A/N: Hello, and welcome to the first installment for the Halloween Prompt Games we're playing in DEE. I hope you enjoy the next 30 days of drabbles and one-shots, and may you have a wickedly witchy Halloween season.
Room for Two
By Kittenshift17
Prompts: Alecto Carrow ~ Animagi ~ Antonin Dolohov ~ "Get off me, witch." ~ "There's room for two."
Alecto prowled the length of hall, her paws silent and her tail swishing from side to side. Antonin had just stumbled down this way in the direction of his bedroom and she would be damned if she wasn't going to corner him. He'd had enough Pumpkin Spice Mulled Wine – a Samhain favourite of Lucius's – to pickle a toad and she wasn't above taking advantage.
Nosing open his bedroom door, Alecto gave a little squeak of sound to announce her presence, but the Russian sprawled upon the bed didn't move or acknowledge her entry. Alecto licked her chops, pleased to know that he might just be addled enough not to immediately push her away this time. She was so tired of having him push her away.
Wiggling her hindquarters and cursing that her Animagus form was something so small, despite how often she used it to her advantage, Alecto leapt up onto the bed, snagging her claws in the quilt and mewling again that it was so far up. Antonin lifted his head, his eyes unfocused as she clawed her way to the safety atop the bed before she twitched her tail, trying to decide how best to approach him.
"You, again?" he asked, his Russian accent thick as he tried to focus on her small, black-furred form.
She'd been surprised the first time he'd found her hiding in this form. She'd expected him to be his usual, twisted self and that he would attempt to do her harm, but he hadn't. That first night he'd come across her, balled up and asleep in kitten form hiding in his clothes hamper after running from Amycus and his friends, she'd thought he might hex her or curse her, or at the very least, kick her. He hadn't. He'd crooned to her in his native tongue, words Alecto didn't understand, and he had soothed her as he lured her from the basket and into his arms.
She might've grown a little fond of being curled in his embrace, even if she had to do it in cat form, rather than human form, because she'd been back almost every night since then. Burrowing down into his hold while he slept.
She mewled at him softly in greeting, bravely padding across his thighs, over his taut stomach and up his chest until she could crouch upon him, feeling the steady thump of his heart. Merlin, she loved him. She hated that he couldn't see it and she wished she could show him all the ways she adored him, but he never gave her the time of day. She'd never regretted being such a trollop at Hogwarts more than she did when Antonin spurned her every advance excepting those times when he was drunk and angry and the loneliness and the memories of Azkaban got the better of him.
"Always come back, don't you?" he murmured, trailing a gentle hand over her soft fur. Alecto arched into the touch, purring contentedly. "Even when I'm a right ublyudok, you always come back, don't you, Alecto?"
The sound of her name on his tongue made her freeze and she turned her eyes on him, her heart beginning to race inside her chest. Did he know? Had he figured out that it was her, hiding in this form? Or was he just even more of a bastard than she thought and calling some stray cat by her name for the habit of always seeking out his attention?
She had her answer when he rested one heavy hand on her back while the other aimed his wand right at her. The spell to reverse her transformation slammed into her hard, almost knocking the wind from her and she hissed when she found herself very much human, sprawled atop him.
"Get off me, witch," Antonin rumbled from beneath her, sounding slightly pained. Realising she'd dug one of her knees into his groin by accident, Alecto lifted off him enough to keep from hurting him, sliding to one side just enough to press up against him without crushing him.
"Why are you here?" he demanded, slurring just a bit, the hand he'd had on her back as a feline lifting to grip the back of her neck unforgivingly.
"There's room enough for two," Alecto said softly, eyeing him warily, worried over his impending reaction.
"Pochemu ty vsegda vozvrashchayesh'sya?" he asked, his mother tongue so fluent and natural to him that it made her quiver with delight just to hear it. She didn't know what he'd said, languages had never been her gift, but she loved to listen to him talk when he spoke to her in Russian.
His eyes searched hers, no matter how bloodshot they were with his intoxication, and she could tell that he was frustrated with her. He was always frustrated with her.
Alecto sighed. "Do you want me to go?" she asked sadly, knowing he would likely throw her out any minute now, never able to stand her presence for very long. At least, not in human form. He often let her stay the night as a kitten.
"Why do you always come back, Carrow?" he asked, frowning at her, his wand still trained on her though he'd begun lightly digging his nails against the nape of her neck in a way that made her want to purr all over again.
"Because I'm hopeful that, one day, you might see past the empty-headed little girl I used to be and realise there's more to me than some tart who'll spread her legs for anyone," Alecto admittedly boldly, finding her courage when he didn't immediately throw her out or begin cursing her all over again.
Antonin shook his head.
"Sumasshedshaya zhenschina." She knew that one. He spoke the phrase often in muttered annoyance with her and she'd figured out what it meant. Crazy woman. She supposed it was true. The definition of craziness was doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. And she came back to him over and over, hoping and praying that this time, he might finally let her in. But she knew better than to beg. He loathed being begged. It bought out the absolute worst in him and transferred her from being his colleague, to being his prey, reminding him entirely too much the victims he tortured so frequently.
"You've been invading my space as the cat," he said when she offered no defence against his accusation and bit her tongue on the urge to wheedle for his attention.
"I have," she agreed. "Though not always intentionally. How long have you known it was me?"
His lips twitched when she couldn't resist tracing her fingers through the patch of chest hair peeking through the unbuttoned gap in his shirt.
"You transformed in your sleep last night," he told her, smirking just a little, and Alecto's cheeks cut crimson, realising she'd woken him.
"Oh," she murmured. "Sorry."
"Svegda obvinyayu sebya," he murmured, his eyes glittering with something akin to pity and he shook his head slowly.
"Why me, Alecto?" Alecto blinked at him for a moment, carefully lowering her head until she could prop her chin against his chest, breathing in the sweet scent of his cologne.
"Why do I fancy you?" she confirmed, her fingers still tracing his chest, toying with the buttons on his shirt and hoping against hope that this time he might just let her win.
"Da," he nodded.
Alecto sighed, her mouth twisting unhappily.
"Why do the waves crash against the rocks when they're so unrelenting and steadfast, unaffected by their buffets?" Alecto shrugged her slim shoulder, closing her eyes against the pain it was to love him. She heard him sigh in response and she tensed, awaiting his rejection and his cruelty once again.
"What do you want from me, Carrow?" he asked in a low, soft voice, surprising her once again. Alecto opened her eyes, lifting her head enough to meet his gaze. His dark eyes were intense and focused suddenly, as though his intoxication was wearing off. She blinked at him slowly, frowning a little.
"I don't understand," she admitted.
"What do you want?" Antonin reiterated. "Why do you keep coming back? Why me? Do you just want to fuck or are you as obsessed and enamoured as you seem? Is it just a game to you? Do you follow me because you know I'll reject you? What is it that has you sidling up to me in the dark when you know what a twisted mudak I am?"
Alecto sighed, resting her chin on his chest once more.
"I want your eyes to light up when you look at me," she whispered. "I want you to see me and forget, for a few moments, all the wretchedness of this life. I want you to want me, Antonin. I want to crawl into bed with you every night and I want to wake up next to you every day. I want to know what it feels like to know, without a doubt, that the only person allowed to hurt me is you; I want to know that if anyone else tries, you'll hurt them. I want to know that if I wake up screaming in the middle of the night, you'll soothe me with words I don't understand when you speak to me in Russian. I want to weather your bad moods and make you feel better when you're hurting. I want to bite back when you snarl at me, knowing that no matter I say or what I do, you'll still want to pin me to something and fuck me silly in the small hours of the morning. I want…."
Alecto blinked, trying to force away the tears that threatened in her eyes.
"I want you to love me, even though I'm broken," she whispered thickly.
She didn't dare open her eyes to look at him. She couldn't stand to see the pity or the disgust glittering in his dark gaze. Another tear trickled down her cheek at the way his fingers continued digging gently at the nape of her neck, the touch comforting when it felt like her whole world was falling apart.
"I'm sorry," she whispered, unable to bear his silence when he made no response to her admissions. "I… I'll go. I'll try to leave you be from now on, Dolohov."
Reluctantly, Alecto sat up, attempting to pull away. She swung her legs over the edge of the bed, turning her back to him as his hand slipped out of her hair, trailing lightly down the back of her neck.
"You want me, even though I'm such a miserable arsehole to you?" he asked before she could take her feet. "Even though I'm a twisted fucker who revels in the pain of others and who has more blood on his hands than the rest of the brethren, combined? Even though I'm as likely to turn on you and torture you as I am to turn on the others, with as much viciousness and wickedness as I can muster? You really want such a man?"
Alecto sighed, leaning forward and putting her face in her hands.
"I want you, Antonin, even though I'm certain that when Death comes for me, he will bear your face. Even though I've no doubt that I will die with your hands wrapped around my throat and that lilting, accented voice I love so much cursing me to the foulest pits of hell in a language I don't understand. I want you even knowing that you're more broken than I am."
Shaking her head at her own weakness, and knowing she was bordering on begging him to love her, in danger of sparking the darkness inside his soul until he turned on her once more, Alecto pressed her hands to the mattress and pushed herself to her feet. Before she could take a step, his hand closed over her wrist and she paused, turning to meet his gaze questioningly.
He eyed her with confusion, his brow furrowed, his dark eyes intense as they fixed upon her face. He seemed at a loss of what to say, and Alecto frowned at him in return, aching with the urge to have him tell her that she was wrong, that he could grow to care for her, given time.
"You were right, you know?" he said finally, shaking his head and using his grip on her wrist to slowly pull her back toward him.
"That you're twisted and broken and a right foul git who'll never give me the time of day?" Alecto asked bitterly, hating herself for the thrum of hope coursing through her when she spied the faintest sparkle of heat in his dark eyes.
His mouth twisted into a cruel half-smirk that tended to terrify those around him whenever he wore it, for it foretold bad things.
"No," he said, yanking on her wrist just hard enough to topple her down on top of him once more. "There is room enough for two."