It was too damned hot for the Macmillan Family Summer Party. And, yet, here Bellatrix was, getting ready for the event. She put on a loose-fitting black dress that reached her knees, in a lightweight cotton material, and she piled her hair atop her head in a messy bun. She put on a chunky silver necklace and slid on some lace-up sandals. When she went downstairs, her mother scolded her,
"You look like you're going to mop the floors of Macmillan House, Bellatrix."
"The invitation specifically said to come dressed casually," Bellatrix noted. She glanced over at Narcissa, who was wearing a flouncy silvery dress, and her sister Andromeda, who was in mint green silk. She scowled. "You two are not casual."
"Well, we wanted to look nice," Andromeda spat, putting her hands on her hips. "You look rather sloppy, if I'm honest."
"Fine!" Bellatrix huffed. "I'll change."
Ten minutes later, she was in a black silk dress with little ruffles round the hem. It was sleeveless with a deep V neck - entirely too girly for Bellatrix's taste, but more fitting to the apparent dress code. She went back downstairs and heard her mother say,
"Ah. Much better."
Bellatrix rolled her eyes and followed her family into the Floo fireplace. One by one, they headed to Macmillan House for the summer party. When they came stumbling out of the green licking flames, they were in an elegant parlour, but of course the party was outside. Bellatrix followed her parents and sisters out through the foyer and front door, into the vibrant sunlight and blazing heat of the summer day. Yes, Bellatrix thought. It was entirely too hot for this party.
She snatched a Gillywater with mint off the tray of a passing House-Elf, and she sipped at it as she and her sisters padded onto the grass. Her father greeted Mr Macmillan, thanking him warmly for the invitation. The wizards must be absolutely dying in their long robes, Bellatrix thought. Right on cue, one of them walked up to her - Rodolphus Lestrange.
"Hullo, Rodolphus." Bellatrix flashed him a small smile, and he grinned broadly back down at her. He was drinking a firewhisky on the rocks, for he was already seventeen. Was he handsome? Bellatrix couldn't decide. It didn't matter. She wasn't going to marry him. She flinched when he put his hand between her shoulder blades and bent down to kiss her forehead.
"Rodolphus!" Bellatrix exclaimed, shocked by the move. Rodolphus shrugged and gave her a playful smile.
"Couldn't help myself," he claimed. "Not when you look that pretty."
Bellatrix shuddered, uncomfortable for some reason. She didn't like him touching her, talking to her like this. To make matters worse, there was a dance floor where summer party revelers were starting to gather, and Rodolphus dared to lace his fingers through Bellatrix's.
"Dance with your future husband," he said, and it only sort of sounded like a suggestion. Bellatrix let Rodolphus drag her out to the dance floor, and she quickly swigged down the rest of her minty Gillywater. She was almost to the dance floor with Rodolphus when he took a sudden detour, pulling her away from the dance floor and around the white tent where the food and drinks were. Bellatrix gasped in surprise as Rodolphus yanked her around the outside of the tent.
"Rodolphus, what are we… ahh!" Bellatrix dropped her empty Gillywater glass onto the grass as Rodolphus wrapped an arm around her. She was pulled against his body tightly, and she gulped as his hand pressed to her lower back. "Rodolphus, stop."
"Bellatrix." Rodolphus was suddenly lowered, his lips too near hers, his breath mingling with the hot air against Bellatrix's cheek. He murmured, "We're to be married, you and I."
"Not yet," Bellatrix said through clenched teeth. "Not any time soon."
"Bellatrix, don't you want to touch me? To let me touch you?" Rodolphus asked. "We're to be husband and wife, you and I."
"Oh, pardon the interruption," said a voice, and Bellatrix had never in her life been so relieved to hear the sound of Lord Voldemort speaking. Rodolphus pulled back, stumbling away a few steps, and Bellatrix stared with hot cheeks at Voldemort where he stood with an icy drink in his hand. He sipped it and said rather nonchalantly, "Bella, I was just looking for you in search of a dance. I'm sorry if I was interrupting… something."
"You actually arrived just in the nick of time," Bellatrix said hotly. "Rodolphus rather forgot himself, sir. About that dance?"
She walked past her dropped Gillywater glass and stomped toward Voldemort, slithering up alongside him and moving out past the tent with him without looking back. As they neared the dance floor, Voldemort muttered,
"I sensed distress in your mind. What was he doing to you?"
"He meant to kiss and touch me," Bellatrix lamented, "because we are to be married. He is labouring under the delusion that our engagement gives him permission to treat me lecherously."
"You are sending him mixed signals." Voldemort pulled Bellatrix into a rather tight dancing stance and gave her a scolding look. "You've agreed to marry him, but you want nothing to do with him."
Bellatrix began to sway to the music. "What am I meant to do when we go back to school? He's going to tell everyone that I am his. He's going to tell everyone that I belong to him."
"You do," Voldemort reminded her, "according to the contract your fathers signed."
"Damn the contract!" Bellatrix stamped her foot, and Voldemort leaned down and whispered,
"You're acting like a child."
"Am I? Is it easier for you when I do?" Bellatrix was being cruel now, she thought, but she couldn't help herself. He pulled back and frowned at her, and she shrugged. "Ought I to have worn my hair in pigtails to make you think I'm just a little girl and not a grown woman to be touched by her future husband?"
"You're not making any sense, Bella," Voldemort announced, and Bellatrix scoffed rather loudly.
"None of it makes sense," she hissed. "You have been my teacher since I was small, and now I want you, and I know you want me back. But I am to be married, and I despise him, and I do not want him. I am leaving for school soon, and I'll be left with memories of kisses in your office, of being backed up against a wall by you, and I -"
"Bella. Stop." Voldemort shut his eyes and shook his head. He kept dancing with Bellatrix, and finally he opened his eyes. "Don't marry him."
"I do not intend on it," Bellatrix informed him. Voldemort licked his bottom lip and amended,
"Don't even say you'll marry him. Don't go along with the contract. Break the contract."
She faltered in her dancing steps. Her voice was soft as she noted, "It'll cause all kinds of discord. My father will loathe me."
"Not if you have someone else waiting in the wings, ready to sweep you up," Voldemort curled up the corners of his lips. "Someone who's waited for you to grow up, someone who wants you as a soldier, as a… as a…"
"As a wife?" Bellatrix breathed, her heart thumping. Suddenly she could hardly stand, much less dance. Voldemort kept them moving, and he insisted,
"It may destroy my movement, taking you as a wife. It may destroy me to do it. I'm not sure why I'm suggesting it. But it seems like the only logical thing to do right now, somehow."
"Logical," Bellatrix repeated. She chomped her lip and shook in Voldemort's arms. "You're being logical. Are you?"
"No." He choked a little laugh. "Not at all, actually. I'm not being rational or logical; I'm acting foolishly and out of emotion. But how am I meant to see that boy's arms around you, Bella, and do nothing about it?"
"You could just talk to my father and convince him to call off the engagement," Bellatrix argued. "You could just tell him that you need me in your movement and that I'll be too busy to be married."
"I could." Voldemort nodded. "But it isn't just that I don't want to see Rodolphus Lestrange's arms around you, Bella. It's that I want my arms around you. I want… I… you'll be seventeen very soon; we could marry at Christmastime at the Ministry."
"I could leave school," Bellatrix suggested brazenly, "and finish my studies under you instead."
"Now you're talking nonsense," Voldemort laughed. He shook his head and bent down until his lips brushed against Bellatrix's. "You'll torture for me. You'll kill for me. And when the battles are finished, you'll come to my bed. Hmm?"
"Ohh." Bellatrix actually moaned then, moaned up onto his mouth, and as he pulled back, she whispered, "That sounds nice."
"Let me talk to your father," Voldemort suggested. "I'll tell him that you're dreading the match with Rodolphus, that you and I are a much more favourable pairing, and that I will take fine care of you."
"And will you?" Bellatrix asked. "Will you take fine care of me, Master?"
"As much as anyone can take care of Bellatrix Black," he nodded with a smirk. "She rather takes care of herself. I suggested going to the Ministry at Christmas. Did you want something bigger?"
"No. No. I do not want anything public. At all. That Debutante Ball was a horror show," Bellatrix scoffed, "and the only time I care to wear a white ball gown, thank you."
Voldemort curled up half his mouth. "If you marry the Lestrange boy, they'll doll you up in white lace again and parade you down an aisle in front of every single Pureblood in existence."
"I know." Bellatrix kept dancing. It was so hot, she thought. So bloody hot out here. "You're going to teach me Occlumency."
"You're going to do so much," he predicted. He studied her face. "You are going to be something wonderful and terrible, Bellatrix, and I could not stand to miss a single moment of it. I must witness you in your glory."
"Teacher," she hummed, leaning closer to him. "Master. Husband. I like them all on you."
"Let me talk to your father," he said again. "I will convince him. Go get yourself some more mint and Gillywater. Your cheeks are red as lobsters. Hot as Hades out here."
With that, he pulled away, and Bellatrix was left standing on the dance floor as he moved with brisk strides in the direction of where her father and mother stood talking to her grandparents.
Author's Note: I'm home from Hawai'i now and can update more regularly now. Thanks for your patience.