"Honestly Andromeda, I can't keep up with you and your mood swings." Bellatrix rolled her eyes as she reclined against the green leather in the common room.
Andi rolled her eyes before sitting at her sister's feet and smiling slightly back at her.
"I don't know what you mean."
"Come off it, you have been acting so down and suspicious this last week, then you're the happiest person alive yesterday, and today you're back to keeping yourself to yourself."
Bellatrix was right, she had felt a huge pit in the bottom of her stomach as she had awoken from a dream which she didn't wish to remember. It had completely dampened the mood and her whole dorm had sensed it as she sullenly sat at her mirror, painting her nails red and applying the invisible façade of pride and pomp that her family wore so well. "And you've been thinking far too much darling, your nose is wrinkling like an old lady's, do you ever expect to find a good husband?"
"Do you?"
"Well yes, I trust Mother and Father's opinion." She looked dead pan at her sister momentarily before throwing her head back with a cackle. After they both laughed momentarily, Bellatrix took Andi's hand, stroking her sister's fingers with her own. "Oh I'm awfully dreading it, if it ends up being one of father's bachelor friends I may just die!"
"I don't think it will be that bad..."
"At least I know Rodolphus is interested, I think I could live with him."
"What and not the Dark Lord?" Andi winked and giggled but Bella pouted and looked down at her lap.
"Don't be so naïve, as if that would ever happen."
Andi's eyes softened as she saw the one slither of weakness her older sister had. She had adored the Dark Lord since she was a little girl, for (not that the Dark Lord would ever call him so) her father Cygnus and Tom Riddle (as he was apparently formerly known) had even been friends during their Hogwarts days. He would come over and hold meetings in "The Lord's Room" as her Nanny called it. A young Bellatrix would dress in her Sunday best as she greeted him with a curtsy at the front door, her Lord and Master towering over her, twisting a curl of her hair around his unnaturally long fingers as she told him of the new curse she had learnt. She hated to admit she understood the attraction, he was angel like when Andi crossed him in the hall for the first time, and even now he didn't look a day over 25 (despite the fact that in the new year of '73 he would have been celebrating his 45th birthday according to Andi's calculations) his pale almost waxy, skin stretched tight across his cheek bones. He had become less handsome over the years; she had noticed the change in his eyes as the white became bloodshot and as his irises became the same red as her nails, his skin becoming even paler than death and, whether it was just her nightmares corrupting her vision, his general appearance becoming more and more snake like.
She watched Bellatrix as she stared into blank space, her eyes misty as she ran her fingertips over the fabric on her left forearm. She had been branded with his mark upon her sixteenth birthday- she had demanded it to be so. She was so brave that night, initiations were oft held in her house, and the screams that emitted from the room echoes throughout the house, but her sister wouldn't let a cry from her lips or a tear from her eye and she stood proudly afterwards, thanking her master for the honour. She was the first and remained to this day the only female to join the Death Eaters; she was the Dark Lord's little princess.
"Bella…"
She snapped out of her daze and pouted, shaking her head slightly.
"Affection is vastly overrated." She lay back against the cushions, her face framed by her raven hair, her eyes dark and her lips as red as her bra, her shirt seductively undone just far enough that it was visible.
"I don't think so."
Bellatrix scoffed and closed her eyes as she shook her head again. "Ickle Dromeda, still with her head in the clouds."
"Don't call me Dromeda." She noticed how she had immediately corrected Bella, and yet when Ted called her it, nothing seemed more natural. She shook her head as Bella chuckled. "You shouldn't lose hope in lov-" Bella's eyes widened maliciously and Andi caught herself, "I mean don't lose hope in affection, I believe Cissa and Malfoy would have an affectionate marriage."
"What?!" She snapped. "What are you talking about marriage?"
"I'm just saying—Okay, I have to ask, why do you have such a thing against Lucius all of a sudden? You've been friends with him as long as I can remember; he spends half of his summer in our pool, when we're not in his I mean. I thought you'd be happy for them both."
"I just don't like the idea of him defiling our little sister. He does that kind of thing for sport you know."
"Have you seen the way he looks at her?"
"No, I have to look away even when I see them talking, I could cruciatus him in a heartbeat. She's just a little girl overwhelmed by a crush. Could you ever imagine either of us doing such a stupid thing? Following your heart, pah! Father would have a fit."
Andi frowned and slouched back into the sofa as Bella moved her legs to lie across her sister's lap.
"Andi!" She looked up to see a very cheeky looking Madeleine sauntering over to them.
"Yeah?"
"I've got something that's going to cheer you up! Look what I found in the post!" She waved a letter as she continued to move over to them.
Andi's heartbeat quickened as her eyes widened. "Give me that!" She jumped up and turned to lean over the back of the sofa reaching for the parchment envelope but Maddy held it just out of reach.
"It's very clean, not been to the owlery, must have been put in the box by hand." She smiled and rocked back and forth on the balls of her feet.
"I feel like I am missing something intriguing, please, do share." Bellatrix half sat up, a cocked eyebrow at her sister.
"It's nothing, from no-one I guess."Andi finally managed to snatch the letter off Maddy and held it out of her friends reach as she tried to retrieve it.
"Well, Mr No-one is certainly into you if he's sending you letters and delivering them himself."
"Mr No-one huh?" Bellatrix was back to her usual self as she grinned her dark smile, the one that always gave her eye a twinkle. A twinkle that always made Andi go cold inside, for it was the twinkle that Andi had first witnessed when Bellatrix, as a child, was levitating a squealing half-mauled mouse above their cat's open mouth. (It was moments like this when she thought of how good Bella and the Dark Lord would be together. Well, not good, because they were both cruel, but the principle was there.)
As Andi's stare returned to and became preoccupied with Maddy, Bellatrix suddenly snatched the letter from her sister's hand and stood, ripping open the envelope and her black eyes, still sparkling, pouring over the words that were written there.
The panic surging through Andi's entire being was excruciating, rooting her to the spot with pure fear.
Bellatrix read aloud, her tone harsh and sarcastic as she did so.
"Hey beautiful, thought we'd make the second date official."
Andi dived for her sister, her eyes wide and scared. She could give all the contextual stories about her sisters, her family, the Dark Lord, but no amount of storytelling would soften the blow that when told Ted's background, underneath all the layers, he was a simple muggle-born. She lunged again demanding it back, but Bellatrix whipped out her wand and held it in Andi's face as she continued to read sauntering around infront of the fire as if she owned the place. Andi felt like the mouse, her body in pieces, her head screaming as she was dangled in front of the jaws of death, as her sister laughed and played her favourite game.
"Sorry I haven't been able to catch up with you today and I know I'll see you in class tomorrow, but in case we can't chat, fancy another match tomorrow night? Same place as last time, but same time as dinner? Yours, T xx"
A wave of relief hit her causing her knees to buckle and she flopped down onto the sofa. He had just signed it T and not been specific about anything. She smiled slightly, she ought to give him credit for he was smarter than she thought. And a second date? Despite the rut that she had been all day, she couldn't help but grin and blush at the concept and she felt butterflies fill her stomach at the thought of them spending more time together, alone.
It was odd when she thought of the time they spent alone together, it was like he existed out of space and time, as she thought before sleep last night, he couldn't be part of her world, so it was like he was in his own, his own world where they could just be themselves and play muggle games in the snow and get away from... well, everything. It was only when Bellatrix clicked her fingers in-front of her face she realized that her sister had been talking the whole time whilst Maddy was biting her lip hard to stop herself from laughing.
"Andi, are you going to completely ignore me? Who is this T?"
"Huh?"
"Oh for crying out loud, who is he?"
"That's… none of your business, Bellatrix." With a smile she took the letter from her and after quickly folding it up, stuffed it into her bra before grabbing her bag and heading towards the dorms.
"Andi!"
"If you're that interested, make a guess Bella. Have fun with it, the girls spent all day yesterday trying to riddle it out. Maybe just accept that he's no-one."
"Okay, so he said match, that's obvious."
"Quidditch."
"Yep, so I'm guessing they'll be going to the Quidditch pitch…"
"Maybe, but then, why say "same place" and not "the pitch". Maybe… the training ground?"
"True… very true…"
Bellatrix and Narcissa lounged on the sofa late that evening, Bella with a large glass of red wine in her hand as she frowned, trying to work out who Andi's beau was.
"Perhaps we should just giver her space, Bella. If it's only their second date…"
"Space? Space?!"
"Yes, space. I know I'd appreciate it a little."
Bellatrix scowled and downed the rest of her wine. "She's keeping something from us. I know it. And I will find it out, I won't have anything disgrace the family name."
"Who said she would be disgracing it?"
"Evening ladies…"
"Piss off, Malfoy."
Lucius smirked at Bellatrix as she looked away from him. He leant on the back of the sofa, running a hand down to settle on Narcissa's shoulder, before he grazed her neck with the back of his fingers. Bellatrix's eyes darkened as she scowled at Cissa's blush.
"Get your perverted hands off of my little sister."
Lucius stood up cocking his head back, crossing his arms across his chest, his smirk still present. He had obviously just come back from Quidditch practice as the ends of his shoulder length hair still looked damp and he was that squeaky clean that you only are straight after a shower.
"How was practice?"
"Your sister seems distracted." He answered Narcissa, his smirk softening slightly.
"What?"
With that air of frustration that Narcissa thought became him so well, he turned back to Bellatrix.
"Distracted, yes. She nearly got hit by bludgers, twice. And anyway my dear Bella, is there a chance I could have some private time with Narcissa here, you know, without Rodolphus interrupting…?"
Bellatrix stood as she snarled at him. "What are you insinuating?"
"Don't pretend Bellatrix, he follows you around like a bloody puppy. You would have only had to say one word and, either way, he's been stalking me whenever I'm near Cissa-"
"I don't know what you are talking about, come on Cissy."
"But I-"
And with that Bellatrix dragged her sister across the common room and down the stairs to the dormitories, Narcissa giving a fleeting glance at Lucius as he winked and laughed at her poor fortune. For the moment, Andi's deviations and secrets had been completely forgotten.