Suspected

Chapter Four: Caution, With Love

Her hair was a mass of silky tangles and frizzy curls; her skin was pale and gaunt from the absence of sunlight. And yet, as the chains rattled and Bellatrix Lestrange stepped toward the solid, steel bars, Rita felt the familiar butterflies lurch in her stomach and her pulse thundering in her chest—an urge to join her in her cell. Fides in Culpa…combined with Rita's confusing feelings for her. The emotional conflict alone…

Musk and dirt covered her bare feet, and the grime under her long, thorny fingernails didn't destroy any aspect of Bellatrix Lestrange; she was radiant. Rita saw the goddess in disguise, the breaking beauty in the tired lines of her face—

"Another year gone, my lovely," said Bellatrix in a hoarse, crooning voice; despite the rubble, a smile broke across her full lips. Rita felt her breath catch in her throat. "And here you are again. Must be close to the start of term, it seems." A silence waved over them, with Rita only gazing at her—half-vehemently, the other half in a forlorn, dazed, and wanton expression on her face. "Your hair has grown longer since the last time I've seen you."

"Cut the shit," Rita breathed. Her words were harsh, but her voice was winded.

Bellatrix rapped her fingers along the steel bar thoughtfully, and then she leaned in, "You feel it burning, don't you, Rita?"

Rita nodded slowly.

Bellatrix's eyes glazed over at the thought of her master in a far-off country, crawling for power, gaining it, "He's getting stronger. I told you that the Dark Lord was not gone, didn't I? I was right, and the fools—"

"Bella, He's been gone for fourteen years," Rita said quickly—

Bellatrix stopped her mid-sentence, reaching through the bars to grab Rita by her left forearm, "When the Dark Lord comes—"

"He hasn't yet," Rita remarked, pulling her arm out of reach, taken aback by how quickly she had seized her. "I am not an Unbeliever, Bella. But I can't just leave the instant that He is summoned; I have obligations at the school."

"Yes," Bellatrix drawled. "The Defense Against the Dark Arts…If you were any of a good teacher as they say you are, you'd perform the Dark Arts on the students yourself if you wanted to truly show them just how nasty they can be."

"You mean just how nasty I can be," Rita remarked. "That's what you really want, isn't it, Bella? You've always thought that I could do more than reside at Hogwarts as an aide. A prodigy of absolute power; well, I haven't mastered it yet, have I?"

"Hm, you have been practicing, though, haven't you?" Bellatrix remarked, for the first time it seemed, with approval, pointing at Rita's fingers. "The Dark Lord will summon His followers, Rita. When He rises, you may join Him, learn from him, as you always should have. And I will be at his side—just like the good old days. And though it might escape some even the cleverest of minds, He will know who didn't answer it. And," she added sullenly, "He'll know the ones who sacrificed their lives for a spot on his right-hand side."

"You'd like me to walk into the school this year and recruit for Him, wouldn't you?" Rita said with a frown. "Well, I really couldn't do that, could I? I've got one very paranoid boss this year: Mad-Eye Moody—"

Bellatrix grinned, "The Auror…" She hissed his name, "Mad-Eye. Thought he was in retirement."

"The Ministry's got enough of him, apparently; it was Dumbledore who requested it…" Rita said, and the anxiety wasn't lost in her voice.

"Hm," Bellatrix growled, "you'd best hope that you're still that clever shrew that I took under my wing; or else, you'll be sharing a pod with me. He put your brother in here as well, don't you remember that?"

As if on cue, a hoarse voice came from the next cell over, "Sister…"

Rita popped her head to the left-hand side, glancing at Antonin Dolohov. Rita made an excusing, side-glance at Bellatrix before she side-stepped in front of Dolohov's cell, gazing down at the mess of a man. Same as Bellatrix, he was in tatters, though he held the same strong family resemblance as his sister: dark, brown eyes and brunette hair to match, except instead of a curious, atoned expression, Dolohov gazed at Rita with a look of resentment. Their relationship staggered on back-and-forth banter, a not-so-strong foundation of a relationship flowered by sibling rivalry.

"Brother…" Rita greeted him.

"Enjoying the outside while the rest of the brave soldiers languish in prison?" Dolohov drawled. "You've not come to visit me like your dear mistress. I'm hurt," he added sarcastically. "How'd you manage to talk your way out of the scrape? You were one of the ruthless Death Eaters; I watched you torture some of the most innocent Muggles—"

"I know what I did, Antony," Rita said irritably, frowning down at him as he sulked in the corner of his cell. "I won't need a grand rendition of my crimes."

"I think that you do because I hear," Dolohov said, rising to his feet with some difficulty, "that you're giving some of those filthy mudbloods quite an education."

"I don't teach them, I'm a teacher's aide," Rita corrected him.

"Mudbloods, half-breeds, blood-traitors alike," Dolohov proceeded to spit on the floor at Rita's feet. "Mother and Father are writhing in their graves as we speak. They taught you better. Remember what we stood for? We are one of the Sacred Twenty-Eight—"

"I don't need a family history lesson," Rita interrupted his lecture.

"Mm-hm, and then you married a half-blood."

"You know that if the Dark Lord returns," Rita said hotly, "The Dark Lord would reward Severus Snape with the highest honors—"

"The Dark Lord is mistaken," Dolohov hissed—

"The Dark Lord does not!" Rita heard Bellatrix exclaim fierily from her cell at the sounds of such blasphemy.

Rita held a hand up. Trying to dispel Bellatrix's fury all the while dispelling her brother's lecture about the blood purity of their growing family tree made Rita's stomach turn. Dolohov was right, of course: Rita's favorite student was a "Mudblood", and one of her favorite teachers had been a werewolf. Her growing fondness for Muggleborns and Blood-traitors (The Weasleys) and a growing dislike for those who tried to hurt the former made visiting the pureblood mania almost intolerable. The confliction of whom she used to be and the person that she had been despite her love of the Dark Arts and those who performed them were beginning to clash with each passing year; and it would become harder to distinguish once the Dark Lord finally became strong enough to show himself…

However…

Rita approached Dolohov's cell, "Severus is his own man; and I'm not in any position to demand exactly what his own agenda is at Hogwarts. I'm his wife, not his keeper. As you know, some Death Eaters are privy to information that the rest of us are not,"—Rita heard Bellatrix utter a word of agreement, for even she had her own knowledge of the Dark Lord's secrets that the rest did not. "I have stayed out of Azkaban, despite my Dark practices in the Forbidden Forest, by being present at Hogwarts, staying as useful as I can be; and if that means tutoring Mudbloods and Blood-traitors, and aiding half-breeds alike, then so be it."

Rita raised an eyebrow, "As you should recall, I gallivanted with the same half-breeds in the Dark Lord's favor as a werewolf myself, with Fenrir Greyback and all the rest of them. That didn't seem to bother you then, did it, when I was doing it in the Dark Lord's name?"

"You baby sit those teachers," said Dolohov. "I heard about one, that Gilderoy fellow. Hogwarts has brought you down to the bottom of the totem pole; you're better than that."

"Some are more adept than others," Rita remarked, thinking of Lupin. "Are these words of encouragement, Antony?"

Dolohov shook his head, "You watch your six with this one, Rita. I don't care how clever you are, even Severus Snape will be cautious around a man like that Mad-Eye Moody. He'd go straight for the Dark Lord if he could: Is it bravery, stupidity—?"

"It's foolishness, is what that is," said Bellatrix from her cell, listening in on their conversation.

"How often those two things coincide," said Dolohov with a disdainful note.

"The Ministry of Magic might have forgiven Snape," said Bellatrix, a note of loathing in her voice, "but you can bet that they'll be watching you—"

Rita shook her head at the two of them, "How reckless do you think I am? Do you think that I'll just be wand-waving throughout the corridor, cursing every student in sight? I do my bidding in private."

"You're practicing Dark Magic in the Forbidden Forest. On Hogwarts grounds." said Dolohov. "That is reckless."

Rita frowned. "Practice makes perfect."

"If Snape wasn't a talented potion-maker, that magic would have reached your heart," said Dolohov, "if it hasn't already. Don't be reckless this year, Rita. I might loathe you right now, but you're still my sister. Don't want you croaking right when the fun starts to begin."

"I'm touched," Rita remarked.

Bellatrix made a small sigh. "Oh, the Dementors are coming. Looks like our little visiting hour is over…"

Rita furrowed her brow, confused, until she glanced over her shoulder to see two of the Azkaban guards enter the corridor, seemingly out of nowhere. She nodded, turned to both Bellatrix and her brother. The Ministry of Magic would tighten the security everywhere; she wouldn't know when she would be able to visit again…

"I'll see when I see you, then," Rita said to Dolohov, who dismissed her with a hand. Bellatrix gave the same farewell, still grinning, but slowly massaged her left forearm.

Rita left them, the blood draining from her face as the two Dementors glided along the cold, concrete floor behind her. The low, howling hisses from beneath their hoods made Rita's stomach wretch uncomfortably, and she made her way quickly to the exit of the prison. From the edge, Rita Disapparated.