He was more furious than Bella had ever seen him, and he certainly punished them in his anger. He had told them only to summon him if they had Potter, but he had escaped. Bella could still hardly believe that he was gone. How had he managed it? Where had the elf come from? A thought suddenly dawned on Bella – what about the other prisoners? She certainly wasn't going to be the one to bring the subject up – she did not want to experience the Dark Lord's wrath any more than she had already that night. Everyone in the room seemed to have been struck with the same thought as she heard Lucius mumble "Wormtail" at the same time as the Dark Lord shouted for him. He did not appear, and Bella suddenly knew that the other prisoners had escaped too. Her fears were confirmed when the Dark Lord stormed off, and a couple of minutes later they all heard his scream of rage.
Bella did not remember much about that night, apart from the rage, the hurt, and the despair that she felt. The Dark Lord's anger had been frightening to behold, and the entire house had been forbidden from leaving. That was part of their punishment. Wormtail was dead, killed by his own hand, and the other prisoners had escaped! The wandmaker was gone. Bella hadn't known why exactly the Dark Lord had needed him, but she also knew that it was important to his plan.
The next blow happened about a month after the fiasco at Malfoy Manor, when they had learned that Potter, the Mudblood and the Blood traitor had broken into her vault at Gringotts. When the Dark Lord learnt that they had stolen the cup that he had given to her to keep safe, he was furious. Bella had never seen him as angry as he was that day in the bank. Even the night at Malfoy Manor did not compare. She didn't know what was so special about the cup, but she knew that the trio had stolen it, and it had sent the Dark Lord into such a rage, that he seemed to lose himself for a moment. He lost all of the composure that he had ever had, and killed everyone in sight, apart from her, although she wasn't sure whether this was intentional or not. He didn't seem to have known what he was doing. The Dark Lord had gone immediately from Gringotts, without telling her where he was going, so she went back to Malfoy Manor to await his instructions – that was where he would expect her to be, and she did not want to give him another reason to be angry with her.
As she was sat waiting in the chair by the fire, she suddenly began to remember an evening from almost a year ago. The evening that she and Narcissa had gone to visit Snape, to ask for his help to protect Draco. Bella sat up in the chair. She rapidly began to remember everything she had thought and felt that night, and began to tear up. She quickly went up to her room so that nobody would see her crying, performed the same silencing charm on the door and began to sob, slumped on the floor. She did not know how long she had been crying for, only that she had now stopped and was sat on the floor. She came to the same realisation that she had had that night – the Dark Lord must never find out, especially now that he was so angry with her. She would not allow any more of her family to die because of her. It was late, so Bella knew that nobody would say anything if she slept all night, so she performed another memory modification on herself, and when she awoke the next morning she remembered nothing of her recollection. She did however remember how angry the Dark Lord was with her, so she went back to the chair by the fire in the drawing room, to await his return.
Narcissa was sat in the drawing room, as if she was waiting for Bella to appear. "I have something that I need to ask you," she said, a seriousness in her voice that Bella did not recognise. She sat down in the chair opposite her sister by the fire.
"What is it, Cissy?" All Bella could think about was the Dark Lord's anger.
"There is something happening with you, Bella. On occasional evenings, you get extremely upset, no matter how well you try to hide it, I am your sister and I can see it. You stay in your room all night, and then when you come downstairs in the morning, you seem perfectly happy again. What is happening with you, Bella? I am worried about you!"
Bella was taken aback. She had no idea what her sister was talking about. She could not remember being upset and withdrawing to her room. She remembered the Dark Lord's anger over the previous couple of years, but she did not remember this causing her such distress that she went to her bedroom all evening and night. "I have no idea what you are talking about, Cissy!"
"It happened again last night, Bella. I was about to come into the drawing room to join you, when you rushed out and upstairs. You were crying, Bella." Bella went to say something, but Narcissa stopped her and continued to speak. "You were crying, so I followed you upstairs. I had hoped to comfort you, but when I got to the landing, I saw you quickly close the door. I went to your room, Bella, but I heard you cast a silencing spell on the door so that nobody would be able to hear you. I was so worried about you – I knocked on your door, but you didn't answer. I don't know if you cast a double-sided charm so that you couldn't hear anything either but you didn't answer me, even when I shouted your name through the door. I couldn't bare it knowing you were crying alone and I could do nothing to help you, so I got my broom, and flew up to your window. You had pulled the curtains, but hadn't locked them. So I unlocked the window, and was about to come in when I heard what you were crying about. It was Sirius, Bella. You were sobbing his name. I really wanted to comfort you, Bella, but I knew that I couldn't intrude on this, so I stayed sat on the windowsill, listening." Bella was furious.
"I have no idea what you are on about, Cissy, and even if I did, how dare you? How dare you come into my room like that? According to you, it was clear that I wanted to be left alone, but you didn't! You spied on me doing something that I don't even remember!" Bella was slightly scared now. If Narcissa was telling the truth, then she had spent all evening crying about the death of her cousin, but she could remember none of it. Why?
"I know why you don't remember last night, Bella," Narcissa said softly. She had leant forward and was holding Bella's hand. "You cast a Memory Charm on yourself. You didn't want to remember, but I don't know why. You currently don't know why either. There is a way that we can both find out. Let me reverse it for you, Bella. Let's work out why you want to forget Sirius' death and what we can do about it. Let me help you, Bella. I know you haven't truly let anyone in in a very long time, but please, I'm your sister, so let me help you."
Bella didn't know what to say. She broke down into tears, but she had no idea why. Her eyes were aching as if she really had cried all night, but she couldn't remember. She looked at her sister, who was looking at her, not with anger or fear or resentment, but with love and care. "I don't know what it is, Cissy, but surely if I want to forget there's a reason for that," she sobbed. Narcissa knelt down in front of her and hugged Bella tight.
"We can find out together. And then we can work it out together. What do you say, Bella?"
Bella knew that she had a serious decision to make. If she let Narcissa in, she might be putting her sister in danger, after all she had no idea what she would want to hide from herself. "Okay, Cissy, but we have to make some arrangements. Whatever it is that I have forgotten, there must be a reason for it. It might put you in danger if you know."
"Yes I understand that, Bella. And I'm willing to take that risk to help you."
"Thank you, Cissy, but we need to put some precautions in place. We need to make sure that we will not be discovered at any time while we do this. We need to protect ourselves, because if there is something that will put you in danger, nobody but the two of us can know about it."
"Okay Bella, let's go up to the attic. We can put silencing charms on the room, like you did last night, and I have a sneaky spell which will stop anyone being able to find us using magic. Using one of our rooms will be too dangerous, as if the doors are locked, someone will expect us to be in there. The attic is always locked anyway, so if anyone does look for us, they will not guess that we are up there. How does that sound?"
Bella was surprised at her sister's readiness with this plan. It was almost as if she had been planning to ask Bella about this for a while and had prepared for her to say yes. She also wondered what spell would stop them being discovered by magic. There was no spell that she knew of that could do this. After all these years, her sister still managed to surprise her. "That sounds good," she managed to sob out. Narcissa nodded, and went to the drawing room door.