Bellatrix

Bellatrix lays on her right side, so still that anyone who might enter the room could mistake her for dead, facing the semi-darkness that the setting sun does not light up.

"Up!" her tutor hisses, irritation evident in his usually calm, quiet voice.

When she does not even blink, he moves so he towers over her body.

"I did not take you on – and waste my time teaching you," at this, he kicks at her hip, " – for nothing," he hopes that this will get some sort of reaction out of her, but instead three single drops of wetness roll down her perfect, soft, pale cheeks, and she remains perfectly silent. "Perhaps my men were right. Perhaps you – a mere female – do not possess the power to learn the Dark Arts from me. Do I need to remind you that a war is on the horizon and this might change the world for good? That it may mean only Purebloods are in power permanently? I truly thought you wanted to be a part of it – yet you are only sixteen – was I wrong?"

This makes her let out a strangled sob, combined with a "No, my Lord!" and a leap to her feet. He sneers, mocking how she can become so irritated so easily.

"I truly hope not. Now, try again."

The Dark Lord corrects Bellatrix's posture; her wand raised more to the left; her head held higher; her back straighter; her knees bent. He does not hear how her breath hitches in her throat, see how her eyes flutter the slightest bit, and how she leans into his touch just a tad.

Instead, he places a kiss on the top of her mass of pure black corkscrew curls, whispering a gentle 'good girl'.

How he loves teasing her.