A.N: Written for the Hunger Games Challenge on the HPFC, with the prompt "Alma Coin – Write about Dolores Umbridge".
oOo
Dolores had never been in love before.
Love was a needless emotion, when there was so much work to be done, and so much honour and tradition to uphold. She had never been interested in boys when she was a student, and little (if any) had any interest in her. Dolores valued herself of being better than her fellow Slytherin classmates, and peers – she knew that pure blood reigned over all, and she was living embodiment of that. With a passionate strife to make everyone know how upper-class her blood was, Dolores soon made a lot of enemies within Hogwarts, but her Slytherin friends would remain close to her cold, pink heart forever. She would grow to show no interest in men or finding love or a husband; but desired nothing but solid, noticeable power, right in the palm of her stubby little hand.
However, as defiant as she was, and no matter how much she flourished within the Ministry of Magic, Dolores soon began to feel jealous of the other women. The bitter feeling that arose in her windpipe like bile was hard to deny, when a younger Mafalda Hopkirk had been describing her elegant spring wedding, complete with twittering bluebirds presenting the newlyweds with their rings – Mafalda's of which, she showed no restraint in making every passing witch or wizard aware of the glittering diamond on her left hand.
Dolores thought she would never find love. Until the Dark Lord rose again, to wrap the Ministry in his dark embrace.
There was something about the Dark Lord that made Dolores tick like a sped-up clock. She felt the change in the air as soon as he sucked the Ministry under his influence; other employees made hushed complaints to each other of how it felt like Dementors were scouring the halls and corridors, but Dolores had never been happier. Her glee had practically burst through her spleen when the new statue had been erected, even more so when she was appointed as Head of the Muggle-Born Registration Commission. It was every sadists dream, especially one who held such a bitter dislike for anyone or thing with impure blood. Dolores was free to enact her persecuting wrath on the Mudbloods she had disliked for so long.
It was all thanks to him – the Dark Lord who had dazzled and dazed her with his mystique and his malevolent demeanour. He had no idea how captivating his dark presence soon became, and how blissfully blinded Dolores soon was by his ideals and dreams, dreams that she so fondly shared. Everything he preached, Dolores found she believed in wildly.
The Dark Lord was the mystery man who had been missing her entire life. Her one true love, and the reason she had never fallen in love before now. But Lord Voldemort would never notice Dolores, no matter how sparkling and shining her blood was. The simpering personality that took over her whenever he made routine visits to the Ministry went completely unnoticed.
As nothing but a mere cog in the works; Dolores would just have to carry on.
oOo
