The leaves had began to change colors. Kirsten used to love the fall. The

beautiful mosaic the leaves would make, the crisp clean air, and perfect

temperature. When she was little she and her friends would spend hours building

a huge pile of leaves to jump in.

But now it sucked.

She had thought she would be relieved when Malfoy left. One less thing to

worry about, certainly. Instead she felt incredibly lonely, and allowances that

Draco Malfoy had made for her were not honored by Bellatrix Lesterange. The first day was the worst. In the summer Malfoy had always been the one to give her the

key to cellar when it was time feed Ollivander and didn't mind if she spent

about fifteen extra minutes talking with him. And if she told Draco that

Ollivander need something like a blanket he would make sure he recieved it.

But the first morning Draco was away at school she had went to Narcissa for

the key only to be told that Bellatrix was keeping it. Her heart had immediately

sunk to the ground. Kirsten tried to avoid that hag like she would the plague.

Kirsten hadn't had the heart to tell Ollivander that it probably wasn't a good

idea for her to sit there and chat when he pressed her for details about what

the weather was like and what it looked outside. After sitting there for about

ten minutes the cellar door had blasted open and in came Bellatrix.

She immediately grabbed Kirsten by the hair and hauled her to her feet;

Kirsten cried out in pain. "Having fun?" Bellatrix hissed at her; shaking Kirsten. "A nice little tea party, you lazy, filthy, good-for-nothing muggle."

Then Bellatrix caught sight of the things laying around the cellar: the blanket,

the pillow, and plate filled with pancakes and bacon. Her fury exploded.

She threw Kirsten so that her head smashed painfully against the wall. Kirsten clung to the wall desperitlly, her vision blurring.

"You no good, lying, scheming piece of shit! What makes you think you can sneak things down here? Or bring him better food than what your supposed to?" Bellatrix kicked the plate sending the food flying.

"They were leftovers," Kirsten snarled back, still leaning against the wall. "From breakfast. They would have been thrown away."

Kirsten was slapped straight across the face. She fell onto the floor.

Bellatrix bent down to grab the blanket and pillow. Something inside Kirsten

snapped. She leapt to her feet. Behind her Ollivander whispered, "Kirsten

don't."

She tried to grab the blanket out Bellatrix's grasp. "You heartless bitch!" Kirsten screamed, "It'll be winter soon. He'll freeze to death without it. And what

use is he to You-Know-Who if he freezes or starves to death!"

No sooner had the words left her mouth when she found herself airborne

colliding with the opposite wall. As she lay on the floor gasping she felt a

familiar pain in her side as she breathed. She meet the gaze of Ollivander, who

was staring at her in horror.

"Crucio!"

Kirsten screamed, and began to wither on the floor. She would have done

anything for the pain to end but Bellatrix continued, and not just with the

cruciatus curse. Bellatrix had many 'inventive' ways for torturing someone. Finally

the stream of spells had stopped. Kirsten lay on the floor taking stock of her

injures: some ribs, and her nose were broken. There were slash marks all over her

body, one of her eyes were swollen shut, and her body in general ached all over

from the cruciatus curse.

"Get up," Bellatrix hissed, kicking Kirsten.

Kirsten blanched at the thought of the pain standing would cause but she

realized that if she disobeyed she would not live long.

Slowly leaning against the wall she stood up, to her shame she began crying.

"Walk upstairs to the kitchen," Bellatrix ordered.

Every breath, every step was horrible. Kirsten could not keep her self from

gasping and groaning in pain. When she reached the kitchen she headed toward the bed but Bellatrix grabbed her by the hair to stop her.

"Oh no, you don't get to go rest. You still have to work." With a wave of her

wand a tub full of warm soapy water and a scrub brush appeared. "Clean the

floors."

Kirsten was in agony as she scurried from one end of the kitchen to the

other. Bellatrix leaning against the counter with her wand out waiting to punish

Kirsten for resting. Kirsten's vision quickly began to get blurry, with black

splotches blacking things out. But she clung to consciousness; afraid of what

Bellatrix would do to her if she passed out. The sickest part though was that as

she cleaned her wounds were dripping blood over the areas she had cleaned.

Kirsten wondered if Bellatrix make her go back and clean the blood in an cycle

that only ended when Kirsten collapsed.

Then Kirsten heard a man's voice say, "Bellatrix, the Dark Lord would like a

word with you."

Kirsten let herself fall to the ground. Her ordeal was over. Bellatrix strode

leisurely over to her. "Remember this you disease infested muggle, you are

nothing better than dog. And a dog that disobeys is beaten and a dog that bits

the hand of its master is killed by its master." With that Bellatrix walked away

and Kirsten let herself surrender to the blackness.

Kirsten became aware that her arm was being held out at an awkward angle, and

something thick and cold was being spread across it. She could tell she was laying on her bed. Slowly she opened her eyes. Sitting on a stool in front of her rubbing some thick, green, odd smelling paste on her arm was the same black haired man who had helped kidnap her.

Absorbed in what he was doing, he didn't immediately realize that she was

awake. Kirsten experimentally toke in a deep breath, and was happy to realize

that there was no sharp pain. Kirsten then examined the man in front of her. The

night she had been kidnapped she'd been so afraid she didn't really notice

anything. She was able to examine him closer now, than she had that night and

realized that in a thesaurus his name (whatever that was) would be an antonym

for pretty. His hair was long and greasy, he had pale sickly looking skin, and a

giant hooked nose.

"You are an idiot." the man said matter of factly, glancing up a Kirsten.

Thank you Captain Obvious, she thought sarcastically but didn't say it aloud.

Talking back had gotten her in this trouble in the first place. She sat there

thinking for a moment, while he bandaged her other arm, before asking, "Why are

you helping me?"

The man glanced back up at her but said nothing. When he finished with her

arm he got up to leave. This surprised Kirsten. She could barely see out of her

left eye and she could tell the rest of her face was heavily bruised. She had

assumed he would fix that as well.

"My face, can't you...?" she began to ask.

"No," the man answered curtly, not looking at her and with that he left the

kitchen.

Kirsten sat there for a moment, lost deep in thought before going over to the

sink to wash the blood from her face. She then went to clean the blood up off

the floor only to find that the floor was sparkling clean.

That didn't make any sense, she had bleed all over the floor. Had the man

cleaned it trying to be kind? But if he was trying to be kind why wouldn't he

fix her face? And why would he want to be kind to her in the first place?

"Kirsten," Narcissa called peering in through the kitchen door.

"Yes Mistress"

"We have guests; bring out the best elf made wine we have and four glasses

and serve us."

"Yes, Mistress." Kirsten answered obediently.

When she reached the living room she found the double oak doors wide open.

Laying on the carpet was the biggest snake she had ever encountered. Sitting in

four armchairs were Bellatrix, Narcissa, the black haired man, and... Kirsten

nearly ran back to the kitchen and barricaded herself inside because the second

guest was Voldemort.

Taking a deep breath she placed the silver platter she was carrying on a

small table next to the door. She poured the glasses and headed toward the

blacked haired man; deliberately procrastinating serving the horrifying monster.

"What are you doing?" Bellatrix snapped loudly at Kirsten. Kirsten jumped

spilling a little bit of wine and winced. She had hoped not to attract

attention.

"What my mistress told me to do." Kirsten answered. She kept her eyes averted

to the ground, shoulders hunched, and her voice soft and quite in hopes to look as a

slave should, stupid and docile.

"Serve the most important guest first," Bellatrix ordered.

Reluctantly Kirsten turned to Voldemort, who picked up a glass without

comment and began to sip it. Kirsten could feel his eyes on her, though. She

then turned back to the man.

"Why Severus," Bellatrix asked, "Would you fix its wounds? How else it

supposed to learn anything?"

Kirsten kept her gaze lowered but listened intently as she served the women

in the room. "As you can see Bellatrix, " Severus said condescending,

"I only healed what was necessity to keep the muggle working and keep her from

bleeding on the carpet."

"Well at least we won't have to put up with it for long. Soon the Ministry of

Magic will be ours and we will be able to control the muggle minister through

the ministry and she won't be any more use to us." Bellatrix commented.

"On the contrary, once we take power she'll be an example to muggles and

wizards alike what a muggles proper place is - in the servitude of wizards."

Severus replied.

"That's true." Voldemort murmured. Kirsten flinched his voice was unnaturally

high and cold.

Kirsten glanced quickly up at Severus. Again he had helped her. "Is there

anything else you need mistress?" Kirsten asked softly wanting nothing more than

to escape from the room.

"No, just leave the wine."

Kirsten placed the bottle on the table in the middle of the room. She had to

move close to the snake who raised its head and hissed at her. She tucked the

platter under arm and began to walk to the door when the high cold voice called

"Wait."

Kirsten froze. "Come here." he ordered.

Slowly she turned around and walked toward him keeping her eyes down.

"This is what caused so much trouble this morning. She seems obedient enough

now." Voldemort mused.

Bellatrix snorted.

He reached up to grab her chin, with pale unnaturally long fingers. Kirsten

gasped and felt her heart race, as he tilted her chin so she was forced to look

in his horrible, blood red eyes.

"Do you think yourself equal to everyone in this room?" He asked her. "And

don't lie. The Dark Lord always can tell when someone was lying."

Kirsten thought quickly. "No, My Lord," she stammered.

Kirsten waited anxiously. If he could read mind, tell her every thought, then she

was screwed. But if he could only tell when someone lied than she would be fine.

Because she hadn't lied. She wasn't equal to any one in this room, she was much

better.

Voldemort released her from his grasp and turned away from her. "That is

all," he said.