For months, it had been sweet dreams for Leo Black or, well, it had been better than before. For nearly five months, he had been home with his father and Uncle Remus. Apart from Sirius's constant and frantic search for Ella, things were comfortable between them. They both knew, of course, that things could never be entirely normal until their family was completely united but they were better none-the-less. It had been decided "unanimously" (actually, it was just Sirius) that Leo not be sent to Hogwarts in September. As such, Leo was privately tutored at home by Remus, who was unemployed yet again. Ollivander had delivered a wand to them personally three weeks after Ella's capture.
The healing process had started between father and son the day after Sirius went back to the Ministry, still slightly drugged by Lily's tea. Leo rolled over in his bed; he couldn't sleep. Ever since Ella had been taken, he couldn't quell the memories that flooded his mind. Before, right after he had woken up in the hospital, he had been blissfully unaware of what had happened to him. A whole span of time was gone from his mind, from his earliest memories to immediately before he awoke. Now he remembered everything with biting clarity. He had not shared this with anyone, too afraid that he would be dismissed as yet another problem they didn't have time for. He couldn't help but think he would also be blamed for Ella's capture; he wouldn't fault them for thinking so. Of course, as is true with many painful things, it wouldn't take a terrible amount of coaxing to get him to talk, releasing him slightly from his burden.
Silent tears slipped down his face, over the tip of his nose. Memories from his imprisonment played out before him like a long, horrible movie clip. The beating, the starvation, the torture, all of it was an ever-present appendage he could not amputate. Part of him desperately wanted to tell his father or Dumbledore, anyone. He felt so helpless and weak. They did not need him there; they needed to concentrate on finding Ella. Unlike them, however, he feared for her, not because he was clueless as to what fate befell her, but because he knew exactly in what hell she was living.
"Leo," Sirius voice split through the silence of the room. His shadow fell across the floor from the doorway. Leo turned to him, rubbing away his tears.
"Yes Dad?" he asked, his voice quivering. Sirius walked into the room, seeming to debate just how close he should get.
"We need to talk."
"About what?" Leo was afraid his time to talk was now upon him.
"What happened to you?" Sirius inquired tentatively, not looking Leo in the eye. "I've seen the way you react to things every since, ever since Ella was taken. I need to know what has changed."
"I don't suppose telling you nothing happened to me would suffice?" Leo asked, pushing himself to a sitting position. Sirius shook his head and took a seat beside the bed. The effects of Lily's tea were beginning to fade. He had been to work that day for the first time since Ella's capture.
"Leo, I'd like you to start from the beginning." Leo nodded gravely and cleared his throat.
"My earliest memory is in a dark place." Leo began, assuming a distant expression. "I must have been only a couple years old but I have no way of knowing. I didn't even know I was sixteen till I woke up and the nurse told me. There was a man standing before me, a club in his hand. I had done something wrong and he was angry with me. He hit me and that's all I remember. I don't remember ever going outside, not till I woke up in the hospital. I grew up in that house. We were held in separate rooms during the day then herded down to "the cage" at night."
"Wait, how is that possible? You were in the hospital-"
"Please don't stop me," the desperation in Leo's voice made Sirius halt immediately. "We were always cold, always hungry, always scared. They were our masters and we did everything we were told or we would be deal with. I, I must have had too much of you in me because I fought back. I could never keep my trap closed. He must have tortured me twenty times. But, Dad, it was worth it. I heard things, so many things they never wanted me to hear." Leo's eyes were filled with golden glory, a haunted satisfaction. "I heard what they did to me," he turned his gaze to Sirius.
"What?"
"They planted a, a magical hologram I suppose you could call it, in the hospital. It was exactly like me but asleep. I was, for more than fifteen years, essentially two people. They were planning on using me as a lure for you but apparently I was too risky. A couple months ago, they decided a better target would be Vela, my sister. They would use me as a distraction. Well, I couldn't have that. I planned on warning you, telling you everything before it was too late. I should have never been so stupid as to think that would be permitted. They wiped my memory and somehow, I don't know how, Voldemort entered me, his power was in me. It wasn't full possession; I could feel myself and could barely feel him: He was like a buzz in the back of my head. I suppose that's how I could do all those things. They replaced the real me with the hologram and I was here."
"After Ella was captured, You Know Who left me and, with that vacancy, came all of those forgotten memories. I couldn't tell you."
Leo stopped, no tears coming to his eyes but instead filling with a pitiful despondency. Sirius was at a loss for words. It explained everything but brought with it a whole new layer of horror. The incident in Diagon Alley was no accident, no coincidence. Perhaps, Peter had been unaware but Voldemort had not been so. He had known everything and Sirius had been stupid enough to allow him to see into the lives of his family. He had been so blinded by surprise and joy at Leo's awakening, he hadn't even taken the tiniest precaution.
"D-Dad, please don't be angry; there was nothing I could do. If I could, I would trade places with Ella in a second." Sirius whipped his head toward his son, surprised.
"Oh, Leo, I don't blame you. It is not your fault. You did nothing wrong; I should have, I don't know. . .done something." The two fell silent, overcome by their own emotions. Finally, after ten full minutes of tense silence, Sirius got up. "You need to get some sleep, real sleep. I'll go and get you some dreamless sleep potion." He was now determined to get to the bottom of this. He had had enough of Voldemort's meddling.
"Dad," Leo said softly.
"Yes?" Sirius asked, pausing in the doorframe.
"If you had to choose, would you choose for me to be in Ella's place? I won't blame you if you would; I just wanted to know." Sirius didn't say anything for a moment.
"Leo, I can not answer that question. All I can say is that I would have changed places with you in an instant and that I would do the same for Ella now." Leo, knowing he wouldn't get his question answered, nodded and settled back against the pillows. He felt slightly guilty that he wasn't sure he would be able to switch places with Ella if given the chance.
His childhood had been misery and he was at least slightly comfortable in his new home. If only Ella would come home, the picture would be complete. "Leo," Sirius cleared his throat gruffly, looking everywhere but at Leo.
"Yeah Dad?"
"I love you."
"I love you too."
The sun shone down brightly, reflecting painfully off the glittering, blue ocean. An empty, white sandy beach lay before them. Picnic basket and brightly colored beach towels in hand, they ventured into the sun, out of the shade of the trees which flanked the beach. The sand beneath their feet was soft and warm but not too hot. She spread out a large, pink and blue towel, kicking away a few potentially painful sea stones. He set down the picnic basket and spread out a beach towel of his own.
"This is perfect," she murmured to him, tossing her brown curls from her face and reclining on her elbows. He smiled at her warmly, flashing white teeth.
"Yeah it is." They fell into silence and watched the water lap up against the shore. "Ella," he said softly, nudging her leg gently. She didn't stir, to enraptured with her surroundings. "Ella," he repeated slightly louder. The warmth slipped ever so faintly. "Ella," this time he gave her a powerful shove and the warmth completely melted away. She opened her eyes slowly, heartbroken to see bars all around. "Good, you're awake. There coming and I didn't fancy having Death Eaters wake you for breakfast," Andrew looked strained. She imagined she didn't look too wonderful herself.
Their relationship had grown immeasurably in the almost five months of mutual imprisonment. They were each other's companion, always in sight of each other. If it had not been for him, she could have only found solace in her dreams. "Thanks, I'm up," she murmured, sitting up and endeavoring to rub the kinks from her back. The cage door slammed open and a few lower ranking Death Eaters pushed their way in, a cart of dry bread and water following them magically.
"Come and get it!" the largest one bellowed.
"I'll get breakfast this morning," Ella said, standing up slowly, stumbling to the crowd surrounding the cart. She came back a few moments later with three metal cups of ice-cold water and three identical, brick-hard rolls. Andrew took his breakfast with a weak smile. Ella walked over to where Vivienne, Helia's mother sat, rocking back and forth soundlessly. "Here you are Vivie," Ella said, shoving the roll and water under Vivienne's nose. When the woman didn't react, Ella crouched down to her eye level. "Come now Vivienne, you have to eat something." Vivienne hadn't taken her daughter's death well, if there is even a "good" way to take your child's death. She had completely detached from everything, only eating when Ella forced her to. The bright spot was that Ella had found in her a project, a reason to live.
The months hadn't been easy. Voldemort seemed to take a special interest in the youngest Black, torturing her personally as often as he could find the time and giving the duty to equally merciless Death Eaters in his absence. Somehow though, Ella Black had found purpose and even satisfaction in her small role.
After a few minutes of prodding, Vivienne began eating and Ella went back to Andrew to finish her own breakfast. After the meager breakfast had been devoured, a troop of Death Eaters came back to take the prisoners up to their separate rooms. Andrew helped Vivienne up, making sure to keep her as far away from the Death Eaters as possible.
Neither Ella nor Andrew liked to think about what happened to Vivienne when she was in her "cell". It was hard enough trying to keep her in the right in the evenings. A month before, all of the prisoners had been given "tasks" to do during the day. They were not informed of exactly what they were doing, only given their duty with the expectation that they would do it, no questions asked. Lately, they had been given various potion ingredients to prepare. At least, that's what Ella and Andrew were given. They could never get a straight answer from the others.
"You're to squeeze the puss out of all of these," a young Death Eater ordered from the doorway after Ella and Andrew were in their room. He gestured to a bucket of what looked like a mass of extremely slimy slugs, he then threw in two more, smaller buckets and two pairs of hole-ridden rubber gloves. Andrew nodded and picked up the bucket, Ella picked up the gloves and small buckets. The work wasn't horrible and Ella found she rather enjoyed her long conversations with Andrew. She sometimes thought about what her father would do if he found out she spent every waking moment with a boy two years her senior.
After getting situated on the floor with the large bucket in between them, they began, falling contentedly into friendly conversation. They must have only been at it for an hour or so when two men swept into the room or, rather, one swept and the other tottered self consciously. One had long, slivery blond hair and a disdainful look on his face; the other was short and balding with long front teeth and a fairly rat-like face. Ella recognized both immediately as Lucius Malfoy and Peter Pettigrew.
Andrew saw Ella's shoulders slump. He wished that he could take her place, just once. She was taken far too much in his opinion. "Vela Black," Lucius boomed. "The Dark Lord requests your presence," his face was split into a vicious grin. Pettigrew just looked scared and twitchy as usual. With an air of resignation, Ella rose from the floor, silently telling Andrew to leave it be. She crossed the room to the door, her head held as high as she could force it, still limping a bit. "Mr. Gibson," Lucius said over his shoulder, putting his hand on the small of Ella's back. "You can get back to your, um, "squeezing". Ella pressed her eyes shut, hoping Andrew wouldn't do anything rash.
Lucius didn't take his hand off of her until they stopped before a large, oak door. Ella knew it to be Voldemort's private office. Peter knocked on the door hesitantly, only after Lucius gave him a swift kick on the shin. The door opened on its own and Ella was pushed into the room, shivering slightly. A large, wing-backed chair whipped around, revealing Voldemort's glinting red eyes. "Why, Ms. Black, how nice of you to drop by. I actually have something to discuss with you. Please, sit down," Peter pushed her into a chair. This was odd; it had always been straight to torture before.
"Do you need our presence any longer Master?" Lucius asked, smirking in Ella's direction.
"Just get me what we talked about," Voldemort snapped. "After that, leave us be and make sure Ms. Black and I are not bothered." Lucius nodded and glided out, followed by Peter who's face had gone oddly pale. Not a word was spoken until Lucius re-entered with a tray of tea and biscuits.
"That will be all Lucius." Voldemort hissed. Lucius inclined his head slightly and walked out of the room, clicking the door shut behind him. Voldemort turned to Ella. "Now Ms. Black, I'm afraid I've been fairly inhospitable as of late. Let me make it up to you. Please, have some tea."
A/N: Manic laughter. How's that for a cliff-hanger eh? I was going to keep going but I felt it would work better to split the whole thing up. Don't worry, the next installment is right around the corner. It could possibly be up before the end of the day if I was given some incentive. . . "cough, cough, reviews, cough". Happy Holidays all! By the way, I wanted to apologize for disabling anonymous reviews. I hate it when people do that and think that it is pretentious. So, I suppose it's my fault that I haven't had as many reviews as I would have liked. I've rectified the situation though so you're free to review away!