Here's a little something for Valentines Day. Thank you to everyone who has continued to follow this story- I really appreciate it.

Warning: this story is rated M for sexually explicit content.

The same way that the crow flies through a morning sky, solitary, surrounded by the cutting cold, by a shock of brilliant winter sun, I walk among the virgin February snow that has so evenly, so harshly, smothered the ground beneath my feet entirely in white. Blades of grass restlessly poke their sharp tips through the blanket and mottle it with a green that seems unnatural against the startling white, but with each footstep, I unearth more of it, corrupting this perfect terrain, this unbroken expanse of innocence.

You'll catch your death of cold out here Bella.

I smile and turn to find that Lily had been following my footsteps. She smiled up at me, her amber eyes gleaming with all the excitement of a child.

Did it occur to you that might be exactly my intention?

Lilith laughed. Her smooth caramel hair dampening, darkening as snowflakes settled and melted into it. her skin was as pale as the snow itself and it seemed for a moment that she shone just as bright.

Come on Bella, you can't want that.

I smiled as I trudged further out into the fields that surrounded the school, leading Lilith to I knew not where.

You think you know what I want?

Lilith stopped placing her feet where mine had been and ran up in front of me, stopping me in my tracks.

Yes.

Lilith was panting with the exertion of running through the snow, her lips were parted as she stared at my own, reddened, like my nose, by the cool air. I grinned and pushed her into the snow. She giggled, laying on the ground before me with her hair, now sodden and chocolate coloured in a halo about her face, her pale neck and cleavage that was covered sparsely in her Slytherin robes. She cocked her head, playfully questioning me, then all together her smile faded and was replaced by something much more intense, something that sent shivers down my spine more so than any snow flurry, any storm: it was desire.

"Reminiscing are we Bellatrix?" Narcissa's voice cut through the memory.

I whipped my head around, "Is it not enough for you, dear sister that I just burnt the only woman I have ever loved into nonexistence?"

Narcissa sighed. "We have lost all the prisoners, your husband is dead, Grayback is about as useful as a chocolate teapot now that he has no teeth or claws, and half of our wands are missing. Not to mention that we have five snatchers buried in our ashen front garden and I have not the magic reserves to remove them because I was too busy duelling the very woman of which you are mourning. Where do your loyalties lie?"

I began to laugh a cruel laugh, "Any good news?"

"Pettigrew is still alive- how that happened I will never know."

"Bring him to me."

"Why on earth would I-"

"Pettigrew!" I cried.

"Bella what are you-" Narcissa began to speak when the man arrived at the door to the drawing room in which the women were speaking.

"You called Mistress?"

"Avada Kedavra!"

Pettigrew's lifeless corpse fell to the ground.

Narcissa just shook her head. "Dinner is at seven." She spoke as she left the room.

I fell back into my memories.

Lilith took my hand and lead me to the fifth-floor prefect's bathroom. I was quidditch team captain then so I was allowed past the threshold, Lilith was a sixth year Slytherin prefect. The place, was of course empty, for it was seven in the morning on a Saturday, not to mention the Christmas holidays. Lily flicked the door closed with her wand and turned on the taps, warming the huge bath. Her robes were clinging to her slender frame due to her unfortunate fall in the snow and she shivered as she removed them, her hair was dripping. To the eyes of anyone else, it would appear as though Lilith had already had her bath.

Seriously? All you can think about is how bedraggled I look?

I smiled and began to remove my robes. What would you prefer I thought about?

"Hmmmm," Lilith hummed thoughtfully and walked over to where I was still standing by the door. "Maybe think about my body?"

I stepped toward her, bringing our faces together, so close but not yet touching. I could feel the heat of her breath.

Or what?

Lilith leaned to kiss me, and I pulled away, smirking. The woman elicited a tantalising moan of frustration, I felt it between my legs.

Seven o'clock sounded in the Malfoy household as the grandfather clock chimed its final note. I walked into the dinning room where Narcissa was seated alongside her husband and son. I plonked myself down onto an empty seat (of which there must have been twenty along the length of the great table), and began to push my food around the plate. It seemed that I was in the company of two cowards, silently but quickly working to clear their plates, and a sister, tired and indifferent, who would proceed to cut her food slowly into minute pieces before popping each morsel, now cold, into her mouth. After I was happy with the arrangement of the food on my plate, I began to eat and felt my body warm gratefully. My magic stores, replenishing. Lucius and Malfoy left the table when I was half way through eating. I took a sip of the red wine that was placed beside my food. I observed my sister, who hadn't yet made a dent in her meal. Then, I continued to finish mine, leaving her alone to ponder today's events. It was no business of mine if she wished to weaken herself by not eating properly. I took my glass with me and retired to my quarters on the top floor of the manor. I sat on my bed and sipped my wine slowly, drinking in the red as though it didn't represent the blood on my hands.

Let me help you with that, Lilith insisted as she stood behind me, taller than me despite being younger in years, and slowly she undid my robes with dexterity and ease. My breathing shallowed as the air of the room touched my skin, the exposure hardening my nipples and raising the hair of my arms and the back of my neck. I swallowed as the last items of clothing fell silently to the ground and Lilith pressed her body, warm now, into my own cooler. Her hips, wide and beautifully sculpted, pressed into my arse, her chest, against my shoulder blades. I turned to kiss her, hold her, finally. But she had already moved away, submerging first her feet, then her long legs, muscular torso and elegant neck into the blissfully warm water.

Come on in: the water's fine.

She swam to the side of the pool closest to where I was standing. I sat down on the edge and then dropped in next to her.

"Now what?" Lilith whispered.

Back at the Malfoy manor, I placed the empty wine glass on the bed side table, removed my clothes and slid between my bedsheets. It was not yet late but today had been more mentally and physically taxing than most. I stretched out my aching body and lay flat, arms beneath the covers, looking up at the ceiling. In truth, the battle had ensued in less than an hour, but the repercussions of both Lilith's actions and my own, would have life-long consequences and that frightened me. What frightened me more was that even after hours of searching, Lilith's body was not found…

"Now, you stay quiet little witch." I spoke back in a low voice, pushing Lilith's body firmly into the wall that formed the edge of the bath. I captured her lips with my own in a passionate kiss, the kind of kiss that never leaves, it lingers in your mouth for years, shattering all perception of what making love could really mean. I felt Lilith's knees become weak as I pushed my tongue into her mouth and she held on to me as though for dear life. Her strong arms holding my back, pulling me closer, further into her, until my thigh was between her legs and she could no longer keep quiet.

The memory had begun to make me feel irritable. I turned over in my bed and tried to think about something else, about the repairs I would have to complete on the manor tomorrow, or perhaps how to phrase my apology to Narcissa. I certainly didn't want to think about how the Dark Lord would react when he would find out that Lilith was a traitor, the abuse I am sure to receive for losing the prisoners… it's unthinkable. I am surely to be tortured to near death if not slain entirely or turned over to Azkaban. I shivered in my bed.

No, if this is the last night I get to live, I want it to be filled with thoughts of Lilith, for only she has ever touched truly, my heart.

I smirked up at my ceiling.

Not just my heart.

I moved my hand to the tops of my thighs and gave in.

"Bella!" Lilith cried.

I smirked and pressed my lips to her ear. "What did I just tell you Lilith?"

"Stay quiet?" she replied breathlessly.

"That's right. That's your first warning, got it?"

"Yes Bella." The witch replied obediently.

I removed my thigh from Lilith, who gasped, and began to lavish her neck in kisses, occasionally pausing to meet her eyes, or to suck on her pulse point. Her hands pressed tentatively over my breasts. I moaned softly. That's when Lilith, obviously spurred by my gentle plea, pressed her fingers somewhere altogether more sensitive. Her eyes locked on to mine and in them, the soothing honey colour was replaced by a fierce red. They flickered, flame-like as the reflection of the water shifted rhythmically and I my head rolled back in pleasure. It was my turn to relinquish the silence of the room, and as Lilith finally pushed her fingers inside me, I begged for release.

It did not come, the younger witch removed her fingers and licked them inches before my face. I held on to the wall either side of her head as my body trembled. She smiled brilliantly. "What? You think I'd just give it to you?" she whispered as she turned and exited the bath.

"Surely, you know better by now than to frustrate me so, Lilith."

The witch didn't bother with a robe. "Oh yeah? What are you gonna do?"

"This is strike two Lilith. One more warning and I'll-"

Lilith held my jaw from where she stood outside the bath, "Or you'll do what Miss Black?"

I drew my wand into my hand from where it rested across the room. Lilith's eyes were wide at my use of wandless magic. "Alarte Ascendare." I spoke as soon as it met my palm, and launched myself out of the water in seconds to stand before my lover. "Incarcerous." I whispered next, conjuring ropes to tie my Lilith around the nearest pillar. I walked toward her, wetting my lips.

"Fuck Bella!" Lilith cursed, I smiled at her use of the muggle word.

Are you comfortable with this? You want me to take them off?

Bella, I never want you to take them off. Now please just-

Lilith's thoughts where interrupted as I knelt down before her, parting her with one hand and pushing into her with the other, my teeth tugging softly on her most sensitive spot. I rolled it with my tongue as Lilith's body began to shake with anticipation.

"More." She demanded in a hiss. "Please Bella, I need more."

Her words made me moan into her, the vibrations of my voice causing her finally to fall over the edge of orgasm. I continued as she rode out her pleasure and removed the ropes with a flick of my wand. Her body fell limply onto the ground before me, thoroughly satisfied.

She pushed me ever so gently into the ground so I might lay next to her, and crawled on top of me, still drunk on the sensations that dominated her body only moments ago. She kissed me, tasting herself, her body laying atop my own and soon, blissfully, and with the lightest of touches, I came into Lilith's hand.

We stayed like that for a while. Next to each other on the ground. Everything just felt perfect.

"I love you Lily." I spoke into the silence.

"I love you Bella." She whispered back.