The room, it was dark. It was so dark. I could hear little under my hood, see even less from behind my mask. The mask that had come with the mark on my arm, burning me. I hardly noticed it now, I was used to it. But tonight it was something else entirely. It burned on my skin, searing it so that I could think of nothing but the wailing of those who had been left partially alive, bleeding out, being slowly tortured with spells, and many other things that I shivered to think of. I could see her, though. Her and the man she adored, the man who had ordered this. I nearly laugh to myself, thinking that man is too pleasant a term for what stands before me, arms crossed, in a billowing black robe that is still swinging after he slithered away from another body that lay on the floor.
"My lord, when is it my turn?" Bellatrix asked suddenly, turning around to face him and the rest of us.
"Patience, young Lestrange." The Dark Lord soothed her.
'But... But, my lord...?' Bellatrix stammered as she was silenced with one movement of his hand as he walked closer to the next one in line.
"AVADA KEDAVRA!" the red-eyed man screamed as a bolt of green light shot out at the innocent person in front of him.
She barked out her version of a laugh and stalked over to the lifeless body on the ground before her. She actually danced around it. Bellatrix Lestrange is not a kind woman by any means, and she knows it. I hated her with all of my being. I could never stand the puppy dog eyes she made at the Dark Lord and the nearly dog-like behavior that she exhibited around him. She wanted to become his right hand man, or woman I should say, and be there to do every little deed for him.
'My lord, please, may I have a turn on the next one?' She nearly begged.
"Pathetic" I thought, wanting to spit the word at her, not caring what happened.
He nodded and motioned for her to do what she loved. Bellatrix grinned and shook her wild mane of dark hair. She stepped forward to the young woman who was crying silently, sobs wracking her frail body. I knew this woman. She was an Auror here at the Ministry. Her name was Alice, and she was married to Longbottom. He was an Auror as well, and they had a young son. Neville, I think it was.
"Crucio." She murmured in a rasping whisper, and allowed a small giggle as the body of Alice Longbottom writhed on the floor. The tortured woman could make no sounds and merely pleaded for help with her eyes at her husband. I could see the tears in both of their eyes as she was thrown around the room, hitting walls, pillars, anything. This was hurting her husband as well, as he cried silently, wanting to draw as much attention from himself as possible. I grit my teeth and stared down at the floor, not wanting to see any more.
"That is enough." A voice called from the shadows. It was none other than Severus Snape, second in command in the Death Eater ranks. This man was as greasy as he was dark. His lank hair, his large nose, his soulless eyes. Everything about the man screamed "Do not cross me. At least, if you value your own life, you will not dare to do such a thing." I knew that he was a man who would not mince words. Perhaps, if given the chance, I could grow to like him. He seemed a respectable man, a half-blood, not that he would ever tell anyone. Though frightfully dull and far too filthy for my liking, working in the Ministry has its perks. I can access any information on any wizard or witch that has ever lived with only the flick of my wand. I learned that Severus Snape was born to a poor family, a witch for a mother, and a horrid Muggle father. He had befriended a young Lily Evans, now Lily Potter, in his youth and had told her about magic, the magical world, and all about what she could do with her powers. They had grown apart in their school days, and she married James Potter. Snape was still bitter about their union, and had spent weeks seething and brooding about it. But now, Snape, the man who had found the Longbottoms worthy of torture, was calling for the end.
"Bellatrix, that is enough." He hissed, staring down his hooked nose at her, black eyes meeting another pair of black eyes. She growled and yanked her wand away from the Alice's body, severing the line of magic that had caused her so much pain. Her chest was heaving, and she had a crazed look in her eyes. She scrambled over herself to try and reach her husband, but was stopped.
"Petrificus Totalus!" Bellatrix shrieked, a new sinister grin forming as the woman was frozen in place, only those crazy eyes moving. Her husband was, at this point, hiccuping from crying so much, and looked like he wanted to rush right over to her and stroke her hair, her face, wipe away her tears. Such a shame he was tied to a column, though.
"Now, now, Severus. I was only starting on my fun." Bella rasped at the dark man not wearing a mask and still in his professor's robes from work. "It would be a shame if something were to happen to her husband, don't you think, Sev, dearie?" She bared her teeth and turned on her heel, cutting each rope that bound the man to his prison with every step. She stopped instantly, her head cocked to one side. "Do you hear that?" she whispered urgently. "That is the sound of your impending demise." She taunted the sobbing man, cackling as she levitated him into the air above his wife.
"Please..." he whimpered, new tears falling from his face and onto Alice. "Please, just let us go. We'll not bother you, we'll quit as Aurors, just please..." he begged for his life and hers to a woman whose heart was only lightened by the pain and suffering of others.
Bellatrix laughed as she heard his pathetic speech. "You really think that if you promise to give up hunting us, I'll let you live?" At this sentence, I clenched my fists, wanting to only free the Longbottoms and take their word.
"We'll... We'll let you keep an eye on us, monitor us." He tried again to save their lives, but got thrown into a wall.
"That," she spat. "Was for thinking that we would let the likes of you live." With another harsh movement of her wrist that sent her wand tip flying from the floor to the roof, he crashed into both, and crumpled on the floor once more. "That was for thinking we would watch over you like children!" She shrieked. She barked out the curse she had used on Alice once more, and then laughed as his body began twisting in ways that hurt me just looking at it. "THIS," she roared. "IS FOR BEING AN AUROR!" She smirked as he began crying once more. "Oh, and here I thought that Aurors were supposed to be tough." she mocked the man, relishing in his pain. "Siwwy Bewwa. I fought dat you wewe a big boy." She cooed in a voice that one would use with an infant or toddler. "But I suppose it was all lies." She spat once more and turned to face the rest of us, wand still pointed at him. "IS THIS ENOUGH YET, SEVERUS? IS IT?" She yelled at him, got right in his face and screamed. His face remained emotionless and he merely stared into her onyx eyes, the little light reflecting in them so that even I could see the crazy in them from here.
"Bellatrix." The Dark Lord said quietly, his lips barely moving. "I would suggest you back away from Severus before you become like her." He said, head motioning at the woman who was fearing for three lives at the moment. Her own, her husband's, and her baby son's. She had tears running from her eyes, down her face, and into her hair, wetting it and making it clump together.
I snorted at this, and managed to turn it into a cough to avoid suspicion. I could only imagine what Bellatrix Lestrange would look like as a broken woman, embarrassed in front of her fellow Death Eaters and being reduced to a weeping shell of her former self. This amused me far more than it should have, and I continued smiling under my mask.
"Yes... My lord..." She hissed at the pale man, Nagini circling around his feet. She bared her teeth at the snake, then stalked over to where she had discarded Longbottom's body. "Ready for round two?" She spat at the already broken man.
He managed to croak, "You'll not break us. The fight for justice will continue long after we're gone." This earned him a quick bark of laughter and, a wave of her wand later, a nasty smack on the back of his head as it hit the concrete floor. I winced as I heard the resounding crack on the hard floor, and a wave of sympathy crashed over me.
c
"NO!" Alice screamed as her voice was returned and the Cruciatus Curse was placed upon her husband again. She could now move, thanks to me lifting the curse. I'm a master of hiding what magic I do, and this was no exception. Bellatrix whirled around, and cast it once more on Alice. She screamed over and over, the sound echoing off the walls of the empty room, off of the high ceiling. I'll never forget those sounds, torn from a broken woman's throat as her husband looked on, being broken as well.
"Sister. Sister, please, let them live." A voice called from behind a mask, long white-blond hair covered with a black hood. This voice was mine.
She turned to sneer at me and, raising her wand above her head to lift the Longbottoms, said, "And why should I?" She threw her arm down at her side, throwing the Longbottoms against the floor, and they moved no more. "Why should I let them live, Narcissa? What have they done for us? Hmm?"
"Perhaps... Perhaps Severus is right. This is quite enough. If you let them live, it will be a reminder of just how powerful we are. If you just have them go mad, then eventually their son will accept that the Death Eaters have done this, and were so cruel as to leave him with mad parents. If you kill them, why then, it will only enrage him. He will come after us, and he will fight us." My voice was strong, despite my feeling so weak. "And when he does, we will be ready. We will show him just how powerful we are. Torture him and them together, kill them and make him watch the life fade from their eyes. Then, we will kill him as well." Speaking like this scared me, I had never wanted to become like Bella, never wanted to be like the rest of them. But now, here I was, giving a speech about how to properly harm this family even more, harm them when they had only been doing their jobs.
Bellatrix smirked at me and wandered over. She cocked her head to one side and had a look of curiosity on her face. "I didn't know you were like this, sister." She whispered breathlessly at my ear, circling around me as if I were the prey and she was the predator. "I think I quite like this, new you. I could get used to having you around if only you acted like this more often." She laughed once more, and I was reminded of how different we are. Her hair, eyes, and demeanor was dark while mine were all light. I was cold and calculating, and she was downright rash. She could never pretend to be as sophisticated as I, and I could never be like her. She wore tight clothing under her open and billowing black robes. I kept mine closed and my clothing well-fitted, but not too tight and not too loose. Her robes seemed to suck in all of the light and never give it up, while mine were always a simple black with deep emerald green hem that went well with the inner silver trim.
"Sister, we are too different to like each other. Yet, we somehow manage it. Merlin knows it's not been easy, and so do you and I. But, please, Bella, just leave them be." I pleaded with her, my mask now in hand and my gray eyes begging.
"Oh, tut tut tut. Come now, Cissa. We both know that the only reason you want me to let them go is so that if little Draco gets into a... conflict, with their child, you can say that you saved their lives and that he should be forever grateful to the Malfoys." Bellatrix smiled like a Chesire Cat and twirled her wand. "That. And the fact that you were never one for violence. I never did understand why you and 'Dromeda were always so... Faint of heart. It seemed at times that I was the only one with any sense. But now, look at us. Look here," She lifted up the left sleeve of her robe, and used her wand to pull up mine. "We are the same, now, both in this wonderful organization for the rest of our lives. Meanwhile, our failure of a sister is married off to some undesirable man and they have our little niece. What was her name again? Come now, you know it. Don't be shy." She egged me on, like a supportive grammar school teacher.
"Nymph- Nymphadora Tonks." I whispered, my voice breaking for what seemed like the hundredth time tonight.
"What was that? I don't think Rosier heard you all the way over there!" Bellatrix screeched gleefully at me.
"Nymphadora." I said once more, my voice quite stronger and louder than it had been but a mere moment before. "If only I could have been this strong when HE wanted me to join this bloody thing" I thought morosely to myself.
Bellatrix took delight in this little bit of information I had and walked around me again. That is one thing more I detest about her; She paces when she tries to be intimidating. "So, you'd like me to drive the Longbottoms mad, would you?" She asks me without really asking. "Then so be it." Bellatrix whispers harshly next to my ear and revives them. I am forced to watch it go on for another three hours at least, until they've started babbling nonsense, are foaming at the mouth, have blank stares, and many other things. I watch as Bellatrix hands over the Longbottom's Cruciatus Curse over to Rosier and began using a curse made by Snape. She whispered over and over "Sectumsempra" and then quickly healed them. She then traded in her wand for her favorite knife. She'd had it since she started her magical education.
"I hope you didn't like your hair," She coos at Alice. "And what pretty hair it was, too." Bellatrix yanks Alice up to a sitting position by her hair and cuts it off with her knife. She laughs as the large chunk of hair in her hand is thrown on the floor, held together by Alice's tears and blood. She then strolls over to the baby Neville's father, and stabs him once, twice, three times, in the leg. She howls with laughter as he howls in pain. She motions for Rosier to heal him, and he scrambles forward, not wanting to get on this crazy woman's bad side. He mutters the spell, and then kicks Longbottom in the ribs while he's at it. I hear a very loud, very sickening crack as the rib breaks.
"You fool! You've broken his rib! Now how are we going to fix it? I've not got any Skele-grow on me, and if you don't either then we'll," Here she waved a finger between the two of them. "Are going to have a problem!" Bellatrix screamed at the tall man, snarling as she raised her knife to him. He flinched and backed up a few steps.
"We're just droppin' 'em at St. Mungo's, ain't we?" Rosier muttered, his voice somewhat muffled by his Death Eater's mask. "'N' anofer fing, 'e's just fine. 'E'll get better."
Bellatrix screamed once, long and loud, and grabbed the Longbottoms by the arms and dragged them over to two of the younger Death Eaters. "HERE!" She yelled. "APPARATE WITH THEM AND THEN JUST DROP THEM IN FRONT! DON'T LET ANYBODY SEE YOU!"
"Oi, mate, she's bonkers." The shorter of the two mumbled to his companion who just snorted. Neither of them got the chance to Apparate. She had killed them both before they could, the shorter one with a knife, the taller with a curse.
"YOU TWO! TAKE THEM AND IF YOU DARE INSULT ME, I'LL HAVE YOUR LIVES!" She roared at another pair who nodded vigorously and nervously.