AN:
Sorry for the relatively late delay - but hey, I've still met the Friday deadline. :D
I hope you guys enjoy this little look into Sirius's head (towards the end), and Lillian's trip to Azkaban.
I haven't described Azkaban in as great as detail as I did in the first book, so, if any of you want a refresher on what it's like (or how I've created it to be) check back with SoS!
To my plethora of followers and favoriters, new and old, thank you! Getting those emails seriously makes me smile.
To my reviewers, big thank you to you eight (all beautifully wonderful 8of you)! Ya'll make me smile too, and your responses are at the bottom! :D
x
"Ah," Bellatrix announced in a piercing shrill, "The Prodigal daughter returns."
Lillian just barely repressed the sigh lingering on her lips; she didn't know what it was, but Azkaban was unusually…rabid that day, and though it scared the Gryffindor part of her, the Slytherin half refused to react.
"What for, I haven't a clue," Bellatrix continued on, huffing a strand of curls from her eyes, "Honestly, it's not like he cares."
"Why do you care, Bellatrix?" Lillian challenged, quirking a brow at the Aunt she could just barely see by the flickering torchlight. Hazardous, electric black curls falling into a sharp face that probably used to be beautiful, back when she still had some sliver of sanity left within her. "Why should you care whether or not I return to visit?"
Bellatrix's dark eyes narrowed, her mouth pursed as she jerked her chin up and gazed down the opposite end of the corridor – though Lillian knew it was just a haughty display of ignoring her, considering the other corridor was nothing but a wall.
Lillian continued to watch her haughty Aunt, wondering at the emotions the crazed woman was hiding; Lillian didn't speak until she turned her gaze to the man withdrawn to his usual corner, arms, as always, loosely folded over legs bent at the knees, his head bowed slightly, shaggy black hair shielding his ever-sinking face.
He seemed a little more rigid than usual, and she knew it was because of the somewhat animalistic buzz of the prison's atmosphere. She wondered where the Dementors had gone off to, to allow such riotous emotions to exude from the prisoners until the air was thick with their rage, their insane cackles accompanied by unending screeches of glee.
"What would you say, if I were to inform you that I come here to visit you as much as I do him?" The bland imploration had her father's chin tilting, and she just barely caught a glint of silver between ragged strands of black, tangled hair.
Lillian wondered just what about her statement had warranted the attention of Sirius when it usually required her speaking of Harry Potter.
Bella scoffed, "I'd say you were about as full of it as the dear brother who sired you. The outbred mutt."
Lillian didn't react to the blood slur; Bellatrix had been uttering them for so long, slinging them around like mud so often, that her demeaning insults meant nothing to Lillian – coming from Bellatrix, they were practically terms of endearment.
Lillian smirked, her eyes never leaving her father's, who was still looking at her from the shield of his hair, "But my dear Aunt, you're my Bellatrixter," Lillian mused quietly, "I had every intention of inviting you to my wedding – have I told you, there's a boy at school, muggleborn, he's rather perfect."
The subsequent screeches of undiluted rage that flooded the air had Lillian's smirk taking on a particularly wicked edge, she did enjoy shaming her Aunt. The hard slices of satisfaction that filled her was something she often looked forward to, was one of the few things to look forward to when it came time for her to visit the desolate island.
It was in those moments, those moments where wicked satisfaction overcame her normally unchanged, indifferently twisted expression that Sirius and Bellatrix noted the uncanny resemblance between the girl and her sire. It brought both a pang of sadness, and a burst of pride somewhere far, deep within the recesses of Sirius's emptied, hollowed being; to know that on some level, he was responsible for that, he created her, a girl as wicked as he.
It was Bellatrix's sheer rage and Lillian's small feeling of triumph that brought them.
A pulse of ice down her spine preceded their arrival, goose bumps rippling beneath the billows of her robes as her breath puffed white before her; filling up her vision to mar the image of her father, of her Aunt – who had shrunk back as far as she could into the depths of her shadowed cell, not a peep of noise escaping her.
A whisper of a touch along her shoulders, Lillian's hand clenched tight around her wand, but before her fingers could so much as twitch, the dark, twisted form of a Dementor caged her, touched her.
Her fall to the unyielding floor beneath her feet felt as though it lasted forever and as her mouth parted on a silent scream, her breath was taken; every good, every light emotion she had ever felt tearing through her throat in a way that Lillian could only compare to a sword splitting a stomach and blood oozing out of the open wound without hope of ever stopping.
Being kissed by a Dementor, it was like a strange mix of drowning, and strangulation. Her head grew fuzzy, her limbs numb, and breathing was near impossible.
She had been kissed a few times, having spent so long visiting Azkaban, it would have been impossible not to be touched by the Dementors at least once before; but it wasn't a feeling you could ever get used to, it wasn't a feeling she would ever grow used to.
That feeling of life slowly trickling through one's grasp as though it was nothing more than water; that feeling of meaning being slowly stripped away by each grueling, painful second until one feels as important as a stray feather, floating in the breeze, forever forgotten and ultimately insignificant.
It was a crushing debilitation that would cling to her skin for countless weeks, would haunt her dreams for months; the mark the encounter would leave on her soul, it was a mark that she wouldn't ever be able to leave behind, a mark that would forever taint her, a mark that would forever darken her, until she wouldn't even be able to remember a time before it.
With a loosened, barely manageable grip, the tip of her wand peaked from her robes and during a short, two-second lull between kisses where one Dementor backed away only for another to replace it, she whispered the words that would save her.
The spell was uttered so quietly, so weakly, it was almost inaudible; but it awarded her a sharp, short burst of white light that drove the Dementor back just far enough for her to rise shakily to her feet. And despite the foggy weight of her body, the unrelenting urge to shut her eyes and never reopen them, she forced her wand hand upwards, calling out the spell properly as the two Dementors regrouped to come after her once more.
The flash of light that emitted from her wand was a blinding beam, the sheer force of her spell knocking her weakened body back a few steps, the remnants of her energy fading quickly as she drove the two Dementors so far back that they disappeared through the cold stone walls where they would eventually find their next victims.
Shakily, panting, her quivering arm lowered, and she just barely managed to keep a firm hold on her wand as she tucked it away into the folds of her robes; robes that were suddenly so heavy against her skin, that she wanted nothing more than to just lie in a corner, turned into herself because, though the kiss had ended, she still felt as though she were drowning; straining under an oppressive sorrow that could not be countered by a simple spell, or meager thought.
But Lillian couldn't afford to wallow in the weight of her sorrows, she was a Black, she was a Malfoy ward, she couldn't show weakness – especially in the mad house that was Azkaban. If she wanted to make it out of there alive, if she expected to walk through rows, upon rows of masochistic murderers, rapists, and dark magicians – she couldn't show weakness.
It took her a minute, a very long, very weakened minute to gather herself; and slowly, so slowly, she got her breathing under control, her heart to slow to its regular rhythm as her hunched shoulders slowly straightened, her chin lifting and her expression schooling itself into one of unparalleled indifference.
She was Slytherin – and Slytherin bowed to no force, be it spiritual or physical.
If it weren't for the tick of her jaw, one wouldn't be able to tell just how much of a struggle, just how much it hurt, to compose herself so quickly after a devastatingly long, and deep Dementor's kiss. If it weren't for the unmatched storminess of swirling, churning slate grey eyes, one wouldn't have ever been able to tell that her emotions had just been stripped from her. The dark destruction seen in tornado-like eyes was a nonverbal representation of the pain, of the weight of desolation bestowed upon her by the kiss of death.
It awed even Bellatrix, as she and Sirius watched the young girl, their kin, Sirius's daughter, build herself up from nothing as if nothing had happened. It was in that transition, as Lillian turned afterwards to face them with an expression that made even the Black siblings doubt the validity of the attack they had just born witness to, that spoke of just how strong the young Black child was.
She was far stronger than Sirius had ever been and had he still been capable of true emotion, had he not been stripped of every good part of his soul by the Dementors that governed his hell, he was sure the strength of such a young, such a delicate face, would have hurt him; would have weakened some part of his heart that surely would have held intense, unparalleled paternal love for the young woman created by him.
He felt a sting of regret, very minor, almost unnoticeable in its inferiority, for his inability to feel that hurt. He didn't have a paternal bone in his body, maybe once, a long time ago he had, but not anymore. He didn't have the capacity to love Lillian as a father was supposed to love a daughter, he didn't have the capacity to feel anything aside from a deep bout of loyalty – the kind of loyalty associated by friendship. The last of his love had been spent on James and Lily Potter, he had nothing left to expend.
He would have worried about that affect on the young girl before him if he wasn't so positive that she already knew – that she had always known; and where he should have felt pain at that, he felt only the deepest sense of relief. Relief inspired from the knowledge that she wouldn't ever depend upon him for a thing; Lillian Marlene Black, wouldn't ever ask or expect of him anything, no matter its capacity. She knew he had no place in his heart for her, she knew this, and he reveled in it; he couldn't handle, nor did he want, the responsibility of caring for someone when anyone he had ever cared for, had been stripped away from him, abandoned him, broken him.
The fact that he had been abandoned, not by choice, but by force, only broke him further; until his sanity had been snapped, until his mind had delved so far into the past, he wasn't always sure which was reality and which was the memory. Even then, he didn't know which was worse; living in the past, or waking up to realize that he was alone – his best friend, his brother, was gone, and he wouldn't ever be returning, and that fact, that inescapable knowledge, hurt Sirius more than his daughter's pain ever would.
But in that instant, in those short moments after Sirius's silent revelation Lillian didn't feel pain, she didn't feel anything. She felt painfully empty inside, wanting nothing more than to escape that prison, that hell, and return to the Malfoy Manor; but she couldn't escape, not yet. There was something she needed to know, something she needed to ask, and the best person to ask was right beside her.
"What do you know about the Chamber of Secrets," She questioned, her body stiff as she looked into that corner where Sirius remained; he hadn't moved, he hadn't even blinked in the eye of her encounter with the Dementors; there was nothing he could have done to help her, and he knew she could care for herself, he had seen her do it before.
"It's an old fable." Sirius's scratchy, empty response.
"Bellatrix," Lillian demanded, "In your time with Voldemort, what was said about the Chamber?" Bellatrix was so taken off guard by the subject of her niece's question, she didn't snap at the young girl for daring to have the nerve to utter the great Wizard's name.
"Things, here and there. Why, little Black?"
"It's been opened," Lillian responded, catching the shift of movement from her peripheral as her father's head snapped upwards; the sudden sharpness of his eyes startling her on some level that hadn't just been stripped from her.
Bellatrix hummed, a lick of glee to her tone that assured Lillian that there was something inescapably dark about the Chamber opening. "Then you best be careful, little Black, because you're one of the most impure blood sources in the magic world."
Another subtle confirmation that told Lillian that if Voldemort ever got a true foothold into the world, if he made his return, Lillian would be one of his biggest targets. The fact that she was born from the Black lineage, that would just be the icing on the cake; and as she maneuvered the cold, dank halls of Azkaban, following Lucius to the awaiting carriage once she came upon him, she thought the ultimate question.
To Voldemort, who would be the priority, she, or Harry?
AN:
Special shout outs:
xXMizz Alec VolturiXx: Thank you! A lot of things happen in Prisoner of Azkaban - and those who don't already know about her origins, well, they figure it out. haha. So there will be plenty of scenes like that in the next installment! :D
Mira SeverusSirius Snape-Black: Maybe once school lets out. But I've got finals coming up, and then it depends on work. I like the one week thing because that way I have time to plan for unplanned circumstances. :*
Moon-Chan: I'm glad you liked Narcissa's insight! And that is something to think about, isn't it? haha.
Foxe165: I think they're perfect too! So I'm so glad I've got people to share that love with. haha. :D I'm sorry this is such a late Friday update!
Guest: Yay for day making! I love writing Blaise x Lily fluff! :D They'll be making up super, super soon! Like, within next chapter soon! ;)
Strawberry Obsession: Only with her. ;) Don't fret too much about Draco's absence - I've got it covered. 0.o Yes and no on the arranged marriage - you'll have to wait and see, but I can guarantee it's probably not what you're anticipating. Next chapter! Swear! You'll get your Draco x Lillian then. And it should be epically beautiful! haha. :P
Luisa: Thank you! I really love your review. :) I hope their interaction didn't disappoint! :D
Dauntless14: Yes! Blaise x Lillian shippers, you warm my heart! Yes it is Sirius like, I always like to slip in those moments where you can just tell, oh yeah, she's related to him; just so nobody really forgets, you know? Neutrality is an important part of Blaise's personality! And all Slytherins can't be bad - they're just largely misunderstood. ;) And if you thought the Zabini scene was cute, you'll love the extra I have of that moment at the end of this installment. ;) I hope you enjoyed this chapter, you weren't too far off on Sirius's and Lillian's skewed relationship. / I haven't read the series, but I've seen the movie (loved it) and I have the first book. Go Dauntless! ;)
Reviews are welcomed, but they aren't mandatory.
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Hope you enjoyed!
See you next Friday and have a great Easter,
x