I barely have time to react before I feel smooth, cold stone under my back. The wall - ground? - curves sharply, and soon we are both tumbling to a stop in a dark room, still echoing with the sounds of our fall. "Cissa? Are you alright?" I am immensely glad for wandless magic as I twist my hand and conjure a ball of light at my palm.
It's easy enough to find Cissa, as there's nothing else in this room. She lifts herself off the ground, wandlessly casting several charms to put her robes and hair back to rights. "Yes, I believe so." A few casts of Episkey take care of some minor scrapes on my shoulders and legs. I hear Cissa walk over to me while I finish up.
"Good." I take a deep breath and look around to see if there's a way out. It does seem so - there's a door on one wall that should hopefully lead out. "I can't tell if she's trying to kill us or annoy us." We don't technically know if Bellatrix laid that trap, but I have a feeling it was her.
"If I had to hazard a guess? Both." If I weren't so rattled, I might laugh at that - it doesn't seem far off.
I cast a quick Accio to find my wand, pleased when it flies to my hand in one piece. I start slowly walking to the door, eyes darting across the floor, wary. "What do you think it meant?"
I glance back at Cissa, a meter or so behind me. "It seems pretty self evident, doesn't it?" I don't believe for a second that this is a coincidence. Magic doesn't work like that.
"No, what did it mean? What was it trying to say?" She flicks her wand and a scrap of parchment cones fluttering out of the darkness to her outstretched hand. "I can't work out what it was trying to tell her."
I read over it once more, trying to find some meaning to the words that I haven't already seen. "I don't know," I say after several seconds. "Either it's incredibly straightforward, or we are missing some piece of the puzzle that she had. I haven't seen anything in her memories about it, so I'm really not sure which."
"Yet another question we need answers for." I understand her frustration. If I thought I could, I would read straight through the journal in one go. Finally know what happened to Bellatrix, why she spiraled so strongly. There may not even be a reason, it has occurred to me - she may have just been predisposed to madness. A cruel fate, but not unheard of.
"Let's just get moving. I don't like the idea of staying in this… pit." It's unnerving being in the dark for so long. Even with wand light, something about it feels distinctly… unsafe. I lead the way to the door, carefully scanning the ground ahead with each step. If I can help it, we won't be stepping on any more pressure plates.
As soon as we are with arm's reach of the door, we both set about making sure it's safe to touch. It is, thankfully, and pushing the door open shows a small circular tunnel, dimly lit by Bellatrix's stars. Looking at them now feels different. I'd assumed she chose stars because of her family's names, initially, but now…? It feels almost desperate.
I take a step forward into the smooth-bored tunnel, eyes scanning for danger. The stars are so dim that the tunnel fades into blackness beyond my wand light, forcing me to end the spell and allow my eyes to adjust to the low light. Even so, I cannot see the end of the tunnel, only a trail of stars that seems to fade into an impossible distance. "Looks like we're going to be walking a while." Cissa sighs audibly, but we don't really have another option. Press on, or die.
Eventually, I notice that the tunnel is bending slightly to the left, though I have no idea what that really means. We continue steadily forwards, my legs burning from the awkward angle of the floor. I desperately want to be out of this damn complex, a sentiment I know Cissa shares.
Suddenly, I find myself stumbling down a step I hadn't seen, and into an entirely different type of tunnel - this one is square-cut, for one, but it's also intermittently lined with large stone tablets, each bearing a name and a wand. I look back to see Cissa's hand sticking through the wall below one of the tablets. "Hermione? Darling, are you alright?"
"Yes, it's safe! Come on through. I think we're in the crypt." She sticks her head through first, then finally steps into the hallway.
"I believe you are correct." She looks up at the tablet we just exited under. Druella A. Black, it reads in large square letters, with a short, thin wand resting below it. "Though I do wonder what happened to Mother's body… it would have been behind this wall…" She shrugs as if the information means little to her, then turns to march down the hallway with purpose.
I follow as closely as I comfortably can, since she seems to know exactly where we are. "We must be quite far down. Our parents only passed recently." I nod, though she can't see me, and scan the tablets we walk past. Many of them are blank, leaving room for newer members of the family to rest. All of the plaques have the last name "Black", even the ones I know took different names in life. It somehow doesn't surprise me.
I see one that makes me come to a stop. Bellatrix D. Black, I read. Below it sits a wand I've never seen before. It's just shorter than my own, and made of two even halves - one darker wood, one lighter, though similar in shade. Sycamore and fir, I know. Just like mine.
I feel Cissa's presence behind me - partly through the wind of her movement, and partly from her cool magic washing over me. "This," I gesture at the wand, "is her first wand, right?" The wand she kept at Hogwarts, the one I've seen her use in her memories. The one that was too weak, that held her back.
"Yes. It felt… wrong to leave the other at her grave." Several silent moments pass before she continues, "I wanted to remember her like this." The pain in her voice prompts me to reach back and take her hand, to offer some comfort.
The wand is in pristine condition. On a whim, I close my eyes and reach out with my magic, surprised to feel traces of warmth still breathing within the wand. "It still remembers her," I say, though I'm not sure why. The detail does strike me as odd - it must have been nearly fifty years since it was used. "It's very loyal."
"As was she." I can't really argue against that. Cissa begins walking again, this time more slowly.
"How much more walking do we have?" My legs are absolutely killing me, but if it's less than an hour I'll just push through.
"I can't say for sure, but I believe it will be at least an hour." Right. Definitely stopping for a break.
"Let's stop, then. I don't think I can walk for another hour straight." I look around for a blank space to sit under. "Wait. We can just Apparate, can't we?" I'd gotten so used to not being able to that I hadn't thought about it.
"I suppose we can." Cussa looks back down the hallway. "We may have even been able to do so from the pit, now that I think about it." She holds her elbow out, which I take, and in an instant we are being sucked through a straw to land in the foyer of Black Manor.
I look around, almost incapable of processing that we are finally out. If I had the energy, I'd probably be grabbing Cissa and dancing around in celebration. Instead, I just collapse on the floor. "We made it."
"We did." Cissa sits next to me, and we lean into each other. The moment is calm, peaceful. "We should let Andie know we are safe. She must have worried herself to death." I watch as she whispers a Patronus charm and tells it, "Take this message to Andromeda Tonks when she is alone. We are safe. I apologize for the lack of communication, but we have been predisposed for some time. Please, make your way to Black Manor when possible. Hermione and I are both in need of your expertise, but there is no emergency."
The bird flies through the wall behind us and off to Andromeda, wherever she may be. "We should really go to the Ministry first." They need to hear about this, about Bellatrix Lestrange being alive. Cissa's hand closes around mine.
We sit in silence for several minutes, exhaustion folding over us like a blanket. Cissa is the one to break the silence. She speaks softly, tentatively. "Hermione… I do not think that going to the Ministry is our best option."
I can't help but to sit up straight, turn to look at her directly. "What?!" The force of my own voice surprises me, and I take a moment to bite it back. "Sorry, I didn't mean to shout. What do you mean, we shouldn't take this to the Ministry?" There is an incredibly dangerous witch out there somewhere, likely trying desperately to cling to whatever life her horcrux will allow her. We could get ahead of it. We could stop her.
"I just think we should get all of the information we can first. She hasn't done anything for eleven years. Surely we have enough time to finish the journal, at least?" She squeezes my hand tightly. "The Ministry does not have a favorable view of me, Hermione. I fear they will try, somehow, to incriminate me with this."
She definitely isn't wrong about the Ministry's opinion of her, and I can already see how they might try and convict her of a crime if given the opportunity. If Bellatrix's horcrux is on the grounds, she could be pinned for harboring a fugitive - or even just for some of the illegal magic that exists on the grounds. Besides, she is right about how long it's been. There's a very good chance that we have enough time to put our case together before we take it to the Ministry, assuming Bellatrix even has a body to use.
Not to mention that the memories in the journal appear to be particular about who they show themselves to. It may just be that Bellatrix and I have similar magical signatures - I was able to use her curved wand, and my own new wand is remarkably similar to her older one, after all. If we take the journal to the Ministry, they'll confiscate it as evidence, and I won't be able to see it anymore. Not only will we never truly know what happened to Bellatrix, but the Ministry might not even be able to extract the memories.
Not for the first time, I can't believe I'm doing this. "...okay. I think… I think you're right, taking the journal and our case to the Ministry immediately would probably be a bad idea." They don't exactly have a history of impressing me, recently. "Let's… let's take a break and figure out what our next step is."
I feel the tension slowly bleeding from my body as I once again lean against Cissa's side. "This could be a very bad idea."
"It could." Cissa doesn't sound nearly as unsure as I feel. I do agree with her, but I still feel the low undercurrent of fear that is telling me to run to Shacklebolt and give him all the evidence we have.
We sit there against the wall for several hours, both of us fading in and out of wakefulness but completely unwilling to move. Eventually, what drags us out of our stupor is the snap of Apparition close by. Both of us have our wands in hand before we're even fully awake, and we hear the voice of Andromeda calling, "Hey, no need for all that! You asked me to come."
Cissa and I look at each other for a moment before - to my own surprise - bursting out in laughter and charging at her sister. "Andie!" I slow down a bit as we approach, watching as Cissa crashes into her full-force. I feel the same way, a bright rush of giddiness coursing through me, as though Andromeda's presence has finally proved that we are safe.
"Merlin- What has gotten into you two?! I thought you were injured!" Despite her annoyed tone, she still wraps her arms around her little sister.
"We probably are. Everything hurts, so I can't be sure." I put my hand on Andromeda's shoulder. "It really is great to see you. We've been trapped underground for at least a few days."
"Trapped? How in Merlin's name did you manage that?" Cissa finally breaks away, a grin still plastered across her face. It's good to see some happiness from her, after the doom and gloom of the past few days.
"Our sister. She left several nasty surprises in a secret facility underneath the property. We only made it out by luck - we could have easily been trapped down there forever." The excitement of finally seeing another person seems to be wearing off on the both of us. I can feel my own exhaustion creeping back in, and Cissa is beginning to slump a little around the edges.
Andromeda shoots me a halfhearted glare - one I've seen many times before, always jokingly. "I thought I could trust you to keep both of you out of trouble."
"Me?! After all you've heard about my Hogwarts years?" I can't help but laugh, despite my energy sapping slowly.
She hums. "Fair point. Let's get the two of you checked out, then, since you're so bent on hurting yourselves at every turn."
It turns out we'd been down there for nearly five days. It didn't feel like it, but keeping track of time was impossible. "Alright, you two are both clear to go. Try to give me at least a month until the next one, alright?" I know it's her way of telling us to be careful, so I nod with a smile as Cissa gives her sister another hug.
"You know," Andromeda says, looking around, "I never thought I'd see this place again - much less be allowed inside. It's just as gaudy as I remember."
Shortly after, she is gone, and we are alone in Black Manor once more. "We need to sleep." I say it despite the fact that I don't really want to. Now that we're safe, my curiosity to read the journal is almost impossible to ignore.
"Yes, we do. But first, I need to bathe. Preferably for the next several hours." I crack a grin at that and follow as she leads us further into Black Manor.
Eventually we arrive at a door similar to the one in front of Bellatrix's suite. Narcissa waves her hand as we approach, and the door opens smoothly for us. Immediately, she walks directly towards the bedroom and into the bathroom. I hear the water turn on just before the door shuts behind her, and I am - for the first time in five days - alone with my thoughts.
I can't believe I agreed not to tell the Ministry immediately. I won't go back on it now, not without discussing it with Cissa first, but a part of me is still screaming to send an owl or a Patronus as soon as possible. Instead, I turn my mind to the journal. I'm not even sure if I can read it normally, and I can't do it at all without Cissa's help - we didn't have much time for French lessons down there.
It is both fascinating and infuriatingly obtuse. Why not store the memories some other way? Why would she have gone through the trouble of inventing a way to store memories? Was it so important to her that the journal be a complete retelling of her life story? If so, why was it so important?
I shake my head to clear my thoughts. I always end up circling that same question: Why? There must be some kind of reasoning to her decisions. The journal had to have been made before she began to lose her mind. Perhaps it was simply the first symptom. The first instance of paranoia that would spell her doom later. I doubt I will ever really find any true answers, even with the help of her memories. They must stop somewhere, after all, and will only give a partial picture because of that.
Then there's the prophecy. It's burned into my mind, right next to Cissa's.
A bright witch burnt to banish the dark, left alone to waste
A mind shattered, let the stars guide your way
Could this have been what started it all? A self-fulfilling prophecy in the most literal sense? I sigh in frustration. So many questions, but so few answers. Even despite everything we've learned, I still can't shake the feeling that we're missing a piece of the puzzle. Soon, I try to reassure myself, but I don't really believe it.
I sit in one of the chairs in the lounge and lean my head against the cushioned back. Tomorrow. I'll read the journal tomorrow.
