9 November 1981
Isle of Mull
"A… A Horcrux?" Bellatrix repeated, staring across the dining room table at Voldemort. They were both eating porridge and drinking tea, and he'd brought up the idea of her making a Horcrux. He'd only just begun explaining what one even was. "So it'll… split my soul?"
"Yes, but in doing so, it will preserve you from an ordinary death," Voldemort pronounced. He cleared his throat and took a bite of porridge, and then he said, "I… it has been many years that you've… admired me."
"I have been in love with you," Bellatrix said bluntly, "for many years, yes, Master."
"I know." He quirked up half his mouth and looked almost wistful. "I only found out recently that I actually cared about that, Bellatrix. And I do care about it, you see, rather thoroughly."
"Master." She lowered her eyes, staring into her porridge bowl. After a while, he said softly,
"And so I can not let you simply die in battle."
"How do they work?" Bellatrix asked. "You have one of them? The Horcruxes?"
"I have… several," Voldemort corrected. He folded his hands again and said carefully, "One must have murder fresh on the soul. It can only be split successfully if there is murder fresh upon it."
"How fresh?" Bellatrix asked. "I've just killed yesterday."
"Yes. Those deaths are fresh enough, if we make your Horcrux today," Voldemort said. "The deaths from the Tonkses and the Longbottoms. The difficult part comes when you cast the spells upon the object you choose to hold the split bit of your soul. You'll say the spell a total of one hundred times."
"One hundred?" Bellatrix asked in shock. "How will I keep count?"
"Oh, you'll know when you hit one hundred," said Voldemort. "You'll be socked with the most vicious, violent pain you can possibly imagine. And that pain will last for twenty-four hours. It will rip you to shreds inside. You'll think you're screaming the entire while. You'll think you're dying. But when you wake up, you'll feel more alive than ever. You'll look more tired, more worn, a little broken, even."
"I'll look broken?" Bellatrix asked worriedly, but Voldemort assured her,
"It's not bad at all the first time. You'll have a few grey hairs and bags beneath your eyes. It's worth it, Bellatrix. Worth it not to die. I have an object for you to use."
"You have?" Bellatrix asked, feeling breathless and overwhelmed. Voldemort slid a hairbrush toward her. Bellatrix wasn't even sure where it had come from, and then she realised he had Conjured it. She frowned, until he said,
"Keep it here. Keep it here in my house on the Isle of Mull."
Bellatrix studied the brass hairbrush, which was square and elegant, and she nodded.
"My soul will be inside this hairbrush."
"I will keep it safe for you," he told her, and Bellatrix's eyes watered at that. She felt profound love for him, all of a sudden, and she needed to tell him.
"I adore you, Master," she whispered. "I adore you more than you could ever possibly -"
"I do know. I do understand," he nodded crisply, and he informed her, "That's why I am protecting you, Bellatrix. Let's get to work. Finish your porridge."
Bellatrix found that she had very little appetite, but she ate when Voldemort insisted she would need her strength. Bellatrix went upstairs with Voldemort, and he told her,
"Before you do this, I want to take you flying."
"Flying?" Bellatrix asked. She looked outside. It was frigid and raining. It did not seem like good weather for flying. Voldemort opened a window in the master bedroom, though, and he grabbed Bellatrix before she could protest.
Suddenly they were whipping through the air, flying faster than Bellatrix could believe. Things were whizzing by her so quickly she couldn't make them out, and then, very abruptly, Voldemort came to a stop. Bellatrix only then realised she had been screaming. Voldemort was holding fast to her, clutching her close, and he was hovering high above the sea as though they were on a broomstick.
"Look down," he instructed her, and Bellatrix cautiously did as he commanded. She gasped when she saw the shadows of whales in the grey, churning sea beneath them. They came up to surface, leaving puffs of water vapour behind when they did, and Voldemort laughed with a shiver,
"I wanted you to see the whales before you felt the pain," Voldemort said. "They've always brought me comfort, strangely."
"I can see why, Master." Bellatrix clung to him, wrapping her arms and legs round him, and she let him fly them more slowly back toward the blue house. They seemed to shrink down to fit into the window, and then they were standing, soaked, in the master bedroom again.
"The incantation is Creatio Horcrux Meus." Voldemort tucked Bellatrix into the guest bedroom, the bed in the blue bedroom, and she shook with nerves as she gripped her wand in one hand and the hairbrush in the other.
"Goodbye, Master," she whispered, but he laughed at her and said,
"There is no goodbye, Bella. You'll still be you after this, and you'll be protected. We are doing this to protect you. You understand. I know you understand."
"I understand." Bellatrix heard the shake in her own voice. She spared one last glance toward her lord and master, toward his handsome grey-haired face with his black glasses. She stared at him for a long moment and then shut her eyes.
"Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus." She quickly lost count of how many times she had said the spell, but she dutifully kept incanting it. She felt a sudden crack, a sudden break inside of her, and she gasped.
"Keep going, Bellatrix," said a stern voice, her master's voice. Bellatrix kept on.
"Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus. Creatio Horcrux Meus."
With every passing incantation, her energy faded away until at last she felt everything go tight and snap. But unlike an orgasm, this snapping was like getting shot with a Muggle gun.
Bellatrix screamed.
She kept screaming. It hurt. It hurt so badly. It was like fifty thousand needles all stabbing her from the inside out. It was like knives slicing her muscles open all at once, saws cutting through her bones. It was like arrows shooting into her, Cruciatus Curses hitting her and being sustained. It was like her blood was being drained, like her fingernails were being pulled off, like her teeth were being pulled out. It was like her hair was being plucked out one strand at a time. It was like every pore of her flesh was being penetrated by a separating Stinging Hex. Everything hurt. Everything, everything, everywhere hurt.
And then, suddenly, she was awake.
She blinked a few times and caught her breath.
"Water."
She turned her face and saw Voldemort holding out a cup of water from where he'd pulled up a chair beside the bed. She drank deeply from the water and coughed and sputtered a little.
"How is it possible?" Voldemort murmured, and Bellatrix asked hoarsely,
"How is what possible, Master?"
"You look more beautiful than ever," he insisted, and he quickly Conjured a mirror. Bellatrix frowned as she looked at her reflection. She looked a few years younger, perhaps. More refreshed, like she'd spent a good solid few weeks at rest. She flicked her eyes up to Voldemort and asked,
"Is this not what happened for you?"
"It broke me a little, every time," he said. "I was a handsome young boy the first time; I got a few wrinkles that first go. You're lucky. You took to it differently. But you've always been different, Bella, haven't you?"
"Did it work?" Bellatrix asked, and Voldemort nodded firmly.
"I put it in a safe place in the writing desk downstairs. You'll be drawn to it if you ever need it," he said. "Now. Just rest. You've been through the wringer, haven't you?"
"It wasn't so bad," she mused softly. "It hurt like hell, but… to stay alive for you, My Lord, I'd endure that pain a thousand times over."
"Well." He smirked at her and said, "I won't ask that of you. I am proud. You make me proud."
Bellatrix felt tears come to her eyes, and she nodded. "I always want to make you proud."
"I realised something," he said carefully, pushing up his glasses, "whilst you were… sleeping."
"You did?" Bellatrix sat up a little, and Voldemort nodded.
"All these years you've been enamoured with me, I've ignored something very important," he said, "which is… how I really do feel about you. And that is to say… I feel extremely strongly about you, Bellatrix. And I would like you to stop living at Castle Lestrange when we go back. I would like for you to stay with me."
He wasn't barking orders. It was almost like he was asking. But Bellatrix knew better, so she whispered carefully,
"As you command, Master."
Author's Note: Whew! She's got her Horcrux! And he feels very strongly about her! And he wants her to live with him! And the Longbottoms are dead! Anyone feel Dumbledore coming on?