Masquerade Act Four: The Hiphil of World and Love

The Thirty Ninth Dance: Where do we go From Here?

I am lost in this world without you- unknown

It had been four months since Bellatrix last disappeared and Hermione contented herself with thinking Bellatrix was dead. It wasn't like that at first. She was a madwoman possessed in finding her. But when Luna had finally said Bellatrix was somewhere Hermione could no longer reach, it took all the fight out of the brunette. She just fell into a pit of despair. She didn't want to go to work or to eat, but she did it, because she knew that her friends would get suspicious if she acted so devastated. For surely, they would see no reason as to why Bellatrix's disappearance should impact her so much. Only Luna knew and she kept her lips tight on the topic, not telling anyone the true emotions running through Hermione that her friends couldn't see.

Luna was the only one Hermione could confide to, asking for her advice and what to do next. Talking to the blonde helped a lot and it was how Hermione was able to keep her head during all this. If Luna hadn't been by her side, then Hermione feared to think what could have happened. With Luna's help, she was able to accept that she couldn't do anything about this situation. That all she could do was hold her memories close, cherish them, and go out and live her best life.

It was hard to at times, when the longing for Bellatrix hurt more than a knife to the chest and all she wanted to do was curl up into a little ball and cry. They had fought too hard for their feelings, had come too far, for them to not even get a goodbye kiss.

It was hard to do at times, when there were so many unanswered questions around Bellatrix's disappearance and about that figure. Hermione had tried to get in contact with the judges but she couldn't. They stayed silent and she raged and threw things in her inability to be useful.

Her need to have answers, to understand the situation she was in, drove her insane. She hated not knowing anything but Luna stressed that in this case, Hermione was messing with forces beyond her measure and that she had been lucky thus far, but there was no point in continuing messing with destiny. That the best thing to do would be to forget and move on.

"I can't just move on. Not when we were just learning how to be together," Hermione said, eyes red but too dry from all her crying to shed anything more.

"I know. Yet this is the end of the road. You've fought the odds for so long, but this isn't some fairytale. The main characters don't always win in real life," Luna pointed out as she blew on her ice cream to cool it and then took a bite. She offered the half eaten cone to Hermione to cheer her up but the brunette just shook her head.

Walking the line between focusing on her future and focusing on the past was a thin and hard one. There were days when Hermione would slip into her longing, into wanting to rescue Bellatrix, into doing whatever was needed to bring her back. And then there were days when she tried not to think about any of that but just concentrate on finishing her ministry approved projects and doing things with her friends.

In trying to live vicariously for the both of them.

But more often than not her nights were filled with nightmares that would leave her sweating and unable to go back to sleep. That would leave her shaking and broken, shivering with newly awakened pain like in the early days when she realized Bellatrix wasn't coming back.

She had been foolish, thinking that somehow Bellatrix would just waltz back into her life in that cocky manner of hers, proudly and arrogantly proclaiming she had won and succeeded in whatever task it was held her imprisoned. And she stupidly waited with baited breath each time a door opened- no matter the location, be it bar, her apartment or the ministry- and hoped it was her striding through. Slightly harried looking but alive and in one piece.

And each time Hermione's hopes had been dashed and smashed to bits so utterly only for them be rebuilt again for her to start the painful and vapid cycle all over again.

Still, time was the best medicine and at the end of four months she was able to finally get a semblance of her old life back, of getting herself on track. She began to smile more, began to eat properly, sleep properly. The pain in her heart was still there but at least it wasn't suffocating. And while she thought back to Bellatrix more than was healthy, she tried to focus on the happy moments they had together rather than the sad moments. She tried to do her proud, do things that would make Bellatrix laugh. Like becoming more sharp tongued, more confident in herself, and in not letting anyone walk over her.

She knew that would make Bellatrix proud of her.

But as usual, just as Hermione was beginning to content herself with her life, someone threw a wrench into her plans. Ron became shockingly ill. Deathly ill, in fact.

The disease came from nowhere and it was not magical in nature. It must have been a muggle one but the healers at St. Mungo's had no clue on what to do.

"We need to take him to a muggle hospital," Hermione urged Molly and Arthur when she came to visit Ron in his hospital room. Lately she felt like she was all too familiar with the stark white of these rooms be it her that was ill or someone else she knew.

Mercifully he was knocked out, or else it would have been awkward between them even with him on his death bed.

"I don't think that would do any good-"

Hermione cut Molly off, not wanting to hear a denial when Hermione very well knew that she was right in this case. Ron was her friend, even if he was an ass, and she wouldn't let him die not if she could help it. She couldn't lose another person close to her. Not so soon after Bellatrix. "We should be open to all options. There still might be hope."

"I think she's right Molly. The muggles have their own methods of curing illnesses. Perhaps they can have something that will help Ron. It's worth a try." Arthur held onto her as they both looked down on Ron with sad expressions. With so much pain.

It was a look Hermione was all too familiar with. She had worn it everyday after Bellatrix's disappearance and then she had masked it, when the questions got to be too much about why she was this sad.

"How did this even happen?" Harry shook his head, musing to himself but Molly answered anyways.

"He was a mess ever since he and..." She swallowed, cutting herself off. She avoided saying Hermione's name but the brunette witch was past caring. She was an adult. And she had made a choice in breaking up with Ron.

"He and I broke up," she filled in, jaw set.

Molly looked shocked that Hermione had finished it, as if she expected Hermione to hide from the truth. "I'm not sorry we broke up," she explained to Molly, meeting her gaze steadily and feeling no remorse for how cold the first half of her statement seemed. "But I am sorry that it came to this because of it."

"Don't blame yourself, dear," Arthur chimed in, though he wasn't very convincing with how he said it. Hermione knew there would be some amount of blame assigned to her no matter what, and she was fine with it. She hadn't bothered to fix things with Ron and now this had occurred because of that. True, she had been busy wallowing in her own misery for the most part and could barely focus on getting through the day to day motions, but she shouldn't have put off talking with Ron this long. It seemed he had been worse off than everyone thought. "We should have done more for him." Arthur finished bitterly, probably thinking back on all the times he could have helped his son but instead let the warning signs slide, too afraid to push Ron too hard, to ruin the status quo.

"What does he even have?" she asked, trying to read his charts but the doctor didn't seem to have it figured out as well- the symptoms were a mess.

"We don't know. Which is the worst part. But his organs are shutting down. They put him to sleep with potions so his body could repair...but it's not working," Ginny added in a heavy voice. "You moron," she added to him. "Why did you have to go and get sick? Whose going to talk about Quiddicth with me?"

"And whose going to always eat all the extra pieces of bacon at breakfast?" Molly added, wiping a tear from the corner of her eye.

If they had been expecting a response they were sorely disappointed. He lay still, the rising of his chest shallow and the skin around his lips a bluish unnatural hue.

"This is why he needs to go to a muggle hospital now," Hermione stressed. His condition could not be improving. "Just keeping him on potions and hoping he remains stable is not enough."

"But how would we get him out? We'd have to break him out. The healers won't just let us take him," Harry said grimly.

"And when has breaking a rule ever stopped us before?" Hermione arched a brow at him, challenging him.

He managed a weak smile at their childhood escapades through his grief. "I suppose you're right. But we need to come up with a plan and now. We don't want to keep him waiting."

"We'll help any way we can," Molly said, rising to her feet, Arthur standing up with her supportively. "We want to give our boy a fighting chance. I will not say good bye to another of my sons."

Hermione opened her mouth to confirm her desire to help Ron no matter what, but was rendered speechless when a silent swirl of black robes in the corner of her eyes robbed her of her words and thoughts.

Bellatrix.

Impossibly, Bellatrix was standing right there. By Ron's bed.

Had Hermione gone crazy?

"Bellatrix," she mouthed, eyes staring at her.

The dark haired woman picked up her head, eyes meeting Hermione's. They were rimmed in black from lack of sleep and her cheeks were thin, cheekbones jutting out like knives. Her hair was lacking the natural bounce in it's curls and it drooped sadly over the long black cloak she was wearing that hid all of her body with the exception of her head.

She looked terrible, but in one piece.

"Holy shit, what is Bellatrix doing here?" Harry exclaimed, jumping when he saw her and drawing out his wand.

So Hermione wasn't alone in this? He saw her too?! "You see her, right?" Hermione gasped out, for in some miracle twist the woman was here in this very room. The urge to throw herself at the woman was strong but she reminded herself she was in public. And even if she wanted to hug her tightly to her, her limbs were unable to do anything but hang there uselessly.

"What are you talking about?" Ginny looked confused, staring between Hermione and Harry and the corner by Ron's bed where Bellatrix stood like a dark shadow. Her eyes passed over Bellatrix's form like nothing was there.

That did not bother Bellatrix; her eyes were looking at Hermione like she couldn't drink in the sight of her enough. She barely even noticed Potter's wand on her.

"She's right bloody there!" Harry stabbed his wand in the direction, wary of her and unsure of what to do. She wasn't doing anything, just standing there.

"Standing by Ron's side!" Hermione added.

"We don't see anything, Harry and Hermione," Arthur said apologetically, scratching his head almost like he was embarrassed by their antics for them.

"It must be the stress getting to you, though I admit, I rather suspected Hermione seeing Bellatrix everywhere ever since losing her only subject in her study. But not you." Ginny came up to Harry to rub his arm. To soothe him. It only seemed to frustrate him more. "I know you're worried about Ron. We all are. But try to relax a little."

"But-I-that doesn't make any sense. How come only we can see her?" Harry sputtered to Hermione, and suddenly things clicked in Hermione's head. Of course only Harry and Hermione saw Bellatrix. It was because only the both of them had been touched by death but never truly claimed.

That was how come they could see Bellatrix. But then what did that imply about Bellatrix's current state? Was it bad news? Good news?

Bellatrix sighed out heavily when she noticed she had drawn attention to herself unnecessarily, and made a fight occur between the visitors in the room. With a lazy wave of her hand, emerging from under the heavy cloak, Molly, Arthur, and Ginny all instantly fell asleep standing on their feet, mouths hanging open.

"What did you do?" Harry accused, his wand still pointed at her but not casting any spells. Yet.

"Put them to sleep. They were annoying me." She straightened her back. "And this way we can chat without them thinking the two of you daft."

"What is going on?" Hermione wondered out loud, blinking rapidly as if Bellatrix was an image that could dissolve any minute.

"I don't have much time to explain, sadly-"

"How did you escape? Where have you been hiding? You're still a fugitive, Bellatrix!" Harry shouted out, taking two menacing steps closer to her.

"Harry-" Hermione placed a warning hand on his shoulder. The man would never truly trust Bellatrix.

"How cute, your auror side is coming out. But really, it's not needed now, Potter. I'm dead, surely a wish come true for you."

"Dead." Hermione paled. So it was true. The word tasted sour in her mouth. The concept even more. It was irrefutably true.

All the hope that still existed inside of her despite being broken and beat down countless time, finally trickled away and she felt cold with the knowledge that right now she was speaking to a truly dead Bellatrix.

"Then how are you here?" Harry barked out.

"I am here to do my job. Ron is dying," she cast a look down at the red haired boy.

"No!" Hermione exclaimed in horror, her hand coming up to her mouth.

"You won't take him from us!" Harry cried out, face flushing in fury and worry.

"I won't, sadly," she sighed out, expelling a heavy breath that made a strand of her hair flutter up. "I wouldn't want to break Hermione's poor heart. She's done much good for me, and I wish to repay her by going good in return. Thus, I will spare his life."

Frozen, the two of them, either by magic or wonder and fear, watched as Bellatrix waved a hand over Ron's face. Instantly color returned and he took a deep shuddering breath, eyes flickering open.

"Ron!" Harry and Hermione exclaimed in unison as Bellatrix staggered backwards from exertion in maintaining his life. They both unfroze and rushed to his side as he coughed violently and shook.

Ron was safe.

He was okay.

Hermione was relieved, a huge chunk of her worry gone for now.

"We're here. We're here," Hermione repeated soothingly, grasping his spasming fingers and when she looked up she saw Bellatrix was gone.

Harry pocketed his wand and wrung his wrists around helplessly, not sure as what to do about this. He approached Ron closer and tried to help him sit up against the pillows.

"What the hell?" Ginny shook her head as she awoke from the spell Bellatrix had put her under. Molly and Arthur did too, confusion on their faces. To stave off their questions about what had just happened, Hermione called them over. "Quick, Ron's awake!"

"My baby, he's awake!" Molly cried out and Hermione backed up so she could pepper kisses over a disheveled Ron's face.

"Mom, stop that," he called out but did nothing to fight her kisses as his family and Harry crowded around him. While they were celebrating Ron's revival, Hermione moved over to the window and looked out it, drawn to it for some reason.

Down on the street, looking up, was a cloaked figure. Bellatrix. People parted around her, not aware she was even there. She lifted a hand in a wave and then a person passed right in front of her and she was gone.

The sounds of joy behind Hermione only depressed her further. For while they were celebrating Ron's return to this world, Hermione had to yet again contend with the fact Bellatrix could no longer be a part of it.

After everything had calmed down a bit, the healers keeping Ron overnight to make sure he was stable, the family and friends talked in hushed voices outside his room so as not to worry him.

"I swear to you, she was there," Harry insisted, emphasizing this point with wild hand motions. "And she was the one who saved Ron's life. She just waved a hand and he was fine." His eyes were wide and he looked almost dazed.

"She told us he was hovering at death's door but that she would save him as a favor to me," Hermione added, still shaken over seeing Bellatrix again. She thought she would have never seen her again. She hugged her arms to her chest. That coldness in her chest had not faded.

"But why would she do that? How would she even have the power to do it?" Ginny questioned, brow furrowed in confusion. Her and her parents were aware they had suddenly been put to sleep without Harry or Hermione being the ones to do it, so they suspected some other magical force had been around.

"I don't know. But she seems to possess great magical force." Harry shook his head, not able to understand anything of this either.

"Hermione, you worked with her closely, surely you must know something," Arthur turned to her. They all did. With hope and trust in their gazes. She squirmed under the weight of it all. She didn't have an answer for once and it irked her.

"The true matter is complicated. A while back...there was this figure." She decided she might as well tell them the details they were missing. Maybe now they would believe her, after seeing the miracle of Ron being brought back awake. "It only ever appeared to me and Bellatrix. And we figured it had something to do with how we escaped death and it could be something from beyond the plane of existence come to punish us. We tried to do research on it. We tried to find a way to fight it- but no magic could touch it. And then one night it attacked me. Scratching me on the arm." At this she could see the cogs in their heads moving but they stayed quiet, wanting to hear what else she had to say. For once they looked at her while she was telling them stories of the mystical and unknown without a glimmer of concern over her mental state. For once, they didn't think her unstable.

"I got very ill and I was going to die. But then, while I was trapped in my own body, waiting for the end of the line, I heard Bellatrix and some other voice. The voice of the figure, I now know. They brought me back to life, but I suppose Bellatrix's life was taken as payment for mine." Hermione swallowed harshly at this, truly thankful for Bellatrix's sacrifice but hating it at the same time. Why couldn't they be together? They had fought so hard to finally realize their love, to accept it. And now it had to be torn from them this cruelly.

"She sacrificed herself for you?" Ginny asked softly, with something like burgeoning respect in her eyes.

"I told you she's not all bad," Hermione defended but with no real bite. Seeing Bellatrix again and not being able to properly talk to her, to ask her what was going on...was killing Hermione. All she wanted to do was put her head down and cry while another part of her wanted to chase down Bellatrix and demand an answer from those plump lips, demand a kiss from them too. In summation, she was tired. When the war with Voldemort ended, she expected things to be easier, and not harder.

"And she saved Ron too..." Harry added begrudgingly.

"So now what do we do? Does...she need saving?" Molly's mouth twisted up in discomfort, in pain at having to voice this. Despite all Bellatrix had done in the past to her, she had just saved Ron though Molly herself had been unable to see it.

Hermione shook her head. "I honestly don't know what to do. I don't think there's a way to reach her right now. The figure must have done something to her and until she or it, make an attempt to contact with us, we cannot do anything about her."

"Maybe if we order-"

"No, Harry. She's somewhere where no magic can reach her." Hermione let her shoulders sag down. "For once, I think it's best to leave things as they are."

Harry gave her an incredulous look. Staring at her as if someone else had replaced her entirely and she was some foreign entity. "You're giving up Hermione?"

That caused her to snap so suddenly it startled even herself. "And what the bloody hell would you have me to do? She's bloody dead! No law, no magic, can reach her. Can we just let it damn well be?"

Not able to stand the open mouth looks as her outburst, she drew her robes closer to herself. "I'm going home. I'm tired." She said in a small and calmer voice and then left them behind.

Why did she always have to solve everything? Why couldn't someone else for a change of pace do it for her?

The trek back to her place was long as she chose to walk to clear her mind. It did little to help but the space and distance from her friends was nice. When she arrived to her apartment, she found all the lights on in her bedroom. She was certain she hadn't left them like this.

Sliding her wand from under her sleeve, she held it close. Better safe than sorry. All the troubles in her past had taught her to almost be suspicions of such an inconspicuous thing as having the lights on.

She pushed the half open door all the way so she could enter the room, wand pointing in front of her. She dropped it with relief when she saw a familiar all black figure on her bed.

"Bella," she breathed out and Bellatrix did not turn her head or give any indication she had heard Hermione speak. She sat on the bed, back turned, looking out the window. Hermione tentatively approached her, worried she might frighten the woman off but when the older woman didn't move she sat down next to her, a few inches away- the self imposed distance killing her but one out of respect for she didn't know Bellatrix's current situation- and brimming with uncertainty. She wanted to hug, kiss, cry, yell at Bellatrix but she did none of those, just drew in Bellatrix's profile. It looked worse from wear, as if more life had been sucked from it since they last met.

"Bella, what is going," Hermione whispered, afraid to speak louder so as not to scare Bellatrix away. "You look...you look like-"

"Death?" Bellatrix completed humorlessly, fully turning her face to gaze upon Hermione. One eyes was clouded over now, unseeing, and her cheeks had sunken in more. "Tends to happen when you are Death," she gave a dry smile.

Hermione's eyes widened in horror. "Death?"

"I don't have much time to explain. Even as I sit here, others are in pain because I am neglecting my duty." She tapped a finger against her temple and drew out a cloudy substance without a wand. Wandless magic. How amazing. It seemed whatever had happened to Bellatrix had only enhanced her magic. "Get me a bowl, quick."

Hermione nodded her head and stumbled quickly to get one, grabbing a flower vase and chucking the flowers out haphazardly before handing it to Bellatrix who dropped the wiggling gray matter suspended in air into it. It plopped down into the vase, swirling with blurred images and unheard voices. "This will hopefully help you understand how dire out situation is." A makeshift pensieve.

"Are we in danger?" Hermione looked up, brimming with even more questions now, but Bellatrix was no longer on the bed. She was gone, the sheets not even rumpled to show she had sat. Only the spot where Hermione had been was marked.

Gulping, Hermione decided she might as well look into Bellatrix's memories for it seemed the woman could never stay in one spot for long. She sat down and pinned her hair back, fingers tapping on the desk. She felt scared to look inside. What if there were horrors there? No, Bellatrix would want to spare her from that if she could. Taking in a deep breath, Hermione closed her eyes and plunged inside.

"Where am I?" Bellatrix inquired, rising to her shaking feet. Everything was a gray swirling mist. And it was cold. Bone chilling cold, yet she couldn't feel anything. She simply knew it was freezing given the way her breath clouded in front of her, turning into icicles and shattering onto the ground. If there was a ground below her feet. All she could see was more swirling gray mist, so thick it was like a blanket carpeting everything. And it was the same color as ash; a dirty and drab color.

"You are in the plane of existence between the living and the dead," the figure answered as it began to walk in a set direction. How could it tell where to go?

"What does that even mean?" Bellatrix followed it because she had no other choice.

The figure sighed in annoyance. "You ask as many questions as the other one."

She bristled. "Well maybe I bloody wouldn't have to if you told me what was going on. And I did you a favor by quietly coming with you. I could have fought you. Could have killed you."

At this it chuckled and stopped its journey through the ashen fog. Slowly it turned to her and pulled its hood back from its head. Bellatrix's eyes bulged out in horror. She had seen many horrendous things in her life time. Bodies torn apart by magic, people driven to their insanity by desperation, even that hellish three headed hound from hell come to collect her soul. This struck that same fear within her.

It's face was grotesque. A skull with wisps of blonde hair clinging to it, along with pieces of rotting flesh bubbling and festering on the facial plate, with worms coming out, with spiders crawling over the white bone. In one socket it still had an eye- greenish blue- and the other was dripping pus.

"How can you kill Death?" he asked, managing to speak while missing the lower portion of his jaw.

Bellatrix felt physically ill at the sight of it. And she was so stuck on it's appearance that it took her a while to drink in what he said.

"Death?" she echoed and somewhere off to her left, some distance away, thunder boomed, startling her and making her wildly look around.

"You knew you were going to die," he stated matter of factly.

"Could you put your hood back on?" she couldn't keep looking at him like this. He didn't seem offended. He slipped it back on and her unease resolved a bit. "And I thought you were going to bring me back to the Hotel. That you worked for the judges."

This time lighting flashed and struck the space between them as thunder rumbled so loudly over their heads that Bellatrix nearly stumbled to the ground in a bid to avoid getting hit.

"I do NOT work for the judges!" the figure growled out. "And I do not work for the Hotel. Not anymore. This," he extended his cloaked arms, "is my realm. The Hotel is merely purgatory, where dead souls go to be judged for. Whereas this is the realm they pass through to go to the Hotel. All this fog around is the departed souls of the dead on their sojourn down to the the Hotel."

Immediately Bellatrix's hand shot up to cover her mouth and nose and she waved the fog away from her face with her other hand to get it away from her. "You mean to tell me I am inhaling the souls of the dead?" She wondered who she had just inhaled. Was it a friend or a foe? She shivered in disgust and tried really hard not to think about it.

"Yes. But let us not dwell on that. We have more pressing matters to attend to."

"Matters you will tell me about?"

He was reluctant to give in but nodded his head. "If I must."

And so off they walked again, Bellatrix keeping a hand clamped to her nose and mouth. She had no idea what she had just gotten herself into, but she was committed with this choice if it meant Hermione would stay alive. Bellatrix didn't even feel dead. If she was truly so, then she would floating with all the other souls here. But she wasn't, which meant this figure had other plans for her. What could they be? She had no option but to find out now. There was no going back.

While her heart yearned and ached for Hermione she knew this was the right decision. The distance would hurt but the brunette witch would be able to move on with life. Bellatrix just wished she could see her face once more. Could kiss her lips once more. But she could not.

Take care, Hermione, she thought to herself, hoping impossibly that Hermione might hear her thoughts one way or another.

Eventually Bellatrix's aimless wandering was ended when lights began to break through the fog. As they drew closer it got clearer and before them, with it's spiraling towers and high walls, stood the castle of Hogwarts.

"Why is this here?" Bellatrix asked, not expecting the castle to be here. It looked like it had in real life but more dark and twisted. Barbed vines strangled it's walls and ghostly lights floated in it's windows. And the stones making up it's walls seemed to be made of dark black material that shimmered insubstantially.

"This is what your mind desires and thus, it is here."

"That doesn't make any sense." Her mind desired Hermione, not an old castle.

"This realm shifts to our safe spaces. To places we beloved during our time alive and for you it must be the castle of Hogwarts."

Hogwarts had been Bellatrix's safe space for most of her tumultuous life. Especially when she had been young and trying to avoid the chaos of her home life. Hogwarts was a reprieve from all of that and it meant being able to do what she pleased without having to worry. Too much worry. The punishments doled out by the dull witted professors here were favorable to any her father gave her.

Here, she was unstoppable practically. Slytherins respected her, the other houses feared and reviled her, and she had all top marks in classes so that even the professors didn't see her as completely hopeless despite her long record for detention and trouble making.

It was where she made her fond memories. Where she discovered who she was. She could still recall the taste of her first butterbeer, smuggled out of Hogsmeade and enjoyed under the tree outside.

"But I thought you said this was your realm. Why does it show what I find comforting?"

"Sharp, like I knew you were," the figure chuckled as they ascended the stairs to the castle. "This is because this will no longer be my realm."

Walking through the school, figures of all the students Bellatrix had gone to school with crowded the halls. All young and hopeful faces, bustling to class, or talking in the halls. Bellatrix could even spot a familiar mop of brown curly hair, so alike to her own.

"Andromeda?" she called out, reaching for her but her hand went through, distorting the smoky image. She pulled her hand free and her sister, captured in the image of her youth, reformed, continuing talking to her friends like nothing had happened. "I can see them all?" she looked down at her hands in shock.

"Figments of your imagination come to life, to keep you company in your solitude," he answered, walking right through another ghostly Hogwarts student without any bother. "When it was my realm it was a simple hut with my family."

"Why do you keep saying it is no longer your realm now, when you told me it was yours not so long ago," she curled her hands up, a sense of hopelessness taking root in her chest. She asked, but she knew she would dislike the answer.

"I have acted in the role of Death for far too long and I am weary of it. I want to pass on and be with my dead wife and children. Thus, you will take over the role from me, after one last final act from me."

"And why me? Why no one else?" she asked as they stopped in front of the fireplace in the Great Hall. It was a green pale fire and it gave off no heat, or none that Bellatrix could feel.

"The judges kept me imprisoned in this role for centuries and it was because I bested them in escaping from purgatory. No one else had ever dared to do this, but my love for my wife and my children was so strong that it kept me tethered to them, to life. Kept me of enough sane mind to seek a way out. But the judges didn't like that." As he spoke memories played in the flames and Bellatrix watched the story unfold. A young man, with blonde hair and blue eyes, fighting the Hotel which remained unchanged in décor even all those years ago. Bellatrix shivered at seeing it again. It brought back too many bad memories.

"So they punished me. I escaped but because of that I was cursed being stuck in a state of half life and half death. Everything I touched died around me. I was forced to thus work as the judges minion, collecting the souls of those who were dying or meant to die, by finishing them off myself. I despised this job. As everyone I loved died around me I grew more and more bitter but I resigned myself to this fate. A fate that lasted many centuries for the judges cruelty knows no bounds." He clenched his hand and Bellatrix saw it was made of bone when the sleeve slid up.

"But then I saw hope. Hope in the form of you and Hermione. Both of you were smart and linked to each other in a manner that would allow you to see through the Hotel's magic. You had died Bellatrix, but because Hermione was alive and the spell you cast on her threw her into a death that was too full of life, for she was falsely sent to the Hotel, there was a link that allowed you to be sane of mind like I was, enough so you could start to fight back. And Hermione could as well because of your magical link."

Bellatrix absorbed this silently while inside she was seething, seething with anger and sadness and annoyance.

"Thus, I helped you out by throwing little hints here and there, all enough that neither you or the judges would know I was helping out. I helped you get your wand, Bellatrix. And it worked. You were able to escape. And now the time has come for you to repay me for my help."

"So are you telling me you are going to punish me in the same manner as the judges by forcing me to be Death?"

"No, I am rewarding you with immense power. As Death's companion, for now, you will be able to do things no witch or wizard can. You will unstoppable."

"I don't want power," she spat. "Maybe when I was younger I would have cared, but all I want now is a calm life. A normal life."

"You could never have one not with all the blood on your hands that had not been repaid. I have guided everyone of the people you have killed through here and I know the exact damage dealt to them. This is the best option for you."

"And what will I do? Kill?"

"It's what you did best," he chuckled and the story in the flames dispersed. "But our purpose is greater than that." He turned to her, suddenly taller than before."We are going to kill the judges."

And the fire roared behind him, bathing everything in a menacing light as his laughter rang off the stone walls.

A/N: Hiphil is a Hebrew word that essentially means ruin or destruction of something. So the name of this act- The Hipil of World and Love- refers to the ruin of the love and world the characters are in. That's not to mean they cannot fight against this- the title merely is foreshadowing these concepts.