February 18th,
Dear Diary,
It's a sick feeling when you realize you're not immortal.
To be reminded of one's mortality, who would ever wish for such a thing?
But none the less, such reminders are inevitable in the circumstances of war. Even the victorious are forced to accept the possibility of failure. To surrender or die, and which would be honorable? To surrender to mortality is preferable than surrendering to the enemy. But either way, it is surrender to my cause. A defeat, some call it.
But such is the risk of the game. Such is the nature of war. It's the history of the trade.
Thus, I fight on.
The article released by Rita pitched the so-called "Order of the Pigeons" (who denied existence and their namesake I offered to Rita) against the aptly titled "Death Eater Youth" A battle between Slytherins and Gryffindors, a battle between pride and prejudice. A battle between right and wrong. And she asked, "Who is right when a school becomes a battlefield? It would seem the only right answer would be peace."
Yeah fucking right.
The article was called "Children at War" and the pictures were of Sirius dressed as a woman, and Roddy bearing his wand angrily. I was not mentioned, due to the money I enclosed in my letter detailing Fabian's actions at the dance. He was referred to as "Mentally unstable" as Rita delineated everything I forced him to do under the influence of my curse.
It was a lovely article except for the fact that the bastard Gryffindors had exposed our name, the name of the DEY.
But a small loss in a great battle.
Naturally, this article spread like fiend fyre around the school, from first years to prefects, to the baffling choice of a grounds keeper, Hagrid, everyone was chatting incessantly about the Order of the Pigeons (who were furious at the name) and the Death Eater Youth.
"D 'ya think they exist?" I heard a 2nd year Ravenclaw girl with blond curls as her dark haired friend as they passed me in the corridor.
"They must," Her friend shrugged, "Who do you reckon will win?"
"The Gryffindor's and their order." The blond girl said empathically, nodding so suddenly, her curls fell over her tiny face.
"Think about it, Jennie," The brunette sighed, "Slytherins are going to be craftier. My galleons are on the Death Eater Youth."
And suddenly, the blond girl found herself tripping, breaking her potions scale as she fell, while the brunette suddenly opened her palm to find an unopened chocolate frog.
"Yeah, the Slytherins," The blond, Jennie, agreed, as the brunette showed her the chocolate smugly, helping her to her feet. The blond looked close to tears as the brunette happily ate her chocolate.
I smirked as I walked on without comment.
This newfound awareness of our ongoing war seemed to frustrate Dumbledore immensely, as I discovered this evening at our first detention since the release of the latest Witch Weekly.
Lucius, Dolohov, Severus, Roddy and I walked with a sense of smug purpose to his office to find the Gryffindors already seated, Dumbledore staring straight ahead, nodding as we closed the door behind us and took our seats. His expression was grim. The silence was heavy as we waited for him to speak. I glanced at his large window, the one behind his desk, and the landscape below it of the grounds, before staring at the landscape of the endless sky, and I choose the first star I saw, the brightest of the night, and I made the wish that at the end of the war, every sacrifice will have been worth it. I wanted assurance. I asked the stars for that promise.
Dumbledore finally spoke after what could have been several seconds or several minutes, the silence was unbearable, "I read the latest article by Rita Skeeter. More than learning is taking place in these halls, and I am well aware, and now the rest of our world is as well. Are you proud of yourselves? Disgracing your school, your house, and your names? Are you proud?"
"No sir," Gideon sighed, "The war will end, we can find solace in agreement to disagree, it must end, united we stand-"
"Sycophant," Lucius snapped, "Don't lie, you know you'll curse us the first chance you receive. What's noble in saying what he wants to hear? There is no nobility in lying, Prewett."
"Malfoy, shut up," Fabian hissed.
"Shut up isn't a noble expression," Roddy snickered.
"I'm going to-" Fabian exploded furiously but stopped himself as Gideon kicked him viciously in the leg, Sirius and James smirking.
"You're going to what?" I taunted, "Tell on us? Or curse us? If it is either of those options, please do say them before our headmaster,"
"If you think for one second this is just a game, you're lying to yourselves," Dumbledore looked truly angry, his blue eyes like a stormy ocean. I felt myself tense, "This is life, or this is death."
"Sir, I do understand your point, but despite our paths, we are all AIMING for life," Roddy insisted, "I just mean, no one's goal is, in fact, DEATH. Unless the Gryffinors are unbeknownst to us- suicidal, and there are treatments, potions, self help books for that sort of thing,"
Lucius and I tried to keep from smirking and the Gryffindors scowled furiously. But the question on all our minds, was what in the name of Merlin was Dumbledore going to think about that…
"That's it," Dumbledore sighed heavily, "You're all going to forget about your house alliances for the night. You're going to go together and sleep in the Great Hall. You're going to write an article together this evening, an article I will force the prophet to publish, that explains how you RESOLVED AND ENDED THIS CAMPAIGN OF HATRED. Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes, sir," We said softly, feeling ashamed, small even, the way I felt as a small child who would use her magic to curse Andy and Cissy earning endless reprimands from my parents.
"Good," His eyes looked so severe under his half moon spectacles, "Now go. I'll check on you at 6am, which is when I will instruct Nick and the Bloody Baron to wake you up, and together you can vanish the sleeping bags I have in place and conjure the house tables. Right now, take this quill and parchment and ink-"
Gideon reached over and accepted the materials Dumbledore had pulled out of thin air.
"Now, go." He said sternly, and without any further words, we left. We were so silent in our exit, believe none of us even dared to breathe. He was an intimidating man. But I had the Dark Lord's blessing, and thus, I was safe, I knew, no matter what happened next, no matter what Dumbledore said, I served a higher master, a greater power.
And the war was never going to end without a winner and a loser. Without one victory, and one defeat. The war would go on forever if it must. But peace was impossible when the enemy existed, when the enemy worked against you. No, to surrender without cause would be the worst defeat of all, to surrender now, barely having fought, would be worse than to lose to their hands.
"This article is going to be a bigger lie than Sirius's blood status," I sighed, glaring at my waste of a pureblood cousin.
"This article will appease Dumbledore, and we have disappointed him, the one person we didn't want to disappoint," Sirius replied heavily.
"Hardly, we answer to someone else," I snapped.
"Who?" Fabian rolled his dark eyes, "To Voldy?"
"I prefer to call him Morty" Sirius snickered.
"Don't you dare mock the greatest wizard-" I hissed in a low voice, raising my wand from my pocket.
"Fuck off," Fabian snickered, "We can fight after we write this lie."
"We'll fight whenever we find cause," Lucius corrected him harshly.
"And don't speak to Bella like that," Roddy snapped, clutching my hand in his own.
"She can obviously defend herself," Sirius laughed coldly, "She doesn't quite fit the role of damsel in distress."
"She will after I'm finished," Fabian sneered, his eyes narrowing.
"Then I'll destroy you, and show the world what a piece of flith you really are, what a waste of magical blood, what a waste of oxygen, of a wand-"
"Yeah, yeah, Lestrange," Fabian waved his hand impatiently, "I'm sure you will. I'm terrified. I'm feeling so cowardly, just call me a Slytherin."
"We would never compliment you that way, blood traitor," Lucius laughed.
"And it is not the Slytherins who are cowardly, is is the Slytherins who are not reckless-" Severus began.
"Precisely, and Gryffindors are not BRAVE, they are merely the most foolish-" Dolohov continued
"Does it ever get cold living in Lucius's shadow?" Gideon said forcefully to Severus and Dolohov, "Is it ever dark there?"
"Not as cold as the orphanage, Prewett," Severus laughed, but his eyes betrayed his anger, "And how did it feel being used in a plan to avenge your psycho brother? How does it feel to fall for a witch who hates you, and realize her only attraction to you, was the attraction of hurting you and good old Fabian? How's that feel? Dark? Cold?"
We had arrived at the Great Hall by this time, the sleeping bags arranged beside a round table with a chair for each of us, a hard metal chair, the kind you see in cheap muggle restaurants. Fabian stormed passed us, with Gideon in tow, the two of them taking their seats as the rest of us followed, yawning, and already frustrated with the assignment of feigning a peace treaty for the sake of the wizarding world's faith in their children, for the sake of Dumbledore's sanity, for the sake of reassurance to the school and the parents, for the sake of an endless litany of reasons that I didn't give a house elves' ass about.
"How do we begin this inane article?" Lucius demanded impatiently as Gideon set out the parchment and quill before him, our self assigned scribe, "How do we begin this travesty of a peace treaty?"
"The same way we will end it," I smiled simply, "With a lie."
"Hogwarts: A Present" Gideon read what he had scrawled thus far, "The present day, we have put down our wands, and opened our arms, embracing diversity and accepting the differences between Gryffindor and Slytherin as positive qualities rather than reasons to quarrel. The over exaggerated claims in the previous article have cast a dark shadow on the bright light of the future which we are sure will be once of peace and accordance, without petty wars. "
"Well, its definitely a lie," Sirius shrugged, "How do you write so fast, mate?"
"Its my thing," Gideon shrugged, smiling, "if I didn't feel I had to become an auror, I'd have liked to be an author."
"How quaint," Lucius drawled, "Carry on, then. Say the following- Together we agree that the value of learning surpasses the need for rivalries and we wish for our hallowed halls of knowledge to be used for education, not violence and discrimination. Together we have seen that only together we can see."
"Is that enough?" I asked, bored already, resting my chin in my hands, my elbows on the cold metal table's surface as I wondered why he had to make this as uncomfortable as possible.
"Sure," Gideon shrugged as he put down the quill, "Now let's sign it-"
He passed around the lie (I mean article) and we left our signatures below the words none of us believed, none of us would adhere to, the words none of us would ever accept. The lies.
"So Sirius, is moaning myrtle a good kisser?" Severus asked after Gideon place the parchment in the center of the table and we all began to stand, stretching luxuriously, pushing in our chairs.
"Fuck you," James cut off Sirius, "I know those chocolates were spiked. We know you were behind it, but Myrtle was confounded so we couldn't prove it. Blasted ghost didn't remember who gave her the blasted candy-"
"Innocent until proven guilty, Pothead," Severus snickered.
"Hardly," Fabian interjected as we each grabbed our sleeping bags, the Gryffindors dragging their deliberately away from ours, "We all know Bella used the imperious curse on me to make me look like a buffoon at the dance-"
"No one has to curse you to make you look like a buffoon, Fabian," I said sweetly, giggling.
"You used an illegal curse-" He hissed.
"So did you," I shrugged, "You used-"
He silenced me.
"I didn't do a damn thing-"
"You crucio'd her," Roddy sneered hotly, "She told us, so you know what? You know fucking what, you slimeball?? Crucio!"
Fabian screamed. Roddy lifted his wand, looking pleased and shocked.
"You'd never done that before!" I said excitedly as he flicked his wand, returning to me my voice.
"I know," He was beaming, regarding his wand excitedly, "I feel… electric…"
Gideon, Sirius, and James were helping Fabian to his feet. They looked disgusted at Roddy, but suspiciously at Fabian who shrugged, "So what if I crucio'd her?"
"So, that's illegal…" Gideon drifted off.
"Its unforgivable," I piped in, cheerfully.
"You can't do that, mate, even on someone as worthless as Bella," Sirius sighed.
"He's acting like a wee Death Eater, isn't he?" I jeered, "Crucio, and all his outbursts, and how he isn't even sorry, how he didn't even tell you all. Isn't that something you'd expect from a Slytherin? From a Death Eater? Not your precious Prewett…"
"Your parents shouldn't have reproduced," James said, looking at me coldly, "Fabian will never be as bad as you. You're a monster-"
"He used the same curse as I did," I reminded them, standing as tall as possibly, chin proudly in the air, "He acted in the same manner as I. The only difference is that I'm the enemy. But our actions-"
"You're a sickening excuse for a witch, do you hear that a lot?" Fabian snapped furiously.
"You know sometimes I wonder if my parents are proud of me," I pondered aloud walking away from Dumbledore's office and our tedious, affectless, and utterly useless detention, "Do you ever wonder that, Fabian? Or you, Gideon? You see, when I wonder, I remember I can always ask… Guess you two will never know. But I'd bet a lot on the answer being an unquestionable 'No',"
"Whose parents would be proud of a whore?" Fabian sneered coldly.
"I don't know ask Molly Prewett's parents… oh wait, she's your sister and they're dead," I laughed, "My mistake, all apologies of course."
And then, it seemed to all happen so quickly. The other Gryffindors might look back on this moment in years to come, in dear memory of Fabian Prewett and think "oh how the mighty of have fallen" But future Slytherins will know the un mighty Fabian never had far to fall to begin with.
He crucio'd me for the second time, and my screams were silenced by Gideon, who also disarmed his brother hastily. Furious, Roddy jumped at Fabian, holding his wand to his throat, then to his heart, and almost whispered crucio again if not for Lucius who held him back, saying Fabian wasn't worth it, while Fabian turned to Gideon and screamed at him for stopping the torture, and I sat up, shakily from where I fell and I raced to the table, picked up the parchment and tore it into little pieces.
"I can't lie this way," I said calmly, as every person in the room stopped, mid-scream to stare at me in horror as I tore the parchment apart, tearing apart our lies, ripping it letter-for-letter into confetti. All that remained was the truth.
"That's the only noble thing I've ever seen you do," Sirius said after a moment of silence passed in the wake of our article, "And I've known you all my damn life."
"Super," I said sarcastically, surrounded by the fragments of our lie, "Let's rewrite it. Let's make it mean something-"
"It won't mean a thing if the word "peace" is written anywhere in it," Gideon said, burying his tired face in his hands, "We can't be honest and reassure the wizarding world-"
"I don't give a damn about reassurance," I snapped, kicking over the nearest chair, "I care about the truth."
"Cheers," Gideon rolled his eyes from behind his hands, "But Dumbledore-"
"Will be glad we aren't liars," Lucius cut in, "Who wants to write the right thing?"
Everyone but Gideon and James approached the table immediately. Slowly, the final two Gryffindors joined us, looking apprehensive as I began scrawling away, my cursive in black ink on white parchment, truth replaced lies, my own handwriting, replacing Gideon's.
"What's it say?" Severus asked eagerly after several minutes of silence had come and gone without interruption.
"Let me edit it," Lucius sighed, tearing my blunt speech from my shaking hands, hands shaking with anger at my own mortality, anger at Fabian, anger at Dumbledore, anger at everything but the one truth I wanted to scream to the world, the one truth I wanted to write to the world- Nobility and Ambition aren't limited to ONLY Gryffindors and ONLY Slytherins. We were all a little of both, but our nobility was subjective, it was all fucking subjective, even though my heart told me I was on the right path, that Dark magic would show me the light, they were as convinced as I was of the opposite. Thus, we could never agree, there could never be peace. That was the truth.
Lucius finished and handed it to Fabian who added his bit, and then to Sirius, and by the time it was finished, honesty had never contradicted itself more. It wasn't a peace treaty, but it wasn't a mockery of the truth.
It read
"Hogwarts: A Present
We are all ambitious, not the Slytherins alone. We all adhere to our own definitions of nobility. Nobility is not alone found within the Gryffindor tower. And we are intelligent, we are loyal, we are all magical. And united, we can agree that in every person, there is some of every house, in every person, there is magic, whatever shade of light or dark, it is magic that brings us together, and still it is magic that tears us apart. I do not wave a white flag to anyone. For I am intelligent enough to know never to surrender what I believe in, because that would betray my loyalty, my nobility, and I am ambitious enough to know not to cause a war without the promise of victory. I am every house, I am every shade of magic. I am noble in my own right, I am loyal to my own cause, and I will never surrender, because Godric Gryffindor and Salazar Slythern and Helga Hufflepuff, and Rowena Ravenclaw would have never surrendered to another's beliefs."- Bellatrix Black
"We can work together under one school, we can unite under magic, but we cannot make peace with opposing views. And we cannot make peace out of war."- Lucius Malfoy
"There is no glory in war, only in peace, but to attain peace, what is the sacrifice we must make? The sacrifice of war? Or the sacrifice of surrender?"- Fabian Prewett.
"Blood, Friendship, Houses, Love. I don't care whatever connects us, all bonds can be built, all bonds can be broken. Let us be at peace under what is right, not what is a delusional prejudice against others. Let us have peace on our own terms."- Sirius Black
"Peace follows war, war follows peace." Severus Snape
"I am here to learn, not to fight. Make potions, not war'- James Potter.
"Hogwarts is not a battlefield, but its students might just be warriors."- R. Lestrange.
" If I could, I would say the magic words and we would all agree, but in the meantime I fight for what I believe, and I believe in what I fight for,"- Gideon Prewett.
"Slytherin and Gryffindor weren't friends at the end of their lives."- Antonin Dolohov.
And that is what Dumbedore collected in the morning.
And those are the words of the warriors in this war.
And these are the battles we fight, and our hallowed halls of learning remain our battlefield, and every day is another victory to be had, and every defeat is another cause for revenge, and none of us will surrender , so all of us will fight. And there is so much to be gained from the fight, and nothing to be gained from standing back, watching the world rise and fall.
I respect the truth. And the truth is this: This is war. And the DEY meets tomorrow night to plan the next battle. And someone will be the loser, and someone will be the winner. I bet the two Ravenclaw second years know who to put their galleons on. Let there be love, let there be hate. Let there be war so we may have a better world when we are finally at peace. I am so alive with battle wounds, I am so alive when I'm tortured, or torturing, I am alive when I am in pain, or when my enemies are. I am alive at last. And if I die for the only thing that has ever made me feel so alive, then I shall know I really and truly lived. And I really, and truly loved.
Love always,
Bella
Author's Notes:
Hope you guys like it so far?
Big battle scene approaching…. Big big battle scene, hence the build up in this chapter. Enjoy!! Tell me what you think, I love knowing people are reading.
Thank you so much =]
-your hopeful author.
