Chapter IV

WHISPERS THROUGH A MASK

oOo

Sitting in bed, Bellatrix is putting a little too much effort in fluffing up the pillows on her lap. She focuses on her blows. The fabric that meets her knuckles looks smooth and soft but feels rough against her skin. Her hand doesn't want to come back for the next blow. Her arms hurt. Still, she keeps going.

She feels so weak. And the more she feels like that the more she becomes aware of the need to push her limits. This is not the kind of pain one can get high on during a fight, this is the kind of soreness that comes with atrophied muscles, this is the kind of weakness that can scare Bellatrix Lestrange out of her wits.

Her hand plunges into the pillow one last time as the sound of her short, shallow breaths fills the room.

"Are you quite finished?" Snape's very unconcerned voice comes from behind the newspaper he's holding in front of his face while sitting comfortably in a leather armchair across the room.

Bella snorts loudly, crossing her arms over her chest; the bandages wrapped around them scratch against the tender skin of still-fresh wounds, making her wince in pain. Snape casually flips through the pages of the Daily Prophet, a satisfied smirk tugging at the corners of his thin lips.

Bellatrix responds by slowly dragging her fingernails back and forth over her wrapped up forearms; a childish dare she cannot help.

"Leave them alone." His raspy-voiced reprimand follows promptly, just as expected.

"But they itch."

He rolls his eyes at Bella's whiny tone. "Then you should have thought about that before hurting yourself, shouldn't you?"

"Fuck you, Snape." She spats. "Why are you still here anyway?"

"Because, apparently, you need someone to babysit you so you don't go and try to kill yourself." Sounds of paper edges slicing through the air.

"I-" She stares at him wide-eyed, speechless. "I wasn't trying to kill myself!" She blurts out.

"But of course, you were just feeling a little itchy, weren't you?" He drawls mockingly.

Bella's nostrils flare.

Snape lowers the newspaper he's holding, folding it carefully before placing it on a nearby table. His pale, bony fingers curl around a glass of firewhisky. He brings it to his smirking lips and takes a long sip, his obsidian irises never leaving Bella's smoldering ones.

"How dare you?" She asks in a dangerously low-toned hiss.

"Always the little ingrate." He has never looked more relaxed, taking his time with the next sip of the amber liquid.

"How dare you? I am no child, you can't talk to me like that! Fourteen years... for fourteen years I've had nothing but myself in Azkaban! No one was there, no one cared." Bellatrix looks away, the room and its other occupant now unfocused. Tears return to veil her eyes; trapped there, they won't fall. Visions play out on the glassy surface and when she speaks again, her voice sounds like it's coming from far away places. "Death was all I could smell while I crawled in the darkness, it was the only promise the Dementors offered me, the air becoming rich with its sweetness. I could almost taste it. A promise they would break every time. And I crawled to the edge so many times, curled up there, frozen, half-dead but still not quite ready to die."

Bella's head whips around, her eyes are ablaze with rage and accusation when they lock with his. The tiniest shiver runs down the dark-haired wizard's spine but all she can see is the same old hard-faced man.

"How could you know how that feels, Snape?"

And yet he does. But she cannot know, he won't tell. He never tells.

The glass he was holding joins the newspaper on the table with a soft clink. It rests there, almost completely empty.

"How could you ever understand me?" This time he can almost hear the crack in her voice. "You who were here all the time, perfectly safe, standing at the old fool's side! You turned your back on the Dark Lord while I sacrificed everything in his name!"

Bellatrix is panting, the force of her own words hitting her square in the chest, leaving Snape unharmed. And his eyes are already gleaming, knowing it's his turn to lash out.

"Are we having regrets, Bellatrix?" A raised eyebrow and a snide look on his face, he gets up from his chair.

She holds her breath, nails digging into the crumpled bedsheets pooling at her sides.

"Poor, little, wounded thing." He drawls wryly, drawing nearer to her bed. "Does it hurt? Does it hurt to know he would have simply let you die after all you gave him?"

If looks could kill...

"Because it really shouldn't." He stops in front of the bed, ignoring her threatening hisses. "We're nothing to him, we all know that. We live to serve. We want to please him, yes, but only to be spared the pain of his punishment. We pray to die before having to witness his wrath. That's how we survive. But you... You have always been a fool, Bellatrix. You grew fond of him, you started craving his praises for all the wrong reasons."

Bella's upper lip twitches, jagged teeth now bare.

Still, Snape goes on. "Fear is what keeps us all faithful. What is it that stopped you from running away, I wonder? Love? No, I don't think so. But whatever it was, now you think it's gone."

Yes. Bella silently breathes out, her swollen heart wishing the truth could wither on Snape's faded lips. But there's more to come.

"Do you think you hate him?" He snickered. "You don't. You still got the smell of hope about you. You will kneel for yet another chance to make him proud. I sure wouldn't want to be in your sister's place, the biggest threat underneath this roof being her own family. You are a fool and Lucius is a coward; Narcissa is also vulnerable, because of the two of you."

Bellatrix doesn't hesitate to deliver her sharp answer.

"Don't you speak her name."

Snape studies Bella's ashen face, the twitch in her jaw, her quivering lips, the dark pink rims around her nostrils... the hurt she's trying so hard to bury behind the hard look in her eyes.

"You think you're angry with her." A statement, not a question.

The only sound in the room that of Bella's clenched teeth pressing against each other.

"I am angry with her. She turned her back on me." There, she said it. Where were you, Narcissa? Damn. Where are you?

Chasing thoughts of her sister inside of her mind, she doesn't notice Snape sitting down on the edge of the bed. Too close. She lets Narcissa go.

She eyes him warily and draws her knees up to her chest, hugging herself tight.

"You're angry with yourself because you've scared her away." His voice betrays no emotion; she doesn't trust her own to do the same.

"You saw her standing there, did you not?"

Bellatrix flinches. She tries to picture the blond witch standing in the doorway. Of course she remembers seeing her, how could she forget that beautiful vision, but was she really there? Maybe that's all she was, a vision. Nothing more. Her sister in the flesh would have stayed, she would've not run away... would she?

Looking back though, many years ago now, Bellatrix finds her answer. Narcissa has always feared her.

Snape's waiting.

"I... I couldn't see the blood. And then it was there, all over my skin. I thought my eyes were tricking me, I thought... I thought she wasn't really there in the end, that I'd only imagined her."

"She did come to see you." Snape quietly confirms.

Bella's heart stops. "How can I trust you?"

"You can't. But you can trust her. You know your sister, deep down inside. You know she'd come."

Why is he doing this? Bellatrix asks herself. Why is he telling me these things? Surely not to make me feel better. No, it's Snape we're talking about; he always follows his own agenda. Is he hoping I will trust him from now on? Is he hoping I will betray the Dark Lord?

She doesn't need his reasons, she decides. She has made up her mind.

"Show me."

Snape is taken aback by her request, she can tell. "You can't trust my memories more than you can trust me."

"I need to see her."

"I could feed you lies".

"I'd swallow them gladly." Her own words surprise her.

"Just to see her again?"

"Just to see her again."

Maybe trust is overrated, for there they sit, Severus Snape before Bellatrix Lestrange. He doesn't trust her. She doesn't trust him. And yet he lets her inside his mind and she dives deep into the beckoning darkness.

And he shows her.

AN: My biggest thanks to all those who were kind enough to review or even silently read this far. I'm sorry, I cannot promise the next updates will be regular and frequent. What I can promise however is that I'm doing my best to carve out some time on my working schedule to write this story, which I love. Unfortunately, writing in English takes longer to me since it's not my first language. And yeah, well, I'm a little slow in general xD Hopefully some of you will bear with me and together we'll see what fate awaits our dear Bella :)

I love Snape, sorry if you feel like he's too present but I think Bellatrix needs him right now; he's the only one who can push her to the limit and make her see things for what they truly are. Don't worry, Narcissa will have more space. I long to write about her.

As always, all mistakes are mine, sorry about that.