.
It can't be.
She pushes harder, every ounce of magic in her veins honed in on this one thing, willing it not to be true. But she finds nothing. No cold touches that make her feel alive in a way that nothing else ever has. No ensnaring eyes that encapsulate the very essence of her soul. There is only emptiness. There is only a world without him.
Bellatrix falls to her knees and screams.
He is gone.