Bellatrix blinked her eyes open to see the face of a snake.
Nagini. She smiled a little and pet the snake's head, whispering,
"Where's your master gone?"
Nagini lowered her head and nudged at a little scrap of parchment. Bellatrix frowned and picked it up, seeing neat handwriting upon it.
Dinner. Tonight at eight. Downstairs.
Bellatrix's heart thumped in her chest, and she raised her eyes to Nagini. She stared right into the snake's dark, mysterious eye, and she wondered aloud,
"Is he fond of me, d'you think? I wish he were. I'm awfully fond of him."
The rest of the day passed interminably. Bellatrix found herself staring out a window in the library for over an hour, watching frigid rain fall outside. Finally she decided she was going to walk outside, despite the cold. She headed down the main staircase in a heavy waterproofed cloak, and she heard from behind her,
"Bella? Where are you going?"
"Rodolphus." Bellatrix turned round and sighed. "What are you doing here?"
He scowled. "I'm here getting orders from the Dark Lord. Training myself again so I can serve him. Fourteen years in Azkaban makes one a bit rusty with a wand, you know."
"Need some help practising?" Bellatrix asked, and Rodolphus cocked up an eyebrow.
"You're going to duel me?"
"To help you practise," she repeated, and Rodolphus smirked and nodded. He walked outside with Bellatrix, and then he said,
"You're really lovely like this. Young. I do feel a bit odd, having a wife who's so much younger than me."
"I'm not your wife," Bellatrix said firmly. When Rodolphus looked angry, she clarified, "I'm not even nineteen; I'm not married. I haven't lived through our wedding or our marriage."
"But we did get married," Rodolphus told her as they stepped out into the gardens. The waterproofed cloak did little good against the freezing rain, and Bellatrix shivered as she insisted,
"No. You married me after I left my time. The forty-five-year-old me vanished months ago. You and I - this me - we were never married. I'm sorry, Rodolphus, but I'm not your wife."
He seemed far more excited about duelling her at that. Rodolphus looked irritated as he took his place on the sopping dead grass, and he bowed perfunctorily. Bellatrix mimicked the motion and then held her wand up.
"Ducklifors!" Rodolphus cried, slashing his wand downward. There was a flash of yellow light, but Bellatrix quickly blocked the spell and scowled.
"Trying to turn me into a damned duck, Rodolphus? Really. Ebublio."
Rodolphus looked shocked as a large bubble of water formed from the falling rain, encompassing him entirely. He thrashed against the water and then went still for a moment, and Bellatrix was mildly concerned he might drown. Then she saw a blast of orange, fiery light and realised he'd cast a Blasting Curse from inside the bubble. It burst at once, sending water cascading all around him. He was completely drenched then as he aimed his wand at Bellatrix, but she made a careful mark of winding squares with sharp corners and incanted,
"Tetraplegus!"
Rodolphus collapsed at once, his limbs giving out on him. Bellatrix watched him drop his wand, and she cried,
"Expelliarmus!"
The wand came soaring at her, whizzing through the air, and she caught it deftly with her left hand. She watched as her Tetraplegus Hex started to wear off, as Rodolphus very slowly and clumsily made his way onto his knees.
"Ah… yes…" he panted, sounding desperate for air. "Your old favourite. I should have known."
Bellatrix shut her eyes tightly. This was all so much to take in. Voldemort and Rodolphus both had vivid memories of her using a spell she'd only learnt the night before. She shook her head a little and aimed her wand at him.
"Finite Incantatem."
Rodolphus stood more quickly then, and Bellatrix approached him, holding his wand out.
"Fair to say you won that duel, I suppose," he told her, shivering like mad as he took his wand. "I think I'll head home. You probably don't know where that is."
"Castle Lestrange, I reckon." Bellatrix had grown up in the Pureblood world. She at least knew where the families lived. Rodolphus shook his head and frowned.
"No. Rabastan has the castle. You and I lived in a townhouse in London. A pretty place… nice and airy."
"I wouldn't know," Bellatrix reminded him, and he tightened his lips.
"No. You wouldn't know. Thanks for the practise, Bella."
She watched him make his way out of the gardens and through the gate, where he Disapparated. Then there was movement in a window, and Bellatrix snapped her face up to see Voldemort staring out of his office onto the grounds below. When she caught his scarlet eyes, he nodded once and turned away. Bellatrix pushed her soaked hair from her eyes and turned to walk inside, thinking that perhaps she ought to make herself look decent for dinner.
Bellatrix was exceedingly anxious as she headed down the winding stairs in the corner of the manor. Nagini followed close behind; she'd stayed near Bellatrix as she'd put Sleekeazy's in her hair and carefully applied mascara and lipstick. She'd put on a black gown with flowing, pleated silk skirts - a treasure she'd found in the trunk Narcissa had provided for her. It had been a bit too long, so she'd hemmed it carefully with her wand. Narcissa was a few inches taller.
Bellatrix carefully approached the dining room. This was what he'd meant by 'downstairs,' surely? Perhaps the Malfoys would be there. Or perhaps they'd already eaten. Bellatrix gulped and stepped into the room, and Voldemort rose slowly from the chair where he was sitting. His red eyes flashed wildly as they panned up and down her form, and he said softly,
"You certainly dressed to the nines. Sit."
Bellatrix did, feeling rather far away from him, even just across the width of the table. She unfolded her napkin and put it on her lap, and she cleared her throat as roasted beets with goat cheese and greens appeared before her. She sipped a little at her white wine and waited for Voldemort to take the first bite. After he did, Bellatrix smiled a little and told him,
"I quite like beetroot."
"I know," Voldemort said simply. Bellatrix couldn't keep her eyes from burning then. She studied his hands as he ate. They were so long and pale, so odd, almost alien in their form. But she remembered the feel of him touching her hair and scalp, of him massaging her breast and touching her between her legs…
She finished her first course and set her fork down. Both her food and Voldemort's disappeared, and he informed her,
"The new House-Elf here… he's a fair cook."
"Yes, it does seem so, Master," Bellatrix agreed.
"I saw you duelling Rodolphus," Voldemort said tightly, sipping from his wine. Bellatrix nodded.
"Yes. You were watching."
"You used the Tetraplegus Hex," he noted, "as well as a few other quite clever spells. You're ready for combat. He is not."
"Well, he's spent fourteen years in prison, My Lord," Bellatrix said, "with all due respect."
"And you're a teenager," he said sharply. "Neither of you should be ready, but you are. You're ready. I have a job for you."
"Is that why you asked me to dinner, Master?" Bellatrix wondered, and he gave her a serious look as he reminded her,
"I did not ask you to dinner. I instructed you on a place and time to be. There's a difference. And, no, it isn't why we're having dinner together. Do you want to serve me or not, Bellatrix?"
She ignored the way roasted goat and potatoes had appeared on her plate, and she insisted,
"I do want to serve you, Master. More than anything anyone's ever wanted."
"So eager." Voldemort smiled a little as he dragged the pad of his middle finger around the rim of his wine glass. "You have always been lovely in your eagerness, Bella."
That made her breath catch. She finally managed to whisper, "How may I serve you, My Lord?"
"Do you remember… I told you what your first work for me was," Voldemort said, cutting a bite of roasted goat. He chewed it and sipped from his wine, and Bellatrix nodded.
"You said that I killed Muggles for you, to instill fear in the Ministry."
"Well, it's time for a little more fear." Voldemort put a roast potato in his mouth, swallowed it, and said, "There's a Mudblood called Barney Plattley. He has a Muggle wife and an adult son, a Squib. They live in Lancashire. I want you to take the trio out and cast my Mark in the sky."
Bellatrix smiled as her main course disappeared and was replaced by a honey and pine nut tart. She grinned at Voldemort and asked him,
"When will I kill them, Master?"
"Next week," he said. "Do you suppose you can do it?"
"Of course I can!" she cried indignantly. Voldemort smirked and ate a bite of his tart.
"Of course you can," he said quietly. Bellatrix scarfed down three bites of tart inelegantly and made a noise of immense satisfaction at the taste of the dessert. Voldemort seemed to be watching her quite closely, and he asked,
"You like the tart, do you?"
"Mmm-hmm," Bellatrix nodded. Voldemort gave her a knowing look and informed her,
"It was served at a party once and you were practically moaning over it. After that, I had it for you whenever I could."
Bellatrix froze. She swallowed the bite in her mouth and washed it down with a swig of white wine. She set the glass down and said firmly,
"I will kill the Mudblood and his useless family for you. I would kill a hundred thousand Muggles for you. I would burn every forest, flatten every town. I will cast your Mark in the sky over and over. I will never stop until it's all yours, until they've all prostrated themselves to you."
Voldemort nodded and sipped slowly from his wine. "My eager little creature."
His eager little creature. Bellatrix blinked. He seemed unaffected as he set his wine down and told her,
"We had dinner in this room dozens of times. Just you and I. And I always let you choose the menu."
"Did I choose beetroot, roasted goat, and honey tart?" Bellatrix asked, and Voldemort dragged his finger over the rim of his glass again.
"Sometimes," he said, his voice far more gentle than anything she'd heard from him. He breathed slowly through the slits on his face and then said, "Sometimes you chose fennel salad and seared scallops. One time, I told you I didn't feel much like seafood, so you requested my own favourite. Pork shoulder. But we always, always had the honey and pine nut tart. It was… tasting it again is rather nostalgic, I'll admit."
He finished his glass of wine and pushed it away.
"I missed you," he said plainly, and Bellatrix felt her lips part. She wasn't sure what to say to that. Before she could speak, he told her, "You can't have missed me, because you hardly knew me before you fell asleep. And the me you knew was different, I know. But I missed you, Bellatrix. Sometimes, I'd be floating along without a body, wandering for a year in a forest without ever hearing a real voice, and the only thing tethering me to a shred of human existence was the memory of you."
Bellatrix pushed her chair back and rose, walking slowly around the table. She approached Voldemort and stood beside his chair. He stared at his empty plate, and she examined the veins of his pale grey, bald head. Her fingers trembled terribly as she reached out and curled her fingers around his shoulder. She stroked him a little there and watched him shut his eyes, and she whispered,
"Thank you for dinner, Master."
He said nothing. She dragged her knuckles up his neck and back down again, all the way over his shoulder and down his arm. She covered his hand with hers on the table and turned her face up to his. He was so close, his lips pale and trembling, looking like she'd cracked him a bit. He smelled like the ocean, sharp and fresh and cold, but his eyes burned like fire. Bellatrix moved a little closer to him and dared to whisper,
"I want you to possess me the way you did in your memories."
He looked shocked then, but Bellatrix nodded and repeated,
"Possess me again, Master. Just like you remember doing."
He blinked and murmured, "Let's go upstairs, Miss Black."
Author's Note: Awwwww, they had a special dessert that was theirs. And Rodolphus is just plain unlikable in this storyverse, no? Raise your hand if you're ready for Voldemort to… possess Bellatrix. Mwah hahaha.
