Professors Dippet and Dumbledore, as it happened, were remarkably unfazed by the actual notion that a human being would accidentally travel through time and space. Apparently, there were dozens of instances of it happening throughout history.
"But, my dear," said Albus Dumbledore where he stood beside Armando Dippet's desk, "by far the most important thing is that you simply live here. Try not to change anything as you knew it, or there may be catastrophic consequences. You see, the future is an uncertain thing, ever shifting, ever changing. What is past to you is future to us. You have already lived it, but to us, it is yet to be and may change. Your memories may become irrelevant, wiped out by decisions and shifts you do not intend on enacting. Do you understand?"
"So you have no intention on sending me back?" Bellatrix asked. Dumbledore and Dippet eyed one another, and Dippet said,
"To the best of our understanding, there is no way to safely send someone through decades of time and space, especially not forward. That degree of time travel typically happens on accident only. The will of the Universe… not the meddling of wizarding wands."
"So you're not sending me back," Bellatrix confirmed, and she suddenly realised she wasn't going back to a cell in Azkaban. Dumbledore asked her plainly,
"You were a Slytherin when you attended Hogwarts, Miss Lestrange?"
She didn't correct him about her being married. It would throw her mother off for her to go round with the Black surname, and it would be confusing for someone who appeared seventeen to be married. So she just nodded. Dumbledore sighed and suggested to Professor Dippet,
"Perhaps she ought to simply take the bed in which she awakened. I believe there was a spare in that dormitory. And she might simply take up the class schedule of the seventh-year Slytherins. No doubt she'll excel in her studies."
"I believe that is the best course of action," Dippet nodded. "My one rule, Miss Lestrange, is this. If any of your fellow students ask you questions about the future - say, for example, Will I be fat as a middle-aged witch? - you must not answer. You may reveal no details about the future which are not known in this time. You must simply blend in to the best of your ability. That is, to our working knowledge, the only way of coping with grave accidents such as these."
"One last thing, Miss Lestrange," said Albus Dumbledore, and he narrowed his eyes over his spectacles at her a little. "Why were you in Azkaban?"
Bellatrix was silent for a long moment, and Dippet looked very uneasy. Bellatrix opened her mouth, hesitated, threw up her Occlumency shields, and finally lied,
"I came from a time of war. I was on the losing side. I do not think it wise to give much more detail than that. I am not a criminal in the strictest sense of the word."
Dumbledore didn't look like he believed her. Not one bit. But Dippet, for his part, seemed mostly convinced, and he suggested,
"Perhaps we could make a loan to Miss Lestrange the same way we've done for our students raised in Muggle orphanages… so that she might send away to Madam Malkin's for robes and the like."
"I think a gift is more appropriate, given the extraordinary circumstances, Headmaster," Dumbledore murmured, still staring oddly at Bellatrix. She shifted where she sat and mumbled,
"Thank you."
An hour later, she was sitting in the Great Hall, having sent away by owl for supplies and robes. She sat with the girls in whose dormitory she'd awakened, and she learnt that their names were Druella, Ivy, Sutton, and Theodora. Bellatrix knew Sutton Crabbe and Theodora Avery by their married names and lives, and of course she knew her own mother. It was odd to be sitting across a table in the Great Hall from her own mum, and even more strange when Druella said to the other girls,
"I hope Cygnus asks me to the Autumn Ball."
"You know he will," said Sutton, the plump brunette girl, rolling her dark eyes. "He's mad for you."
Bellatrix stared down the table at where Tom Riddle was surrounded by a gang of Slytherin males, including one stringy young wizard she easily recognised as her own father. He was a year younger than her mother, she knew.
"He's a sixth-year," Bellatrix said quietly, and Druella demanded,
"How'd you know that?"
"He just looks like it," Bellatrix lied, and Druella tipped her head.
"How'd you know which one was Cygnus?"
Bellatrix's cheeks went hot, and she blinked. "Saw him staring at you a few times."
"She's observant, this one," said Theodora Avery, and she started peeling an orange as she said, "I hope Abraxas Malfoy asks me. He's so dreamy with that Quidditch body of his."
"Well, I hope Tom Riddle asks me," said Ivy haughtily. "He's the most handsome boy in the whole school."
"Are balls ordinary in this time?" Bellatrix asked, and the others frowned.
"What, you didn't have Autumn and Spring ball?" asked Theodora. Bellatrix just shook her head. She wondered why they'd done away with the dances.
"When is the ball?" asked Bellatrix nervously, and Sutton squealed a little.
"Oh! You need to get dress robes tout de suite, Bellatrix! You'll have to send away for them straight away. The ball's next weekend."
Bellatrix nodded. Suddenly four of the Slytherin boys rose up from where they were sitting with Tom Riddle, and Sutton muttered,
"Oh, no. Here they come. Here they come."
The girls all got asked to the ball, all except for Bellatrix. Druella got asked by Cygnus, who Conjured her roses in asking her. Sutton got asked by an awkward-looking boy that Bellatrix instantly recognised as her future husband - Druella's brother and Bellatrix's uncle, Jacob Rosier. Theodora got asked by her own cousin, Nikolas Avery, but she still said yes. And Ivy Greengrass got asked by Abraxas Malfoy, which seemed to irk Theodora. By the time the boys left, everyone was quite breathless. Bellatrix just stared, thinking how odd it was to see her parents' generation lost in a swell of teenaged romantic entanglements.
"So," Bellatrix began, "What are you all wearing to the ball?"
"Pardon me, ladies."
Bellatrix turned her face and let out a rady ungraceful noise as she looked up and saw Tom Riddle standing right behind her. Her lord and master. She resisted the urge to fly to her feet and bow her head. She could tell he knew she wanted to do it. His smirk grew; he liked the way her instinct was to defer to his authority. Everyone at the table went silent as Tom folded his hands before him and said very crisply,
"Miss Lestrange, it would be my honour to welcome you to our… time and place… by escorting you to the Autumn Ball. Will you accompany me?"
"Catch me; I'm swooning," whispered Druella, and for a long moment, Bellatrix couldn't answer. She just stared at him and nodded, and she finally squeaked out,
"Yes, please."
He smiled warmly. "Thank you. I shall meet you in the Common Room at seven the night of the ball."
He walked away, his robe billowing behind him. Bellatrix flicked her eyes up to the Head Table to see a very concerned-looking Albus Dumbledore eyeing Tom Riddle as he sat back down. She returned her own eyes to the Slytherin girls' table, where the others were scoffing and laughing in utter disbelief.
"I'm so jealous!" Ivy growled playfully. "He's the most desirable boy in the school!"
"He just wants to go with the time traveling girl," Bellatrix said, waving her hand dismissively, but her insides were screaming with joy. Her lord and master - Lord Voldemort - had just asked her to go to a ball with him. She would get to dance with him. With him! She wanted to fly up from the table and twirl around in circles and sing. Instead she just let out a shaking sigh and sipped her pumpkin juice, and she nodded.
"Definitely need to get some good dress robes."
"Bellatrix."
She whirled around as she packed up her Potions supplies. They'd just finished brewing up a Nonemesis Potion, which Bellatrix had probably done a dozen times in her life and could do in her sleep. She'd gotten full marks from Slughorn, of course, and he'd asked her and Tom Riddle to stay after lessons for a brief meeting. Now Bellatrix placed her instruments into their leather sleeve, looked around to be certain no one was listening, and murmured,
"Hello, My Lord."
"You call me that so easily," Tom whispered back. "You must have made quite the habit of doing so."
"I could never call you anything but My Lord and Master," Bellatrix told him, wrapping up her leather sleeve of supplies and tying it together. She tucked it into her rucksack and stared into his dark eyes. She felt compelled to inform him, "Sometimes, you'd call me Bella, and it would make my day."
"You liked that. When I called you Bella." Tom seemed to take note of this, to file it away, and he nodded. He licked his lip and asked, "What sort of soldiering were you doing? You said you were fighting. A war. Serving me as a soldier. What did you mean?"
"You gained strength. Enough to wage war against your enemies," Bellatrix whispered, flicking her eyes about. "There were battles - a dozen against a dozen, sometimes more, sometimes fewer. You trained me in Occlumency and advanced duelling. I was at your side in every battle. Master."
Tom pinched his lips, and his cheeks went a little pink. He cleared his throat and asked cautiously,
"Were we… were you and I…?"
Bellatrix gasped and shook her head. Intimate? Were they intimate? No. No, they never had been. Oh, how she'd always wished they had been, but… no. Her face went very hot, and she told him,
"You touched my cheek one time. That's… that would be the extent of it."
"I see," Tom said, and suddenly Slughorn said in a booming voice from the front of the classroom,
"All right, you two. Now! Seeing as how both of you have utterly mastered any curriculum Hogwarts would be able to throw at you, I wish to expand and extend your studies. Yes, yes. That's right. I wish to create an Advanced Potions Course just for the two of you! What do you say?"
Tom smiled at Bellatrix and then grinned at Slughorn.
"I'd be grateful for more difficult work, Professor."
"I'd certainly be amenable, sir," said Bellatrix. She hadn't been to school in years, and she was rusty at studying, but being seventeen again felt good, and it felt good to be good at being seventeen. Yes, she would gladly accept an advanced potions course from Slughorn. They spent the next half hour working out logistics - scheduling and the like - and then Slughorn sent them on their way. Out in the corridor, Tom said to Bellatrix,
"I am very glad that the Universe decided you needed to cross paths with me here, Bella."
She shivered at the sound of his young, smooth voice using her shortened name. She smiled at him and shook her head, and she said,
"You know I like when you say it; that's why you said it."
"Of course." He smirked and shrugged. "What colour are you wearing to the ball?"
"Black," Bellatrix laughed. "I always wear black."
"Do you?" Tom flicked his eyes up and down her Slytherin uniform, and she rolled her eyes, something she never would have done before the older version of him. She amended,
"When I have my choice, I wear black."
"I see." Tom nodded. "Well, that makes my job easier. Have you a favourite flower?"
Bellatrix's heart hammered in her chest. A favourite flower? She blinked back tears and whispered,
"Deep, erm… deep red roses."
He curled up his lips and pulled out his wand. He shut his eyes and very carefully Conjured a flower in the air. It was a rose so deeply red it was almost black, and it floated in the air until Tom plucked it with his fingers. He held it out to Bellatrix and asked,
"Will a corsage of these work with your dress robes, then?"
"Master." Bellatrix simply could not breathe. She took the rose and studied it, and when she raised her eyes again, she could not keep from crying. "I am not worthy of these attentions from you."
"No? It sounds as though your devotion has always been absolute. I will need people like that close to me," Tom said. "I will need devotion. Will you continue to give it?"
"Of course! Always!" Bellatrix clutched the deep red rose to her chest and nodded frantically. "My Lord, I will always, always be your most ardent servant. I have been since I was sixteen years old and I went to prison because I refused to forsake you. Please, I beg you, allow me to serve you here the way I served you in my own time."
"Of course," Tom said, looking quite content indeed. "Of course you may serve me, Bellatrix. But first… first you must dance with me."
Bellatrix shut her eyes, and then she gasped, for she felt a hand cupping her jaw. When she opened her eyes, he was holding her face, staring into her eyes and nodding. He leaned down and pressed his lips against her forehead, and then he walked very quickly away. Bellatrix was left alone in the corridor, wheezing from the exertion of merely staying standing, in shock that her master had just deigned to give her a kiss.
Author's Note: I do hope others are enjoying this idea as much as I'm loving writing it. If you get a chance, PLEASE do leave a quick review. I really would be very grateful for your thoughts. Thank you!