DISCLAIMER: The ideas are mine. The characters and everything that is in the Harry Potter Universe belong to J.K.
"Today?" Bellatrix asked, spreading some raspberry jam on her toast.
"Yes," her father confirmed, taking a sip of his coffee. "I have it on good authority from Malfoy that the O.W.L.s results will be arriving today. Abraxas is on the board of trustees at the school, you know."
He looked at Andromeda from the corner of his eye when he said that. Lucius, Abraxas only son was Andromeda's intended, and perhaps the father hoped to inspire something in his middle daughter with the knowledge that her future family was so well-placed in magical society. Andromeda, however, didn't even bother to look up at him.
Bellatrix had barely listened to those last few words about the board of trustees.
"Are you quite sure, Father, that no owls have arrived this morning?"
"Yes, Bellatrix, I would have noticed," Cygnus replied patiently. "But it's barely nine, there's still plenty of time…"
"I don't know why you care so much," Andromeda pointed out in a confrontational tone. "It doesn't matter if you flunked all of your tests, it's not like you're going to do anything with them."
Bellatrix was not the target of her sister's words. Their father was.
"If you cannot think of anything pleasant to say, Andromeda, please restrict your remarks to the weather," Cygnus ordered sharply.
"What happens if a person fails their O.W.L.s?" Cissy asked, with interest.
"In our case, nothing." Andromeda snapped back at her youngest sister. "With or without our O.W.L.s , either way, you end up married and pregnant, raising the next generation of pureblood wizards."
"Andromeda that's enough!"
"But I –"
"I will not tolerate this language at the breakfast table."
"I didn't say anything that is not true! It is what you expect of us, isn't it? That we get married and get out of your sight? I don't understand why do you even go to the trouble to send us to school What's the point? We can't choose our own friends, we can't date, we can't have a job or a career -"
Cygnus took a deep breath and the look in his eyes made Andromeda stop talking, her blood frozen inside her. When he spoke, his voice was cold with disdain:
"Jobs... Careers... Those things are for people who were born with nothing, Andromeda. You were born with everything and seem to have your mind set on becoming nothing."
A heavy silence followed his words, and after that. Andromeda was sent to her room.
Realizing that there would be no point in insisting, the girl dragged herself upstairs making a lot of noise as she climbed the stairs.
Andromeda was angry. Since her parents had found out about her trips to the village, she'd been confined to the house, and the girl hated being cooped up like that. Andy was like an unopened Howler: bound to blow up at unexpected moments of the day, and those moments usually happened during meals when the family was together. Her father usually sent her up to her room without finishing her food. Her mother seemed to believe Andromeda needed more punishment than that. Fortunately, however, Druella preferred to have breakfast in bed, so the girls were spared an unpleasant shouting match in the first hours of the day.
Cygnus went back to reading his copy of the daily prophet and Bella gave up on asking him any further questions about owls.
Bellatrix would never admit it - Merlin knew her sister needed no encouragement - but Andromeda had a point. The reason why many fifth-year students went through nervous break downs when the O.W.L.s were getting closer was that their results on those exams could alter their entire future; O.W.L.s mattered because many careers in the wizarding world required certain levels of academic performance. Be that as it may, neither Bellatrix nor any of her sisters were expected to pursue a career when they were finished with school. In that sense, she supposed it didn't really matter how well she had done on her exams.
Bellatrix wished her father had given reasons why Andromeda was wrong instead of simply sending her up to her room. She certainly couldn't think of any.
At the moment, however, it was difficult to concentrate on that. Instead, she went over her exams in her mind over and over again, trying to remember any obvious mistakes she might have made.
"I'm sure you did fine, Bellatrix," Cissy pointed out, trying to cheer her sister up and taking a generous bite of a piece of sausage with fried eggs.
"I know I messed up Ancient Runes,…" muttered Bella feverishly, "I definitely made at least one serious mistranslation. And the Potions practical was no good at all, to say nothing of the History of Magical exam…"
"Is that an owl?" Cissy interrupted, pointing out the window.
It was. A great horned owl flew into the dining room window, landing on the counter under a large oil painting of Cygnus Black the I riding an Abraxan winged horse. The wizard – who had been great-grandfather to Bellatrix and her sisters – steadied his palomino animal and dismounted, watching the great horned owl as it lifted its right leg.
Cissy moved forward and untied the letter from the animal's leg, patting the owl softly in the back. The purple wax seal in front of the thick, square envelope depicted Hogwarts' emblem. The large letter "H", surrounded by a lion, a racoon, an eagle, and a serpent. It was addressed to Bellatrix.
Every pair of eyes in the dining room was fixed on Bella. Even the great horned owl at the counter seemed to linger to hear about her results. She picked up the envelope from Cissy and broke the wax seal. She pulled out the letter and read.
HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY
Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore
(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)
Dear Miss Black,
Please find enclosed in this letter the score reports regarding your Ordinary Wizarding Levels (date of test: june/1970). We await your owl with the applications to N.E.W.E.T. level disciplines no later than the 15th of August.
Yours Sincerely,
Albus Dumbledore
Headmaster
The second piece of parchment inside the envelope read:
Ordinary Wizarding Level Results
Pass Grades:
Outstanding (O)
Exceeds Expectations (E)
Acceptable (A)
Fail Grades:
Poor (P)
Dreadful (D)
Troll (T)
Bellatrix Cassiopeia Black has achieved:
Ancient Runes: E
Arithmancy: A
Astronomy: E
Care of Magical Creatures: A
Charms: O
Defense Against the Dark Arts: E
Herbology: O
History of Magic: E
Potions: E
Transfiguration: O
"So?" Cygnus asked, trying not to demonstrate his curiosity about the results. Bella had not even noticed when her father stopped reading his copy of the Prophet to watch her from the corner of his eyes.
Bella handed him the parchment as soon as she was finished reading it through for the second time. She could read the disappointment in her father's eyes, but to Cygnus credit, he didn't say a word. Cissy, unable to stand to be the only one who didn't know what was written on the letter, whipped the parchment out of her father's hands and read it through.
"Ten O.W.L.s, Bella! And you passed everything! That's great, isn't it?"
Bella smiled faintly and stuffed her mouth with a toast to avoid having to give a response.
She understood exactly what her father was feeling because she was also disappointed with herself. Belatrix knew most students would have been thrilled to get her O.W.L. results, but as her father often pointed out, she was not "most students". He didn't expect her to be above average. He expected her to be the best. And Bellatrix expected that of herself as well. Up until the last few weeks of her fifth year, Bella would have thought she could get at least eight "Outstandings", perhaps nine. Instead, she had only gotten three, and she had barely scraped by in Arithmancy and Care of Magical Creatures.
It was unfair, she thought futilely, staring at the little black "E"s all over her score reports that all of those things had happened just weeks away from her exams. It was unfair that she hadn't been able to revise properly or to focus on those important last few lectures before the exams. It was unfair that she had been so ill, tired, worried, nervous and afraid and that all of that happened just before her exams. It was cruel beyond belief that the girl had spent the last few weeks before the most important set of exams she had ever taken sleeping poorly, eating badly and wrestling with her memories about the violence that had been done to her over the Easter Holidays.
If only her parents could have waited before setting up that dinner at Lestrange Manor… If only those things hadn't happened just before her O.W.L.s…
She could never tell her father any of those things. She could never make him understand.
The worst was, of course, that it didn't matter. The O.W.L.s were now part of the past. She couldn't take them again – they would never let her reseat the exams simply so she could boost up her scores to Outstanding levels.
In spite of the fact that she would never use her marks to start a career or a job, Bellatrix had always thought she would be able to look back at her academic performance with pride. She thought she would be able to say she could have gotten into any career she wanted, had she chosen to do so, but that's not how things turned out in the end. Instead, whenever she looked back at her O.W.L.s in the future she would be reminded of what had happened at Easter. Forever reminded of the worst moment in her life.
Whatever happened in the next few months, she was beginning to realize it was not going to be easy to simply move on from something like this. Lestrange had robbed her of much more than she realized when she was crying in the guest room of the house she hated, the house she was one day expected to call her own. It was all too much. It was too big, too insurmountable to forget and bury away.
Bellatrix was beginning to realize that whatever scars had been carved on her soul these past few months, they would remain with her forever. She had no idea how to even begin to deal with that.
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/
The day they went to Diagon Alley was a gloomy Saturday, with clouds that promised spitting rain. The sky was low and dark, full of deep steel shades of blue-grey, and the wind blew savagely, touching the wizarding guild signs and in front of the shops, and making they dance. The emblems were made in wrought-iron and wood. The iron hinges sang when they moved, and those whistles and screeches joined the voices of witches and wizards in the narrow, diagonal cobblestone street.
"Where are your lists?" Cygnus asked.
Bellatrix and Cissy handed over their booklists to their father, while Cygnus fished a third list from the inside breast pocket of his robes. Andromeda's list. The girl had not been permitted to join them, given her recent excursions to the muggle village outside the family property. Andromeda had been rather cross about that. She protested insistently, talking about how she was looking forward to meeting her friends, but it was of no use. Druella had stayed home to ensure Andromeda's obedience.
Cygnus examined the list carefully.
"I suppose the two of you need new robes?"
"Yes," the girls replied in unison.
"Very well. The two of you can go to Madam Malkin's first. Bellatrix you can help your sister get fitted for new robes," he said, ignoring Cissy's annoyed protest. "I have business at Gringotts to attend, and then we can all meet at Flourish and Blotts. Does that sound okay?"
Bellatrix agreed and they parted ways. The girls watched as their farther walked to Gringotts in large strides before making their way to Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions. Cissy complained about their father's behaviour all through the way to the shop. It wasn't that she minded getting robes with Bellatrix, she said, but she was not a baby anymore, and she resented being treated as such. She was, Cissy insisted, perfectly capable of getting fitted for robes on her own.
Bellatrix didn't say anything. If she were to speak candidly she had to admit she'd been hoping to visit the tailor's shop on her own. She had something very specific she wanted to purchase and she was trying to figure out a way to get it without her sister noticing what it was that she wanted to buy.
It was her mother who had given her the idea, unintendedly, a few nights before.
Her body was changing. It wasn't that the bump on her abdomen was very large yet, but it definitely seemed like she had gained some weight. Her breasts seemed a bit bigger. Even her thighs seemed to have some extra padding in comparison to how skinny she had been before.
Her mother had pointed that out during dinner one night. She looked at Bellatrix from head to toe, sizing her up when the girl came into the dining room. Bellatrix was embarrassed. She refrained the impulse to cross her arms in front of her stomach, fearing such a gesture might direct her mother's gaze to that part of her body.
"You are getting fat, Bellatrix," Druella said finally. "If you wish to continue to fit those dresses I got for you, you have to start watching what you eat."
Bellatrix had barely eaten any of her pasta that night. Instead, she moved the food around her plate with a fork while her mother went on and on about how Bellatrix's eating habits had changed, how she was eating too much, how she was starting to walk a path from which there would be no return...
Bella remained quiet. Oblivious as her mother might be about her condition, Bella knew her mother was right. Bellatrix had been eating a lot more than she used to, a dramatic contrast to those days just before her O.W.L.s when she barely ate anything at all.
When the morning sickness went away - that's what it was called, she had learnt - her appetite seemed to double. It felt good at first. After months of not being able to eat properly, feeling pleasure with her food was a welcomed feeling. One thing that made her feel good in spite of the sadness, the trauma, the fear and the constant anxiety she'd been experiencing since April. She barely realized she was eating so much more, or that some of her choices in the food department had become somewhat unorthodox. Come to think of it... It was not normal to have ice cream with toast. Not that it wasn't delicious.
When her mother pointed out the changes in her body and her eating habits, however, Bellatrix made a conscious effort to slow down. There were lots of things about what was happening to her that were out of her control. Bellatrix knew that. But she could control what she ate.
The girl didn't want to gain weight. She wanted to delay people learning about her condition for as long as she possibly could. She wanted to have her body back as soon as possible. Her young, athletic, skinny body, just the way it was when it all started.
She certainly didn't want to be called fat.
Overnight, Bellatrix went back to eating barely anything at all. Some days she had barely more than a slice of cheese all day. Her restraint did not go unnoticed at the dinner table. Her mother praised her commitment to maintaining her figure.
It was surprising how quickly your body could adapt when you stopped eating. She had bad headaches in the first couple of days after that unpleasant interaction with her mother, and she felt lightheaded and drained at times, as she had expected, but other than that, Bella was doing fine. She performed weighing spells to keep track of her weigh and celebrated when she realized she was two pounds lighter after only a few days. She also conjured a measuring tape to assess the circumferences of her thighs and her arms.
She never used the tape on her abdomen though. That would have been too hard.
The girl discovered, however, that it wasn't always easy to control what she ate.
It happened for the first time three nights ago. Bella had been tossing and turning in bed for two hours, unable to conceal any sleep. It wasn't just that she was hungry. Bellatrix was accustomed to being hungry. It was more than that hollow feeling inside her, more than the convulsions of her gut – which she could feel when she was very still. She knew there was chocolate in the pantry – uncle Ignatius had brought some from his latest trip to Switzerland – and Bella wanted it. She craved it more than she had ever craved anything in her life, and she suspected even if there hadn`t been any in the house, still she would have wanted some.
Bellatrix hated the feeling. She hated not being in control of her own body, hated feeling overwhelmed by those impulses and she did everything she could not to surrender to those wishes. She got out of the bed, took a shower, read some of her History of Magic book, and even did a couple of jumping jacks like they did when they were warming up for Quidditch practise at school. Nothing worked. She counted hippogriffs and stars and blades of glass but in the end, she tied up her robe and went downstairs to the pantry. She ate all of the chocolate in less than five minutes.
Nothing could have prepared her for the regret she experienced afterwards. Her mother's words kept rolling around in her head and eventually Bella made her way to the loo to empty her stomach in the toilet.
Making herself throw up was not as easy as she might have anticipated. It was not as simple as sticking a finger down her throat. It took effort. Time. She had to try several times before the contents of her stomach finally erupted from her mouth, and it hurt. It was entirely different from the morning sickness of the first few weeks. Before, when she was done throwing up, she was fine for most of the day. Now that uncomfortable burning sensation lingered long after there was nothing else in her stomach to get rid of.
Bella realized she wouldn't be able to keep that up for long.
And besides, she thought sadly, looking down at her stomach, it was not like it was going to make that much of a difference in the long run. Weeks ago she had realized that there was no halting this thing forever. She was torn. On one hand, she was happy to have control of at least one aspect of her body. She enjoyed the way she felt when she was hungry because she knew every aspect of that was under her control. There was dignity in that self-abuse. On the other hand, however, if she continued with that, it wouldn't be long before she passed out and when someone took her to a healer they would definitely find out about her secret. Bellatrix couldn't take that chance.
That was why she was going to Madam Malkin's. She had a plan.
A young witch, no doubt Madam Malkin's assistant came to the girls as they approached the door when they walked in.
"Hogwarts, girls?" she asked, "there are a couple of students here already, getting fitted for robes right now!"
She indicated two boys standing in small stools at the end of the corridor. Narcissa must have known the older one because he waved at her when their eyes met and the measuring tape got tangled around his right wrist.
"You can go first, Cissy," Bellatrix said, "I am going to look around for a while".
Cissy was off to join her friend before Bella could say another word, and the older girl walked quickly, her eyes perusing the shelves trying to find what she had come for. When she found the squat Madam Malkin working on needlepoint behind a tall desk at the other end of the shop, Bella decided to ask for assistance.
"Humm— Excuse me," she started awkwardly.
"Yes, dear," the smiling witch replied joyfully.
"I need a set of slimming robes," Bellatrix said decidedly, "I need the ones with the strongest slimming spells you've got."
"Certainly, dear," the witch replied, studying Bella over her rectangular spectacles. "But we shouldn't need that strong a spell for you, though,-"
"The strongest spell," Bella insisted.
The older woman nodded.
"Come with me, please."
She guided Bella to a stool in a different part of the shop and instructed her to remove her cloak. The witch slipped a long robe over her head and started pinning it to the right length. When she took the measuring tape to Bella's stomach, however, Madam Malkin halted. Her hand brushed against the middle of Bella's body and she felt the hardness of the young girl's stomach. Bella was terrified. Her fear turned to anger when her words came out.
"What where you're sticking that pin, woman!"
With a quick gesture, she pushed the witch's hand away from her.
Madam Malkin was frozen where she stood.
"Is that all?" Bella asked impatiently. "Have you finished the adjustments?"
"Dear," the older which started, "you do understand these robes aren't meant for –"
"I am buying the robes, I know exactly what they are for," Bella interrupted.
"Yes, but, -"
"I could just go to Twilfitt and Tatting's!"
"Of course," the tailor acquiesced, "It will only be a few more minutes."
When they were done, the owner of the shop folded the robes carefully and placed them on a box. Bella had gotten two, and Cissy too was carrying a box with her own robes. She stood a few metres away, waiting for Bella to finish her purchase and chatting to her friend who had also just been fitted for robes.
"You do understand," Madame Malkin lowered her voice to a whisper when she handed the box back to Bella, "that these robes are meant for visual concealment only? If someone were to touch you or come two close..."
"Yes," Bella replied curtly.
"And they won't— huh, they won't expand when you – if you need bigger ones –"
"I understand," Bella agreed, making her best efforts not to demonstrate her worries about that information.
Madame Malkin sighed and bit her lower lip.
"Are you sure you don't need any help, dear?" She asked finally, reaching out to hold Bella's hand over the counter "I could serve you tea in the back, you could talk to me. You're so young you shouldn't –"
"Don't touch me!" the girl said, harshly, "retrieving her hand as if the older woman's touch could burn her. "Come on Cissy, let's go."
Cissy followed quickly as her sister left the shop. She looked back before the door closed. The little girl could not decode the look in the tailor's eyes.
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/
They met their father at Flourish and Blotts. He was still in line to pay for the books in spite of the fact that Bella had insisted on stopping at Apothecary before heading to the book shop. She had applied to continue studying Potions at N.E.W.E.T. level and she needed ingredients. The N.E.W.E.T.s must indeed be exhaustive and interesting, Cissy considered, for she was entirely unfamiliar with most of the ingredients Bella placed in her shopping bag.
Obviously, her baby sister didn't know N.E.W.E.T. level classes were the farthest thing from her mind when she was choosing those ingredients.
The bookshop was crowded. The rain had finally started and many witches and wizards took refuge in the small café at the back or sat in one of the comfortable armchairs in between shelves to browse through the pages of one book or another. There were many Hogwarts students there with their parents, and it didn't take long for the girls to encounter people that they knew.
Bellatrix and Narcissa joined a small group of Slytherins at the invisibility section of the bookshop while they waited for their father. Narcissa quickly started a conversation with Gibbon and Bella was looking at the books distractedly when the Carrows approached her from behind.
"So… Have you heard?"
"Have I heard what?"
"About the conscription! Everyone is talking about it,-" Alecto started
"We assumed Rodolphus would have told you," Amycus added. He was a year of his sister and Bella at school, but he constantly walked with Lestrange's circle.
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Bella said.
"The Dark Lord!" Alecto whispered excitedly, "He-who-must-not-be-named, has issued a conscription call to join his ranks."
"He wants to see us during our first Hogsmeade weekend," her brother explained.
"Why?"
"Avery said he wants to talk to us about his ideas for the Wizarding World. He wants young people by his side!"
"I think he means to test us. He will only want the strongest of us in his inner circle!"
"He means to rebuild everything the muggle-loving blood traitors who run the Ministry have destroyed these past few years. He wants to improve the quality of life for all wizards, and usher us into a new era of peace, without subservience to muggles and their ways."
"How do you know all that?" Bella asked.
"Lestrange's father told me when we visited their Manor last week. He is sending letters. We received our owls this morning… Yours can't be far behind! He says every Slytherin who has passed their O.W.L.s will be given a chance to participate!"
"Only Slytherins?"
"He only wants the best by his side," Amycus said matter-of-factly.
"They say He is the heir of Slytherin himself!"
"Bellatrix?"
It was her father's voice. Bella said her goodbyes to the Carrows and joined him and Cissy as they left the shop.
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/
That night, Bella went to her bedroom early. She lay on her back for a long time conjuring colourful smoke rigs with her wand and watching them dissipate on-air as she thought about what she had heard.
The letter the Carrows had mentioned at Flourish and Blotts was waiting for her on top of her pillow that night. It was different from the letters she'd gotten from Hogwarts. There was nothing about her address at all in the back, nothing to indicate how the owl had managed to find the recipient at all. Instead, there was only her name, written in bright red ink:
To Mss. Bellatrix,
Daughter of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black
The letter had been sealed with green wax, and there was an emblem Bella had never encountered before. A large letter V, enwrapped by the Slytherin serpent on one side.
Actually, now that she stopped to think about it, her window was closed. There was no indication at all that an owl had been in her room. Bellatrix had no idea how that letter had appeared in her pillow.
For the few months that preceded that summer, the kids at Hogwarts didn't seem able to talk about anything other than that Dark Lord. They believed he was the heir of Slytherin and he was a Parselmouth . They said he had the power to transform himself into a giant snake with venom ten times as powerful as that of a basilisk. They said he didn't need a wand to perform magic and that the charms and hexes shot right out of his fingertips at the slightest thought. They said he knew no fear.
Bellatrix wasn't sure she believed those stories. It seemed unlikely that a wizard no one had ever heard of before could be capable of all of those things. And yet, that latter had arrived on her pillow without the aid of an owl and already that was magic beyond anything the girl had ever seen.
Some of what they said about him must be true.
He-who-must-not-be-named was recruiting young people to join him. If half the things Bella had heard about that wizard were true, he would already be an impressive individual. All her life she had listened to the adults in her family complaining loudly about the directions the ministry had taken. All her life she had listened to stories about the old days, the days when wizards were not forced to hide their magic away. The International Statute of Secrecy was sham, Grandfather Pollux had said. She knew many other pureblood families felt the same, but somehow, in spite of the fact that the Statute had been established in 1692, no one had ever done anything concrete about it. That is, until now.
For the first time in a long time, there was a real possibility of change. The winds of war had been blowing from the east and the west, and everything indicated they were on the winning side. The Daily Prophet seemed to be pretending that nothing was going on, but the news of disappearances, accidents and even deaths had other ways to reach Black Manor. Only last week, Claudius Yaxley and his wife had come to dinner, and he had told the Blacks all about how the Dark Lord had given the Oakland Abbey back to the Bulstrodes, after nearly 100 years of litigious squabble.
"The property had belonged to the Bulstrodes' estate since the XIII century," Mr Yaxley argued. "The muggles took it from them at the turn of the century due to a legal technicality in the paperwork, and the Ministry refused to give them permission to use magic to gain back their home."
"Madness," Cygnus agreed. "And the Bulstrodes are part of the sacred 28!"
"Indeed. But the Dark Lord took the matters into his own hands and resituated the property back to the rightful owners."
"What did he do to the Muggles?" Andromeda had asked.
"He used the killing curse," Claudius explained. "It was merciful really. They didn't even see what hit them."
That conversation went on for nearly an hour.
Earlier that day, Bella had noticed how different the Diagon alley was from the other times she had visited the shopping hub. The colourful, glittering window displays of screeching owls, strange potion ingredients and cutting edge Quidditch apparel were lost to view, hidden behind large Ministry Propaganda Posters. The posters had sayings like: "John is a muggle, he is not that different from you," "Secrecy is not a choice. It's a necessity," and "Remember the stake?". A colourful sketch of a tortured witch-burning in yellow-orange flames accompanied that last one.
Many of the people who walked by seemed to be in a hurry. Hardly anybody was shopping alone. Even the shoppers stayed together in tightly knitted groups.
The noticeable exception to that strange behaviour were her Father and the other pureblood wizards they had seen. Her father walked tall and unafraid, guiding his daughters through the people as they picked up materials for their next school year. Cygnus had nothing to fear from the Dark Lord. He was not a traitor to his blood. Bellatrix wanted to be like that as well. She wanted to know that powerful wizard whose name inspired so much fear no one ever dared pronouncing it out loud. She wanted to learn from him.
She wanted to be feared. She didn't want to be afraid anymore.
Author's note: This chapter has been Beta-Read by davros fan. Any remaining mistakes are entirely my responsibility.
Thanks for reading. There was a small delay in posting this chapter, but now I am back on track... next chapter will be up within ten days... I would be grateful if you left me a review to let me know what you think of the story so far.
Additionally, I usually reply to reviews via private message, but this time I couldn't because the reviewer didn't have an ff profile. I would just like to thank M. for the awesome feedback on chapter 5. I am glad you like the story, and that our vision of what kind of people the Black sisters are is similar, at least a little bit. Your review was incredibly motivating, I hope you keep on reading.
Live Long and Prosper.