Half past seven, a very reasonable time to put a child to bed one would say, never a time a child would like to go to sleep. Not without the necessary preamble. Isabella had never been able to sleep without a bedtime story and her mother was always one to oblige, a mother was made to indulge her child.
"Mummy, tell the one about the Nargles!" Isabella squealed excitably.
"What do we say when we want something, Izzy?" The mother crowed, her voice not quite able to chide the little girl in the way she knew she should; too soft, too loving to be a telling off.
The girl giggled, knowing she would get her demand as she often did wherever her mother was concerned, "Please." She said, earning a proud grin from her mother.
The woman chuckled fondly, a noise you would not expect from someone usually so fierce; though whenever she was around her daughter it was impossible to imagine who she really was and what she was capable of. "Good." She praised, nothing ever pleased a mother more so than hearing an offspring be polite. "Now we'll begin. One day a curious little girl, named Izzy, went on her merry way to her favourite garden where she suddenly-"
"BELLATRIX!" The girl's father shouted from downstairs. "Here. Now!"
Her mother looked worried, there was something in her father's voice that scared them both; it was more than anger, more than fear. Isabella could not put her finger on just what it was, but it was not something she would ever wish to hear. Her father could be mean at times. Times when he thought Isabella were sleeping. Times when he thought he was alone with his wife. It was strange for his tone to be quite so harsh when Isabella was still known to be awake.
"In a minute, I'm just tucking Izzy in." Her mother hedged, evidently she did not want to know what was so urgent. Isabella much preferred it when her father worked away, that we he could not make her mother quite so sad. The only times her mother ever cried were when her father was due home.
"The girl's old enough to go to bed without a story by now!" Her father replied, he had always hated stories and believed that by six years of age a child should not need them to be able to sleep. Isabella knew already she would have to do without. It was not that it helped her sleep, it was more that it allowed her and her mother to be alone together. The stories were just an added benefit for her mother told the most fantastic tales.
The mother sighed, Isabella's father could turn nasty very easily - they both knew that. "I'll tell you two new stories tomorrow, I promise." She vowed, a crease forming at her brow. "Goodnight, Izzy." She placed her lips to her daughter's head.
Isabella accepted her mother's kiss to her forehead, knowing that her mother would stay true to her promise as she always had. "Night, mummy." She half-sulked.
He mother reluctantly stood before striding to the door. Isabella knew her mother should not leave him waiting. He hated waiting. Waiting for even the smallest thing could put him in a mood.
"Bellatrix!" Came another blast from the bottom of the stairs.
She watched as her mother rolled her eyes, "I love you, sweetheart." He mother voiced before departing.
Below all that could be heard were harsh words only half-whispered. Usually her father would at least attempt to keep the conversation unheard, but this time she could hear almost every other word. She knew this would be no ordinary falling out about the price of robes or the quality of the housework. This one would be big. The biggest one yet. Even at six years old, she could sense that.
Silently, Isabella crept out of bed and through the still open bedroom door, stopping at the top of the stairs where it was still dark enough for her to go unseen. Her mother and father were joined by another; her uncle on her father's side, Rabastan. He rarely visited and Isabella knew that her mother disliked him very much. Isabella did not like him much either. After all, she was her mother's daughter.
Something was wrong. Very wrong. Isabella could feel it in her bones. Bad things were about to happen. Bad things always happened when her uncle visited. Six years was old enough to realise that her parents, more so her father, were not the most liked people in the world. Whispers buzzed about them like flies, rumours clung like bad smells. She was used to that, but her uncle never had any company. No one ever mentioned him if they could help it.
"We can't do this now, Rudolphus." Bellatrix refused, glaring pointedly from Rabastan to the stairs, where Isabella perched on the landing, cloaked in thick shadow and knowing she had not been seen.
Rabastan looked somewhat bored, "We are only doing what we must to find the Dark Lord, or had motherhood wiped that from your memory?" He mocked. His face morphing into an arrogant sneer, the sneer of someone who knows their remark has hit home.
Bellatrix turned on him. "It's been a year since He disappeared, much as I would wish Him back, we will not find anything of Him!" Isabella had heard of this Dark Lord, it was who her father worked for and she assumed her mother had at some point. It had been over a year since her mother had worked though, she did not miss it even though she got to stay with her aunt Andromeda for a few days.
Rudolphus struck his wife and not for the first time, Isabella could not remember a time when her father had been pleasant to either of them. "That is not your true fear, my love." He drawled. Isabella did not think he meant that last bit to be affectionate at all, in fact she believed it to be taken as an insult almost.
She blanched. "Think of Isabella, if we are caught who will look after her?" Bellatrix countered, refusing to acknowledge any pain she may have incurred.
He husband leered, "You need witnesses to be caught and I do not intend to leave any."
Isabella gasped, it did not take more than the mind of a small child to know what her father was implying; he was going to kill someone. From conversations she definitely was not supposed to overhear, this would not be the first time. His no-nonsense demeanour never normally gave Isabella any reason to doubt him, but this time his over-confidence her unsure.
"We will leave now and be back by morning." Rudolphus ordered.
Bellatrix looked about to argue, but a firm slap soon stilled her tongue.
"The child has made you soft," Rabastan chuckled, though Isabella could not see how that could be an insult, he said it as though having a child would be the most disastrous thing in the world. Small wonder he had never married. "There was a time that you would not have hesitated."
"Well, now I know what I have got to lose." The mother answered, her voice sounding far away and not just because her husband had begun shoving her forcibly out of the door.
That was the night her parents were arrested. At the time, Isabella was still too young to understand just what for, aside from two people having been hurt and her parents being held responsible – her aunt had had to explain all sorts of things like indictment, incarceration and justice. Above all the Cruciatus curse was not something a six year old could possibly relate to. The loss of a mother was, she realised her joy at never having to see her father again, but her mother… that would be far more difficult.