Author's Note:
Christmas? Ha ha, yeah sure, so I kind of lied. I promise I wasn't trying to, I'm just a very busy 17 year old and so writing, especially fan fiction, has kind of taken the back burner in my mind. So yeah, I will never again promise when to update cause I know it will be a really long time. This one was almost a year in coming; hopefully the next won't be quite so bad.
Ch. 15 Calculating
Delia smiled to herself as she nestled closer into Sirius's arms, kissing him gently and watching for his responding grin with bated anticipation. I'll get you out of here, she thought, knowing he would instinctively hear her and he smiled again in agreement. I promise. And then I'll tell you everything about Robbie.
"I know you will, Delia," he told her, stroking her hair back from her forehead. Delia could only imagine how odd he looked to the Death Eaters, petting empty space. "You've always been so much braver than me," his eyebrow twitched, "embarrassingly enough."
I have to leave.
"Please don't," Sirius begged, his arms tightening reflexively around her, "I'm so much weaker without you. They hurt me." As if on cue a sensation of bone chilling fear swept through the room in an icy wave. It couldn't affect Delia, but she sensed its presence as it passed through her spirit body. Sirius shivered.
The do it because they're scared of you, she told him. They know they're losing their hold on you and they don't know why. Together we're stronger than them. You're stronger than them. You just needed me to show you how to be.
"I know that. You're right, as always." Sirius shrugged. "You can go," he told her, but he laced his fingers through hers as though to hold her prisoner there.
"I love you."
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Delia willed her spirit back into her own body. She sighed in relaxation as she felt herself being enveloped in self-ness. She hadn't been back in her own skin, literally, for days, maybe weeks. As always time passed uncertainly in the White Room.
One by one she had visited each of her friends, and eventually the other inmates of the White Prison as she learned to further control this power of hers, thinking courage and spirit into them and drawing them out of their individual fear prisons. It was then that the Wave Fear started. When anyone was feeling happy or hopeful or even just numb and wave of pure fear would sweep through every crevice of the room as though a Dementor had entered. If Delia were present she talked them through their fear, helping them to hold on the their reality and fight of the demons of past decisions and forgotten fears.
She wished she could spend more time comforting her friends but she was spending all her time in the Dark Room, watching the Death Eaters, learning from them. She whispered fears into their ears. She didn't need to see into their souls to know the kind of things they feared: the Dark Lord, the Ministry, an uprising by their prisoners.
It was exhausting. Whisking from one person to another, taking their fears onto her self, tormenting her jailors, and trying to think of a plan. After a good, dreamless, visit-less sleep she'd return to the Dark Room and try once again to discover a way out, and further a way to get the other eleven prisoners out with her. Impossible.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Delia awoke with the hairs on the back of her neck on end and a prickling sense of being watched creeping up her spine. Of course you're being watched, idiot, figure out why it's freaking you so much today.
And in a blink she vacated her body again and entered the Dark Room, her least favorite place to visit by far.
"I see," I frigidly cold, high-pitched voice filled the entire room. "So they all just suddenly started fighting back, feeling happy again?"
A kneeling figure huddled on the floor, cowering and quivering pathetically. "We don't know how my lord," he pleaded. "First it was that Black boy," he gestured towards Sirius's window and Delia stifled a gasp, "and then slowly they all started having visions of some kind. There must be some magic here interfering, maybe Dumble—"
"Stop!" Voldemort commanded, throwing up a hand. The man, if possible, shrunk even closer to the floor. "What have you done to stop this, unpleasant altercation?" he asked, a dangerous warning note in his voice.
The man shuddered clearly hearing the note. "We've been using the fear, my lord, just like we did when they first arrived. Whenever they seem to be feeling better we send the fear spell towards them to try and fight it back."
"Ahhh," Voldemort sighed in understanding, pressing his fingertips together in a mockery of praying hands and nodded. "And if it hasn't worked thus far, what makes you think it will work now?" he asked. The man whimpered, then opened his mouth to answer.
"Don't!" Voldemort shook his head. "I don't want to hear your pathetic apologies anymore." He turned his back from the man and began to stroll through the room casually as though he were wandering in a park as opposed to the observation room in a prison made of fears. At each window he paused and glanced at the clipboard there and the notes on each occupant. Delia held her breath as he got closer and closer to her window.
"And what of this one?" he asked, pointing one ghostly pale finger towards her sleeping form. "You have remarkably little written here," displeasure tainted his tone.
"There's nothing to write, my lord," the taller of the two observing men responded, stepping from the shadows.
Voldemort's eyes narrowed. "Explain Rodolfus," he commanded.
"She doesn't do anything," he answered, shaking his head. "She never has. She just rolls over every now and then and keeps sleeping. It's as though she's in some kind of coma." He glanced down at Delia and shrugged with a grimace. "I have a theory if my lord would care to hear it."
Voldemort didn't answer, only nodded encouragement in silence. "I think she must be a naturally accomplish Occlumens. Our fear and numbing spells don't affect her because her mind is guarded. So she sleeps. Useless, at best, I say."
Rodolfus's eyes narrowed and a sickening grin spread across his face, filling Delia's gut with a chilling sense of dread. Whatever he was about to say, she knew didn't want to hear it. And she knew she really didn't want Voldemort to hear it. "Unless of course you broke her my lord," he suggested. "Few things are as inspiring as watching you work," he added with a maniacal glint in his eye.
His dark, empty eyes still focused intently on Delia, calculating, Voldemort did not answer at first. "Not yet," he answered, his voice oddly cool and unconcerned. He turned slowly back to face the men. Spotting the first man still shivering against the dark tiles he extracted his wand from the folds of his draping cloak. "Crucio!"
With a shock Delia was back in her own body, heaving for breaths and sweating heavily through freezing cold. Break me, she shuddered, I can't let them do that. But Voldemort doesn't seem to want to hurt me, she pondered, for some reason he wants to leave me alone, for now anyways. What's he waiting for?
And with all the grace of a blooming flower, a plan began to develop in Delia's brain. If they were right about her, if she truly were a natural Occlumens…it just might work.
A/N:
So this is a pathetically short chapter but I know the next one will be impossibly long so I thought I'd get this up and hopefully one or two people are still interested in this story. If so, reviews please. I need a lot of encouragement to get to writing the next bit because it's quite daunting.