A/N: Ok, admittedly shorter than the last chapter, but that one I wanted to finish in one chapter and this...well, the cutoff point was one of those moments that requires a chapter end. For all translations of Latin phrases see the 'Foreign Words and Phrases' section of a Merriam-Webster dictionary. Otherwise I haven't much else to say.
Incidentally, about Harry...um...well...Just because he isn't really that smart (Now, don't give me that look, we all know it's true) doesn't mean he can't be nice at times. Or mean. Or whatever. But I still agree that punching him would be infinitely fun, albeit infinitely improbable.
Oh yeah: hi everyone out there who has this on a favorites/alert list and hasn't reviewed...Hi...Are you starting to feel guilty...? (Not those of you who review about half the time, which is nice, but those of you who just...don't review. Yeah.)
So, without further ado:
The exact second Bellacine walked into Gryffindor Tower, Hermione dragged her to an empty corner of the common room and proceeded to read her the riot act.
"Where have you been all this time, Bellacine- two weeks? - you just run away!"
"I was in Russia. I'm allowed to visit my friends for Christmas, aren't I? I don't remember there being a law saying I have to tell you every single thing I do!" she replied scathingly.
"Oh? And isn't it a bit- funny- that you decided to run right after Fudge left the Three Broomsticks? Why did you run, especially if you hadn't done anything? Or did you go off somewhere and- and get a cursed Firebolt? Was that you?" Hermione's eyes flashed dangerously but she managed to keep her voice level.
"A Firebolt?" echoed Bellacine.
Hermione spat, "Yes! A Firebolt! You knew about that, admit it! You're trying to- to- to kill Harry or something! Just because your father's a murderer-"
Bellacine's face turned ashen with shock. "I don't want Harry dead. You know that. And I told you months ago, my father is dead. I admit it; he was a Death Eater too, but…." How could she think I want Harry dead? How could she, when that half-breed--? she thought.
"Dead! Ha! You liar!"
"Liar?" she echoed, bemused. But…her father was dead, wasn't he? What on earth did she mean?
"You just don't want to admit it," Hermione said mockingly. "So instead you make up a slew of lies because you're- I don't know- ashamed or you want us to be friends with you so you can betray us too, or something. You just don't want to admit it- that your father is Sirius Black!"
Stupid mudblood Bellacine thought, mouth agape, as Hermione stormed up to the girls' dorm. But she managed not to say it.
Harry found her standing there, dead still and glaring at the staircase Hermione had departed up, a few minutes later. "Hi," he said nonchalantly. "How was your Christmas?"
This being a completely different approach from the welcome she had expected, Bellacine was thrown off her guard. Careful to keep her voice as emotionless as possible, she said, "Aren't you going to accuse me of everything under the sun too?"
Harry asked what she was talking about.
"Let me see," she said in mock wonderment. "There's some bizarre thing involving a Firebolt, what brooms have to do with the world at large I don't know, my uncle, oh, and apparently I'm under some kind of house arrest courtesy Hermione Granger."
He frowned. "What does Malfoy's dad have to do with the Firebolt? He bought the Slytherin team Nimbus 2001s last year, he wouldn't buy me a Firebolt even if he is rich-"
"Okay. Malfoy- Lucius Malfoy, yes?" She waited until Harry nodded. "He doesn't have anything to do with this, I meant my other uncle."
"Your other uncle-?"
Bellacine sighed abjectly. Someone Up There was working against her, getting her stuck in this conversation the minute she came back. All she really wanted was to go to bed, have Hermione, Ron, and Harry miraculously forget the events of the Three Broomsticks and forgive her, and to kill Lupin very dead. "Sirius Black."
Harry's jaw dropped open in shock, and she winced, knowing what was coming next: Traitor, murderer, Death Eater, and everything he could throw at her would be true.
"Harry, please, he's only just my uncle, I've never even met him before cos he was in Azkaban most of my life and before that my dad, his brother, they never really got along so I've never even seen him or anything, I don't think he even knows I exist, and, well, I'm not...not like him," she finished, lamely.
He shrugged. "Yeah, I know you're not. We've all been friends with you for almost half a year, it doesn't really matter. I know that you're, er, really not bad." What he was saying was also as close as he'd ever get to apologising for the Three Broomsticks. Rather than being offended, Bellacine was personally glad he hadn't brought it up.
She visibly relaxed, and Harry gave her the Saga of the Firebolt, with all Hermione's suspicions and McGonagall's lack of understanding. Oliver Wood, the Gryffindor Keeper and the team captain, overheard Harry, and he went into even further detail, reiterating the Saga of Random People Trying to Kill Me, and the Saga of McGonagall Just Not Getting this Whole Quidditch Thing.
"I'll go and talk to her, Harry," promised Wood. "I'll make her see reason...A Firebolt...a real Firebolt, on our team...She wants Gryffindor to win just as much as we do...I'll make her see sense. A Firebolt..."
"Wow," Bellacine muttered as Wood wandered off. "Someone's obsessed."
Harry told her about his pep talks before Quidditch games. She actually considered banging her head against the wall.
Bellacine noticed that most people had a strong tendency to treat her as if she didn't exist, but there were a few people (previously Hermione, and now Harry) who were decent. That and visiting Anya and Vasily gave her a confidence boost strong enough to put up with anything. Even a werewolf.
Everyone resumed school the next Monday, in the midst of a snowstorm; a nice sort of storm compared to Durmstrang weather. The mood heading out to Care of Magical Creatures was apprehensive to say the least- what if Hagrid procured some vicious, cold-loving, flesh-eating creature for them to study next?—but they were perfectly fine, as were the salamanders. In Divination the third-years began palmistry. Hermione and Bellacine remained partners, so Hermione retaliated by making an exception to her 'Divination is a load of worthless lies' rule and started prophesising Bellacine's death every other day. Aside from that, Hermione ignored her.
Bellacine took great care to always be in the Defence Against the Dark Arts room before Harry arrived, and to always be the last to leave. She just knew Lupin was going to try something one day.
So when Harry remembered to ask Lupin about the anti-dementor lessons, she packed her bag as slowly as she could.
"Ah, yes, let me see," said Lupin. "How about eight o'clock in Thursday evening? The History of Magic classroom should be large enough...I'll have to think carefully about how we're going to do this...We can't bring a real dementor into the school, of course..."
Harry thanked Lupin, and left. Bellacine saw him join up with Ron, who had waited behind for him. They headed away down the corridor without stopping for her. She finished packing hurriedly and strode to the door.
"Bellacine, may I have a word with you?" asked Lupin. She pretended not to hear him. "Bellacine, it's about teaching you separately."
"I shall be perfectly fine on my own, thank you," she retorted with mock politeness. She edged towards the door, one hand inside her pocket for her wand.
"Ah," Lupin said softly. "Well, then, that shouldn't be a problem. I won't be able to teach you- I think you know enough already, you are certainly ahead of your own class-"
Suddenly Bellacine felt a mad desire to laugh. So she did. "You see," she said dryly, "I know too much. All my life I've known too much. I've always been like this; rarely is any provision made. And I'm not going to pretend I don't know anything when I do." She was of course referencing what she knew about Lupin, but he didn't need to know that, that was suicide. Instead she stared into his eyes; it would have been a glare but for the fact that she wasn't frowning, exactly.
"I will not be able to teach you, Bellacine; however, I will give you a chance to use what you know- better, I think, than practicing on your own. I want you to help me teach Harry to make a Patronus. It might be easier for him if there's someone his own age there who can also manage it."
She mulled it over quickly. All Bellacine's instincts shouted No! as loudly as possible, but the rational part of her mind said Deal with it. Help Harry out and stay in the classroom during lessons and if that werewolf tries anything you'll kill him. Act like nothing is wrong and you'll be safer. "Fine, I'll do it."
"Thank you, Bellacine."
She nodded stiffly and said, "May I go now?" Without waiting for a response, she left. Werewolf. She didn't want to hear anything he had to say, to her or anyone else, because nothing could assuage the crime of what he was.
Bellacine and Harry arrived at the History of Magic classroom before Lupin, who showed up five minutes later clutching a large packing case.
"What's that?" asked Harry.
"Another boggart," Lupin explained. "I've been combing the castle ever since Tuesday and very luckily, I found this one lurking inside Mr. Filch's filing cabinet. It's the nearest we'll get to a real dementor. The boggart will turn into a dementor when he sees you, so you'll be able to practice on him. I can store him in my office when you're not using him; there's a cupboard under my desk he will like."
"Okay," said Harry uncertainly, and she could tell he was much more frightened than he let on to be. "Professor, why's Bella here?"
Lupin began: "I am going to teach you a charm, Harry, that will be like an anti-dementor. Now, this charm is well beyond Ordinary Wizarding Level. It is called the Patronus Charm-"
"So why are you here, Bella? And, Professor, what's the Patronus Charm do?" interrupted Harry.
"In answer to your second question, it creates a Patronus. This is a sort of anti-dementor, a guardian that will stand between you and a dementor. Bellacine is here because she knows how to make one."
"You do?"
Bellacine sighed, but it was all for theatrics. "Remember the first day of Dark- I mean, Defence Against the Dark Arts? When the boggart turned into a dementor"-After whatever happened when it wasn't there for a few moments she mused- "That was the Patronus Charm I used, the little silver thing."
"The little silvery thing that looked sort of like a...a cat?"
"Yeah, Harry, you need to be more observant...it was a cat." And please, please don't go into that any farther, you idiot, no one's supposed to know. Because if you actually were observant, maybe you'd catch on that that is a WEREWOLF!
"Expecto patrono- no, patronum, sorry- expecto patronum, expecto patronum--" Harry chanted. A bit of silvery gas, like cold air but shiny, rushed from his wand.
Amateur thought Bellacine coldly.
"Did you see that? Something happened!" Harry said excitedly.
"Very good," said Lupin. "Are you ready to try it on a real dementor?"
Harry nodded stiffly; it was patently obvious he no less wanted to hear his parents' death again than she wanted to be in this room, with Lupin, a werewolf, when Ilya had been killed—She gasped suddenly, realising that whilst Harry would hear his parents, dying, she would hear Ilya dying, slowly, here, now- she couldn't stand it, not in this room, not with Lupin—
"Expecto patronum!" shouted Harry. "Expecto patronum! Expecto-"
"Please, Bella, it hurts...oh god, it hurts, please Bella, kill me, let it stop...it hurts...oh god..."
"Ilya, you're not going to die! Ilya, Ilya, you're fine, you'll live, just stand up- I think your leg might be broken, it looks that way, but you're not going to die..."
"I am going to die, Bella...I'm dying."
"No! Ilya, you're going to live! You've got to live!"
"No, Bella, I won't make it...you've got to live for me. You still have a chance now...I'm already almost gone...Live, whatever it takes, just live...Remember me."
The room grew clearer again like someone had flipped a light switch. Harry lay on the floor- she couldn't tell if he was unconscious, or had fallen, or worse- and Lupin, Lupin the werewolf was bent over him. She knew- she k new- he had come to kill Harry just like Greyback killed Ilya- She felt a sudden surge of hate- aimed at Lupin—
"Av-" she started to shout, and then Bellacine realised precisely what she was doing: If anything were to alert Lupin to the fact she knew, this would certainly be it- killing someone, or attempting to kill them, can be painfully obvious...She jerked her wand down, and a jet of greenish-blue light hit a desk in the front row.
It blew up.
Harry finally woke up, shakily grasping the desk next to the ashy remains of the other and pulling himself to his feet. "Sorry," he muttered, "I'm okay."
Bellacine surreptitiously poked the air and hissed "Reparo"; the desk reassembled itself. Had Lupin noticed--?
Lupin handed Harry a Chocolate Frog. "Here- eat this before we try again. I didn't expect you to do it your first time; in fact, I would have been astounded if you had."
"It's getting worse," said Harry, eating the Frog. "I could hear louder that time- and him- Voldemort..."
"Harry, if you don't want to continue, I will more than understand-" began Lupin.
Harry replied fiercely that if he couldn't conjure a Patronus Gryffindor would lose any hope of winning the Quidditch Cup. She herself thought Quidditch was a rather inane reason to want to learn a Patronus, but to each his own.
"I know," Lupin said. "Bellacine, how are you doing? Are the dementors bothering you...badly, I mean...you don't have to-"
"I'm fine, Professor," she snapped. "Absolutely wonderfully fantastically fine." Harry gave her a sceptical look, but she dodged his gaze and pretended not to see.
And she kept on hearing Ilya dying, again and again, not daring to tell anyone a single thing she suspected or knew, because she couldn't trust a one. Hermione and Ron avoided or ignored her; the rest of the school (except Slytherin) avoided her as well- in all likelihood they too thought Sirius Black was her father, the idiots, and were afraid of her. She had no desire to begin 'hanging out' with the Slytherins. She'd gotten herself stuck in Gryffindor and she at least would remain there.
Oh yes, life really was lovely.
"Harry?" she asked tentatively. It was right after the Slytherin-Ravenclaw Quidditch game (Slytherin, it transpired, had won. Bellacine really couldn't care less.) which she had skipped, instead staking out the best spot in the common room to do her homework. Harry was the first person back from the pitch.
"Yeah? What is it?" he said anxiously. "I don't want to try a Patronus any more than we do with Professor Lupin, let's not practice that-"
"No, it's not that. I...well, I was wondering if..." How was she going to ask this without sounding suspicious? "Well, I was wondering if you knew anything at all about Sirius before he went to Azkaban since he's your godfather and because he's my uncle but I don't know anything about him really I thought maybe you might or you might know someone who—"
"Whoa, calm down," he ordered. "Er, I don't know that much about him aside from what we'd heard in Hogsmeade and that he was best man at my parents' wedding. I- I have a picture from that, if you like."
Bellacine looked down- she felt almost ashamed, asking, but in a way she had to. "Can I see it?"
"I'll go get it," he said at once, without giving her That Look. "Wait here, I'll bring it down."
He went up the stairs to the boys' dormitories and returned a few minutes later with a brown leather-bound photo album; brushing past the others who had returned to the common room he found a chair beside her, sat, and paged through the album. Eventually he came to a picture obviously taken at a wedding.
The man standing next to the groom had black hair and grey eyes, like his brother, like herself. His face was as smoothly arrogant as her father's, as her own. He was laughing.
"It doesn't really say much," Harry said, "but that's what he looked like before Azkaban, if you were wondering. He-er, he looks kind of like you. Don't take that the wrong way," he hurriedly advised, as she had bolted upright and opened her mouth defensively. "I just meant that he does, that there's some family resemblance there, is all. That's why Hermione thinks he's your dad, because you look alike. I didn't mean anything bad by it."
Bellacine shrugged, tight-lipped. "So those are your parents, then? The great Lily and James Potter?"
"Yeah," he said quietly.
"You know," she continued, settling back, "I have pictures of my parents too. But it's different when your parents aren't Lily and James Potter."
"Voldemort killed them too, didn't he?"
Bellacine shook her head. "No, I never implicitly said he killed them, I said they died because of him."
Harry, who had almost interrupted in confusion, asked, "What's the difference?"
"The difference between you and me," she said quietly. Now, she decided, was the good time for an exit. So she did.
Harry's fourth Patronus lesson (or whatever you would call it) was just as bad as the first three. He still only managed- at the most- an indistinct silver shadow or puff of pearly smoke, but at least he was past passing out. Occasionally Bellacine would make a Patronus just to shut up the voices in her head.
"I thought a Patronus would charge down the dementors or something," he said disappointedly. "At least make them disappear-"
"The true Patronus does that," said Lupin. "But you've achieved a great deal in a very short space of time. If the dementors put in an appearance at your next Quidditch match you will be able to keep them at bay long enough to get back to the ground."
Bellacine clenched her fists and stared fixedly at a spot some feet away, scenes in her mind playing that she had no wish to ever see again.
"Here- you've earned a drink," Lupin said, smiling. How could he be smiling? "Something from the Three Broomsticks. You won't have tried it before, Harry-" He pulled three bottles of butterbeer from his briefcase.
"Butterbeer!" exclaimed Harry, idiot that he was. "Yeah, I like that—" He broke off when Bellacine kicked him under the table. Lupin cocked an eyebrow at them.
"Ron and Hermione would bring us some back from Hogsmeade," Bellacine said hurriedly, "and I brought some back from the Underground."
"The Underground?" asked Harry
She sighed dramatically whilst giving Harry a glare that told him in no uncertain terms not to ask questions. "St. Petersburg Underground, Harry, I was there this Christmas to visit my friends. I told you all of this when I came back, remember?"
"Oh, right." Harry took a bottle from Lupin.
"I see," he said, his expression remaining suspicious. "Well, let's drink to a Gryffindor victory against Ravenclaw! Not that I'm supposed to take sides, as a teacher, but…."
They sat in silence for a while, until Harry suddenly wondered, "What's under a dementor's hood?"
Lupin slowly lowered his bottle. "Well, the only people who really know are in no condition to tell us. You see, the dementor lowers its hood only to use its last and worst weapon."
"What's that?"
"They call it the Dementor's Kiss," said Lupin, smiling ironically. "It's what dementors do when they wish to destroy something utterly. I suppose there must be some kind of mouth under there, because they clamp their jaws, as such, on the mouth of the victim and- and suck out his soul."
Bellacine gasped slightly and dug her nails into her palms to keep herself from saying something she'd regret. To think it was her family in there. They were the ones slowly going insane there, they were the ones hearing every day the equivalent of what she heard once a week. And it was her family's souls that could be drawn out through their mouths any time.
She wondered how it felt.
"He deserves it," said Harry suddenly, and she knew him to be talking about Sirius Black.
"You think so?" Lupin said lightly. "Do you really think anyone deserves that?"
"Yes," said Harry, "for some things…."
And then Bellacine decided that she didn't much care if she said something she'd regret and went ahead and said, "No."
"What?"
"No," she repeated firmly. "No one deserves that. They're all human. They're only human. People aren't evil, people aren't something you can look at and label 'evil' or 'good' because people change. If you're destroying their souls, or having their souls destroyed, which is just as bad, then they can't change. Ever. Nothing gives anyone- anyone or anything- the right to do something like that." She stood, finished the last of her butterbeer in one gulp, dropped it in the wastebasket, and walked off.
"What's up with her?" she heard Harry ask the werewolf.
She heard Lupin sigh. "I think her family-"
Bellacine stalked back to the now-closed door and slammed open the door into the wall. "There is a saying, homo sum: humani nil a me alienum puto." Harry looked at her uncomprehendingly. "There are very many people in the world who can't agree with the second half of that statement. There are some people in the world who not only cannot concur with the second, but also cannot concur with the first." Bellacine kept her eyes on Lupin's when she said this; he blinked in shock and looked away. As good as a confession. She knew, he knew, he knew she knew, she knew he knew she knew.
As she returned to Gryffindor Tower, she wondered what on Earth had possessed her to practically tell Lupin she knew he was a werewolf. Practically telling him he wasn't human. Well, he wasn't…what was she supposed to do?
Gryffindor won the next Quidditch match- this time against Ravenclaw- and the victory was even sweeter, for Draco, Crabbe, Goyle, and Marcus Flint, the Slytherin captain all dressed up as dementors in an attempt at sabotage. Harry had thought they were real dementors, and managed to make something very close to a Patronus, the closest he had ever managed.
She hadn't bothered to tell Lupin Patronuses were easier if you weren't concentrating completely on the task at hand; better to have your mind on something else- less time to worry.
There was a rowdy party in the common room that night, with Fred and George and a friend of theirs, Lizzie, mysteriously vanishing and reappearing half an hour later, their arms full of butterbeer and sweets. Hermione, the only person not enjoying the festivities, sat in a corner chair with an enormous hardcover, Home Life and Social Habits of British Muggles. Harry went over to have a word with her, and she appeared to be developing a slightly more agreeable mood, when Ron said loudly,
"If Scabbers hadn't just been eaten he could have had some of those Fudge Flies. He used to really like them-"
Hermione burst into tears and fled to the dormitory. Bellacine almost followed her upstairs, then decided not to: it wasn't like Hermione was any more likely to be civil now.
The party only ended at one in the morning when Professor McGonagall showed up (in tartan dressing gown) and ordered them all to go to bed, and go to bed now. Bellacine, who had found a post in one of the armchairs away from the fire didn't have the energy or the urge to get up, so remained she there. She set her wand and a few textbooks on the table and considered studying. Apparently butterbeer didn't contain much in the way of caffeine, because she was soon fast asleep, dreaming.
She was on the foredeck of the main ship, the Hesperus, with Anya, Vasily, his friends, and some of the others. She recognized the scene, it was the first day of school the previous year. Bellacine kept asking everyone where Ilya was, but no one even seemed to hear her. Finally Vasily said to her, "He doesn't exist. He doesn't exist because you forgot about him. He told you to remember him and you haven't. You don't care about any of them, you just forget them once they're out of your life." Bellacine turned away, and saw a large wave bearing down on the ship. Someone behind her shouted, and she shot awake.
There were footsteps pounding down the staircase from the boys' rooms. She slowly stood up. Then the door slammed open and a black-haired man dashed into the room.
"Bellatrix?" he asked, his voice croaky and stiff from lack of use. An insane smile started to light his skeletal face.
It was Sirius Black. She was so dead.
"No- no- not me," she gasped. Bellacine felt for her wand and realised it wasn't there. Black held a knife in one thin hand. "Please don't kill me," she whispered desperately. I'm dead. I'm so dead.
They both froze as footsteps began to pound again overhead.
"I have no intention of killing you," he croaked.
They heard loud, anxious voices.
Black picked up a thin piece of wood from the table. Her wand. She'd set it there.
"I really am sorry..this is for your own good, whoever you are. You won't remember ever seeing me. I'll wipe your memory, I'll even leave the wand here.
"Stupefy!"
As he ran from the room, Bellacine fell slowly backward, already unconscious.
