I swear, this stuff is all relevant to the story. It is. Seriously. Ahahahaha.
The editing on this one is also off. I know. I am a bad, bad girl. Chuh. Scold me. Blah.
Divine Feminine
There were times when Voldemort wished he was a woman.
He barely ever talked about it, of course. He mentioned it once, to Bellatrix, because he was certain she would understand, because she was a smart, fiery girl, with all the makings of a priestess deep in her bones. And understood she had.
But Voldemort once wrote, on one of those many letters he always used to write, which he would inevitably burn instead of sending, his wish to have been born a female. And though a female must change her name when she is married, and become a man's property, almost, Voldemort viewed this as a Christian custom and therefore did not take it seriously himself. That, and he doubted he'd ever get married, female or no. He was not the marriageable type.
However, all rambling aside, his letter went something like this:
It is in my opinion that, as a whole, men are rather ignorant of power and, therefore, weak in this ignorance. There are, of course, exceptions - time will tell if I am one of them - in which this ignorance does not ring true, but for now I must content myself in realising that I am, truly, hindered by my gender.
There is a simple explanation for this, which I doubt many will understand, since the ways of the world have long been splintered beneath the steady hand of God. For I speak of the Goddess, who is, according to many priests, a work of the Devil. (I find that odd, since the Devil isn't nearly as powerful, or important, as the Goddess was and is. For one thing, the Devil ended up being made King of Absolutely Nothing.)
But I digress (as I often do).
Any and all religions that worship or pay homage to - or at least respect - the Goddess is not a religion that was created for the boosting of mankind's ego, which I believe Christianity to be. I do not say this to anger, since many others do not like to discuss religion - offensive, apparently - but I say this to support my argument. Or my wish, rather.
Sometimes, many times, I wish I was born female. And this boils down the that unearthly being dubbed 'the Goddess'.
I am not a religious man, but I am spiritual, in my own right. I believe that mankind's first mistake, among many, was to ignore the earthly things. They became jumped up with their own power, and their own prestige - this applies to muggle and wizard alike - and, invariably, are going to end up destroying themselves. Not exactly a smart thing to do, but humanity as a whole is rather stupid. This could probably be explained by the fact that for years (that is, when the Romans took over) women have been regarded as property and therefore their opinions never caused due attention, but then Nelly McClung came along, and you know the rest.
But, as usual, I think too much, and my mind has wandered from the original topic which I wished to speak of. I must work on that.
Ah. Yes. The earth.
I support the idea of the Goddess because, I think, any religion that was formed from the frantic belief that the world is the mother of all things had the right idea. Nature is and was the beginning and end of all life. Technology does not create life (though it hints at trying with each passing year; yet another folly of man) nor can it destroy it. You can kill a man, but it is the earth that devours him, in the end.
The destruction of nature has always been a sore spot for me, because of my talent of speaking to snakes (who have been symbols of reincarnation, regeneration and holiness for generations. Modern wizards have started to associate snakes with the Dark Arts, because the Dark Arts were often used to unveil the Mysteries of this world and others, and snakes were strong symbols of the earth and land and therefore the pagan religions which sought to understand Mystery at its darkest; but reputation oft grows tainted with time and enough meddling.) The earth is very important, since we - 'we' being synonymous for 'everyone' - live on it. This is apparently a very hard idea for many people to wrap their minds around. Most of these people are
a) men, or
b) housewives.
I am, unfortunately, a). However, I am, fortunately, not b), since I find most children annoying, and I have, frankly, had quite enough cleaning experience to last me until the end of the world (if everything goes according to plan, I shall live that long).
There I am, getting sidetracked again.
You see, the world is and was the mother of all things, and only a female can understand it. Yes, it is true - women suffer, often. They are plagued by all sorts of pains, such as menstruation, and childbirth - but these they suffer fairly, for they are also given the gift of knowledge, and understanding. Women know the pain of life. Men - ha, men. Men may plant their seed and stand back, but a woman nurtures the child within her womb, and after when it is born. Men know nothing.
Men know not the pains of childbearing, though they have, often, over the generations, made it a habit of 'fighting to protect the women' and killing themselves upon the field of battle. But that is mainly their fault for being stupid, and making up such a silly thing as honour. Honour gets you nowhere. It just makes you feel better.
Men are free of the pains of women. They pay for this luxury by having to be ignorant.
I resent my gender. It was useful, of course - a man traveling the world raises less brows than a woman - but still. If I were a woman, I'd be a priestess of the earth; and maybe I could understand it all, and glimpse those Mysteries for which I have sought all these years.
I must content myself in being a man. The Druids had survived long ago - Merlin survived, after all - in the presence of those females. Besides that, there are none any more - I have no need to fear that there shall be a black-clad lady at my back, laughing at my ignorance. Perhaps one day, Bellatrix will grow, and become that which I have sought; and that will be well and good, for I have nothing to fear from her, and I wish only the best for her. She will be fourteen, soon. I must find something to give to her.
I do not like many children, but she is alright.
He was a complicated man, but all fascinating people are complicated. He was a work of art; the Mona Lisa of the wizarding world. And they all tried to burn him because they were afraid of his smile.
Bellatrix, however, was somewhat of an expert on Lord Voldemort, in the same way Robespierre had been an expert on revolutions.
.x.
Bellatrix kept stopping, no matter what Severus said to sway her. She just couldn't help it - there were all these little glitches on the edge of her memory, chewing on her spine, telling her, over and over, turn around, turn around and you can see me…
Finally, with a frustrated sigh, Severus swept past her, catching her elbow as he did so and momentarily pulling her along. She stumbled, found her footing, then trailed after him dutifully, her dark eyes glancing about the whispering forest and its peculiar shadows.
She wanted to hold Severus' hand again, but she didn't. Part of it was because Severus was foul, bad-tempered, and was very bad when it came to hand-holding; the other bit was that, mostly, she wasn't sure if she was comforting herself, or showing a shred of the sisterly affection she had always felt for him.
"See any hands popping out of the ground yet?" she asked.
"No," Severus muttered. Turn around, little girl, the trees teased.
"Ah." Bella said. She crossed her arms over her chest and stuck her hands in her armpits, trying to warm them. She should have worn gloves, but she had no idea the chill of the forest would reach past the emotional and sink its claws into the physical. It was summer, after all - she'd expected something warmer.
There was a snapping sound, at her shoulder. Without thinking she whipped around, hand diving into her robes for her wand, taking one step back, tensing her body for a strike.
But nothing was there. Nothing except an imperceptible movement at the corner of the eye, that blended into the shadows of the emerald green trees. She grit her teeth and turned around with a huff, and she could hear the laughter, buzzing irritably in her ears.
But as she turned, she realised that Severus wasn't there.
Her mouth twisted. "Fuck."
.x.
Well, she was gone. He wasn't at all surprised by that.
"You're an idiot," he said, sighing, to the silent forest. It did not talk to him; it knew that if it did, there would be hell to pay. This was not a man of the wild, to be tiptoed about and laughed at. This was a scientist, and logical thinker, someone who saw past the glamour and saw only the lies. He was not to be reckoned with.
Well. Severus sighed. He couldn't stick around all day - he'd have to get to Regulus, then, and fast.
Bellatrix was on her own - if he were to wander about to find her, well, that was just plain stupid. And she knew that. So he didn't bother with it. He just kept going.
Pure habit.
.x.
He can remember it, vividly. Or maybe he only remembers one, and all the others just mesh together. It's not like it matters, anyway, because it's all the same, when you get down to it.
The same type of girls, the girls that thought they could change him and his ways, habits, neurotic and obsessive as they were. It was just too tempting to resist. He wasn't much to look at, but he certainly was skilled, and he could make a girl blush to the roots of her hair with the sort of things he could whisper in her ear, mixtures of endearments and flattery and bedroom talk.
And sometimes they moved in with him, but they just couldn't stand it. "Who's this?" They would demand, thrusting a photo of a beautiful, dark-haired woman in his face. And he'd shrug and say, "Bellatrix." Because the photo was worn and Regulus had accidentally spilt water on it, once, and besides, Bella had been in the past, and that was that. Sometimes he'd wake up, and realise it was her birthday, and cringe because he'd forgotten; then he would remember that it didn't matter, anyway.
But the girls didn't like that. They didn't like to think of other women, because Severus was quite a catch to the type of girls he dated - namely, them. He liked the dark ones, with the leather corsets and too much makeup. Young girls, too, not much older than his students, sometimes, because they liked the thought of a tall, forbidding man who made vampires look laughable. Young girls always liked to play pretend, Severus figures; unless you counted his goddaughter, but she was special, because she had Bella's eye for truth and a frightening ability to accomplish anything she set out to do.
But they couldn't stand him because he had secrets all over the house, and you couldn't decipher them. Like the photos… like that framed picture of a tall, slender woman, a modern Helen of Troy in a wrinkled dress, her hair long and blonde, sleeping on the couch that was in Severus' living room. There were letters to and from someone called Lucius, there was a garnet and silver necklace in the kitchen in the knife drawer, and there were books written all in Latin that made the room feel cold.
And Severus was never home - off teaching at some elegant boarding school, apparently, because he was oh-so intelligent, and his very presence made you want to scream because his superiority crawled over you and suffocated you and no woman on earth could stand that.
Except for, maybe, that suspiciously beautiful woman, whose picture was kept inside a copy of Hamlet
So they always ended up leaving him, not that he cared. He'd just sit at the kitchen table with his forehead on the tabletop, and sigh, and wonder why the hell he even bothered.
